Number two, they were having sexual relations with the women who worked at the temple.  And our boy Eli had no idea about it.  Eli was asleep at the wheel.  His two kids; wheels off.  He could not hear the voice of God.  Why?  Because he was asleep.  He was asleep parentally and he was asleep emotionally and he was asleep as a leader.  He was totally asleep.

And talk about poor discernment, he thought that Hannah was drunk.  Then Hannah says, “I’m praying.  I’m talking to God.”  She asked God for a son.  She said “O Lord Almighty, if you will only look upon your servant’s misery and remember me, and not forget your servant but give her a son, then,” check this out, check this vow out, “I will give him to the Lord for all the days of his life.”  Now that is a powerful, powerful voice.

“Lord, if it’s your will give me a son and if God you give me a son I will give him to you.  I will just dedicate him to you.”

Be very, very careful what you promise God in prayer.  Be very careful.

Now, let me ask you a question.  I want to ask the moms this question.  Moms, why do you have children?  Don’t answer it out loud. Just marinate on that for a second.  Why do you have children?

Okay now let me ask the guys something, guys, guys, husbands, husbands.  This will take longer.  Why do you have children?  No, guys, you have to look past making love.  I’m talking about why do you have children?  Why are you a father?  Why do you have this desire?  Why?

It might take the guys hours.  Ladies, I know you’re tracking.  Let me tell you why we don’t have kids.  We don’t have kids to fulfill our unfulfilled dreams or fantasies.  That’s not why we have babies.

For God did not call us to be impure, but to live a holy life. Therefore, he who rejects this instruction does not reject man but God, who gives you His Holy Spirit.

Then Jesus said this in Matthew 5:8: “Blessed are the pure in heart for they will see God.”

I can have intimacy with the God of the universe because of my sanctification, my holiness.  There’s a direct correlation between that and seeing God. It’s about making right choices.  So, I’m setting the course for, ultimately, intercourse in marriage.

Sexual immorality. Let me talk to the students and singles for a second about premarital sex.  That’s a popular subject, because a lot of us are doing it around here.  Premarital sex.

I talked to a guy the other day who was looking, man.  He was looking for a woman to get married to.  Here’s what he told me.  :Ed, I’m looking for a woman who knows her way around the bedroom.  I want a woman,” he said, “who is sexually experienced.”

Now, how many of you believe that?  No! I just told you a lie.  No one would say that!  Nobody would say that.  You think a woman would say that?  “Yeah, I want a man who’s been with a lot of women.”

Yet, we have all these guys running around thinking they’re more of a man because they’ve had more women.  What a joke!  What a joke.  Premarital sex—you know what it does, students and singles?  These things even rhyme.  It abuses and it confuses.  Say it with me. It abuses and confuses.

That’s what it does every single time.  Some of the time?  No. Every single time.  It abuses.  I’ve already said this.  It abuses the Trinity.  You abuse your mind.  You abuse your body.  You abuse your soul.  You abuse the other person.

You walk up to the group and they ask you your opinion of the political situation and you kinda give your opinion and you see another guy in the group turn red in the face and suddenly he BOOM he backhands you.

This guy’s a punk you can punch his lights out.  What do you do in that situation?  You’re served up the tortilla of death, what do you do?  You know what Jesus said to do?  Turn the other cheek.  Absorb the insult.  Absorb the slap.  Get in touch with your anger and channel your anger and say to yourself, you know I can mark this person with the gospel by my response.  God give me the ability to do what you would do in this situation.  Help me to see the depth and the richness of this situation.  Help me to take advantage of this.  Now Jesus was not saying for us to become passivist or for us to go soft or get weak, but he was saying, and he is saying, don’t take the tortilla of death.

Back in Christ’s time there was something called the Law of Impressment.  Remember the Jews were under Roman rule and, and these Jews hated this Law of Impressment which meant, let me give you the cliff notes, 24/7 a Roman soldier could come up to a Jewish man and say, hey, boy, carry my bags.  You’d be out in the field working, you’d feel the flat of the spear against the small of your back, you look up, you see a big, bad Roman soldier and he would say, carry my bag.  And the Law of Impressment said you had to at least carry it at least a mile.  Historians tell us that most Jewish men had a mile marker in front of their property.

Every week when I’m walking around the community—I’m maybe in a coffee shop or a restaurant or working out—someone will run up to me and go, “Man, Ed, I can’t believe what you said!  I mean, have you been following me around?  Have you been reading my emails? I mean, I needed that message and that was, like, right to me!”

It’s not me. It’s the word of God. I have the opportunity to preach with the authority of a prophet or an apostle. Why? Well, I’m not an apostle or a prophet, but why can I preach with that authority? Because I’m preaching their words. I’m the man of God preaching the word of God.

And the Bible says throughout the pages of Scripture that through the foolishness of preaching God’s word will be revealed. It doesn’t say that preachers are fools, although some might be. But it says through the foolishness of preaching. I’m a fallen and fallible guy. I don’t have it together. I’m a sinner. Yes, I’m elevated on a platform so you can see me better, but at the foot of the cross we’re all equal, man.

But something supernatural takes place when men and women who are called by God open up His Word corporately and share it. That’s the Holy Spirit of God. It’s not me. It’s not some other teacher. That’s the Holy Spirit of God. What is the church’s role? We’re to preach life.  What is life? The Gospel.  What’s the role of the church? To preach the Gospel. That’s the most important thing. What’s the Gospel? It’s the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Instead, I am talking about that selfishness, that one-upmanship, that revenge factor that infiltrates all of our lives.  Are you teaching your kids how to deal with it?

As I read this verse this past week in studying for this message, I thought about how many, many times I have blown it as a Christian in my life.  I have been around a lot of people who don’t know Christ, someone has hurt me and they have seen that I have been hurt and most of the time I have fallen into the temptation of slandering them, agreeing with them, laughing with them about this person instead of saying, not in some pietistic, super-spiritual tone, but in saying that we should love this guy or this girl.  They matter to God too.  I want to help them and I want to encourage them.  How are you doing with that?

Romans 12:20.  I want to prepare you for something here.  Romans 12:20 freaked me out this week, because I had totally misinterpreted this verse.  Let me read it.  “If your enemy is hungry, feed him, if he is thirsty, give him something to drink.  In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.”  Throughout my Christian life, and I have gone to seminary, have my master’s degree, studied Hebrew and Greek, I though that this verse meant that if someone has been mean to you, you are nice to them back, you feed them and give them something to drink and when you do that you are burning them up.  You are taking hot coals and putting them on their head and you are just burning them up.  And it is eating their lunch that you are being so nice to them.

He models to his men how to handle the urge to seek revenge.  He models to his men how to pull back instead of pay back.

The Apostle Paul puts it this way in Romans 12:17, “Do not repay anyone evil for evil.”  Have you ever thought about this?  What if God said this?  What if God said, “You know what, I’m going to start repaying evil for evil.  None of us would be here, not one because any sin, any little white lie, any little off day is abhorrent in the eyes of God and sin demands a punishment and if God had not sent Jesus Christ, He would have had to punish us for it and we wouldn’t be here.

God did not repay evil for evil, he repaid evil with good by sending Jesus Christ to take the punishment on the cross for all of our sins.  “Do not repay anyone evil for evil.  Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everybody.”  We have many, many people who are believers here, and some who are not, and if you are a believer this is the place for you and if you are a seeker, this is the place for you, but we pray that you will come into a personal relationship with Jesus.  But let me talk to Christians for a second.

If you are a Christian, you have people who are watching you.  You have scores and scores of people who are watching your every more, your every word, where you go, what you say, what you do, what you don’t do, if you pay back or if you pull back.  Parents are you teaching your children how to handle revenge properly?  Are you modeling to them pulling back instead of paying back?  I do not mean we are not to stand up for what we believe in.  I do not mean that we should cower or back into the shadows and never confront anybody.

Well, how in the world is God going to bless your family when you’re not under His authority? How in the world is God going to bless your family when you’re not involved in a local church? When you’re not serving in the context of the biblically functioning community? When you’re not bringing the whole tithe into the storehouse? When you’re not loving your wife like Christ loved the church? When you’re not submitting to your husband as you would the Lord? When your kids are not obeying the parents? When you’re not forgiving one another even as God for Christ’s sake has forgiven you?

How in the world is God going to bless you? Positionally you’re in the rain. You’re drenched in dysfunction. You’re being pelted by problems. You’re being hammered by hell.

We’ve got to get under what God is over and then he’ll put us over the stuff that needs to be under us.

That’s a stupid prayer. A stupid prayer is like, “God, bless me in my relationships.” And maybe you’re a single adult or a student and you’re hooked up with someone who’s not a believer. You’re having sex outside marriage. You’re taking God’s name in vain 24/7.

God’s not going to bless your life. Don’t give that weak stuff to God. Don’t waste His time or your time. Prayer? No, no, no. Obey and then pray. You don’t pray then obey. We disregard Scripture. We edit the Bible. But the Bible is what it is. You can say what you want to say about it, but it is what it is. And we have a problem in this whole area when we disregard Scripture.

WHAT IS THE BIBLE?

A LOVE LETTER

The Bible is what it is. What is it? It’s a letter. Let me let Jeremiah 31:3 unpack that thought. God is speaking here in Jeremiah. He says, “I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with loving kindness.”