What is Sin?

In this GoToMeeting session, Mr. Michael Heiss discusses the topic of sin. He starts by explaining his journey of understanding sin and provides definitions from 1 John 3:4 and the King James Version. Michael emphasizes that sin is an action and a thought process. He then explores the concept of sin in James 1:13 and how it starts with the mind and leads to death. Mr Heiss highlights the need to overcome sin and master it with the help of God's spirit. He mentions scriptures from Romans 8:6 and Zechariah 4:6 that emphasize the importance of God's spirit in overcoming sin. Proverbs 4:23 and 2 Corinthians 10 are also discussed, stressing the need to guard the mind and thoughts to overcome sin. Michael also teaches us about the steps of sin by understanding these three words' meanings in the bible. Avon, Pesha, and Khata. Well, thank you, Steve. And good evening, everyone. Sabbath greetings and welcome to another edition of GoToMeeting. Yes, tonight we're going to be discussing the topic of sin. It's a big one. And as I was reviewing all my notes and papers, I figured, no, one evening isn't going to do it. So tonight we're going to have part one. And part one is going to consist largely of the background. We're going to set it up so that we can really go into examples next time, which, according to the schedule, is only in about two weeks. So you won't have to wait too long. Anyway, what is this thing we call sin? I first got involved in studying that when God began to call me out of Judaism to the Worldwide Church of God. And I was introduced to a good definition of it, which we can find in 1 John 3, 4. So if you'll turn there with me, we will read exactly what it says. And John had a pretty good take on it. He says in verse 4, everyone who practices sin is also practicing lawlessness, for sin is lawlessness. Now, that is a very good definition, because it really encompasses all that is sin. Now, if you look way down below, with kind of an asterisk there, we have the King James Version, which reads, whoever commits sin transgresses, transgresses, for the law is the transgression, I mean, sin is the transgression of the law. Now, that's not a bad definition. It's true, but it doesn't go far enough. See, it is incomplete, because it reduces sin to something we do. Now, it's true that we do it, but there's more to it than that. It's a whole thought process. And this is what the King James Bible doesn't show. Now, I can remember when I first got my first King James. I was, there I was, in the world of Judaism, God was calling me out. And what did I know? I was introduced to the plain truth, Ambassador College, and I soon realized, oh, I need a New Testament. Yeah, I gotta get one. But which one? How do I know? Well, the masters of the powers that be said, you've got to get a good Oxford-wide margin King James Version. I said, yes, sir. Yes, sir. That's what I'll do. And that's what led me to the King James. In fact, to show you how much I know, in high school one time, in my sophomore year, the instructor was talking about the Beatitudes. Now, I tried doing that in an English class today. It won't fly, but back then, it did. So anyway, he asked a question, who has never heard of the Beatitudes? I sheepishly raised my hand. Anyway, he looked at me and said, oh, well, I can understand why you haven't heard of them. So anyway, that was my introduction to it. Now, in order to really understand sin, though, we have to get the concept, and it's best expressed by James. So we'll turn over there to the general epistle of James. We'll look in chapter 1 and verse 13. And James says, do not let anyone who is tempted say, I am being tempted by God, because God is not tempted by evil. And he himself tempts no man with evil. But each one is tempted when he is drawn away and is enticed by his own lust. Now, we're going to see that one of the three Hebrew words that comprise sin is described right here. It starts with the mind, with the thinking. And James goes on to say, and after lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin. And sin, when it is completely finished, brings forth death. Well, Paul made that very clear in Romans chapter 6, verse 23. We won't go there, but he said, the wages of sin is death. So we find out that it's a process. You think. And we're going to see how one of the words talks about the thinking. The next word talks about, at some point you determine, yes, I'm going to do this. I'm going to go this way. You've determined it. And there's a third word that really does mean sin, the doing of the act. Those three. And you have to have all three, because if you don't have all three, we're not completely sinning. And every time we come up with sin, all three of those words are involved. That's the whole process. Well, here we are, and I'm asking myself, well, why do I have so much sin? Where's it coming from? Ultimately, I understood that it came from the adversary. But let's look what Paul teaches us in Romans chapter 6. Actually, it's verse 6, but it's chapter 8. Got ahead of myself there. We need to turn to the book of Romans chapter 8, and we come down to verse 6. For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is light and peace. Because the carnal mind is entity against God. It is not subject to the law of God. Neither, indeed, can be. Well, that's where we are. Sin is lawlessness. It is wrong thinking. And if the carnal mind cannot obey, if it cannot be subject to God's law, then obviously sin is going to reign. And that's exactly what we have. We have sin. Now, as I said, sin is much more. Sin, as I said, is like a philosophy. It's a mindset. So, we went through Romans 8, 6, 7. God tells us we must identify sin, defeat it, and master it. Let's look at what God told Cain back in the book of Genesis. Genesis chapter 4. And one of the major examples we're going to see, but it won't be text next week, is going to be the story of Cain and why God rejected his offering. It's a very interesting story. But you have to think in Hebrew in order to understand it. All my life, even though I was raised in a Jewish home, we spoke English. English was my language. I thought in terms of English. But to understand that, we have to learn to think in terms of Hebrew because the revelation is there. But anyway, chapter 4 and verse 7. Look what God says. If you do well, shall you not be accepted? But if you do not do well, sin lies at the door. Its desire is for you, meaning it wants to take you over. It wants to envelop you. It wants to totally dominate your thinking. That's what sin does, and it's deadly. But, God says, you must rule over it. You must master it. Well, that's a lot easier said than done. You know, very much easier said than done. So we now have to look at another scripture. Yes. In order to overcome it, we have to look at Zechariah 4.6. What God says to the prophet Zechariah. 4.6. Then he answered and spoke to me, saying, This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel, not by might nor by power, meaning not by human might, not by human strength, but by God's spirit. Without God's spirit, we can't fight sin. We're losers. We can't do it. Now, it is interesting to see how we defeat sin. We're given admonitions, one in the book of Proverbs, and one in 2nd Corinthians. Let's look in Proverbs first. Proverbs chapter 4, and we'll go to verse 23. Proverbs 4 and verse 23. Where we read, Above all, guard the door of your mind. Now, this is a very interesting scripture here, because this translation is exactly what it means, but it's not what it says. You know the old saying, well, I know what it means, but what does it say? Well, this indeed is what it means, but it's not what it says. If you have your faithful version, look at the center margin toward the top, and you come to verse 23. And it says, the alternate reading is, guard your heart. Now, that's not just an alternate reading. That is the reading. But you see, in English, we separate the mind, the head from the heart. Hebrew does not know such thing. And one of the best illustrations of seeing in English, the separation of the head from the heart, was best illustrated, as I was talking to some of the people before the message, by the words of a song sung by one of my favorite songstresses that I ever listened to, Olivia Newton-John from Australia. She had the softest voice. She arrived here in the US, oh, in the early 1970s, burst out with her song, Have You Ever Been Mellow? But the one I'm referring to is I Honestly Love You. Beautifully sung, beautiful melody, but she's talking about an illicit desire to love someone. Because in this song, she says, and she knows it's wrong, in the song, there you are with yours, here I am with mine. So it doesn't work. And she says, you must realize this is coming from my heart, and not my head. So she well illustrated that we think with our head, but our emotions are with the heart. But you see, that's English. That's not how God thinks. God put it in Hebrew, heart. Because everything is the heart. The heart is the seat of rational thinking. It is the seat of decision making. Have we not read the words, Thou shalt love the Lord your God with all your heart? How many times do we read, he said with his heart, he said to his heart, or his heart was right with God, his heart was not right with God. Always the heart. And let us turn to Psalm 51. We're going to look at this more deeply a little later on. But I only want to point out one aspect in Psalm 51, where David is lamenting what he did with Bathsheba, and he's crying out to God for forgiveness. And wait till we see the words for sin in this, in this Psalm. But we're going to be looking Psalm 51 and verse 10. Create in me a clean heart. Doesn't say mind. Because the heart is the mind. The heart is the whole person, all wrapped up in heart, lev, in the Hebrew, lev. And so we understand that we think with our heart, the lev. Now, we are like goalies in a hockey game, or a soccer game. There you are. And here, and we're guarding a net. So we're supposed to guard the door of our mind. We're guarding our net. And here comes the adversary. And is he ever firing hockey pucks at us? Some of them seem to be coming at us a hundred miles an hour. Well, you know, not that fast, but still pretty fast. They're coming high. They're coming low. They're coming this way. They're coming that way. And we have to identify them and block them. That's not easy. But that's what God said when he said, guard the door of your mind. Now, we translate it as mind because we're English speaking people. And so we can, we can grasp it more easily. Guard the door of our mind. Now, the fallback scripture to that is in 2 Corinthians. So let's turn there. 2 Corinthians chapter 10. And we've read this. We've read this any number of times. 2 Corinthians chapter 10. And we'll pick it up in verse 4. For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the overthrowing of strongholds, casting down vain imagination, every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought. That's guarding the door of our mind. But that's, that's a tall, that's a tall order. How do you cast down all those imaginations? Well, remember Zerubbabel in the prophet Zechariah? By my spirit. There's our key. God's spirit helps us to identify the sin, whatever it may be. It's a wrong thought. It's a wrong concept. Whatever it may be, and then we have to suppress it. That's the goal. That's what he tells us we have to do. Now, the next thing we need to look at are some of these words. Let's take a look here. There are three words that actually define sin. The first one is avon. A-V-O-N. It's a long, elongated O vowel. And wherever you find it, it's under iniquity. You read iniquity? That is avon. The next word is peshah. P-E-S-H-A. Peshah. And it's translated transgression. So when you read in the Bible and you find the word transgression, it's almost always peshah. Now there are one or two exceptions, but they're very special. The third word is chetah. Now, chetah is translated as sin. So when you read, ah, we've sinned a sin. Your sin is great. It is almost always chetah. And these three words are used. Avon starts it off. Remember James talks about when you draw in a way of your lust? Avon is the thinking. It is the thinking stage. So if you don't stop the thinking, if you don't stop the wrong thought, what happens? It eventually turns into peshah. You start to think, yeah, I think I'm going to go do that. And then you wind up doing it, which is chetah. And that is the pattern. And there are no exceptions. It's just that way. No ifs, ands, or buts. So now let's go take a look at where we find these words. And we're going to look at four scriptures. We could look at many more, but four will give us the point. Let's start out with Exodus 34. And in many respects, this is the most inspiring scripture reading, when you realize how it describes God. Exodus 34. And let's start out in verse six. And the Lord passed by before him and proclaimed, the Lord, the Lord, God, merciful, gracious, long-suffering, abundant in goodness and truth. What a great God we have. Aren't we all glad we have such a God? But look what he goes on to say. Keeping mercy to the thousandth generation. And here we are, forgiving iniquity. That's avon, forgiving our thinking. And transgression, teshach. That's the act, shall I say, the determination that we're going to do something. And finally, forgiving sin. Chata. And chata is the guttural when you say it. It's not chata, but chata, C-H-A-T-A. So we need to look at it as lawlessness. And under the heading of lawlessness comes those three words. So while we think of sin, we need to think of lawlessness, because in Hebrew, the word for sin is no better or worse than the other two words, and they all come by patterns. Always. Avon, teshach, chata. Now let's look at Jeremiah. Jeremiah 33 and verse 8. Jeremiah chapter 33 and verse 8. And we're going to find the same words. Of course we are. 33 and verse 8. And God's talking about the children of Israel in the future. When they're resurrected, the second resurrection, and they're brought back. And he says, and I will cleanse them from all their iniquity. Avon. And by which they have sinned against me. Chata. And I will pardon all their iniquities. Avon again, by which they have sinned. Chata. And by which they have transgressed. Teshach. Again, avon, teshach, chata. Always. No exceptions. Well now, let's take a look at the mother lode. At least I like to call it the mother lode. We were there a while ago in Psalm 51. So let's look at Psalm 51. Here's David. Very, very repentant. He knows what he did with Bathsheba. He knows it was wrong. And here he is crying out. And he says, verse 1. Have mercy upon me, O God, according to your loving kindness, according to the greatness of your compassion. Blot out my teshach, my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity. Avon. And cleanse me from my chata. For I acknowledge my teshach. And my chata, sin, is ever before me. Against you, you only have I sinned. Chata. And done evil in your sight, that you might be justified when you speak, and be in the right when you judge. Behold, I was brought forth in avon. And in chata did my mother conceive me. Always those three words. Now, in verse 5, we have to realize at times the Bible is not to be taken literally. Sometimes it's in more poetic form. And so, he's just describing the condition of sin that humans are in. He's not, in verse 5, saying that he was born in iniquity. No, he's not saying that. And in sin, that his mother did something terrible when she gave birth to him. But he's creating an atmosphere. And he says in verse 9, hide your face from my chata. Blot out all my iniquities. See, that's the pattern. That's the whole concept of sin. Thinking from beginning to end. And if we don't understand that, we are indeed in trouble. But we have to understand that. Now, let's take a contrived example. And who knows, as we're moving along here, we may finish the whole thing tonight. That would be great. And we're talking about an individual who's walking down the street. Well, actually, he's a druggie, all right? He's a druggie. He's looking for drug money. And as he's walking down the street, it's night, not midnight, but it's night time, and 8 o'clock, 9 o'clock, somewhere the sun's gone down. Houses are occupied. He sees the lights. And then one house, though, hmm, that house is dark. There are no lights. Maybe nobody's home. Eh, maybe I can get some drug money. Maybe. Thinking. His thoughts. What is that? Avon. Avon. He's thinking. Wrong thoughts. So he goes off the street road. He goes toward the house. He still hasn't done it yet. He hasn't committed sin as such. But his thinking is along the wrong path. And he sees, oh, that window. Man, that window looks like it's unlocked. It looks like it's not closed. Yeah, I'll bet you there's drug money in there. And nobody's home. I'm going to go in. Peshach. See, Peshach also has a concept of rebellion. Avon does not indicate rebellion. It's just wrong thinking. But Peshach, you make a determination that you're going to commit an act that is in violation of God's instructions, in violation of his law. So, what do you do? You go up to the place. And you take, and you break in. Either through the door, through a window. It doesn't really matter. That is Chata. So there we have it. We have Avon. We have Peshach. And we have Chata. No exceptions. Always. In all our thinking. Now, there's one other example of words that I didn't mention. I'd like to look at Psalm 32 and verse 5. I overlooked that one. Psalm 32 and verse 5. And David is talking here. He says, I acknowledge my sin to you, Chata. And my iniquity I have not hidden. Iniquity. Avon. I said, I will confess my transgression, Peshach, to the Lord. You forgave the iniquity of my sin. Now, that is a very interesting way of putting things. In English, it may not grab you. But in Hebrew, it just jumps right out of the page. Off the page. It says, you forgave the iniquity of my sin. Well, what do you mean the iniquity of my sin? You forgave my carnal mind. The thought patterns. Remember, avon. Wrong thinking. Remember, James, when you are drawn away of your own lust. That's the beginning. If that were written in Hebrew instead of Greek, it would be avon. Because that's what it is. The wrong thinking. And so, David is saying, you forgave my wrong thinking. My attitude. You forgave all that I am. That is profound. David realized that. What a gracious God we have. Because you forgave my wrong thinking that led to Chata. That's what David is saying. The iniquity of my sin. That is my whole wrong system. My whole wrong belief. You forgave it. You wiped it clean. Even though it led to sin, you forgave. It's an amazing verse. Well, now, let us go into a most fascinating example. Cain and Abel. Let's look at Genesis 4. Genesis 4, and we'll pick it up in verse 3. And it came to pass, that Cain brought to the Lord an offering of the fruit of the ground. And Abel also brought of the firstlings of his flock. Now, the fact thereof, the Lord had regard to Abel, but not to Cain. And there's a good reason why. He didn't have regard to Cain and his offering. And Cain was exceedingly angry. His countenance fell. If you've ever seen some of the ads for the Shriner's Hospital, they have kids, you know, singing certain songs and they try to get you to contribute. Well, one of the tunes goes like this. If you're happy and you know it, your face will surely show it. Well, Cain's face certainly showed something, but it didn't show happiness. So God says, Cain, what's wrong? Why are you so angry? Why is your countenance fallen? You know, why so blumchum? Well, God knew what was wrong. And he's explaining it here. And this is the most profound part of it, in verse 7. If you do well, shall you not be accepted? But he didn't do well. That's why he wasn't accepted. All right. What was it that he didn't do well? God lets the cat out of the bag here. But if you do not do well, sin lies at the door. Yeah. Sin. But you must rule over it. That's the same thing as we find in Romans 6, verse 12. We won't turn there. Where Paul says, let not sin rule or reign in your body, your mind. And that's here. And Cain didn't change. He talked with his brother Abel, and it came to pass when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him. All right. So what is the problem here? How do we understand why God accepted Abel's offering, but not Cain's? We got to go back to a couple of chapters to find that. Genesis chapter 2. And we have God planting a garden in eastward in Eden, in verse 8. And there he put the man whom he formed. And out of the ground the Lord God caused every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life also was in the midst of the garden and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. So tree of the knowledge of good and evil. God said, don't eat it. Look what we have in verse 16. Well, beginning in verse 15, actually. And the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to dress it, to keep it, you know, take care of it. You're a gardener. And the Lord God commended the man saying, you may freely eat of every tree of the garden, but you shall not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. For the day you eat of it, in dying, you will die. So Adam knows don't eat of that tree. Well, afterwards, Eve is created. And then we know what happened. Chapter 3. Now the serpent, verse 1, was more cunning than any creature of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, oh, this is a, he's a smooth operator. He is slick. Is it true? Really? Did God actually say, you shall not eat of any tree of a garden? And the woman said to the serpent, oh, we may freely eat of the fruit of the trees of a garden, but of the fruit of the tree, which is in the middle of the garden, God has indeed said, you shall not eat of it, neither shall you touch it lest you die. Now, this is an interesting thing here in verse 3. We don't have anything in scripture that says, God said, don't touch it. Now, maybe he did. Just because we don't find it so stated doesn't mean God didn't command her that way, or Adam didn't. What is interesting, the rabbis take it to mean that they didn't tell her. But she embellished it. You know, in rabbinic thinking, build a fence around Torah. So, all the do's and don'ts on the Sabbath. See, if you don't do this, don't do that, you can't, you can't break the Sabbath then. It's like the cute sign I once saw. It was in a posh hotel. And I mean a posh hotel. Oh, the velvet, the carpet, oh, the carpentry. It is beautiful. And there's a dining hall. And of course, you know what happens if you take fruit out of the dining hall, you might spill it. And so, the people who ran the dining hall had a sign over the dining hall, which said, to avoid the carrying of fruit out of the dining hall, there will be no fruit served in the dining hall. Well, that'll do it. So, therefore, the rabbis pointed out that Eve was the first one to build a fence around Torah. Because if you can't touch the tree, then you can't eat of it. Oh, who knows? But at any rate, look what happened in verse 3. And the serpent said to the woman, you know, in, serpent woman, in dying, you shall not surely die. No, no. For God knows that in a day you eat of it, in your eyes shall be open, and you shall be like God, deciding good and evil. Right? Here we go. Here comes the sin. Because remember, the key is that sin caused the whole thing. It was sin that caused God not to accept Cain's sacrifice. But it begins here. And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, yeah, oh, that looks nice. Pretty. Like the song, lemon flower, ah, very pretty. Lemon flower is pretty. And when the woman saw, she saw it was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eye. And a tree to be desired to make one wise. Oh, yeah, I want to be wise. Avon, see, avon, wrong thinking. What did God say? First big mistake. What did God say throughout? Obey my voice. Well, Eve was listening to another voice. She wasn't listening to God's voice. And when she saw it was desired to make one wise, she thought, yes, I want that. I want that. Peshaw. Peshaw is now taking over. And she went and she took of the fruit and ate. And she gave it to Adam. And he ate. That was chattah. Now, God knew it all. But look what he says when he said to Adam and Eve after he said curse is the ground and all that. And we read here. Because you have done this, the Lord said, behold, the man is good. But that's true. What I'm looking for in particular is the section, excuse me, which I told you, out of the ground, you beat me, call me evil. Sent him from the garden, he drove out the man. But he made coats of skin for him. And for some reason, I'm not finding it, but I will find it very soon. Hearken, you shall not eat of it. The ground is curse. It shall bring forth thorns in the sweat of your feet. And Adam called Eve, God, behold, good of us, evil. Therefore, he sent him out, and he drove the man. But it is here, and I don't know why I lost it, but my apologies. But he said he made skins of animals to hide the shame, to cover the sin. Now, that taught them or should have taught them that you need to acknowledge God by sacrificing an animal. Now, there's nothing wrong with bringing fruit and bringing grain, because later on, God was going to have Israel bring the first troops. But that's not here. This sacrifice that Cain and Abel brought was supposed to be a sin offering. It took the shedding of blood and the killing of an animal to cover the shame of the sin. That should have been a clue to Cain. And remember, God said, if you're not doing well, sin lies at the door, which means, which means you did something wrong. What was it? You didn't offer me an animal. You didn't think you needed to address me. You didn't think you needed to be humble. You didn't think you need to acknowledge me as the one who covers your sin. That was the problem. That was the reason that God didn't accept the grain, the fruit, whatever it was, because it was improperly offered. Grain, fruit does not cover sin. Only the blood of an animal can do that. But look what he went on. He killed his brother. And then look what Cain says to the Lord in verse 13 of chapter 4. My punishment is greater than I can bear. Now, it's interesting. The word for punishment, it's not the word for punishment. What is the Hebrew word? We've just been talking about one of them. Avon. So he says, my avon is greater than I can bear. Well, what do you mean your sin is greater? It's really punishment. But you see, in Hebrew usage, it is the sin that leads to the punishment. That's the Hebrew usage. And so therefore, we all translate this as punishment, because the punishment is the result of sin, which ultimately leads to death. So it's just interesting how it works. So here, Cain said, my punishment is greater than I can bear. You've driven me out. I'm going to be a vagabond. And God says, all right, okay. He set a mark on Cain that if anybody should find him, should not kill him. And it says, Cain went out from the presence of the Lord. That is, he went out from, away from God. And he never returned. The way of Cain. That was the problem. That was the problem. There was no repentance. Cain never did. So now, let's look at a man named David. We all know the story of David and Bathsheba. And so we're going to find it here in Samuel. When a time, the time came for kings to go to war. And David is on his porch, you know, and he's looking out and there's Bathsheba. Oh, she's beautiful. Okay. Okay. Okay. That's good. That's fine. Leave it go, David. Leave it go. But he doesn't. He looks and he thinks, wow, I sure want her. Wrong thought. Avon. Avon. Avon. So then he calls for her. Cushah. He decides to take her, which he does. And they get together. And there is Chata. From the lust, to the thinking of doing it, they're doing it. Again, we have Avon, Cushah, and Chata. Well, now I would like to spend the rest of the time that I have looking at the greatest war of them all. Satan, the devil. There are other individuals we could look at. We could look at Jeroboam. We could look at the man, the man, the prophet that God, prophet that God sent up to warn Jeroboam. But let's look at the evil one. And we're going to start out here in Ezekiel 28. Ezekiel 28. And this is extremely telling here. Ezekiel 28. And God begins it in verse 12. Son of man, lift up a lamentation over the king of Tyre and say to him, thus says the Lord God, you seal up the measure of perfection, full of wisdom, perfect in beauty. You've been in Eden, the garden of God. Every precious stone was your covering, the ruby, topaz, diamond, barrel, all of that. The workmanship of your settings and of your sockets was prepared in the day that you were created. You were the anointed cherub. Wow. He must have been some individual to see. And who know, he might have been, I don't know, maybe a step or a nod above Michael Gabriel. Because Michael and Gabriel are not described in terms like this. The anointed cherub that covers. I set you so. You're in the holy mountain of God. You were perfect in your ways in the day that you were created until iniquity was found in you. Now here, it's almost a discrepancy. It's like a dichotomy. How do you compute this? You're perfect in your ways. Well, how can perfection become imperfect? If you're perfect, you're perfect. And yet somehow, he was perfect until he wasn't. But to understand that, we need to think in terms of Hebrew, not English. The Hebrew word here for perfect is Tamin. Now let's look at what God said to Abraham in Genesis 17. Genesis chapter 17. And pick it up in verse 1. And when Abram was 99 years old, the Lord appeared to Abram and said to him, I am the Almighty God. I am God Almighty. Well, actually, he is Almighty God. But this doesn't really say he's God Almighty. The Hebrew is something else. Shaddai, El Shaddai. Now Shaddai has the root going back to a woman's breast. And you think, what's that got to do with this? Oh, it does. Because think of a newborn baby. It sucks on his mother's breast. And what is God? What did Paul say? His God was able to provide for your every need. So what this is really saying, I am God who provides. I am the God who is capable of providing everything for you. Therefore, he is Almighty, because he has to be Almighty in order to provide. But then he says, he goes on, and he says, I am only walk before me and be here we have perfect. Again, what's the word? Tamin. How can a human be Tamin? Because Tamin doesn't mean in Hebrew what we think it means in English. Tamin really in its ultimate meaning is wholehearted, devoted, fervent, loyal, dedicated. That's what Tamin really means. Remember in Luke chapter one, where uh Zachariah and Elizabeth are described walking the law of the Lord blameless? Yeah, they were blameless. They were Tamin if it were Hebrew. So when God says back in Ezekiel, your heart was lifted, you were corrupted by reason of your brightness. Yeah, you were you were perfect. Until you started thinking wrong. Here we go Avon, Peshah and Chata. So here he is talking about the multitude of his merchandise. You have sinned. You violated the law. It started with Avon. And you want to see how Avon he was? Now let's go to Isaiah 14. This is almost enough to blow your mind when you understand it in the Hebrew. Isaiah 14. We've been here many times and we discussed this being. This being? Okay, we'll start it out in verse 11. Talking about this being, this glorious being that was thrown down. Your pride is brought down to the grave. The noise of your harps, the maggot is maggot is spread under you and the worms cover you. How you are fallen from the heavens, oh shining star. Yeah, he was the shining star. Son of the morning, how you are cut down, you who weaken the nations. Because this is moving back and forth from Lucifer as the shining star into a king on earth. For you, and here we have what I call the five eyes. For you have said in your heart, I will ascend unto the heavens. I will exalt my throne above the stars of God. Now watch these five eyes. Each one is higher and worse than the previous one. I also will sit upon the mount of a congregation in the sides of the north. I will ascend above the heights of the clouds. What nerves? And then he says, I will be like the most high. What this is really saying is, as good as God is, I am that good. There is a preposition here, which is like or as. I will be as good as. I will be as powerful as. I will be as the most high is. Is. How could anybody think like that? But he did. Iniquity was found. Now this word for iniquity is not the typical Ogon. It's a word that is wrong thinking, okay, but it has wickedness and perverseness involved in it. So you can see his wickedness. You can see his perverseness. He's saying, I will be as good as. I can rule this universe just as well as God can. I'm just as good. Talk about familiarity breeding contempt. Oh, and how? Well, I wondered, you know, how you could ever think that way? What went through their minds? Now, one of the blessings I have being here in the Pasadena area is I have the opportunity of working with and communicating with two fellow elders, Byron Norred and Darrell Brown. And I really appreciate both of them. It's like iron sharpening iron. But one day in particular, I was talking with Darrell and he related to me an instance way back when, many years ago, he was riding in a car, was driving, and the man alongside of him was not just a human. He's talking to a demon, was there. And it was clear who he was. And Darrell got around to asking the question that I would have asked when he asked, how could you think that you could take over from God? What was your thinking? And the demon replied. And when I heard his reply, I thought to myself, yes, I agree. What he said was true. And here was the reply. And he said it with a kind of a contorted voice, face. You didn't picture these demons. He said, we didn't think he was that good. I said, yeah. Didn't think God was that good. That's what happened. That's what happens when you start out with a bone. You start to think. Let's read that again. Excuse me. Let's go back to James and rehearse that again. Because you really can't do this enough. James chapter one, again. Here we are. Verse 13. Do not let anyone who is tempted say, I am being tempted by God, because God is not tempted by evil. He tempts no one. But each one is tempted when he is drawn away and enticed by his own lust. There's Lucifer. His own lust, his desire to rule as God was. At some point, he thought to myself, I'm doing a good job. I'm just as good as he is. I can rule just as good, just as well. It's pictured right here in James. And after lust has conceived, after it has kind of taken you over, you're now determined you're going to do something about it. It gives birth to sin. And sin, when it's completely forth, is completely finished, brings forth the death. Except God is going to banish him forever into outer darkness. But here he was. Here was this being that started out with a bone, up to Pisha, and then Chata. And what was the act of Chata? Gathering around with all his followers and swarming up to try to take over from God. Stupid. Just completely out of his mind. That's what sin will do. That's when sin takes over. You can't think straight. And you know, those demons still can't think straight. That's just the way it is. So here we have the example of the ultimate in sin. Our job is the opposite. Our job, again, is to guard the door of our mind, pull down vain imaginations, bring thoughts into captivity. Not like Lucifer. He let himself be taken over. We dare not do that. Our job is to be on Torah road, free from sin. And the way we do that, deflect the sin, call upon God, asking for his spirit to recognize that sin. And with his help, we get rid of it. We blow it out. And when we don't, and when we're unable to do it, God provides us with the power to do it. But God says he wants us in his kingdom. Jesus said in Matthew chapter 6, verse 33, seek ye first the kingdom. Well, when we are devoid of sin, not that we're completely, we're going to falter, but as long as with our mind, we seek the law of God, we seek the will of God, we are on Torah road. And let's conclude with one last scripture. Matthew chapter 7. Matthew chapter 7. Okay. Matthew chapter 7, verse 13. Enter in through the narrow gate, for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction. And many are those who enter through it. For narrow is the gate and difficult is the way that leads to life. And few are those who find it in this current gate and age. We have to be on that road, not the yellow brick road, that road. No, no, no. On Torah road, the road of obedience to God, his law, his statutes, his commandments. That way we're not sinning. And if we stay on that road, then that is the road that leads to the kingdom of God.