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Fountain in the City SDA Church

Faith in Action

Eric Walsh

Making Sense of Suffering

Making God’s Word Come Alive

Being Remade to be Like Christ

Making Disciples

Our scripture reading comes from Romans chapter 3.

We're gonna read verses 23 and 24, which says, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God, being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.

So our last message for today, the God who remakes, being remade to be like Christ.

Father God, we thank you for this opportunity to study your word.

We thank you, Lord, for your mercy and for your grace.

Once again, Lord, I ask that you just make me a nail on the wall, and upon that nail hang a portrait of Jesus Christ.

Once again, Lord, bind the devil and cast him far away.

Fill this place, fill our hearts with your Holy Spirit, and Lord, have him lead us into all truth.

This is our prayer in Jesus's name, amen.

We're gonna go to the book of Second Chronicles the 33rd chapter, 2nd Chronicles chapter 33 and verse 1, 1 of the interesting Old Testament Bible stories of conversion.

The Bible says in 2nd Chronicles 33 and verse 1, Manasseh was 12 years old when he began to reign.

And he reigned 50 and 5 years in Jerusalem.

This is the story of a boy king when he starts out.

Verse 2 says, but Nasa did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord, like unto the abominations of the heathen, whom the Lord had cast out before the children of Israel.

For he built again the high places which Hezekiah, his father, had broken down.

And he reared up altars for Balaam and made groves and worshipped all the host of heaven and serve them also he built altars in the house of the Lord whereof the Lord had said in Jerusalem shall my name be forever.

And he built altars for all the host of heaven in the 2 courts of the house of the Lord.

And he caused--" this is where this thing gets tough.

And he caused his children to pass through the fire in the valley of the son of Enam.

Also, he observed times and used enchantments and used witchcraft and dealt with a familiar spirit and with wizards.

And he set a carved image, the idol which he had made in the house of God, of which God had said to David and to Solomon, his son in this house, and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen before all the tribes of Israel will I put my name forever neither will I anymore remove the foot of Israel from out of the land which I have appointed for your fathers so that they will take heed to do all that I have commanded them according to the whole law and the statutes and ordinances by the hand of Moses so Manasseh made Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem to err and to do worse than the heathen, whom the Lord had destroyed before the children of Israel." This is 1 of the most interesting stories of the Old Testament kings.

In fact, if you look at the lineage of the kings of Israel, not 1 of them was ever right with God.

Not 1 of the lineage from the Northern Kingdom.

This is a man on the scene and he just rejects everything.

He is worse actually than the heathen, yet he's opposed to leading God's people.

And I want to submit to you that he creates an environment Jewish idolatry, selfishness, pride, thrive.

Do we live in the kind of environment that makes it difficult for us to serve God?

In fact, as a parent and as someone who has been a youth pastor, I can tell you, I don't know.

As a matter of fact, I think I can say this confidently, never in Earth's history has it been more difficult to be a person than it is today.

I mean, when I was a kid, to get into trouble, you literally had to go and get in trouble.

You had to go somewhere and get in trouble Today you can Through social media and the internet and get into serious trouble I've had nurses that work for me more than 1 who've had teenage daughters that have ran away to meet some guy on the other side of the country who's several, sometimes many more than several years older than them, and all of it happened on the roof of their parents in their own home.

We live in a different type of time, And it makes it so that it's more difficult for us to be like Christ.

In that, there are more distractions, more things for us to look at.

And we become by Christ, as I said in the last session, by beholding we become changed.

As the Holy Spirit works on us, and we lift up the image of Christ before us, and we look into his face, as I said, we read the words about Christ, the stories of Christ.

As we study these things, we are transformed.

But comfort, technology, the idea of love, you know we have eclipsed the truth of love.

A lot of people think the highest form of love is a romantic love.

The highest form of love is agape love, it's God's love.

And then when people say they think that The highest form of love is agape love.

And then when people say they think that this is romantic love and romance fails them and their relationships fail them, they often turn their back on love.

But if you turn your back on love, oftentimes it leads to turning your back on God, because God is love.

But this guy Manasseh really got into some mess.

This was an artist's rendition of Moloch.

This is from, I think, the National Enquirer.

The true history of Moloch, the ancient God of child sacrifice.

And it says that Manasseh causes children to pass through the fire.

It's pretty tough to read, but you can see that this is what he this is what Moloch looked like and there's a way that they would handle him.

2nd Kings 21 16, moreover Manasseh shed innocent blood very much till he had filled Jerusalem from 1 end to another beside his sin wherewith he had made Judah to sin and doing that which was evil in the sight of the Lord Manasseh caused his children to pass through the fire, we'll talk more about that in a second, he shed innocent blood, he caused the people to sin, He was probably the wickedest of all the kings of Israel.

And again, I want to show you, you can trust your Bible.

Here is 1 of the stone slabs in the Tofit of Salamabot, which was covered by a vault built in the Roman period.

And you can see the rabbi actually describes it.

A medieval French rabbi, Shlomo Yitzhaki, otherwise known as Rashi, wrote an extensive commentary on this in the 12th century.

Topeth is molech, which was made of brass.

And they heated him from his lower parts, and his hands being stretched out and made hot, they put the children between them, and the fire was burnt.

When it vehemently cried out, but the priest beat a drum, that the father might not hear the voice of his son and his heart might not be moved.

He actually allowed this to happen to his own children.

And let me submit to you, when we talk about God in scripture, understand that the devil wants nothing more than to get at our children.

You know, in America, when I do some of my health talks, I have these amazing pictures of 7-Up Cola.

I don't know if you guys ever had 7-Up as a cola down here.

And I have pictures of little babies, 1 and a half years old, 2 years old, guzzling down 7-Up.

And you see these companies understand that if they get you hooked to a product, when you're a little kid, you will be a loyal customer for the rest of your life.

Satan understands that if he can get to our children, he will make them his customer for the rest of their lives.

So the attack and the assault is on our children.

Basically this author, Jonathan Cahn, says all of these Old Testament gods, not just Moloch, but Baal and Ashtaroth, all of them have resurfaced in Western society.

I don't agree with everything the guy says, but I will say something spiritually is changing.

This way that Manasseh corrupted Judah in his day, it is as if our society is being corrupted as well.

So Pew Research Center says more Americans now say they're spiritual but not religious.

You're going to hear more and more People say, no, I'm spiritual, but I don't do the religious thing.

Jay-Z, world famous rapper, was being interviewed, I think maybe it was by the Breakfast Club or 1 of those morning shows.

And Jay-Z said, I'm not a part of any organized religion.

He basically, I'm Paraphrasing, he basically said, I'm not stupid enough to join an organized religion.

I want to submit to you that this is what I believe is 1 of the devil's ploy, to make you think that somehow you can move outside of the organized religions and find God by yourself, although the Bible says that we should forsake not the assembling of ourselves together.

There's this idea that somehow I can figure out my spirituality without your help, even though the Bible says, confess your faults 1 to another that you might be healed.

And so there's this idea that, look, I can be spiritual, I can figure this out on my own.

And as the Eastern religions begin to sweep in, this idea that you are inherently divine has cropped up in a lot of people.

Well, you can see, I won't go through this 1 too much.

You can see those that are religious and spiritual are on the rise.

And there's this whole thing, spiritual but not religious going up.

Back to Menu

Series

Faith in Action

Being Remade to be Like Christ

Transcript

Parent Series

Sponsor

Recorded

The True Medical Missionary

56m

What is Righteousness by Faith?

The Answer to Our Deficiencies

57m

Restoring the Joy

49m

Being Adventist

The Terrifying Tyranny of Adventist Eschatology

1h 7m

Lost in Paradise

42m

It's Time Someone Finally Told You the Truth About...

The Human Nature of Christ - Part 2

51m

Back to the Mission

The Battle Cry of the Remnant

1h 1m

Surviving the Surge

42m

Personal Preparation

Personal Preparation- Part 3

1h 9m

Summary and Conclusion

39m

In Such a Time as This

The Good News of the Judgment

56m

Is Creation Important to SDA Doctrine

55m

Sound Doctrine