Understanding Government, Pt. 2

Ronald Weinland

June 4, 2020

Today will be Part 2 of the continuation of the new series entitled Understanding Government.

As it was brought out in Part 1, God’s ways have everything to do with righteous judgment. This is something that hasn’t been really well understood in God’s Church over a long period of time, about what government is. We think we all know and understand it, but it isn’t that simple. One of the primary things we’re focusing on right now as a matter of government is judgment, and that becomes more important as we go through this particular series, what that’s all about.

So, we are to learn righteous judgment, how to judge, because we have to judge things every day of our life, situations, and matters, especially in contrast to what God says we’re to live and how to live. That requires a matter of judgment. And so, we are to learn those things. It isn’t just a matter of knowing about God’s laws and God’s ways, it’s a matter of how to implement them in our lives, when and where and how, and all the things involved in that.

I think a good place to begin here would be to start exactly where we left off last week in Part 1 back in Romans 11. We’ll go back through those verses and then continue on.

But something I wanted to point out today here too, is that Romans 11 goes right into Romans 12. Sometimes as we read through things of the Bible people will go through a chapter or read certain parts of it, maybe even begin with Chapter 12 not understanding that, wait, what is the context? Because oftentimes you can pick up more.

Man put in the verses and the chapters and so forth and in this particular matter before you get into Chapter 12 (which is an awesome section here in the very beginning, of what we’re being told), it’s important to notice the context of what is said in the verses preceding this. That’s why this is that much more important, to understand what is being discussed.

And I have to say, too, that we came out here to Arizona a couple days earlier. I think I’d mentioned it, that when I come out here sometimes when we travel, like three time zones away, we try to stay in the same region. If we’re coming out west we try to go to some other location without going back to Cincinnati and coming back a second time, and especially with air fares and everything going up like they are it almost works out better anyway.

Then to begin to work on the sermon series, or the sermons, I should say (series), sermons for the Feast of Tabernacles. So, I think this is probably earlier than normal. I generally get started toward the end of June, the beginning of July on these, but this year I wanted to get started a little earlier. This helps those who are translating get their portion done because they get the outlines and they’re able to at least give outlines in the different languages and so forth for people at the Feast. That’s difficult because they’re doing weekly sermons as well, translating those, and so this helps them if that’s done in advance.

So, I’d mentioned that to everyone and really had no idea what I would be going into as far as the Feast is concerned. From year to year, I really don’t until it’s that time to begin thinking about it and praying about it and asking for whatever is to be given this year, that I begin to see it. Especially since I’m starting earlier, praying in that vein. I am dumbfounded, I really am. To me, this year is going to be very much akin to 2005, and if you know what was given in 2005 that should mean a lot. This is in an order of things that God is giving before Christ comes, before that government is established on this earth, of things that are being placed in the Church.

And so, this year is going to have an incredibly unique focus that is absolutely awesome! Then on top of that, to realize that the first sermon that I’ll be focusing on at the Feast this year has a lot to do with this subject. It’s a follow-up to some of this but has a lot to do with this.

So, for me personally, and I hope for the Church, as you see these things—that’s why I mention them and point them out—so that we can be in awe of how God works. Because everything is in order. God has things planned out. We just went through a series that shows how God planned things out before mankind was ever created.

All those things that we went through in the stories of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and Joseph, they didn’t just happen, and God didn’t just decide to do a certain thing with a certain family. “Well, I think we’ll have a nation of people come out of someone now. Abraham, I’ll work through him.” God didn’t work that way! He planned everything in ways that we can’t begin to comprehend with the pea-brains we have.

God is so far above and beyond us we can’t even begin to grasp it. That’s why I mentioned, I think it was last Sabbath or the Sabbath before, how that even once people are in the God Family, spirit in composition, minds that are far, far superior, obviously, to what we have now, it’s going to take us a long, long time. God is going to continue to lead us, teach us things that we have never known.

That’s an incredible thing, because if you ever stop learning that would be a shame, in the sense of human life, but especially in life that goes on and on and on. How can we comprehend what we could be doing for a thousand years? How could we comprehend what we would be doing for a hundred thousand years? How can we comprehend as human beings that we’ll be doing things for a million years, or a trillion? We can’t think that way! And time, obviously, to us will be a little bit different, in that respect. But anyway.

There are things that we’re just barely scratching the surface on in this life. That’s why it becomes to me even more dumbfounding when you think about how much Abel knew, the first man of righteousness. It wasn’t Adam, it was his son. And you think of how God began to work with Abel in a very unique way and what was given to him, and then you go all the way up to Abraham after the flood, long after the flood. Well, not too long, but long after as far as our time is concerned, and you see God beginning to reveal more, but not much in the sense of things we know today.

Then to Moses, finally when it was time to bring them out of Egypt. All this progressive part of human life and how God has revealed that we should stand in awe of it. The more we know, the less we know, or we know that we know less. It’s an awesome thing, it really is. It’s hard to find words to even describe it sometimes, how incredible it is that God is leading us.

So, this Feast is going to be an incredibly unique and exciting Feast for God’s Church…so much so that I’m asking everyone who transcribes anything that you not tell another person. Not your mate, not anyone about what’s in it. Because it should be for the Feast, to come out at the Feast of Tabernacles, everything that we’re going to go into and everything that’s being addressed.

Anyone who is transcribing or translating, or whatever you’re doing, it’s for you and for you alone. Those of you who might be in that household, do not try to go in and find out because that won’t be good for you because I’ve made this request and I believe I know where it comes from, and I hope everyone else knows where it comes from. It’s saved, reserved for the Feast of Tabernacles.

So anyway, used to be a lot of carrots. This is a whole bag full being put out there. But anyway, it’s going to be exciting, it really is, and something we need to keep praying about, that God continue to open up those doors, but I already have and have been given several sermons in my mind, of where I'm to go and what I'm to do.

And to me, that is awesome! That’s the best word I can find. Because sometimes I may know a sermon or two and I start working on those and I don’t know what the next one is going to be, I don’t know what it’s supposed to be. Then God opens up the door and helps me to see that and I start working on it. This time it’s kind of like 2005, almost beginning to end of the Feast.

So, it has to do with this subject, and I mention that because this is all planned out. God plans what He gives to us. We are growing. He molds and fashions us and He does it as a Body, as a group of people as well. We’re a very small group that God’s working with at the end to accomplish what is there. It wasn’t God’s purpose that we be as large as we were during the period of Philadelphia and Laodicea, but that we would have an apostasy.

What an awesome thing to understand that, that one of the greatest things in the sense of what mankind is to learn, would be, in that respect, one of the greatest apostasies ever. The one before that that was great and mighty happened in the angelic realm with Lucifer and what he did. He rebelled. His was an apostasy. The next one was what happened in God’s own Church in God’s own people who had access, the impregnation of God’s holy spirit, who had been called to become a part of Elohim, greater than the angelic realm, to become a part of the God Family.

That is mind-boggling to comprehend, what we went through. We have experienced at the end here some of the most incredible things. I think by the time we’re at the Feast some of this is going to come out even more, of how important it is of what God is doing at this end-time and what we get to share in.

I am, candidly, kind of somewhat speechless during this period here in the last few days and now, to think about some of this and to realize life is about sharing and God wants to share with us, and when we’re called to be a part of His Family, begotten of Him, He shares with us.

There is enjoyment in that; there is fulfillment in that for Him. He obviously has been sharing with His Son now for the past 2,000 years, everything that He’s doing. He’s given all authority to His Son to accomplish His will and His purpose.

But for the Church through the past 2,000 years He’s been sharing, and a few before that, obviously, during the first 4,000 years. And to be a part of that? How can you describe it? You can’t. You just have to be in awe of it as you see it come about.

Romans 11:33— Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! Now, that says a lot, because we receive knowledge first; God begins to open the mind and begins to give us knowledge about Himself. He begins to give us knowledge of His plan and purpose, of how to live life, and depending on what part of life in the last 6,000 years people have lived in, that has been given in measure until now. God has just been pouring out more and more and more because of where we are because His Son is about to return.

So, we’re given knowledge. Then it’s up to us. We’re given the ability, in other words, to believe God. He gives us knowledge of Himself, of His plan, and He’s drawing us and offering us of His spirit—not to be begotten yet until we’re baptized—but giving us of His spirit because what has to be revealed to us as far as that kind of knowledge is a matter of God’s spirit. It’s spiritual. His way of life, it’s spiritual. And so, He helps us to begin to understand some of those things before we’re baptized. Then we make choices along the way and we’re able then to begin to believe what He says because He gives us that ability to believe it’s true.

There is no better example. That’s why I use it over and over again. When I went home one night from college, after my third year in college, and my father late at night, around 10:00 at night began to talk to me. We went in the kitchen table, began to talk to me about the Sabbath, Holy Days.

Now, I grew up and if he ever talked about God it wasn’t in a good way. Never went to church. I don’t ever remember him being in church. I didn’t go except maybe at Christmas and Easter with friends, in that time of year. So, it didn’t mean a lot to me. And all of a sudden to hear some of these things, the Sabbath, the Holy Days, Israel, who Israel is today, Ephraim and Manasseh, and what God is doing in the end-time, that we live in the end-time.

Again, I heard it here but immediately I knew it was true. How can that happen? It’s God’s spirit. He gives us of His spirit to help us to know when He gives us that which comes from Him. It’s like switching something of the mind, but it isn’t in the mind until He gives it, but it’s like all of a sudden there is this light. You never saw it before and now you can see it and it’s so clear. It’s so clear! It makes so much sense!

And so, that’s how, in large part, one way or another, each one of us begins a journey. God begins to give us the truth and then we have to decide am I going to live by it? Because once you know it, it’s up to you. God doesn’t force it on us. It’s up to us to choose it. Then what an incredible thing, we’re able to believe it, we begin then to choose to live by it.

That’s what faith is. Belief is given by God, the knowledge, and the ability to believe it is there, to know it’s true. But then to act upon it if we choose to do so, that’s what faith is all about, living by faith. We’re living what we have been given to believe.

So, knowledge is just a beginning. Wisdom follows all of it. Because as we grow with knowledge we begin, which is what we need to do even with this subject matter, to understand it. To understand government is not a simple thing. Many in God’s Church have believed they understood government and they didn’t get it at all. In Philadelphia, very few got it. In Laodicea, even fewer because it was being lost, what God’s government is and how it functions in our lives.

And so, we can hear the words and think we understand it but the proof in our history is there and what we’re like as physical human beings.

Understanding follows knowledge. We begin to see and understand, and this is where judgment begins to enter in. If you understand something and you’re living by it you can begin to exercise it and understanding begins to develop. Understand what? Why God gave us these things. To understand certain laws, why they’re there and why it’s better for us to live that way, and then choosing to live by that. As we live it, that’s what wisdom is. Wisdom is living by what you understand because you agree with God. Wisdom is from God, and it is the word of God, it is the mind of God.

Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments…? Because I’ve just given what the context is all about. Judgment has to come out of this. Understanding leads to matters of judgment. Because we’re exercising certain things we can come to understand it. Just having the knowledge is not understanding it.

That’s where many went astray and have not grasped and comprehended what God is doing and why He does what He does.

…and His ways past finding out! You can’t do it on your own. Matter of fact, you’ve got to fight against trying to do things on your own. You’ve got to look to God and seek His guidance and direction and help in these matters. Because if it comes from us it’s worthless, because it’s always going to be based on selfishness. Always, always, always, always! Because we’re selfish by nature.

Human beings were created to be selfish by nature. We were made physical for this purpose, to be made selfish. Why? Again, so we can come to understand what our ways produce. They produce the ways of Satan. Because it is the ways of Satan. Selfishness is his way. Pride, haughtiness, knowing we know better than God, not listening to God. It’s an amazing thing.

…His ways past finding out! For who has known the mind of the LORD? How can you know the mind of God except God let you see it, except God begin to communicate it to you and help you to see it and open it up to you? This is a matter where understanding begins to come in, to understand why God gives us what He does.

Or who has been His counselor? Or who has first given to Him, that He should owe something back? For of Him, through Him, and to Him are all things. God is the source of everything. Everything comes from God that is good and right. …all things, to whom be glory forever. Amen.

Then it goes on into Chapter 12 [Romans 12:1]. No break. Same context here of what’s being discussed. I, therefore, implore you, Paul is writing by inspiration from God. This didn’t come out of Paul. I implore you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, because God is full of mercy. His way is merciful, and God wants us to receive mercy. …by the mercies of God that you present your bodies a living sacrifice.

I think back in time here through Philadelphia and other times of how this has not been understood by people. How do you present your body a living sacrifice? What is the primary way? You give up self. You fight against self, selfishness that comes out of the human mind, and strive to yield yourself to the righteousness of God, to His ways.

Our ways, all we have to do today is look at this world. It is so sick! And through technology that’s being manifested so much more to mankind than ever before. And if you want to talk about evil in the world?

My wife and I were talking about that, I think, this morning or yesterday, whenever, I don’t remember when. But talking about a period of time—maybe we mentioned it in the car, I don’t know—Sodom and Gomorrah. Everybody, we were talking about that this morning, of how bad the world was at that particular point in time and what it was like before the flood, candidly, before the flood, how mankind was. That was the context of some of what was said, where mankind had to be destroyed finally, a great flood. One family to be saved out of it all.

Again, that didn’t just happen and all of a sudden then God decided, “What am I going to do? We’re going to start all over through one family.” It was planned. God knows what human beings will do, what mankind will do, if you’re given a life that can live up to 900 years old plus. God knew what the world would be like after a thousand years, thousand five hundred years. He knew what we would be like. He knew what the earth would be like, what people would be like.

He created us for that purpose! That we make our own choices. We’re responsible for our own choices and we’re to learn that our choices suck! They produce evil. They produce sorrow, unhappiness, drama to the nth degree in human life. There is so much sorrow and suffering throughout mankind’s history. There really is!

That’s hard sometimes for people to grasp and comprehend. We’re blessed in this country especially, and in the western world, as a whole, if you want to put it in that framework. The rest of the world… We have suffering here, too, but we close our eyes to it as a whole, as a society, when that should be a great focus to help those who are suffering because we have the capacity to do so. But we don’t do it because we’re not able to as human beings.

But the rest of the world, it’s hard and it’s about to get a whole lot harder. Because there is famine that’s already started that’s going to increase so much more, food, basic things for grain, bread, things that people need for sustenance… It’s coming and it’s coming fast on this world, and we’re living there at that time.

So, all kinds of suffering in the world, how people treat each other, how governments treat people, their subjects. Some of it so atrocious, so sick.

Anyway, you can’t help, if you really see these things, to sigh and cry inside, to hurt inside of what mankind is doing to mankind. We’re destroying the earth. Given enough time, if it wasn’t a war, we’re going to destroy ourselves. We’re already doing it big time.

But if our life is going on and we can pay our bills and live comfortably we don’t pay attention. Just like what’s happening in Ukraine. Sickened by that, that already you don’t see it much on TV anymore because it’s easier to look at other things that are, well, “more important,” – two movie stars and who’s going to win the case. Who is going to win? If you’ve watched any TV, you know what I’m talking about.

That becomes important, more important than all those who are being murdered and killed in Ukraine, and children and old people that they don’t have a chance. The slaughter of human life. And what do people do? What is Europe doing? I’m sorry, I’ve got to go on… Sick. Sick. Sick. But it’s a part of the end of the age. It has to happen.

…that you present your bodies a living sacrifice. That’s the choice. This is not mine to do with what I want. The moment I was baptized it wasn’t mine anymore to do with what I want, to do my own thing that’s disagreeable or disagrees with God. But I have because we all have sin in our life. As we grow we are able to work on those things, but we still see sin. We’ll always have sin in our life in this human life, but we’re to fight against it, we’re to strive to conquer it with all of our being.

So, what we might have done in the beginning becomes less and less but we find on a spiritual plane, because we understand more, that there is sin there. We have to repent of those things. It gets more and more refined but there is always going to be that in our life.

But we’re to give self up because it’s hard to give up self. It’s hard to give up our ways, “The way I see it!” “I’m right!” What really irritates me is people who get on the computer now a days and they know everything! I have a hard time listening to it. That’s in the Church a lot, just to be candid with you.

We can get on the internet, study a subject, and think we know it; we understand everything there is to know about it. We’re expert in a particular field, or maybe many fields. “And all you have to do is ask me and I’ll tell you.” “You want my opinion, the way I see it, the way I think is right and wrong?” We’re so anxious as human beings to let people know what we see, what we know, and it’s difficult for us to listen to someone else.

Sometimes because they’re trying to tell us what they know rather than just having family and conversation that binds family together in sharing of life together. We have to get rid of the garbage and the stuff that hurts. Hope we understand that. With God’s spirit we do.

So, it’s a matter of fighting against this, “The way I see it.” Because we all have opinions. The world has opinions. Today you turn on the TV, everybody has opinions. As a matter of fact, I don’t care what the subject is, they bring people on because they’ve written a book. “They have written a book and they are expert in the field, and we want to hear what they have to say.” No, I don’t. I don’t really care to hear what they have to say. I don’t really care to hear their viewpoint because I know what their viewpoint is. It’s screwed up. It’s human. It’s carnal. It’s selfish. They don’t have the answers to everything. God does.

And I hope we can see. They call it “news” today. You think, “Are you nuts?” That’s why I love being able to get some real news when I go to Europe. Their news over there, they have a lot more of it in the sense of what’s really happening in the world and how certain things affect people and hurt people and how things are happening in the world. Whereas over here we kind of gloss over things and throw things out every once in a while that don’t fit into an overall view of the fact that this is a world that we live in, and one thing can affect everything else throughout the world.

…present your bodies a living sacrifice, I may not make it through this today, holy, and this is still last Sabbath’s (we went through this), holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. That’s what we’re called to! This is a reasonable service, to fight against self, to say no to self and to say yes to what is right. Judgment, being able to judge righteously. Not our way.

When we want to spew out our way and what we believe we’ve read out there that’s right and we want others to know about it, is that really what’s important in life? Is that what we need?

Do not be conformed to this world. There we go. Don’t be like this world! Don’t do the same things they’re doing because they’re going the wrong way. Don’t get sucked into the things that are out there as being the know-it-all of everything and this is right.

Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. That’s what God has called us to, to have a different mind. I’m so thankful I’m not what I was when I was called. I’m so thankful that I was called out of that and had a place to begin. Slow process through time, since 1969. Been a lot of fighting along the way, self, and the world around, and a demonic world because they broadcast, but most of it’s right here. Because if we can’t fight self we’re not going to be able to fight that out there. This is where the biggest fight is, it truly is; it’s in the mind.

So, God says, “renew your mind, be transformed.” I love that word – because it’s only used two places – metamorphoo, like a butterfly. From something that’s crawling around and all of a sudden it has this change, metamorphosis, metamorphoo in the Greek. This word is used in the Greek language here, that the whole mind has to become something different, transformed from what it was to something new and different. Beautiful!

How can you get something so beautiful out of something crawling along that looks pretty ugly, you don’t even want to touch it? Well, maybe you do, I don’t know. Some of them have these things that are stuck out of their head, and you think, if it was something that big coming at you… anyway. But a butterfly, who doesn’t like the beauty of a butterfly, the color and so forth?

And what about us? We change, we’re transformed, we think differently, we start to live differently. What people see in us is different. It’s a beautiful thing because it’s not us they’re supposed to see!

We carry the name of God, the Church of God, God’s Church, God’s people. That’s why we learn and understand that it’s not just a physical commandment not to take God’s name in vain, to curse or whatever, because that’s where the world stops, as a whole, and sometimes people in the Church have stopped at that. No, that we not defile His name, not take His name in vain.

We carry His name. We’re a part of the Body of Christ, the Church of God, and so if we as individuals do things that are wrong we take His name in vain. We’re doing this all for the wrong reason then. We’re at that point in time, whatever we’ve done, it brings shame and dishonor and it’s the opposite of what that name is supposed to reflect in our lives. What a beautiful thing to understand.

So, we’re to be transformed by the renewing of our mind. That’s why I love the word “repent.” It means in the Greek language, “think differently.” And so, to repent means that you acknowledge the wrong thinking, and you strive to begin thinking right, in agreement with God.

…so that you may prove, in other words, by what you’re living, so that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. Because this is how we do it. By right judgment, by putting, implementing it in our life we begin to prove that it works, that God’s way works, that it produces fruit, it produces what is good.

For I say, through the grace given unto me, to everyone that is among you, not to think of more highly than you ought to think. See, that’s the problem. That’s why it’s so important that we be a living sacrifice fighting against self, not having this high estimation of our own thinking, our own ways.

…not to think more highly than we should, but to think, the word translated here is “soberly,” but it’s not “soberly” at all. But to think, in other words, to have understanding, is what this is about, according is what the word is, as God has dealt to everyone the measure of faith. Meaning, He has given us the ability to know the truth, to begin choosing to live by it, “to the measure of faith.” We’re very much a part as to what measure of faith exists in our life, as to the choosing and the judgment that we use in implementing His ways in our life. Because He’s given us the ability to do that.

Well, let’s continue on from that point. When I think about this subject I can’t help but think of what was given to Herbert W. Armstrong as the first truth that’s attributed to him in restoring truth to the Church. So, he was called at the end of Sardis, the Sardis era, when God gave different eras that would exist through time of the Church over a period of nearly 2,000 years, beginning with Ephesus up to Laodicea.

In those periods of time different things happen. By the time we got to Sardis and the printing press and so forth, and people beginning to translate, it was being made more available, in other words, a Bible, the word of God, and all these different groups began to pop up. There was only primarily one before that. There were some others, but nothing of note. But there was one great church at 325 AD and things of Latin that were given, that people didn’t know what they were saying in the first place. They didn’t know Latin. But they would give other things in their own language, whatever it was, whether it was French or English or German or wherever people were. And so, they would say other things as well in that big church.

But then other groups began to splinter off of them because they didn’t like that particular group, but they took with them the doctrines anyway, Sunday, Easter, Christmas, all the things they already had by that time. Anyway, you think of some of those things that took place.

And what was happening to the Church during the period? It became very weak. It was, basically, a tremendous attack, in that respect, against God’s people. It was very hard for them to continue on, things that were out there, in that respect. It was God’s purpose to allow for that as well, just like He did with Laodicea.

But by the end of Sardis (we understand our history), there were only three primary truths left. The name of the Church. It didn’t belong to anyone. It wasn’t Luther’s church. It wasn’t some system, catholic. It was called Church of God through time from it’s beginning on, referred to by the disciples, the apostles, the Church of God. And so, that began to be lost in a lot of places through time and the Church was coming to a point of almost losing that, but they still had it.

The matter of first tithe. Other tithes had already gone by the wayside but that was still understood.

And the Sabbath. Not the annual Sabbaths; they were already lost, but the weekly Sabbath, it was still known.

So, God raised up an apostle in the end of an age to begin restoring truth. Why an apostle? Because that’s how God works to give truth in His Church. And so, He raised him up, began to give him understanding of things, gave him the Holy Days. After his wife and himself had kept them for seven years he finally saw what he needed to see to a point where he had confidence.

Because he didn’t have someone coming down like different ones in different ages and an angel or something standing there, or God Himself coming down and talking to them. He didn’t have that! He had what came into the mind by the power of God’s spirit to give him knowing. But as an individual in the beginning like this, he had to know that he knew and knew the responsibility before he said to the Church, “These are the Holy Days of God that we are to keep.” So, they finally started doing it.

Anyway, so three basic truths. So, here is the first one that’s attributed to him. And I marvel, though man put them together, the order of what they are. Here is the first one because it’s the most important in the sense of understanding. For the Church to grow, for the Church to continue on, people needed to understand this. But so few did.

So, this is what we have on the website, kind of a condensed form here, “The government of God,” number one attributed to Herbert Armstrong, the fourth truth by this point because he’s going to begin restoring truths through his period of this ministry.

4 (1) The government of God. When Christ comes, He will restore God’s government to the whole earth.

So, we learn this. We understand what that means when the government of God comes to this earth. We understand it’s a literal government. We didn’t know then how many. Today we know exactly how many, 144,000 and one, Christ being that one. But 144,000 more out of 6,000 years of human history who are going to be resurrected to come with Christ—which we’re going to hear about tomorrow because it’s about tomorrow, Pentecost and what that means—but going to return and establish the Kingdom of God on this earth to rule all nations.

People can’t rule. There won’t be any governments allowed to rule anymore because mankind’s governments have destroyed the earth over 6,000 years, over and over again in the sense of destroying life and destroying property and destroying everything in its sight in many cases.

I think of some of the things in WWI, some of those trenches and how horrible that was. We have two pieces on our mantel, shells from WWI. It’s called Trench Art. Because they sat there and they were in those trenches, muddy, filthy, people dying just because of the environment, and they’re banging away and made art on shells from cannons. Incredible. Sober reminder of what people went through back in that period of time, 1917 and on. And beautiful things. Flowers, birds, tried to focus on and think about something with their minds that was better than what they had. That’s how they survived up in the mind.

War is hell to the human mind, truly is. Evil. People come back, they’re messed up for the rest of their life, in one respect, because it’s hard to deal with that. A lot of people came back from Vietnam totally screwed up because they knew what happened. They knew what happened to villages, to children, to babies. They saw them in the streets.

How do you live with that knowing you’re a part of that? What did they do? What did they ever do that was wrong? And that eats away at you. Then your own comrades, your own fellow soldiers (comrades may not be the best word), if you use it in the right context. But anyway, if you have different ones beside you that you have a uniqueness of a relationship because your life depends on them. You work together and you have this mindset that’s unique. Then they get blown up. You see their bodies, the way they are.

I had a hard time because I didn’t go in the beginning, I was going on to college and I can’t think of what the name of that deferment was at that point in time because I was going to college. But a good friend of mind that I grew up with did go and when he got killed over there did a number on me for a time. Because I felt guilty. That’s what happens a lot, people feel guilty. (Pshew…still there.) Because you didn’t go.

And if I went, I was going to go in a jet because I was going to kill as many people as I could. That was my mindset. If I go I’m going to go as a lieutenant who can go directly into the Air Force, fly a plane, and I’m going to kill as many as I can. I’m not just going to have a machine gun in my hand, that’s nuts. To me, I’m going to have some big guns.

So, that was my mindset. That was my goal. Thank God I never had to have it because I got called in the process. But those things affect you. If I just have a friend who was shot in the head (wouldn’t even open the casket because of that), and knowing those things, I had a difficult time dealing with that at 18 years old, whatever it was. I think it was 18 then.

Anyway, war is evil. It’s ugly. To think we have a government coming to this world that’s going to change all these things. And so, we deal with these kinds of things in life. There’s a lot of evil out there. People who go to war, it does something to the mind. But there are all kinds of atrocities out here that take place, that people live through.

Just like the things down in Texas there, Uvalde. You think, people’s lives because of that incident, there’s going to be things that will be scarred in their mind for the rest of their life. This is mankind’s history over and over and over again, the atrocities of human life. Thank God He’s shown us what’s ahead of us.

I don’t know why I got off on part of that, but just talking about God’s government coming. We see what’s coming. We know the exact number. We look forward to it because we want it so much. We want to see mankind be able to be helped. We want, as I was saying when I started this, God isn’t going to allow any other government to exist. There will be no governments elected. There will be no despots. There will be no dictators get into powers of position.

God’s not going to allow it because it’s God’s time to rule. He’s allowed mankind to make this mess for 6,000 years to teach us we can’t govern ourselves. No government has been able to. Every government of mankind has ended, it’s been destroyed. It comes to an end. That’s just the way of life. If He didn’t intervene this is going to end anyway at some point.

Candidly, if it went on we know who’s going to take the place. China. It’s very obvious. They’re the ones going to take over. And if the world doesn’t believe that or people don’t believe that? Some understand and believe it, others are just kind of oblivious to it. It’s going to happen.

But God’s not going to allow it to go any farther than what it is now because this is prophetic. It has to happen. There are certain things that have to happen to this country, to Great Britain, and on, and to the rest of the world.

What a blessing to know these things. We’re almost there. God’s timing.

So, to understand government:

4 (1) The government of God. When Christ comes, He will restore God’s government to the whole earth. God’s government was restored to His Church during Philadelphia.

It was gone in Sardis by that time. There wasn’t much left. Government wasn’t there. Going on:

It is not a government of men where decisions are made by such practices as voting…

And we had to be reminded of that after the Apostasy. We had to go through that again a little bit for a little while. Thankfully, it didn’t last too long. Even with the Church here that God brought out of that, where it came to a point where it was very obvious that doesn’t work and it’s not going to function that way. Even if it just begins with her and me alone, we’re gone because we’re doing it right, God’s way.

So again here:

…where decisions are made by such practices as voting or one’s own will, but as God leads through the power of His spirit.

Now that is just the beginning of understanding of government. There is more to what was given in that number 1, in that respect. But this is it in a nutshell. But there’s a lot here. To understand government, right government. What governs our lives? God’s law. God’s way of life. That’s what’s to govern our lives. How does that come into our lives?

You know what? I was thinking this morning again about some of this. What an incredible thing to understand God’s spirit as it begins to open our minds to the truth. He begins to call us. What does He call us to? He doesn’t just leave us out there by ourselves and reveal truth to us. And how did we hear it and know it in the first place?

See, it has to be given somehow from something. A book? Audio of something? And then if we hear it – because that’s how we learn it. It’s not because we figured it out on our own. It doesn’t work that way. It did for Herbert Armstrong because God raised him up as an apostle and taught him over many years what was true so he could teach it, so others could hear it (or read it), hear it, see it, believe it, and begin choosing whether or not to live by it.

If we could only understand that’s how God’s spirit works continually in our lives. It’s through the Church. Because if we don’t receive what God gives to us in the sermons, in guidance and direction, whatever is given, it cuts off His holy spirit. Because that’s how His spirit works. His spirit drew us into His Church where He molds and fashions us and has been molding and fashioning His people for the last 2,000 years.

Sometimes people have a hard time with that because it’s like, “Well, what are you saying?” Well, I’ve been pretty clear. I know how it works. We have to understand how it works. And anyone who resists any of that along the way they’re going to have to deal with it one way or another with God. They’ll either repent of what they’ve done wrong and thinking wrong or not. And if they won’t, they become weaker and weaker and weaker and in time they’re gone. We’ve seen it happen over and over and over again in God’s Church. Awesome to understand that.

Now, although it was acknowledged that the structure of government has been restored to God’s Church the ability to really see it and understand it has been deeply lacking in God’s people through Philadelphia, definitely gone in Laodicea, and then we had an apostasy largely because of that. Then we’ve struggled.

For those who came through the Apostasy, I see my life and you should see yours if you came through the Apostasy, as a branding iron plucked out of the fire. Otherwise, we’d be in exactly the same place as everyone else who’s gone astray. God had mercy on us because He had a purpose of ending the age with a small, very scattered group, because He’s going to make sure the world understands, that all understand, “Not by might, nor by power, but by My spirit.” That’s from God Almighty. He’s going to make it clear that He’s doing everything that happens at the end of an age in the sense of what takes place, in the sense of truth that is established within the Church that is then made great in the world when Christ is here.

Awesome to be a part of that. It doesn’t have to be great to do that. It doesn’t have to be great in numbers to do that. On the contrary, it’s God’s purpose that it be small. That’s why we are what we are.

God’s government, as that truth that we just read states it, is to be received as God leads through the power of His holy spirit. Because that’s how He leads us. That’s how He works with us. That’s how He molds and fashions us. And how does He mold and fashion us? It’s not a private thing. Yes, He molds and fashions us as we repent of various sins in our life and desire to walk what is right, but how do we grow, how are things molded and fashioned in us? Sabbath after Sabbath after Sabbath, Holy Day to Holy Day to Holy Day. That is the primary tool that Joshua the Christ is using in his Church to mold and fashion His people, God’s people.

Let’s turn over to Deuteronomy. Going to read this verse again here because it has so much to say in the sense of what’s being accomplished. Because what God offers those who seek to understand that government is a matter of His thinking, because it’s about God’s thinking. There is nothing more beautiful in life. When you know that your decision, your judgment is in absolute agreement with God there is nothing richer in life. You can only do that when you know this is the mind of God because you agree with God. Whatever area of life it’s in you’ve come to agree with God.

And that’s the goal. That’s what atonement is about. To be at one with God. What does that mean? The mind of God, the thinking of God, the word of God, the truth of God, the way of God, to be at one with that. And so, the ultimate of that is in judgment because that reveals the understanding, whether it exists or not and to what degree it exists in our life.

Deuteronomy 32:3, God Almighty says, He says, For I proclaim the name of the Eternal. Isn’t that amazing? God has to declare His own name. He has to declare Himself. He has to reveal Himself to human beings. To the majority He’s revealed Himself and given them an understanding, do you know what has happened? They’ve turned against Him. The majority of people who have been called into God’s Church over the last 2,000 years have turned against God. Many have been called, few have chosen.

That’s an awesome thing to understand, that with the impregnation of God’s spirit as begotten children of God we can turn against God. And the majority of people have. That really is an incredible thing to understand. Therein we should be sobered to the battle, that we don’t want that to happen to us, that we want to be moldable, pliable by God, the clay that doesn’t resist Him as He molds and fashions us. The clay that doesn’t harden and can’t be used. The clay that wants to be of a humble and a meek spirit, meek meaning a willingness and desire to learn, to be taught by God. Humble in the sense of not seeing ourselves as great but as puny as we are and knowing that we need God.

He is the one who makes us great. God makes us great. His way of life makes us great. It’s not something personal that we should want to be great, it’s automatic with God and God’s way of life. But to lust after it, to want it is perversion.

For I proclaim the name of the Eternal. Ascribe, meaning “give,” greatness to your God. We’ve been doing that in this sermon, truly have. The mind of God, the being of God, how great He is, everything planned like it has been through time. The more we see that the more in awe we are of it. God just becomes greater and greater in our thinking.

Ascribe greatness to your God, the Rock. He’s the foundation. He’s everything. He’s the one that everything is built upon maybe the better way of saying it, and everything built upon Christ, also the rock. To understand that, to see that, everything has to be built that way. That’s what solidifies us.

…the Rock. His work is perfect, word meaning “complete” or “of perfection.” God’s way is perfect. Everything has been thought out before time began before the angelic realm was created. Joshua the Christ, the Passover, was determined and planned, everything to be built upon that as far as God’s Family. He desired a family. Started with an angelic realm, angelic beings. The creation of the universe was to come first bit by bit by bit.

It wasn’t God just saying, “Okay!” Poof! Sometimes we think that’s how it happened. No, it did not. It didn’t happen that way. Could God have done it that way? I have no doubts. But that isn’t how it happened. He created it by His power, which we can’t comprehend. He sustains it by His power, which we can’t comprehend because it’s spirit and we don’t comprehend that fully, a spirit power that exists that comes from Him. By His will it’s done.

But He created angelic beings to be a part of His creation. Now, more will be given to us in time about that, but it didn’t pop up all at once. This galaxy didn’t just happen all at once. Stars didn’t just automatically exist all at the same moment in time. They were created at different times over billions and billions of years. And we cannot comprehend that!

We’re still trying to find, just like they used to try to find where does the earth go? After a while finally they came to realize that we’re not going to drop off the edge. Finally came to understand it is round. It is round. Kind of laughing because one time we had someone who said it’s not round. Think, okay… You fell off something.

So, to understand these things, that mankind is looking out there now trying to learn about our existence. You think, well, wish you’d just listen a little bit. You probably could learn a little bit about your existence and why it’s there, but you won’t listen to that, so hey, going to have to learn the hard way. Anyway, that’s the mind of man.

13.5 billion light years away. We’ve kind of guesstimate now it’s out there. But to understand that there could be light that still hasn’t reached the earth that’s a hundred billion light years away? Our minds can’t comprehend that. To understand that there is still light reaching the earth of something created that took billions of light years to get here, a light year and how far light can travel in a year’s time? And that it could take billions before that light even reaches the earth?

That Hubble could all of a sudden have something appear that wasn’t there before. Do we understand that, that there are things like that that can happen, that have happened, that all of a sudden there’s light that wasn’t there before? Where did it come from? It just got here because it was 13.5 billion light years away and it took 13.5 billion years to reach the earth. How do you understand that?

So, we’re still looking. Let’s send something faster than Hubble. Let’s get out there. We can’t live long enough for it to get far enough to learn much anyway. The human mind, it’s an amazing thing. Just can’t accept that God, that there is a God that has that kind of power.

And no, we had to crawl up from slime. That’s how. Because to understand that someone said, made a human body and breathed into it life? No, it’s better to think we kind of came out of the slime and kind of crawled around on the ground like frogs for a little while, or little lizards and tadpoles, and then all of a sudden later on we figure out how to become something bigger over millions and millions of years after dying over and over… Anyway, stupid.

For I proclaim the name of the Eternal. Ascribe greatness to your God, the Rock. His work is perfect. For all His ways are judgment. “All His ways.” Everything that comes from God involves judgment. Now, there’s a lot said there. Sometimes we think we understand what we read.

A God of truth. That’s where it really begins because truth comes from God and the mind of God, the word of God. He reveals those things to us, what is true. A God of truth without injustice. He is just and right. The more we’re convicted of that in our lives the richer our lives become; they truly do.

Genesis 18. We’re going to look more closely at this matter of judgment as we continue on in the series here and how some of these things are revealed to us.

Genesis 18:17—Then the Eternal said, Shall I hide from Abraham that thing which I do? So, we’ve just gone through a series talking about Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and Joseph. Seeing that Abraham shall surely become a great and mighty nation? So, here is God revealing things in His plan that have taken a long time to be revealed. Here is where so much of this began. It’s beginning with Abraham and what God says He’s going to do with Abraham. It’s all planned out long before Adam and Eve were created. He’s going to pick out an individual, in this case it was going to be Abram, Abraham.

…seeing that surely he’s going to become a great and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed in him? Because it goes beyond anything physical even. Even here God begins to reveal things about His plan, that there is that which is going to be physical in nature to reflect something on a spiritual plane that He’s doing. Again, you have to go through the process and build upon it to learn these things, to see these things and become in awe of these things.

“And all the nations shall be blessed in him.” How? Everyone is going to be blessed because of what comes from Judah, eventually, one of the tribes, one who’s going to be the Messiah, one who’s going to be the King of kings over this earth, of every nation.

For I know him, that he will command his children. So, came to that point in time where God knew him. He says, “his children.” Not just child. Abraham had a lot of children. We start here, For I know him, that he will command his children and his household after him. What an awesome thing to say because when you’re convicted of this way of life you’re going to want others to receive it. The only ones you have real sway, real ability to give and help in that is in your own family.

Now, we have lived through many things where we understand in the Church it’s a bit of a different matter. Because that was a very physical world, in that respect, and in the Church it’s another matter because it becomes something that is very spirit, in that respect. But as far as the parents are concerned, those who are convicted of God’s way of life, they will strive to teach from a young age, children, about God. They’re going to live it. They’re going to teach it.

Now, we’ve seen that as time goes along though that there are different ones for different purpose, that people make choices and decisions and sometimes it’s not for them right then. God has a plan in what He’s going to accomplish, and if He has a plan for someone to continue on it’ll be there. But it’s in God’s hands. He does the molding and fashioning.

But for Abraham, as far as on a physical plane of people, God knew him, that he was going to teach this to his family. Because he’s going to live it and he’s going to teach them about certain things with whatever they knew to this point in time.

He will command his children and his household after him, and they will keep the way of the Eternal. So again here, just on a physical plane alone they’re going to strive to do these things because it’s going to be such a strong family life and connection. Even society at that time was so different from what it is today, and not as many people on the earth.

So, this is a powerful thing that’s being said here in that regard in the ability to follow through with it.

…and they shall keep the way of the Eternal, to do righteousness and judgment. So, with what they know they’re going to strive to do these things and to apply it to their lives. We see that in some of the stories we went through, of what followed because God had a plan and He was working it out in their lives. And so, because of the strength of Abraham, Isaac had a mindset. So when God began to work with him by His spirit he was able to receive that. Jacob is able to receive things because God’s spirit was working with him.

God’s spirit isn’t always working with everyone at all times, obviously, but He had certain ones that He’s chosen to accomplish things by. Jacob had a purpose in that which was going to be done in him. And then Joseph, look at what happened to him. But look at their response.

I mean, that’s a marvel, to go back and look at these things. The brothers were working on a very physical plane. Joseph wasn’t. He was working very much so in a spirit plane, if you will, of things he was receiving from God that he knew this is what it was. The very fact that he was taken captive into Egypt, he knew that this was God’s plan to deliver his whole family, to deliver his father and his family with life, to be able to be brought down into Egypt eventually.

The brothers never got this, even at the end, even after their father died. After Jacob died they were still afraid, “He’s going to do us in; he’s going to make it right now, because father’s gone, and now he's going to take care of us because of what we did to him in putting him in that pit.” It hurt him when he heard this. He was cut to the core. It’s like, “No. Don’t you understand?” Well, they couldn’t because God’s spirit wasn’t working with them as it was in Joseph. Simple answer.

…to do righteousness and judgment. So, everything that he did was based on things that he knew in the mind. How did he know them? Because of God’s spirit. That’s how he lived then, judgment, the choices, and decisions he made.

…that the Eternal may bring upon Abraham that which He has spoken to him. God had a purpose for various things coming to pass within the family line through time. Just like with David when we finally come to king David and what happened to him. It’s all planned out. All planned out, the family line, more than what we can ever begin to comprehend and understand. That he would be the young individual that he was, that he would have the kind of characteristics that he had, someone who was willing to and desirous of believing God was in his life and there to protect him, that he would tear apart a lion with his bare hands, a bear with his bare hands. Who does that? …and knowing that God is going to be there, the one who is going to deliver him and not being afraid to go do it.

If I see a lion, I’m looking for cover because I don’t see God having a purpose in keeping me from running. He had a purpose because of what he was guarding. Now, if someone were in danger, I would do what I could, you know. That’s a different matter. And we know then, you know what, it’s in God’s hands.

Exodus 28. Now we get into a section here that is absolutely astounding in something that God began to work with on a very physical plane to teach us things that are spiritual as He gives us His holy spirit. So many of the things, even the tabernacle that was built, everything about the construction of it, every piece that was put into the tabernacle, every bit of it had meaning.

We understand very clearly the two separations of the tabernacle. The first part, the first two-thirds called the holy of the tabernacles, the Holy Place, and then behind a curtain was the place called the Holiest of Holies. Even there the High Priest could only go in there once every year on the Day of Atonement.

So, all these things in time God has been revealing to His Church what it meant, what it means on a spiritual plane. It’s tremendously powerful when you have something physical like that that is able to teach you.

He uses something simple about blood on the doorposts, the blood of the lamb, so that when the power that went through there to destroy all the firstborn in that region of the earth, none of it happened to the Israelites because they were protected. It passed over them. This was the beginning of teaching about our Passover. But the Passover didn’t come for a whole long time later, till 2,000 years ago.

Here is an area, Exodus 28:15. Now, this account here is the time when God began to give to Moses the things that were to go into the tabernacle and how to serve, how Aaron was to do his job as the high priest, and of the things he was to wear. Here it’s talking about part of what he was going to wear, in the meaning that we understand today, that it’s a part of all this. Incredible, what’s being shown.

Exodus 28:15—You shall make the/a breastplate of judgment of skillful workmanship. So, Aaron is supposed to wear something that he’s going to wear on his chest that’s added to some of the other garments that he’s to wear, that are to be very fine in their own making as far as how they’re tailored and so forth.

You shall make a breastplate of judgment of skillful workmanship. You shall make it for the ephod. It’s a kind of decorative, well-tailored apron. So, whether it be like an apron, or we might see it as kind of a robe, this is what he was to wear. But this breastplate was to be able to be attached to it.

And so it goes on to say, that is of gold, blue, purple, scarlet, and fine woven linen. Now, even in this, in some of these things that God gave, some of the details of certain things that were made are in scripture, but the exact way to make them, some of the exact things involved, they’re not written down. It becomes an amazing thing when you realize that even in the tabernacle when it was finally built, when David had it in his mind to do various things and passed along then to Solomon, that there were certain individuals, artisans, craftsmen, and they were given abilities to do things that aren’t all mapped out.

How did they know? God’s spirit. God can give an individual ability to see things, to know things. They might think it’s even coming from them, but how to do it and what to do and what was being said, they had some general guidelines, but the specifics of it, and some of it was very ornate in that respect, very detailed, God gave it.

And so it goes on to say it’s fine woven linen. On the breastplate there were four rows of three different stones. So again here, verse 21 starts speaking of this. So again here, these four different rows of three stones each, twelve. Twelve tribes. Twelve tribes of Israel.

Verse 21—Then the stones shall have the names of the sons of Israel, twelve according to their names. So, here is something very physical. There are twelve tribes. There was an organization of the structure of a nation that was being molded and fashioned while they were there in the wilderness for forty years. This instruction being given to them, of how they were to come before God, how they were to worship, the entire structure of that on a very physical plane because it was about a physical form of worship. It wasn’t spiritual. They didn’t have God’s spirit. A few individuals were given God’s spirit, but they weren’t. It was a very physical thing.

…twelve according to their names, like the engravings of a signet, each one with its own name. So, they had the names there. It took us a long time – we went through Philadelphia, we went through Laodicea, and finally we come to the Apostasy, things happen to us, God opened up our minds to understand, to see something about 144,000, that those twelve tribes, that there would be twelve tribes with twelve thousand.

It used to be that people thought there had to be twelve thousand out of each tribe. After the Apostasy it was like, no, that’s not going to happen. That’s not what God is doing. God used that to teach it.

Just like what’s happening in Europe right now. If we understand what’s happening in the end of an age we will understand what’s happening in nations over there right now when you see certain new articles. When you see certain things happening in Europe and an attitude changing where they’re turning away more and more from the US and looking to themselves. Now they have someone knocking on their door and they’re afraid because they’ve lived through war after war after war. Except this time there is a unique thing happening because Germany’s not in the same place as they were in the first war and the second war. But it’s still there and one of the primary moving forces, them and France. Incredible.

So, as these things come out and we hear this push now to put money into this common military force? Because they know when it comes push to shove they’ve got to be able to do this on their own. They can’t wait until the last minute and beg for weapons, like they did in WWII, wanting weapons, wanting help and someone saying, “No, we don’t want in it, and we can’t do it because of our laws.” Made it convenient. All the things that we went through, finally, before we got into a war, when it finally took something like Pearl Harbor to do it.

And Europe knows. They’re not stupid. They’ve got to do this on their own. Now, that should move us because it’s a part of something prophetic that we know has to happen. We get to watch it come into being. We see attitudes changing. We see attitudes changing toward NATO.

And to me, one of the stupidest things of all, is someone can read the book like that and say, “Well, where are they going to get their nuclear weapons?” Well, France already had a lot of them. Great Britain does too. You say, “Well, Great Britain is part of Ephraim.” Doesn’t mean they can’t be used. They’ve kind of been back and forth in some things. But anyway, time will tell.

All they have to do is take over those weapons. There is a massive arsenal of nuclear weapons scattered throughout Europe under the auspices of NATO. But they have them. Just like Turkey has threatened at different times, to keep our weapons in Incirlik and not let us have them. There used to be, I think, seventyish, if I’m correct about that, I think, close to seventy nuclear weapons in Incirlik, the air base there in Turkey. They have used that against us.

“NATO, well, they’re part of NATO.” You can’t trust them one iota. But anyway, they are, and they’re prophesied to turn against Israel. So, interesting to see what will happen when that all plays out. But they have the power to keep them there. They have the power to take over at any time if they wanted to. They’re not going to do it, as a whole, but to not think that Europe can’t take over everything that’s there, that’s already there is insanity. It’s an easy thing to do.

So, we can watch the news and see what God is doing because God is molding and fashioning and allowing things to be molded and fashioned to bring about the end of the age at a specific moment in time.

I was thinking today, some day it’s going to be this way. What if this is our last Pentecost? I thought that a long time ago, we were going to have our last Pentecost observance in the sense of what we’re able to do as a Church. Some time it’s going to happen. Some time it’s going to take place, it’s going to be the last one until Joshua and 144,000 return on a day of Pentecost. But as a whole when that happens we’re not going to be gathered together like we are today. We’re not going to have the ability to do so, not going to be able to do that. Hope we understand that.

But we can look at the world and what’s taking place and understand if these things are taking place here God’s involved, God’s doing it. He might allow a demonic being to do it, but it’s going to happen. He might allow Satan to do various things, but it’s God who has designed it all and to allow it to happen.

You think, “Well, how can that be right?” Because God Almighty is right. God Almighty is righteous and He’s allowing mankind to come to a point that if God didn’t involve Himself in any of these things we’re going to destroy ourselves anyway. We’re going to destroy ourselves with nuclear weapons. If He didn’t intervene and stop it that’s where the world is headed. It’s just going to happen. Because who is going to be the one that will stop using nuclear weapons when it starts happening? If we’re dumb enough to think that’s not going to be the case of human beings?

It's like in Russia right now, that’s how that individual thinks over there. Let them all go. They’re already spouting it off. It only takes four nuclear weapons. Two on the east coast, two on the west coast, and this country is over with. They’re already spouting it off. You get generals who say things like that, military leaders who spout off something like that? Or individuals in the government that say something?

You think they’re saying that by themselves without approval? You think they’re stupid enough to do something that they’re not going to have their head cut off, or whatever, disappear one way or another? We live in a sick world.

What an amazing thing that such things can even be talked about today. A year ago, you wouldn’t dream of certain things happening. Just like we talked about not too long ago when a news individual—I think we were in Europe at the time—when someone on the news made comment of what German was doing.

They made this switch of now a willingness to send certain things into Ukraine. There were people astonished at that. They never thought they would see that. They made the comment, one newscaster made the comment, “A few weeks ago you would never have dreamed that this would have ever happened, and here it is, it’s already happened.” Well, we know these things are going to take place. Awesome.

Here we have twelve tribes all pictured here, twelve tribes, because of the names. That’s what’s important. Because it’s not about physical nations, it’s about a spiritual one, the Israel of God is Zion, is the Kingdom of God, it’s God’s Kingdom. He establishes His Family by the use of those names. Israel is not a name that is specifically about a physical people. It is about a spiritual one. That’s why they had their physical name given because it’s something that it reflects by the very meaning of the name what God is doing to establish His Family, and then these names are going to be a part of it. That’s why you read those things in Revelation, and it talks about this structure, this building, and how this thing is built and as great as it is, and it bears all twelve names. Twelve different kinds of stone.

Verse 28—Then they shall fasten the breastplate by the rings upon the rings of the ephod. So again, this garment that was being worn had rings on it on the shoulders, and so this breastplate would have the rings where they could fasten it then together, tie it together so it would hang down in his chest. So, this is what it’s describing.

…the rings thereof and the rings of the ephod with a cord of blue. So, the cord of blue, whatever that is, it’s going to be used on each one. We don’t know what that means yet, but that has meaning too. Some day we’ll be shown more.

…so that it may be above the intricately woven band of the ephod, so that the breastplate will not come loose from the ephod. Then Aaron shall bear the names of the children of Israel. You know what this was about? The High Priest will bear the names of the children of Israel. Spiritual Israel is being molded and fashioned by Joshua the Christ. God has given him all power to bring His Family to pass. God has given Him all power to do the things that he is doing to create spiritual Israel.

Now, God is doing this, and His power, but He’s given the authority to His Son to accomplish it. And so, it’s about the High Priest because everything is built upon him. He is the Chief Cornerstone. It says, “he bears the names of the children of Israel,” those names; it’s the names and what they mean, what they signify in the God Family.

…the names of the children of Israel, in the breastplate of judgment. Because judgment is so important. It reveals the unity with God or the lack of it. It reveals the mindset and how we’re thinking, if we’re thinking right. …in the breastplate of judgment upon his heart. It means so much. That it has to be from in here, deep inside. What we do, what we decide, how we determine various things – because it’s inside here. It’s our being. It’s who we are. It’s how we think. We make certain decisions because of that, because we love God, we love God’s way of life, we love His truth. As He shows us various things, we want to live by that, we want to honor Him, we want to be in unity and agreement with Him, in everything, to be of the same mind.

“Let this mind be in you which was in Joshua,” as we’re told. “Be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” All these different kinds of scriptures. But upon the heart. What a beautiful thing.

…and the breastplate of judgment upon his heart when he goes in unto the Holy Place, for a memorial before the Eternal continually. So, his work, service in and out of the Holy Place. Not the Holiest of Holies once a year, but as he did his work as a high priest. And again, revealing things about Christ and what he is doing, his work.

So you shall put in the breastplate of judgment the Urim and the Thummim. So, it had the stones there, and then these two by themselves. Not a lot known about these things. A lot of thought, controversy that people have had through time, of what this was all about, but again, not fully shown all of this, but somehow believe that it may be a light, may be that when one lit another that God was revealing yes or no to them at different times.

We don’t really fully know and understand all this, how it totally worked. But there is very little given in that respect as to how it fully functioned, but this had something to do with when they were taking it, a matter before God, that something would happen with these two to reveal to them what God’s judgment was in a matter. So, they’d present things to God and God would give them answers this way.

I marvel God worked with them in different ways at different times, as it says in Hebrews. He worked with His people in different ways in different times. He worked with Abraham in a specific way, and now He’s getting ready to work with the tribes of Israel as they go into, and if they will look to Him, as the tabernacle and the Levitical system there is a method and a way that God’s going to work with them.

And it says, and they shall be upon Aaron’s heart. What are they doing here? They’re looking to God for answers. What is God’s judgment in a matter?  It’s here. It’s upon the heart. The desire is that you want to do it. Whatever it is you’re looking for, we’re to learn from this.

…when he goes in before the Eternal. When do we go in before the Eternal? Can we go before the Eternal? Every time we pray. Doesn’t matter where you are, what you’re doing, you can pray to God and know He’s hearing. He listens to you, He hears you, He wants to hear us. He wants to be a part of our life. We seek guidance and direction in certain things in our life; it’s in our heart to go before Him. We want to do His way, His will, not our own. That’s much of what our prayers should be about, to be careful about certain things we do, especially when it involves other people and what we’re going to be doing with them and how we’re going to be doing it. It better come from God.

That’s why within the ministry I do things in a certain way. I’ve worked with the ministry in trying to teach various things. Not to insert ourselves into various matters sometimes. Because we can insert ourselves into things we don’t need to insert ourselves into. Sometimes it’s a matter of watching something play out, just let it go. God will bring it to us and to me when it needs to be dealt with and how it needs to be dealt with.

In the very beginning of PKG I had different ones that would get aggravated at times that I wasn’t dealing with something more quickly because they thought it should be dealt with quickly. Some things I didn’t do it. It’s like, “You’re not doing your job. You’re just letting this go on. You’re not going to let them go on and do…?” Yep. God does.

You know how I know this with all of my being as much as I did when God revealed the Sabbath to me and the Holy Days? He lets you know if you’re looking to Him because you want to do it the right way. He’ll give it to you when it’s time, and especially to me in this respect, working with the Church. I know that because I’ve experienced it over and over and over again.

So, I got to a point where I didn’t have to worry or think about what others thought. I thought, “I hope one day you can learn from this. I hope one day you’ll come to understand this, how God works within the Church, how God’s spirit mold and fashions us,” and if we’ll look at those things we can learn from it. Some have, and some haven’t. Because it has to come from God, just like sermons, or what good is it? What use is it? What purpose is there in doing things our way? It’s absolutely worthless.

We can think something should be done in a certain way but if we wait on God, God will show us. I don’t have to worry about those kinds of things in the Church, I really don’t. God will bring them to the surface if they need to be dealt with in a certain way. There are times I’ve told people to kind of back away from certain things. Sometimes I’ve told individuals go and do a certain thing. Sometimes they feel like, “Well, that’s…” I know they felt that way because I’ve seen the fruit of it and the result of it though they haven’t said it to me. It’s like, “Well, that’s kind of hard.”

I had something not too long ago that I asked someone to do, and I knew it was going to be hard. Whether it happened that way or not, I don’t know, but in time God shows and helps us to understand and to learn from it. But the thing we have to learn is we’ve got to learn to do things God’s way, how God leads and guides and directs us and works with us. We have to do that individually.

I have to do that in the ministry, but we have to do that individually in our own lives. Because if you’re striving to do things your way out here, you’re missing the mark. But if you’re striving to do it because it’s right with God, because it’s a good and a right thing with God, it agrees with God, it’s what God allows, it’s what God says we can do or whatever, then you can have confidence in it, be bold in it.

Judgment comes from God, especially when it comes to relationships, especially when it comes to various things within the Body or the Church. So much to learn.

So Aaron shall bear the judgment of the children of Israel upon his heart before the Eternal continually. Again, this Urim and Thummim. It’s a matter of something of looking to God for judgment. Don’t you want to do that in your life when it’s a matter of something delicate or hard to decide how to deal with a matter?

What’s God’s law primarily about? Relationships. All the 10 Commandments are about relationships. The first four are about a relationship with God Almighty, how to have a right relationship with God, the way God says we’re supposed to do it. The next six commandments have to do with our relationships with others, other human beings in or out of the Church. It’s how we’re to live and think toward others. Awesome!

We have to make judgment in those things of how to apply some of those things through our life at times, obviously.

We’re to live spiritually God’s way of life, to strive to get rid of our will, our way of doing things. That’s what judgment is about, it’s striving to do it God’s way.

Deuteronomy 1:15—So I took the chief of your tribes, wise men and well known, and made them heads over you, captains over thousands, captains of hundreds, captains over fifties, captains over tens, and officers among your tribes. So, here is the beginning point here where this is the second — Deuteronomy means the “second giving” basically, of the law.

Because now they’ve gone through this long period of time in the wilderness. They’re not long away now from going into the promised land that God’s going to take them through on to inherit that which He told them He was going to give to them after forty years in the wilderness. And so, here is a reminder of the various things that took place, the organization, the structure that was given. He’s reiterating some of these things.

Then I charged your judges at that time, saying… So, there were judges established to judge but they weren’t to do their own thing. There was a process here given to them of how to do various things, and a lot of the scriptures about various things that can happen in people’s lives and what should happen and what shouldn’t happen, and so when there was a conflict there they’d bring it before the judges to make a decision here.

Hear the cause between your brethren. See, the commandments, whether you’re living this way of life because it doesn’t just break down to those six commandments. Because if you don’t understand the spirit of those commandments, if you don’t understand how they’re to be lived on a spiritual plane, a physical carnal people had a tough time with a lot of this and so they had to go through various things in minute detail, things were written. The Jews even wrote books and books and books and reams and reams of books trying to say how certain things could be done, because they carried it way too far and went too far, went far off base.

Hearing the cause between your brethren, and judge righteously. How can you do that? Because it comes from God. If it’s going to have righteousness in it it’s because it’s something that agrees with God. …between every man and his brother and the stranger that is with him.

You shall not respect persons in judgment. So, why is this being addressed? Because that’s what we do as human beings. We do it in God’s Church! You’ve got to fight against that and get rid of that because that’s a natural carnal thing that people do. And so, we have to learn when that happens and to realize this is not right, this isn’t good, that you shouldn’t do this. We shouldn’t put people in various categories and esteem others higher than different ones and so forth, and then give sway in that because of a matter of judgment.

So, don’t show respect. Judgment is judgment based righteously on God’s way of life and let the chips fall where they may. It should be equal, expected of all, a certain way of life to live. If it’s not done that way certain things need to take place. And what needs to take place, well, that can vary. We’re to learn from those things as well within the Body. That’s why sometimes things are given the way they are, so others can learn from it.

You shall not respect persons in judgment, but you shall hear the small as well as the great. Now, where does that come from? Who is the small and who is the great? Well, already we’re kind of screwed up a little bit in our thinking, but you mean someone that’s more important. Yeah, because he’s a captain over a thousand and here is this captain over ten down here (just to give an example), and surely the captain over the thousand, he’s going to be more on target of doing things right, and so you sway judgment in his direction. That would be wrong.

That’s what it’s talking about here. We can sway judgment sometimes because we see someone, and we have these categories of people. We do this in our own minds without thinking as human beings. But we have to be careful. What’s right is right. What is true is true. What is wrong is wrong regardless.

That’s why within the Church, that’s why we should be able to look at the world and say, “Isn’t it sick what they do when someone is sick and does sick things within their churches and they just transfer them to another region,” to do the same crappy things again to people, to hurt people. Children is the most atrocious thing of all. Does that happen? Nothing has stopped. It’s still going on out there because it’s human beings. “But how could they do that because they’re supposed to be a preacher and a teacher, a priest…”

So, what happened within God’s own Church? Well, I think of an individual who came into our Church area as an associate, I guess, he was called at the time. He was supposed to be there for six months and then if he did okay he was going to go ahead and be given that Church area up in Pennsylvania where we were located at that time. But he’d already been in, I think he’s an Australian. So, he’d been in Australia, he’d screwed up over there, a Church, sent him to Germany, screwed up the Church over there, did things that were wrong. He was sick in mind. So, they just transferred him back to the United States and this was going to be his last chance. Then the Apostasy came along, and people just loved him.

He was the type that’d get up and give a sermon and they’d be so sick sometimes that individuals commented one time about “Didn’t know we had to give an R-rating on certain sermons before we brought our children to services.” Because he was sick in some of the things he had to say. Well, I have no time for that kind of stuff. Someone does something wrong, something, especially when they’re given that kind of responsibility, they should be out on their butts somewhere and out of the Church. Not just out of the ministry for good.

Garner Ted Armstrong should have been put out of the Church long before, but I understand the process there and what happened. We have to learn that in our lives. There are times you have got to take a stand for God’s way of life. And if you don’t, it’s on you.

So, no wonder we became weaker over time by the time we got into Laodicea. Because there are regional pastors and different ones out there who knew about various ministers and what some were doing.

I think of one individual who some in Cincinnati know very well, who was a minister that I knew quite well because he was out in Kansas for a time, he got to Cincinnati and he would invite people for counselling (women), to his basement with candlelight. Did they have wine too or just candlelight? Yep. That’s how you counsel women, married women in the Church.

If I had cowboy boots I’d tell you where it would be, okay? Right there, pointed all the way up as far as I could go. I’m sorry, but just to make it clear. There are some things that are so sick.

In the ministry our training had always been never, never, never, never, never, never counsel any woman by yourself or be alone with her in God’s Church. It’s just wrong. Why would anyone do anything like that? We knew that. So, why was it allowed that anyone should do something like that? Judgment. How do you judge things? We’re to judge things righteously.

And so, God has given things within the Church. God has given things within Israel through time. There are judgments that have to be made and people have to make choices and decisions. But it all boils down to what is right before God. Either we do it or we don’t, and we make decisions by God’s law and by God’s way of life.

So again, just being open and honest about things that have happened in our past that should never have happened. That’s how we are to learn. When you see something wrong you’re to learn from that. We’re not to do that. We’re not to live that. We’re to get rid of things that are wrong.

That’s why I love what Herbert Armstrong had to say about truth. We don’t have all the truth, but we have more than anyone else. No one else comes close in the world. He made that clear. He said, “Are we right about everything? No.” So, that’s why I love the expression about the present truth that’s spoken of in scripture. What we’re given to that moment in time we live by it to the best we can. And if God reveals something else to us or corrects something?

Just like he did with Pentecost, he had to correct the day. He corrected it and made the comment, “We’re that much closer to being pure.” We get rid of the things that are wrong. We get rid of the things that are not true. God’s Church is known by the truth. And so, if we come to a point in time where something is revealed, that this isn’t true, then we address it. It has to be addressed.

That’s the way our lives should be because that’s how you come into unity and oneness with God. You grow. You address sin when it’s there. You address things that are wrong in your life, and you strive to get rid of them. Because you can’t have them in your life. They can’t exist in God’s Church; they have to be gotten rid of.

That’s why it can’t be allowed for sin to continue on and exist in God’s Church. One way or another God either brings it to the surface or whatever. He’ll either deal with it directly or in time it’ll come to me, and I don’t hesitate to deal with it for the sake of the Body.

You shall not respect persons in judgment, but you shall hear the small and the great. You shall not be afraid of the face of man or the face of others, because of whatever, “I’m afraid… I don’t want to have to go…” It’s like going to a brother alone and talking. Are you afraid of the face? Are you afraid of them because you’re afraid of losing your friend? That’s what you’re telling me?

I’ve heard that excuse in God’s Church in times past where, “I’m afraid, you know, they’re not going to be my friend anymore and I’m going to lose that friendship.” And it’s like, “Do you love them or not or are you just going to allow this to continue on, something you know that was wrong, or are you going to do what God says?” God says there’s a right way of dealing with that, and it’s going to them alone out of love. And hopefully, because of that friendship they’ll be pricked in the heart and repent.

But if you let it go on you’re condoning it. Your actions condone it and you’re going to suffer because of it and you’re going to become weaker spiritually because of it. On and on it goes. So, we’re to learn how to judge righteous judgment, and so we’re tried in these things over and over again. It’s not easy. Why? Because we’re carnal human beings. We’re going to have things to deal with.

You shall not be afraid of the face of man, for the judgment is God’s. In other words, the judgment needs to come from God. If we’re focused on doing things because it’s in agreement with God, with what God has given us to this point in time and we see something, that’s how the judgment has to be. Because it’s right, not because of how we feel or how we think it should be done. That isn’t always the way God wants it done.

Are there many different ways of addressing various things in life in relationships? Yes. But it should always come from God one way. Because He knows what’s involved in people’s lives. He knows what has to take place, when and how and to what degree various things should be done.

I don’t. I don’t know that. I don’t rely on myself. I can’t. I don’t rely on myself in giving sermons. I’ve given too many. I know how God works. I cry out, I don’t know what I’m going to give, don’t know anything about the Feast sermons, but I know they’re coming and it’s so exciting when they do. It’s like that fleece, wet on one side at one time and the next time dry or whatever. It’s like being given a lot of fleece through life. Without it, it’d be very difficult. But God loves us, and He gives us those things in life.

Then the cause that is too hard for you, bring it to me, and I will hear it. So I commanded you at that time all things which you should do.

Oh, it’s going to be a longer series. I always love that because I have quite a bit more to go through on that I thought I was going to give today, and it’ll be next Sabbath. So, we’ll stop there today, and tomorrow is Pentecost.