Sermon

Election - Part 2 | Pastor Paul McGee

First Apostolic Church

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  1. Hallelujah, that garment of the high priest that was passed down

  2. from father to son, father to son, father to son.

  3. That old garment had all the oil of the previous high priests

  4. that were anointed in that garment in the garment.

  5. But still, yet when that new king took position, all that oil

  6. from the previous kingships wasn't enough, took a fresh

  7. anointing on that king. Amen.

  8. This coming weekend, this is our revival services for the Michael

  9. Moppin. All right So Friday night at

  10. 7:00 and then he'll be preaching also Sunday morning and Sunday

  11. night on Sunday on Saturday however is our annual chili

  12. supper in hayride that starts at 4.

  13. There will be schedules posted here about when what is taking

  14. place or what may overlap, some other things.

  15. You'll know all that. There'll be stuff posted around

  16. here that day that one form you on that.

  17. Concerning the Cone Corn Ho competition, we are doing away

  18. with any entry fees. And so if you wanted to be a

  19. part, but you know that stood in your way, anybody can be a part.

  20. No entry fee. If you already submitted an

  21. entry fee, you'll be getting that back.

  22. All right, You'll be getting that back.

  23. We still though have two trophies to award and there will

  24. still be a cash prize awarded by the 1st Apostolic Church, but

  25. there isn't no entry fee, all right, nothing like that

  26. involved. All right, so you still have

  27. tonight you can get you a partner and swing them round and

  28. round for the old corn hole competition.

  29. All right, I already got the trophies there in my office.

  30. Be one for each each team member.

  31. All right, And so just be mindful of that out on the

  32. bulletin board. There's still sign up sheets for

  33. the food items needed. There's some lines still left on

  34. that. There are also some lines left I

  35. think on the volunteering to either set up, tear down or

  36. stuff in between that Brother Mason has out there that you can

  37. sign your name to and participate in as well.

  38. If there's anything else that I forgot someone can pull on my

  39. coattail, my wife can or such. Also, just a friendly reminder

  40. to whenever you made your missionary commitments back in

  41. the month of March and they started the month of April,

  42. there is a shortfall right now and that some are behind, so we

  43. just ask. If you're not sure if that's

  44. you, just check with Sister Mason.

  45. She'll be happy to help you to see where you're at concerning

  46. that and so on and so forth. So just try to be diligent.

  47. Amen. Concerning that tonight you may

  48. be seated. I've had you standing.

  49. I'm so sorry you can be seated. I'm not springboarding from Jose

  50. again, by no means I'm not going to put it up there, but we are

  51. destroyed for a lack of knowledge as well Jose and told

  52. us nonetheless. We're just going to dive on in

  53. here tonight with Election 2024 part #2 here this evening.

  54. And let's, I think this goes without saying, but I think we

  55. should just say that, and we maybe made mention this a little

  56. bit last week, There are no perfect candidates, OK?

  57. As long as candidates are made-up of humanity, there will

  58. never be a perfect candidate. And so there never has been.

  59. There never will be. There will be no singular

  60. candidate that 100% aligned with perfectly all your spiritual

  61. values and your moral values. Seriously doubt that.

  62. And so as you go forward and you support maybe one candidate or

  63. the other, it, it, it's probably not about them identifying 100%

  64. with your morality because they're probably not going to.

  65. But it's about us considering as a, as Christians about putting

  66. somebody in the most powerful position in the United States of

  67. America, right? It's about that and the ripple

  68. impact that that could have on us as a society and realizing

  69. that that person can either help dilute or defend a lot of the

  70. liberties we have as or has had as an American people.

  71. And so we just keep those things in mind as we as we go forward

  72. to the polls. And they tell me and Sister

  73. Robert just handed me a thing before church.

  74. There were millions of Christians that didn't vote last

  75. year, millions that did not vote last year.

  76. And so it's, it's a great privilege that's been given to

  77. us to be able to do that. I was even talking with my

  78. daughter the other day. I said, I think what's happened

  79. is we're so far removed when women didn't have a right to

  80. vote, when others didn't have the, the novelty of being able

  81. to vote, That privilege that was extended several years ago,

  82. however long ago, I think we lost in the understanding of how

  83. much of A privilege that really is.

  84. And so since we're so far removed from that, it, it, it

  85. just becomes less important to people.

  86. But it is, it is a great pillar. You're, you're not in a country

  87. that a dictator or, or something like that, or, or a king that

  88. just comes through a lineage, you know, type of thing.

  89. You, you, we, we're, we, we got this, this privilege to be able

  90. to do this. And so when we do this tonight,

  91. I'm going to take a little bit of time. 1 is considered the

  92. power of the presidency. All right, consider the power of

  93. the presidency. Some of you, you, you know,

  94. you're so smart and educated, You know all these things

  95. whenever we talk about the executive branch, the judicial

  96. branch and the legislative branch.

  97. But just humor me tonight. Let us just, you know, again,

  98. trigger our minds again. The executive branch, of course,

  99. led by the president and vice president, they enforce our

  100. laws. They enforce our laws.

  101. We talk about the judicial branch, which is led by the

  102. Supreme Court. They interpret the laws that we

  103. have. We talk about the legislative

  104. branch, which is made-up of Congress, both the Senate and

  105. the House. They make our laws.

  106. But when we consider the power of the presidency, there was an

  107. article that was published by National Public Radio, NPR on

  108. June 16th of 2024. And it reports that Biden said

  109. this. He said the next president is

  110. likely to have two new Supreme Court nominees.

  111. That's what he said. And so Biden expects that the

  112. winner of this year's presidential election will

  113. likely have the chance to fill 2 vacancies on the Supreme Court.

  114. Again. The reason why this is important

  115. is because whenever justices are appointed to the Supreme Court,

  116. they are given lifetime appointments.

  117. That is something they serve in for the, for their life.

  118. They serve in that capacity. And so with that, you have the

  119. potential of altering the entire landscape of your culture for

  120. generations to come by who is appointed to our, our Supreme

  121. Court system. And so that's just something to

  122. take in consideration as we go in.

  123. And they have our next president with the likelihood of, of, of

  124. two new nominees for the Supreme Court.

  125. Also, you got to consider your Amendment rights whenever you

  126. talk about the President of the United States and such, because

  127. since it is the Supreme Court or the Supreme Court justices, when

  128. it's the Supreme Court that interpret our laws.

  129. So they going to interpret the First Amendment, the Second

  130. Amendment, all these things that are seemingly up for grabs right

  131. now, today. You know, we have, well, what

  132. did the founders believe? They interpret what we believe

  133. the original intent of those things were and how sometimes

  134. they can be redefined. So they're going to look, then

  135. again, be the ones looking over our First Amendment right, your,

  136. your free speech, your free expression, your freedom of

  137. religion, going to be looking over your Second Amendment or

  138. the right of citizens to bear arms.

  139. What does that really mean? They're going to be helping to

  140. give interpretation, if you will, to these things that have

  141. been under scrutiny even in our day and and reconsideration

  142. given to them. But whenever you talk about

  143. this, we also then talk about the lower courts, right?

  144. You have Court of Appeals, district courts, federal judges

  145. and things of that nature. Well, the president and the

  146. United States nominates these federal judges, and then the

  147. Senate will confirm them. And so you have the power of a

  148. president involved in this as well.

  149. And although these lower Court justices are not appointed for

  150. life like the Supreme Court, they do usually serve some

  151. lengthy terms and their decisions have huge effects and

  152. impacts. As a matter of fact, it is

  153. notable that the Supreme Court often does not re examine the

  154. decisions of the lower courts. Basically, what is made in the

  155. lower court usually just goes on through.

  156. They don't re examine those. So there is some power that's in

  157. even the lower courts. And the president again

  158. nominates those federal judges and they must be confirmed by

  159. the Senate. Also.

  160. We have your president, right? We go to war.

  161. He's the commander in chief. He's the commander in chief in

  162. the military. He's not just deciding to send

  163. when to send our troops into harm's way, but he's determining

  164. who's going to serve and who doesn't serve.

  165. And he's going to determine the rules of engagement that that

  166. bind our troops in warfare and in battle.

  167. It also means he has the ability of the command of nuclear

  168. weapons. Just think about that for a

  169. moment. You know, really internalize

  170. that. Also, the president of the

  171. United States has the ability then to give executive orders.

  172. We've experienced those in some recent years.

  173. But executive orders which can be issued, and it almost seems

  174. like an unmitigated power over a nation and over all our lives

  175. because executive orders do not require a congressional

  176. approval. It doesn't require the approval

  177. of the Senate or the House of Representatives, but to take

  178. effect, they must have legal way.

  179. They have legal way as laws passed by Congress.

  180. That's that they have weighed as though they were passed by

  181. Congress, but their executive order from the president

  182. himself, Section 3 of Article 2 of the Constitution, further

  183. directs the president to take care that the laws be faithfully

  184. executed. Now, when we talk about

  185. Congress, Congress may rewrite and amend a previous law.

  186. They can rewrite or amend the previous law, but then the

  187. president has the ability to veto that.

  188. That's what we call checks and balances within our government.

  189. But it basically takes about 2/3 of majority in both the Senate

  190. and the House to override an executive order.

  191. So in order, there's going to take a 2/3 of both in order to

  192. override it. So when we talk about the

  193. president, we're also talking about control over bureaucracy.

  194. What does that mean? It means this.

  195. This is what Carl Gallup said. He said personnel is policy.

  196. And the president doesn't just direct or influence things like

  197. the economy and health care system, but appoints the people

  198. who run the major federal institutions, right?

  199. He can set up who's Secretary of Defense, who's the secretary of

  200. commerce, who's the Secretary of State.

  201. He can set and place these people in these particular

  202. positions so and so forth. They required the Senate to

  203. confirm them, but he can give say, I want them.

  204. And whether or not the Senate will confirm them is of course

  205. up to the Senate also. Then the president has control

  206. over immigration in our in our in our country, right?

  207. And however that president views immigration can determine

  208. sometimes the security of your border, if you have a border at

  209. all, right, about who comes in or who is not allowed him.

  210. It's control over those things. He has control over a lot of

  211. intelligence. There's a lot of things that the

  212. president is entrusted with that's very sensitive material.

  213. The highest national security in our nation is under his hand.

  214. So, you know, what type of person would you like to have

  215. that type of intelligence, I guess, is what you got to ask

  216. yourself. They also deal with foreign

  217. governments in the United Nations.

  218. All right, Carl Gallup. Gallup also said this.

  219. The fact is the president has almost unlimited power in

  220. dealing with foreign policy and usually gets what he or she

  221. wants when it comes to treaties and foreign agreements.

  222. And these are bonding on all of us.

  223. So let's let's go to Scripture, right?

  224. Moses's father-in-law Jethro came to him and advised Moses to

  225. appoint some rulers and appoint some judges, and he gave him

  226. some criteria about what should be the qualifications of these

  227. judges and rulers. The Bible says in Exodus 18 and

  228. verse 21, he said, Moreover, thou shalt provide out of all

  229. the people able men, such as fear of God, men of truth,

  230. hating, covetousness and play such over them to be rulers of

  231. thousands, rulers of hundreds, rulers of 50s and rulers of 10s.

  232. So there were 4 prominent qualifications listed in those

  233. that would be judges and rulers here in exodus #1 They're going

  234. to demonstrate they're going to be able men.

  235. So they're going to demonstrate some type of capability, right?

  236. They're going to have some type of competence in, in, in maybe

  237. managing business affairs or professional fairs or a nation

  238. for that matter. They, they, they would fear God.

  239. That doesn't mean to be afraid of him, but have a respect,

  240. right, a God consciousness about them.

  241. They would hate covetousness. And so they're, they're,

  242. they're, they're going to have some honesty.

  243. They're going to have some integrity.

  244. They're going to or men of truth, I skipped over men of

  245. truth, men of truth. They're going to have honesty,

  246. integrity #4 is hating covetousness.

  247. So there's going to be generosity.

  248. They're going to have benevolence.

  249. They're going to want to be able to help and not necessarily

  250. desire and want and just pull everything into my pool, but

  251. they're going to be able to help and be generous.

  252. And so we're, we're privileged to be a part at best, what is

  253. known as a Democratic Republic, as I said earlier, rather than a

  254. dictatorship. We're not under a dictatorship,

  255. you're not under a communism. And you need to thank the Lord

  256. every day for that, that you're not understood.

  257. We have enough history, world history that indicates what what

  258. the fallout is with some of those type of things.

  259. And so this by and large, we are still by and large.

  260. I know some people would probably debate with it, but a

  261. government of the people, by the people, for the people, as

  262. Abraham Lincoln noted in his Gettysburg Address.

  263. And so the word democracy comes from an origin of two words, one

  264. the most meaning common people and the other Kratos, which

  265. means roar, strength. Simply put together, common

  266. people rule. And so we're not purely

  267. democratic because our vote does not directly vote in the

  268. president or pass laws. In other words, it's not like

  269. everybody votes in the popular vote gets the president in.

  270. That's not the way that it operates.

  271. But we still have a voice. Our vote still then impacts

  272. those that the representatives in our state known as the

  273. Electoral College. All right.

  274. And so with that, we try to the best of our ability to vote and

  275. hope and then enabling our representatives that will stand

  276. in for our values and the things that that we entrust Moses in

  277. Deuteronomy, there's this biblical sound concept that

  278. Moses took the people in Deuteronomy 16 and verse #18 he

  279. said judges and officers shalt thou make in the Greek, it's

  280. basically or, or the, the word can basically be defined.

  281. Shalt thou make a point? All right, judges and officer,

  282. shalt thou make thee, and all thy gates, which the Lord thy

  283. God giveth thee throughout thy tribes, and they shall judge the

  284. people with just judgment. And so Moses to the people

  285. you'll appoint people, and then will hopefully they will give

  286. just judgment for the nation of Israel.

  287. He later said in Deuteronomy 17 and verse 14, when thou art

  288. coming to the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee, and

  289. shall possess it and shout dwell therein, and shall say, I will

  290. set a king over me, like as all the nations that are about me.

  291. Verse 15. Thou shalt in any way set again,

  292. or appoint him king over thee, whom the Lord thy God shall

  293. choose one from among thy brethren shalt thou set king

  294. over thee. Thou mayest not set a stranger

  295. over thee which is not by brother.

  296. And so just. In these two passages, the

  297. people were important or essential for appointing their

  298. leaders, and they were instructed to appoint judges.

  299. They were instructed to appoint officers.

  300. But then, even in this instance, the king was really only chosen

  301. by God or should have been chosen by God.

  302. John MacArthur in his book Right Thinking in a World Gone Wrong,

  303. said God's sovereignty never excuses man to be lazily lazy or

  304. irresponsible. He said having a eternal mindset

  305. does not excuse us from temporal responsibilities.

  306. It should help keep them in right perspective.

  307. What he's saying is this though. That's what he's saying.

  308. You, you can have an eternal mindset that you also need to

  309. remember there's some temporal responsibilities we have on this

  310. life as well. That's the reason why some

  311. people play even plan for a four O 1 AK or in retirement.

  312. You say, well I might not ever reach retirement.

  313. You might not, but you might. So, you know, you just got some

  314. temporal obligations that you can see to as well.

  315. I mean, did not the Lord even tell the one man, he says what

  316. man that built the house or a structure does not sit down 1st

  317. and count the cost, right? That's the Lord saying that.

  318. He's not saying just be Willy nilly about this stuff.

  319. He said take take responsibility for what you need to be

  320. responsible for. So it doesn't matter whether or

  321. not we vote, folks. There have been elections that

  322. have rewritten history many times over, and you might not

  323. think just one vote is important, but your one vote

  324. could swing an election just in the right direction.

  325. There have been 12 presidential elections that were decided by

  326. less than 1% margin, meaning that if less than 1% of the

  327. voters in certain states had changed their minds about the

  328. other candidate, the outcome of the entire election would have

  329. been totally different. I did this eight years ago.

  330. I'm going to share it again because I think some people are

  331. fuzzy upon what it all means when you cast your vote and how

  332. that affects the Electoral College from where the president

  333. is truly, truly elected from. So this is just about 5 minutes,

  334. just a little education video here from Prager University.

  335. And we're just going to show that right now if Brother Alex

  336. is ready for. Me.

  337. I want to talk to you about the Electoral College and why it

  338. matters. All right, I know this doesn't

  339. sound like the most sensational topic of the day, but stay with

  340. me because I promise you it's one of the most important.

  341. To explain why requires a very brief civics review.

  342. The president and vice president of the United States are not

  343. chosen by a nationwide popular vote of the American people.

  344. Rather, they are chosen by 538 electors.

  345. This process is spelled out in the United States Constitution.

  346. Why didn't the Founders just make it easy and let the

  347. presidential candidate with the most votes claim victory?

  348. Why did they create and why do we continue to need this

  349. Electoral College? The answer is critical to

  350. understanding not only the Electoral College but also

  351. America. The Founders had no intention of

  352. creating a pure majority rule democracy.

  353. They knew from careful study of history what most have forgotten

  354. today or never learned. Pure democracies do not work,

  355. they implode. Democracy has been colorfully

  356. described AS2 wolves and a lamb voting on what's for dinner.

  357. In a pure democracy, fair majorities can easily tyrannize

  358. the rest of the country. The founders wanted to avoid

  359. this at all costs. This is why we have 3 branches

  360. of government, executive, legislative, and judicial.

  361. It's why each state has two senators, no matter what its

  362. population. But also different numbers of

  363. representatives based entirely on population.

  364. It's why it takes a super majority in Congress and 3/4 of

  365. the states to change the Constitution.

  366. And it's why we have the Electoral College.

  367. Here's how the Electoral College works.

  368. The presidential election happens in two phases.

  369. The first phase is purely democratic.

  370. We hold 51 popular elections every presidential election

  371. year, one in each state and one in DC.

  372. On Election Day in 2012, you may have thought you were voting for

  373. Barack Obama or Mitt Romney, but you are really voting for a

  374. slate of presidential electors. In Rhode Island, for example, if

  375. you voted for Barack Obama, you voted for the states for

  376. Democratic electors. If you voted for Mitt Romney,

  377. you are really voting for the states for Republican electors.

  378. Part 2 of the election is held in December, and it is this

  379. December election among the states 538 electors, not the

  380. November election, which officially determines the

  381. identity of the next president. At least 270 votes are needed to

  382. win. Why is this so important?

  383. Because the system encourages coalition building and national

  384. campaigning. In order to win, a candidate

  385. must have the support of many different types of voters from

  386. various parts of the country. Winning only the South or the

  387. Midwest is not good enough. You cannot win 270 electoral

  388. votes if only one part of the country is supporting you.

  389. But if winning were only about getting the most votes, a

  390. candidate might concentrate all of his efforts in the biggest

  391. cities or the biggest states. Why would that candidate care

  392. about what people in West Virginia or Iowa or Montana

  393. think? But, you might ask, isn't the

  394. election really only about the so-called swing states?

  395. Actually, no. If nothing else, safe and swing

  396. states are constantly changing. California voted safely

  397. Republican as recently as 1988. Texas used to vote Democrat.

  398. Neither New Hampshire nor Virginia used to be swing

  399. states. Most people think that George W

  400. Bush won the 2000 election because of Florida.

  401. Well, sort of. But he really won the election

  402. because he managed to flip one state which the Democrats

  403. thought was safe, West Virginia. It's four electoral votes turned

  404. out to be decisive. No political party can ignore

  405. any state for too long without suffering the consequences.

  406. Every state, and therefore every voter in every state, is

  407. important. The Electoral College also makes

  408. it harder to steal elections. Votes must be stolen in the

  409. right state in order to change the outcome of the Electoral

  410. College. With so many swing states, this

  411. is hard to predict and hard to do without the Electoral

  412. College. Any vote stolen in any precinct

  413. in the country could affect the national outcome, even if that

  414. vote was easily stolen in the bluest California precinct or

  415. the reddest Texas one. The electoral.

  416. College is an ingenious method of selecting a president for a

  417. great, diverse Republic such as our own.

  418. It protects against the tyranny of the majority, encourages

  419. coalition building, and discourages voter fraud.

  420. Our founders were proud of it. We can be too.

  421. I'm Tara Ross for Prager University.

  422. Join Prager University. All right, So hopefully maybe

  423. that brought a little enlightenment.

  424. If he was a little confused over the fact that whenever you vote

  425. again, it's not the popular vote of the people that does it, as

  426. we vote, then we're voting for our representatives, our

  427. electorials that will cast that same vote.

  428. Then in December, whatever we, whenever we consider these

  429. things again, 538 electors must have 270 and know the

  430. representatives based upon the population of these states.

  431. And that's constantly in flux. For instance, I looked back, but

  432. whenever I did this eight years ago and there were numbers that

  433. had changed for California and Texas and Florida, the number of

  434. lectors have changed just in eight years because the

  435. population have shifted. Some have got more, some have

  436. got less based upon population. And so an article that was

  437. updated on July the 6th of 2020 by Brennan Center for Justice

  438. stated on July 6, I quote, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled

  439. a state may enforce an electors pledge to support his party's

  440. nominee and the state voters choice for president.

  441. Electors are not free agents. They are to vote for the

  442. candidate whom the state's voters have chosen.

  443. In other words, it's not like the popular vote says, oh, we

  444. vote for this one and then they can go there and do what they

  445. want. No, they speak the voice of the

  446. people from that popular vote, if that makes sense to you.

  447. OK. They're not free agents just to

  448. do as they please. They do as we please through our

  449. popular vote. As a side note, folks, there is

  450. a lot of policy. I say policy.

  451. There's a lot of things going out there that people would like

  452. to see it change to just be a national popular vote.

  453. There's a lot of that that's going around today that they

  454. would like to push. That would just be that.

  455. So something to consider or keep a pulse on as we go forward from

  456. year to year or election from election.

  457. So maybe maybe my personal choice doesn't get in the White

  458. House, right. If if you lived long enough,

  459. that's probably happened to you, Maybe your personal choice

  460. doesn't get into the White House.

  461. Regardless, we do have a mandate in Scripture that we pray for

  462. that office. Regardless whether the person

  463. virtuous survival the office Scripture says that we pray for

  464. it. First Timothy chapter #2 and

  465. verse #1 Paul told Timothy he said I exhort therefore, that

  466. first of all supplications, prayers, intercessions and given

  467. of thanks be made for all men, for kings and for all that are

  468. in authority. Why I'm in certain to why why

  469. that we may lead a quiet peaceable life in all godliness

  470. and honesty for this is good and acceptable in the side of our of

  471. God our Savior. You know what why we need to do

  472. this so we can live peaceably and acceptable, you know in the

  473. side of God and and for this is good us doing this practicing

  474. praying for those that are in authority over us is acceptable

  475. in God's sight. That means that God approves us

  476. praying for our national leaders.

  477. For that matter, think of for a moment whenever the Israelites

  478. were taken away into Babylon, he told them even to pray for them.

  479. Jeremiah said, why? Why should you do that?

  480. Because that's where you live. That's where you're living right

  481. now. Pray for that environment

  482. because that's where you're living right now.

  483. And that's going to have a direct, indirect, if you will

  484. impact upon you. So, yeah, absolutely.

  485. Just remember, I want to talk about Israel for a little bit

  486. here, probably for the rest of the night.

  487. Israel, let's be reminded of a promise whenever we consider the

  488. nation Israel. I know there is a lot of and

  489. there's just a lot of stuff going on around Israel right

  490. now. All right.

  491. And there are a lot of opinions as well that surrounds Israel

  492. about what is right, what is wrong, what about what they have

  493. done or what they shouldn't have done, so and so forth.

  494. I'm just here to remind you of biblical promise concerning

  495. Israel. Genesis chapter #12 verses one

  496. through 3. The Lord spoke.

  497. He said Now the Lord had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy

  498. country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house unto

  499. a land, that I will shew thee, and I will make thee a great

  500. nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy nation make thy

  501. name great, and thou shalt be a blessing.

  502. And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse them that curse

  503. thee. And in thee shall all the

  504. families of the earth be blessed.

  505. All right. One thing concerning the nation

  506. of Israel in particular, all the other nations through times past

  507. have been the designs of men, right?

  508. Brought about by men. But when if we look at the

  509. nation of Israel, it was a nation that's been established

  510. by God. So that is quite a contrast

  511. right from the go. And so that we asked, why are

  512. these people blessed? And it's evident you can look at

  513. them in science, Pulitzer Prizes, so and so forth.

  514. That seems like the nation of Israel, The people of Israel are

  515. somewhat mighty, blessed. And it's because God blessed

  516. Abraham and his covenant son Isaac in the Scripture.

  517. The Bible says in Genesis 25 and verse 5.

  518. And Abraham gave all that he had unto Isaac, but unto the sons of

  519. the concubines which Abraham had, Abraham gave gifts and sent

  520. them away from Isaac his son, while he yet lived eastward into

  521. the E country. And so there were some

  522. concubines that Abraham had had as well.

  523. But they, Abraham didn't give all he had to them.

  524. They were just giving gifts. But all that he had, all that he

  525. possessed, he passed on down to Isaac.

  526. And so Abraham is respected all right.

  527. Abraham is respected among the the the monotheistic religions

  528. of the world, which are namely 3.

  529. Christianity, all right being one.

  530. And then there's the Jewish community and the Muslim

  531. community as well. I understand that the, the, the

  532. religion of Islam, they have a God who is all of, but it's

  533. monotheistic, one God. All right?

  534. That's what monotheistic means. And so all of these three

  535. religious groups are monotheistic again, believing in

  536. one God. But the Bible is absolutely and

  537. quite different from the Quran. The Bible has Abraham in our

  538. scripture, Genesis 22, I believe it is, has Abraham offered up

  539. that only son Isaac, that was of the covenant.

  540. But whenever you read in Quran, Abraham is offering up Ishmael

  541. in the Quran in Genesis chapter 17.

    Genesis 17 chapter mention

  542. We'll read the Scripture here in a little bit, but remember, God

  543. had promised Abraham and Sarah that they would have a son, that

  544. they become impatient and waiting for that to occur.

  545. And so was the suggestion that Haggard the handmaid, which from

  546. what we can see in Scripture more than likely came from

  547. Egypt. During Abraham's time spent in

  548. Egypt after they first came to the land of Canaan, The Bible

  549. says there was famine in the land.

  550. They went down into Egypt. They didn't spend much time

  551. there, but he got a lot of gold and silver and other stuff.

  552. And he also got some handmaidens and men servants as well.

  553. Haggard then Abraham goes into Haggar, has his son, his name is

  554. Ishmael, right? Ishmael, that was not the son

  555. that God was talking about. It was going to come between

  556. Abraham and Sarah, all right? And so they kind of pushed, if

  557. you will, the agenda of having a child rather than waiting on

  558. God. Later Abraham and Sarah would

  559. conceive they would have a son Isaac, which was the promised

  560. son, the covenant son. And this is what Scripture says

  561. in Genesis chapter #17 and verse #18.

  562. And Abraham said unto God, Oh that Ishmael might live before

  563. thee. And God said Sarah, thy wife

  564. shall not to kind of preface where this is.

  565. This is where God has already told Abraham, you're going to

  566. have a son. All this is going to happen.

  567. There's like we're we're O God, you know, we're like up in years

  568. we're owed. They laughed about it.

  569. And then this is Abraham's response.

  570. Verse 18 And Abraham said to God, O that Ishmael, a male

  571. might live before thee, right, because Ishmael has already been

  572. born at this stage. And God said, Sarah, thy wife

  573. shall bear thee a son indeed, and thou shalt call name Isaac,

  574. and I will establish my covenant with him for an ever Everybody

  575. say everlasting, everlasting covenant, and with his seed

  576. after him. And As for Ishmael, who you

  577. brought up, I have heard thee. Behold, I have blessed him, and

  578. will make him fruitful, and will multiply him exceedingly. 12

  579. Princess, shall he begep, and I will make him a great nation.

  580. But my covenant, if I say covenant, well, I establish with

  581. Isaac which Sarah shall bear unto thee at this set time in

  582. the next year. And so whenever God says I'm

  583. going to do this, he's like, well, God, how about Ishmael

  584. over here? Let Ishmael live before you.

  585. He says I see Ishmael, I acknowledge Ishmael.

  586. He says I'll bless Ishmael. This is important.

  587. But my covenant will be with Isaac.

  588. Folks, there's a vast difference between just being blessed and

  589. being in covenant, he says. I'll bless Ishmael, but my

  590. covenants going to be with Isaac.

  591. It's later then that we see that there is Jacob and there is

  592. Esau. The Bible describes them as two

  593. nations that struggling within the womb of Rebecca who also

  594. have been barren. And these two nations are

  595. struggling from the womb. They come out right and we

  596. understand that Jacob's hand is up on the heel of Esau as they

  597. issue for from the womb. We will later see them.

  598. Esau, guess what? He intermarries with some

  599. Ishmaelites according to the word of the Lord, Genesis 28 and

  600. verse 9. Then when Esau unto Ishmael took

  601. unto the wives which he had, Mahalaf, the daughter of

  602. Ishmael, Abraham's son, and the sister of Nabajaf, to be his

  603. wife. So here all the way years ago,

  604. there comes this parting, the separation, what really began as

  605. the what we know today is the Israeli Palestinian conflict all

  606. the way back here in time with Ishmael that even continued

  607. through Esau's intermarriage with the Ishmaelites and so

  608. forth. Again, God blessed Isaac, right?

  609. He that covenant son, he blessed him.

  610. He was in so much so that he's in covenant with him.

  611. All right. But now we see that God would

  612. even he's in covenant with Jacob out of the Esau and Jacob, he's

  613. in covenant with Jacob that he would later rename.

  614. Remember at the river jabalk. Here's Jacob wrestling with an

  615. Angel, huh? He said your name shall no

  616. longer be called Jacob though, because you'll be Israel because

  617. you have you have wrestled, you have struggled with God.

  618. Israel comes these twelve sons, right?

  619. The 12 sons of Israel or the 12 tribes of Israel that would make

  620. up the nation of Israel. And so this child Jacob, mind

  621. you, not Ishmael and not Esau, received the blessing of their

  622. father to become what the nation of Israel was and even is today.

  623. The Bible says in Genesis 35 and verse 12.

  624. Please note this and the air by say land and the land which I

  625. gave Abraham and Isaac to thee I will give it and to thy seed

  626. after thee will I give the land now No.

  627. Back a few verses ago we talked about how this was an

  628. everlasting covenant. This doesn't change.

  629. This doesn't end. It doesn't have a a date of

  630. termination. And this largely considered a

  631. man the people with a land. He said, I'm given the land that

  632. I gave to Abraham and Isaac. I'm giving it on to Jacob.

  633. I'm giving it to his seed and his seed after him.

  634. I'm given the land. Well, 600 years before Christ,

  635. the Jews were deported to Babylon.

  636. They spent their 70 years there in Babylon.

  637. Then they were brought back to Israel in 70 AD Rome conquered

  638. Jerusalem. There was the dysphoria, which

  639. basically means the scattering, if you will, of the Jews took

  640. place. We have Jews All in all kinds of

  641. different countries around the world.

  642. We have Jews in the United States, Jews here, Jews

  643. everywhere, Amen. Those who remained, many of them

  644. were, were just simply massacred.

  645. But early Christians had heeded Jesus warnings and the Olivet

  646. discourse in the New Testament. Many of them escaped the city,

  647. got out of Jerusalem, and in the next 2000 years persecution even

  648. continued upon the Jews. We have seen it in history.

  649. For instance, the Night of the Broken Glass as it's called,

  650. formed the beginning of the Holocaust that killed some

  651. 6,000,000 Jews, led many of them away in those cattle cars going

  652. to death camps such as Ostwich and other places then.

  653. Yet they returned 1900 years after saying goodbye to

  654. Palestine, nearly 2000 years after being expelled from their

  655. land back under the Roman Empire.

  656. Then there is the Balfour Declaration that was signed.

  657. It was a declaration by the United Nations of statehood for

  658. Israel in 1948. Some of you were alive maybe.

  659. Then May the 5th of 1948, U.S. President Harry Truman issued

  660. the declaration recognized this fledging state of Israel as a

  661. statehood or nation. And America, oh good old USA,

  662. America was the First Nation to extend recognition to Israel as

  663. being a nation. That that's the foot that we

  664. took so many years ago and acknowledged then their, their,

  665. their statehood. And then there were others that

  666. followed, however, throughout the years, and many of you

  667. probably already know this, and that's fine.

  668. Just let me be redundant. We have had throughout years, a,

  669. a good relationship with the nation of Israel.

  670. Amen. We've, we've been an ally to

  671. Israel on many fronts and in many conflicts.

  672. We've been an ally to Israel. Ten days after the country was

  673. founded, Harry Truman met with her first president, Israel's

  674. first president or Prime Minister, and pledged our

  675. nation's support to that Jewish state.

  676. And consider this. Our nation has been blessed

  677. whenever we've had strong support to Israel. after World

  678. War 2, we experienced global domination like never before and

  679. we grew in stature ourselves as a nation.

  680. And we were blessed at home and abroad.

  681. But we had some tetherings of support to Israel. the US did

  682. not stop supporting Israel in 1948.

  683. Whenever there was the Six Day War of Israel in 1967, United

  684. States stood right next to her. After the war, Lyndon B Johnson

  685. administration again extended support to Israel.

  686. Phantom fired fighter jets and other armaments were sewed to

  687. Israel. In the Yom Kipper War of 1973,

  688. Israel again was surrounded by all these forces, hostile

  689. forces. Hey, man, they were backed and

  690. supported by Russia. President Nixon ordered a

  691. strategic airlift operation to deliver weapons and supplies to

  692. help Israel. All right.

  693. And Israel then gave the upper hand again. the United States

  694. supported Israel administration since Truman, including

  695. Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, both Bush

  696. administrations, the Clinton administration.

  697. These are some of the presidencies that have supported

  698. Israel and have been at peace with Israel.

  699. And I just read just even today from a virtual library of Jewish

  700. history and they said all together since 1949, Israel has

  701. received more than 160 billion in assistance and this does not

  702. include loan guarantees that United States have given to

  703. Israel. So we have been supportive, not

  704. just by word of mouth, but financially we have been

  705. supported. Furthermore, the same thing said

  706. Israel has received more direct aid from the United States since

  707. World War 2 than any other country.

  708. In March of 2022, Congress to prove the largest funding

  709. package for Israel in history, according to the British Colonel

  710. Richard Kemp. And this is a debatable

  711. statement, but we could talk about it.

  712. But nonetheless, he said, I'm saying when he said Israel has

  713. never started a war, said the only reason that Israel really

  714. have ever went to war is to defend herself.

  715. So we support Israel, because the Bible says that any nation

  716. that would try to divide the land is getting on the bad side

  717. of God. In Obadiah 115 the Scripture

  718. says, For the day of the Lord is near upon all the heathen.

  719. As thou has done, it shall be done unto thee.

  720. Thy reward shall return upon thine own head.

  721. But more plainly spoken in Joe three and two, he says, I will

  722. also gather all nations and bring them down into the Valley

  723. of Jehoshaphat and will plead with them there for my people

  724. and for MyHeritage Israel, whom they have scattered among the

  725. nations and parted my land, right.

  726. I'm not happy with the disbursement and he's not happy

  727. with the divion up or dividing of his land, the nation of

  728. Israel. So our obligation to end Israel,

  729. particularly you've heard to say before we pray for Israel, we

  730. talk about Psalms 122 and verse 6, where the psalmist advises to

  731. pray for the peace of Jerusalem, right?

  732. They shall prosper that they shall prosper that love thee.

  733. Do you see what that says? Pray for the peace and they

  734. shall prosper that love Jerusalem, that love that place.

  735. All right? And so that puts us in the same,

  736. in the same basket, Amen. Potiphar.

  737. And it's not uncommon, right? We see it in Scripture, Old

  738. Testament, we look at Joseph, right?

  739. This Jewish guy Potiphar prospered because Joseph the

  740. prison keeper and that in the prison prospered because of

  741. Joseph. Pharaoh prospered.

  742. Egypt did knowing what to do in the time of famine and the time

  743. of plenty because of Joseph. Then there was another Pharaoh

  744. that Rosa over Egypt that did not know Joseph.

  745. And when that Pharaoh rose over Egypt that knew not Joseph, he

  746. had then attempted to kill the Jewish boys.

  747. And in that particular setting, that's when the exodus came

  748. about. And it's interesting that that

  749. Pharaoh that didn't know Joseph, that Pharaoh as Israel would

  750. leave Egypt, that Pharaoh's first born son would be taken.

  751. You want to take all the Jews males, that first born son, but

  752. that Pharaoh would be taken because what you do to the

  753. Jewish people is rendered back to you said, I'll bless them

  754. that bless you, I'll curse them that curse you.

  755. Amen. Look at Luke chapter #7 verses

  756. one through 6 and just consider this if you will.

  757. The Bible says Now when He had ended all his saying in the

  758. audience of the people entered to Capernaum, a certain

  759. centurion servant who was dearing to him, was sick, ready

  760. to die. When he heard of Jesus, He sent

  761. to him the elders of the Jews, beseeching him that He would

  762. come and heal his servant. And when they came to Jesus,

  763. they besought him instantly, saying that He was worthy for

  764. whom He should do this, for He loveth our nation.

  765. You hear this, He built us a synagogue.

  766. Then Jesus went with them. And when he was now not far from

  767. the house, the centurion sent friends to him, saying to him,

  768. Lord, trouble not myself, for I am not worthy that thou should

  769. us enter under my roof. So Jesus goes to this house and

  770. capernum to heal, to heal a a servant of the centurion who the

  771. Bible speaks as though he's ready.

  772. He's at this point of death. And the logic, no, the logic

  773. that the Jewish elders used with Jesus was this said, Come to

  774. this House of this Gentile, because the centurion was a

  775. Gentile. Come to unbeliever, come to this

  776. House of this Gentile and perform a miracle.

  777. And the logic they used is found in verse #5.

  778. For he loveth our nation, and he hath built us a synagogue.

  779. What is it? He's been kind to the Jewish

  780. nation and the people. He's saying, God, this Gentile

  781. deserves a God blessing because He loves our nation.

  782. He has done something very practical to bless the Jewish

  783. people. The Bible says this in Exodus

    Exodus 19:5

  784. 19, verse 5. These are God's words to Moses

  785. at Sinai. He says Now therefore, if ye

  786. will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall

  787. be a peculiar, if I say peculiar, treasure unto me above

  788. all people. For all the earth is mine, and

  789. ye shall be unto me a Kingdom of priests and a holy nation.

  790. These are the words with which thou shalt speak unto the

  791. children of Israel. So God wanted Moses to tell

  792. Israel this Israel, you're a peculiar treasure to me, you as

  793. a nation. You, you are above all people to

  794. me, a Kingdom of priests, a holy nation.

  795. You are to me. So if you tamper, if you tamper

  796. with Israel, you're tampering with God's peculiar treasure.

  797. You tamper with them, you're tampering with God's peculiar

  798. treasure. And so to stand against them, by

  799. and large is to stand against the holy nation is to stand

  800. against God. Amen.

  801. Just share a few things here. Just in closing, all right, just

  802. share candidates views. Visited the site just today

  803. again, the Family Resource Council.

  804. It's a 5O1C for nonprofit and it just gives the statement on

  805. anti-Semitism Awareness act, federal legislation defining and

  806. opposing anti-Semitism. Let's define anti-Semitism for

  807. anybody that may not know directly from the dictionary.

  808. Hostility or prejudice against Jewish people.

  809. That's why anti-Semitism is or means hostility or prejudice

  810. against Jewish people. So this is a anti-Semitism

  811. awareness act. Federal legislating the

  812. legislation defining and opposing anti-Semitism.

  813. Harris supports Trump. It's unknown at the site.

  814. The Council on Foreign Relations last updated October the 14th of

  815. this year concerning the topic of Israel and Gaza in the Middle

  816. East. Harris and it quotes and I quote

  817. verbatim. Harris supports a ceasefire and

  818. hostage release deal in the war between Israel and Hamas.

  819. She also calls for A2 state solution to the Israeli

  820. Palestinian conflict as a Sinner.

  821. She endorsed that Iran nuclear deal and voted for restrictions

  822. on arms sales to Saudi Arabia. Trump I quote verbatim.

  823. Trump's approach to the Middle East has been defined by strong

  824. support for Israel and Saudi Arabia, a confrontational stance

  825. toward Iran. He backed away from long

  826. standing bipartisan consensus by saying he wasn't interested in a

  827. separate Palestinian state. Lastly, I'll read it from the

  828. again, the Family Resource Council on the parties,

  829. Republican Democrat. Just one issue I'll read to you

  830. about and that's Israel and anti-Semitism under the

  831. Republican Party. This is their platform for

  832. Israel and anti-Semitism. Promised promises to stand with

  833. Israel and seat peace in the Middle East condemns

  834. anti-Semitism and supports revoking visas of foreign

  835. nationals who support terrorism and jihadism promises to hold

  836. accountable those who perpetuate violence against Jewish people.

  837. The democratic platform on Israel and anti-Semitism

  838. supports building a durable peace in the Middle East.

  839. Bolster by regional integration a strong coalition to counter

  840. and deter Iran and prevent it and its terrorist proxies from

  841. threatening the security of the region.

  842. And in the negotiated 2 state solution says the United States

  843. strongly supports Israel in the fight against Hamas and that

  844. it's the body of an administration with having made

  845. real progress on a way forward that will free the hostages,

  846. establish a durable ceasefire, ease humanitarian suffering in

  847. Gaza, make possible normalization between Israel and

  848. key Arab states, together with meaningful progress and a

  849. political horizon for the Palestinian people.

  850. If you can stand with me here tonight, again, our purposes

  851. last week, this week and next week is just basically to

  852. educate. All right, to to to point out

  853. maybe where the biblical stance is on issues and the share with

  854. you where each party, each candidate is on the same issues.

  855. Next week we'll be looking at like the economy, abortion and

  856. things of that nature and we'll wrap all this thing up whenever

  857. this is all said and done. I might take a poll whether or

  858. not this help for anybody. If it's not, I won't do it.

  859. All right, if, if, if, if this is like, you know what, let's

  860. just do other stuff. You just let me know because I

  861. don't want to waste your time or mine.

  862. All right, but nonetheless, so let's pray tonight that God

  863. would lead us. Father, I need you, God, you're

  864. able to lead our hearts and our minds.

  865. I pray God in the days to come, Lord people, some already early

  866. voting Lord and others Jesus. God that will in November, I

  867. pray, O Lord Jesus, you're able to give us wisdom and knowledge

  868. and understanding. I pray, O God, in the best of

  869. our ability, God to follow Lord Jesus, the scruples, the Lord

  870. Jesus of your word. I pray, O God, help us Lord over

  871. all as a nation in the days to come.

  872. God will put our faith and our trust in you God.

  873. We'll pray Lord God for the authority God and those Lord

  874. that come into place God because Scripture Lord admonishes to do

  875. so. God for those that hold

  876. authority Lord and rulership of office.

  877. I pray, O God today, minister Lord, as only you know how God,

  878. and we just depend solely upon you God and help us to do our

  879. part. God in this, in the name of

  880. Jesus Christ that we pray Amen and Amen.

  881. Everybody say Amen Friday night. Everybody say Friday revival.

  882. All right, don't get so focused on Saturday you forget about

  883. Friday. Friday revival at 7:00, all the

  884. sign up sheets again are in the back.

  885. If you have submitted entry fee, see my wife, she will give it

  886. back to you. All right, all right, so let's

  887. have a good time Amen this weekend before we leave, Can I

  888. get some? I just for Thursday and Friday,

  889. who will fast on Thursday for revival?

  890. There's a few hands. Anybody fast on Friday for

  891. revival? There's some hands.

  892. There we go. Amen.

  893. Let's enter in a prayerful fasting.

  894. That's great. All right.

  895. Thank you Jesus name.