Holidays vs Holy Days: By Whose Authority? #4

Fred R. Coulter

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Every human being in the world is under one of two authorities; you're either:

• under the authority of God the Father and Jesus Christ, live by the Bible and keep His Holy Days

or

• under the authority of Satan the devil and his demons, you're part of the world and keep the holidays of this world

There are a few folks in between, but one way or the other they're going to have to choose as time goes on.

Let's understand something very important concerning the holidays and Holy Days question. Many people do not understand why God did all the plagues that He did in Egypt, before He brought the children of Israel out from captivity.

Here's something that most people fail to recognize or understand: God will choose your judgment! God chose pharaoh and raised him up in great power. Remember that pharaoh represented 'god in the flesh,' the representative of the sun-god, symbolized by the serpent as you see on the crowns of many of the mummies of the kings of Egypt. By the way, they're still dead.

Romans 9:17: "For the Scripture said to Pharaoh, 'For this very purpose I raised you up in order that I might show in you My power…'" That's why God lets the wicked prosper. That's why God lets the wicked conquer. So they can think and Satan can believe that eventually he'll overthrow God.

"…so that My name may be declared in all the earth" (v 17). The only way that's going to be done is in the written Word of God. Has that happened? Of course it did! Every year guess what we do? We go back and we review the battle between Moses and Aaron and Pharaoh and the magicians of Egypt and all the plagues that took place there!

We won't go through all of them except to say, every one of these plagues or signs had to do with some of the gods of Egypt, even the three days of darkness. Remember that the three days of darknesswas so heavy and thick that they could feel it; they couldn't see. One of their gods was the 'god of darkness.' Of course, the firstborn was the one that went into the elite hierarchy of the government and religion of Egypt. Plus, they had all:

• the statues
• the idols
• the writings
• the drawings
• the murals
• the temples everywhere

—serving and worshipping Satan and his demons. They were totally under the authority of Satan the devil. This is why God says throughout the Bible through the Prophets and even clear into Rev. 11, don't go back to Egypt. Rev. 11 says that 'Jerusalem is like Egypt and Sodom.' So, I'm not going to visit Jerusalem until I come down with Christ. You read the book of Luke it says, 'those without, don't go in.' I'm not going in! Why did God do this? To show that He's God! To show that He is over every god!

The first lesson of the Passover, and this is why Christians are to keep the Christian Passover… {note book: The Christian Passover} I want you to know something about the Passover, because the Passover is the most important Feast day of God!

Satan the devil has tried to confuse it with so many contradicting beliefs and lies to discourage people from doing so. Because the Jews are not in covenant with God, they do not keep a 14th Passover. They cannot keep a 14th Passover until they accept Jesus Christ.

Let's understand something concerning the Passover and why it's so important. Exo. 12 is the instructions on the lamb:

• what to do with it
• where to put the blood
• how to cook it
• roast it

Exodus 12:11—here is the summary of it: "And this is the way you shall eat it: with your loins girded, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand. And you shall eat it in trepidation. It is the LORD'S Passover, For I will pass through the land of Egypt this night, and will smite all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast…. [primary reason]: …And I will execute judgment against all the gods of Egypt…." (vs 11-12)—which had all the known pagan gods of the world represented there. This is a judgment against every:

• religion
• false god
• idol
• statue
• image
• picture
• temple
• priesthood

God has already executed His judgment against it.

"…I am the LORD…. [then He says that the way that you're going to escape is]: …And the blood shall be a signto you upon the houses where you are. And when I see the blood, I will pass overyou. And the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you when I smite the land of Egypt. And this day shall be a memorial to you. And you shall keep it a feast to the LORD throughout your generations. You shall keep it a feast as a law forever" (vs 12-14).

The long and the short of it is that God has judged all the gods of this world who are under the authority of Satan the devil or any newly created gods from that time down to this, under the authority of Satan the devil, He has already judged them!

We're going to see today some important things concerning it. We're going to see why God will not and cannot at any time anywhere in history accept any of the practices of the gods of this world as part of worship toward Him. Satan comes along and makes it all:

• nice
• glitzy
• glamour
• fun
• excitement

and you get the opportunity:

• to lie to your children
• to lie to yourself
• to have ceremonies
• to have rituals
• to have pageantry
• to have popes
• to have cardinals
• to have Dahlia Lamas
• to have imams
• to have whatever you want to heap to yourself

God allows you to do that and you are under the authority of Satan the devil and not under the authority of God. That's why He judged it this way. That's why He took His time judging Pharaoh and Egypt. Pharaoh being a type of Satan could not repent. Pharaoh would harden his heart and then God would harden it.

What is the first, foremost and primary command of God? As we have already covered, if you judge the Law of God, you are judging God and you are sitting in the seat of God! When people come along and bring a false Christianity with a false Christ and have all kinds of ideas and things about how to worship God, guess what? They never have the right God and they never do it on the right day because God will not allow it! Maybe for a while, but God's judgment is coming unless they repent. We've all seen the experience of that. This is why most people, when they look at religion, get so confused.

Exodus 20:1: "And God spoke all these words, saying." Remember, He was on top of Mt. Sinai and He had come down there in person to speak to the children of Israel and these are the Words of God.

Verse 2: "I am the LORD your God, Who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. You shall have no other gods before Me" (vs 2-3). There it is, it can't be any clearer.

What we're going to do today is we're going to see how that God judges all of those who change the true worship of God, which the religion of Moses is not Judaism, never has been. Judaism has its own peculiar problems; their idol is the law. In order to support their idol, they create thousands and thousands of laws. You need the Code of Jewish Law by Solomon Ganzfried and Hyman E. Goldin {amazon.com}

You cannot understand the Epistles of Paul unless you understand the Code of Jewish Law. You cannot understand Jesus' statements that their traditions have rejected and nullified the commandments of God. In the name of law they have buried the Law of God, because they have rejected Jesus Christ! Some people don't like that. Some people may say that's anti-Semitism, but it is a fact that that occurred to the majority of Jews. However, the first ones that Jesus will save are the very ones that crucified Him. If anybody wants to get all 'hoity-toity' about anti-Judaism, you cannot use that phrase to take away a fact of history.

Let's go on with the next commandment. We won't go through all of them, but just this one here.

Verse 4: "You shall not make for yourselves any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in the heavens above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the waters under the earth. You shall not bow yourself down to them, nor serve them, for I, the LORD your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of those who hate Me, but showing mercy to thousands of those who love Me and keep My commandments" (vs 4-6).

This whole second commandment is profound and important. Remember the last sentence here: "…showing mercy to thousands of those who live Me and keep My commandments." That is New Testament doctrine.

John 14:15: "If you love Me, keep the commandments—namely, My commandments"—New Testament doctrine.
How did it happen that the greatest 'Christian religion' on earth today that calls itself 'Christian' can be so filled with idols? Because it's not Christian! It is totally pagan and is filled with other gods. The whole hierarchal structure of that church centered in Rome is not of God, though they claim that it is. You need to understand it.

Here's the principle: God defines the terms on how you come to Him and how you worship Him! No man defines the terms on how they're going to approach God. What did Jesus say? No one can come to Me unless the Father draw him! No one can come to the Father except through Me! This is why, brethren, it is good to memorize certain basic Scriptures:

• Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today and forever
• I, the Lord, do not change

When we go back to the Old Testament, see what happened there and see God's reaction to it, we'll understand that God is the same today as He was then; only it's far more particular than it ever was in the Old Testament because you cannot approach God in a relationship way without the Spirit of God. You cannot receive the Spirit of God until you repent and are baptized; 'if you don't have the Spirit of God, you're none of His.'

All the false preachers like to have the 'fudge factor' on that and say, 'God is love and God loves me. I take His grace. I appropriate the name of Christ. I appropriate the blood of Jesus Christ.' I'm here to tell you one thing: No man can appropriate anything from God. He must impute it to you upon repentance!

2-Corinthians 6:14: "Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and lawlessness have in common?.…" Lawlessness may even have some law in it, but laws that are contrary to God. Lawlessness is against God's Law. That's why those who are against Sabbath-keeping have some of God's Law, but remember, since they only take some of it they don't have all of it; so, even using the Law of God, they have created their own version of lawlessness and it is not of God.

{note book: Primitive Christianity in Crisis by Alan Knight, and understand the message about lawlessness}. 'What do righteousness and lawlessness have in common?' Nothing! What is the righteousness that we have had imputed to us? The righteousness of God!

"…And what fellowship does light have with darkness? And what union does Christ have with Belial? Or what part does a believer have with an unbeliever? And what agreement is there between a temple of God and idols?…. [it is a temple of God, being you and idols] …For you are a temple of the living God…" (vs 14-16). God has something greater than any idols, statues and works of art that men can do; His Spirit in you! That's greater! That's a greater work!

"…exactly as God said: 'I will dwell in them and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. Therefore, come out from the midst of them and be separate…'" (vs 16-17). Is that what did with Israel? Yes, He took them out of Egypt! The only problem that we'll see is, they took Egypt in their hearts with them. That's why we need to come out.

How many people who have been in the Church of God sat there and listened to sermons which were not sermons—I don't know what you call them, because they never taught the Truth in the way that it should be taught—and then comes along someone with a false doctrine and they fall for it 'hook, line and sinker'? In order for that to be done, there has to first be put confusion in the minds and hearts of the people. Those who know the Truth will stand for the Truth and they're going to wonder what's going on. Those who don't know the Truth will say, 'Well, we got to listen to both sides.'

Remember when the booklet came about the nature of God? Someone brought it to me and said, 'What do you think?' I said, 'This is confusion so that you will choose the trinity.' That's exactly what it was. A lot of people couldn't see through it because they weren't grounded enough in the laws and commandments of God and they didn't exercise the Spirit of God in them. So, God made a judgment and took them away, because God has already judged all the gods of this world. All the gods of this world are identified by:

• different days
• different laws
• idols
• statues

In the case of Judaism, they have half the story and reject the other half.

I tell you this, we'll put it in simple terms: If you had a lotto ticket and you won the 'hardball' lotto of $200-million, you went to claim it and you only presented half of the ticket, will they pay you? Of course not! You can't have:

• half of God
• half of His Word
• some of His Word
• your own theology
• your own ideas

and come to God and say, 'Here I am.' God will say, 'Who are you?'

This will help us understand more about the calling of God and why it's important. There are too many people that play religion and play the politics of religion.

Verse 17: "'Therefore, come out from the midst of them and be separate,' says the Lord, 'and touch not the unclean, and I will receive you; and I shall be a Father to you, and you shall be My sons and daughters,' says the Lord Almighty" (vs 17-18).

• Isn't that better than having a religion?
• Isn't that better and having a church building filled with idols and burning candles?

Christ in you, there can't be anything greater than that.

Exo. 23—here is the Sabbath and the Sabbath is a test commandment. There are two test commandments:

• the Sabbath
• idols

Exodus 23:12: "Six days you shall do your work, and on the seventh day you shall rest, so that your ox and your donkey may rest, and the son of your handmaid, and the stranger, may be rejuvenated." When Gentiles come along and say, 'Oh, we don't have to keep the Sabbath. That's Jewish.'

• What did God say?
• Who is 'the stranger?'

Then you read Isa. 58 and 56, they keep the Sabbath.

Verse 13: "And be watchful in all that I have said to you. And make no mention of the name of other gods, neither let it be heard out of your mouth." He knew that they were in Egypt long enough that that's all they knew.

Then He gives the Feast Days—'holidays' or Holy Days. Here are the Holy Days of God. Just a brief summary, which is before the institution of the tabernacle and the animal sacrifices therewith.

Verse 14: "You shall keep a Feast unto Me three times in the year. You shall keep the Feast of Unleavened Bread. You shall eat unleavened bread seven days, as I commanded you, at the time appointed in the month of Abib, for in it you came out of Egypt. And no one shall appear before Me empty. Also, the Feast of the Harvest of the Firstfruits… [another name of the Feast of Pentecost] …of your labors, which you have sown in the field. And the Feast of Ingathering… [the Feast Tabernacles and Last Great Day] …in the end of the year, when you have gathered in your labors out of the field. Three times in the year all your males shall appear before the Lord GOD'" (vs 14-17).
Come on down and it talks a little bit about some of the sacrifices there. If you have a concordance or you have a computer, look up all the places where it says gods—little 'g.'

Verse 24: "You shall not bow down to their gods…" Every time you go into a cathedral and do the genuflect, you're bowing down to their gods. Every time you bow down when the priest gives his 'mumbo-jumbo,' you're bowing down to other gods.

"…nor serve them. And you shall not do according to their works. But you shall surely tear them down, and surely you shall smash their standing images. And you shall serve the LORD your God, and He shall bless your bread and your water. And I will take sickness away from the midst of you" (vs 24-25). Why is there a lot of sickness in the world. It's not just what they eat alone, but what they worship and who they serve. It's very important.

Living at the end of the age we have a lot of weaknesses and sicknesses because of weak bodies, lack of knowledge, poor food, etc., and because we lived in the world and served other gods. God has called us out of that.

Here's a covenant that God made with them, Exodus 24:3: "And Moses came and told the people all the words of the LORD, and all the judgments. And all the people answered with one voice and said, 'All the words which the LORD has said, we will do.'"

This is when they entered into covenant with God. This was the marriage ceremony that took place. They had the burnt offerings, peace offerings and Moses took the blood and sprinkled some on the people and some on the Book of the Law and after that they said:

Verse 7: "…All that the LORD has said we will do, and be obedient."

Let's understand something about a covenant: When you make a covenant with God, it cannot be broken without severe penalty. A covenant with God cannot be reneged. In the New Testament, if you go back on God and commit the unpardonable sin, you have no recourse. With this covenant that He made with the people, He gave them the blessings for obedience and the cursing for disobedience. The covenant was established. It was made.

Exo. 31 becomes a very important sequence of events. The way the Bible is laid out is that's it's laid out with lessons for us and the order in which things have been laid out also show the lessons for us in the order of the events. This becomes very, very important and we're going to see the comparison. A lot of this we already know.
Exodus 31:12: "And the LORD spoke to Moses saying." Let's just clear up one matter, here, too. The law that Moses gave was not Moses' law. It was the Law of God that Moses gave! Everywhere that Moses spoke, God spoke.

Verse 13: "Speak also to the children of Israel, saying, 'Truly you shall keep My Sabbaths…'" That's His Holy Days, plural. Not one Sabbath; it includes all of them:

• Passover
• Unleavened Bread
• Pentecost
• Trumpets
• Atonement
• Tabernacles
• Last Great Day

If you haven't heard those words before and that sounds strange to you, please understand that the holidays you keep sound strange to those who keep the true Holy Days of God.

He said, "…Truly you shall keep My Sabbaths…" What does God require? His authority and His way!

"…for it… [refers to the keeping of the Sabbaths; the act of keeping the Sabbaths…]: …is a sign between Me and you throughout your generations to know that I am the LORD Who sanctifies you" (v 13).

1-John 2:3: "And by this standard we know that we know Him: if we keep His commandments." God is the same in the book of Exodus as He is in the Epistle of 1-John, written by the apostle of love: John. No question about it! If you don't keep His days, guess what? You don't know God! You may use His name, you may even use the Bible, but you don't know God!

Matthew 7:22: "Many will say to Me in that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy through Your name? And did we not cast out demons through Your name? And did we not perform many works of power through Your name?' And then I will confess to them, 'I never knew you. Depart from Me, you who work lawlessness'" (vs 22-23).

That's what people don't understand, that the Bible—Old Testament and New Testament—is one unit. If you want to get rid of the Old Testament, then you have to also cut out up to one-third or one-half of the New Testament, because those are quotes from the Old Testament. How would your Bible look after that? It would be 'holey' in a different way—filled with holes! Also, it tells you that you are not sanctified by God.

The truth is if you have not repented, have been baptized, received the Holy Spirit of God and keep the Christian Passover, you are not sanctified by God. Stop and think, those of you who have: When people quit keeping the Passover and Holy Days of God, what happens? They lose all knowledge! A living testimony that God's way is always true.

Then He says, keep the Sabbath. Why do we need the Sabbath every week? Because we're being taught of God and that's the appointed time that He has set! Yes, we do rest, we don't do our labors, but with God's Spirit and God's Word He teaches us. You're being taught of God by studying His Word. Every minister who teaches and preaches needs to understand that he's just like Moses. You better preach the Word of God because God is going to hold him accountable for teaching anything else! Those who hear and listen are accountable to God to prove and make sure that what is being taught is right. That's why when we have services, we have our Bibles in front of us.

Verse 16: "Therefore, the children of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations as a perpetual covenant. It is a sign between Me and the children of Israel forever; for in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day He rested, and was refreshed" (vs 16-17)

Exo. 32 is a great instructive chapter. There are many, many things we can get out of it. What I think is profound is the contents of it; right after giving the commandment here, concerning the Sabbath, to end everything that God instructed Moses when he was up there on the mountain: all about how to make the tabernacle, how to do all the priest things, etc. He ended it with the Sabbath, the sign, and so forth. We have what most people do with the Word of God!

(go to the next track)

With the background of what we've covered so far, and especially what we just read in Exo. 31, let's read major parts of Exo. 32. Right here at the very beginning God makes it abundantly clear that you shall not combine the worship of God with the worship of other gods. It's very important that if God accepted the worship of other gods in worshipping Him, then He would be a hypocrite because He said, 'You shall have no other gods before Me.' He would be joining them and they would be god and not Him.

The reason people can't understand it is because they don't have their spiritual thinking caps on right, if we can use that as an analogy.

Exodus 32:1: "And when the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mountain… [they couldn't wait] …then the people gathered themselves to Aaron…" Who is Aaron? The priest of God! The priestly family would only come through the line of Aaron.

Who does Satan want to corrupt if he can? The leaders and to placate the people! I don't know how much this was akin to a riot or akin to just a meeting, but notice what they said.

"…and they said to him… [came to Aaron] …'Up! Make us gods…'" (v 1); breaking the first commandment immediately and the second one. They came out of Egypt, but Egypt had not yet come out of them. It's just like with us. We may come out of the world but how much of the world has come out of you? Same thing! This is so loaded with things and so instructive for us.

"...'Up! Make us gods, which shall go before us, for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him'" (v 1). He was up there 40 days. They couldn't wait. What was Aaron's responsibility? He should have said, 'Moses is up there and undoubtedly he has a lot of business and writings with God, and he will be here shortly. Wait on God!' He didn't do that.

This is also a prophecy of the corruption that the Aaronic priesthood would exhibit down through history. This was also a prophecy as to why the Aaronic priesthood had to be replaced with the priesthood of Christ. To have a true priesthood you need someone who is incorruptible. That's why Christ is our High Priest, no one else. That's why God does not allow a man between you and Him. Carnal nature always wants to have a man between them and God, so that when the going gets tough, you can blame the man. A lot of lessons here!

Verse 2: "And Aaron said to them… [he said the wrong thing] …'Break off the golden earrings which are in the ears of your wives, of your sons, and of your daughters, and bring them to me.' And all the people broke off the golden earrings, which were in their ears, and brought them to Aaron…." (vs 2-3).

Of course, they were loaded down because the Egyptians said, 'Here, take it! Get out of here!' They got rid of all of the idols, the little trinkets and idols and good luck charms that were made out of gold, and so forth and gave it to them. They were loaded down. They brought them.

Verse 4: "And he took them from their hand, and fashioned it with an engraving tool, and made a molten calf. And they said, 'These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt.'" We're going to see a repeat of this about 500 years later. Were those the gods that brought the children of Israel out of Egypt? No! What did they have to lead them by day? A cloud and a pillar of fire by night! God was there!

Verse 5: "And when Aaron saw the calf, he built an altar before it…. [we need to understand something very profound in this lesson]: …And Aaron made a proclamation and said, 'Tomorrow is a Feast to the LORD.'" The combining of the worship of God with the gods of Egypt that God had already judged and say that it's 'unto the Lord.'

• Can you think of some things today that people say and do?
• What do they call it? The Lord's Day, Sunday!

That's an invention of men and serving other gods. Sunday is the worship of the sun-god. If you go to church on Sunday—it doesn't matter if you're Catholic, Protestant or otherwise—and say, 'This is a feast unto the Lord,' you're doing exactly the same sin that Aaron did when he made the molten calf and said, 'This is a feast unto the Lord.' It's not a feast unto the Lord because God didn't say it was a feast unto the Lord. Most people, because:

• they have a good idea
• they feel good
• it looks good
• it sounds good
• it please the majority of people

Then they go along with it.

Verse 6: "And they rose up early on the next morning, and offered burnt offerings, and brought peace offerings. And the people sat down to eat and to drink, and rose up to play"—having a sex orgy.

If you want a modern day equivalent of this, think of Woodstock. Didn't they do that to other gods? We are free!' Every time you see a rock concert, you're looking at what this was. You know what happened. This is interesting. Whenever the people do well, they are God's people. Whenever they don't do well, they're Moses' people.

Verse 7: "And the LORD said to Moses, 'Go! Get you down, for your people, whom you brought out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves. They have turned aside quickly out of the way, which I commanded them….'" (v 7-8). Here's a feast day that God didn't command.

• What did God command?
• What did we already see?
• Sabbath!

If you keep the Sabbath, you're under God's authority!

• Holy Days

If you keep the Holy Days the way God wants them kept, you're under the authority of God!

"…They have made them a molten calf…" (v 8). That is a bull and the bull had two horns. In between the two horns was a round golden disc—in this case pure gold—signifying the sun-god.

I don't know what day this was on. I don't know if it was on a Sunday that it happened to be, or whatever. Whenever you go to church on Sunday, you're worshipping the sun-god. Though it has the name Jesus Christ on there, it has no compatibility with God or the Bible, even though they may read some things of the Bible. We'll see this a little later concerning even false prophets that God didn't send.

"'…and have worshiped it, and have sacrificed to it, and said, "These are your gods, O Israel, who have brought you up out of the land of Egypt."' And the LORD said to Moses, 'I have seen this people, and behold, it is a stiff-necked people'" (vs 8-9)—rebellious!

It says, 'a disobedient and contradicting people' (Rom. 10:21). What does that mean? We want the Lord. We want the name of the Lord but Lord, we're going to do it our way. Didn't that happen with 9/11? 'Oh! Why did this happen?' All patriotic, God bless America and that's all you heard and they continued right on the way that they were doing: "…a stiff-necked people."

Verse 10: "And now leave Me alone, so that My wrath may burn hot against them and that I may consume them. And I will make of you a great nation." God can still do it with one man if He wanted to.

Moses intervened. Moses told God, 'Please don't do this. Remember Your promise to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Please don't do it.' So, the Lord said He wouldn't do it (v 14). Moses came down carrying the Ten Commandments and he heard all this noise. Joshua was there with him.

Verse 19: "And it came to pass, as soon as he came near to the camp and saw the calf and dancing, then Moses' anger burned hot, and he threw the tablets out of his hands, and broke them at the bottom of the mountain." That is also symbolic from this point of view: You cannot combine the worship of God and the Ten Commandments with the worship of pagan gods.

Verse 20: "And he took the calf, which they had made and burned it in the fire, and pulverized it to powder, and scattered it upon the water, and made the children of Israel drink of it. And Moses said to Aaron, 'What did this people do to you that you have brought so great a sin upon them?'" (vs 20-21).

Let's stop and think about this a minute. Most people don't understand that it's sin if you try and combine a pagan worship, do it in the name of God and say you're worshipping God, it is sin! No doubt about it!

Aaron had his excuse. While I'm reading this, I want you to think about what happened in the Garden of Eden. God said to Adam, 'Why'd you do this?' Adam said, 'The woman you gave me.' The woman said, 'It was the serpent that got in the Garden.' Notice the same rationale here.

Verse 22: "And Aaron said, 'Let not the anger of my lord burn hot. You know the people, that they are set on mischief, for they said to me, "Make us gods who shall go before us; as for this Moses, the man that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him." And I said to them, "Whoever has any gold, let them break it off." And they gave it to me, and I threw it into the fire, and there came out this calf'" (vs 22-24). I didn't have anything to do with it. It just leaped out here. A miracle!

Verse 25: "And when Moses saw that the people were naked (for Aaron had made them naked to their shame among their enemies)."

We'll summarize this story: Moses said, 'Everyone who is on God's side get over here.' Then he told the Levites, 'You get your sword and you go out and you utterly slay everyone.' So, 3,000 people fell that day.

Verse 30: "And it came to pass on the next day, Moses said to the people, 'You have sinned a great sin.'" Let me just be very straightforward. If you keep:

• Halloween
• Christmas
• Easter
• New Years
• any of the other feast of Christendom

You are sinning a great sin!

• If you bow down to any idol, you're sinning a great sin!
• If you go into a cathedral filled with idols, you are surrounded with sin, you're under the authority of Satan the devil and his demons!

You're not under the authority of God, regardless of what the priest, pastor, pope, cardinal, bishop or imam may say; it's a great sin! We're going to see some other things, here, as we go along. What we need to understand is that nowhere in the Bible does is sanctify:

• Sunday worship
• Christmas worship
• Easter sunrise services
• any of the pagan days

Period!
If God desired to change the day from Sabbath to Sunday, that is, from Saturday to Sunday in today's modern lingo, He would have to have a command that would have to go something like this:

You have heard it said in old time, 'You shall remember the Sabbath Day to keep it Holy,' but I say to you, 'You shall not keep the seventh day, but you shall keep the first day.'

I will offer anyone a million dollar reward if they can show me that command, that way in the Bible. I have no fear that I will have to pay it, because it's not there.

All the other excuses and things that people use, the first thing that's going to happen, you run up to your minister and say, 'Oh! Did you know that the seventh-day Sabbath, Saturday, is the day we ought to worship on?' He says, 'Yes, but we do it on Sunday; God knows my heart.' Yes, it's deceitful above all things! Keep every day holy. God didn't make every day Holy; He commanded you to work six days.

The Jehovah Witnesses say, 'We keep every day holy.' Nonsense! You can't do it, because God didn't make them Holy. There's only one day that God made Holy and the annual Holy Days He gave, He made those Holy. He didn't make six days of the week Holy. You cannot keep them Holy. You:

• sit in the seat of God
• judge God
• condemn God
• make yourself more righteous than Him
• say that you know more than God

Some people are not going to like what I have to say. I'm not here to entertain people and please people. If you want to find God and know about His Word, I'll tell you about it. If you don't want that, then you can go to another website. It's that simple.

Let's see what else happens. The way that you introduce heresy is through a feast. How is the forty days of the fast of Lent introduced? With Mardi Gras! So, you can debauch and be licentious in every one of your activities, that is on 'Fat' Tuesday. Then on Wednesday, which is 'Ash Wednesday,' people go into their cathedrals—I saw this on John Kerry's forehead during the election. He had the ashes put on his forehead in the form of a cross. That's not from God! It's nowhere in the Bible, nowhere in the Bible! You have to have a feast. Why? Because there's music, there's dancing and it's fun and it appeals to carnal nature!

Num. 25—this is the council of Balaam, who couldn't curse the children of Israel, but he taught Balak to teach the children of Israel to commit fornication, sexual immorality. So, they had a 'religious feast.'

Numbers 25:1: "And Israel dwelt in Acacia Grove, and the people began to commit whoredom with the daughters of Moab." The first thing that people do to get you compromised is to bring illicit sex. I want you to think about what has been done in the societies in the Western culture—sex education in school down to the kindergarten level where they're even teaching acceptance of homosexual behavior. Satan knows that when you introduce sex at an early age you corrupt the mind, emotion and the psyche of that individual permanently! Only the true forgiveness of God through the blood of Jesus Christ can clean that up. This is why Satan does it.

Verse 2: "And they called the people to the sacrifices of their gods…" 'Oh, don't worry about it. These gods won't hurt you. They're fine. We've been doing this for a ling time. Besides, smell the food, look at the women; what more would you want?' You put that on ESPN and you have everybody filling the stadium.

"…And the people ate and bowed down to their gods. And Israel joined himself to Baal Peor" (vs 2-3). Now, Baal is the sun-god. We're going to see a lot about Baal as we go along. The sun-god has all of his feast days: spring feast days, winter feast days, fall feast days.

"…And the anger of the LORD was kindled against Israel. And the LORD said to Moses, 'Take all the heads of the people and impale them before the LORD facing the sun…'" (vs 3-4).

• Who was involved?
• Who was leading the charge?
• The leaders!

I'll give you an example: former President Bill Clinton said that oral sex is not sex, and he created a plague of oral sex and sexually transmitted diseases among teenagers in America. 'If the President can do it, I can do it.' That's why corrupt the leaders. When a church is infiltrated, corrupted and taken down, what happens? You get the leaders! Satan's tactics never change. That's what we need to learn in this. It never changes.

"'…so that the fierce anger of the LORD may be turned away from Israel.' And Moses said to the judges of Israel, 'Every one of you kill his men who were joined to Baal Peor'" (vs 4-5).

God will not tolerate of the mixture of pagan religion and pagan gods with His name. That's all they have done with the name of Jesus Christ. Those of us who know the Truth and preach the Truth will be counted is heretics and it will be said that we're preaching heresy. So be it!

Verse 6: "And behold, a man of the children of Israel came and brought to his brethren a woman of Midian, in the sight of Moses…" You talk about gall! You talk about absolutely just throwing it in Moses' face!

"…and in the sight of all the congregation of the children of Israel, who were weeping before the door of the tabernacle of the congregation. And when Phinehas, the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, saw it, he rose up from among the congregation and took a spear in his hand. And he went after the man of Israel into the tent, and pierced both of them through, the man of Israel, and the woman, through her belly. So, the plague was stayed from the children of Israel. And those that died in the plague were twenty-four thousand" (vs 6-9).

Because God does not come down and bring those kinds of punishments today, people do not take it seriously. He has other punishments that come; they are called sexually transmitted diseases of which there are 60 known. The most recent is an HIV that is resistant to 19 of the 20 drugs and it goes from HIV to full blown AIDS in two to three months. God has another way of handling it.

There's a blessing for serving God! At that point it was the death penalty. So, God executed them.

Verse 10: "And the LORD spoke to Moses saying, 'Phinehas the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, has turned My wrath away from the children of Israel in that he was zealous for My sake among them, so that I did not destroy the children of Israel in My jealousy. Therefore, say, "Behold, I give him My covenant of peace"'" (vs 10-12). A special blessing. Wherever the descendants of Eleazar are today, this blessing is upon them and probably the same characteristic of zeal.

Verse 13: "And he shall have it, and his seed after him, the covenant of an everlasting priesthood because he was zealous for his God and made an atonement for the children of Israel." That shows you how God honors those who honor Him and are zealous for Him. This shows that you cannot combine the worship of the rue God with the gods of this world.

We will take sort of a historical overview as we go through. Judges 2 is very instructive. This also is reflective of what happens to people in the second and third generations. I want you to think of this in relationship to the founding of America and all that, as we're doing this.

Judges 2:1: "And the angel of the LORD came up from Gilgal to Bochim, and said, 'I made you go up out of Egypt, and have brought you into the land which I swore to your fathers. And I said, "I will never break My covenant with you."'"
Because He won't break the covenant, there are blessings and cursing. Remember that half of the promises of God are blessings and half of the promises of God the cursing, or correction for sin!

Verse 2: "And you shall make no treaty with those who live in this land. You shall throw down their altars." But you have not obeyed My voice. What is this that you have done? And I also said, "I will not drive them out from before you, but they shall be thorns in your sides, and their gods shall be a snare to you" (vs 2-3). They had to be on watch all the time.

Verse 5: "And they called the name of that place The Place of Weeping. And they sacrificed there to the LORD."

They all went back to their inheritance and Joshua died at 110 years old (v 8) and they buried him (v 9).

Verse 10: "And also all that generation were gathered to their fathers. And there arose another generation after them who did not know the LORD…" We've seen that even within the Church. They grew up in the Church but they don't know God.

"…nor even the works which He had done for Israel. And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the LORD, and served Baalim" (vs 10-11). Baal is the sun-god and Baalim is many gods of Baalim:

• How does God view sun-worship?
• What does He say?
• It's evil!

Verse 12: "And they forsook the LORD God of their fathers, Who brought them out of the land of Egypt. And they followed other gods, even the gods of the people who were around them, and bowed themselves to them, and provoked the LORD to anger. And they forsook the LORD and served Baal and Ashtaroth" (vs 12-13). Now we're introduced with another god. Ashtaroth is a goddess, the female god.

What is being touted today among the feminist movement? To worship a goddess—Diana, Ashtaroth, Cybele—all the different names of them! We have on the website—cbcg.org—The Two Babylons by Alexander Hislop and you can draw down from any of the chapters, any of the information regarding the origin of these things.

What happens when people do that? We're going to face the same thing today. We can be guaranteed this: Unless there is a mass, nationwide repentance by those who call themselves Christian to forsake Sunday-keeping, Christmas, Easter—all the pagan days—and:

• they repent to God
• accept the true Jesus Christ
• worship God on His day
• repent of their adultery
• repent of all the things that they have done:
  • their lying
  • their cheating
  • their stealing
  • their gambling
  • their divorce
  • their remarriage

This nation is going to go down! That's how serious it is.

This is not a theological argument. The handwriting is already on the wall. The only thing that is holding back the judgment of God is that there is not enough warning messages out there for the people who are sinning to hear it and to understand what's going to happen when it comes. That's the only reason.

Every minister, every elder and every teacher who names the name of Christ, had better repent and had better preach repentance to their people, to their flock, to those that follow them, that God's hand of judgment is coming, and it is going to be swift, powerful and sure, because we have forsaken the God Who:

• gave us this country
• gave us His laws
• gave us His Bible

Just like the generation here in Judges, that turned its back on God to serve Baalim, this younger generation is going to be called into judgment for:

• all of their fornication
• all of their idolatry
• all of the things that they have committed
  • rejecting God
  • worshipping Satan the devil

It is coming and it needs to be said! Some people don't like to hear it because, 'we're all good Americans.' Tell that to God! See if He will accept you.

Brethren, we are living in desperate and terrible times, because most of this nation is under the authority of Satan the devil and not God!Whose authority are you under?

All Scriptures from The Holy Bible In Its Original Order, A Faithful Version

Scriptural References:

• Romans 9:17
• Exodus 12:11-14
• Exodus 20:1-6
• John 14:15
• 2-Corinthians 6:14-18
• Exodus 23:12-17, 24-25
• Exodus 24:3, 7
• Exodus 31:12-13
• 1-John 2:3
• Matthew 7:22-23
• Exodus 31:16-17
• Exodus 32:1-10, 19-25, 30
• Numbers 25:1-13
• Judges 2:1-3, 5, 10-13

Scriptures referenced, not quoted:

• Revelation 11
• Isaiah 58; 56
• Romans 10:21
• Exodus 32:14
• Judges 1:8-9

Also referenced: Books:

• The Christian Passover by Fred R. Coulter
• Code of Jewish Law by Solomon Ganzfried and Hyman E. Goldin
• Primitive Christianity In Crisis by Alan Knight
• The Two Babylons by Alexander Hislop

FRC: nfs
Transcribed: 04-26-16
Proofed: bo—bo—6/1/16