God

The inciting incident.

So they both bring offerings to God.

Cain brings crops and Abel brings portions from the firstborn of his flock.

And the notes point out that God favored Abel's offering but rejected Cain's.

which at first glance feels totally arbitrary, right?

Yeah, it really does.

it's that visceral reaction you get when you see a peer get public recognition over you.

Okay, let's unpack this.

But like, do you see results as far as that goes with your...

Oh my God, absolutely.

I would say that that's the main thing.

I think that that's also a selling point where I don't perceive, rather, even if, okay, the only way this is, like, if there's an acute injury where you take, like, a knife wound or, you know, you drink bleach or something, but any other sort of illness is going to be spawned from...

So I think a really important factor in that too is having, if you're doing any sort of like... channeling or healing understanding the level what what your team actually is and understanding the sovereignty and really doing audits on your team understanding um that you don't really need all these you don't need something outside of yourself you're the the your god really you know you are as The real you.

Yeah, the real you, the real you, not the heart-centered you.

That's God right there.

That's your conduit, and that's the one with everything sort of system.

And we're going to be looking at Leviticus chapter 26, verses 40 through 42, as we look at the power of repentance.

So would you join me right now as we set our hearts toward the Lord's instruction through prayer? Our God, it's our desire to understand your word and understand this issue of repentance.

Show us what it truly looks like and how it comes about in our hearts.

We ask in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Okay, we are in the book of Leviticus studying God's instruction to his people Israel.

And back in the old covenant day, God was busy setting up a new society, a new group of people who are going to live differently from all the rest of the nations.

At least that was God's intention.

And most times, like, I'm going to do something about that.

I'm going to right this wrong, right? And it's part of us as made in the image of God, your DNA of who you are has got people made from the things of God to see right and wrong and to do something about it.

But here's the catch.

We're so limited in our capacity to enact justice in its purest form, are we not? Most of us, if we sit in a car with no air con for 15 minutes, our sense of judgment and control over the world starts to go askew.

You might have the freedom to buy takeout whenever you like.

She didn't like my response.

The justice of God... is like that but a little bit different, is it not? If you've been going through this series on Revelation, chapter 4 is this throne room scene where you have this throne and the Lamb of God, the slain Lamb, which is Jesus, is sitting there.

And the throne is an image of pure justice and judgment done as it should be done.

Round foods are eaten after a funeral, and the reason is so that we remember that life comes and goes.

Everything that God has created is round, if you notice.

To always remind us that things come and go, come and go.

Life begins and life ends.

Oh, here we go.

The birthright gave Yaakov the future privilege to serve in the holy temple.

Esau didn't behave appropriately to serve in God's temple.

He hunted and killed and didn't have respect for life.

From there he went up to Beersheba.

And the Lord appeared to him on that night and said, I am the God of Abraham your father.

Fear not, for I am with you and will bless you and multiply your offspring for the sake of Abraham my servant.

So he built an altar there and called upon the name of the Lord and pitched his tent there.

I have done as you told me.

Please rise and eat of my game, so that your soul may bless me.

And Isaac said to his son, How is it that you have found it so quickly, my son? And he answered, Because Hashem your God made it happen for me.

Then Isaac said to Jacob, Please come near, so that I may feel you, my son, to know whether you are really my son Esau or not.

We're watching the ultimate judgment of evil and sin in the world.

We are watching the ultimate justice of God.

The whole world is moving toward a global event ordained by God, which will bring about the end of time as we know it.

Jesus said, I'm the Alpha and the Omega.

I'm the first and the last.

When the Lamb opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven for about half an hour.

I'm sure you're asking, even if you haven't read the passage and you know about the silence between the sixth and the seventh, and you're probably asking, why is there silence in heaven? Well, John doesn't tell us why, but there's some possibilities.

One possibility is that it could be God's way of granting humanity one last chance for the doors of mercy to be opened before it is shut and the judgment becomes final.

I pass this plan along to our four children, and on occasion to different ones of our ten grandchildren, as well as to those men and women who are preparing their lives for ministry to others.

Or who doesn't want to know how to live a life marked by security and fulfillment, free of envy, free of competition with others, finding acceptance and satisfaction in one's own life as God has made us? This simple plan has only three parts.

And they will sound so easy, you'd think they would come naturally, but they do not.

They are learned truths that must be cultivated.

To begin with, we need to know who we are.

To understand that we have been made uniquely by a God who took care to build within us qualities that made us unique.

Just as we all have our own DNA, we all have our own qualities, characteristics, intuitions, voice inflections, mental attitude, personality, that makes us who we are.

But you don't automatically know that when you're born or even when you're growing up.

Yeah, the caddy.

Oh, my God.

Okay, okay.

So go ahead.

All

right.

Thank God you brought up messy food.

Give it to me straight, man.