Sermon by Dr.Wayne Sedlak is entitled: Bearing Fruit...Bringing Forth More Fruit, Based on John 15:1-27 Grace of God's Holy Law: Zechariah 4:1-14; Hebrews 11:1-10. Refresh your understanding of Acts 23 as it will be referenced. Zechariah is awakened from his sleep and is confronted with images of a candlestick and olive branches. As he stares on at the images and does not know what they mean. Similarly, the Church being asleep is being awakened and is confronted with the reality that is in front of her. And she does not understand. In this sermon Dr. Reverend Sedlak instructs us on what Zerubbabel was confronted with, which was hatred and division, to what we are confronted with and how the Lord commanded Zerubbabel to "Not despise the day of small things." In the midst of all the confusion, the Church is commanded to bring the Altar forward, as worship of the Lord is paramount, and the principal founding element of the Christian life; as testified by Abraham in his quest through the land of Canaan. The Culture War is about the hearts of a people. The Psalmist points out in Psalm 60, that when your heart is right that God raises up a protection, as the Psalmist says "Now I know the Lord saves His anointed." In contrast sinful hearts have an agenda: control someones resources to their benefit. God sends us into the world so that they may see the goodness of Jesus in all aspects of life. God gave His Son a people, the Church that is called to deal with the Culture War: with your heart.

Grace of Gods Law Reading: II Chronicles 34; I Peter 4: 11-19 (Reference Acts 23) Sermon Scripture Text: II Chronicles 6: 40 - 7: 1 - 22: Solomon and The Dedication of the Temple. Of Note: The Fire from Heaven to Consume the Sacrifice....

The History of the Great Commission shows that the greatest advances in the history of the Church take place when the Church understands its “toolbox” – the Law of the Lord. God made it clear to Israel repeatedly that to impugn or ignore His Law, was to walk away from Him. So is it written in Judges 3, where Israel is revealed as being “tested” by the Lord by the lifestyle, customs, beliefs and behavior of the nations God left in Palestine when Israel conquered the land. Christ’s admonition in Matthew 5 calls us to be a light to the world. Immediately after that verse 16, Christ, instead of developing the theme of being a light, warns us strictly NOT to believe He came to destroy the Law and the prophets (vs. 17). He came to “fulfill” them. The term Christ uses is πληρόω, “play-ro'-o” in the Greek. Its proper use means “mature.” And Christ teaches us that such maturity begets supernatural impact and awe-inspiring change when the Church teaches and preaches it and the people live it! The tragedy of our impotence in the Church for so long lies in the way our teachers and pastors have been teaching us that “fulfill” means “when Christ arrived, the Law came to an end.” Thus, in essence, the Law becomes, at best, a museum piece …. or …. a mere quote book. It gets marginalized by the pulpits until its precepts are simply not known to most in the pews. That is the tragedy. The Law of the Lord (Pentateuch) is foundational to the rest of the Bible. Without it, the Great Commission is damaged and the Church wanders from her moorings. Satan knows that and seeks to blind us concerning the Law, keeping the Church from the understanding of its miraculous and pregnant content (Psalm 119: 18 ff.) God is judging the world. But Peter tells us that when He does so, He first goes to the Church in judgment: “For judgment begins in the house of God…” We desperately need to understand this truth, for the Lord will NOT lift His wrath and judgment UNTIL we repent and adopt the Law of the Lord… and move forward to mature it.

All throughout history, government has been one of the least examined issues by the Church of Christ. It is simply presumed that because God is sovereign over “governments” (cf. Romans 13:1), He has taken that issue on Himself and left us to merely “obey” government edicts as if “from God.” However, governments throughout the history of the world have been dominantly “pagan” and have consistently been responsible for untold suffering. To make matters worse, such suffering has been the direct result of disobedience to God’s “Civil Laws.” God tells us there is a Fellowship with rulers of all the earth with which he is concerned. Repeatedly, they violate that Fellowship. “Shall the Throne of iniquity have fellowship with Thee, those that frame perversity with a law?” - Psalm 94:20 Both Psalms and Hosea 8 challenge the pulpits of today by declaring that God did not choose wicked rulers in the sense of any call to obedience to them. Yes, God is Sovereign over the nations just as He is Sovereign over wicked men. But that does not mean in either case “Sovereign” call to honor and obedience of same. Impenitent evil is never justified and got abhors the wicked (cf. Psalm 11). The law the Lord is divided into three branches: 1) The Moral law of the Lord guides us in our walk, both personally and as societies. 2) The Ceremonial law of Israel thereby instructed us in the major Doctrines of our faith, including such doctrines as Atonement, Sin, Redemption, Justification, The high priesthood of Jesus Christ, the Fall of man, etc. 3) Civil Laws of the Lord teach governments principles guiding their framework, rules of evidence, and application of “just” principles of jurisprudence and law.. Many of those Civil Laws of the Lord provided the explicit framing for a constitutional history, a fact little-known to theologians lawyers and people in the pews. Principles include three branches of government – Executive, judicial, legislative (cf. Isaiah 33:22), formation of national and tribal legislative assemblies (bicameral structure), appellate jurisdiction, constitutional (derived) authority, local government, qualifications of rulers and judges, to name a few. 1 Samuel 8 provides us with the failure of idolatrous Israel, a failure reflected in an inability to mature the principles of constitutional government. As the prophets repeatedly charge Israel with idolatry, so Israel repeatedly demonstrated an incapacity to rule itself in a godly, upright and safe manner, with Jesus Christ as the King over all nations (cf. Psalm 2). 1 Samuel 8 explains the principles dominating the disobedience of all idolatrous nations. Such nations have invariably tended toward “conquest” and not peace and safety, much less any honor toward the Lord. Church of Christ needs to begin to teach God’s Civil Laws in-depth so that magistrates and people BOTH may understand HOW justice is to reign to the glory of God and the peace of society (cf. 1 Timothy 2:1 – 6). Until the Church learns a lesson taught us in the book of Acts in the person of the apostle Paul, governments will continue to march toward conquest, bloodshed, wars, famine, and evil under Satan’s authority (cf. Ephesians 6). That lesson? The Church needs to take the principles of the Civil Laws of God and “institutionalize” the principles of justice as in part once understood in early America, England, Scotland and other historical episodes (though none matured consistently). It is foretold of the ministers of Jesus Christ throughout Scripture, there will be a day in which such ministers will teach the Civil Laws of the Lord worldwide. Until that day, God will continue to “break” fellowship with governments of the earth, and judge them until they repent or are uprooted (cf. Psalm 2; 149). 6000 years is simply too long a period of injustice. God is calling us, worldwide, to repent of our presumptuousness concerning the gift of government… abused.

Our Message by Dr. Wayne Sedlak is entitled Biblical Under-Girding: Plague... Quarantine... Famine. Join us live at 11:35. The biblical doctrine of plague and its consequence, quarantine is, like so many other areas contained in the Law of the Lord, is underdeveloped by commentators, pastors, and theologians. One of the reasons for this reluctance to deal with these two issues (plague, quarantine) is that it is presumed the word of God is primitive – not medically and scientifically up-to-date – so as to be trusted with the subject. Tragically, it is the churches themselves that have helped foster that view. This is simply an area in which a person could have lived his entire life, never having heard even one sermon upon the subject! When one studies this subject, there are quite a few surprises the Holy Spirit has interwoven throughout the subject’s theme (plague) as it is pursued in the Word of the Lord. Though the dual-subjects of plague and quarantine are heavily stressed in dealing with the disease group called “Leprosy” (Lev. 13), elsewhere the overall practice involved with plague and quarantine is invariably concerned with something considered by the word of God to be a sign of God’s consuming anger… …famine. Famine is repeatedly addressed in Scripture. When a nation is plagued – and that can be any one of a number of dangerous calamities – famine is the ONE consequence to such plagues about which the Church is to be most concerned. And it is famine the church must be equipped to handle, and to help our neighbors understand as well. “Plague” is used as a term likened unto an invading army and incorporates all kinds of overwhelming calamities engulfing a nation, including, of course, pestilence and disease. So what is the biblical response? More importantly, what is it that the Lord is making us to understand concerning as Will?