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Hendersonville Seventh-day Adventist Church, NC

David Wright

Appetite for Sin or Victory

Well, I remember it was my senior class year, and I was not the senior class president, so I can wash my hands of all of this.

And Our class did something rather rebellious.

We were supposed to do a class pretty close, but our senior class president went out and bought all these tickets to San Francisco.

And so we had a lot of money to fundraise, and how we got away with that, I'm not exactly sure, but somehow they ended up letting us go, but we had to get a lot of money to get everybody that wanted to go to San Francisco over there.

And so 1 of the ideas that came in as a fundraiser, as everybody was thinking, thinking, thinking, our wonderful class officers came up with the idea, we're going to have a food eating competition.

And so they did it in the auditorium there at College Hill Academy, and they blacked out all of the windows, and the idea is we're gonna charge admission so that people will pay, I think it was $2 or something, to come and watch and be spectators in this sport.

And the way it was set up, and I didn't participate, I probably paid my $2 though, which is participating.

Anyway, they had tables on either side and you could line up on either 1 of the tables and you had to eat various food items and in between, as you finished your plate and you were inspected to go or approved to go, you would race to the back of the auditorium, touch the back doors and race back.

Anyway, so I don't remember all the various items.

I remember burritos was on the list, or a burrito, and 1 of the last and final things was a hot dog.

And so a friend of mine, I won't say his name, Corby Swafford, he ate...

Sorry, Corby, wherever you are, you're my hero.

He ate a whole hot dog without eating a hot dog.

You take the hot dog and you go like this, to win, I mean, all to win.

And so he did this, got the okay, races back to touch the end, and he's coming back up to the front, and if you're truly choking, it doesn't go, ah-ha-ha, it's more like, and so he started doing this, and goes off to the side of the stage up there at the academy.

Thankfully, 1 of the smallest, most petite faculty members there saw this going on and did the Heimlich maneuver on my friend, and out comes A purely untuned hot dog.

We're not going to have anybody at potluck today.

I don't think we're serving burritos or hot dogs, but anyway.

Have you ever heard of the idiom, it's too much of a good thing?

It's the undisputed authority on competitive eating worldwide, so now you know.

And they have official eating contests, And I took note of some of these.

8 and a half ounces of onions in 1 minute.

Peas, 9 and a half 1 pound bowls in 12 minutes.

It takes me that long to get corn off of 1 ear, let alone 47.

I know it's not the same thing, but a soft taco, similar.

We don't use that word too often anymore.

Well, it's to dispose entirely of things that are harmful, and secondly, to use in moderation the things that are good.

So this idea of temperance, of moderation.

Now we don't want to be moderate with our crack cocaine use.

We want to just abstain from that altogether, right?

So we put that on, but anything that's good for you, it's moderate use, that's temperance.

And some of you are thinking, are we really gonna talk about temperance today, really?

We'll come back around, but for now I want you to turn to Daniel chapter 3.

I like to read through, if you have your Bible this morning, we're going to read a lot of Daniel chapter 3 this morning.

But we're in Daniel chapter 3, beginning verse 1, and I'm reading from the New King James Version.

It says, Nebuchadnezzar the king made an image of gold.

Because he had a dream of an image that had different metals in it symbolizing different kingdoms that would come, but oh no, no, no, no.

There will be 1 image with 1 type of metal material.

It's not even really metal, it's gonna be all gold.

Not just the head, the entire thing will be gold.

And so King Nebuchadnezzar made an image of gold whose height was 60 cubits and its width 6 cubits.

And he set it up in the plain of Dura in the province of Babylon.

And King Nebuchadnezzar sent word to gather together and listen to the list.

The satraps, the administrators, the governors, the counselors, the treasurers, the judges, the magistrates, and all the officials of the provinces.

If you didn't catch on, everybody who's anybody is going to be there.

And he invites them to come to the dedication of the image which King Nebuchadnezzar had set up.

So the satraps, the administrators, the governors, The counselors, the treasurers, the judges, the magistrates, and all the officers of the provinces gathered together for the dedication of the image that King Nebuchadnezzar had set up, and they stood before the image that Nebuchadnezzar had set up, in case you missed it.

Then a herald cried aloud, to you it is commanded, O peoples, nations, and languages, that at the time you hear the sound of the horn, flute, harp, lyre, and psaltery in symphony with all kinds of music, You shall fall down and worship the gold image that King Nebuchadnezzar has set up.

That's the authority behind this whole thing.

And whoever does not fall down and worship shall be cast immediately into the midst of a burning fiery furnace." So at that time when all the people heard the sound of the horn, the flute, the harp, the lyre, the symphony with all kinds of music, all the people, nations, and languages fell down and worshipped the gold image which King Nebuchadnezzar had set up.

And I believe this story parallels very closely Revelation chapter 13, the beast power.

We looked at that in the pastors class just last week.

You have a universal world leader in both, Daniel 3 and Revelation 13.

You have a counterfeit image in both, the image of gold and the image to or counterfeit Sabbath, an image is a likeness of in both.

The dimensions that we have are 60 and 6, we just read it, but in Revelation 13 it's described as 666.

You have a command to worship the image or the false image of Sunday.

You have a universal death decree in both.

And so my question is, based on this story, based on Revelation 13, when this situation comes up, what will you do?

I mean you could rationalize, God you don't want me to go through this, certainly.

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Appetite for Sin or Victory

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