The Christmas Package

We're going to put together today something that has great significance, especially because this time of the year, great significance. And regardless of what we're going to put together, so relative to this time of the year, we're going to call it the Christmas package.

And that serves as the title. Or in words, the Christmas package. Now, if you're going to put together the Christmas package, what would you isolate about it that makes up the package? What is central? What is core? What's intrinsic? Well, first in this package, there are actually two main elements or ingredients in this package that make it up. The first one that we're going to look at in this package is the issue of line.

Line. Now, if we're not talking about the issue of line, and we're going to talk about it as a prime ingredient of the package, I think with the issue of line itself, as far as an issue, we'll start at the very top.

That is, we'll start with God Himself. Because the Christmas package is promoted as worshiping God. So let's just start with God as far as the issue of line is concerned. There's a very basic fact about God. God cannot lie. He cannot lie. It is impossible for God to lie.

He never has and He never will. That's one of the great beauties about life. That He's never lied. And when we become part of His family in the full-blown sense of being a spirit composed through a resurrection of change, we can go through all eternity, no matter how many eons and eons of ages, we can know as we go forward, He'll never lie to us. Ever. Never has, never will, can't, it's not possible. Titus 1 to 2. Let's look at a couple of scriptures along that line. Because, again, our spiritual stability only count doctrinal sitements. It borders the scripture.

Titus 1 to 2. Now, Paul is writing to them, and he's encouraging Titus, and in Titus 1 to 2, he says, "...and hope of eternal life, which is a hope that is automatically built into our system, so to speak, and our motivations, and hope of eternal life, which dies that cannot lie." He goes on to say, promise to the poor of the world, begin.

Now, it's interesting that says, you know, Paul, in writing to Titus here, says, in hope of eternal life, which died, and then he inserts this, that cannot lie. And then he uses Mark promise, before the world began, that references the fact that God committed himself to a purpose that he, once he said it in emotion, he would not back out on. That is speaking to a commitment that God, that the Father and Son made before they created Adam and Eve.

They committed themselves to it. But let's look at Hebrews 6, verses 17 and 18. Now there it says, God cannot lie. And then in Hebrews 6, verses 17 and 18, it says, wherein God willing to work abundantly to show unto the heirs of promise the inudibility of his counsel, confirmed it by a note.

Verse 18, that by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation to have fled her refuge to lay hold upon the pope's setting for us. Now, it says, by two immutable things. One of those things is what he says there, it's impossible for God to lie.

Second is the oath. He not only cannot lie, it's impossible to lie, but it is almost like he is magnified, had talked it all, by actually giving a note and committing himself to a note. But that's what the two immutable things are, by the oath he made and the simple fact he cannot lie.

This is why true worship of God cannot involve lying. I said true worship of God. I didn't say worship, I said true worship. And we'll look at a scripture along that line in just a moment, but it cannot involve lying. This is why true worship of God cannot be based on lies. Well, they're okay. The lines are fine, but we use them to worship God. But that cannot be. By Jesus Christ's own words, that cannot be. John 4, verses 23 and 24. By the words of my Savior, your Savior, the Son of God, representing God, that cannot be.

True worship cannot be based on lies. Talking to this American woman, he says here in John 4, verses 23 and 24, he told it what the hour comes, and now he is, when? And again, he makes a distinction. The true worshipers. And early on, when I was first here, I gave a sermon on true worship. And he makes this distinction when the true worshipers show worship to the Father, true worshipers, in spirit and in truth. For the Father seeks such words of Him. God is a spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth. The truth has to be involved.

Any Christ and the Father cannot be worshiped with lies. This is one reason they have given us the Book of Truth. John 17, 17, speaks of this book we have, the Book of Truth. Where John 17, 17 sanctified Him, and I know that sanctify means to set aside for holy use. But in simplistic language too, it means set apart. Set apart. Sanctify, or set apart, them through your truth. Your word is true. Set them apart through your truth. Is there any time of the year, more than this time of the year, when the truth sets you apart in the midst of families and friends and co-workers, than this time of the year? When the greatest package of lies are told in this season, and the context between what you believe and know and do is so obvious in the midst of a package that is so heavily built upon lies. Your word is truth. It is the word of instruction to us so that we cannot break the truth before them. And when we read it, it lays out what is acceptable to them and what is not. Say, you and I, we don't determine what is acceptable to God. I have no right or power to determine what is acceptable to God because He's already determined that. We only determine whether we will get in line with Him or not. In general, as a general rule, human beings determine for themselves. Isn't that what we see around us? In God's name, it's pretty moral agents. They determine for themselves what they will and will not do. And God doesn't care if you buy a red car, a black car, a blue car, a green car, a yellow dress, a blue dress, unless your guy is going to be buying. That's just for your wife or girlfriend. But He doesn't care where you live. He doesn't care if you're a carpenter, plumber, electrician, software programmer, whatever. He pays a teacher. That's any number of things like that. It's straight back to you. But when it comes to the moral issues, it's not up to us. In Saturday too, when it comes to starting a worshiping guide, too many people essentially start to determine for themselves, This is how I choose to worship God. And that's not what it is. Couldn't it? Luke 6. 46. Luke 6.

When we call Jesus Lord, we're acknowledging Him as boss, master, our head, where acknowledging His authority to tell us what to do. So, this contradiction is presented in Scripture by Jesus Christ. He says, why do you call me Lord, Lord? Which is acknowledging Him as having the authority to tell us what to do, that He's our boss, He's our master. He says, why do you acknowledge that? Why do you call me Lord, Lord, in His repeated parenthesis? But, at the same time, you acknowledge that I am your boss, your master, your head, having the authority to tell you what to do, you won't do it. It's a contradiction. And that's what He's pointing out. Why do you call me Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say?

Mark 7, verse 7. Mark 7, verse 7.

Now, again, we register for about true worship. He says here in Mark 7, 7, How be it in vain, in vain, low-lasting fruit, fuel, empty, not really blowing you in the clear. How be it in vain do they worship me? That's not true worship. It's worship, but it's not true worship. It's false worship.

Do they worship me? How so? Teaching for doctrines, the commandments of men.

Like in the commandments of men, they're done. Goes on to say, for laying aside the commandment of God, it's interesting, there's a commandment of God, He gets by the side, and actually what He is pointing out here is a pattern. It's a pattern of wanting to do what men say to do at the expense of laying aside what God says to do. For laying aside the commandment of God, you hold the tradition of men. Now that's the pattern. And just like we will do a lot of times when we express or lay out a pattern, we will give an illustration of it. And so He's not limiting it to what He says next, He's just using that as an illustration of it, as He wants you to put some notes, and He says, and many other such like things you do. In the bottom line, verse 9, He said unto them, and this is the bottom line, for well you reject the commandment of God, you can make it your own tradition. That is the human, natural, human, carnal pattern. That's what the companion scripture is. That's what the Matthew said, verse 21. Matthew 7 and verse 21.

Matthew 7 beginning in verse 21, Not every one that says to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven, but he that has to go to my Father, which is in heaven. Many of us say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied, preached, in your name? I mean, we've used your name up one side and down the other. And in your name we've cast out demons, and in your name we've done many wonderful works. And then, like the crescendo, I never knew you. Oh, I'm aware of what you do. We're doing all that, but I didn't have a relationship with you.

There's no true worship.

Depart from me you that work in equity.

Now think about something. In Matthew 7, Mark 7, verse. In Mark 7, it talks about laying aside, and rejecting the banana. And Matthew 7 through the freezer talks about working in equity. Lying is iniquity. We can't get around that. It is iniquity. And guess what? There is a commandment that forbids it. There is a commandment that forbids lying. I'm not going to turn back there. Exodus 20, then Exodus 20, verse 16. We want that reference. Exodus 20, verse 16. And also, of course, funny with that, also, do run in 5 verse 20. You're running in 5 verse 20. You should not bear false witness.

A lie is false witness. So, this commandment gets laid aside, and the iniquity of lying abounds. It gets laid aside so that the iniquity of lying can abound. The iniquity of lying... Where does lying come from? Who's the author? Who's the promoter? Who told the first lie? Well, John 8, 44, tells us... You're probably, and I'm sure you are, ahead of you on some of these scriptures. John 8, 44.

A powerful statement by Christ, the certain ones at that time, where he said, you are your father, your father, the devil. John 8, 44. You are your father, the devil, and the less of your father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and if I would not end the truth, because there is no truth in him, when he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own. He owns lying. It's his baby. It's his creation. For he is a liar and a father of... Wouldn't it be? Do you think, any picture, God the Father ever saying to Jesus Christ, or Jesus Christ saying to the Father, you know, Father, or, you know, the other wife's son?

Lying is not really that bad of a device. We know the devil came up with it, and he used that device against us with the angels. That's part of how he turned by lying to the angels. That's how he turned one of the means by which he turned the third of them against us, before false witness against us. But, you know, I believe we can take what he created, that was part of the reason we had such a rebellion in the universe, and all the pain and suffering that we were in, and we can take that and incorporate that into a package and a program where we can do worship through the device of lying.

You think God would ever come to that like good? No. He cannot lie. Some possible lie. He hates lying. And the devil, who is the liar and father of it, neither he nor his activity have a future. Let's go to the very last book of the Bible, Revelation. See, Revelation 21 and Revelation 22 is not back behind us. It's in front of us. What I mean by that is, it's a statement, not just of current times, but it's also a projection in terms of God's values and standards on that other future.

So, in Revelation 21, and it talks about a time when there's heavenly Jerusalem, when this earth, this universe, and all have been rebuilt, and there are no resurrected sons and daughters of God. Verse 27, Revelation 21, and there shall in no wise enter into anything that defiles, neither will several works of our nation, nor may it save life. It makes a lot, but they which are written in the language of the life. Makes the life.

Well, that's one of chapter 22. Now, in verses 14 and 15, I will say this, in the Luke, James, I believe it is. Maybe it says it exactly the same way it does in the King James, but in some translations, it substitutes the word, takes the word commandments and substitutes something else in their life, quite clothing or whatever. But as the truth in the King James is the way it should be, verses 14 and 15 says, blessed are they that do this commandments, you know, they don't them aside, who do them, that they have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city, that holy, heavenly Jerusalem, which is coming down through some day that God hath followed.

It says, for without a dawse, sodomites, male prostitutes, and sorcerers, and horebongers, and murderers, and idolatry, wow! Talk about a heavy, heavy list. That's heavy stuff. And what's the last thing mentioned? Whose whoever loves and makes a life. Loving lies, making lies, and loving one. Satan loves lies. He loves life. He loves and makes lies. And we humans have to repent of loving and sharing in that.

Now, again, I understand because of there being an age of salvation during the millennial reign of Christ, and I understand about the eighth day, the last great day, and an age of salvation for a hundred years when the millennium is finished, of a general resurrection. Everybody coming up, and all of it aren't dis-removed, and the light turns on, and you don't see and understand what we are being given now. I understand all that. And I know out in the ultimate, we're talking about a reign of God's plan reaching way on out.

But when it's all said and done, whenever one's time of opportunity comes, it is required that we as a human being have to repent of loving and sharing in lives. And when one comes to the knowledge of the truth, he is required, she is required to repent, and adjust their life accordingly, because lives never have a part of the truth. And the Christmas package is infiltrated with them from the lie about Christ's birthday, which is nowhere in December, period.

It was either late summer or early fall. We're not even given the exact date, although we could speculate, and it would be speculation, but we could speculate. But one thing that is not up for speculation is that it was possibly in December. All the authority. You go to the Internet, you check, you breathe. It is commonly known that his birthday was not in December. The lies about his birth to the all-seeing, all-knowing Santa.

And all the connecting lies that go with it. Lying, let me put it this way, lying is such a part of the Christmas package. Now think about this for a moment. It is such a part of the Christmas package that if you remove all the lies, the package collapses.

Think about it. If you strip all the lies from it, it collapses. This is why the truth is such a threat to it. This is why the truth is such a threat. And that is why that God's people of truth face their greatest challenges at this time of the year with family, with friends, with co-workers. Endeavor at any other time of the year is more important to use wisdom and discretion. For faith and fortitude, burn up your loins by the tops of the bow, and with faith and fortitude, stand to do the right thing. Never throughout the year does such need more. And I mean your written count on discernment, on wisdom, and discretion. Let me just give you a couple of examples. I go to the bank to do my banking business. I know it's going to happen, and it does happen. It happens every year. And I go up to the teller to conduct my banking business, and she says, Are you ready for Christmas? And I say, As ready as I'm going to be, that I lie? No. As ready as I'm going to be, that I'm not going to get any more ready than what I am. And she says, Are you doing anything different for Christmas this year? And I say, I'm doing exactly the same thing as I did last year. One teller one year asked me, because she knew I was a minister, and she said, Is your church doing anything different for Christmas this year? I said, No, we're doing the same thing. And see, I know what I was supposed to have done. I was supposed to say, Wow! God has given me this wonderful opportunity to convert this person and show them the truth. I looked behind me, and there's five or six other people waiting in line to do their business, and everybody's in a hurry, and I got this Dovanov opportunity, and with the acoustics, they're all going to be able to hear me, all the tellers, the people in the cubicles, the people behind me. And do you know how pagan it is, and what makes it up, and blah, blah, blah? You know, you get some kind of thanks for stuff like that. They're taught to be friendly. They're trying to be in the Christmas spirit. It's just roach. It's just, you know, they're just doing it because it's just both the things to do. I'm just going to pass it off. I'm not being given an offer of timidity to, quote, witness. But I tell you what I will do is, if you're telling me to lean in a little bit and say, You've been ministering to me. Yeah? Does she touch Christmas? No. Yeah, I've got some questions about that myself. Can I talk with you some time about it? Sure. Won't you today? Won't you get off work? 3.34 prayer. Doesn't it come right down here? You tell me that time. I'll meet you there. I'll bring the light up. And I'll tell you what we believe in light.

You know, it's time of the year to speak the truth in love. Such a speech be seasoned with salt. To use wisdom and discretion and ask God to give us this moment. We're not talking about compromising our beliefs. We're not talking about compromising what we do.

Well, there's another big ingredient. There's two major ones in the Christmas package. The first is lime. Secondly, is the issue of idolatry. Idolatry. Children are taught, though the word is not used, they are taught to idolize sand.

You call rose by any name, but it still smells like a rose. The effect of the fruit or the flavor in little kids' minds is idolization. I got a call this week from someone that is in the business community that I had to deal with. I was there when we moved to Rome, and the person's children are seven and five.

The person told me they still believe in sand. They don't know yet who's not real. And they were proud of that, that somehow they had, I guess, got their kids to this point without it being exposed at its faults. Seven and five.

He becomes an idol. Think about it. He's all-knowing, and he's omnipresent. He's the one that knows if you're good or bad. He's the one that rewards and blesses you with what you want. He is the omnipotent judge. He is rewarded and the beholder. In the trusting minds of the little children, and I've always thought, you take the most precious and fresh and misty human beings, the little kids. That's when the play is the most moist. That's when you instill so many things.

In the trusting minds of the little children, he takes the place that only God should be in. And here, once again, there is a command about that, and it gets laid aside. In Exodus 20, verse 3, and again, we don't have to go back there, but remember, God started off His commandments with the one that is most important. Because if this one's in place, the others have a chance to follow suit. If this one's not in place, it's really not going to matter about the others, because you're not going to be keeping them.

And that is, you shall have no other gods before you. That's also the great command that God has to come first, here. So to take a stand, and to put him in a position that only God should be in, is to put another God before the true God. Now, again, I'm not interested in how people reason around that. I'm interested in the reality, what I know and what I require God to live.

And again, I realize and understand that the rest of mankind will have clear opportunities someday. But think about something. It takes no stretch of imagination to acknowledge who is most important in the world's child's mind. Just go sit in the mall, close to where there's a Santa, and watch people coming through the mall shopping, and just focus on the little kids when they see Santa. That's what they get. And they, you know, they're tugging at Mom and Dad. They want to get over. They want to see Santa.

They want to sit to his left. They want to tell him what they want for Christmas. It takes no stretch of imagination to acknowledge that in the little child's mind Santa, especially at this time of year in particular, is more important than Jesus Christ. And any honest person being objective would acknowledge that. And here again is the working mimicry, the mimicry of adultery, and just as with the lies, who's behind the promotion for this doctrine. Is it too much of a stretch to take the name Santa? Drop the end down, the letter in, slide it to the end of the word, and you have Satan.

I think that's very appropriate. Just take the end and Santa, slide it to the end of the word, and you have Satan. And hasn't he always wanted to be worshiped? If you obey the Son of God, just bow down and worship me. And all these kingdoms that I have shown you in this panoramic vision is yours. These kingdoms, I will give them to you if you will just bow down and worship me. That's what he told Christ in Matthew 4, and he looked for in the Battle of the Lotus, worked for forty lives and nights.

Christ was in that money battle with Satan. See, here's something about Satan. He lets self worship by proxy if he can't get it direct. And he never runs around in a red suit with horns and a pitchfork. He would use representation or instrumentality because when Satan saw him again, he gets better than none. That's what he sees. If I could get some, even if it's in the red, if my ways can be promoted and my ways can be followed and my ways can be valuable to people, that's good enough. He has the ability to come across as the light. In other words, that's good.

To humans who either don't know better or don't think it through. In 2 Corinthians 11.14 2 Corinthians 11 and verse 14, Paul, in writing to the church people, was not just informing, but he was once again warning. 2 Corinthians 11.14, and no marble. It should be a thing that you marble that for because Satan himself was transformed into an angel of light. He isn't an angel of light. He was an angel of light, as he'll know in the Hebrew or Lucifer in the Adam. When he started, they started, light-bringer. He was an angel of light.

He created his angel of light. But he turned out his light long ago. He's an angel of darkness. Yet, he has the power to come across as light or as something good. Or that is, his ways to be made, quote, to look good. All the lies in the idolatry at this time of the year, you try to tackle that with people and take it away. You get yourself all the way from ostracized to, in some cases, from an inch or so, too.

Because you're taking away something that is so good, that is so light, so bright, so worshipful of God, the way it is viewed. He has the ability to dress things up and make them look good. Again, angel of light. But let's not think about something for a moment. Never throughout the entire year, 2018 and the big assignment 2019, never throughout an entire year is there so much simply light. Light. I'm going to come up with the sun and all that. That's about light. The bright lights, the lights, with all the beautiful colors at this time of the year. Now, something that a parent with little kids never wants to do.

You know, there's things you can turn down that are more frightening than it did. Now, on the street in the middle of the New Mexico, it seemed to me that fewer and fewer people were going to the trouble to put up Christmas lights at Christmas time. But it seemed that as some didn't put up Christmas lights anymore, the ones who still did put up even more to compensate for the poor neighbors who wouldn't do.

But there's some streets you can turn down that are just brilliantly lit up with all kinds of light and color. Never go down a street with all the bright lights and all the colors with your kids or grandkids and say, Look how ugly all that light is.

Look at how ugly all that color is. Because you're mine and the kids know you're mine. Because the light is not ugly and the colors are not ugly. I love colors. God created colors. He created light. The lights aren't ugly. The colors aren't ugly. It's how they're being used to promote something that is ugly.

But if you say the light is ugly, that's not realistic. That's not the truth. Red is pretty. Green is pretty. Yellow is pretty. White is pretty. Black is pretty. Brown are all the shades. The colors and the light, just like a cell, the color of a cell is pretty. But he takes some things that are pretty and puts them together to promote something that is not pretty.

This is why he comes across as an angel of light. He's good at what he does. He's an expert. He's a professional. And this is what Paul is talking about in referring to him transforming himself as an angel of light. But the wise one of God has to look deeper and beyond the superficial and brackest in beauty. What lies underneath? What is intrinsic? What are the benefits of marriage?

Let's go back to that autop wise. Get, get, get, get. That's the spirit of Christmas. Get. A man or a hoe, a great deal too, as a servant of God, as a bona fide servant of God, that we owe, oh, oh, a great deal too. His faithfulness is 42, his hand in there, it's only long ago. You can define God's way versus man or Satan's way of simple Satan. The way of you versus the way of you. And when a parent says, well, I am giving, well, what are you ingraining, though? You're ingraining get, get, get, get in the precious clay of the mind that will ever be in this life.

The way of you is being promoted. This is the way of Satan. And this wouldn't force you to walk home any time. This is the way of covetousness. And covetousness is idolatry. Colossians 3.5. Colossians 3 and verse 5. For all rights, mortifying and contained just means kill, you know, neutralize, kill, lullify.

Therefore your members which are upon earth, before seeing is very specifically identifies what should be killed, what should be gotten rid of, what should be ceased. Cease and assist, fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, able to un-cute your sins, and notice, get, get, get, get, get covetousness, which is idolatry.

Lying and idolatry are equities. God in his word has thoroughly and clearly expressed how he feels about so. Lying and idolatry have never been acceptable to him and never really. There are two scriptures along this line that are bedrock scriptures. One is nullified 4-6. We don't have to turn there. We'll recognize it. Nullified 4-6. I am little over. I change not. The value system, the nature, the character, the righteousness, never changes. I am the Lord. I change not. Nullified 4-6. The one who spoke those words was the Word and became Jesus Christ.

He was speaking for the Father and Himself. And then that's re-emphasized in Hebrews 14-8. And again, one we're very familiar with. Hebrews 13 verse 8. Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today, and forever. Bedrock scriptures of reality regarding God. Lying and idolatry, the faith and customs were filled with such and even much more than just that. This is why John warned Israel back in Deuteronomy 12.

I'm going to turn back there and read the warning. Deuteronomy 12 verses 29-30. Deuteronomy 12 verse 29. I go to warn. When the Lord your God shall cut off the nations from before you, where you go to possess them, and you succeed them in the world of the other land, you take heed to yourself that you be not snared by following them after that faith is restored from before you, and that you inquire not after they are God's saying, well, how do these nations serve their gods?

Hmm, that's a feeling. That's pretty. Oh, that looks good. Oh, wow. That would really be interesting and exciting. That looks good. I don't see what's wrong with that. I'm going to move into that. I don't know. Now, how do these nations serve their gods? Well, even so, why do they likewise? And then what God mentions is a full range. And if the smallest unit of it would be what on a relative basis of the scale you might call a minor in, but it can progress even into the major in. And it's not that in every single case, somebody is loving paganism is going to do all this, but on that scale, it can go from the bad to the atrocious, as it did in ancient history.

They actually wound up having some kings that burnt their children in the fire of the moment. So he says, you shall not do so unto the Lord your God for every abomination to the Lord which he hates, as they done to their gods. I mean, it ran the whole gamut for even. Their sons and their daughters, they have burnt in the fire to their gods. I mean, that is one of the practices of some of the Canaanites. And again, some of the practice of even some kings of Israel. And he goes on to say, what things, wherever I command you observe to do it, you shall not add thereto nor diminish from it. And then one which we're all very familiar with, Jeremiah 10, verse 2. Thus says the Lord.

How much sugar could it be? Learn not the way of the heat.

Learn not the way of the heat. I mean, not the sma- that this may have the signs of heaven or the zodiac, but the heathen or the sma- the land not the way of the heathen. For the customs of the people are vain. For one puts a tree out of the forest to work with the hands of the working with the axe. The net he was still there would go the fasted with net of the peppers that moved not their upright as the palm tree, which is never very. Learn not the way of the heathen.

Flying and idolatry go together. Flying promotes idolatry.

Idolatry depends upon flying. They have a symbiotic relationship.

They mutually support each other. They are carnal and unspiritual to the core. Three final scriptures. First one, Psalm 101, verse 7. Psalm 101, verse 7. They have no heart and a true relationship with God. Psalm 101, verse 8.

I gave a song recently on the supreme sovereign.

I talked about the simple fact that God does all human beings. He sees all activities. He loves mankind. And he has a plan of purpose when he's going to deliver mankind through his plan from the darkness that surrounds him.

But the bottom line is, as a result of whatever that opportunity is given, the result that's got to be is that we turn from those ways, yes, which is what you and I are doing, and done, and are doing, and trying to make sure that we're doing, because God is not carrying a personal relationship with the world right now. And we know that. And we know something about a personal relationship with God through relationships on 101.

And verse 7. He that works this seat shall not dwell within my house.

It's a major, major chronic character, crack, character small.

And God will not risk his house, his family, with that. He that tells lies shall not tear you from my sight. Psalm 66 verse 18. David, 2nd chapter, Psalm 56 verse 18. David understood, and he acknowledged this, and it's in spite of being written down, it serves good for me and you. If I regard iniquity in my heart, I don't care if it's lying, or adultery, or any other iniquity, if I regard iniquity in my heart, and oftentimes my heart is used in terms of something that you're motivated for or something that you're in love with. If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me. I have a relationship with God, but if I want to start diminishing that relationship, start shrinking it, start killing it. All I have to do is start hanging on to iniquity that I know is iniquity, tolerating it, accepting it, loving it, and I'll start killing my relationship with God. And David understood that, and it's put into your as an acknowledgement and as a warning. Because what we read in Psalm 101 and chapter 66 here, it has no part in true righteousness. Lying in the city, adultery, all these things, they're not part of God's makeup, and they cannot be. And they must not be a part of our makeup. And we do have a period of grace to grow and overcome the doubt. Final Scripture, first Peter 1.

First Peter 1, verses 15 and 16. First Peter.

Verse 15. But as he which has called you is holy, so you be holy, in all manner of conversation that that is kind of. Verse 16, because it is written, be you holy, for I am holy. Intrinsic, that is core, consensual to Christmas package, is lying at a dollar. Again, if you take everything that is a lie, and you take everything that is a dollar, and you strip it out of the package, the package collapses. It's good, and it cannot stand, because it cannot exist without these two ingredients. God has delivered you and me from this darkness that still surrounds the world. He delivered us into the true light, and let us be thankful for that. And in due time, whether with a few more dead in this age, or during the morning of rain, or the time of the general resurrection and the last great day, He will deliver our life moments. Our family, our friends, our co-workers, our neighbors, He will deliver them also, someday. And we can be and are very thankful for that. But in any time, you and I, we, with family, with friends, co-workers, who don't get it, or who don't want to get it, in some cases, they just don't want to get it, let us exercise wisdom and discretion and love in how we deal with them during this, our most challenging time of the year.