Haughtiness and Oppression

The beginning of chastening from God

Fred R. Coulter—January 23, 2021

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Greetings, everyone! Welcome to Sabbath services!

After three days of Biden, everyone is wanting Trump back! Biden is putting a lot of people in distress! Everything that he is doing is going to be oppressive! Let's see how that's going to work.

The book of Proverbs is great for reading and studying:

• right from wrong
• good from evil
• righteousness

It's put in such a way that it is directed toward teenagers and young adults. It's so that they're minds can be properly programmed to know the difference between right/wrong and good/evil.

We see what happen when in schools they don't teach anything about God, nothing about right and wrong or truth. All they do is preach socialism, and they're brainwashing the kids! We'll have to see how long the situation goes with Biden.

Remember, the Word of God is Truth; everything about it is true. There may be some things you don't understand, but that does not mean it's not true. Some things you have to work on a long time to understand, because there are some difficult things that are in the Bible! There are a lot of easy things like here:

Proverbs 18:12: "Before destruction, the heart of man is haughty…" That's what we are seeing!

Deut. 8 explains that in great detail, and we will see that this is exactly what is happening today. Exactly! We're going to be in for some tough times. We've already had it with the Chinese virus.

Isn't it interesting that those who use truth and common sense in the medical field, such as in Florida, Texas and South Dakota, their states are wide open and they're doing fine. But the ones who want to rule and oppress—you know which party that is, the Democrats—it would be a true statement to say: anyone who supports the platform of the Democrats is not a Christian! You may think you are, you may pretend you are, but you're not, because they're the party of death and destruction! And you're seeing it in action in the first three days of Biden's administration.

All the rest of the people, the 75-million, that voted for Trump, you need to listen up! IF you're wanting to have the 'good times' back, you're not going to get them. IF through these experiences you want to find God, THEN there may be a little reprieve.

Even though there are a lot of people out there praying and wondering what's going on… Even one commentator on Fox News says that we better read our Bibles. Okay, what good is going to read the Bible unless you know what to read.

You pick the Bible up and start reading from the first, Gen. 1-9 and then chapter 10 you reach all the genealogies: so and so begat so and so, and then you turn the page and there's another one. Going a little further in Gen. and then there's all the genealogies of Esau. All of that is hard to read, so people get discouraged.

The place to start, as I have said, is Proverbs. This answers the question as to why we have trials, because we've got a lot of trials going on right now. What good are trials? We're going to see that trials work for the good if you turn to God! If you don't turn to God they won't work for good.

Deut. 8—This is Moses in his long, long farewell teachings to all the children of Israel before he went up on the mountain to die and God buried him.

Deuteronomy 8:1: "All the commandments which I command you this day shall you be diligent…" As we're going through here, I want you to ask:

• Are you diligent?
• How do you approach God/
• What do you think of God?

If you think you're perfect, fine, well and good—even in a Church of God—remember that Peter said: the righteous shall be saved with difficulty!

"…diligent to observe and to do that you may live and multiply…" (v 1). Everyone wants to live, but it's how you live!

"…and go in and possess the land, which the LORD swore to your fathers" (v 1). That's how we got America!

Verse 2: "And you shall remember all the way, which the LORD your God led you these forty years in the wilderness in order to humble you… [get rid of the haughtiness] …to prove you…"

Why does God have to prove us? Because they're free moral agency! Whenever there is free moral agency, you have to have choices and you have to be proved! That will prove whether you're:

• diligent
• faithful
• love God

All of those things are included!

Verse 3: "…He fed you with manna, which you did not know, neither did your fathers know it, so that He might make you know…"

Here's the whole lesson, and this is quoted twice in the New Testament by Jesus. For all of you evangelicals out there—if any of you are listening—the Law has not been abolished! Jesus said:

Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God shall man live!

• Do you live that way?
• Do you live by every word of God?

OR

• Just the ones you like?

Try opening a safe with half the numbers! Never happen! You can't understand God if you're partial in your obedience, because it says:

"…that man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of the LORD does man live" (vs 3).

God knows that there are going to a lot of people, and not everyone is going to hear the voice of God. How are you going to hear it? He has it written down and preserved. What I'm reading to you is well over 3500-years-old, but you will see that it applies today exactly as it applied back then.

Now something that God took care of, since there are no shopping malls in the desert, no stores, no delivery trucks, planes, or drones, nothing! Here'  what God did:

Verse 4: "Your clothing did not wear out on you, nor did your foot swell these forty years. And you shall consider in your heart… [Have you ever had a talk with yourself?] …that as a man chastens his son, so the LORD your God chastens you" (vs 4-5).

We are in the middle of the beginning of some chastening from God by the oppressors! Not only in Washington, D.C., and whatever state you may live in, but also from those around the world. Stop and think on this:

• Why is it that the whole world turned against Trump? They don't do it without reason or cause!
• What is it that he knows that they don't want anyone else to know?
• Could that be the reason?

The man (Trump) has been cutoff from all digital communication, banks turned him down, but He'll get some other banks. His own party that he led for four years, half the Senators turned him down, and the whole Democrat Party despised him with a despicable hatred!

• Why?
• What are they hiding?
• Why did they have to spy on him?
• Why did all of the CIA—and the different countries in their spy networks—work against him?
• Why is that?

Yet, he's still alive! We'll have to see what happens. But nevertheless, we're in for some difficult times!

Listen to this, and ask yourself: Do I do this?

Verse 6: "And you shall keep the commandments of the LORD your God to walk in His ways and to fear Him."

• Can you recite the Ten Commandments by heart, long version?

if you are a Sunday-keeper

• Why are you a Sunday-keeper?

Here's a good in-depth study: Refuting Sunday Keeping. You can't say, 'Lord, I keep nine of them!' The brother of the Lord wrote, 'if you break one, you break all!' You figure that out!

Verse 7: "For the LORD your God brings you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and depths that spring out of valleys and hills, a land of wheat and barley and vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive oil and honey, a land in which you shall eat bread without scarceness…." (vs 7-9).

• Anybody starving?
• Will we shortly?

"…You shall not lack any thing in it…." (v 9). You may desire a lot of different things, but what do you really lack?

When my wife passed, we had to go through a lot of things. There were a lot of things just accumulated over the years. We couldn't contain them all, so we had to give them away. Then our neighbor across the street, his mother died and they had three truckloads of stuff they had to take out. Then compare everything that you have and then go down and drive pass all the homeless.

"…It is a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills you may dig copper" (v 9)—oil, coal and everything else that God created!

Here is where we are, v 10. In other prophecies it talks about when Israel waxes or grows fat! What is the biggest problem in America today? Obesity!

Yes, it is, everywhere all the time, in every circumstance!

Verse 10: "When you have eaten and are full, then you shall bless the LORD your God for the good land, which He has given you."

• Have you blessed God?
• Have you thanked God really?

Think about that! Here's why it's all coming, v 11.

How many people are really returning to God? He doesn't want you come part of the way, or half way, or three-quarters of the way! He wants you to be wholehearted and come to Him His way with repentance!

Verse 11: "Beware that you do not forget the LORD your God by not keeping His commandments…"

• How many are out there who say that they're 'good Christians' are
• shopping
• mowing lawns
• trimming hedges
• painting houses
• building houses?
  • Is that keeping the Sabbath?

'Oh, I'm good Sunday-keeper.' But you're not with God! You may think so. The Sabbath is the day that connects you with God, and if you don't keep the Sabbath Holy—from Friday night sundown to Saturday night sundown—you're not connected to God! You may feel that you're near, but you're not connected!

One other good thing about the Sabbath is that this is the day that God puts His presence in. This is the day that all of His true ministers and elders are to teach the Word of God in:

• love
• truth
• humility

but also to

• cry aloud and spare not!

That's what the Sabbath Day is for. It's not for our sports, not for our pleasure, not for what we want to do! Consider that we keep the Sabbath because God said that in six days the Lord God made the earth and everything in it!

God created you and every other human being! Are you willing to honor God on His day the way He said? That's the root of the problem today!

That's why 75-million people voted for Trump, but he didn't get elected, because their hearts weren't right with God!

Verse 11: "Beware that you do not forget the LORD your God by not keeping His commandments and His judgments, and His statutes, which I command you today, lest when you have eaten and are full and have built goodly houses and lived in them" (vs 11-12).

Fly over any city in America, Australia or Europe and look at the mile after mile, spread across the land, of houses, buildings, roads, all of it, and everybody busy. But no one turning to God! So, if there isn't a turning to God, how bad will the trial get? We'll have to see!

Verse 13: "And when your herds and your flocks multiply, and your silver and your gold is multiplied, and all that you have is multiplied."

Notice what happens because people don't turn to God; something happens thought-wise in the mind, and in varying degrees of hatred, animosity, stubbornness or disobedience.

Verse 14: "Then you become haughty of heart… [that what we are] …and you forget the LORD your God Who brought you forth out of the land of Egypt from the house of bondage, Who led you through the great and terrible wilderness…" (vs 14-15).

Verse 16: "Who fed you in the wilderness with manna, which your fathers did not know, so that He might humble you and that He might prove you to do you good in your latter end."

With the correction that is coming—and it is going to come—there are already seventeen Executive Orders to kick them all off. They're going to come. If you think we had an immigration problem before, you haven't seen anything, yet! It's coming!

• Will you yield to the correction of God?
• Will you get out the Word of God and study it?
• Will you go to a quiet, private place and get on your knees and repent to God?
• What are you going to do?
• What is your life going to be?

Everyone talks about what they do, their plans, and their way! God says:

You didn't get any of it without Me, because I God created you in the first place! I made everything that you have used to gain all the wealth, and whatever you have came from Me.

That's what God says! He gave the land that we're in. When you forget God, what happens?

Verse 17: "Beware lest you say in your heart, 'My power and the might of my hand has gotten me this wealth.' But you shall remember the LORD your God, for it is He Who gives you power to get wealth, so that He may confirm His covenant, which He has sworn to your fathers as it is this very day…. [warning]: …And it shall be if you do at all forget the LORD your God and walk after other gods serving them and worshiping them…" (vs 17-19).

You might say, 'I don't have any other gods.'

• Do you wash and polish your car on the Sabbath Day? That's your god!
• Do you clean your house? That's your god!
• Do you work? That's your god!

God says that you shall not do any labor on His Sabbath Day!He wants do good things for you, but you want the good things without reciprocal response to God! It isn't going to happen!

Notice what God says here, and this is true. I want you to think about this very deeply:

"…I testify against you this day that you shall surely perish—yes, perish" (v 19).

Since we are the descendants of the ten tribes of Israel, you need to have a little lesson in history:

• Did God send the ten tribes of Israel off into captivity by Assyrians in the 700s B.C.? Yes!

Think about what this is like; an army comes in and orders you out of your house and tells you to pack up whatever you want to take and you're 'leaving for our slave camp.' Don't think it won't happen here! It could be so easy! You just don't understand! It happened, didn't it?

What did God do to Jerusalem a little over 100 years later? He destroyed it; burned it, after 40 years of Jeremiah's warning that it was going to come! Nothing left! They built another temple after 70 years.

• What happened in 70A.D. because the Jews rejected Jesus? Rejected God? And most of the Jews today still reject Jesus!
• What did God do to Jerusalem?
• To His Temple, to the Temple of God? It was taken down stone by stone!

All the gold and wealth was melted and went down into the cracks of the rocks. Every rock was torn apart going after that gold and treasure, to fulfill the prophecy that Jesus said. So, if you believe in Jesus Christ, you better go to Matt. 24, Mark 13 and Luke 21 and read what He said, which was:

You see these beautiful buildings; there shall not be one stone left standing upon another that shall not be thrown down!

Did that happen? Yes, it did! So don't be haughty and high-minded, and say to yourself that you're a 'good person, God won't do that.' Well, if you don't keep the Sabbath, you may be a 'good' person in the world, but you're a sinner standing before God! And many other things go with it.

Isa. 3—here's another prophecy given in 800B.C. that affects us today. An amazing thing, because you need to understand that the Word of God is living! It is inspired by His Spirit, and Jesus said that 'the words that I speak to you, they are Spirit and they are Life.' They come from the eternal God and apply in all phases of history from the beginning to the end.

Isaiah 3:1—spoken about 200 years before it happened: "For behold, the Lord, the LORD of hosts, takes away from Jerusalem and from Judah the stay and the staff, the whole stay of bread and the whole stay of water."

What are you going to do when the water is cut off? I have to say that unless we get an awful lot of rain in the next 60 days, we're going to be midst of the worst drought possible in California.

Verse 2: "The man of might and the man of war, the judge and the prophet, the diviner and the ancient, the captain of fifty, and the honorable man and the adviser, and the cunning charmer and the skillful enchanter. 'And I will give young lads to be their princes, and capricious children shall rule over them'" (vs 2-3).

Notice what will happen as I read this; think about Portland, OR, today. What are those people going through? What is happening there?

Verse 5: "And the people shall be crushed, every man by another, and every man by his neighbor; the young shall rise up against the old, and the base against the honorable."

In the New Testament Jesus says, 'Son against the father and father against the son; mother against daughter, and daughter against mother; daughter-in-law against mother-in-law, against each other.' We're getting close! Difficult, isn't it? We're going to see that there is going to be a lot of oppression, and it's going to come!

Psa.119:121 tells us how we can get around the oppression that is coming; that is to set God first in our lives!

• His way
• His Truth
• His commandments

Psalm 119:121: "I have done justice and righteousness; leave me not to those who oppress me." If you get right with God, you're going to be able to avoid some of it!

Verse 122: "Be surety for Your servant for good; let not the proud oppress me."

I don't know about you, but after three days of Biden I felt really oppressed! It hasn't even been enacted, just hearing about it!

Verse 123: "My eyes fail for Your salvation and for the Word of Your righteousness."

In other words, hungering and thirsting after the Word of God. Then when you come to the point of repentance, baptism and receiving the Holy Spirit of God, then God is not only with you, He's in you! You can draw close to Him!

Verse 124: "Deal with Your servant according to Your mercy, and teach me Your statutes."

Remember what we read in Deut. 8; all of the difficulties and trials are so that we can be proved and taught by God so that our latter end will be better than the beginning! That's what God wants!

Verse 125: "I am Your servant; give me understanding that I may know Your testimonies."

Notice how David thirsted for the Word of God! He wanted it! Jesus said, 'Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for they shall be filled.' That's what you want. You want to be filled with the:

• Spirit of God
• Truth of God
• Way of God
• Word of God

That's the only thing that's going to see us through these dark days! When Biden says it's going to 'be a dark winter' he meant it!

Verse 126: "It is time for the LORD to work, for they have made void Your Law."

Doesn't that describe it today? Yes, indeed! They may void it, but they can't void it, because it's always active and working.

Verse 127: "Therefore, I love Your commandments above gold—yea, above fine gold."

Do you love the commandments of God? If you have any doubt, go to Exo. 20 and memorize the Ten Commandments! As you go through them, ask yourself:

• How does that apply to me?
• What do I need to do?

This will draw you closer to God!

Verse 128: "Therefore, I esteem all Your precepts…"

• God is perfect
• God knows everything
• God has created everything
  • on the earth
  • in vastness of the heavens

So, if you have nice clear night some night real soon, go out and look at the stars and do like King David did and ask: 'Ah, Lord God, what is man that you're mindful of him, and the son of man that You think on him?' God wants you! That's what He wants!

God doesn't want you be partial with Him. After all, every one of us live, move and have our beingin God. If you don't believe that, quit breathing!

"…concerning all things to be right, and I hate every false way" (v 128).

• Can you discern between what is right and true?
• What is false and not of God?

There are a lot of people out there doing a lot of things.  There's Satan the devil out there who deceiving the whole world, and he comes with a lot of good, happy, happy things for you to do to lead you into sin. That's where the world is.

Verse 129: "Your testimonies are wonderful; therefore, my soul keeps them. The entrance of Your words gives light…" (vs 129-130).

Your mind will be opened to Truth through the Word of God. Whether you know it or not, if you're not on God's side, and if you're out there just living in the world any ole way you want to live, you have a blinder on spiritually, and you can't see things they way God sees them!

• You have to come to God!
• You have to come to His Word to do it!

"…it gives understanding to the simple. I opened my mouth and panted, for I longed for Your commandments" (vs 130-131).

I know there may be some out there saying, 'There he goes again, harping on this and that!'

• Do you love God's commandments—yes? or no?
• Do you yearn for the right way of God—yes? or no?
• Are you willing to admit your sins before God and repent—yes? or no?
• What is your choice?

God isn't going to force you, but you're not going to escape the consequences of your ways and what's happening around you, unless you turn to God!

Verse 131: "I opened my mouth and panted, for I longed for Your commandments. Look upon me, and be gracious unto me, as You are known to do for those who love Your name" (vs 131-132).

You see all of these preachers on TBN, DayStar and wherever they are. They all talk about God is love. That's true, but how many of them tell you how to love God back? How do you do that?

Think about what God really wants from all of us, every single one of us: to love God:

• with all your heart, nothing else between
• with all your mind, your thoughts

Your thoughts can be improved by having the commandments of God written in your heart and mind.

• with all your strength, there's no middle ground with that
• with all your might or soul, your whole physical being

Verse 133: "Order my steps by Your Word…"

That's quite a sentence; you could give a hundred messages just on that one phrase. Are your steps ordered by the Word of God?

"…and do not let any iniquity have dominion over me" (v 133)—rule over you!

• What rules you?
• What's in your mind?

Verse 134: "Deliver me from the oppression of man, and I will keep Your commandments. Make Your face to shine upon Your servant, and teach me Your statutes. Rivers of water run down my eyes because they do not keep Your Law" (vs 134-136).

That's certainly true! Look at what people are doing, where they're going, what is happening; they don't know why we're here. Every once in a while I watch Watter's World and he asks some of the simplest questions. I don't know, but New York City must be filled with a whole bunch of people who know nothing! They can't even name Presidents of the United States!

Let alone having anything to do with the Word of God. I wonder what would happen if we do a little survey with a microphone and camera and say, could you please tell me:

• What's the first commandment that God commanded?
• What's the second commandment?

Go all the way through all ten! They wouldn't know! Most of them would say, 'Which god are you talking about?' That's where we are today.

If you can last another week under Biden, come back and we'll be strengthened with the Word of God.

Scriptural References:

• Proverbs 18:12
• Deuteronomy 8:1-14, 16-19
• Isaiah 3:1-5
• Psalm 119:121-136

Scriptures referenced, not quoted:

• Genesis 1-10
• Matthew 24
• Mark 13
• Luke 21
• Exodus 20

Also referenced:

• In-Depth Study: Refuting Sunday-Keeping
•  

FRC:bo
Transcribed: 1/27/20

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