Good morning and welcome, it's good to see everyone here today.
Today I'm going to talk about the sign of Jonah.
We'll come to that.
First there are some things we have to talk about.
Then we will understand how it applies to the sign of Jonah.
You'll remember last week, what did we talk about?
The portal to heaven, that was the title.
What was something you learned, last week?
Okay, it represents the pearly gates, the gate to heaven, anything else?
Amen, it's about the pearl of great price, who is Christ.
Also we have the portals of the body, like the eye that Jesus mentioned.
The light of the body is the eye.
The hearing of the ear, we read about even those in the chapter we read this morning.
The mouth, speaking, the nose we talked about in relation to the sacrifice of the sweet-smelling aroma, and also what?
Yes, the prayers, yes, the prayer of Moses.
So, we're going to build on that today because I think there's more that we need to talk about with respect to the portals of the body,
portals of the mind.
In fact, I originally titled this the portals of the mind, and then this morning God pointed out the theme of the sign of Jonah.
So we'll start with the portals of the mind, and then we will see how that relates to Jonah.
Now, you remember we talked about Cain.
It's the first mention of the door in the Bible because God told Cain when he didn't accept his offering.
Cain was upset, God said, why has your confidence fallen?
Why are you upset?
If you do well, you'll be accepted, and if not, sin lieth at the door.
When we consider that the door of the mind, remember the little kitty cat lying at the door, that's the imagery.
That's the kind of animal that would normally be at our door.
It wants to come in, wants to come inside.
In the sign of the Son of Man, we see that not as a cute kitty cat, but as a snake wanting to come inside.
That's the sin that wants to come into our mind.
So, with that recap from last week,
I think it would be good to talk more about how that snake comes inside and how we can be watchful to make sure that it doesn't.
All right, because what should be in our minds?
The Word of God, that's nice.
Looking at the sign, what should be?
The Holy Spirit.
Of course, the Holy Spirit speaks the Word of God.
I don't deny what you said, but the Holy Spirit is what we want in our minds.
Exactly, the temple of our body is the temple of the Holy Spirit.
The portals of the mind are where they're all connected with the Holy Spirit.
Jesus said, the eye of the body, or the light of the body is the eye.
We hear what the Spirit says to the churches.
Jesus said, my words are Spirit.
They are life, and the sweet-smelling aroma from the sacrificial character.
That is also about the Spirit, the vapor.
So, all of the portals connect to the Spirit, all the portals of the mind.
So, we want the Holy Spirit.
To come into our portals, into our minds, and not the snake.
So, let's look at some examples in the Bible, and I'll look at several.
Some good and some bad, and we will see and we'll learn from that some things.
So, first, let's look at one of the kings, King Uzziah.
In 2 Chronicles, chapter 26, and verse 3, it starts out, it says, sixteen years old was Uzziah when he began to reign,
and he reigned fifty and two years in Jerusalem.
His mother's name also was Jecoliah of Jerusalem.
And he did that which was right in the sight of the LORD.
So, he started off good, he was doing what was right, but something happened.
And it talks about some of the good things that he did.
He sought God in different ways, but in verses 15 to 16, we read,
And he made in Jerusalem engines, invented by cunning men in terms of war, to be on the towers and upon the bulwarks,
to shoot arrows and great stones withal.
And his name spread far abroad; for he was marvellously helped, till he was strong.
So, again, talking about some of his achievements.
As the previous verses have been, his military might, he built his kingdom, he built up Jerusalem to a very strong state.
But then, verse 16, But when he was strong, his heart was lifted up to his destruction:
So, he started out good, and God prospered him.
But when he was strong, his heart was lifted up to his destruction, for he transgressed against the Lord his God,
and went into the temple of the Lord to burn incense upon the altar of incense.
And I won't go into the details there, but the priests gathered together and said: Hey, you don't belong here, that's not for you to do.
That's only the job of the priests.
He, though he was a king, and a strong king, but that was not his work.
He wasn't entitled to that.
So, we see the first warning.
What was the problem?
He became proud, his heart was lifted up.
Now, this expression, his heart was lifted up, what does it mean?
He thought too much of himself.
Okay, he thought too much of himself, certainly.
I would like to show you that in a little bit more literal sense, his heart was lifted up.
So, let's look again at the sign of the Son of Man.
Is the heart shown?
Do we see what would represent the heart?
The law of God in the middle engraving the law in the heart.
Okay, engraving the law in the heart, okay, that's nice.
Two comets in the heart, there's the two chambers of the heart, and the heart is connected with what?
What does the heart do?
The heart pumps your blood, it's necessary for life, yes.
And where's the blood?
Here's the blood in the sign, the blood of Jesus, and the heart is pumping that blood.
So, we're looking in this area, so far so good?
Yes, because the soul is connected with the blood, and the heart is there pumping that blood through the whole body.
So, it's very closely connected with the blood.
Of course, it's an organ, it's flesh, so also part of the body.
The heart was lifted up, Uzziah's heart was lifted up.
If you take that just literally, it means raised, okay?
So, if you were to raise the heart, where does it go?
In place of the spirit.
What does that mean?
You become your own standard.
Not just your own standard, but like the heart is generally understood as, at least biblically – out of the heart, yeah,
the abundance of the heart,
the mouth speaketh – the heart is where your emotion is.
It's the seat of your emotions.
So, if your heart is lifted up to the place where the Holy Spirit should be, that's the ruling position.
Then your heart, your emotions, your feelings are making the decisions instead of the spirit.
And of course, that's an expression.
The heart being lifted up is an expression referring to pride in particular.
So, how does that relate to pride?
I think what you said in the first place, this is the throne, if you will, it's where the spirit should be governing our lives.
And when we are lifted up, then we are governing our own lives.
That is ultimately the root of the problems that we have when our heart is lifted up and we want to rule.
So, there's a lack of submission.
Exactly, there is a lack of submission, sub meaning putting it down, below, sub-mission to the Holy Spirit.
All right?
So, how does that manifest?
What comes about as a result?
We have the ear.
Instead of hearing the voice of the Holy Spirit, what do we hear?
We hear our flesh, we hear the voice of our own desires, our own heart, all right?
Now, I want to show you a clip from this year's World Economic Forum.
Some of you know already where this is going.
But it needs little explanation, but I want you to think and I'll bring you to a Bible verse afterward.
I want you to see, compare and contrast what we see here.
So, let's play this, just a few minutes.
So, we count on you and ask your help, all the people.
So that we may unite, hold hands and unite our hearts, unite our thoughts.
Unite our heart and thoughts.
In the same direction, for healing of the planet, and the healing is spiritual.
So, I want to ask all the people that the forest, our forest, is our life.
She is asking for help, and asking that we may all be united in our hearts and in our thoughts.
And when we are all united in our hearts and thoughts, our Mother Earth will listen to us.
Thank you very much.
Suddenly, there's no translation.
What is she doing?
She's praying into her hands.
She's laying hands on them.
Thank you.
Notice what she's doing?
Our hearts are united.
That's where she wanted to communicate.
She touched her own heart, in the heart of this woman, who is the chief of an indigenous tribe in Brazil, who live in the forests.
A woman chief, which was only possible since 2005, I think, in their tribe.
But I wanted to show this because it relates to a scripture in a contrasting way.
Is it a little bit surprising to see that at the World Economic Forum?
The red mouth looks like a face mask, as though they are planning a new pandemic which will be more deadly.
Yes, thank you for pointing that out.
I wanted to mention that.
The tribe often uses colours, and they paint their face, and they do it in different ways.
At least, this is what I read.
But here, she has this, what looks very much like the face masks that we were all too familiar with in the last years.
But what else is peculiar about it?
It's red.
So, maybe, I don't know what all symbolism they use that they're trying to communicate, but to me, when I see a red face mask,
I see a sign that there's coming another pandemic,
which is no mystery.
Really, when they talk about disease X, and they are often saying there's another pandemic that's going to come.
It's just a matter of when, not if.
So, another pandemic and one that will kill, that will be much more deadly than the previous one.
It also seems like she has a stripe over her eyes.
Well, that's another interesting thing.
Yes, she has this stripe going from her eyes back to her ears.
They are also portals.
Exactly.
All the portals are touched by this.
So, very interesting.
Did you notice her words?
She said, the healing is.
.
– did you catch it at the beginning?
She said, the healing of the earth is spiritual.
And then, she prays, lays hands on these leaders, and blows on them.
So, look at John chapter 20 and verse 19.
This is the day of Jesus' resurrection, and He is now showing Himself to the whole group of the disciples, or most of the disciples,
in the evening of that day.
Then the same day at evening, being the first day of the week,
when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews,
came Jesus and stood in the midst.
So, he passed through the shut doors, interestingly.
But that's not the point that I'm making right now.
And saith unto them, Peace be unto you.
They were in fear because of the Jews.
And verse 20, And when he had so said, he shewed unto them his hands and his side.
Then were the disciples glad, when they saw the Lord.
Then said Jesus to them again, Peace be unto you: as my Father hath sent me, even so send I you.
And verse 22, And when he had said this, he breathed on them, and saith unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost:
So, Jesus did something in some way similar to what we saw happen at the World Economic Forum, but with the Holy Spirit.
Whereas, I think it's pretty clear that what happened at the World Economic Forum was not the Holy Spirit.
That's interesting, yes.
He says, as my Father has sent me, even so send I you.
And in the case of this chief of the tribe, she was worshiping Mother Earth.
By the way, Mother Earth is everywhere.
It's the counterfeit to the Holy Spirit, who is omnipresent.
You can't escape from Mother Earth, so to speak.
So, it's definitely the imitation of what Jesus was doing here with his disciples, preparing them for their ministry.
Yes, Jesus emphasized, peace be unto you.
Peace be unto you.
He said it more than once.
And the world, they also want peace and security.
So, they are going about to heal the planet, so to speak.
Likewise, God is sending out His disciples also very soon.
So, we can see even from that, that Satan knows what time we're living in,
because he's imitating what Jesus was doing right at the time of His resurrection,
at the time of the early reign,
when Jesus was sending out His apostles.
Now, in our time, Satan is sending out his apostles to evangelize the world for Mother Earth, so to speak.
So, it's important that we understand what spirit we're receiving.
And on that line, it's also important to know what is being spoken.
She was speaking in an unknown language, an unknown tongue, as the Bible would say.
There was no interpreter.
You don't know what she was praying, and I certainly wouldn't want someone laying hands on me in that circumstance, where the prayer,
literally praying into her hands,
laying her hands on the head of each person,
and breathing on them an unholy spirit.
Take care that you know what's being given to you, if someone lays hands on you.
You want to make sure you're receiving the Holy Spirit, and not some other spirit.
They never use the name Jesus in prayer.
Sure, yeah.
I mean, when we talk about the world, the world is in opposition to Christ.
So, it's natural that the world will not use the name of Jesus, because they know whom they stand against.
And even some who will use the name of Jesus, you have to be careful to make sure that their Jesus is the Jesus of the Bible.
Okay, but what I want to emphasize is receiving the Holy Spirit.
We see the world activating their spirit, getting things prepared for what is coming just ahead.
We also need to be ready with the Holy Spirit.
We need to have the portals of our minds with guards.
Remember, we talked about how David prayed.
Lord, set a watch at the doors of my lips, because we need the angel of protection at the portals of our minds.
Okay, but the theme that I want to focus on is how we can make sure that we have the Holy Spirit and put out the unholy spirit.
We saw already how this is connected with the lifting up of the heart, putting ourselves in the ruling position.
We saw that in the example of Uzziah, the king, whose heart was lifted up.
There are other examples.
For example, in 2 Chronicles, chapter 32, verse 25.
Hezekiah was sick, the Lord healed him, and then it says,
But Hezekiah rendered not again according to the benefit done unto him;
for his heart was lifted up: therefore there was wrath upon him, and upon Judah and Jerusalem.
So, he prayed for the Lord to heal him, God healed him, gave him a great sign,
and the men of Babylon even came from a long distance and inquired from him.
He was very happy, his heart was lifted up, and he showed the men of Babylon all the treasures of his house.
But he did not render, he didn't return to God according to what God gave to him.
He didn't give God praise.
He didn't thank God, essentially, at least not in the public.
He didn't give witness for what God had done.
I guess the common denominator is that the focus is on the creation rather than the Creator.
Yes, the focus is on us, our creation, on what we have, it generally focuses around self, yes.
Now, I won't look at too many more examples, but I do want to share from, or contrast two examples of two kings.
The first two kings, King Saul and King David.
Very different kings, yet both of them made very severe mistakes.
Notice in 1 Samuel 16, verse 13, this is already after Saul was rejected, or at the point when Saul was rejected by the Lord.
Then the Lord told Samuel to do this and anoint David.
So, in verse 13,
Then Samuel took the horn of oil, and anointed him in the midst of his brethren:
and the Spirit of the Lord came upon David from that day forward.
So Samuel rose up, and went to Ramah.
But, verse 14, But the Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul, and an evil spirit from the Lord troubled him.
That's interesting.
So, well, an evil spirit from the Lord.
sure, he allowed it.
He takes responsibility for everything that happens, ultimately.
That's not the focus, but we have this transfer.
David was anointed, he received the Spirit of the Lord, and Saul’s anointing was removed because he no longer had the Spirit of the Lord.
Now, I want to point out, or I want to clarify that this receiving of the Spirit of the Lord was a form of manifestation.
Not that he was completely devoid, that Saul was not at this point completely devoid of the Spirit.
Nor was this the first time that David had the Spirit.
But it was a certain anointing of the Spirit.
He was the anointed king.
Saul, at that point, although it may not have been obvious to men,
the Bible gives us the view that that was when the anointing on Saul's life was taken away.
Then, from there, it kind of just goes downhill with Saul.
But, you know, he started out good.
You remember when he was first anointed.
They had a big ceremony, and they singled him out.
But he was humble enough.
He was kind of shy, and was just hiding behind some stuff, and didn't want to have all of the special recognition.
But then, after a year or two, things changed.
He got familiar with his position as a king, and the rebuke that Samuel gave him is also telling.
This is in 1 Samuel 15, verse 17:
And Samuel said, When thou wast little in thine own sight, wast thou not made the head of the tribes of Israel, When you were little,
then you were made the head of the tribes of Israel.
And the Lord anointed thee king over Israel?
So, he points out that when he was little, then the Lord raised him up.
See, it's one thing if we lift up our hearts.
It's another thing if we are humble, then the Lord will lift us up.
Notice in James 4, verse 10, he says, Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up.
Because, and there's actually one example.
I don't have the verse for it offhand, but King Jehoshaphat, it says that his heart was lifted up in the ways of the Lord:
So, there's a difference.
That's when the Lord lifts you up.
Then, your heart is in submission to His spirit and not to any other spirit.
So, Saul began to take one step after another, one downward step after another.
Just to see how that progression went.
1 Samuel chapter 18.
I'm just going to pick some highlights.
I don't have time to look at all of the context,
but hopefully you're a little bit familiar with the story of Saul and some of the things in the relationship between him and David.
1 Samuel 18, verse 17.
And Saul said to David, Behold my elder daughter Merab, her will I give thee to wife: Now, this is at a point when Saul wants David dead.
He wants to kill David.
But notice how he goes about that.
Only be thou valiant for me, and fight the Lord's battles.
For Saul said, Let not mine hand be upon him, but let the hand of the Philistines be upon him.
So, he wanted to be guiltless and say, The Philistines killed him.
He wants to be lifted up.
We see that theme throughout.
He likes that position of being the king.
You'll remember when in 1 Samuel 15, verse 30, this is when Samuel pointed out his error and he apparently repents.
This is important to note how he does that.
He says, Then he said, I have sinned: He repented.
yet honour me now, I pray thee, before the elders of my people, and before Israel, and turn again with me,
He wanted the honor of Samuel and Saul standing there together as though he had Samuel's blessing.
He wanted that honor.
I've sinned, but honor me anyway.
That's the most important part for Saul was the honor and yeah, yeah, I've sinned, but honor me.
That was what he wanted, especially because he didn't want to be made low in front of the people and before all of Israel.
And then at the end, to make it more appealing to godly Samuel, he says that I may worship the Lord thy God.
He puts a religious character to it, but that doesn't change the core motives.
The core motive was honor me.
Give me that honor.
And he coupled that with his supposed repentance.
Now, let's look at the story of David.
This is in 2 Samuel chapter 11 and verse 14.
We'll start here.
And it came to pass in the morning.
Yeah, this is in the middle of the story.
You know the story.
It's the story of David with Bathsheba.
Let's just start at the beginning of the chapter.
In verse 1, it came to pass, after the year was expired, at the time when kings go forth to battle,
Right?
Was David a king?
Yes.
David sent Joab, and his servants with him, and all Israel; and they destroyed the children of Ammon, and besieged Rabbah.
So David, the king, at the time when kings go forth to battle, he sent Joab, he sent his servants, he sent all Israel.
But David, the king, tarried at Jerusalem.
That was the first problem.
David didn't go out to battle.
He took his ease at his house in Jerusalem.
And then it came to pass in an evening tide that David arose from off his bed and walked upon the roof of the king's house.
From the roof,
he had a different perspective of the surroundings and he sees a woman washing
herself probably in what would be the privacy of her garden with walls,
but he's looking down from the rooftop.
And the woman was very beautiful to look upon.
Now, that would have been enough because the Holy Spirit always speaks to us.
If David were listening to the voice of the Holy Spirit, he would have recognized that that wasn't going in the right direction.
He would have heard the voice of the Spirit saying, what are you looking at?
He would have put a watch on his eyes.
Like it says in the book of Job, I made a covenant with mine eyes; why then should I think upon a maid?
So, he ignored the voice of his conscience, the voice of the Holy Spirit telling him, don't do that.
And then, what did David do?
He took it a step further.
David sent and inquired after the woman.
So, now David communicated with somebody else because he sent a messenger, said, hey, find out about that woman over there.
And one said, isn't this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?
So, then he knew this was a married woman.
The wife of Uriah the Hittite, who happened to be fighting the battle that he sent him to.
Then David sent messengers.
So, what happened in David's mind?
Now he knows this is a married woman.
I'm sorry?
Sure, it's already going in his mind.
Now, this is a process, especially in those days.
He didn't just send an email.
He sent messengers.
He talked to somebody.
Those people walked over, searched out, brought back an answer.
And then he sent messengers again and took her.
So, this was methodical.
It was planned.
There was plenty of opportunity for him to hear the Holy Spirit.
You see, at every step, it gets deeper.
It gets stronger.
This is now unmistakable that it would be breaking the law of God, the Ten Commandments, because that would be adultery.
But he's working with this in his mind.
You can see from the time that he let his eyes linger on this woman, the thoughts are going round and round and round and round in his mind.
The Holy Spirit has no access.
He's not listening to the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit speaks, but he has another spirit that he's paying attention to.
He let the snake in.
When did the snake come in?
He should have gone out with his people to the battle.
Okay, he should have gone out to battle, and he would have prevented the whole thing.
I would compare that in the story of Cain with Cain's offering of the fruit, but that wasn't when the snake comes in.
That wasn't when it came in with Cain.
That was when God said, what's the problem?
If you do well, you'll be accepted, and if not, sin lies at the door.
It still hasn't come in.
The snake didn't come in when Cain offered his fruits and when he got angry.
The snake came in when he didn't repent.
That's when the snake comes in.
When God speaks to you and you don't repent, you invite the snake in.
See, the snake comes in according to whom you agree with.
You have to agree with the snake.
The snake says, will you let me in?
He presents himself as that cute little kitty that you want to let in, but the Holy Spirit says, no, that's a snake.
You command it, and you send it away.
Who do you agree with?
Do you agree with the Holy Spirit, or do you agree with the snake, the sin?
It's about your agreement.
And when we repent, who do we agree with?
We agree with God.
We say, okay, Lord, you are my Lord.
I submit to you.
I say, no, go away.
Even if it looks like a cute little kitty, I say, no, the Holy Spirit governs in my life.
Go out, and then you humble yourself in repentance.
You surrender to the voice of the Holy Spirit, but if not, then you agree with the snake.
And that's when you open the door and the snake comes in.
It's when the Spirit confronts you with the truth, and then you say, no, I don't want that.
Let the snake come in, and I'll have a nice time with my kitty.
Understand?
It's about who we agree with at the point when the Lord would have us repent.
It's not the initial condition.
And so David, yeah, he made a wrong decision.
He should have gone out with the kings.
And I think that was the point where sin was at his door, and he should rule over it.
He should have ruled over it, but instead, he allowed something that he found pleasurable into his mind.
And he shut out the voice of the Holy Spirit.
Let's continue a little bit.
So, it just gets worse.
After he lays with her, the woman conceives and sent and told David, I am with child.
Now David is confronted in a very obvious way because her husband is off at battle.
So he has another opportunity to repent, because at every point, at every stage, the Spirit is there.
Repent, repent, repent.
That's what he does.
He convicts us of sin.
And if it's not convicting of sin, when you're faced with the consequences and some woman with whom you had adultery comes and says,
by the way,
I'm with child,
now it's public,
if that's not an opportunity to repent,
then I don't know what is.
So, David puts out that voice, and he sends Joab with the instruction to get Uriah, the wife of Bathsheba.
I'm sorry, the husband of Bathsheba, and so he has this scheme.
Now, he's manipulating the circumstances so that, what?
What does he want to achieve?
Yeah, he wants it to look like he's fine.
I wasn't the one.
He lay with his wife and got her pregnant, and she gave birth in less than nine months.
Because by this time, it took some time for her to realize that she was pregnant, so it's not a perfect cover-up even then.
Of course, there never is, but you can see how it's just getting worse and worse and worse.
But don't we do the same thing sometimes?
Don't we, rather than admitting our error, we come up with some way that we can make ourselves innocent, make ourselves appear innocent,
and put the blame somewhere else?
So, he has this plan, but it doesn't really work very well, and why?
Because Uriah is an honorable man.
And unlike David, who is taking his leisure while his men are fighting his battles,
Uriah slept at the door of the king's house with all the servants of his lord,
and went not down to his house.
He wouldn't even go to his house to have the comfort of his own bed.
He sleeps on the ground at the door of the king's house.
Because he says why.
David asks him, how come you didn't go down to your house?
He wants him to go to satisfy his own needs, but Uriah says, The ark, and Israel, and Judah, abide in tents;
and my lord Joab, and the servants of my lord, are encamped in the open fields;
shall I then go into mine house, to eat and to drink, and to lie with my wife?
Like you did?
Ouch.
as thou livest, and as thy soul liveth, I will not do this thing.
He also confronts him indirectly by mentioning that they are in battle without him.
Yeah, so Uriah is listening to the Holy Spirit.
Yeah, he has a conscience.
That's what I mean.
His conscience, the voice of the Holy Spirit.
That's what our conscience is.
It's the voice of the Holy Spirit.
Uriah tells David indirectly what is missing.
Exactly.
In the process, the Holy Spirit is saying, David, contrast.
And that's why the life, the very life of a righteous person is a rebuke to the wicked.
They see the righteous way, and they are convicted in their heart by their own error.
Uriah is listening to the Holy Spirit above the king.
King David said, go to your house.
And he says, I have an order from the king, but how can I do that?
That's just not right.
He couldn't bring himself to violate his conscience.
You see, when we ignore the voice of the Holy Spirit, we violate our conscience.
That's what David was doing.
Every step of the way, he's violating his conscience, violating it deeper and deeper and deeper.
And he's still not getting the message.
He's still putting out the voice.
Now, David was a respectable, even a godly person.
He will be saved.
The Bible confirms that.
But why was it that he was refusing to listen to the Holy Spirit?
He lifted his heart.
Yes, he was working out of his emotions, out of his own selfish ways.
And that puts us in that position that Adam and Eve were in when they sinned.
They were afraid of God.
Whereas before they had communed with him, now sin had separated them from the Lord, and they were afraid to be in his presence.
Because he was seeking to avoid that pain, avoid the pain of humbling himself, the pain of acknowledging his sin,
acknowledging his wrongdoing.
So the next step down for David, he gives him wine.
He tries to make him drunk so that he'll lose his morals or his better judgment, and then go to his wife.
It still doesn't work.
So finally, he says, if I can't get him by tricking him, then I will use his honor against him.
So he sees that this is a very honorable man.
And it came to pass, verse 14, in the morning, that David wrote a letter to Joab, and sent it by the hand of Uriah.
And he wrote in the letter, saying, Set ye Uriah in the forefront of the hottest battle, and retire ye from him, that he may be smitten,
and die.
He sent the death message by his own hand, the hand of Uriah, because he knew he could trust him not to open that letter.
That's pretty, pretty terrible.
That's violating, certainly violating his conscience to stoop to that level where one of the most respectable people, that very trait,
he uses it and abuses it against his life.
And why?
So that he can be innocent.
The whole thing is so that he can appear innocent, so that he can then take Bathsheba and, okay, she's my wife now.
If I can't make it seem like he had the child with her, then take her fully as his own wife.
So it's, I think you would agree, pretty severe what David was doing.
Completely turning away his ear from hearing the Spirit, what he was saying, that voice of conviction.
And now he's even turned against the nobility of Uriah and using it against him like the enemy would.
But you know the story.
Nathan came to him, gave him the parable of the rich man who had many riches and a lot of sheep.
And when the visitor came, instead of taking one of his own, he took his poor neighbour's only new lamb, small little animal.
But the only one that his neighbour had that he bought with his money and raised it up as his own child,
emphasizing that how much of a greater sacrifice it was for that poor man who represents Uriah as for himself,
the king.
And so Nathan tells him this story, and David is in a rage, and he says in the previous verse, he says, then David, in verse 7,
Nathan said to David,
Thou art the man.
So he tells him the story, and then in his anger, David's anger at the story,
he then turns it over and he has to bring it to that climax so that David finally can see himself.
Thou art the man.
He saw himself.
He saw how he condemned himself in the story.
He saw his own sinfulness.
And then the verse that I wanted to read.
When David is confronted, Nathan tells him then all of the things that the Lord has said against him, which is a story in itself.
But in verse 13, David said unto Nathan, I have sinned against the Lord.
And what's the next thing?
Period.
There is nothing more.
David stops.
There's no but.
There's no yet.
There's no but honor me anyway.
I have sinned against the Lord.
Period.
There is nothing more to say.
And then when David is humbled, Nathan said unto David, The Lord also hath put away thy sin; thou shalt not die.
Because that was David's own sentence, that he should die.
So the Lord is very forgiving.
Because we just saw how deeply David had fallen.
But because David humbled himself, he had true repentance.
Because true repentance doesn't say, forgive me and do this.
Because I want to look good in front of the people.
True repentance just recognizes the sin.
I want to point out the contrast again with Saul.
Because Samuel, when he rebuked Saul, in 1 Samuel 15, 23.
For Samuel is speaking now to Saul.
And he says, For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft,
He says, you were disobedient to the Lord, doing your own thing.
And behold, to obey is better than sacrifice.
For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft.
And stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry.
And why witchcraft?
Sometimes that might seem unrelated, but it's very closely related.
Witchcraft is a practice it's what you do when you want your will.
And you're willing to use Satan's power to accomplish your will.
That's witchcraft.
Rebellion is the same thing.
You want your will.
You say, not you, Holy Spirit, in my heart.
I don't want you governing me.
I want that position.
The heart is lifted up.
That's rebellion.
And accomplishing that in the same moment when you lift up your heart in the place of the Holy Spirit, what comes in?
The snake.
Witchcraft.
The power of the enemy is now in you and leading you in your rebellion.
Now, notice where that leads in Saul's life.
And when Saul enquired of the Lord, the Lord answered him not, neither by dreams, nor by Urim, nor by prophets.
He was quiet.
The Urim was when they would consult at the priest and they would get a yes or no answer from the Lord.
And then Saul wasn't content with the Lord's silence.
He wanted to go further.
He wanted an answer.
So Saul said to his servants, seek me a woman that hath a familiar spirit, that I may go to her and inquire of her.
Familiar spirits he himself had forbidden and taken out of the land.
And that's part of the story.
But he goes and inquires of this woman through an evil spirit.
And that's where it leads.
You don't listen to the Holy Spirit.
And when He is quiet, and then you, instead of repenting – see, Saul never repented.
Every opportunity that he had, like David, neither of them repented.
Neither David nor Saul until the end, when David finally repented.
But Saul, through his whole life, never, he never repented.
He always kept his heart.
You can see it.
I don't have time to look at all the verses, but he always wanted to be high.
He always wanted to be the king.
He always wanted that high position.
He never humbled himself.
And here at the end of his life, he doesn't hear any more from the Lord.
And he seeks the evil to give him the word of the Lord, which of course is not the word of the Lord.
So what I want to say in closing is:
When we look at the sign of the Son of Man, and we see the portals to the heavenly kingdom,
understand that these are the portals to our mind.
And they're the same doors and this is the connection.
For a long time, I was wanting to understand what the missing piece was, because we have all these great signs and wonders in the heavens,
but it just seems so disconnected.
It's all nice.
It's up there in Stellarium.
But how does it connect to us?
But when we understand that the portal to heaven is the same as the portals to our minds, then it brings it to earth.
Then it brings it to our hearts.
And that's the connection that we need.
Now, I don't have time to make the connection to the title of the sign of Jonah, so we'll have to postpone that until next week.
And I'll keep you on edge, hopefully.
But we see the portals to the mind, nevertheless, in this message.
Let's stand for a word of prayer.
Dear Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word and for the patience of your Spirit to work with us over and over and over again.
Until we are broken or dead.
We either respond like David or like Saul.
So, Father, I ask that you will awaken your people, because many of us are fighting against your Spirit.
We're running from your Spirit.
We're turning our ears away from hearing your voice and turning our eyes away from where you're pointing us to.
Forgive us, Father.
We have sinned against the Lord, and we have nothing to recommend us to you, but by your grace, as it is in the story of David, you forgave.
Not that there weren't consequences that lingered, but you forgave.
Aand you gave him that opportunity to have communion with your Spirit again.
So, I thank you for that.
I praise you for your ways and how you work, and I ask that you will continue that work a little bit longer.
We know your time on the clock, that it is not much.
Therefore, I make this urgent appeal to everyone who hears my voice to repent.
Repent now while you may be found, while the Spirit of God may be found.
Because soon your Spirit will not be found on earth.
And then, have mercy on your people.
Your mercy endures forever for those who love you, who are safe in your ark, but we must be in your ark and not lost in our own ideas.
But what we see in heaven must be a reflection of what is happening in our minds.
And then we can know that we are safe with you.
Thank you, Father, for your love.
Go with us through the rest of this Sabbath day, and fill your people with your Spirit.
We pray in the name of Jesus Christ, Alnitak, the wounded one of Orion.
Amen.
Thank you, and be sure to come back next week to get the rest of the story.