A New Christianity

A new Christianity has formed. You'll see that throughout history, where actually a totally new Christianity will form. We see that in the second and third centuries, that by the early 300s you have what is now called the Catholic Church, which had very little to do with the original Christianity.

It was a new Christianity had formed. During the Protestant Reformation, whole new concepts of Christianity were created. And they fought each other. There were wars fought in Europe between Protestants and Catholics over this new form of Christianity that was being created. Now we have, of course, what happened especially in the United States, was American religions.

New forms of Christianity. The Mormons is American religion, totally created here in the United States. We have a new Christianity that's formed. This new Christianity rejects much of the Old Testament, not because the same way the Protestants did. Protestants studied the Old Testament, but looked at the Old Testament as having very little impact on the life of the Christian because we were no longer under the law, but under grace.

They reject the Old Testament because the God of the Old Testament is cruel and angry and capricious. He killed innocent children in Sodom. He's an abortionist. He killed unborn babies in the flood. That's the definition. So they look at the Old Testament and they say either one, it is a total misrepresentation of God or to its myths. Now they know part of it's true, part of its history, but what they believe about the Old Testament for the most part is that it's either myths or it's just human beings misunderstanding what happened.

Sodom was destroyed by a natural disaster and everybody said it was God's fault. They also apply a lot of those thoughts as far as their interpretations to the New Testament in very many ways. They see that this new Christianity is more enlightened, more loving, and has a higher set of spiritual values than what the Bible presents. A much higher set of spiritual values. Back in 2005, Oxford Press printed a book by two sociologists who had done pretty extensive research into the religion of American teenagers. Now remember, this is 16 years ago. They actually created a term for this new religion and it was based on five basic premises that they found that almost all teenagers they interviewed could agree with.

Now, if you were 15 then, you're 31 now. So they're all adults now. They're all members of society. The first premise is that there is a God who exists who created and ordered the world and watches over human life on earth. Well, so far, I think everyone who comes to be a Christian would agree with that. No matter what group or denomination you come from.

Two, God wants people to be good, nice and fair to each other, as taught in the Bible and by most world religions. Now, this is a very important concept because goodness is totally explained by being nice and fair. And this is taught in the Bible and by all other religions.

There's a commonality in all religions that must be acknowledged and actually embraced. A commonality of religions about being nice and about being fair. Three, the central goal of life is to be happy and to feel good about yourself. The central goal of church, then, is to teach you about being happy and feeling good about yourself. Messages who don't make you feel happy or feel good about yourself are truly Christian messages. Think of Joel Osteen. Okay. Four, God does not need to be particularly involved in one's life except when you need Him to be.

In other words, God doesn't care much about how you live except when you need Him. Because God only has one purpose. He wants you to be happy. And since He wants you to be happy, you define your happiness. And then, the fifth one is that all good people go to heaven when they die. And what are good people? Good people are people who are nice, they're fair, and they're happy, and that makes them good. The sociologists gave a really strange term to this religion. They called it moralistic therapeutic deism, which isn't actually a very accurate description, but I understand why they said that. It's moralistic because they believe you earn salvation.

You earn your salvation by being nice. It's therapeutic because the purpose for church is that church is a place where your emotions are healed. It's a therapy. And it's deist because God's there, but, you know, He doesn't care much except when you need Him. So you can do whatever you want until you need God. Theism is that you actually worship a God. So it's moralistic, and we're going to show you how far that goes. It's therapeutic. The whole purpose of church is to to feel good and to feel good about yourself.

And it's deism. God is out there, and everybody relates to Him in their own personal way. And therefore, a good person who is a Hindu or a Buddhist or a Muslim or anyone else is just as good before God as any Christian, as long as they're nice and good. And now I want you to think about that. That was the major belief of teenagers 15 years ago. A recent poll showed that this is the majority of the beliefs of people now 35 and under who claim to be Christians.

And it is a large number of people between 35 and 55.

In fact, among many of the mainstream denominations, this is their primary view of Christianity. Christianity has morphed. We've been watching it happen. We've been talking about it for 80 years. We've watched it morph into something else. Now, not all Christians are in that direction, but this is the primary this is the major direction that Christianity is going in. Now, what does this mean? Well, a couple of things. Once again, we go back to this idea that goodness is defined by only defined by how much you love and accept others. You have to accept them. And therefore, obedience to God is only measured by how much you accept others. So, a good Christian looks at anything from transgenderism, homosexuality, just freedom of sex. Freedom of sexual activity is actually good, and you can't judge anybody. Now, if you want to get married to be monogamous and have children, that's good for you. But that may not be good for somebody else, and good people don't judge. Only evil people judge.

Now, how many times have you heard those kind of things said?

So, this isn't just the secular world. This is becoming a new form of Christianity. You know, sometimes in the Church of God, our biggest problem has been the opposite. We judge everybody over everything. We judge each other. Of course, we're hard on each other. Now, this is the opposite. You can't judge anybody on anything. So, the greatest good is being nice. So, people will literally say, that person is a Christian. I know it because they're nice. Then, you find out the person's agnostic. I don't know if God believe. I don't really know if I believe in God. Well, God's in your life. I know it because you're nice.

The purpose of the religion, of course, is to make you feel good and be happy.

The message that you must repent of your sin becomes a non-Christian message.

In fact, the idea of Jesus as Savior begins to be removed out of Christianity. He's a moral teacher, but God loves you the way you are. Now, the problem is Protestantism has been teaching that for 50 years, longer than that. Probably less than 100 years. God loves you the way you are, which is true. God accepts you the way you are. There's a problem with that. God accepts you just the way you are. No, He doesn't. He loves you just the way you are. He calls you, and He expects you to become His child.

No, God accepts me just the way you are. So, that term, which was used in Protestantism for 100 years, has now become embedded into this new Christianity as one of the fundamental absolute truths. God accepts me. God made me this way. You'll hear that argument all the time. God made me this way, for whatever behavior that they want to support.

So, if any message that doesn't bring happiness to me, and since God loves me, He wants me to be happy, is a false message.

So, you get back to the idea, then, that all people who love each other and accept each other go to heaven. Anybody that says they obey God but doesn't accept everybody just the way they are as good can't go to heaven.

It's very interesting because I don't know how far this will go in accepting human behavior.

I mean, what human behavior? I mean, okay, well, you can't steal because stealing hurts other people, but I just noticed one of the cities, it might be the state of Oregon. I think it was Oregon or Washington, once now, to legalize prostitution. That's a good thing.

It is good to have prostitutes. It's good for the women, and it's good for the men. And, of course, they'll get the taxet. Now, that's probably going to pass. And there'll be Christians who support and I understand people who are secularists accepting that, but these are Christians who will accept it. And so, the idea of obeying God, since I'm the one who determines what makes me happy, if any message that tells me, this will make me unhappy, you've got to repent, you have sinned, makes me unhappy, therefore it's not of God. It is a total emotional-based religion. It's based entirely on emotions and very little reasoning. And I say that to tell you that our old ways of reaching people won't work. You shouldn't eat pork. You know, I wondered about that. Half my friends are vegans. You should go to church on Saturday. Oh, well, I actually go to my Wicca service on Wednesday night, and I go to a Muslim service on Friday night, and Saturday I go to a Jewish service. So, I believe, yeah, you should worship, but whatever days you wish to worship God, it makes you happy.

Suddenly, our old ways of teaching the Bible means nothing to them. It can't reach them because it's a let's reason through the Scripture. We literally have to reach them emotionally first and then reason through the Scripture. What it reminds me of is the difference between Jesus and Peter and John arguing in the synagogue and Paul arguing to the pagans in the Areophagus. Totally different arguments. Totally different arguments. Because we now entered a pagan Christianity. I mean, we knew there was a pagan Christianity out there. I mean, Catholicism is about as pagan as you can get. We're talking about a paganism that goes beyond that. Oh, I long for the days when sitting down with a new person to be discussing why you shouldn't keep Christmas.

Because that's not even an argument. If Christmas makes you happy, keep it. If it doesn't, don't keep it. Just be happy with God.

Let's look at a Scripture. I mentioned this because there was an article I read actually used a little bit in a Beyond Today program about six months ago. But I want to show you where this interpretation goes. Where it goes. This is from a blog that I read from a person who I think he was a minister, who was a big proponent of this involved in the New Christianity. Let's go to Matthew 15. They don't have a name for it yet. Moralistic therapeutic deism isn't going to work. I mean, you're never going to find anybody that says, oh yes, I'm a moralistic therapeutic deist. It's just not going to work as a explanation. Verse 21.

Then Jesus went out from there and departed to the region of Tyre and Sidon.

The whole one of Canaan came from that region and cried out to him, saying, Have mercy on me, O Lord, son of David, my daughter severely demon-possessed. But he answered her not a word, and his disciples came and urged him, saying, Send her away, for she cries out after us. Now, the first thing when you look at this is, from their viewpoint, is well, Jesus here is a sexist Jew.

Because Jews looked down on women. You know, the purpose of a woman was to get married, have children, contribute to society that way. There weren't a lot of women out in the workforce at this point. So he is a sexist Jew who doesn't understand how much God loves women.

So that's the explanation of this. So we have a problem here with Jesus. Verse 24. But he answered and said, I was not sent except to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Ah, he is an incredibly prejudiced man who is only going to preach to Jews. So at this point, literally, the article said he was a racist and a sexist.

He was against women, and he was against anybody that wasn't a Jew.

Then she came and worshiped him, saying, Lord, help me. And he answered and said, It's not good to take children's bread and throw it to little dogs. Now, there's been a lot of attempt to explain this. He said, little dogs. So he called her a puppy. So it was a term of endearment. No, it was not. In the Middle East, a dog is a that's a low form of animal. It was in the scripture. In the Bible times, it's still today. It's a low form of animal. From what I understand, in many Arab countries, they won't even let dogs in the house. That's dirty, right? When he called her a little dog, in that society, it was about as horrible a thing as you could say to a woman.

And so they say, see how evil Jesus is. Now, they say they're Christians. They're followers of Christ, but they see Jesus totally different than we do.

And she said, Yes, Lord, and even the little dogs eat the crumbs which fall from their master's table. Jesus answered and said to her, O woman, great is your faith. Let it be to you as you desire. And their daughter was healed from that very hour on. And so their conclusion is God had sent this Canaanite woman to Jesus to teach him about love and goodness and being nice. After his interaction with her, he now was more loving and a nicer person. He had learned goodness from her.

So if you understand their basic premises about religion, that makes absolutely sense to them. Of course, it makes the Bible a mess. That's why part of it's myth, part of it's not true. You can't even trust Jesus.

And eventually, how can Jesus be my Savior?

How can he be my Savior when, well, he wasn't a good Christian. Oh, I mean, he is Christ. No, he wasn't good. He wasn't moral enough.

See, it's moralistic. He wasn't good enough to really be what God wanted him to be. So God had to teach him. Fortunately, he had this woman, this Canaanite woman, non-Jewish woman, to teach him. How would you explain that to someone who came up and said, that's what that means. How many have heard—I know at least one person here—how many have had somebody here tell them that? One, two, okay.

That's because some of you are older and you're not going to come in contact with too many moralistic, therapeutic deist at a certain age, okay? But it is common.

You said you didn't have any? No. Oh, watch that older stuff. Man, he's pointing his finger at me. I thought, okay. To truly understand what we have here in this story of Matthew, we have to understand the whole Bible. But what I want to do is just go through what Jesus said in other places, his teachings, okay? To understand Jesus here, you have to understand what he taught.

Going to the Ten Commandments means nothing to this brand of Christianity.

Saying, we're supposed to keep the Ten Commandments. And their answer is, we're not into rules and regulations. We're into love. And those are just rules and regulations. We're not into religion. We're into being spiritual. And spiritual means that inside of me, I am good and I love.

So going there doesn't mean anything. You've lost the battle already.

So what I want to do, first of all, is look at the teachings of Jesus. And then we're going to have to just wrap it up with, how do we talk to these people? And I don't know entirely how.

I know somehow from interacting with people to have this viewpoint. But I'm just going to tell you, our normal way of doing things, handing them a booklet, won't mean much. The only thing that they may really be interested in is that there's no hell. Because, you know, how does a loving God have an everlasting burning hell? That question bothers them. The rest of it is God a trinity. Oh, we don't care. If He's a trinity to you, that's good. If He's Brahma over here, that's okay, too. Remember the prayer of the congressman here not too long ago? Praying in the name of the God of the Bible, the monotheistic God and Brahma? That's okay. Because it's all the path to the same God. It's just different ways to get there. Of course, Oprah has been saying for 25 years.

For 25 years, she's been teaching that. So this is a whole new change in society that took a long time. It started way back in the 60s. It took a long time to create. But now, we wake up and it's the norm. And how do we deal with it? Okay. Jesus goes to Tyre and Sidon. This is interesting because He had never been there because it's outside of Judea. It is a place in which the majority of the people aren't Jews. So this is a very interesting thing He's doing here.

Now let's go to Mark 3 because I want to show something about this. You know, He just picks up and goes there. But there's a reason why. What happens here in Mark 3 is much earlier in His ministry. Mark 3 verse 7. But Jesus withdrew with His disciples to the sea, and a great multitude from Galilee followed Him, and from Judea and Jerusalem and Edomia and from beyond the Jordan, and those from Tyre and Sidon, a great multitude, when they heard how many things He was doing, and they came to Him. You see, His reputation had reached way up into that area.

This is important to understand, but the way She approaches Him is very important. This woman had a deeper understanding than anybody gives her credit for at times. What She says, how She says it, is very important. She knew He was different. She had heard about Him. Possibly, she had actually gone down to Judea to meet Him at one point, to see Him at one point, as these crowds would gather. So, this isn't just some person walking up and saying, oh, I hear you're a magician and you can heal my demon-possessed daughter. This is a person who understood something about Him. So, what is Jesus' viewpoint of humanity?

If I come to this from this new Christian viewpoint, all human nature is basically good. The problem is, when we were born, other people sort of got us messed up. Society got us messed up by teaching us wrong things. And if we could strip away the wrong things, we're basically good. It was sort of like the hippie movement of the 60s. I remember that. It was sort of attractive.

Oh, everybody just sing Beatles songs. And, you know, we're all happy. We all live together. Everything's great, right? Those communes didn't last very long. They couldn't. They all died out.

People got mad at each other. People got jealous. Sleeping around was fine until it was the girl you really liked. Then you went and killed somebody, right? The hippie movement deteriorated. It had this ideal. Think of the new Christianity as just the old hippies. Remember Jesus freaks? How many of you are old enough to remember Jesus freaks? Not too many of you. That was a hippie movement that Jesus freaks. Jesus Christ Superstar. Okay? The movie. The rock opera movie.

I'm telling my age. I guess I am Grandpa. But that movement was an idealistic movement.

That love and peace and joy could be created by humanized Christianity. Actually, Jesus Christ Superstar actually had a few elements in it more common to the Bible than this new movement does. So if we believe all human nature is basically good, it just needs the right guidance. Of course, the question always is, who gives it the guidance? That's what's interesting.

That's one reason why this new Christianity is also a political movement. It's going to become a strong political movement because, well, we have to get all these bad people to be good, because they've learned all these bad ways. As an older person, you won't be put in a gulag.

You'll simply be to attempt to re-educate you. And if you can't be re-educated, you'll be just ostracized, shoved off to the side. This isn't going to be 1984. It's going to be a brave new world if you've read either of those books. It's not 1984. It's a brave new world. In a brave new world, they've tried to create a Christianity without tears. And everybody got up every day, and the whole purpose of society was to be happy. And so every day, every time you felt anxiety, there was a little pill you took, and you had no more anxiety. And everybody was happy.

And everybody had a job, and it just worked out fine. Until this guy came along and said, no, we're supposed to struggle. We're supposed to have ups and downs.

You've taken away humanity, and you've taken away Christianity, and he was seen as a crazy man. That's where we're headed. It's a brave new world with a whole new Christianity.

And, you know, how long before marijuana is absolutely legal, every place in the country, so between, you know, between a couple beers and a toke, you can be mellow. That's what a brave new world was. It was a little pill, and you could be mellow. And it was written in the 30s. He had to make up the drug, because there was no drug that didn't have side effects. He had to make up a drug without side effects. They just made everybody mellow. But then, when you had to deal with your normal human emotions, you couldn't deal with normal human emotions. And that's where we're headed. Because Christianity is about dealing with normal human emotions. It's about dealing with the fact that life isn't perfect. It's about dealing with the fact that human relationships are messy. It's about literally dealing with life, without running away or being in constant conflict. Well, in a brave new world, nobody runs away, and no one lives in conflict, because they just take the pill, and everybody's happy.

What was Jesus' viewpoint of human nature? Luke 13.

I didn't mean to get into a brave new world, but it's...

I have to admit, I haven't read all the book. I've read parts of it.

Luke 13, verse 1.

Now, it's easy to miss an important point he makes here. There were a president at that season, someone told him about the Galileans whose blood pilot had mingled with their sacrifices.

And Jesus answered and said to them, Do you suppose that these Galileans were worse sinners than all other Galileans because they suffered such things? See, the point was, this bad thing happened to these people. They were killed by the Roman government, and their blood was mixed with the sacrifices to pagan gods. I mean, that's about as horrible a thing that could happen to you. And Jesus' answer is, do you think they're actually worse sinners than everybody else? Because they must be, right? Now, this happened to you. You must be a really bad person. He says, I tell you no, but unless you repent, you will likewise perish. Now, think about that. He's telling everybody there, there's no innocent person among you.

Unless you repent, everybody dies and has no hope of the resurrection.

There is no innocence. Everybody. Christ's view of human nature is the same as the view of human nature given in Genesis and explained in detail by Paul, and that is, human nature has been corrupted, and there's some good in it, but it is basically corrupted and cannot be saved by itself.

So the idea that God goes around just slaying innocent people is not true.

Now, we understand something they don't. We understand the idea that everybody gets an opportunity. That's beyond the discussion of what you could do in this case, but the idea is all human beings are corrupted, period. We just are. You say, well, the baby that's not born is not, no, but the parent was. The parent was corrupted.

Now, we understand there's still a chance for that baby and that mother because of the great white throne judgment, but we can't accept the fact that all human nature is good.

Because if all human nature is good, why do you need a savior?

You can save yourself by simply being nice, by being kind, by being good.

So if you're a really kind person, then you've earned your salvation because you're good. John 12. See, Jesus said he had a mission, that he came from God to do. John 12, verse 27. I'm only using him. Paul explains this in great detail. I just wanted to show you what Jesus said. Do you think that somehow these people, this calamity came to, were worse sinners? Everybody's a sinner. Unless you repent, you have no hope. So that means everybody has a corrupted human nature.

Everybody is a sinner. John 12, verse 27.

Jesus says, now my soul is troubled, and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour, but for this purpose I came to this hour. Father, glorify your name. He says he's looking ahead at the torture and death he's going to suffer, and he says, but this is why I came for this. Now, some people in this new Christianity say that God did not sacrifice his son because that would make God a terrible child abuser. In fact, Hawkins, the great atheist who died here just a couple years ago, he said that he could not worship the God in the Bible because he was a child abuser. He killed his tortured and killed his own son.

So, Jesus did not come to die for us because that would be abusive. That's not nice.

But we have to first accept that we have no value except from God. We have to first accept, and this is where the only way you get somebody with this idea is you have to get them to look inside themselves and actually embrace the angst and the worthlessness and the fear that's driving them all the time anyways. You have to get them into that emotion and say, so is that goodness saving you from that? Why do you feel that way? So he says that a voice came from heaven saying, I have both glorified it and will glorify it again. Therefore, the people who stood by and heard it said that it had thunders. Others said an angel had spoken to him. And Jesus said, this voice did not come because of me, but for your sake. Now is the judgment of this world. Now the ruler of this world will be cast out, and I am lifted up when I am lifted up from the earth will draw all people to myself. He said, I've come here because there's judgment on this world, and I'm taking that judgment on myself, and I am judging the ruler of this world. It's interesting in the New Christianity, Satan isn't even talked about. It's almost like he doesn't exist. So there is no understanding that they live in a corrupt world. Well, they know it's corrupt, but they think they know the answer. They think they know the answer.

And so what they don't realize is they're corrupt, too. And they have no concept that Satan actually rules this world. Without that concept, you can't come to God. Of course, you don't see a need to repent because I'm basically good. I'm just trying to get everybody else to be nice, too.

Remember, over 50% of all Christians under the age of 35 believe this is Christianity.

Over 50% according to the New Barna Poll. That's why in Matthew 20, verse 27 and 28, here's what Jesus said. See, we've got to go back to, if you believe in Jesus, there are certain things you have to believe. If you don't believe these things, then stop saying you're a Christian because you're not a follower of Christ. You're not a Christian. You're a pagan. Matthew 20, verse 27.

And whoever desires to be first among you, he's talking to his disciples, let him be your slave.

Just as the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many. You'll find other places where he talks about this. I have come to redeem people back to God because they're cut off from God and they have no way to get there. Being nice won't give you heaven, as they think. Accepting everybody won't make you right with God. But without an understanding of Satan, without an understanding of corrupt human nature, you don't have an understanding that you need to repent. You don't understand that there's part of you that is absolutely evil. No, I'm good. You're making me feel bad about myself. You're bad. How dare you say there's something wrong with me? You're a bad person. You're not really a Christian.

Because to purpose is therapeutic. You're to make me feel good. Well, here, take a pill.

If you think that's religion, take a pill. You'll feel better. Here, take a value. You'll feel better.

Oh, I like this religion. I feel good.

True Christianity makes us look at the ugly truth.

That's why Jesus said, not only does he point out human nature is corrupt, he points out that he had to come to buy back humanity. And then he makes this incredible statement in John chapter 5, because no one who believes new Christianity could believe this.

John 5, 24. Well, so surely I say to you, he who hears my word and believes in him who sent me has everlasting life and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death the life.

Well, so surely I say to you, the hour is coming and now is when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God and those who hear him will live. The only way for salvation is through Jesus Christ.

That is considered heretical in the new Christianity. Christ died for the Hindu. Christ died for the people in some Polynesian island that still live in the Stone Age and worship rocks and stones and trees. He died for all of them, which is true. Therefore, they're all saved, as long as they're nice people. As long as they're nice people. And so they really are confused about any church that says you must obey God, any church that would make solid stances on certain things. Now, they would agree when we say racism is not godly. That's not what a Christian should be. Oh, we agree with that because you're being nice.

When we would say homosexuality is wrong, oh, you're not being nice. You now have an heresy.

Because there's no biblical criteria for anything.

Criteria becomes basically social. Social criteria and no understanding of God.

In fact, to believe that every human being is inherently evil and the sacrifice of Jesus Christ is absolutely needed. You can't obtain salvation through it. It seems barbaric.

Now, let's go back. Let's go back to Matthew 15. So that premise right there leads us to understanding that Jesus is dealing with a person who has not yet repented.

But he's doing something else here. He's explaining his mission. And that's why he says, in verse 14, I was not sent except for the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

She doesn't argue the point. She just says, help me. You know why she doesn't argue the point?

She understands it. You see, how do you know she understands it?

Well, let's go back up to verse 22. I'm sorry, verse 22.

And behold, a woman of Canaan came from that region and cried out to him, saying, Have mercy on me, O Lord, son of David, my daughter is severely demon-possessed.

The son of David is a messianic term. Jesus argued with the Pharisees about, Do you know who I am? No. Well, who is the Messiah? They said, What's the son of David? That's true. And in Psalm 110, David said, My Lord said to his Lord.

So how could he be the son of David if he existed before David, or at the time of David? And it says they were perplexed. And of course, Psalm 110 is used in numerous places in the New Testament, four places in the New Testament to show that Jesus Christ is that Lord.

So she understands he's the Messiah. That's why she responds the way she is. She has a certain knowledge here. She somehow came in contact with him, either by people who went to Judea or she went there at one time, because there are a lot of people from Tyre and Sidon, it says, who knew about Jesus. He shows up and she says, You're the son of David.

That is a term only a Jew would have understood. And she's not a Jew.

And so she comes understanding who he is. And when he says, Don't you know I've been sent to the lost sheep of Israel? She didn't even argue that point. She didn't even argue. That's when he says, You know what? He goes down here in verse 26, but he answered and said, It is not good to take the children's bread and throw it to the little dogs. He says, It's not your time yet. And she didn't argue that either.

She must have known enough of the Old Testament to know that God's plan is in stages and the Messiah would come first to the house of Israel and his first coming and then to the world.

Remember, Jesus said he came to the world. Remember in John 3 16, that whole passage, what used to be one of the most quoted passages in the scripture is not anymore. Well, let's just go there. Let's just go there for a minute. John 3 16. I know it's warm in here today.

So stay with me here. He talks about, he's talking in Nicodemus, in verse 10, he says, How come you don't understand you're a teacher and you don't understand what I'm talking about? He says he's the Son of Man.

He says, I've come down from heaven and I go back to, I'm the only one to have come down from heaven and I'm going back. I'm the only one. And then verse 16, For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life.

And he goes on and explains what that means. So, Jesus himself said, I have come for the world.

But it was in a certain order. Now, what's interesting here, when he goes to Tyreonsideness, the first time he's gone to a non-Jewish group in his entire ministry so far, he'd always stayed in the Jewish world. And he goes there, and she wants this miracle. She says, you're the Messiah. You're the Son of David. And he says, I'm not here for you yet.

And she says, I know, but you know, God will give me some crumbs. She's remarkable, not because she's teaching Jesus about not being a racist in the sexist. She's remarkable because of her absolute humility before God. It didn't matter what he said to her.

She knew her nature was corrupted. She knew that the Messiah would first come to those people, then other people. She understood that. And she still said, but you know what?

God will give me some crumbs. And he said, wow, now that's faith.

And he cast the demon out of her daughter.

This is a remarkable—you know, I believe this is all set up from God.

He goes there because she's going to be there. This is all set up. She goes there, she's going to be there. This is going to be an interaction which shows that Christ is going to open the door for everybody.

And she was the woman who had enough understanding to interact with him in the way that he could do this.

It's a totally different viewpoint, isn't it? We're seeing Jesus as the Messiah. We're seeing Jesus as the Savior. We're seeing Jesus as the Son of God. We're seeing Jesus as Adonai there in Psalm 110, where he says that proves I'm the Son of David. We're seeing all that in his ministry. But see, you have to understand the Bible. If you don't know the Bible, you don't know any of that. You don't know that he'd never gone to a non-Jewish area before.

And you don't understand her approach. Why is she so docile? Why didn't she walk away? Why didn't she say, you can't be from God, you're not nice? She didn't do that at all.

She said, I understand, but I also understand God will give me some crumbs.

We don't know what happened to her later, but she knows that she understood, and we know that he responded to that knowledge.

And he's showing now how he's going to go to the whole world.

The problem with—and so we look through the rest of this—with that viewpoint, with that biblical viewpoint, this makes total sense. If you don't understand the scripture, or even the basic teachings of Jesus, you have no idea what that means. Jesus seems cruel, unloving, uncaring, and like he only cares for Jews, and he sure doesn't like women.

Can you imagine calling a woman a dog today? We think how the word that she used, that's basically what that was like for her. And this is publicly going on.

And yet the interaction is an incredible interaction, and she's supposed to be a remarkable example of understanding certain things God's doing. And she's not even converted. She hasn't received God's Spirit. It hadn't been poured out on anybody yet.

You see, the problem is this new Christianity is at its core, core, a denial of Jesus Christ. It is not Christian at all. It's an absolute denial of Jesus Christ.

And now if you talk to people that are in this, because it's not one church, it's an ideology, you're going to find they're all over the place. They'll have different explanations of the Bible. They're all over the place. Of course, that's okay too, because as long as it makes you happy, and besides God's relating to you as you, you know, there's such a personal relationship with God, you just are nice to each other, no matter what your interpretations are.

Unless you disagree with that. Oh no, you're wrong. Oh, you're not nice. Now you have a problem.

Because you're not nice. You have the audacity to say that they're wrong.

So it is at its core a denial of Jesus Christ.

I think, you know, just thinking here about the Sermon on the Mount, where Jesus said, if you, people will come to him and say, look what we did in your name, and he'll say, I don't even know you. I don't even know you. The new Christianity is a Christianity without Christ. It's pretend worship of God without submission or obedience to him. So it's not worship at all. It is forgiveness without repentance. A belief that salvation happens without conversion. And it is becoming a social and political movement.

Because it's not, once again, like there's a church moving things. It's a philosophy. There's ideologies that create the world. Okay? It's an ideology. What's that ideology shared with some of the people? They think it's reality. So it's how they interpret. It's how they look at life.

Sometimes we're always looking for the, you know, the six men behind closed doors that's doing this. There aren't six men behind closed doors doing this. This is a satanic deception that more and more people are buying into, and it's becoming an ideology. And once it becomes a core ideology, it becomes the way people decide interpret reality. How do you deal with people like this? Well, a lot of times you can't.

A lot of times you say, well, that's what I believe in. You have your beliefs. Oh, you're a nice person. You accept my beliefs. No, I don't. But okay, you really want to go there or what?

But sometimes you can reach these people, and you do it because you have the first, and we don't know how to do this. A lot of this is done one-on-one. It's you deal with their feelings. Somehow you have them get in touch with the fact that deep inside they know something's wrong. This peace and love and joy, you know, remember Ringo Starr ending his songs or his concerts with love and peace, love and peace, love and peace, you know. And they think that Ringo Starr knew what he was talking about. Not that they know who Ringo Starr is. How many know who Ringo Starr is? A few more than some of the... okay.

That was my hippie taste. Not quite, but they have to get in touch with the fact that...

Stephen Covey did this once. He was in a group of students who he was the writer of... what was that book? He wrote three or four books about... seven habits of highly effective people.

He was with a group of people, young adults in a college setting, and they got mad at him because he said there were absolutes. And they got madder and madder, so he realized he could actually have violence. There were hundreds of them, and the one guy was really... he was jumping up and yelling and shaking. There are no absolute truths. Now, this is 15 years ago this is happening on a college campus. By the way, I read something this week about from a professor saying that college campuses now, you have to be careful about what you say because literally the students can become moms or get them just walk out of a class. So his college students were mad because there are no absolutes. And he said he realized he had the start of the violence, so he said, I tell you what, I tell you what, let's just do this. Let's just take a minute of silence and think about...

I think he said that the concentration camps under Nazi Germany. Is that absolutely evil?

And he says he just stood there for the longest time to have got uncomfortable for everybody because what do I do next? He said, now, are there any of you that want to defend that that's not absolute evil? He said there was silence, and he looked at the one man, that young man who had been shaking his fist at him, he said, what do you think? And he said, I don't know. You see, there's no reason to it. It's a feeling. I don't know. In other words, he did not know how to define what was happening because a thought that needed reasoning showed him something was wrong, but it meant his feeling was wrong, and he didn't feel good about himself at that moment. Well, welcome to becoming a mature adult.

Welcome to becoming a mature adult.

We have to help them get it understand that angst that's there, that fear that's there has a reason, and then we have to explain to them that each human being is made in the image of God, and yes, every human being has value to God. We're not arguing that. A Hindu, it doesn't matter who they are, an atheist has value to God because they were made in the image of God, that every human being is corrupted, and that there is a Satan, and the reason for all this evil, and the reason that there's evil inside of you, because they will, you know, come on, there's evil in you. You know it. You know there's hatred in you. You know there's problems inside of you. The reason that evil is there is because you're corrupted. You're no longer the image of God. And this is why Jesus Christ is more than a teacher. He's the divine Son of God who was sent to this earth because only His life is worth more than all of ours. So you have to reevaluate your view of Jesus Christ.

And you know what? The only thing I know to do at this point is tell them to read the Gospels.

The problem is, too many people today can't read more than about 600 words and maintain comprehension. It takes a whole lot more than that to read the Gospels.

He said, well, no, let's take them to where we used to take people, and the Bible means nothing to them. Let's go read Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Let's start there.

So now we have a basis for looking at the rest. Now we can look at the entire Old Testament in a totally different way. Because if you just started with Genesis, all they come back with is, boy, that God's evil. He changed everybody's languages just to make them confused. And all this confusion we have in the world today is His fault. That's the conclusion they come to.

And so we have to get them to start there. And the most important thing you can do, and I know from just discussing this with parents and grandparents for the last 15 years, as this has become more and more common, all you can do is be a good example by living God's way.

And I've had many grandparents tell me a grandchild came and said, you know, I hate your church, but I wish I had something you have.

There's something you have I wish I had.

I say, it's just God. It's not me, it's God. And you just tell them. Here's something else. If they ever asked you to pray with them, pray with them. We're not used to doing that, but they don't know how to pray. How do you know to pray to God when you have such a false concept of God? It's not even real. Say, I'll pray with you. Just pray with them and ask God to help them.

So why would I do that? Because they don't know.

Most of you came from Protestant backgrounds. If you came into the church, most of you or many of you grew up in the church, you were taught how to pray in the church you went to. Or you just went and talked to God. They don't even know how to do that.

Pray with them. To tell them, your problem is, you know, you accept all this sin.

Oh, you've made me feel bad. You must be a bad person. It reminds me of everybody's eight years old.

Everybody's eight years old.

Now, the other thing we can do is go hide from this, but you know we're not allowed to.

I want to end with something that Christ told us. Because every once in a while I think, you know what? I can hide from this, just not take any phone calls, get off of television, and come preach to the people who understand what I'm talking about. Matthew 5, verse 14.

You, the followers of God, the disciples of Jesus Christ, you are the light of the world, a city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a lampstand it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven, not that they may see our good works and say, wow, you're great people, that they may see your good works, and you can explain to them, no, what you're seeing is God. I submit to God, I love God, and God works in me, and you can have that too. Because one thing is going to happen, this religion is going to fail.

Absolutely fail. Because eventually all they'll do is fight among themselves. Because they'll have different explanations of nice and good. You know why? Because they're all defining happiness by their own selfishness, not God's definition of happiness.

So they'll have to always end up fighting among themselves.

And if we can have that kind of unity that God expects of us in the church, in our families, if we can have that right relationship with God, then we can be used, every one of us, can be used to be that light that He actually commanded us to be.