Hello, and welcome to the Westside churches special Monday Morning Coffee podcast on this podcast, our preacher Mark Roberts will help you get your week started right. With look back at yesterday's sermon so that we can think through it further and better work the applications into our daily lives. Mark will then look forward into this week's Bible reading so that we can know what to expect and watch for. And, he may have some extra bonus thoughts from time to time. So grab a cup of coffee as we start the week together on Monday Morning Coffee with Mark.

Good morning. Good morning. Welcome to the Monday Morning Coffee podcast from Monday, February the 20th. I'm Mark. I have coffee, I have sermon notes, I've got my Bible open to the book of Jose and and we're just kind of in that bleak period of winter now, aren't we? The football season is long over now and there's no Valentine's Day that was last week. It's just bleakness of winter and maybe that goes well, maybe that goes pretty well with Jose cuz that's not the happiest book of the Bible that we've ever read. And yesterday's sermon wasn't the happiest sermon I've ever preached. Lots to talk about. Let's get started. So yesterday's sermon was about the sexual revolution and how that has changed our country and it has changed it permanently and absolutely not for the better. I thought I might get some pushback when I said the sexual revolution is over and we lost. But I think most people just sadly have to shake their heads in agreement. It's not a good thing is it? But this is the world that we live in now and we have to navigate that just like Daniel and his friends had to navigate living in Babylon and just like the New Testament church had to navigate living in a Roman culture. I think about the church in Corinth and what they had to put up with. Well, we just, we just have to think through this. And that's what the lesson yesterday was designed to do. Just a little behind the scenes. Look, this is a really hard thing to talk about in the pulpit. I'm trying to speak frankly about something that our enemies speaks so frankly about without offending anybody, without being coarse or vulgar. And of course, without upsetting or raising a lot of awkward questions with the children who are in the audience, it is a fine line to walk. And I hope I did not create difficulties for any of our families yesterday. However, maybe the thing that I would say about that is if they're old enough to ask questions, it's probably time. Mom and dad had some conversations with them about that, at least at an age appropriate level. A couple of weeks ago, I was in Florida and I was in a class that was dealing with CS Lewis's wonderful book, the Abolition of Man. That book talks about the erosion of a value system and what happens to a culture when that occurs. And the teacher used an illustration, put up an illustration, a PowerPoint slide of someone who had proudly tweeted, tweeted out, tweeted out, tweeted out. Um, actually I think it was on TikTok, um, here, a fellow had come to read to his fifth grade elementary class and had read a book to fifth graders about a child who had gender confusion and so wanted to change genders. And this book was read in the presence of these fifth graders. And that was just wonderful. And we take such pride in this and isn't this just a great thing? So kids today are being exposed to this kind of information and they're not hearing God's side of it. And that really is the emphasis that I wanna make today in an extra thought about the sermon. And that is that children are being taught all kinds of stuff about sexuality in the sexual relationship outside of the home and in place of the home. One writer said the culture aggressively promotes L G B T Q affirmation, especially among a adolescents, activists and allies work hard to develop our children into allies committed to the long game. And once children become their allies, then conflict with parents begin. And I think that's exactly right. There's so much in our society that parents cannot control. You can't hide'em under the bed. That's not gonna work. And so what that means is parents have to have hard conversations with their kids and those conversations have to start well before they are adolescents. We need to be in one-on-one relationships with our children. We need to be talking to them about what they're hearing, about what they're seeing, about what God says about what's right. And you cannot count on the west side church to be given all that information to your children in a Bible class or two a week in a pulpit sermon once a week. That's never going to be enough. Mom and dad, you need to build a relationship with your children where they trust you, where they can come to you for questions where they know these conversations that are kind of awkward are going to happen and they can count on you for reliable and trustworthy and real conversation and real information about that. If you are saying nothing, then be certain that the world is saying everything and they may very well teach your children what you refused, what you did not talk nearly enough about. I hope that the sermon yesterday caused some conversations, good conversations, not awkward and inappropriate conversations, but I hope it led to good conversations. Have you heard any of that? Have you seen any of that? Do you have any friends who are involved in that? Let's talk now rather than discover later that we didn't talk nearly enough. Hope that helps you. I'm sure the book Ofa may cause some of these conversations to arise as well. Let's open our Bibles. It's Jose seven where we start this week. It is Monday and we're reading Isaiah seven verses eight to 16. Basically the back half of the chapter that we began on Friday. And this is that section where Israel is trusting another nations instead of trusting in God. And this baking imagery continues here. That is exactly where Hosea is. In fact, there's a ton of imagery. Question four is about figures of speech and metaphors, and there's so much of that in this particular section. Efrim is mixing verse eight, that's the flower water cake mix kind of thing going on. It's a EFMs, a cake not turned. Uh, that's the idea of half baked and maybe inattentive leaders aren't paying attention. And so the cake is burning on one side and it's still doughy on the other. Remember Efrim, I should have said this right away. Efrim is the largest tribe in the northern 10 tribes. And so comes to dominate and just be a synonym for all of Israel. Verse nine then, is that man who thinks he still thinks that he's in his prime? Oh, I've got it. I'm, I'm still young and and powerful and veil and and and he doesn't even know that he's weak and he's got some gray hair going on there. Well, verse nine is hurting on me there a little bit. But you know the guy that acts that way, that's efram. They don't know where they are, they don't know how bad it really is. And then look at verse 10 once again, pride rears its ugly head. We saw that in chapter five and verse five got a question. Q eight is about pride. Pride here is blocking everything. And so the text moves along. Verse 12 kind some difficulty with the translation there, not entirely certain about that. The text literally reads, I will discipline them according to the report, to their assembly. And that might be a report about these foreign powers they're trying to make an alliance with trying to get involved with. And then in verse 13, we see that they speak lies against God. They say things that are false. There's this worship system where they've chucked the worship of God and the worship of bail in a bucket. Give it a big stir and just pour out whatever they want. A little bit of God, a little bit of bail. We're doing what we want. You get that in verse 14, they gash themselves. You know that's how you cry to bale. Remember the prophets and the contest on Mount Carmel? They cut themselves to try to get bail's attention and get the God to answer them. This is not how you pray to the Lord and whether or not you have the name of bale here in the text, God knows what they're doing and God is angry. But I think there's a sense here that God is hurt. Finally from verse 14. They do not cry to me from the heart. That's the opening of verse 14. Remember in chapter six, which is part of chapter Seven's message where they say, Hey, we wanna return to the Lord verse one and he'll revive us. Verse two, we we wanna press on and know the Lord. Verse three. And then God says, I don't know what to do with you. People we're like, well, they're repenting, aren't they? Look at verse 14. They don't cry to me from the heart. It's fake repentance. Fake repentance. They are trusting not in God, but in their own devices, their own manmade religion and particularly in the political alliances that they can make more on this. Tomorrow as we journey into Jose the eighth chapter, it is Tuesday and today we begin, Jose at the eighth chapter, Isaiah eight verses one to six is our reading for today. Lots of good things for us to think through and good fodder for us to consider as we get ready for tonight's zoom prayer and Bible study. Good opportunity there for us to think about the text and to see what other people are saying and thinking about this text. It begins then maybe, maybe I should say this before I begin in eight one, it begins here with some language about setting the trumpet to your lips. And this may in fact go with chapter nine. Chapter nine has some material that sounds like a harvest festival. And so here we're sounding the trumpet. This may all go together. This is a time when everybody's celebrating the harvest. But look, there's a vulture overhead. That's not good. That's not good. Anytime I'm out hunting out in west Texas or maybe up in Kansas and you see that vulture in the distance sky circling something is dead or something is a is about to die. No good thing underneath vulture. So look up Israel, look up and see something terrible has happened here, but they say, oh, we know you God. Verse two. But it's a false cry. They don't really know God. Notice what they've spurned here. They've transgressed the covenant. Verse eight ver verse one of chapter eight. They've rebelled against the law. Verse one, and then they have spurned the good. Verse three, those three things, covenant law and the good all mark out of people who are far from God. Indeed, once again, we get the idea in verse four about these alliances and this political machinations going on. They make kings, but it's, it's not kings that God appoints not through me. They set up these princes and then they make idols. Everything is going astray. I don't have anything to do with your false worship. Verse five. And you get the anger of God here. You get the anger of God in verse five. I think it's important to see how long suffering God is, but to see that God's long suffering nature does not last forever. We've got worship here that's not of God. Verse six. Those idols are gonna be broken into pieces. Think through that. Work with some of those questions. Hope to see you tonight on the zoom call and then we'll continue tomorrow on Wednesday to read in Jose chapter eight. It is Wednesday. Let me get a big slug of coffee here. As we start the Daya eight versus seven to 14, we complete the eighth chapter. Ofa, get ready, buckle up. There's a big surprise at the top of our reading. Jose eight verse seven says, they sow the wind and they shall reap the whirlwind. Please notice this is not, this is not you reap what you sow. No, you're going to sow and reap a whole lot more than you sow. You sow evil in sin and you're gonna reap catastrophe and disaster much more than you expected. And the whole idea then becomes, everything that Israel does will just be vanity. It won't work, it's going to fail. God's going to defeat it. And they keep seeking for political alliances. Verse nine. They go up to a Syria wandering alone, they hire allies. Verse 10, always looking for someone to bail them out, but not the Lord. This going for alliances, particularly with Syria, is absolute folly. It reminds me of some of these nations that the Soviet Union dominated after World War ii. They'd go rolling into various ones of those Eastern European countries and say, we're liberating these people or saving these people from the Nazis. Well maybe they drove the Nazis out, but then they just replaced the totalitarian state that the Nazis had been running with their very own. How much help was that? Well, great. The Nazis are gone now. The Soviet Union is here. And when you go to asy for help, asy be glad to show up and help you. But now you're under the boot of asy and they were cruel and ruthless people. Verse 11 is difficult in the translation. I think the idea here is you've set up all kinds of altars for sin offerings, but those altars are sinful or have become an occasion of sin. So the people continue to go through the motions and do religious stuff, but it doesn't amount to anything. In fact, it's just making things worse. And even if God were to give laws by the thousands, verse 12, they wouldn't listen cuz they're not listening to God. They don't care about God. As a result, judgment is going to come. There's a word here about Judah's multiplied for multiplied fortified. Try saying that three times real fast, multiplied fortified cities. And those are the cities that sakib the king of Syria will come up against when Hezeki is the king over Judah. And there's archeological records of those invasions and that he took all of those cities except for Jerusalem. And when we read in Second Kings 18, we'll read about why Sakib could not take all of those cities. See you tomorrow will be in Jose nine on Thursday. It is Thursday and we're reading Jose nine, one to nine. This begins a section where there are many images of judgment and total destruction. It's a tough section to read in many places. Please be mindful here that in the discussion of ephrem returning to Egypt 93, and by the way, we saw that yesterday in eight 13, Egypt here doesn't always have to be Egypt. Egypt, this can be a metaphor, a figure of speech for going away in, not necessarily going to Egypt proper. Although when the Babylonians come to Judah, some people do go, they flee to Egypt. That's in Jeremiah chapter 44. But here the problem for Israel, the kingdom of the North is going to be asy. They're not going to Egypt, they are going to as Syria. And as I said the other day, as we begin chapter eight, this seems to be a threshing floor celebration. As we open chapter nine, there seems to be some material here about the time of the harvest. And this would be a time of rejoicing, but says, stop with the rejoicing. There's no place for joy here because we're not right with God. And as a result, there's gonna be destruction in cataclysm will not remain in the land. Verse three, we're not gonna be able to worship God. There'll be unclean food. Verse three says in assy. And so if you don't have properly prepared food to eat, you can't have a proper sacrifice to offer either. So what do you do? Then? You're in a foreign land and you can't even make sacrifices to God. Think about that far from God, don't know how to get home. You're going away. Verse six, to destruction. Verse seven may represent what people are saying, abouta, that prophet is a fool. The man of the spirit is mad. He's evil, he hates us. And then God says that prophet verse eight is my watchman. That may be where that's working out in verses seven and eight. They have deeply corrupted themselves. Verse nine days of gibe would refer to the terrible events of judges 19, where there's horrible immorality and it's just an awful scene. The tribe of Benjamin nearly is exterminated because they stand up for the evil doers in their midst. The rest of Israel goes to war with them. What an awful memory that is. It's gonna be like the days of gibe. He will remember their iniquity. He will punish their sins. We complete chapter nine tomorrow. See you on Friday. Hello Friday. We made it through another week and we are going to finish Jose, the ninth chapter by reading verses 10 to 17 today starts with a wonderful metaphor. Verse 10, like grapes in the wilderness, I found Israel be a big surprise to be out in the middle of the desert and the wilderness and there are grapes that would just be wonderful. And so Israel was found like that, a wonderful surprise. But quickly they turn into a complete disaster. They came to bail pure. Verse 10 says, that's the reference to all the idolatry and sexual immorality that's recorded in numbers. The 25th chapter, the incident with with uh, FEA has and with the people there getting involved in all kinds of sin. So they consecrated themselves to the thing of shame and became detestable like the thing they loved. Notice here's another passage that says we become like what we worship. Psalm 1 15 8 announces that. But here, same idea. They became detestable like the thing they loved. And then there's lots of discussion now about fertility and children and some of this is a little tough to read, but they, the point here, it's important that we get this, is that bail promised fertility. That's what bail was all about. He's the rain God and all of that temple prostitution, all of that contributed to the idea that bail brings the land back to life in the spring. It dies down in the winter. And then we enact all of these fertility rights and once again, our farms will grow crops. Well, you're not going to be fertile. Verse 11, no birth, no pregnancy, no conception. Even if you had children, those children will be taken away into captivity. In fact, verse 14 is an astonishing prayer. Some see that as an intercessory prayer. It would be better for them not to have children than for them to be born and face the horrors to come with an Assyrian captivity. Gil Gal is mentioned then in verse 15, and that is a celebrated spot. Joshua, the fifth chapter tells us that's where they celebrated the first Passover when they came into the land, when they were first taking the land of Canaan. But it's not celebrated anymore. Now it's the center of idolatry in wickedness. If you remember in Amos we read Ammos four four where very sarcastically the prophet says, come on down to Gil Gall and let's send some more. That's the attitude of the people. Gilgal has become a place of terrible iniquity. And so all of this is just emblematic. Ere is stricken. Verse 16, their root is dried up bare, no, no fruit. You're serving the God of fertility and that's not gonna work. Completely dried up. No fruit at all going to be rejected, haven't listened to God going to be a wanderer among the nations. What a powerful phrase that is, particularly given that we know those 10 tribes go into captivity. They intermarry with other nations that have been brought into captivity. And those 10 tribes disappear. They wander among the nations. They don't maintain their identity and they never come home. So there's our Bible reading for the week in the book Ofa. This was, this was kind of a tough week in Hosea, but I just think this is a message that we need today to balance out and make certain that we have a complete view of God, not not thinking God is your grandpa, and that he never is gonna discipline us for doing wrong. God doesn't really care what we do and we can get away with anything He's not really watching. OHA helps us see that God loves his people, cares about his people. His heart breaks when his people do wrong because we're in covenant relationship with him, but God won't tolerate our sins. That's a message that people need. That's a message I need and I hope that you're getting that from the book of Jose. So thanks for listening. If you love the Monday Morning Coffee podcast, we certainly would like for you to follow or subscribe, rate and give a review on whatever app you're listening on that does help people find the show and that'll help them in their Bible reading. Tell somebody about it, that that can be a powerful thing when someone says, Hey, let's read the Bible together and hears something to listen to every day. That'll help you get what you need to get out of the word of God. So until next week, may your coffee be delightful. May your Friday be wonderful and may the Lord be with you today all day. I'll see you on Monday with a cup of coffee.

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