"Jeremiah 4" KJV Bible Study (Verse-by-verse preaching)

Video

March 9, 2016

Jeremiah, chapter number four, the Bible reads in verse number one, “‘If thou wilt return, O Israel,’ saith the Lord, ‘Return unto me and if thou wilt put away thine abominations out of my sight, then shalt thou not remove and thou shalt swear the Lord liveth in truth, in judgment, and in righteousness and the nations shall bless themselves in Him and in Him shall they glory.’ For thus, saith the Lord to the men of Judah and Jerusalem, ‘Break up your fallow ground and sow not among thorns.’”

Jeremiah chapter four, of course, picks up right where we left off in the last few chapters, the Book of Jeremiah, if you remember, is being preached at a time when the children of Israel, especially the southern kingdom of Judah, that’s being referenced had turned away from the Lord their God. Jeremiah’s a prophet that’s trying to call the people back to God and he’s trying to get them to avoid the destruction that’s coming when the king of Babylon will come and take over.

This is before the Babylonian Captivity and if you remember for many weeks, we were in Zechariah and that took place after the Babylonian Captivity. That’s when they’re coming back and so God is a little bit more positive toward them at that time, because in many cases they were right with God. They still had to be rebuked for some things, whereas this is before they go captive into Babylon.

Pretty much the whole book is warning them, “Straighten up, get your act together, get right with God, get rid of the abominations or else I’m going to bring punishment. I’m going to bring judgment. The king of Babylon is going to come and take you captive.” Then of course, when we get to the last chapter, what happens in the Book of Jeremiah? The last chapter it all happens and some of it’s recorded earlier than that, but it records Babylon coming in and taking over and destroying them.

Then Jeremiah also wrote the Book of Lamentations where he laments the destruction of Jerusalem and so forth. Now the reason that I bring that up is because one of the most important things to realize as we study Jeremiah or any other book of the Bible is the context. What is the book about? What’s the preacher preaching about? Because people will often just take verses or sections out of these chapters and take them dramatically out of context to teach all kinds of crazy things.

Jeremiah chapter four, is a chapter that is used to teach some serious false doctrine. There’s a very bad doctrine that’s called the Gap Theory and it comes from a twisting of Jeremiah chapter four and a misuse of this passage and so I want to spend a lot of time dealing with that tonight, because that’s what this chapter is known for but before I get into that, let’s just look at what the chapter says in the beginning part here.

Of course he’s telling them in verse number one, “‘Return unto me. If thou wilt return, O Israel,’ sayeth the Lord, ‘Return unto me’ and if thou wilt put away thine abominations out of my sight, then shalt thou not remove.’” Now what’s the removal he’s talking about? “‘Then being removed into Babylon when Nebuchadnezzar comes and God’s judgment falls.’”

“‘Though shalt swear the Lord liveth in truth and in judgment and in righteousness and the nations shall bless themselves in Him and in Him shall they glory.’” Again the purpose was always that all the nations would fear the Lord, that all the nations would see the example of the children of Judah and that they would worship the Lord also.

“For thus saith the Lord to them in Jerusalem, ‘Break up your fallow ground and sow not among thorns.’” This is like the Parable of the Sower in the New Testament where Jesus said that when anybody hears the Word, the way their heart reacts to the Word is like unto ground: the good ground, the thorny ground, the rocky ground. When they hear the Word sown, the Bible is saying here that they need to break up their fallow ground. Meaning that need to have a heart that’s receptive to God’s Word, that’s ready to receive and understand God’s Word.

The Bible says in verse number four, “Circumcise yourselves to the Lord and take away the foreskins of your heart, ye men of Judah, inhabitants of Jerusalem, lest my fury come forth like fire and burn that none can quench it because of the evil of your doings.”

Now keep your finger there and go to Romans chapter two. Romans chapter two, and as you’re turning there, let me just point out that God’s wrath upon us, God’s punishment is because of our doings. It’s our fault and we can’t blame God when judgment comes. It’s because of our wickedness that judgment comes, according to that Scripture, but in Romans chapter two, we have this idea of circumcising the heart.

Look at verse number 28 of Romans chapter two. “For he is not a Jew which is one outwardly, neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh but he is a Jew which is one inwardly and circumcision is that of the heart in the spirit and not in the letter whose praise is not of men but of God.”

Now in the New Testament, this a major theme that’s taught about the circumcision of the heart being more important than the circumcision of the flesh. In fact, under the new covenant, the circumcision of the flesh has no profit and has no meaning.

The Bible says that, “Neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature,” and the Bible says that it’s not something that we do in the New Testament but even in the Old Testament, he’s already talking about the circumcision of the heart and he’s already in many places, not just Jeremiah four telling you, “It’s not just enough that you just live in Judah or that you’re a Jew. That’s not enough, you need to have a circumcised heart, not just circumcising the body and then saying, ‘Oh, I’m one of God’s people now.’” He says no.

That’s why John the Baptist preached the same thing. “Think not to say within yourselves, “We have Abraham to our father, for I say unto you, that God is able these stones to raise up children of Abraham and now also the axe is laid under the root of the tree, every tree which bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down and cast into the fire.”

This, just being physically circumcised was never the end all, be all and in the New Testament it’s not even something that we practice, but today there are those who put great stock in this and they think that the Israelites are the chosen people, even if they don’t even worship Jesus, even if they don’t even believe in Him, even if they believe in another god and even if they have wicked morals, they’re still considered a blessed people of the Lord. It’s not a Biblical doctrine.

Go back to Jeremiah chapter four there, he says, “Declare ye in Judah,” in verse five, “And publish in Jerusalem and say, ‘Blow ye the trumpet in the land, cry, gather together and say, ‘Assemble yourselves and let us go into the defensed cities. Set up the standard towards Zion, retire, stay not, for I will bring evil from the north and a great destruction. The Lion is come up from His thicket and the Destroyer of the gentiles is on His way. He’s gone forth from His place to make thy land desolate and thy cities shall be laid waste without inhabitant.’”

Now notice, when God talks about the Babylonians coming from the north and destroying the children of Judah and taking them captive and removing them, he uses this term, “The Lion is come up. The Lion, the Destroyer of the Gentiles, is on his way.” Now if you would flip over to Daniel, just a few pages to the right in your Bible, Daniel chapter seven and while you’re turning to Daniel chapter seven.

Let me just remind you that Daniel had this vision in Daniel chapter two of a great image, a great statue with a head of gold and then the image went from gold to silver, to brass, to iron, and then the feet were a mixture of iron and clay. He was told that these different sections of the image represented four kingdoms and he told Nebuchadnezzar, “Thou, O Nebuchadnezzar art that head of gold,” and then he said, “After you there’s going to be another kingdom that arises that’s inferior to you,” that was represented by the chest and the arms of silver which is the Medo-Persian Empire.

Then the belly and thighs of brass represented Graecia, the Greek Empire of Alexander the Great. Then of course, the iron represented the Roman Empire that would crush in pieces and that would be the empire that was in place when the Lord Jesus Christ came to this earth when He would come and destroy the works of the Devil spiritually. Then of course at the Second Coming of Christ, He’s going to physically destroy the Devil’s anti-Christ kingdom and the 10 toes represent the 10 kings and everything of Revelation and on and on.

In Daniel chapter seven, there’s a similar vision that Daniel has but instead of being four section of a statue, it’s actually four beasts that he see, okay. Look if you would at verse number one. “In the first year of Belshazzar, king of Babylon, Daniel had a dream and visions of his head upon his bed. Then he wrote the dream and told the sum of the matters. Daniel spake and said, ‘I saw in my vision by night and behold the four winds of the heavens strove upon the great sea and four great beasts came up from the sea, diverse one from another.”

“‘The first was like a lion and had eagles wings. I beheld till the wings thereof were plucked and it was lifted up from the earth and made to stand upon the feet as a man and a man’s heart was given to it.’” Now think about this, if these four beasts represent the same thing as the four sections of the image, which I believe that they obviously do, when you look at these beasts and study this, then the first beast is like a lion. The Lion represents Nebuchadnezzar. The lion represents Babylon which is exactly what it said back in Jeremiah, calling the Babylonians and their king the lion, okay.

Now more evidence of that is that it says that “The first was like a lion and had eagles wings and I beheld till the wings thereof were plucked and it was lifted up from the earth and made stand upon the feet as a man and a man’s heart was given to it.”

Now something like this happened to Nebuchadnezzar because of the fact that in chapter four of Daniel he lost his mind and became as a beast of the field and, “He was out in the field eating grass like an ox and his fingernails grew like bird feathers,” and I mean … I’m sorry … “Like bird claws and his hair became like unto bird feathers,” but then eventually he’s given a man’s heart once again and made to stand upon his feet, right, isn’t that what this says.

His feathers are plucked in the sense that he loses his kingdom and he becomes a crazy person and he’s referenced like unto a bird, except one that’s on the land, on all fours, eating grass, slobbering, and whatever, but then he’s given a man’s heart. He’s made to stand upon his feet and so forth. I believe that it’s pretty clear that this is referring to the king of Babylon.

Then of course after that it says, the second was like unto a bear in verse number five, the third was like unto a leopard, okay. It says in verse number six, “After this, I beheld, lo, like a leopard which had upon the back of it, four wings of a fowl. The beast had also four heads and dominion was given to it.” The reason why the third beast representing the Greek Empire has four heads is that Alexander the Great had no heir after he died. After he died, the Greek Empire was ruled over by four of his generals, they divided up his empire into four. That’s where you get the four headed beast idea representing the Greeks.

Then it says in verse seven, “After this I saw and then I beheld a fourth beast, dreadful and terrible and strong exceedingly and it had great iron teeth and it devoured and break in pieces and stamped the residue with the feet of it and it was diverse from all the beasts that were before it and had 10 horns,” and so forth. Then of course, this also has an end times ramification because the end times chapter Revelation 13 talks about the beast and it is a beast of seven heads and 10 horns and it is like a lion, it says, like a leopard, like a bear, and it is dreadful and like unto the fourth beast.

There’s a clear connection between Daniel chapter seven and also the end times. Back then it represented Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome leading up to the first coming of Jesus Christ. Then in the end times, there’s going to be basically, a renewal of this beast, this beast will be on the scene once again but this time, it’s going to be a combination of all of them, because it’s going to be a one world system that encompasses everything of the lion, the bear, Medo-Persia, the Greece, the leopard and so forth.

It’s interesting because that beast has seven heads and 10 horns, right. Think about this, we have four beasts here, right, and one of the four beasts has four heads, right, so how many heads is all together then?

Congregation: Seven.

Pastor: Seven, because you’ve got one, two, three, and then on the one it has four heads, so there’s your seven heads of the Book of Revelation, just more tying in there.

Let’s go back if you would to Jeremiah chapter four. I’m just going through this to show you how consistent it is that this chapter from the Bible, Jeremiah four is very clearly talking about one thing. It’s very clearly warning the children of Judah that destruction’s coming, judgment is coming as a result of their sin, as a result of the abominations, and a result of the uncircumcision of their heart, God is sending judgment and that judgment is coming in the form of the lion, the king of Babylon. Of course, in Jeremiah 52, we see the king of Babylon come, etcetera, etcetera.

Let’s keep reading. It says in verse eight, “For this, gird you with sack cloth, lament and howl for the fierce anger of the Lord is not turned back from us.” This is a verse that Joyce Meyer has never read, because she wrote a book called God is Not Mad at You and on the back of her book God is Not Mad at You, it says, “I don’t care who you are, I don’t care what you’ve done, God’s not mad at you,” but this is one of a lot of verses that says, “The fierce anger of the Lord is not turned back from us.” If God was mad then, He’s mad now.

Congregation: Yeah.

Pastor: Because people today are doing the same stuff that they were doing back in Jeremiah chapter four and so God’s still angry. The Bible says, “God is angry with the wicked every day.”

Congregation: Yup.

Pastor: Verse number nine, “’And it shall come to pass at that day,’ saith the Lord, ‘That the heart of the king shall perish and the heart of the princes and the priests shall be astonished and the prophets shall wonder.’” What does it mean when it says they’re going to be astonished and wonder? It saying they’re going to be surprised. They’re going to be blown away. “Whoa, we didn’t see this coming.” Jeremiah’s warning them but they’re not taking the warning seriously.

He’s telling them, “You’re committing abomination. You’re wicked. You’re uncircumcised of heart. Judgment’s coming. The king of Babylon’s coming,” and they’re saying, “Yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever.” Then when it come, it’s like, “Whoa, it’s actually happening.” They’re surprised that it’s happening, but we shouldn’t be surprised when God’s judgment falls upon a wicked nation.

Congregation: Yeah.

Congregation: Right. Amen.

Pastor: There’d be a lot of people that’d be very surprised if judgment came to America but they really shouldn’t be surprised when you think about everything that we’ve done as a country. It shouldn’t really come as a shock but you know and I know, it would come as a huge shock to most people. “What? We’re such a great country. What’s going on? We’re the nicest people ever,” but not in God’s sight.

Congregation: Yeah.

Pastor: Bible says in verse 10, “Then said I, ‘Ah, Lord God, surely, Thou has greatly deceived this people and Jerusalem saying, ‘Ye shall have peace,’ whereas the sword reacheth unto the soul.’” Now it seems like Jeremiah is a little confused here because he is saying, “Aw, man, God, You’ve really lied to these people because You’ve said that they’re going to have peace,” but here’s the thing, He didn’t say that they’re going to have peace but what it is is there are a whole bunch of lying preachers around, a bunch of false prophets who were saying, “Oh, thus saith the Lord, thou shalt have peace.”

Really, there’s no peace coming and that’s why God later in the Book of Jeremiah’s going to say, “I didn’t send these guys. These prophets that are saying, ‘Thus saith the Lord,’ all these peaceful prophecies, I didn’t send them, okay,” and God in His Word, the written Word never says that you’re going to have peace when you commit all this sin and abomination. All of the peace promises to Israel or to anyone else for that matter are contingent upon obeying the voice of the Lord.

Bible says, “There’s no peace, sayeth my God, to the wicked,” but that’s an interesting verse where Jeremiah has doubts there. “Then said I, ‘Ah, Lord God, surely Thou has greatly deceived these people in Jerusalem saying, ‘Ye shall have peace,’ whereas the sword reacheth under the soul. At that time shall it be said to these people and to Jerusalem, ‘A dry wind of the high places in the Wilderness toward the daughter of my people, not to fan nor to cleanse, even a full wind from those places shall come unto me, now also will I give sentence against them.’”

Another thing could be that maybe he’s just kidding when he said that. I mean I don’t know, when Jeremiah says, “Oh, Lord God, you really deceived these people by telling them they’re going to have peace,” I don’t know if he’s doubting himself and he’s just hearing all these other prophets of peace or whether he’s just making fun of the prophets of peace.

Congregation: Yeah.

Pastor: Either way, there were a lot of prophets and this will come up later as we say Jeremiah that are prophesying peace. That’s the big thing that Jeremiah battle with throughout the Book of Jeremiah. Later on the Book of Jeremiah, he’s wearing … You know those things that, like a yoke but sometimes they put people in a yoke to punish people or some … They would attach them to stocks, for example, or other similar punishments have actually taken place throughout history.

Putting people in stocks where they’re stationary like this but also, for example, when I read the life of Genghis Khan, he had to spend a few years or we don’t really know how long but supposedly he spent months or years where he was enslaved. He had to wear this thing called a kang and it was like a yoke that an animal … but he was basically attached to it and other people had to feed him and give him water and stuff like that. He was locked into this thing as a punishment.

Later on, Jeremiah’s wearing a yoke type of thing to basically show them, “You’re going into captivity. You’re going to be enslaved. You’re going to do forced labor.” Then another prophet comes and breaks it and says, “Thus saith the Lord, ‘I’m going to break your yoke and there’s going to be peace.’” He’s like a Joel Osteen coming and breaking it and then God tells Jeremiah, “Tell him that as a punishment for preaching lies instead of a yoke of wood that he could break, I’m going to make you a yoke of iron.”

I’m bringing that out just to tell you that in the book of Jeremiah, there’s a constant battle between Jeremiah, who’s preaching doom and gloom, “God’s going to punish, God’s going to destroy,” and all the prophets of peace saying, “Oh, Jeremiah, he’s hurting people’s feelings and he’s weakening the hearts of the people and the hearts of men of war. He’s discouraging people, he’s not encouraging them enough,” but he’s telling them the truth.

Congregation: Yeah.

Pastor: It’s the same thing we see today where the prophet who tells people the truth is criticized for being too negative and then the guy who’s a prosperity preacher, people just come to him by the droves to hear what they want to hear. That’s why he says that in Jeremiah chapter four, because there’s a mixed message coming from the prophets. Jeremiah’s preaching one thing, the false prophets are preaching something else.

Look down at your Bible there in verse number 13 of chapter four, “Behold he shall come up as clouds and his chariot shall be as a whirlwind. His horses are swifter than eagles. Woe unto us for we are spoiled. O Jerusalem, wash thine heart from wickedness that thou mayest be saved.”

“How long shall thy vain thoughts lodge within thee for a voice declareth from Dan and publishes affliction from Mount Ephraim, ‘Make ye mention to the nations, behold, publish against Jerusalem that watchers come from a far country and give out their voice against the cities of Judah, as keepers of a field and they against her, are they against her roundabout because she hath been rebellious against me,’ sayeth the Lord, ‘Thy way and thy doings have procured these things unto thee. This is thy wickedness because it is bitter, because it reacheth unto thine heart.’”

Now this chapter is not hard to understand, is it? Just really simple, God’s angry, God’s going to punish you, get right with God, get it fixed or you’re doomed. Verse 19, “My bowels, my bowels, I’m pained in my very heart. My heart make the noise in me. I cannot hold my peace because thou has heard, O my soul, the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war, destruction upon destruction is cried, for the whole land is spoiled, suddenly are my tents spoiled and my curtains [inaudible 00:21:30].”

Jeremiah’s just getting really emotional. He’s feeling physical pain when he thinks about the horrors of war. Some of us have been desensitized to the horrors of war just through video games and movies but it’s … War is a horrific thing and I mean just all the blood bath and the death and the carnage that’s coming. Jeremiah sees all this stuff, it’s making him sick. His bowels, his heart, I mean he’s just in pain.

He said in verse 21, “How long shall I see the standard and hear the sound of the trumpet for my people is foolish. They’ve not known me, they are soddish children and they have none understanding. They are wise to do evil but to do good, they have no knowledge.” Now here’s where you get into the Scripture that the Gap Theory crowd just takes and teaches a false doctrine with. Look what it says. “I beheld the earth and, lo, it was without form and void.” Op, there you go, so they see this where it says without form and void and they say, “Oh, this is talking about Genesis one. This is talking about the Creation.”

Now is that what we’re talking about hit this passage? The Creation story?

Congregation: No.

Pastor: Are we anywhere near the Creation story? Is that on anybody’s radar in this chapter? This chapter’s been real consistent, verses one through 22, and in fact, it picks up exactly where chapters one, two, and three have left off. Chapters, one, two, three, and four have all been talking about the same thing consistently, just A to B to C very clear, very simple and then all of a sudden, people want us to believe that we’re back at the Creation now.

We’re just taking a huge leap back to the beginning of the world. “I beheld the earth and, lo, it was without form and void and the heavens and they had no light. I beheld the mountains and, lo, they trembled and all the hills moved lightly and I beheld and there was no man and all the birds of the heaven were fled and I beheld and, lo, the fruitful place was a wilderness,” Now watch this, “And all the cities thereof were broken down at the Presence of the Lord and by His fierce anger.”

Now what Jeremiah is seeing here is a scene of carnage where the earth is unrecognizable, the birds have fled away and where cities are broken down. The fruitful place is a wilderness and the cities are broken down. Now the “Without form and void” of Genesis chapter one is talking about where the earth is basically just covered in water and there’s no dry land, there’s no animal, there’s no … There’s nothing. It’s just the earth without form and totally empty. That’s what void means, empty, okay.

The earth is just complete empty. There’s nothing there. There’s just water and then God says, “Let there be light,” and God creates the firmament and God creates the dry land and on and on. This is something totally different. Just because you say that something’s without form and void, it doesn’t mean that you mean the same thing both times. This is just so ridiculous say … “Since they both say without form and void, ergo, they’re talking about the same thing,” I mean that’s just crazy.

Because this without form and void is meaning, I’m looking at it and the fruitful place is like a wilderness, meaning that farmland, farmland now looks like wild terrain and he says specifically that he sees cities that are broken down. Now is that the image in Genesis one? A planet with cities on it that are broken down? No, it’s without form and void. See there’s empty and then there’s really empty, does everybody understand?

I could have a glass of water with a few drops left in it and if I said it’s empty, that would be accurate to say, “Hey, it’s empty, I need a refill,” but then there’s empty as in totally empty like nothing there or, for example, let’s say we had a really low attendance at a church service and I say, “Yeah, it was really empty on that Sunday,” but then there’s empty as in nothing or I could say the building was empty.

“Hey, I got to church building at five AM and it was totally empty,” meaning that there’s no person there, wouldn’t it be accurate to walk in and there’s not a soul in here and I said, “The building was empty when I arrived.” People got there a half hour later, right. Okay, but what if I walked in and all the chairs were gone, the piano was gone, the organ was gone … Wouldn’t that be a different kind of empty, but both of those could be called empty.

Jeremiah’s not looking at just, “Whoa, the earth hadn’t even been created yet.” He’s looking at broken down cities, look at what it says: Broken down cities, the birds have flown away, not that the birds don’t exist anymore. It’s just that they flew somewhere else. Cities are broken down, fruitful field becomes a wilderness, mounds and hills, whatever.

Let’s keep reading, verse 27, “For thus hath the Lord said, ‘The whole land shall be desolate, yet will I not make a full end.’” What’s He saying? This is a prophecy of the land of Judah being made desolate by the coming Babylonian invasion but He says, “I’m not going to make a full end.”

Now according to this Gap Theory that tries to tie this in with Genesis one and I’m going to explain that in a moment, according to this Gap Theory, basically God wiped out a pre-Adamic race or a pre-Adamic civilization and starts from scratch and so basically our Creation is not the first time. This isn’t the first rodeo because God already destroyed another people and Adam was like a start over, a reset button, but here’s what’s dumb about that. This says, “I’ll not make a full end.” According to the Gap Theory, it sound like He made a full end, I mean everything is wiped out and it’s just water, okay.

“For this shall the earth mourn and the heavens above be black, because I’ve spoken. I have purposed and will not repent, neither will I turn back from it.” Now can you picture an invading army come in and destroy a city and the sky being black as a result. What do you think would cause the sky to be black as a result …

Congregation: Fire.

Pastor: Fire, right. Black smoke would come up and fill the sky and so forth. This is perfectly consistent with the rest of Jeremiah four. He’s talking about destruction coming, the Lord’s fierce anger, the Lord’s fierce wrath, and he says, “I looked and it was just unrecognizable, without form and void. Cities are broken down, wilderness, the sky’s black. God said, ‘It’s desolate but I’m not going to make a full end.’” This is the Babylonian invasion of Judah. It’s clear as crystal.

“The whole city shall flee for the noise of the horsemen and bowmen.” That would explain why it’s empty. Because what did he say in verse number 25, “I beheld and, lo, there was no man and all the birds in the heaven were fled.” Why is there no man? Because it just says in verse 29 because the whole city’s going to flee. When the whole city flees, guess what you have a result? No man.

Congregation: Yeah.

Pastor: Okay, and why are the birds gone? Because they didn’t like that black sky thing. They’re like, “Let’s go where the sky is blue,” so they left. Really this is a pretty simple passage, pretty easy to understand but when you have an agenda to teach this Gap Theory, you can take just a few of these verses out of context and pawn them off on the simple and the unlearned, the people who didn’t read the whole book or the people who just want to believe this.

Because here’s the thing, people believe what they want to believe. When they want to believe something, they’ll ignore all the facts and just believe what they want.

Congregation: It’s true.

Pastor: If they have something that they want to believe, they find a way to believe it.

Congregation: Right.

Pastor: Now this is my hand is the Scofield Reference Bible. Now I grew up with this thing. I mean my first personal Bible, my nice Bible that I studied was a Scofield Reference Bible. I had it as a little kid and I have the Scofield Reference Bible as my personal Bible that I grew up with. In churches this was like the most preferred Bible. If you’ve got the nicest Bible, you had a nice leatherbound Scofield. They gave these away as prizes. In fact I just visited an Independent Fundamental Baptist Church two months ago and someone was presented … Somebody was graduating from school and they were presented with a Scofield Reference Bible as their prize for graduating from school. Very common.

In fact, I’ve been in churches where when they tell you where to turn, they say, “Hey, go to Jeremiah four, which is page number.” They would actually say, “That’s page number 776 in your Scofield Reference Bible.” Then everybody feels like, “Oh, man, I’ve got to get one of those so I can get the page number.”

Now this bible is filled with lies and false doctrine, not just the Gap Theory, okay. It’s filled with a lot of Zionism, a lot of … This is pretty much why, the Preacher of Rapture exists in Baptist churches. It came through this book. This was really the book that popularized it when this thing was distributed, that’s how it got into the Baptist circles, okay, because before that Baptists did not know that doctrine, never heard of that doctrine. That doctrine is really post 1830 but not only that, it didn’t really get popular amongst Baptists until the early 20th century. By that of course, I mean the 1900s, okay.

Basically, if you turn to Genesis one in a Scofield Reference Bible and this is what I don’t understand, how can people not know it’s a fraud when the first page is this bad. Now Independent Fundamental Baptists almost universally don’t believe in the Gap Theory. I mean I would … I think it’s very safe to say that more than 90% of Independent Fundamental Baptists reject the Gap Theory. It’s usually only the Ruckmanite style Independent Baptist that would ever give credence to the Gap Theory, but yet they use this Bible and so they’re poisoning the minds of young people.

You say, “They just read it for the … I just read it for the cross references but I don’t read the notes. I just do it for the cross references,” but here’s the thing, I was a kid, I was given one of these and I confess, I read every note in the thing. I read every note in it. I’m pretty sure I read every note cover to cover. I was reading the notes more than I was reading the Bible. I mean that’s … you and your kid, I mean you’re just like, “Oh, yeah, read all these notes.” I read it. Everybody reads it.

I had the Sword of the Lord call me a couple of months or years ago … I don’t have a very good concept of time but they called me sometime recently and they said to me, “Hey, we just want to let you know,” because we buy a lot of stuff from them, we buy our hymnals from them and so they have a lot of great stuff, great hymnals, Bibles. They called me and said, “Hey, just want to let you know, we’ve got this sale going on on the Scofield Reference Bible,” and I told her, I said, “I’m not interested in the Scofield Reference Bible.” I said, “Do me a favor,” I said, “Do you have a Scofied Reference Bible near?” She said, “Yeah, I can get you …”

I said, “Open it to Genesis chapter one right now while you’re on the phone with me and look how it teaches that the earth is millions of years old.” I said, “Is that what you guys believe?” “No, no.” I’m like, “Maybe you should talk to the power that be on why you guys are selling this thing when on the first page, that’s what it teaches.”

Let me read for you from the notes on the Scofield Reference Bible, you can turn to Genesis one, if you want and keep your finger in Jeremiah chapter four. You start out in the Scofield Reference Bible, right about Genesis 1:1 it says, “The original creation, in the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth.” Then right after that, it has a note immediately between chapter one verse one and verse two. It’s impossible to not read this note, it’s not possible because it’s in the text.

It’s not like just a footnote where you go down to the bottom of the page or over here or over there. No, actually, let me just show you here, look at that. It’s like verse one, note, verse two. You can’t skip it. It’s impossible not to see and you can come look at it after the service, you’ll see what I mean. It’s in the text, as if it’s part of it, practically. “In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth.” Here’s what the note says, “Earth made waste and empty by judgment. See Jeremiah 4:23 through 26.”

Congregation: Wow.

Pastor: Then it says, “And the earth was without form and void and darkness was upon the face of the deep and the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.” Now anyone who just read this without this note, would just think, “So in the beginning God creates heaven and the earth and the earth starts out without form and void and then He’s got to start sprucing it up. He says, ‘Let there be light.” He creates the firmament to separate the waters above and below …” On and on, right. That’s how any rational person would just open their Bible and read it.

Who in the world are you going to hand a Bible to and say, “Hey, I want you to start reading the Bible, Genesis chapter one, ‘In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth …’ I don’t know why but I just have this compulsion right now to turn to Jeremiah chapter four. To get … Because I just feel like something’s missing between verses one and two.

Nobody’s going to come to that in a million years. This is ridiculous. I mean, not to mention the fact that the Book of Jeremiah’s written so much later than the Book of Gene— I mean they had the Book of Genesis for so long, it’s a shame they couldn’t understand it until Jeremiah came along and filled in the most important fact between verses one and two.

Listen to Scofield’s note at the bottom of the page where he really elaborates at the bottom of the page. “Jeremiah 4:23-26, Isaiah 24:1 and 45:18 clearly indicate that the earth had undergone a cataclysmic change as the result of a divine judgment.” That’s clear, right. I mean when you read Jeremiah four, it’s crystal clear that it’s referring to this. “The face of the earth bears everywhere the marks of such a catastrophe.” Now maybe it’s a different catastrophe like the Flood in the days of Noah, for example.”

“Clearly bears the marks of such catastrophe. There are not wanting intimations which connect it with a previous testing and fall of angels. See Ezekiel 28:12-15, Isaiah 14:9-14, which certainly go beyond the kings of Tyre and Babylon.” What he’s claiming, I mean that’s a lot to cram into this gap, big gap between verses one and two, saying, “Oh, first of all, here’s the evidence folks, Jeremiah four is crystal clear, okay. Secondly, all we’ve got to do is look around. I mean look at all the marks of the catastrophe.”

Now that doesn’t make … No, wrong, that’s the Noahic Flood that could have left some of that damage.

Congregation: Right.

Congregation: Oh, yeah.

Pastor: By the way, the earth looks pretty to good to me. I mean it doesn’t look that bad.

Congregation: Right.

Pastor: I mean does it really look that tore up? “It’s everywhere. Look, I can just see divine wrath and judgment.” It looks pretty nice, you know. Maybe, I mean maybe he lived in a weird part of the world or something but Arizona looks pretty good. Anyway, he says, “There’s all these …” He doesn’t want to just speak normal English. He says, “There are enough wanting intimations that this regarded a previous testing and fall of angels.”

Let’s look at where God intimated this to us, okay. Let’s go to Ezekiel 28, for example. Ezekiel 28, this is the intimation of the fact that it was a previous testing and fall of angels on this earth. Look at Ezekiel 28, he is pointing us to … Which verses here? He’s pointing us to 12 through 15. “Southern man, take up a lamentation upon the king of Tyrus and say unto him, ‘Thus saith the Lord, God, thou sealest up the sum full of wisdom and perfect beauty, thou hast been in Eden.’

Now this doesn’t look like it was taking place in some pre-Genesis one verse two former world before God destroyed it because where does the Garden of Eden come into play?

Congregation: Right.

Pastor: Genesis chapter two, so where is the Devil looking so beautiful? Where’s Lucifer looking so beautiful and being the anointed, covering cherub, and being puffed up because of his beauty, and where is iniquity being found in him? It doesn’t say anything about him being in some previous world. It talks about him being in Eden, and so again, this is total nonsense.

If you keep reading it it just says, “Thou hast been in Eden the Garden of God, every precious stone was thy covering. The sardius, topaz, and diamonds, the barrel of the onyx, and the jasper, the sapphire, the emerald, and the carbuncle and gold, the workmanship of thy tabrets and of thy pipes was prepared in thee in the day that thou wast created. Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth and I have set thee so. Thou wast upon the holy mountain of God. Thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created till iniquity was found in thee.”

There is no mention here that it was in some previous world or anything, the only place or time mentioned is Eden, which would go against this theory that they’re trying to show us. Now if you would flip over to Exodus, chapter number 20, Exodus, chapter number 20. Exodus chapter 20 and I’m going to show you a verse that I was taught. Thankfully, I didn’t just have a Scofield Reference Bible as a kid, but my parents had all their notes in the back of the Scofield Reference … They had written with an ink pen.

Thank God my parents’ notes were a lot more accurate than Scofield’s notes because they had in the back that Bible that they gave me as a little toddler, however old I was when I first started reading. I learned to read when I was three. My mom taught me really young and I’m very thankful for that. She taught me at a super young age how to read. I don’t remember when I got that Bible but I was probably around six years old or maybe even younger.

They had written in the back of the Bible, “No gap. Exodus 20, verse 11,” right. That was a counter measure to make sure I didn’t get screwed up by the notes. They wrote in the back, “No gap, Exodus 20, verse 11.” I remember as kid going to Exodus 20:11, trying to figure out, “What are they talking about, ‘No gap. Exodus 20, verse 11?’” Then I figured it out. “Oh, okay, I see what they’re saying.” Because in Exodus 20:11, it says, “For in six days, the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is and rested the seventh day, wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.”

Now notice here, “In six days, God created the heaven and the earth,” that’s verse one. “The sea and all that in them …” that’s verses two through the rest of the chapter with no gap.

Congregation: Right.

Pastor: See how there’s no gap there. Of course, there’s no gap between Genesis 1:1 and Genesis 1:2 either but it’s a little easier to put a gap there. It’s impossible to put a gap in Genesis 20:11.

Congregation: Right.

Pastor: “Six days God created the heaven and the earth.” That’s what it said in Genesis 1:1, “In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth and everything that’s in them,” all in those six days.

Congregation: Yeah.

Pastor: I believe that when God created the earth that probably when He created the heaven and the earth, He created the heaven on the first day as a finished product, the place where He lives, heaven, okay. We’re not talking about the sky heaven. We’re talking about the place where He lives heaven. I believe He created it as a ready made finished product and everything that’s in it, all the angels, everything involved there and that He created the earth without form and void.

He says, He created the heaven and the earth and the earth was without form and void and then He begins to work on the earth and so forth, because God is able … It’s funny how people say, “You really think God created the whole earth in six little days?” He could have done it in six minutes. He’s God. I mean He’s not governed by time, so that’s why I say, He could have just created a ready made heaven.

That’s what the Scripture would seem to indicate and I went into great detail on that and why I believe that and showed Scripture on that in my sermon, I think on Genesis two, when we went through Genesis, either Genesis one or two, I covered that, probably Genesis two sermon.

There’s no gap here. It’s crystal clear, but listen to what it says here in Scofield’s note on Genesis one that I haven’t read to you this part yet. The first creative act refers to the dateless past and gives scope for all the geologic ages. What he’s saying is that we’re putting a gap in here because we want to match up with geology, the geologic ages, the geologic column.

Now this book by Scofield, I used to know what year it was from, but it goes back to what, 1909 it says, 1917. Those are earliest dates on this thing, so 1909, 1917. Archeology and especially the theories of evolution and things like that, they really came on the scene in the late 1800s and they were really starting to be popular in the early 20th century and this was a big battle that was going on in the early 20th century between people who accepted or rejected the teaching of evolution.

Because really this teaching’s only that old, I mean really until a 100 years ago or so, nobody believed in it but it really started getting popular in the early 20th century. It originated in the 1800s, okay. Right at that time, people like Scofield are basically adjusting the Bible to try to fit in with these new scientific theories about evolution. Now here’s the problem with that, the Bible doesn’t fit with evolution.

Congregation: Amen.

Pastor: The Bible doesn’t fit with millions and billions of years old. Honestly, there’s no reason in the world for us to adjust the Bible to this idea of the earth being billions of years old, because there’s no evidence that the world is billions of years old and it’s impossible to prove that the earth is millions or billions of years old, not possible to prove.

Now here’s why it’s not possible to prove that and I don’t want to go on and on about this subject, but the simple fact is that no one was around back then, so any kind of a machine that would tell you how old something is would have to first be calibrated with something we know is that old.

Okay, for example, when thermometers were first being made, they would calibrate the thermometer based on the freezing point of water, right. They’d get some water, get it to the freezing point and then they could draw a line on the thermometer saying, “Okay, we know that that is 32 degrees Fahrenheit or zero degrees Celsius,” put a line on the thermometer there.

Then the boiling point of water, they could measure that temperature and mark that as 212 degrees Fahrenheit and 100 degrees Celsius or they could take the human body temperature, right, and then that gives them another reference point, 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit, what is it? 37 degrees Celsius? Who’s a Celsius person here? Canadian? 37? All right, all right. I don’t speak Celsius. I speak English. No, I’m just kidding, but anyway, the point is you get these reference points, right, and then you can draw all the lines in between.

Then when I stick that thermometer somewhere else and it comes out with a certain temperature, I’d say, “You know what, I know that that’s the same temperature because I tested that on boiling water and we …” You have to have a known. In order to calibrate something that measures how old things are, you would basically have to have something where you say, “I know that this is that old, right,” and then I could calibrate whatever the system and say, “Since I know this is that old, then therefore …”

You say, “Pastor Anderson, but they can measure stuff that’s 1,000 years old or 2,000 years old and then they could just extrapolate that out.” Okay, but here’s the thing, let’s try that with a thermometer.

Congregation: Yeah, it doesn’t work.

Pastor: Okay, so we put the freezing point of water and the boiling point of water, here’s the thing, can we just measure something that’s 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit on that thermometer? No, or what happens once we go so cold that thing’s not going to be accurate anymore. Once we go so hot, the thermometer’s going to break and the Mercury’s going to spill out. It only works for the range that we’ve calibrated and we don’t really know what it’s going to do if we go to extreme colds or extreme heats, until we test that and verify that, okay.

There are a lot of reason why these dating methods could be inaccurate and the one that’s that brought out the most is radio carbon dating. Everybody talks about it and it’s funny, I’ve stood at the doorstep of a guy who had a science degree from Devil State University and he sat there and told me radio carbon dating, and I said, “How far back can you go with radio carbon dating?” and he said, “Millions of years.”

I said, “No one believes that.” I said, “We could go on any website you want right now. We could go to any encyclopedia. We could go to any science book, and no science book, no encyclopedia will tell you that carbon dating goes back millions of years, because no one even makes that claim.” Even the people who believe in carbon dating and swear by carbon dating would only claim that it could go back 25,000 or 50,000 years depending on who you talked to.

No one claims that it goes back millions of years, but your average American, if we were to go take a poll, 90 some percent of them would say, “Oh, they carbon dated stuff to figure out that it’s millions of years old.” It’s not true though. Look it up yourself and there are all kinds of problems with carbon dating but even if you believed in it, I’m saying, it doesn’t go back that far, no one even claims it does, except people who just don’t know and they’re just throwing, “Oh, yeah, of course.”

Listen, listen to me, there’s a dumbing down in America.

Congregation: Yes, big time.

Pastor: There’s a dumbing down in the world that we live in. I mean I literally, I was in a college classroom just a few weeks ago and I was showing a bunch of statistics about the sodomite queer lifestyle, how destructive it is and how they’re so filled with disease and how bad it is. Somebody’s like, “I just don’t believe in that.” I’m like, “These are statistics. I got these off of AIDS.gov. I got these off Center for Disease Control websites, CDC.gov. This is not a right wing website. It’s just studies that they did. These facts are accurate, you can check this with …”

I’m showing them statistics and then this is what one of the students said to me and you were there, Brother Baker, right, and Paul Winber was there, “What about all this … You believe in statistics, what about the statistics …” and this guy was not disabled, this guy was … Look, this guy didn’t have an excuse. This guy was a totally … He had all the chromosomes were right with this guy. This is what he said, “What about all the statistics that say that teach Evolution and the Big Bang?”

I mean this is in a college. We’re in a college class and he’s like, “What about all the statis—” I’m like, “Dude, I don’t think you know what a statistic is because …” Then I had to explain … I’m like, “That’s not a statistic. What are you talking about?” I had to explain to him statistics would be like if I went to my church and I counted all the people that had blond hair and I counted the people that had brown hair. I figured out how many people were this age and that age and how long they lived and how many babies were born and I compiled data.

I’m like, “Those are statistics about …” I’m like … but I just didn’t even know what to say, because it’s just like, “What did he say?” Honestly, when … I hate to say this but at that college there are a lot of moments like that, a lot, where you’re just, “What? We’re doomed.” The human race, I mean, but anyway, you’re just blown away by, “Whoa …” They just believe whatever they’re taught. “Oh, you believe those statistics, what about the statistics about the Big Bang and Evolution?”

They don’t know what that means. They’re just repeating, “Oh, but what about the carbon dating, millions of billions of years.” It’s like, “You don’t even know what you’re talking about.”

Congregation: Right.

Pastor: You haven’t really proved these things or checked into any of this stuff.

Congregation: No.

Pastor: There’s a lot of science falsely so called.

Congregation: Right.

Pastor: The Bible says, “O Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings and oppositions of science falsely so called, which some professing have erred concerning the faith, grace be with thee, amen.” The Bible says, “People have erred from the faith as a result of science falsely so called.” The word science means knowledge, right, things that we know to be true, things that we can test and observe and know to be true.

Now anything where we talk about what happened thousands of years ago cannot be science. Now the Bible is not science. Now if I said Creation and the Flood and everything, that’s not science, okay, because we can’t prove that empirically. We don’t use experiments to prove that the Bible is true. We believe that the Bible’s true by faith.

Congregation: Amen.

Pastor: It’s not science, okay, but neither is Evolution and the Big Bang, neither is that science. That is also philosophy is what it should be regarded as or religion, philosophy, things of that nature. Because philosophy answers the questions of who we are, why we’re here, where we came from and the view put forth by the Big Bang and Evolution of we came here as a result of nothing. There was nothing and then nothing exploded and then there was something from nothing and then that something became a lot of somethings that evolved into other somethings that came to life.

Now here’s the thing, true science never contradicts the Bible and we need to stand on that fact today in 2016. Now there have been a lot of foolish teachings throughout the years that try to attack that truth but true science and that’s implied when the Bible says, “Oppositions of science falsely so called,” that God is okay with real science because He’s calling out a falsely so called science. He’s not just saying, “Oh, avoid science. Stay away from science now.” He says, “Avoid oppositions of science falsely so called.”

See, we as Bible believing Christians believe that the Bible is scientifically accurate and that the teachings of the Bible regarding science are sound teachings, okay. Now the Bible needs no apology in this area because the Bible has always been way ahead of science and … I remember when I was dating my wife … Actually, no, this is actually before we were dating because she wasn’t even saved. This is when we were first talking and I was trying to get her saved, not the first time I gave her the Gospel but a subsequent time that I gave her the Gospel.

She basically just rejected the Bible as being God’s Word, out of hand because she said, “The Bible can’t be true, because the Bible is scientifically inaccurate,” because that’s what she’d been taught her whole life. Then I said to her, “No,” and I gave her all these reasons why the Bible is scientifically accurate. I showed her all kinds of Scriptures and then after that, then she was open to hearing more about what the Bible said, but think about how dangerous that is where she just has a mindset, “We know the Bible can’t be true, because it’s scientifically inaccurate.”

The Devil has an agenda to convince people that the Bible is scientifically inaccurate so that they can be like her where they just reject the Bible out of hand. Now here’s the thing, the Devil is a great con artist. The Bible says he has great wisdom, wiser than Daniel, okay. He’s smart enough to know that one size doesn’t fit all. He has multiple deceptions going on multiple fronts. He has many different hooks in the water, as it were. He always likes to approach things from two angles and this is where we get the False Left Right Paradigm.

Congregation: Yeah.

Pastor: Who’s heard of the False Left Right Paradigm? Wow, I thought we had more conspiracy theorists in the church than that, but anyway, several people put up their hand. A False Left Right Paradigm and, basically, people are falling for this right now en masse because we’re in an election year so it’s just … The Left Right Paradigm is in full swing and what this is is where you are presented with two false alternatives. You are told and convinced that these are the only two options and you must choose the one and if you don’t go with the one, then you have to go with the other and vice versa.

Let me give you some examples of this, Calvinism versus Arminianism. “Oh, you’re not a Calvinist, then you must be an Arminian.” “Oh, I’m not an Arminian.” “Oh, then you’re Calvinist.” They’re both false because Arminianism teaches that you can lose your salvation. Calvinism teaches that God chooses who goes to heaven and hell and that man has no free will. Those are both lies, but you’re told that you have to choose one of those two.

Okay, or republican or democrat, democrats or republicans and they basically say … and think about it, you tell people. “Oh, I hate Barack Obama,” and they say, “Oh, you love Bush.” Isn’t that true? Isn’t that what they say? Or you start criticizing Bush, “What are you liberal? What, you love Obama?” They’re both false.

Congregation: Right.

Pastor: Okay, and we’re constantly presen— How about this one? White magic, black magic. Right. I mean are they both not wicked? All the magicians and the sorcery and all this stuff is wicked but the Devil comes at you with two options: The Wicked Witch of the West and then the Good Witch of the … Right, the good witch and the bad witch, the white magic, the black magic. Coke versus Pepsi. It’s the same drink, people.

People get all worked up about Coke versus Pepsi, what kind of nonsense and it’s the same thing right now in the election year. You’ve got the republicans and the democrats and they both do the same thing. They say, they … Look, I’ll admit it. They say very different things when you listen to them talk, they do talk very differently, but when you look at the deeds, when you look at the fruit, they do the same thing when they get elected.

Republicans in fact spend more money than democrats, that’s a fact, but the republicans, they talk a real good game of how they’re going to cut spending and you’re like, “Yeah, this is great. We’re getting … Finally, trim things out.” Hey, Ronald Reagan said, “Government’s not the answer to our problem. Government is our problem,” and he tripled the size of the government in eight years in office but he said a lot of great stuff. I mean if you listen to those quotes from Ronald Reagan, you’re like, “Man, this guy’s awesome,” but then when you look at what he did, it … and when you look at what Bush did, it tells a different story.

Because actually, they’re buddies. You can even see how the Bushes and the Clintons are like best buddies.

Congregation: Oh, yeah.

Pastor: There are all these pictures of them hanging around together going on vacation together. Look, if you actually had integrity, would you be buddies with a person like Bill Clinton?

Congregation: No.

Pastor: I mean a guy who’s desecrating the Oval Office by committing adultery on the clock in the Oval Office, okay. A guy who is just he vetoes the partial birth abortion ban, a guy who his brother said he had a nose like a vacuum for snorting cocaine. Okay, I mean guy who is just wicked on so many … Bill Clinton and it’s like … but would you really be buddies with that person but then the Bushes are like best buddy … but they claim to believe in different stuff.

It’s like the WWF, where they hate each other and I’m going to kick your butt and everything and then back stage, they’re best friends. They’re touring America together, right. There’s a False Left Right Paradigm going on where the Devil has multiple deceptions, oppositions of science falsely so called. On one hand he comes at us with the Big Bang and Evolution, which is not science. It’s foolishness.

Congregation: Yes.

Congregation: Amen.

Pastor: It’s foolishness. Listen, my sister, “No scientist believes that.” Yeah, there are plenty of scientists that believe in Creation and that reject Evolution. They just tell you that there aren’t any. “None that we like.” There’s no scientist I like that are for it or … but anyway, okay, my sister in law got a four year degree from UC Davies which is a respected school amongst those circles for science. She got a four year degree in genetics, so she got a science degree. She was a good student and studied hard and studied four years of genetics.

At that time they were mapping the human genome and there’s a big thing going on and a lot of that research was going on at UC Davies and I did fire alarms in some of the buildings where they’re working on and everything so I was exposed to a lot of that at that time, too. My sister in law got a four year science degree from UC Davies in genetics and she said that, “It’s just bizarre that anyone could believe in Evolution and the Big Bang in light of genetics because the DNA is so complicated, there’s no way that it could come about without a Creator. It’s just ridiculously complicated.”

Even of the most simple organism, it’s ridiculously complicated and she said that it just confirms … All of the microbiology classes, I mean just confirm your belief in God and your belief in the God of the Bible, more importantly. It’s not that just, “Oh, you bunch of backwards bumpkins you believe in Creation because you’re dumb and …” Here’s a Bible believing Christian, my sister in law who got a four year degree in genetics and still believed the Bible and she used what she learned to demonstrate that it’s foolish to believe in Evolution.

On one hand of the Devil’s False Left Right Paradigm is you have this thing of saying, “Oh, Evolution and the Big Bang,” so then Christians will sometimes try to twist the Bible to try to hitch on to that wagon and say, “Oh, we believe in the Gap Theory and the Gap Theory leaves room for millions and billions of years and he even says here, for all the geologic ages.” Because the truth of the matter is that the dating of these fossils is not based on Radio Carbon Dating as they would lead you to believe.

This is what it is. It depends on which layer they found it in the geologic column and then they say, “How do you know how old that layer is?” “Because we found these fossils in it?” “How do you know that those fossils are that old?” “Oh, because we found them in that layer,” and round and round we go.

Basically, this is something that is somebody twisting the Bible to fit what the world is teaching, which is this pseudo science, science falsely so called of what happened thousands of years ago when there’s no record of what happened, except for … We got … I mean here’s a book that somebody wrote about it, right. His name’s God, but other than that, you don’t have any evidence of what things were like. You don’t know the changes that have taken place on this planet and people say, “Oh, but you can look at it and it looks old.”

Yeah, but if you would have looked at Adam, he would have looked old, too. He probably would have looked about 30 years old, he was just created yesterday. God created a mature earth, He created a mature Adam, a mature Eve. He didn’t have a sapling of the knowledge of good and evil. Hey, once that tree grows it might be a fruit that’s good to eat. No, it was … He planted trees, so if you would have cut down the trees in the Garden of Eden and counted the rings, you would have been wrong about how old they were. They’re two minutes old.

Congregation: Right.

Pastor: They’re five days old, right. See what I’m saying or “Oh, the stars are millions of light years away. How could the light travel?” You know what God could have just created it with the beams of light in place. He’s God or “Oh, this stalactite took this long.” Maybe He just created stalactites. It’s not like he just created like a flat earth. Oh, that’s another subject but anyway … It’s not He created the [inaudible 01:04:25] looking like Kansas and then for the canyons and stuff to come about, the river had to etch … Maybe He just created canyons.

Maybe he just created mountains and rivers and waterfalls. I mean maybe just the first day when God created the earth, it had waterfalls and at the bottom of that waterfall was a pool carved out in the rock and if the waterfall would have carved out the pool, it would have taken X amount of time, but He created a mature earth. It’s impossible to prove that wrong. That could never be disproven and it is reality because we know for a fact that He created …

Look, which came first the chicken or the egg? The chicken.

Congregation: Yes.

Congregation: Right.

Pastor: Solved. Never need to bring that up again. Why? Because God didn’t create saplings and seeds and eggs. He did not sow the Garden of Eden. He planted the Garden of Eden, full grown plants, full grown human beings. He didn’t bring him a lion cub and say, “What do you want to call this?” He brought him a full grown lion and he named the name thereof. Does everybody understand that?

Congregation: Yeah.

Congregation: Amen.

Pastor: This nonsense, this science falsely so called, we don’t need to change the Bible to try to match that because then what happens is pretty soon the Bible just loses credibility, because then we start twisting that, and then what are we going to twist next? Then next thing you know, it’s just, “Oh, well, you know, maybe the Bible is just a lot of good morals but science is what we really trust at the end of the day.”

It’s not real science though, but then there’s another attack that the Devil has because he comes at it from both angles. He comes at it to attack the people who believe in science where they really worship science. He gets them with this Evolution, Big Bang lie but then he goes after the people that aren’t into science that don’t believe in science. Then he comes at them with this Flat Earth stupidity, right. Teaching them that, “Oh, the earth is flat,” and here’s where I get infuriated, my blood starts boiling, “Oh, the Bible says it’s flat.”

No, it doesn’t. It never says that. Show me that phrase in the Bible, “The earth’s flat.” Doesn’t say anything like that. “The earth’s a disc.” It doesn’t say that, so basically what happens is the Devil now has this deception and he’s already pulled this out various times throughout human history but it’s in full swing right now, this Flat Earth crap. I don’t like using that word lightly, but that’s what it is. It’s a bunch of crap.

Congregation: Right.

Pastor: I mean I don’t know what else to say about it and the bottom line is is that this Flat Earth thing, okay, is for people who say, “Oh, we reject that. We’re just going to believe the Bible and the Bible says it’s flat,” but the Bible doesn’t say it’s flat. They just basically throw out the baby with the bath water and just reject all science so instead of just rejecting the part that’s a science falsely so called, where we’re talking about stuff that happened thousands of years ago which we have no way of knowing, instead of just rejecting that part, they throw out the baby with the bath water and just say, “Science is a lie, we can’t trust anything that science tells us.”

Okay, and then they go with the earth being flat. Now here’s the thing about that though, you can prove that the earth is not flat, thousands of different ways, very easy to prove using empirical, observable data. Here’s the thing, every single day, it’s proven. Every single day, people travel based on the fact that the earth is a globe and, no, it’s not a ball. A ball is something that you play with outside, as a toy but it’s a globe or a sphere and the thing about that is that there are all kinds of routes every day where people drive in their cars or fly in a plane or go in a ship and that route is based on a globe and it only works on a globe.

See, every map, for example, look at that map, right there, if you can see it where you’re sitting, but that map right there is a picture of the earth but is the earth really a flat rectangle like that. No, it’s not, so is that map really accurate?

Congregation: No.

Pastor: No. There’s another map, if you turn around and look at the entry way of our church right there. You see that map right there. That is a flat rectangle map of the entire earth, that is also grossly inaccurate. Can you see how Greenland is the size of South America on that map? Do you think that that’s really that big? Because it’s not, otherwise they’d be calling it a continent of Greenland. It’s not really that big, is it? No.

That map is grossly inaccurate. That is called, that map and that map, those are called the Mercator Projection. Now when I was at school, we learned about several different projections of the earth, okay. Because when you take a globe, you can’t make a flat representation of that. It won’t work. In order to flatten it, you have to stretch it out and bend it and tweak it and mess it up, which is why none of these maps are accurate, but they still have a place to give us an inkling of where things are, but they’re not really accurate.

If you really want an accurate representation of things, you have to look at a globe. That’s the only way to do it. Go grab me a globe, Brother Baker, out of my office. You have to have a globe in order to show it. Now if you want to check the distance from point A to point B and actually see how far away things are, if you did it on that map, even if the map is to scale, because it’s a Mercator Projection or distortion, if you did it with a string and measured the string, that would not be accurate. That would not be an accurate distance.

Whereas, if you took this globe right here and you get the scale of the globe where it tells you, it’s a one to 48 million scale, and basically, this distance right here, represents 96 kilometers, okay. If you actually took a string and stretched it over the globe, right, and took those distances, those would actually be perfectly accurate and those are proven to be accurate, every single day, every single day.

Now this is why when you book a flight, even if you just booked a flight to the East Coast, it’s always a curved line. When you’re sitting on the airplane, you want to see how far you are, have you ever noticed, it’s never a straight line. It’s always like a curved line, right. Everybody following me?

If you went on Travelocity right now and I just book a flight and say I want to see the path or whatever, it’s always a curved line. The reason why it’s a curved line, it’s not that the plane is flying in a curved path, the flight is flying a perfectly straight path, but because you’re distorting the map to make it flat and so that route gets distorted. Does everybody understand? You’re flying straight as an arrow but because the map is distorted, the line becomes a curve.

According to the Flat Earthers, nope, nope, it’s all a big fraud. It’s all a big scam and none of that’s real. It’s all fake and … Here’s the thing, you try to talk sense into these people, they don’t listen. They just want to talk and blow off their mouth and they don’t want to listen and you try to give them facts and they don’t listen. You try to explain it to them … and here’s what they’ll do.

They come at you with this flat disk map that’s just flat and in fact, they call it the Flat Earth, right, so wouldn’t you think that they’re saying it’s flat? Just by that name, flat. Then they come at you with this flat map and then it’s like you try to tell them, “No, that doesn’t work because look at all these curved rods.” Then they come at you with this map that’s like a chips and dip bowl or like a bun cake. Who knows what I’m talking about? Like a bun cake pan?

They come at you with this one where it’s like a dome in the middle and then it goes out like this, but it’s like, “Wait a minute, you just finished telling me it’s flat,” and that we’d all fall off the bottom and stuff, so are we all sideways on this little chip and dip bowl? Basically, when they want to, it’s totally flat, but then when you call them out on that, it’s like, “It’s the bun cake.” Then when you’re talking about the curvature, they’re like, “There’s no curvature, it’s flat.”

It’s like, “Oh, let’s throw out the bun cake then and get the flat again,” because this is why. Listen to me, because it’s not real. Because they’re making fun of you.

Congregation: Yes.

Pastor: Listen to me, the people who are behind this Flat Earth thing are not for real. They don’t really believe in it. They are making an idiot of you is what they’re doing. It’s a joke to them. They think it’s funny. Now they have a sick sense of humor but that’s what they’re doing. I do not have any doubt about it and what they’re doing is they get gullible people to fall for this stuff. It’s a hoax and they’re laughing their heads off. The people … I’m talking about the ring leaders of this. They are laughing their heads off, that, “Wow, we can get people to actually fall for this.”

They know it’s fake, which is why when you try to call people out on this thing, either number one, they just stone wall you and just keep switching models and just, “Oh, you’re just trusting NASA and blah, blah, blah,” or what they’ll do is they’ll just be so ignorant that when you try to explain them the math and the science, it just goes over their head. It’s really stupid.

Look, this Geocentricity thing, look, I’m not saying that if you believe in Geocentricity, you’re a complete idiot. If you believe in the Flat Earth, you are a complete idiot. I’m just … Let me go on the record and say that, but, look if you believe in Geocentricity, I don’t believe that you’re a complete idiot. I can see how you could believe that but it’s false. The thing is I used to just ignore Geocentricity and just think, “Whatever, who cares, it’s not really that big of a deal.”

It seems like Geocentricity is like a gateway drug into the Flat Earth. You know what I mean? That’s what’s dangerous about it. It’s the gateway drug. I’m serious. What you have now is you have people saying these stupid things like, “What do you expect [inaudible 01:14:47] we’re spinning in a thousand miles an hour? I don’t feel it.” Okay, but here’s the thing, because the earth’s spinning, right. “I mean if we’re going a thousand miles an hour, I mean weee, you know,” or if we jump, we’re going to land like a few feet over with ...

Here’s what they don’t get and I try to explain it to them and they’re like “Why is the water so peaceful if we’re spinning that fast?” Here’s the thing, get on an airplane, how fast does an airplane go?

Congregation: 500 miles an hour.

Pastor: About 500 miles an hour, right, so if I get on an airplane and I’m going 500 miles an hour, I have a glass water on my tray table and it’s very peaceful. It’s not going anywhere and I can jump up and down as many times as I want and I’m going … They’re saying a 1,000 mile an hour, the plane goes five hundred miles an hour. Why can I jump up and down and keep landing in the same spot? Why is it whoosh, ssshhhh, whoosh? Because the reason why is because everything’s moving. It’s not just the earth that’s spinning, it’s the atmosphere that moves with it.

It’s a pressurized cabin as it were. I mean the air and the atmosphere and everything, it’s all spinning, so it’s all going the same speed and here’s how you know it’s spinning, because you can see everything moving, you can see the sun moving, the moon moving, and all the stars moving. Now here’s the thing about that, you say, “How do you know that we’re not standing still and everything around us and spinning?” That’s about as ridiculous as saying, “How do we know that the plane’s not standing still and it’s the whole world that’s going by?”

Here’s why that … and look, I’m know I’m getting on Geocentricty tonight and I hate this stupid subject but it’s the gateway drug. I’ve got to bring this up. We need like DARE, DARE to say no to this stuff. The thing about …

What is it MADD, or Mothers Against Drunk Science or whatever, but anyway, here’s the thing about it. Look, I feel like I have to teach this stuff.

Congregation: Yeah.

Pastor: I don’t like science that much, but I feel like I have to talk about science just because … to make sure that people know what’s up with this. Anyway, where were we? Yeah, yeah, yeah. The stars moving, here’s the thing about that. Okay, if the earth is spinning, right, then it’s going around basically about a 1,000 miles per hour, relative to its surroundings because of the fact that it’s about 24,000 miles in circumference, roughly. 24 hours in a day, a thousand miles an hour, that’s where that figure comes from, okay.

[inaudible 01:17:37] about that though, because the stars are far away, I don’t care how close you think they are or how far they are. We can all agree that they’re not that close, right? Okay, and that the sun and moon are far away, even if you don’t believe what NASA told you but anyway, even though these things were calculated long before NASA had ever been thought off, okay, like thousands of years ago, but if things are really far away and we’re supposed to believe that they’re all moving, they would have to be moving at some incredible speeds.

Congregation: Right.

Pastor: Do you understand? I’m trying to break this down for people … you’re on a swing, right. Okay, swing at the park, that chain is only what? 10 feet long, eight feet long on the swing at the park. Okay, which links in the chain are moving the fastest? The ones at the top or the ones at the bottom? The ones at the top are barely moving at all, right. Now what if I grab the swing and in fact, I did this yesterday. I was at the park and one of the swings was out of commission because as Baby Stevens said, “Some punk teenager must have thrown it over at the top.”

I walked up and I grabbed that swing and I threw it up and I swung it all the way around and it did a whole rotation. Here’s the thing, the chains that were the closest to the pole, they only moved a little bit. They moved a short distance, whereas the stuff at the end of the chain, moved a really longest and were moving an incredible speed, relative to the one that was in the middle.

If the earth were staying put then it would be like everything’s whoosh, shsshshshh … I mean at amazing speeds, incredible speeds. Okay, that’s one thing, now another … Some people would say this, “Okay, which one’s going around the other?” Does it really matter? Just how you look at it, sun, moon … Sun and earth, just how you look at it, but there’s this problem of the fact that there’s seven or eight other planets … they change it all the time, because they’re not sure what to call Pluto or whatever.

Anyway, there’s eight other planets going around the sun, too, that’s where this Geocentricity thing falls apart, doesn’t work, okay, but again, it’s just a throwing out of things that are observable. We actually can observe the stars, the sun, the moon. We can actually take a trip to Antarctica. We could actually go to Chile and look up at the sky and the Southern Hemisphere and you know what you’re going to see? A completely different set of stars that don’t rotate around the North Star, they rotate at the Southern Cross.

That alone shows that if it was a globe, look the people in the North are looking at the stars that are over here spinning, but it’s actually the earth that’s spinning. Then the people on the bottom are looking at a completely different set of stars that rotate around a different point, but that’s not what this Flat Earth thing shows or anything like that. It’s all stupid and the bottom line is that the Devil has got this Left Right Paradigm where he is going to just do anything except get you to believe the truth.

Either he’s going to get you to believe in all this weird Evolution and Big Bang stuff and maybe through the Gap Theory or maybe just through atheism or else he’s going to get you to just completely reject even the good science and to throw out the fact that the earth is even a sphere, which people have known for thousands of years to be true, because even in Ancient Egypt, Ancient Sumeria, they studied the stars.

Man has always loved astronomy and astrology and the zodiac and these things, very well documented throughout history. They’ve known. It’s a Left Right Paradigm, folks. What happens when you tell people, “Hey, the earth’s a sphere.” “Oh, you must believe in Evolution and the Big Bang, too.” “Oh, you don’t like Obama? You must be a Bush fan. You must love Trump or whatever?” or “Oh, oh, you don’t like the republican party? You’re one of these long haired hippies?”

It’s a False Left Right Paradigm where you say, “Hey, I don’t believe in Evolution.” “I don’t believe in the Big Bang.” They’re like, “Oh, you must believe the earth’s flat?” “Oh, you believe the Bible? Then you believe in a Flat Earth.” Now you can see how the Devil would love this.

Congregation: Yeah, right. Definitely.

Pastor: Where you say, “Oh, I’m a Bible believing Christian,” and then that makes you a Flat Earther which makes you an idiot to anyone who knows any math or science.

Congregation: That’s right.

Congregation: Right.

Pastor: It makes you just an imbecile or if you’re over here, saying, “I’m a bless God, I believe the Bible and the earth’s flat.” Then you just look like a retard to the whole world.

Congregation: Right.

Pastor: Either way, it makes this book look stupid and the Devil loves it. It’s a False Left Right Paradigm. It’s a joke that’s being played on Christians where many Christians are getting on board with this and it just makes Christianity look stupid. It makes the Bible look stupid and this is … I mean people like my wife could have gone to hell because of this teaching. Where she said, “I know the Bible’s not true because the Bible says the earth’s flat.” That’s what they taught her in Catholic religious education class, that the Bible says the earth’s flat. When the Bible says no such thing.

You see how dangerous both of these doctrines are. Here’s what we need to do, folks, we need to accept science, meaning things that we can actually see, observe, measure, test, calculate and we need to reject science falsely so called which is theorizing about the past. Until we build a time machine to go back in the past, no one knows. We need to separate science from science falsely so called, but the Devil wants us to merge these two things.

These people over here, they want us to believe that they’re one and the same, that if you reject Evolution and Big Bang, you just don’t believe in science. Isn’t that what the atheists tell you? Then the Flat Earthers over here, “If you won’t say that it’s flat, you’re rejecting the Bible or something, because you must believe all that stuff.” Either way, it’s the same thing and it’s atheists that are behind it. It’s the Devil that’s behind it, okay.

Honestly, there’s so many lies. I mean I feel dumb even going on about it, but it’s out there, but Evolution is just as dumb. It’s all dumb, but it’s a dumbing down of people where they would fall for any of this stuff. People say like, “Everybody thought it was flat 500 years ago.” That’s not true. Lie, and by the way, you can measure the distance that the sun is using trigonometry, how far the sun is from the earth.

A guy named Eratosthenes did it around a 100 BC. He measured the circumference of the earth and he figured it all out and he wasn’t a 100% accurate because he didn’t have all the facts in front of him but his math was sound but he was very close to the truth. He was within a 100 miles accuracy, the way you look at it. I mean it’s … Because you make triangles, spheres, it’s time to pull out the math book and dust it off if you’re confused about these things.

Honestly, the Bible says that we “Be henceforth no more children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine and cunning craftiness whereby they lie in wait to deceive.” Honestly, it makes the whole Truth Movement look stupid. There’s an agenda to make the Truth Movement look stupid because then it just makes you want to reject the whole Truth Movement and just be like, “Pfft, I don’t want to be lumped in with this stupidity. It’s nonsense.”

Anyway, let’s quickly finish in Jeremiah four, I’m out of time. I just want to point out a couple of things real quick. Look, a plain reading of Jeremiah four and a plain reading of Jeremiah one without a Scofield Reference Bible, you’re never going to come to the Gap Theory in a million years and all God’s people said …

Congregation: Amen.

Pastor: Amen, and the Bible says here in verse number 30, “And when thou art spoiled, what wilt thou do? Though thou clothed thyself with crimson, though thou deckest thee with ornaments of gold, though thou rentest thy face with painting, in vain shalt thou make thyself fair. Thy lovers will despise thee, they will seek thy life, for I have heard a voice as of a woman in travail and the anguish as of her that bringeth forth her first child and the voice of the daughter of Zion that bewaileth herself that spreadeth her hands saying, ‘Woe is me now for my soul is wearied because of murderers.’”

Again just going through and just talking about the carnage and the destruction that’s coming as a result of the disobedience of God’s people. We need to stay true to the Word. We need to believe the Bible. We need to have faith in God’s Word above all else, but that doesn’t mean that we should just ignore facts around us. If we look around the world and we see facts, we shouldn’t just ignore those facts and say, “I don’t care, it’s flat.”

No, there’s facts, about that and about anything else for that matter, but we do need to reject science that contradicts the Bible, because it’s science falsely so called. It’s philosophy, it’s conjecture. It’s not real observable data.

Let’s bow our heads and have a word of prayer.

Father, we thank you so much for your Word, Lord, and we thank you that we have the Word of God to guide us and direct us, Lord. Please help us not to be foolish and gullible. Help us to study to show ourselves approved, Lord. The Bible says that, “If we are wise we will seek knowledge, but the mouth of fools feedeth on foolishness.”

Help us to actually get real knowledge through study, reading, and actual gathering of knowledge, not just listening to all the deceivers out there and weirdos that we don’t even know who they are, Lord.

Help us to listen to people that we actually know who they are and know that they’re actually a pastor if they’re going to teach us the Bible, not just some yeahoo with a Youtube channel but rather real men of God. If you’re going to watch Youtube, Lord, help us to find the guys that are men of God, that are actually real life pastors, not to just play one on Youtube, Lord.

Please just help us, dear God, to not be deceived, Lord. Just open our eyes and help us to behold wondrous things out of Your law. Bless us as we go our separate ways tonight, Lord. In Jesus Name we pray, amen.