They Refuse to Listen to God, Pt. 1

Ronald Weinland

April 17, 2021

Well, perhaps a matter of age but it seems like sometimes that time seems to be flying and then there are other times I kind of wish parts of it would fly a little faster. But that’s the selfish side. It’s amazing today it’s only four weeks now until Pentecost weekend. That’s coming rapidly upon us.

Today we’re going to begin a new sermon series that does tie in with the Pentecost weekend. I’m not certain it will be continuing by that point, but very likely will be.

This new series is entitled They Refuse to Listen to God.

Over the past couple of months this is a subject that’s been striking me with a growing sense of focus, importance, and intensity. This has been magnified by several things, and one has been the fact that when we have substantially increased the advertising and promotion of this last book, that there is no real meaningful response in the sense of how people in times past, how we’ve seen a response to different things take place.

A lot of that has to do with the fact of whether or not God is calling people and drawing people, but at this point in time there is a reality that indeed God is giving that opportunity to people but they’re not listening. God has been driving home the point, the fact, that this world has become so very much worse than it was around 2007 and 2008.

Sometimes as we live year by year we don’t tend to think in those terms, being able to make those kinds of comparisons. It’s rather difficult for us to make such comparisons. But the reality is it’s far, far, far worse than it was just at that period of time, and that was twelve to thirteen years ago.

The reality is that mankind has become far more hardened of heart and will not listen to God. That’s just the state the world is in right now, and it’s getting worse, rapidly so just in that area alone. This is because the pride of people has been growing, escalating, if you will, and becoming more deeply entrenched in something that happens in the mind, if you will, the heart of people.

I think of the fact of this matter of advertising. I think of some of the responses, which is more to point today than it was even back then, of how people might respond to certain things, and it’s incredible. We got to a point where we just took the comments off because some of them are so stupid and off the wall and so far out. It’s just hard to think that mankind thinks like that even. It’s just astounding sometimes. It’s hard to deal with.

But I think of the attitudes of showing something that the name of Christ is actually Joshua and it’s like, “Who cares if we call him Jesus or Joshua. That’s no big deal.” Well, it isn’t to them.

Or the fact that he was nailed to a pole and not to a cross and it’s like, “He’s our Savior. What does it matter how he died?” And it boggles the mind. “It doesn’t matter. These things aren’t really of big concern, how things took place,” as an example “the matter of three days or one and a half days that he was in the tomb… Why does that matter?”

We’re just talking about a physical plane here of something that people could look at, take a look at as far as what scripture has to say, and realize there are some things you could look at just on a physical plane and learn, grow just in carnal, human knowledge. But people don’t care.

Well, there is a combination of reasons for why this kind of attitude has changed and why the heart’s becoming more hardened. Because it is becoming more hardened, just like in the time of Pharoah, just like in the time of what happened if you want to talk about when the children of Israel were brought out of Egypt, when it talks about the hardening of the heart. The same sort of thing that happened before the day of Noah and the like, which we’ll talk upon as we go through this particular series.

But to realize why some of these things are happening it’s good for us to stop and pause and think about it. But a lot of it has to do with the events that happen to be turning people more and more inward. This is what happens. It’s happened at different times in history where even nations, communities turn inward. We see that happening in a very big way, even especially with the boost of Covid. People are turning more inward and people exercising more control over people and it’s about power. It’s about vanity. It’s about pride and some of the things that human beings, the games that human beings play, politics and so forth that is so ugly, so nasty. There is no end to it. It just gets worse and worse and worse. You think, “Can it get any worse?” It just gets worse and worse and worse.

But people are turning inward and that’s a very dangerous thing because it tends to make the heart become more hardened, because you don’t care about others. You don’t care about other nations, it’s just “our nation,” wherever you might be, whatever nation you’re living in. It’s about “our prosperity.” It’s about what “we” need to do. Like China and other places, their people are being taught, if you will, to think in a certain way, to respond in a certain way. Candidly, much of it has to do with preparing for war. It’s just a norm for them but very much inward to where people are justified in the things they do then to other countries.

So, there is no bringing about peace in this age. There is no ability for people to try to bring about peace. It’s just gotten to a point where everything is headed toward a great war. That’s just a reality of life. But the world even there shuts themselves off from that reality. They don’t want to consider it fully, although there are those who are saying it more and more.

But it’s like, “Oh, ho-hum, a war coming. Probably won’t be nuclear.” Others saying, “It’s going to be nuclear.” It’s just the insanity of the human mind today, of how people are thinking. No soundness of mind, no sound reasoning as a whole. It’s just getting worse and worse and worse.

It’s also due in large part to the fast growth of people becoming slaves to the wrong use of technology. That’s why I’ve tried to warn the Church at different times, “Don’t become a slave to technology.” Hence, a long time ago we addressed Facebook—God blessed us with that—of putting all your information out there and throwing everything out there for everyone to see, to know about. Then how it’s misused, mishandled by other people, and how people get trapped in that. Because that becomes their life then. On the internet, “What’s so-and-so doing? How are they doing?” Then people begin to feel low about themselves because “Look at others, what they’re doing, and the things they’re putting out there look so great!”

Young people have had a really hard time with some of this stuff to the point of suicide. Suicide! It’s so great now-a-days in the sense of the numbers of people considering it. What was a sign the other day we saw, of teens? I believe it was one in four considering suicide at some point. Think, insanity!

The warnings gone out to the Church, don’t become a slave to technology. Don’t let your cell phone rule your life. Because, candidly, it works it’s way into too many people’s lives where it starts controlling you and your actions and how you react in public, how you do things wherever you might be. It’s like you have to answer it, you have to see. Not only that, now you can have a buzz on your wrist to remind you somebody wants to be in contact, there’s a message out there for you. “Oh, what is it?!” Nuts, absolutely nuts.

This is due to a vast flood of rapidly communicated information today. No end of books, no end of writing. Who could have imagined what the world would be like at the end-time? So much information out there.

And right now, it’s being controlled. I hope you notice this. In the last few years there is more control of what you might put in for a question on the internet now, that there are answers that they want you to have. They choose. They’re choosing what kind of answers you might be able to receive, and others they’re not allowing.

I hope you recognize that change out there because I sure do when going on the internet and looking for various things out there. People are being spoon fed—they truly are—and blind and ignorant to it. What a sick world to allow that kind of control over our minds. Yet it’s taking place right in front of our faces.

And so, today we live in a world where everybody is an expert on anything and everything because they read it on the internet, because it’s right there on the internet. Whatever you want to believe, whatever you choose to believe, it’s out there. It really is!

You want a question about something, you can find both sides of the issue – extremes on both sides of an issue. Really! I don’t care what it is you look up. Absolute insanity. And so, I caution people again, be careful of what you take in into your mind.

And that’s from God.

Sometimes we hear things, and we don’t think about what God gives us and what He inspires to be given, when He gives it to be given, and so forth. We need to recognize the source. Because if God’s not in it, then you just go ahead and do it. Go ahead and do whatever you want to do. Go ahead and listen to whatever. Allow into your mind whatever you want to allow into it. It’s like saying God doesn’t care. Incredible.

So, people, everyone, everyone out here has their opinion. The news is filled with it. I am so sick of watching anything like that out there. It’s just hideous out there. Everybody is an expert. Everybody wants to hear somebody else if they kind of think like they do, so they know what stations to turn to and what ones not to listen to because that’s the way they think.

But all this is a part of God’s plan—incredible—to allow such a thing to take place at the end of an age. God knew exactly what He would give to mankind and exactly when He would give it. Everything that’s happened through time over 6,000 years, when it comes to technology, when it comes to a plan and a pace for that plan, God’s been in charge. Truly has!

He knows the minds of human beings and what they’ll do under every kind of condition imaginable. He molds and fashions certain things. People make their own choices, but He molds and fashions certain things, especially as He is working out His purpose and plan on earth, 6,000 years of it. The very end of the 6,000 years then He’s allowed certain things to take place out here by design.

These things have to take place, we have to live through it, we have to watch what happens, how mankind responds, and finally, the world is going to have to be humbled. That’s where we’re fast approaching. At some point here it’s going to begin to be humbled. But that egg is not easy to break because the heart of so many, millions upon millions, into the billions, is so hardened it will not turn to God in the worst of conditions on this earth. It will not humble itself. So, they’re going to die. That’s what God says. We’ll get to that as we go through the series. We should know that already.

But it has to be this way for a purpose, by design, because God’s purpose is that when Christ does return there will be a people who will be able to be worked with. Not immediately, because we see what Christ and the 144,000 are going to do. I hope you understand what they’re going to do in the very beginning.

There is going to be a war, one sided war, because everyone who wants to destroy what’s coming themselves will be destroyed. God says He’s going to destroy those who are destroying the earth. Those who resist that government that’s coming, God’s not messing around. It’s not owed to them to live and live on into a new age. On the contrary.

Anyway, we’re fast approaching that period in time and it’s a part of a process of what we’re watching take place.

Anyway, it’s much like, and it’s good for us to go back and look, what happened in Egypt. Let’s start there, Egypt, in Exodus 7.

Exodus 7:10—So Moses went in to Pharaoh, and they did just as the Eternal had commanded. And Aaron cast down his staff before Pharaoh and before his servants, and it became a serpent. Now, incredible things that took place here. Seeing something like that, having something like that happen, be a part of something like that?

Anyway, it went on to say, But Pharaoh also called the wise men and the sorcerers; so the magicians of Egypt also did in like manner with the enchantments or their magic. Now, theirs wasn’t the same because his staff was a staff. Theirs looked like a staff but it wasn’t. It’s just like what might be done by things that happen today with magicians and they do things by slight of hand or whatever and make something appear in a certain way and are able to control that, whatever it is.

Verse 12—For every man threw down… Because when it comes to something miraculous, something that is totally unnatural, they didn’t have that kind of power. No one does. Only God Almighty has the power to totally change something in that regard like this. They didn’t have. They weren’t doing these things from something that was a piece of wood into something that had life in it. They had no ability to do that! I hope we understand that.

For every man threw down his staff, and they became serpents. But Aaron’s rod swallowed up their staffs, swallowed up the other snakes. Awesome!

Now, this had an affect on those who were watching, obviously, and upon Pharaoh himself. This was just the beginning of a process that was working in his life. But as these things happen to him he just became more defiant against God, more defiant against God’s servant, against things he knew weren’t possible. The best of his people couldn’t copy and do the things that Moses did, that Moses told him about that was going to take place that God did.

Anyway, so it says, So Pharaoh’s heart became or grew hardened. So, there are things that cause the heart to become hardened, and it has to do with human nature, obviously, “lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, and the pride of life.” When you are the greatest ruler on earth at that time in the sense of what you know and what you see with other nations, this is a pretty hard thing to take. That’s what was taking place.

To become humbled is not an easy process. I think if we’re not careful, sometimes we think because of what’s going to happen in the future, that people are going to change quickly when things begin to happen, and turn to God quickly. We’ve had the concept in times past of how great the Millennium was going to be throughout the Millennium. But we disregard human nature.

Then what it’s going to be like during the Great White Throne. The reality is when people are resurrected and they lived ugly, hideous lives and their hearts are hardened, they’re still hardened when they’re resurrected. Incredible!

So Pharaoh’s heart became or grew hardened, and he would not heed them, meaning he would not listen to them, to Moses and to Aaron, to the message that God had given through them to give to him. So, he wouldn’t listen.

There is that spirit that grows as far as time is concerned and what we’re living through in this age right now. We’re witnessing something that’s quite incredible. The heart of mankind becoming more and more hardened, more and more deeply set in its ways. And it gets to a point where, can it be changed by the power of God?

God has a desire for mankind, but it doesn’t mean that mankind is going to respond. Candidly, the reality is it’s better to have things happen to bring it all to the surface so you know they will never change, they do not belong in His Kingdom. It isn’t intended that all of mankind be in the Kingdom of God. It isn’t intended.

Sometimes we think that it was because of this concept the world has that God is going to save the world, all of mankind. No, He’s not. That’s not His purpose, to save all human beings. Because you can’t because of free choice, because of the free mind that everyone is given, and in the environments of mankind and because of the nature of mankind and because of choices, this is one of the choices. Just as it was in the spirit realm.

Something that God wants us to deeply, deeply, deeply understand so that when it’s all said and done there will be a family, but not nearly as large as we have thought in times past, not nearly.

You’ve got to want God’s way of life with all your being. There are some pretty tough things said in scripture about those who turn away from, once they have been impregnated with God’s holy spirit and turn from that. It’s not a small thing even there.

So again, So Pharaoh’s heart became or grew hardened, and he would not heed them, would not listen to them, as the Eternal had said. Again, because of events, because of conditions that they experienced or can be experienced that can harden people, strengthen pride, candidly, is what takes place. Pride becomes hardened, strengthened in a person’s mind.

Then the Eternal said to Moses, Pharaoh’s heart is hardened. He refuses to let the people go. In other words, he won’t listen. Surprise, surprise.

Chapter 8. Then there was the plague of the lice. Then after that this is the point we come up to then, Exodus 8:19—Then the magicians said to Pharaoh, This is the finger… So, we’re going through these different things that are happening and finally even they had this response. They said, This is the finger of God. What can any man do?

Well, now, they had a little bit of motive in what they were doing and saying. I hope we understand that, too. Because if they can’t keep Pharaoh happy this could be bad news. They could lose their life. And so, what do they do whether they believed it or not? “This is the hand of God. God is doing this.” Well, they surely full well knew obviously by this point in time there wasn’t a human being that could do it. Because they were the best of the best in being able to deceive people and do the things they did.

So they said, This is the finger of God. And Pharaoh’s heart hardened. It isn’t what he wanted to hear. …and he would not listen to them, just as the Eternal had said.

Exodus 9:4—The Eternal shall sever, meaning “make a distinction to separate.” We’ve read this in times past here. The Eternal shall sever between the cattle of Israel and the cattle of Egypt so that nothing shall die of all that is of the children of Israel. Boy, he’s going to love this one, isn’t he? God knew how he was going to be when he sees indeed they’re suffering and the Israelites now aren’t. They’re slaves, what belongs to him, the power he had over them?

So, instead of acknowledging anything, instead of admitting there’s a power greater than he is or their gods, what he believed in – what he believed in, because, you see, even within what we call traditional Christianity people believe so deeply in the things that they hold on to that to believe the truth or accept the truth is a totally different matter, and it’s not a small thing.

I think sometimes we think, well, it’s going to be easier for them to repent and acknowledge God and admit certain things than it is for Hindu or whatever you want to pick out. No, not so.

So, the Eternal appointed a set time, saying, Tomorrow the Eternal shall do this thing in the land. Then the Eternal did that thing on the following day, and all the cattle of Egypt died; but all the cattle of the children of Israel, not one died. So, all the news came back to Pharoah. He knew it. He was told it, “They’re all dead.” “They’re all alive in Goshen.” Incredible!

Then Pharaoh sent, and behold, there was not one of the cattle of the Israelites dead. He went to find out and so he got news back. So, the heart of Pharaoh was hardened. So, you try to start taking something away from people, to tell them they’re wrong, it’s amazing how hard the heart, the mind can be before they will acknowledge the possibility of something different than what they’re going to insist upon holding on to. Incredible! So, the heart of Pharaoh was hardened, and he did not let the people go.

Exodus 10:1—Then the Eternal said to Moses, Go in unto Pharaoh; for I have hardened his heart and the heart of his servants, to show signs before him. Sometimes when some people have read these things, they look at this is what God did to him and he didn’t have a chance then. No, it’s by the conditions around him. God knew the heart and the mind he had, but He knew what kind of conditions by which he would just progress and get worse and worse, where it would manifest what’s in here, how deep it was.

Things happen in life to manifest where people are and how they think and what choices they’re going to make. God lets us make choices. And so, here it was, He knew exactly what Pharaoh was going to do because of the kind of individual he was, how great he thought he was and so forth, how far he’d already gone in his mind becoming set in who he thought he was.

…for I have hardened his heart and the heart of his servants, to show signs before him. What signs? Miracles that only God could do, no human being can do, Moses and Aaron couldn’t do. But they’re speaking and telling of the things that God has told them and passing that along to them, but he won’t accept it.

I think it’s difficult for the human mind to grasp that kind of mind that would continue to refuse. Yet we’re going to go through a period of time where so many are going to do exactly that. You think, surely people would want delivered from a nuclear war. Surely, people, when they know that there is a power that they can see that’s coming, that’s in the atmosphere and things happening in the world, that surely that would change the heart and the mind of people to humble themselves and acknowledge there is a Great God and look at what is taking place.

But they won’t because they want to hold on to what they have. It’s hard to understand that kind of thinking. It’s hard to understand for the human mind.

It’s hard for us I think sometimes to understand what Satan did, Lucifer did. He had everything going for him. The height of the angelic realm in the sense of power and might and responsibility and beauty that God had given to him of all the archangels, of the three. Look at the choices he made. It’s like, how is that possible?

Again… and his servants. So, their hearts were becoming hardened through this process as well. They were a part of this. …to show signs before him, so that you might tell it in the ears of your sons and your son’s son what I have performed in Egypt, and the signs which I have done among them, so that you may know how that I am the Eternal.

From the very beginning such powerful things that took place and they recognized what they were living through as they went through all these plagues and God began to separate a people for Himself as a nation, and they began to understand and things that mighty and powerful that’s beyond human ability. Then the Red Sea and all the things that took place there.

But it doesn’t take very long for human nature to come back, does it? Couple of days, no water, what takes place? Sometimes you just have to laugh at human nature, how dumb we can be, really.

So, Moses and Aaron went in unto Pharaoh and said to him, Thus says the Eternal God of the Hebrews… Can you imagine? Right there with that kind of a mind, with that kind of an ego, with that kind of thinking? Really hard to take. It was very hard for Pharaoh to take all this. Truly was.

How long will you refuse to humble yourself? Same thing is true today. How long will people refuse? You know how long? Right up to death. Right up to when they die. Right up to when they’re killed by powers great.

How long will you refuse to humble yourself before Me? Which means refuse to listen, in essence, because it has to do with listening, whether one will humble themselves enough to really listen to what God is saying. What is He saying? Let My people go so that they may serve Me.

So again, incredible the different things we see through time and have happened through time, and things we need to learn from.

So again, this world is in slavery. It thinks it’s free, but it isn’t. The mind of Egypt is very much throughout this world, people in slavery.

Just like I talked about technology. Don’t even acknowledge, don’t even realize what they’re in slavery to – to their own human nature. It’s the mind of Babylon, when you think about Babylon. People are enslaved to that, they really are, to what they grew up believing, that it becomes very difficult for them to accept something different than what they’ve always been told. Because that requires humility. It requires a willingness to listen to something different, that you aren’t so right, that you aren’t so absolute in your mind about what you’re holding on to and what you think and believe.

Incredible, how far the mind can go, just like in traditional Christianity and what people will hold to. I was thinking today as I watched part of the funeral of Prince Phillip, and when they finally got inside the cathedral and then one marching down in front of them with this great big miter on his head. The old fish. They got rid of that which was the Catholic Church, but they didn’t get rid of the fish and the stench that goes along with it, dead fish. (Sorry.)

But you think about human beings and how human beings think and they carry the things on with them because they’re captive to it, they’re enslaved to it. Only God can free us from it.

But to begin the steps of being freed, those are some pretty big steps, and it requires a lot, which begins with humility, which is hard for human beings to taste, to accept, to receive into their life, into their thinking. That is going to always depend upon the hardness of the heart, how far have you gone?

I hope you realize that society has changed so much. I was thinking the other day what it used to be like in different areas where you could leave a car in a parking lot. You didn’t have to worry about it being locked. Leave your doors unlocked wherever you lived. Then slowly but surely things began to change, and people began to turn more inward out of necessity because of the kind of world we live in. But people are much different today than they were when I was growing up. Truly are. Much different.

Mankind has to be shown how far we can go when allowed to, to go our own way. Because there is a certain heart that people have, but in certain environments and what people build and what they make, they don’t understand.

But God wants us to experience those things so we are so deeply convicted as we mature in this life, whatever that might be, in the Great White Throne or during the Millennium or now, until we’re able to be born into God’s Family, that we are so deeply convicted of what God is offering us and that we recognize the mind, the thinking that can never, never, never, no matter how much we might love someone else, that if they will not repent, if they will not listen to God, if they will not change They. Should. Not. Be. In. The. Kingdom. Of. God. God will not allow that.

That’s why everyone is tested. “Will you stand?” “Are you going to stand regardless of what anyone else does?” You, between you and God and what you think, and you’re going to continue to walk on that journey, run in that journey, if need be, and never give up. You’re going to persevere to the end because that’s what you desire with all of your heart and with all of your being. You wished, you desired that people would make the same choices. But you can’t control that!

I know people in God’s Church who have tried to save others. They have tried to save family. They try to save loved ones, or whatever it might be, and to make them go to Sabbath services or go to a Feast or whatever it might be, and you can’t do that! You can’t make people change. You can’t make them think about God, that they want, that they want to listen. They can occupy a chair and cause more harm. Because we lack in understanding in those situations if we try to save someone else. You can’t.

So, it’s offered, it’s given, but the reality is every person, young and old, has to make their own choices, especially when given the opportunity by God to do so. Because the reality is not everyone is ever going to choose God. We may love them, we may want certain things for them, but the reality is you can’t give it to anyone. They have to make their own choice.

The mind of Assyria, which is screwed up government, is deeply engrained in the minds of human beings to where different ones believe their government is right or their idea about government is the best. They’re all wrong! That’s why it’s so wrong for us to take sides in politics or whatever it might be, or governments. There are all sorts of governments around this earth, and they’ve all failed through time, and given enough time, every one of them will fail, because that’s the history. But every once in a while, you get some that think this one won’t fail. It’s like the corporations, “We’re too big to fail.” “We’re too good.” “We’re too great.”

Look at China passing us up by mad as far as this nation is concerned. And people are blind to it. It’s like they can’t face the truth. If time were to go on it would be wise to learn Chinese. Seriously! Like a lot of people have learned English through time because of what happened with Great Britain and then the U.S., and then that influence around the world.

But that influence is waning rapidly, far more rapidly than people seem to grasp and comprehend. Doing it to ourselves as a people. Divided. Divisive. I really hate to see what’s happening take place, but it must, sad to say.

So again, these things of Egypt, of Babylon, Assyria. Talking about that which is spiritual, it’s deeply embedded in the mind. It becomes, the worse it gets, the more the pride in these matters, they become deeply embedded in the thinking, in the minds of people. Such minds become deeply set. Today, we have minds out there that are deeply set in what they’re pursuing.

Just because they see something awesome in the atmosphere or see Christ himself stand on earth and able to disappear like that, they’ll still refuse. They’ll hold on to their ideas, their ways, wanting them. In some cases, demanding them! So, as a whole, they’ll just not listen, and they won’t be humbled.

Psalm 81. Now, as we go along we’re going to talk about a mind that is at enmity against God. Every human being has it. But there’s a mind that can go way past that to where that mind can become set in thinking, to where the heart can become so hardened that it will not listen to God ever…ever. And that, sometimes, I think is difficult for us to grasp and comprehend.

Psalm 81:8—Hear, O My people… If we’re not careful we can read through something like this and think, well, this was to the Israelites. It’s to mankind. Everyone belongs to God. Everything in His creation belongs to Him.

Hear, O My people, and I will testify to you! What does that mean? “I will tell you the truth.” That’s what it means. That’s what He’s saying. “I will testify to you.” “I will tell you the truth.” To come from God Almighty, the truth?

O Israel, if you will listen to Me! So again, we can look at this and think, see, it was just physical Israel. No, it’s not. To all whom God gives opportunity to be drawn, to be called, to listen to Him. But there are those who are going to refuse and not listen at all, who are given the opportunity to become what Israel pictures. Because it’s not about a physical people that He’s saving.

There should be no foreign god among you; nor shall you worship any foreign god. Can you imagine when people begin to be shown there is only one God, there is only one Messiah, one Christ, and every other idea you have ever had about god’s or about God, it’s all a bunch of bunk. It’s false. It’s not true. Lies, lies, lies perpetuated, started by, and fueled by a spirit being named Lucifer, who became Satan.

There shall be no foreign god among you; nor shall you worship any foreign god. So, they must come to recognize God, or hear from God or whom God sends.

I am the Eternal your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt. In time, as a whole, all are going to come face to face with that reality, that truth. Just like in a Great White Throne for those who are resurrected, what a clearer message could ever go out? Human beings, to all of a sudden have life? People who were dead? To see a world they don’t recognize? Well, it’s hard to imagine.

I am the Eternal your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt. Open your mouth wide, and I will fill it. So, we understand that on a spiritual plane, of what God is saying, what He’s showing us.

But My people would not heed, in other words, would not listen to My voice. Regardless of how God delivers that voice, written word, by other voices or whatever it might be, there is that which God is testifying, giving as His truth, as truth from Him of what is true in life.

But My people would not listen to My voice. Israel would have none of Me. So, that sets the example as far as the nation of people. It’s there for a purpose, to show that they couldn’t hear God. They went off and did their own thing. The Jewish people have done their own thing in time to the point when Christ came along 2,000 years ago he condemned everyone in what they were teaching and what they believed, as a whole, as far as those who were teachers because they’d gone off in left field. Then in 2,000 years, they’ve gotten much worse.

That’s why it should be an astounding thing to think there were ministers in God’s Church who began to give credibility to rabbi’s, because they must have known more about the Bible and the Old Testament than what we do, so they’re a source of authority. I think, “Are you stark, raving mad? What is your source of authority? Something that someone has written in a book who doesn’t even have God’s spirit, and you want authority, you want truth from that? What’s wrong with you?”

Verse 12—So I gave them over to their own hearts stubbornness. God lets us choose what we want, and if people want to be stubborn, He’s going to allow that to the very end, if that’s what they want. So again, set ways, being set in their ways as hardness due to pride.

So again, I gave them up to their own stubbornness, to walk in their own counsels. Look at what’s happening in the world. Look at what’s happening in this country today. Look at all the different ideas, the different concepts people have about governing, what they think is right, how to rectify problems and so forth. It’s such a mess, absolute mess!

“To walk in their own counsels.” In other words, in what they think is best or right. That’s all you hear, what individuals think in their mind is best or right, their own counsel, or in someone else’s counsel, and then that becomes their counsel because they can’t think on their own.

Verse 13—Oh, that My people would listen to Me. So, that’s the only way we can be God’s people, truly become a part of Israel, is by listening to God. We understand that. But see, I marvel that the vast majority who ever had opportunity to listen to God quit listening, they turned away from God. They became hardened in heart.

They wanted something else. Most of the times it had to do with sex, just like happens in the world, adultery, fornication. It happens in the world and it’s happened a lot in God’s Church through time. Then on and on it goes; on and on it goes, reasons that people make choices they do. Next thing is money – finances, money, how to use it. “I need that. I need that 10%.” Okay. God lets us use it for something else. Boy, and in that day, to rob from God?

Blows the mind that any human being who ever had opportunity to be impregnated with God’s spirit would do such a thing. And to think that you’re going to get by with it, that you’re not going to get cut off from God immediately? You live in la-la land. You become so weak in your own mind, so hardened in your own heart. What a dangerous thing.

That My people would listen to Me. That Israel would walk in My ways! That’s a beautiful thing. There’s no more beautiful thing in life than to walk according to God’s truth, God’s ways of life. Truly! That God is at the forefront in all your thinking, that you want to honor Him, that you want to yield to the process of glorifying Him and His Son, that you want to bring honor to His throne, not dishonor.

So, we have those kinds of choices to make but these things are sometimes thrown out to the world at different times. Here at the end, it’s there. The reality is we continue to do what we can do where we can, and God says to that level is all that’s needed, and it is a witness of how far the world has gone and what the world is. Sad. Sad that mankind can be that way, but that’s what it is.

To realize that’s why it’s going to be so bad, the war that’s coming. Thank God He says only one-third at the very beginning. Just by one section of that, because there is going to be a lot more. Then when Christ returns, how many more? Another third? More?

God gives opportunities at different times in different ways. He has to mankind as well. But the record of the carnal mind isn’t so great.

I think it’s very good for us, healthy for us spiritually to contemplate, to realize, to know, to understand nothing is owed to any human being. When God gives opportunity for a certain way of life then it’s up to us to make those choices. We have to fight for it, because just like Israel, Jacob, you have to wrestle, you have to fight for this way of life. Self is the main thing you have to fight against and bring it into subjection to God because you want that, you want God’s rule in your life because you have learned, you know that’s the only thing that brings true peace and happiness, fullness of life, real joy of life.

We’re the only thing that can get in the way of that, our choices, if they’re different from what God says is right. What an incredible time we’re living through, we truly are.

Isaiah 1:1—The vision of Isaiah the son of Amoz…

Now, the book of Isaiah very much is about things that happened at the end-time and about a judgment that God’s bringing on the earth and why. Basically, showing the mind of mankind for 6,000 years. But eventually, there is a time for judgment, the execution of judgment, and we’re at that point in time where the world is going to begin to experience that after 6,000 years, in other to usher in a new government, a new world, a new age. Everything comes to a point where finally this is it.

It goes through and talks about the minds of human beings that naturally by nature we all have a haughty spirit. By nature, that’s what we have to fight against, “lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, and the pride of life.” Pride! That’s the battle and we have to choose to engage in that and to recognize the only way we can fight that battle is with God’s spirit in our life, in our minds.

We learn that process throughout our conversion, throughout the transformation in our minds. So, we’re constantly making those choices. What an awesome process. Isaiah goes through and explains many of these things as you read through and we’re not going to take time to read through a lot of it, but over and over again it keeps going back to this thing of what God’s going to do.

He’s going to take the pride out of human beings. Either they’ll be dead, or they’ll humble themselves. That’s what it’s coming down to. As a whole there is still pride. Every human being has pride. I hope you understand what I’m saying. But there is that level of pride that God can’t work with, will not work with in certain instances – like the beginning of the Millennium.

Isaiah 1:1—The vision of Isaiah the son of Amoz which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, Hezekiah, kings of Judah. So, it goes through and talks about a point here of something in Isaiah’s time and what God gave to him, but it points to something far greater in another time as we go through it.

Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth! For the Eternal has spoken, I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against Me. Incredible, the human mind. “They have rebelled against Me.” So, just as far as the earth is concerned, mankind is concerned, we see a world that is so far away from God. Even in traditional Christianity it’s so far away. They use the name, they read stories, but the mind is so far away from what is sound or balanced.

Verse 3—The ox knows its owner and the donkey its master’s crib, but Israel does not know. This is a marvel here even with physical Israel if you look at it, and sometimes, sadly, it carries over into the Church if we’re not careful. Because a lot of people have gone this way. They’ve lost sight of God, God Almighty. Who is God? Who is Christ? They’ve lost sight of it.

“The ox knows its owner, and the donkey its master’s crib, but Israel does not know.” There’s a time when people can lose what they were given to know.

But even looking at humanity, people won’t humble themselves to acknowledge that there is a God. You look out in the heavens... The more science, the more scientific things that we come to grasp and understand, if you will, things of science that we come to see on a true scale in the sense of how small, in the sense of how great, we should be able to marvel, marvel at things around us, but man is so turned inward, mankind, that it’s even difficult for people. They don’t know!

My people do not consider this. In other words, who their owner is, who feeds them. They give certain things lip service, but it doesn’t go very deep.

Verse 4—Alas, sinful nation, a people burdened down by iniquity. If we look at the world and especially where the Israelite nations have gone, who had more of an opportunity and ability to see certain things, to hold on to certain things, and there are certain things that God has blessed them to have because of that lineage and things that have taken place through time.

“Alas, sinful nation, a people burdened down by iniquity.” Sin. Burdened down by it. But the world doesn’t realize that. There is so much sin in this country, in every country of the world. But it’s getting greater and greater and more in the open. There are things on TV today that people should be abhorred by. Yet you go back in time at a certain time and some people freaked out when they saw someone singing a song and he’s shaking his hips, you know. “Can’t show that on TV!” You know, those gyrations. Because they weren’t just gyrations, they had a connotation with it, and they understood that back then.

Today it’s like, “Are you nuts? What’s wrong with your mind?” Well, what’s wrong with their minds? Because their minds are so far gone, in that respect, they can’t grasp those kinds of things, how people dress, why they dress certain ways, what certain things are used for, why it’s done that way, why advertising is like it is, you know, that there may be a naked woman there… well, almost naked. And you think, “What are they advertising?” Oh, and then toward the end they have whatever it is they’re advertising.

Why is the mind like that? Well, farther and farther and farther and farther away from God, misuse of technology, greed, money, whatever it takes, whatever it takes to sell yourself out. People are willing to do it.

“Alas, sinful nation, a people burdened down by iniquity.” Now, they don’t grasp, the world doesn’t grasp it’s burdened down by sin. But it is. Because when there’s a burden like that there’s an oppression, there’s heartache, there is pain, there is suffering.

I think of just the reality alone of things that happen in marriages in the world and people who can’t live together very long and then they go on to another who has had the same situation in their life. “But that’s going to be different. They’ll be different.” Then they turn out the same way and it’s like, you just keep going. This is madness of how mankind thinks. People are burdened down by it. Because a burden hurts, it’s painful, carries a great weight to it.

But what an awesome blessing to live God’s way of life, not to have that. What a blessing it is not to be burdened down by the hurt and the pain and the suffering and the sorrow, betrayal, the things that go with how people live and think in their relationships and how they treat one another. How people treat each other on the job, how people treat each other in government, and on and on it goes, in corporations. There are some nasty things that go on and what people will do.

Alas, sinful nation, a people burdened down by iniquity, a seed of evildoers. Now, when you’re in it it’s like the frog in a pot. Which some get upset and say, “Oh, that wasn’t a true scientific thing that really happened.” It’s like, well, it’s good to listen to it and think about it because there is something you can learn from it if you’ll just learn a little bit. Jump out of the pot, this boiling hot water.

Anyway, I don’t want to go into that. There is the thing about you turn up the fire and you’d think the frog would want to jump out, but if it’s slow it just slowly gets cooked. Whether it’s happened or not is immaterial.

The reality is it’s a good thing to learn from in the sense of this can happen to human beings in how we live our lives because this is exactly what happens. Something happens slowly and we don’t realize what’s happening. Like what happened back in the fifties with this gyration and TV was new and here he is and we’re just going to take him from the waist up. We’re not going to show the rest. We can’t do that on TV yet.

Then after a while, and what do you see today? You see anything imaginable. Some things that couldn’t even be thought of in times past because the science hadn’t developed to a point where people could change their bodies. And you think…? And if you dare say anything about it you can be censored. I mean, that’s the way it is. It’s like, if you speak anything against anything or about something that’s a reality of truth, it’s like you’re an evil person.

You’re an evil person. Where is that coming from? Perverted minds. Minds are so screwed up and hardened of heart they don’t know up from down, front from back. That’s where we are today.

I hate to think what it would be like a generation from now if mankind were allowed to continue on that much longer, of people that are living in this age, of what they’re going to be like farther up the road. Because the reality is it would become so much worse, so much worse that it would be hard for us to grasp how much worse it could become.

They have forsaken the Eternal. So, whether people know God or not is immaterial in this in what we’re talking about, the end of an age. “They have forsaken the Eternal.” It’s just that mankind not only has a heart that is against God, but it’s gotten worse and worse and worse to where it can’t turn back. That’s the scary part. To where a mind can become so gone what’s the purpose in the Great White Throne? Because God already knows them. It’s going to be hard enough. Well, we’ll get to that in the sermon series.

They have, it says, provoked… Sometimes I’m so disgusted with how the scriptures are translated. It’s just they paint God in a way that isn’t true. They put thoughts in the mind that aren’t true. Because the only thing they can equate to, because they don’t have God’s spirit, is something that we’re like as human beings. We get mad. We get provoked at people so easily. “And God can be provoked! Be careful!” That’s not what it’s saying at all. But because of how human beings think, when it talks about the wrath of God, they have no idea. They have no concept.

They think about how man is with his wrath toward someone else because, well, because it’s God He must be justified. No, the reality is when God executes judgment it’s about the execution of judgment. There’s a purpose behind it. He loves His creation. He would that everyone would listen. But He’s given everyone free choice and we’re responsible for the choices we make. And if it’s against God, God tells us what’s going to happen. You’re going to die for all time if you don’t repent.

It says, They have treated—it’s what it’s about—the Holy One of Israel, not “unto anger,” with contempt. It’s what the words are indicating or showing by context here in every fashion and form. They have treated the Holy One of Israel with contempt. It’s about how we, how mankind has treated God through time, how people have thought toward God. …and have alienated (separated) themselves by going away backward.

Therein is the danger. Mankind automatically does that by nature, but even when a physical people knew about God and things of God and had a history and so forth, it didn’t take long for certain ones to begin turning against that because they turned to other gods and there were things they wanted that were against what God had given to them.

Judah was the only one, in that respect, as a whole, that kept a semblance of something that had to do with knowledge on a physical plane of history and held on to that. But it was what they did under their own power in choosing.

So again here, “They have alienated themselves by going away backward.” So, how far will people go away from God? What a horrible thing to think about.

Another poor translation is, in essence here it says, Why do you keep turning away? Why, when you have opportunity? Think about people who have been drawn to the truth. Why do people keep turning away? I could ask the same thing of the Church of God through time, past 2,000 years! Why do some keep turning away? Why the majority turn from God when they’ve been given opportunity, impregnation of God’s holy spirit? What a horrible, hideous thing!

It’s one thing for a nation of people, like Israel did to the north, turn from God and after a time mingled themselves with other gods and so forth, Ashtaroth and Baal and all the other things that they were messing around with, and their minds becoming polluted and distorted and turning away from what Judah held on to.

There is one level of thing there for a physical people to do, but for a spiritual one? They’re both bad, but the spiritual is so much worse. Sometimes we can gloss over these things and not realize the degree to which God holds us accountable, responsible for choices we make.

Why do you keep turning away? The whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint, or as the word means “weakened.” Look at the world today. Look at governments today. Look at education today. Sick! Sick, sick in what’s forced down in universities and colleges upon the students and what works its way then into schools, as a whole. The stupid things that they get involved in that are so important to them? “Have you lost your mind?” Sadly, people have. They’ve lost soundness of mind. What’s more important, indoctrinating or teaching people how to think, leading them, working with them, showing them things along the path?

It’s an endless thing today and you think, where is the balance? Where is any soundness? I feel so sorry for young people today. Those who go through university and what they’re having crammed down their throat? It’s scary. It really is. If time were to go on, what this nation would become is scary. It really is. It’s headed that way already. It’s headed that way already, outnumbered. Going to be outnumbered a whole lot more as time is just going on because the minds of human beings are becoming worse and worse and worse on an escalating scale that is mind boggling, how fast it’s happening.

See, by the time you get to this point here where we are right now? Another year it just goes steeper, straight up, worse and worse and worse, more evil, unsafe, unsound, perverted, distorted, sick, sick, sick.

So, that’s what God is addressing here. “The whole head is sick and the whole heart faint.” Thank God if you can see it. It’s a blessing to be able to see it because there is a vast world out here that doesn’t really see this. They don’t realize how fast these things are happening.

Some do and they give it lip service to a point, and then they give their opinions, and nothing changes. But slowly but surely, they get indoctrinated and certain things in their life and it just gets more confusing to people. Talk about Lot vexing his righteous soul from day to day? We should feel that way by what we see going on around us and wanting to see it stopped.

From the sole of the foot even to the head, there is no soundness in it. So, be careful what you choose to believe that you hear out there, what you take into your life out there that’s on the internet.

But wounds and bruises and raw sores. That’s how God says we should see it, how bad it really is, how sickly it really is. They have neither been closed up or bound up, nor soothed with ointment. There is no healing taking place. It’s just getting worse, sicker.

I want to go through and read some of the news. This is just starting April 3rd till now, news. Now, there was a whole lot more, obviously, that’s so distorted and off the wall. But just want to read some of this stuff it’s coming; it’s happening so fast now. It really is. I hope we see that’s changed of how much this is taking place right now, whereas a couple of years ago it was a long time between stories like this, and then never to the depth of some of these, of what they’re saying now.

It shows the mind and the thinking of people and where the world is right now and that’s the gauge. That’s what we need to be able to see. I think it was Herbert Armstrong used to talk about if you want to know what the temperature is going to be you go down in the basement and look at the furnace and see how much fuel is being put in the fire and you know what it’s going to be. Anyway.

There is some wisdom in that for today that most of us don’t even know what that’s all about. You ever thrown coal into a furnace in the basement? Any hands? See? Yeah, I not only had to get it in the basement into the furnace, but out of the boxcar. Now, that was fun as a kid, scooping it out and throwing it into a truck in order to get it over to the house in the basement to put it in the stove. That’s fun. Coal is fun to work with. Black, sooty, nasty, dirty.

Today we just go push a button. Oh, it’s too hot in here. It’s too cold. Oh, get the button. Oh, do it on your cell phone. That’s even better! Woo! Don’t get up out of your chair, you should just kind of blend in with it in time. Well, anyway.

I’m just going to read different news articles, just parts of them and then the headlines. Just the headlines say it.

“Fears grow WW3 could be triggered 'in a month' as Russian military seen 'on the move.'”[1] “Russian military analyst Pavel Felgenhauer has warned WW3 could be sparked by rising tensions between Russia and Ukraine – and things could really kick off in early May. ‘The crisis has the potential to escalate into a pan-European war, if not even a world one,’ Felgenhauer warned starkly in an interview with Rosbalt news outlet in Russia.”

Anyway, another one here: “Satellite images show huge Russian military buildup in the Arctic.”[2] “Russia is amassing unprecedented military might in the Arctic… This unmanned stealth torpedo…”— speaking here of what is in the midst of this article— “is powered by a nuclear reactor and intended by Russian designers to sneak past coastal defenses -- like those of the US -- on the sea floor. The device is intended to deliver a warhead of multiple megatons, according to Russian officials, causing radioactive waves that would render swathes of the target coastline uninhabitable for decades.”

You think, what is in the minds of human beings to contemplate doing this? They have it for a purpose. Would they use it? People in the states would think, “Oh, nobody would ever, ever do something like that.” How naïve. How stupid. How blind we have become.

“In November, Christopher A. Ford, then assistant secretary of state for International Security and Non-Proliferation, said the Poseidon is designed to ‘inundate U.S. coastal cities with radioactive tsunamis.’”

Who thinks up these things?

“China sent its carrier near Japanese waters because Tokyo and Washington’s encroachment unties Beijing’s hands.”[3]

In other words, that gives them excuse to do something. So, it’s like we just keep pushing and pushing, and after a while they have an excuse. It’s like the stupidity of what this country is doing in NATO, under the guise of NATO, in sending all this military might into the Ukraine. So, if Putin does anything, shame on Putin. But who’s instigating it? Who’s jabbing at the bear? Who’s poking the bear?

What would we do if this was happening off our coastline right next door and up in Canada or whatever, and somebody is bringing in all kind of military might and putting it on your border? Do you think we would take it as a nation? Well, today we might, but anyway…

“Biden Administration ‘On Alert’ Over Russian ‘Saber Rattling In Eastern Europe & Arctic.’”[4] “‘the Western powers have no idea what to do in this situation’; that the clock is ticking; and that ‘at the beginning of May, everything will be ready’ for a Russian military advance – if they want to make one.””

Another article: “Is War Between Russia And Ukraine Now Inevitable?”[5] “At the end of the day: 1. The war between Russia and Ukraine is inevitable, but at the moment (in April), it is very likely; 2. For Russia and the Russian People, war ‘now’ is preferable to war later; 3. The USA now will not fight for Ukraine with 99% probability…”

Well, I’d say it’s probably one hundred. How can these nations think when it comes down to it, when it’s all said and done, we’re going to protect them? We’re going to help them? Japan? Think, what are they smoking?

Another one here: “Moscow holds emergency talks with US over fighting in Donbass as Ukraine says NATO exercises will train troops for war with Russia.”[6] “As part of the wargames, Europe is expected to see the largest deployment of US forces since the start of the 21st century. Around 20,000 American troops will participate, along with a 17,000-strong contingent from NATO member states and non-members like Ukraine.”

Another article here: “Japan Poised To Allow Coast Guard To Fire On Chinese Vessels In New Legislation.”[7]

Another article: “Moscow pledges retaliation to US & UK plans for rocket deployment in range of Russia’s borders, sparking new missile crisis fears.”[8] Then the article goes on to say, “Russia would be forced to defend itself if Western nations go through with plans to station short- and long-range missiles in Europe, a Moscow diplomat has warned, insisting they could be used to target the country’s air defenses.” … “The spokeswoman argued that ‘the British military has now joined in with the openly hostile and destabilizing rhetoric,’ citing intentions to upgrade its missile launch complexes to ‘make it possible to deliver deep missile strikes, in order to neutralize enemy air defense systems.’”

Well, just the conversation itself is mind boggling, that these things are happening.

Another one here: “Armada of Drones Sent to Spy on US Warships Off California and Navy Still Has No Clue Why.”[9]

There is a lot said there. Military doesn’t even have a clue of certain things that are going on and why and who’s doing certain scouting out. And you think, if you’ve got a whole bunch of drones going over all these military sites, oh, must be some bunch of teenagers out there or something. I mean, really, seriously.

“US Sails Carrier Into South China Sea As Philippines Enraged Over China 'Territory Grab.'”[10]

Just getting started in some of this. Three weeks time, over and over again, articles, each one of these can be a moment where war begins. You think, this is insane! But it has to be that way. We’re there.

“Beijing Accelerating Timeline for Possible Taiwan Invasion, Expert Warns.”[11]

Another one here: “'A biological Fukushima': Brazil COVID-19 deaths on track to pass worst of U.S. wave.”[12]

Well, I just threw that in there. Anyway, it talks about the numbers and so forth and problems different countries are having, and this just goes on and on and on.

Anyway, another one here: “Taiwan says may shoot down Chinese drones in South China Sea.”[13]

They’re pushing at each other. They really are.

Another one here: “Kiev's Forces Are Primed For Attack If They Can Overcome Their Own Minefields.”[14] The article says, “NATO’s military attaché and its advisers are expected to arrive on the front line in Ukraine and provide their military expertise in the potential upcoming hostilities. The active movement of military transport aircraft between NATO countries and the Ukraine continues. The United States and its allies continue to saturate the Ukrainian army with military equipment, including UAVs, electronic warfare systems, anti-tank systems, MANPADS and other modern high-precision systems.”

Just pushing at them, poking at them.

“War between Russia and Ukraine seems to be highly likely. Many military-political experts claim that the current situation can only be resolved by a military conflict. Some of them declare a war now is preferable to a war later for Russia.”

There is one from Netanyahu: “Netanyahu Warns Israel Will ‘Act’ Against Iran If Biden Restores Nuclear Deal.”[15]

So, all this tension that keeps going on over there with Iran and they’re now stepping up the centrifuge process of radioactive materials being made for bombs, whatever, nuclear warheads.

Another one here: “COVID-19 vaccination site shuts down after adverse reactions to Johnson & Johnson shot, report says.”[16]

Okay. I got mine. It’s amazing here some of the politics. There’s a lot of money involved in a lot of these things, discrediting different ones and so forth, and a lot of politics involved, too. But there’s a lot of money involved in what goes on out here and people wanting to tear down different ones for different reasons and so forth. There are reasons behind all this. But we swallow all the stuff as far as what we hear on TV.

But anyway, I got a bit of a charge out of this here because they were making this big to-do about different ones who had passed out from receiving the shot. It’s like it’s bad, the shot is so bad people are passing out. And so, they shut down some places at one point here. Well, this happened just last week before the weekend, because we were scheduled to have ours in Indianapolis on the way back from Missouri because I found something online and that’s the one I wanted, so that’s the one I chose and we got it signed up for it.

Anyway, so this comes out and it’s like, well, you know, there are people who, they don’t want shots anyway. It’s like, “I don’t want that in my arm,” and this kind of hysteria that goes around then that there may be something… “I don’t know if I should…” and so they faint. It’s like, okay, that’s just their problem.

I’m going to come back to this in a moment, but I just wanted to throw that in there because I want people to know that, yeah, we all have choices to make. I’ve made mine. My wife has made hers and it is what it is.

Another one here: “Hypersonic Missile Fails Test-Launch From B-52 Bomber.”[17]

Just tell the world how bad we really are when Russia and China already have theirs working really well and they’re bragging about it, and we test fire one and it doesn’t work.

“The U.S. Air Force called the failure of the AGM-183A Air-launched Rapid Response Weapon ‘a setback in demonstrating its progress in hypersonic weapons.’”

I wonder sometimes what other nations think? What would you think if there was going to be a war that’s coming, how they might think would be an opportune time to start it? They’re going to do it. That’s what their plan is. They’re already deciding that. But it’s going to be when and under what conditions. And so, you think, hmmm. It doesn’t take a lot of brains to figure this one out. That should stir us up too, to realize yes, yes, it’s at the door. But it’s in God’s hands exactly what that moment is going to be. But in a moment it’ll happen quickly.

“The U.S military has been racing against China and Russia to field numerous types of hypersonic weapons, which can fly at more than five times the speed of sound.”

Catch up. That’s where you want to be, isn’t it, in this kind of world.

Another one: “China flanks Taiwan with military exercises in air and sea.”[18]

I hope you’re seeing some of these things that do come across in the news from time to time because they’re not little things that are taking place. They just keep pushing more and more and testing the resolve more and more. That’s what a lot of things are going on right now, is testing how far can they go without a response. Because then when you do it en masse…?

Another article: “Not the Onion: …” I don’t even want to read this one because it smells like an onion. I don’t even want to mention her name so we’re going to pass that one up. I won’t even give a hint.

Another one here, talk about soundness of mind: “New York: Illegal Immigrants to get one-time $15,600 stimulus payments if they lost their job during the Covid Pandemic”[19]

Another one here: “Israel shifts focus to Tehran’s sea bridge, strikes Guards ship in the Red Sea”[20]

They’re pushing at each other. Again, a lot of these things going on out there that people in the States aren’t even hearing about as a whole in the news. And if they hear it just kind of passes by because it’s, well, that’s clear over there. Doesn’t mean anything.

“US Mulls Sending Warships Into Black Sea To Be "Ready To Respond" To Ukraine Crisis”[21]

Now, this is going back a little bit. And you think, what progress has taken place now just in the last week here. Why into the Black Sea? I hope you know where geography, Crimea, and some of these different things and some of the things that are important to Russia, Ukraine, the world.

So, I read this at this point because there are going to be some other articles come out later and it’s a time sequence.

“Iran To "Without A Doubt" Respond Against US & Israel For Red Sea Mine Attack”[22]

Another one here: “US Delivers Military Cargo To Ukraine As It Hypes Russian Military Movements”[23]

Just keep poking.

“Turkey Confirms 2 US Warships To Enter Black Sea As Ukraine Posturing Grows”[24]

So, they have to go through that particular area there, again, if you know geography and so forth and the direction these would have to travel. And so, they know when something is coming through, and they’re notified and so forth. So, here they are planning on going in there, the U.S., two warships.

Another article here: “Russia-Ukraine 'days from war' as Vladimir Putin puts 100,000 troops on border”[25] “The Russia-Ukraine crisis could be days from exploding into war with a source saying UK commanders are on "high alert" and monitoring the situation "with growing concern"” “Putin’s navy on Thursday piled on further pressure on embattled Kiev by announcing the deployment of a war-fighting fleet towards Ukraine arriving within days.”

Another article: “China Issues New Threats to Taiwan: ‘The Island’s Military Won’t Stand a Chance’”[26]

So, this is rhetoric that keeps being thrown out there. And with them, generally, followed by actions in time. It’s just a matter of their time.

Now, news April 10 through the 16th. This article “Ukraine redux: war, Russophobia and Pipelineistan”[27]

A lot of the things that end with “stan.” Anyway, pipeline.

“Ukraine and Russia may be on the brink of war – with dire consequences for the whole of Eurasia. Let’s cut to the chase and plunge head-on into the fog of war. On March 24, Ukrainian President Zelensky, for all practical purposes, signed a declaration of war against Russia, via decree No. 117/2021.”

Another one here: “Active War: Putin’s robot army to be deployed at Ukraine border with 85,000 troops ‘ready for conflict’ as war tensions mount”[28]

Another article: “Iran Starts Up Advanced Centrifuges In Nuclear Deal Breach”[29]

“US and South Korea Reportedly Believe Pyongyang Soon to Launch Its First Ballistic Missile Submarine”[30]

Just what we need.

“Power failure at Natanz [Iran]: Accident or US, Israel cyberattack?”[31]

So again, things that…things people don’t see out here, they don’t think about. And if they do, they don’t really care. You think, so much going on it’s incredible.

“Incident At Natanz Not An accident, Damage worse Than Iran Revealing”[32]

This is from the Jerusalem Post, so the Israeli’s pretty much know what’s going on there, so they want everyone to know what happened.

Another article: “Ukraine, Taiwan... Two-Pronged US Aggression Toward Russia, China Escalates”[33] “Such a multipolar world of equals is anathema to the United States and its imperialist pursuit of unipolar dominance. The latter configuration is essential for maintaining the dollar as the world’s reserve currency which, in turn, is vital for propping up the U.S. economy.” … “It is therefore logical, if not execrable, [(Very bad.) Not a word that I normally use; very bad, in other words. That’s what it means.] that Washington appears to be accelerating on a collision course against Russia and China. The speed and recklessness is correlated with the growing sense that the American Empire is in terminal demise. The Ukraine and Taiwan are providing the U.S. with a two-prong attack against Russia and China and what Washington views as its last chance to grasp on to a world that is disappearing before its eyes. America’s reckless and delusional gambling is placing the world in an extremely dangerous situation. Its rulers and their political flunkies are flicking matches at a powder-keg.”

Well, again, that’s how one group of people think and believe, and yet you think about what’s taking place, and at the fact that it’s in the news and how people are thinking. That’s what we get out of these things, it’s how people are thinking and how much this is in the news now, all these things that are taking place around the world. And it’s like even though its increasing, people become numb to this.

It’s like what happened before WWII, but it happened so much slower. Yet there was news that was out there. But what did anyone do? But today it’s happening very fast, very quickly, and it’s far, far worse.

Another article: “Next stop, the apocalypse? The bumbling Biden administration’s claim to fame may be jumpstarting World War III”[34]

This is an RT op-ed, so again, the source, Russian Television, their thoughts.

Another article here: “Japan Decides To Dump One Million Tons Of Radioactive Fukushima Water Into The Pacific; IAEA Approves”[35]

Of course, that’s not making the Chinese very happy either and they said, “You should drink it to show it’s safe, be willing to drink it before you dump it in there.” Yeah, that’s going to happen.

“Setting the Scene for Global Destruction. Now It’s the Arctic”[36]

Again, over and over again, all these things about war and US and NATO and Russia and China and how people are antagonizing each other, and it’s just mounting up.

“Russian Warships Deploy to Black Sea Amid US Destroyers' Arrival as Ukraine Tensions Grow”[37]

Another article. So, they’re sending theirs making it clear here now you’re coming in, it’s been notified through Turkey, obviously through that area there with two warships now. We’re letting you know that there are other warships being deployed here. That’s what Russia is saying.

Another article here: “Ukraine claims Putin is preparing to deploy nuclear weapons to Crimea as tensions ratchet up further and Russia holds live-fire drills in the Black Sea ahead of the arrival of first US warship into the region”[38]

Another article: “US Notifies Turkey of Cancellation of Passage of 2 Warships Through Bosphorus, Turkish Source Says”[39]

So again, it’s this testing, how far, what will they do? Well, they backed out. They don’t really want a conflict; they’re going to leave. Don’t worry. So, what does that give? Green light. Not going to stand up for them. Not going to take a stand for them. So, people know it. Incredible what’s going on.

“Washington's decision to cancel its scheduled deployment comes hours after a squadron of warships from the Russian Black Sea Fleet took to the waters to conduct artillery fire exercises.”

Another article: “Joint CDC and FDA Statement on Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 Vaccine”[40] “As of April 12, more than 6.8 million doses of the Johnson & Johnson (Janssen)…” Comes out of the Netherlands with work, I guess from some in Belgium too. That’s where it was developed. …the Johnson & Johnson [as it’s called here in the States] vaccine have been administered in the U.S. CDC and FDA are reviewing data involving six reported U.S. cases of a rare and severe type of blood clot in individuals after receiving the J&J vaccine. In these cases, a type of blood clot called cerebral venous sinus thrombosis (CVST) was seen in combination with low levels of blood platelets (thrombocytopenia).”

And I thought I’d just read this too: “Cerebral venous sinus thrombosis (CVST) occurs when a blood clot forms in the brain's venous sinuses.”[41] “The incidence of cerebral venous thrombosis (CVT) varies between studies, but it is estimated to be between 2 and 5 per million per year.”[42]

But you don’t hear that.

Another one I thought was unique and put out there… In other words, there are some things that happen out here for a reason and everybody has to weigh those measures in their own lives. So, which is it? Well, everybody has to decide for themselves.

Anyway, I thought this was interesting: Tylenol. “About 150 Americans die every year from acetaminophen (which is, I guess that’s what it’s called) poisoning. In fact, that figure's actually a fairly conservative estimate. Over the summer, Time reported that closer to 500 people die in the U.S. from overdosing on acetaminophen, with another 55,000 to 80,000 ending up in the ER for the same reason. And it's not just Tylenol—the ingredient also appears in Excedrin pain tablets, Sudafed sinus pills, and hundreds of other over-the-counter products.”[43]

So, it doesn’t matter what happens in life and what’s taken out there and how you take it and for what purposes. Everyone has to judge for themselves what they do and how they do it.

But it’s coming back. It’s going to be given and people have to make their choices. Let’s see, one out of 6.8 million people died from this. Six others, I think it was, had to be hospitalized and worked with on this. So again here, some of the reasoning behind some of these things sometimes blows my mind.

Oh, this is where I wanted to interject this, letting everybody know yes, indeed, that my wife and I have the Janssen, Johnson & Johnson vaccine, and that was our choice. Everyone has to make their own choice. But I do want to say that we’re going to make a change in how we observe some of the things we’re observing as far as congregations are concerned when you come together.

If you’ve had the shots of anything, of any of those things, from now on in services you don’t have to wear masks, okay? We’re going to do that as far as a Church is concerned. And you don’t have to in fellowship. So, that’s in here.

But when you’re going from inside of a building until you’re actually in the room, you need to wear your mask because that’s what they require. What we do here on our own is our business and so forth in how we’re doing it. So, this has to do with if you’ve had the shot. This is where we’re going to act upon this as far as the Church is concerned.

And others that haven’t had it, for your protection, for your safety, because of safety of the Church then you need to continue to wear it. That’s just.. There has to be some kind of a guideline we go by and that’s what we’re going to go by at this point in time.

So, I think of Early and what he has, what he’s been going through, and I don’t want anyone having the situation where it causes a big problem in that sense as far as the Church is concerned.

Another article here: “Guns Of April And Global War”[44]

Isn’t that crazy, read a headline like that? “Guns of April and Global War.” You wouldn’t see a headline like that two years ago, a year ago, three years ago. You could scour anything you might find, some crazy rag on the grocery store stand of some of these far-out things that sometimes like spaceships along with the alien things and pictures of aliens. And don’t forget bigfoot. You might be able to pick up something about a WWIII thing or a global war, but not in regular normal daily news. Incredible!

“Guns of April and Global War” “Russia has been very clear. It will not allow Kiev to reacquire Crimea or the Russian-aligned breakaway proto-states of Luhansk and Donetsk. It has responded to Ukrainian President Zelensky's signing of Decree No. 117/2021 directing the Ukraine Army to recapture and reunify these areas by flooding the Ukraine-Russia border with weapons, troops, tanks, and elite paratroopers. [And then the article says…] Russia is ready for war.”

Then the next part of this article farther down. “China has been very clear.  It considers Taiwan a renegade province and the Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea and the Spratly Islands in the South China Sea as territorial possessions.  It has promised to use military force to safeguard these claims and has built artificial islands in disputed territorial waters and sent fleets of "fishing vessels" to surround disputed island chains.”

And so, they’re talking about a lot of boats, a lot of ships that have been sent out now just in this past week. Then it says, “China is ready for war.  And Taiwan is ready, too.”

Then another one here: “Israel has been very clear. It will not allow a nuclear-empowered Iran to become a Damocles sword threatening Israel's very existence.” And then it says, “Israel is ready for war.”

And that’s the kind of world we live in right now. They’re talking about it more and more. Just a matter of time, and we understand it’s God’s time.

Then one last one: “Stop the ‘saber-rattling’ & begin de-escalation before Russia-Ukraine conflict turns into ‘nuclear holocaust,’ Gabbard tells Biden”[45]

Sad world we live in right now because we know where it’s headed and what’s going to take place. So again, I think it’s good for us to be sobered by realizing how that the pace of all this, how fast all this is happening and taking place right now, and it’s escalating. Because this is even starting to get in on local news. At different times you see some of these things actually coming out, that they’re talking about. Not that people grasp it, because they don’t, as a whole, but the fact that they’re talking about it says a lot. It really does.

So, as we look at some of these things, news in the world helps to manifest the truths about how mankind continues to get worse and worse, and where we are, and that mankind is headed for a final war.

Jeremiah 7:22. Returning to look at a place where God speaks about this attitude of mankind. And there are some verses in Jeremiah that are so typical for today, they truly are, of this end-time.

Jeremiah 7:22—For I did not speak to your fathers, nor commanded them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices. But this thing I did command them, saying, Obey My voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be My people. Walk in all the ways that I have commanded you so that it may be well unto you. But they did not listen, nor incline their ear, nor walked in the counsels and in the… It’s not “the imagination,” but the word is stubbornness here. Basically, set in their own way. That’s what it’s talking about, of their own evil heart, and went backward and not forward.

So again here, it’s talking about a particular time, but this isn’t written for that time. That’s what we have to understand by so many things that are written in prophecy. We can read through them of something that was a type of something to take place, but the vast majority of all this, these prophecies, Isaiah, Jeremiah, on and on it goes, they’re for now and things are happening that fit into these things.

Now, that’s why I think of the scripture that talks, in essence, about “Who can help but prophesy,” as you talk about the world, world news, the world the way it…the state of the world and what God has said would be at the end time.

Verse 25—Since the day that your fathers came out of the land of Egypt until this day, now up all the way, I have even sent unto you all My servants the prophets, daily rising up early and sending them. Yet they did not listen to Me. So, the reality is that’s the way of mankind, that’s the way it’s always been, that’s the way Israel was. But it’s the way of the world today in a very powerful and profound way, worse than any other time except one.

Yet they did not listen to Me, nor inclined their ear, but hardened their neck and have done worse than their forefathers. And today that can be said, especially this nation and of the Israelite nations.

Therefore, you will speak all these words to them, but they will not listen to you. You shall also call out to them, but they will not respond to you. I think of what it said in the other book, “If you will listen God will listen.” People don’t care, not even a few. Not even to all that it went to and all that took a look at it, that didn’t go very far or even read the whole thing. No response. No change. Incredible. It reflects a spirit and a mind and where the world is right now more than ever.

You shall call out to them, but they will not respond to you. So say unto them, This is a nation that does not obey the voice of the Eternal their God. They will not receive correction. Truth has perished and has cut off from their mouth.

So again, the purpose for reading that is just showing here, talking, showing, in essence, stating maybe is a better way of saying it, this is the world we live in today. This wasn’t just about them and something that happened back then a long time ago. It’s about where we are now in the world and the world not caring, and how much worse it’s gotten since the days of Herbert Armstrong. Much, much worse, and the evidence is all around us.

[1] https://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/world-news/fears-grow-ww3-could-triggered-23847342

[2] https://edition.cnn.com/2021/04/05/europe/russia-arctic-nato-military-intl-cmd/index.html

[3] https://www.rt.com/op-ed/520158-china-carrier-japan-tokyo/

[4] https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/biden-administration-alert-over-russian-saber-rattling-eastern-europe-arctic

[5] https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/war-between-russia-and-ukraine-now-inevitable

[6] https://www.rt.com/russia/520211-emergency-talks-us-donbass/

[7] https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/japan-poised-allow-coast-guard-fire-chinese-vessels-new-legislation

[8] https://www.rt.com/russia/520218-retaliation-us-uk-rocket-deployment/

[9] https://sputniknews.com/military/202104061082555615-armada-of-drones-sent-to-spy-on-us-warships-off-california-and-navy-still-has-no-clue-why/

[10] https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/us-sails-carrier-group-south-china-sea-philippines-enraged-over-china-territory-grab

[11] https://www.theepochtimes.com/mkt_breakingnews/beijing-accelerating-timeline-for-possible-invasion-of-taiwan-expert-warns_3759688.html

[12] https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/a-biological-fukushima%3A-brazil-covid-19-deaths-on-track-to-pass-worst-of-u.s.-wave-2021-04

[13] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-southchinasea-taiwan-idUSKBN2BU1CV

[14] https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/kievs-forces-are-primed-attack-if-they-can-overcome-their-own-minefields

[15] https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/netanyahu-warns-israel-will-act-against-iran-if-biden-restores-nuclear-deal

[16] https://www.foxnews.com/health/covid-19-vaccination-site-shuts-down-after-adverse-reactions-to-johnson-johnson-shot-report-says

[17] https://www.defenseone.com/business/2021/04/hypersonic-missile-fails-test-launch-b-52-bomber/173186/

[18] https://www.cnn.com/2021/04/07/asia/china-taiwan-military-surrounded-intl-hnk-scli-ml/index.html

[19] https://news.yahoo.com/york-offer-covid-relief-payments-183520365.html

[20] https://www.debka.com/israel-shifts-focus-to-tehrans-sea-bridge-by-striking-guards-ship-in-the-red-sea/

[21] https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/us-mulls-deploying-warships-black-sea-be-ready-respond-ukraine-crisis

[22] https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/iran-without-doubt-respond-against-us-israel-red-sea-mine-attack

[23] https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/us-delivers-military-cargo-ukraine-it-hypes-russian-military-movements

[24] https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/turkey-confirms-2-us-warships-enter-black-sea-ukraine-russia-posturing-grows

[25] https://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/latest-news/russia-ukraine-days-war-vladimir-23880564.amp

[26] https://www.usnews.com/news/world-report/articles/2021-04-09/china-issues-new-threats-to-taiwan-the-islands-military-wont-stand-a-chance

[27] https://asiatimes.com/2021/04/ukraine-redux-war-russophobia-and-pipelineistan/

[28] https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/14604655/russian-tanks-missiles-ukraine-border-us-warships-black-sea/

[29] https://www.ibtimes.com/iran-starts-advanced-centrifuges-nuclear-deal-breach-3178452

[30] https://sputniknews.com/asia/202104111082596315-us-and-south-korea-reportedly-believe-pyongyang-soon-to-launch-its-first-ballistic-missile/

[31] https://www.debka.com/power-failure-at-natanz-accident-or-us-israel-cyberattack/

[32] https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/incident-reported-in-iranian-natanz-nuclear-facility-664792

[33] https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/ukraine-taiwan-two-pronged-us-aggression-toward-russia-china-escalates

[34] https://www.rt.com/op-ed/520832-apocalypse-biden-administration-china-russia/

[35] https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/japan-decides-dump-one-million-tons-radioactive-fukushima-water-pacific-iaea-approves

[36] https://austrian.economicblogs.org/lewrockwell/2021/author-global-destruction-arctic/

[37] https://sputniknews.com/military/202104141082628716-watch-russian-warships-deploy-to-black-sea-amid-us-destroyers-arrival-as-ukraine-tensions-grow/

[38] https://blackchristiannews.com/2021/04/ukraine-claims-putin-is-preparing-to-deploy-nuclear-weapons-to-crimea-as-tensions-ratchet-up-further-and-russia-holds-live-fire-drills-in-the-black-sea-ahead-of-the-arrival-of-first-us-warship-into-th/

[39] https://sputniknews.com/world/202104141082632016-us-notifies-turkey-of-cancellation-of-passage-of-2-warships-through-bosphorus-turkish-source-says/

[40] https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2021/s0413-JJ-vaccine.html

[41] https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditions-and-diseases/cerebral-venous-sinus-thrombosis

[42] https://www.ahajournals.org/doi/10.1161/STROKEAHA.116.013617

[43] https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/09/150-americans-die-each-year-from-tylenols-most-active-ingredient/310814/

[44] https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/guns-april-and-global-war

[45] https://www.rt.com/russia/521285-conflict-nuclear-holocaust-gabbard/