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Hello and welcome to the Westside Church's special podcast. Good evening to you. If you've got your New Testament with you tonight, be opening up to Luke chapter 8. Luke chapter 8, that is where we're going to find a beginning place for our study together this evening in just a few moments. Luke chapter 8. Thank you so much. Those of you here at Westside, for the invitation to come and to be with you. I have been looking forward to it ever since Mark called and invited me. I'm thankful to be here. Thank you for treating my family. Thank you for treating me so royally up to this point. Hopefully you can still treat me royally when we're finished tonight. And if you can't, just smile and wave when we're on our merry way. It will be good. Thank you so much for the opportunity to be here. Thank you for your presence, for your interest in spiritual things. As Brother Roberts made mention, our theme for our study together is what's in your backpack. Things that we want to make sure that we have to prepare us for the journey that is in front of us. I searched throughout Google long and hard, and I think I found the exact backpack I had through my high school years. They don't make them like this anymore. Since I got out, this thing kept me from my sophomore year in high school all the way through college. It was a great backpack. Since then, I've had about five or six. They tear, they fall apart. They're not as good, they're not as robust as they used to be. But we're not talking about the actual backpack. We're, of course, talking about what is in our backpacks. When I was in high school, there were two things that featured very prominently in my backpack. Those of you who are 80s kids may realize this. Number one were Starburst hard candies. These were in my backpack, and these kept me alert and awake all throughout those boring biology classes. They don't make them anymore. You can't find them. It was Starburst hard candies... And it was trident gum. Can't find that anymore either, can you? They were going to feed us all that food in the cafeteria and not let us have gum to make our breath smell better afterwards. How rude was that? These are two things that absolutely were in my backpack, but as it relates to spiritual matters, really doesn't impact us. But I want to talk to you tonight about one thing that I think should be in your backpack. That's in my backpack. It's actually in my backpack right now. But I think it's important for us to keep in our spiritual backpacks, if you will, to an even greater degree. And that is noise-canceling headphones. And you saw that in the book, and you were like, what in the world are we going to talk about? Let's see if we can make something practical out of this. As I have gotten older, I have found myself on airplanes and jets more often than I ever thought I would be in my life. And about two years ago... Amazon had a sale and I purchased a pair of noise-canceling headphones. And on my very next trip, I sat down in an airplane, I put them in, and nothing changed. And I was really disappointed. I was like, I've been sold a bill of goods. This isn't what I signed up for. And then I realized you've got to go on your phone and you've got to get that setting clicked on. And I clicked that setting on and there was quiet. It shut out the noise of the engine. It shut out all of the chatter around the plane. It shut out the noise of that person sitting about two seats away from me that feels the need to watch their video on their iPad at full volume and without any headphones on. Shut all of that out. It was quiet. It was peaceful. I was able to sync it up to my iPad and listen to what I wanted to listen to, watch what I wanted to watch, and the only thing that disturbed me was exactly what I wanted to disturb me. Jesus talks about a principle related to noise-canceling headphones. First time we've seen him talk about it is here in Luke chapter 8. Luke chapter 8, as you're looking down here in verse 18, Jesus, after giving the parable of the soils, says, so take care, verse 18, so take care how you listen. For whoever has to him more shall be given, but whoever does not have, even what he thinks he has, shall be taken away from him. So be careful, Jesus says in verse 18, how you listen. But Mark, over in Mark chapter 4, seems to record the same conversation. Except as he often does, he throws in a little bit of a twist. He catches something, he focuses on something that Jesus said that Luke didn't record. And it's not, well Luke said Jesus said this and Mark said Jesus said this, so one of them is wrong. I walk away with the understanding Jesus said both of these things. And Luke recorded one because that's what he was focusing on and Mark recorded one because that's what he was focusing on. In Luke's account, we're to take care how we listen. But in Mark chapter 4 and in verse 24, Mark records the words of Jesus like this after the parable of the sowers. He was also saying to them, take care what you listen to. Jesus isn't only concerned with you and me being good listeners. Jesus is concerned about what you and I listen to. What we give our time and energy and attention to. Jesus is concerned about, and this seems to be expressed across all translations, take care of what you listen to. The La Biblia de las Americas is going to say the same thing. The New English translation, the same thing. Take care about what you hear. Jesus is concerned about the content that we take in. Even in the spiritual setting, we need to be careful what we're listening to. Noise-canceling headphones keep out what we don't want to hear. They keep out what we don't need to hear. I'm on that airplane. I don't need to hear the turbine spinning to you. I'm going to have faith that they're spinning. We're up in the air. I don't need to hear it. Sometimes I'm getting somewhere and I need to sleep on that plane. You ever been there? It shuts out what I don't need. And it allows me to focus on what I do need. And as Jesus describes here in Mark chapter 4, there's a spiritual principle in that that we need to sink our teeth into. Jesus is going to describe some things we need to hear. And He's going to describe to us here that there are just some things that are noise. Noise. that we don't need to focus on, that we don't need to pay attention to, that we don't need to sit and invite into our lives. Because it's going to rob us of peace, of quiet, and of confidence. And if you're familiar with your Bible, you recognize this, don't you? We see moments all throughout Scripture where some noise-canceling headphones would have been good. You remember all the way back in the book of Genesis? Yes. Way back in the book of Genesis, what did the serpent, what did Satan say to Eve? You will not surely die. Did Eve need to hear that? Did she need to have that conversation with the serpent? Isn't what God had already revealed to them, seemingly what Adam had already communicated to her, wasn't that sufficient for her and her needs? She didn't need this other noise, and that's exactly what it was. Noise.

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Noise.

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And it robbed them of peace, of quiet, of confidence. In John chapter 10, Jesus describes the character of his followers. He says, all who came before me were robbers and thieves, but my sheep, my sheep don't hear them. There's our principle of noise-canceling headphones, right? But I want you to look at this passage with me. Look at 1 John chapter 4. 1 John chapter 4. Because we get something here in 1 John chapter 4 that we need to dig down on. When John writes and he talks about the noise of this world and that there are just simply some messages that we need to filter out. That we don't need to hear. That we don't need to invite into our lives. Look at 1 John chapter 4 and come down to verse 5. They are from the world. Therefore they speak as from the world. And what does the world do? The world listens to them. What does the world do? Listens to the world. But all throughout the book of 1 John, you and I are called to be what? Not like the world. We're not to share in the world. We're not to partake of the world. We're to be separate from the world. We're to walk in the light. So verse 6, we are from God. We're not from the world. Catch the juxtaposition there. The world listens to itself, but we are from God. And he who knows God listens to us. He who is not from God does not listen to us by this. We know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error. The world listens to them. But we're not the world. I'm not saying anything surprising to you tonight when I say that we live in the midst of a raging battle. Satan, through his influence in this world, is seeking to drag us down, to ruin us by overwhelming us with the messages of this world. And to a large group around us, that message resonates. The world hears that message, buys into that message, lives that message, embraces that message. The world listens, John says. John contrasts the world listening to his own message and the message of the apostles. A message to which the people of God listen. John's telling us here very clearly there are some things we need to hear. And there are some things that we don't need to hear. And that's not to say that there's not value in studying and understanding things that are wrong. There's a time and a place for that and I want us to understand that. But if we're talking about our formative years... What we need to be focused on is knowing the truth and knowing God's Word and hearing what He wants from me. So let's think about that. Let's think about how the world tries to influence us. And let's think about how there are simply some messages from the world around us that we don't need to hear. And I want us to do that by looking at the lives of four young men that we see in the Old Testament. I want you to come on in your Old Testaments to 2 Kings chapter 20. 2 Kings chapter 20. In 2 Kings chapter 20... The northern kingdom of Israel has already been taken captive. We've got the southern kingdom, Judah. That is being focused on here. A man by the name of Hezekiah is on the throne. Hezekiah's life earlier in chapter 20 has been divinely extended by God for some 15 years. What a blessing that seems like. We'll talk about that in just a moment. But beginning in verse 12, there is an envoy from Babylon that comes to see Hezekiah. And there's a lot going on here beginning at verse 12 and going through the end of this passage. A lot more than what we're going to have time to talk about this evening. They come to him and he shows them, he shows these Babylonian envoy, he shows them all of the treasure, this is verse 13, all of the treasure in his house, the silver, the gold, the spices, the precious oil, the house of armor, all that was found in his treasuries. Why is God going to be upset? Because, spoiler alert, God is going to be upset that Hezekiah does this. Why is God upset that Hezekiah does this? Is it because Hezekiah should have shown them something more and something of infinitely more value than the gold and the silver? Perhaps that's it. I don't think we should gloss over the reality that years after this, the very things that Hezekiah shows to the Babylonian envoy are the very things that they're going to take away and take to Babylon, stripping the temple and the nation bare. But Hezekiah sins, and so we come down here to 2 Kings chapter 20 and verse 16. Isaiah said to Hezekiah, hear the word of the Lord. Behold, the days are coming when all that is in your house and all that your fathers have laid up in store to this day will be carried to Babylon and nothing shall be left, says the Lord. Trouble was coming to Judah. Hezekiah's life, you remember, was extended 15 years. That's the first part there. That seems like a wonderful thing. But look at chapter 21. Hezekiah dies at the end of the chapter. Manasseh, verse 21, becomes king in his place. Verse 21, how old is Manasseh when he ascends to the throne? Manasseh Hezekiah's son ascends to the throne at 12 years old. Because of that 15-year extension on Hezekiah's life, it gives him time to bring Manasseh into the world. And where Hezekiah sinned, Manasseh sins even more. He institutes... back into the nation that Hezekiah had worked to drive out. He even, verse 6, he made his sons pass through the fire, practiced witchcraft and used divination and dealt with mediums and spiritists. He did much evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking him to anger. That statement there in verse 6, made his sons pass through the fire. Here is a Judean king who is so far gone, he's practicing child sacrifice. Skip over to chapter 24. The sins of Manasseh are so evil, so wicked, and so very multiplied that as you come to chapter 24 and verse 3, Nebuchadnezzar comes for the first of three times against the nation of Judah and the city of Jerusalem. And he does all of this, 2 Kings chapter 24 and verse 3, because of the sins of Manasseh. Those sins had been present in Judah. Those sins had not been addressed. They had grown worse and worse. Because of that sin, God was taking Judah out of His sight, committing them over to Babylonian captivity for 70 years to purge that sin out of them and to renew His people. But judgment was coming. And it was coming because of Manasseh's sin. Three times we said Nebuchadnezzar is going to come here against Judah and Jerusalem. And as he comes against them this first time, You will notice 2 Kings chapter 24 and verse 1, Jehoiakim is the king. Now flip a little bit later in your Old Testaments. Come over to the book of Daniel. Look at Daniel chapter 1. Because as Nebuchadnezzar comes in this first incursion against Judah and Jerusalem, it's going to happen, Daniel chapter 1 and verse 1, during the reign of Jehoiakim. Same thing as 2 Kings 24. And the major thing that's going to happen along with treasure being captured is that some of the nobility is going to be deported from Jerusalem to Babylon. And seemingly amongst this group is going to be four young men You come down here to verse 3 of the book of Daniel. The king ordered Ashpenaz, the chief of his eunuchs, to bring some of the sons of Israel, including some of the royal family and of the nobles, youths in whom there was no defect, who were good looking, showing intelligence in every branch of wisdom, endowed with understanding and discerning knowledge, and who had ability for serving in the king's court. And he ordered him to teach them the literature and the language of the Chaldeans. Verse 6, among them From the sons of Judah were Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah. Unfortunately, you and I are going to know them today as Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. And I don't mean to cast dispersions on the songs that we learned as young people in our Bible classes. Those are good and helpful. But it's not Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. It's Hananiah, it's Mishael, and it's Azariah. And I think that's important. Let's notice what's going on here. These are four of the youths that are relocated from Judah to Babylon. And immediately as they arrive into Babylon, what we're going to call the re-education begins. These young men cannot come in and influence Babylon society. That's not how Babylon under Nebuchadnezzar is going to work. We're going to influence them. That's why we're bringing seemingly the best of the best into the court. We're going to influence you. And so look at what happens. Verse 5. The king appointed for them a daily ration from the king's choice food and from the wine which he drank, and appointed that they should be educated three years, at the end of which they were to enter the king's personal service. The Babylonians attempt to change these young men in seemingly every way possible. They start by changing their diet. or attempting, at least, to change their diet. While it doesn't seem much to us today that the dietary laws under which the Jews lived at this time most likely would have forbidden much of the food that was served up to Daniel and Hanani and Mishael and Azariah. You've got this change in diet followed, as you look there in verse 5, by a change of training. Right as we read through our Old Testaments, we're reminded of how much God emphasized... The home being the center of spiritual instruction. Deuteronomy 6 makes that so very clear to us. Now you've got three years of intensive training in the Babylonian captive to put you into service for the king of Babylon himself. A change in diet, a change in training. Look at Daniel chapter 1 and verse 6. In verse 7, it's no longer going to be Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah. It's going to be built to Shazar and Shadrach and Meshach and Abednego. These young men are renamed. One of the last most meaningful connections that they have to their family and to their culture and to the God that they serve. The Babylonians attempt to redefine. Daniel means God is my judge. Hananiah means Jehovah is gracious. Mishael means who is what God is. And Azariah means the Lord is my helper. And those names are changed. Daniel becomes Belteshazzar, the treasure of Baal. Hananiah becomes... And I just noticed that. That's really confusing because that's not Hannah. That's supposed to be Hananiah. I will discipline whoever proofread my charts. I can assure you it is not Hannah back at this time. It is Hananiah. The change in name. So we've got Daniel, we've got Hananiah. Hananiah, his name is changed to Shadrach, inspired by the sun god. Mishael turns into Meshach. He who belongs to Sheshach, one of the false gods of that time. And Azariah is turned into Abed-Nego, a servant of Nebo. Babylon takes the last vestiges of Judaism that these young men could cling to and changes it, tries to erase it. You're not that anymore, Babylon is trying to say. You are who we tell you you are. You are what we will make of you. But then look at verse 3. Change in diet, a change in training, a change in name, and a change in body. I'm reading from the New American Standard Bible for various reasons. They're going to translate Daniel chapter 1 and verse 3 to Ashpenaz, the chief of the officials. If you're reading from the King James or New King James, it's not officials, it's what? The chief of the eunuchs. Think about that. These young men are committed into the hand of the man who is identified as the chief of the eunuchs. Now hold your finger here. Hold your finger here in Daniel. I want you to go back to 2 Kings 20, where we were just a moment ago. 2 Kings 20, where we were talking about Hezekiah and the consequences that were to come from Hezekiah's sinfulness. 1 Kings 20... 2 Kings chapter 20. Pardon me. 2 Kings chapter 20. And look over here. Look over here at verse 18. After saying the things that you showed the Babylonians, they're going to be carried away. None of it's going to be left. Verse 18. Some of your sons who shall issue from you, Hezekiah's progeny, they will be taken away And they will become officials, New American Standard Bible, other translations. They will become what? They will become eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon. That they were entrusted to court service in Babylon is clearly what the text is revealing to us. But make no mistake, what is being described here is a physical alteration of young men. They mutilated these young men. They mutilated these young men for their own purposes. I remember being asked in a Bible class years ago one time, you know, if Daniel is so godly and God talks to us about the wisdom of marriage, why do we never read about Daniel being married or Daniel having kids? And it wasn't the appropriate venue at that time to go into that discussion, but I think you find an answer right here. Most likely Daniel doesn't get married and have children because he didn't have the capacity to father children. That as a teenager, the Babylonians took that away from him. And took that away from Hananiah and Mishael and Azariah. All so that they could influence them. But what did these four young men do? I'll tell you what they did. They muted the noise. They canceled that noise. Because they made their faith their own. That's what's described there in Daniel chapter 1 and verse 8, that Daniel purposed in his heart. How many sermons have we heard from that? And for good reason, you probably have it highlighted in your Bible. Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself with a portion of the king's delicacies that were presented before him. And apparently, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah arrived at the same conclusion as well. That, King, you have set this before us, but we can't do this. Yes, you've tried to change me. Yes, you've tried to alter me. Yes, you've tried to strip my identity away from me. But you can do all of this external stuff, but you cannot touch my heart. The only one who can give up my heart is me. And so they come before Ashpenaz and they say, Hey... We can't do this. Daniel had been brought into the good graces of Ashkenaz by his godly behavior. They proposed this different plan and it's accepted. At the end of the time, they appear better than all of the rest in the Babylonian court. And so we're going to adopt these guys' diet now. And Daniel and Hananiah and Mishael and Azariah are commended before the king and they move on to greater service in the kingdom of Babylon. But what I want us to see tonight is that they made their faith their own. How did they do that? And I'm going to submit to you that it started way before they ever get here in Babylon. That yeah, they are torn away from their family and their community as teenagers it seems. But parents and grandparents and loved ones, they had 16 years to influence these men. They had 17 years. They had 18 years. And whatever influence they gave, held. And it held in the face of everything that Babylon could throw at them. Those songs you sing in Bible class, that you wonder, does this really mean anything to those kids? The readings from the Bible that we may do at night when everyone seems to be so tired and it would be so easy not to do it. The times when we're going to go ahead and pray together at night, even though it's hard to hold our eyes open, does it do any good? Dragging them to church. Because, yeah, traffic is bad. and frustrating and nothing's convenient anymore? Does it do any good? Should we be here? Should we make the sacrifices? Look at what it did for these guys. Look at what they faced down and were empowered to overcome because of what had happened to them earlier. Because of the influence of their parents. The influence of their families. The influence of their communities. They resolved not to defile themselves. Just means they made a decision. Daniel made a decision. Daniel seems to lead the way here. Sometimes we need those kinds of leaders. Someone's got to step up and say, it's going to be me. Daniel steps up and says, I'll do it. I'll be the one to say, I can't do it. And it's interesting that as soon as he seemingly finds the strength to do that, there are others who are willing to say, I'm not going to do it either. We need people who are going to stand up and say, I'm going to do what's right. And don't be surprised when you make the decision to do what's right when you look around and you see other people making that same decision. Sometimes people just need that little spark of encouragement. Make those godly decisions. They were willing to trust God and to trust His will even though this ungodly food was set before them. Even though it might anger the king. They persist in doing what is right. And trust God even in the midst of hardship. And they never forgot who they were. Here's what I wanted to circle back to. Shadrach, Meshach, Abednego, the song we used to sing as kids. You ever read through the book of Daniel and realized this? They never once refer to each other by those names. You go read Daniel again sometime. Never once... Did Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah ever refer to each other as Belteshazzar, Shadrach, Meshach, or Abednego? They never do it. They could be renamed by the Babylonians. The Babylonians couldn't take that away from them. Who they really were. They knew who they were. Know who you are. Know who you are. And when you know who you are, you'll be able to mute the world. Because the world comes to us with a lot of things that are just noise. The world tries to convince you you're all alone. Don't you know Daniel felt alone? Don't you know he felt alone when I'm guessing some sort of pork is set in front of him? Maybe bacon-wrapped shrimp would be pretty tempting. That it's all set before him and it's things that he knows as they got you to do. He can't eat it. But it's so difficult. And I'm in a foreign land. My family's not here. I'm all alone. Can't I just give in? My parents aren't here anymore. I'm off at college. There's no one around. There's no one checking in on me. I can do this, right? I'm just all alone. It's so hard to stand when I'm all alone. The world tries to convince us we're all alone all the time. Yet I see an entire quarter of this auditorium filled with people that as you look around, you're not alone. One of the worst lies this world will ever try to convince you of is the fact that you are alone. Daniel was not alone. Hananiah was not alone. Mishael was not alone. Azariah was not alone. And you're not alone. They had each other. But more than that, they had God. The God who says, I will never leave you and I will never forsake you. Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah accepted that promise and they stood on that promise. And they get through this episode. They get through chapter 2. They get through chapter 3. We're going to get over to chapter 11 and 12. And Daniel seems to be about an 80 or a 90 year old man. And he is still faithfully serving God. Because of who he was when he was 15, 16, 17, 18 years old. We need to mute this world when the world tells us That your only reason for living is reproduction. Tyler, that's a strange thing to say. I saw you laugh too. It's a strange thing to say, right? But yet you look at one of the faces of new atheism, Richard Dawkins, and that's exactly what he says over and over again. We are machines for propagating DNA. It is every living object's sole reason for living. That you're just here to reproduce, to carry on your genes in one way or another. Folks, that's the meaning and the purpose the new atheist movement gives. But I want you to notice something. I want you to notice how that breaks down the very fabric of a respectable society. Notice how that renders as meaningless the lives of those who can no longer reproduce. Or who simply cannot reproduce. Notice how the new atheism, which invites us through reason and separation from theism to enjoy a greater and a higher and a more noble existence, actually delivers none of that. It offers no hope for the broken. For all of its bluster and promises, it delivers nothing. There's no racial reconciliation in the new atheism. There's no meaningful existence for the broken. There is no purpose for life in the new atheism. It is the jiggling and wiggling of atoms. And that's a quote. The new atheism speaks so much and delivers so very little. Mute that noise. And that's exactly what it is. It's noise. Mute it. Put on those headphones, put in those earbuds, and cancel it. Mute this world that provides no answers and no hope and no purpose. Mute the world when it says that you can't know God's will. We want to throw up our hands sometimes in frustration because we feel like we just don't understand what God wants from me. And perhaps it's because we have a little bit of a misunderstanding of God's will. Maybe we're expecting God to just dictate every little faceted decision we make in this life. What if I told you, yes, God is concerned with our lives, but that there are some decisions that are just opinion that need to be guided by good wisdom, but are neither right nor wrong. They're just decisions we need to make. But that what God is concerned about and what God does reveal to us is as well as what He reveals in Scripture. 2 Peter chapter 3 and verse 9. The Lord is not slack concerning His promises, as some men count slackness, but is longsuffering towards us, not willing. Here's the will of God. Not willing that any should perish, but what? But that all should come to repentance. That's the will of God. God wants us to be a repenter. 1 Thessalonians chapter 4 and verse 3. This is the will of God for your life, Paul writes. Your what? Your sanctification. Your holiness. That you abstain from sexual immorality. There's God's will for your life. To be sexually pure. Or Romans chapter 12, verses 1 and 2. That we're not to take the mold of this world. But we're to be transformed by the renewing of our lives that we might prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. That you and I, God's will for our lives, is that we would demonstrate His will by living in holiness, by living in purity, by living lives of sacrifice. We need to mute the world when it tells us we can't know the will of God and we need to mute the world When it tells us we can't serve God. Last passage and then we're done. Thank you so much for being with me tonight. For following along in your Bible. That's been an encouragement. Look at 1 Peter chapter 2. And let's wrap up here. 1 Peter chapter 2. The world sometimes tells us you can't serve God. You can't follow Jesus. Sadly we even hear that from our brethren sometimes. Leaving us with the idea that serving God is just a bridge too far. We can't do it. We can't follow Jesus. We can't serve Him. That we're all simply varying degrees of wicked, unable to break out of the bonds of sin and find liberty. Mute that noise. That is what it is, is noise. Because you can serve God. You can follow Jesus. You can please God. All of us in here can. By doing His will. Or as Peter will sum it up, by doing the very thing we're told we can't do, by following Jesus. 1 Peter 2, verse 21. For you have been called for this purpose. You have been called for this purpose. Since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example... That you should follow in His steps who committed no sin. You can do it. And I can do it. But one thing it's going to take to be able to follow Jesus, to please our God, to serve Him, is to mute the noise that is all around us. So pack those noise-canceling headphones. Pack those earbuds. Turn off the distractions in the world and focus on what is real. Focus on what is true. Focus on what is right. Thank you for your attention this evening. I appreciate it.