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Aug. 7, 2024 - Health Ranger - Mike Adams
55:23
Sermon 010 - 2 Corinthians 10:3 - Though we walk in the flesh...
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Welcome to today's sermon.
I'm Mike Adams.
And today we're going to be covering some very important revelations from 2 Corinthians.
And we'll be quoting from numerous chapters, 2, 3, 4, let's see, chapter 10 and others.
And this is about a much bigger question.
You know, so far in our sermons we have talked about nutrition and purity and cleanliness and God's molecules among many other topics.
But today we focus on a much bigger question, which is what is it that qualifies us to share the Word of God?
Any of us.
You listening, or myself, or anybody.
You see, in 2 Corinthians, Paul the Apostle is being challenged.
He angered the church members of Corinth with his first letter and other letters because he was quite harsh because they were doing horrible, filthy, immoral things, or many of the members of the church were.
And also one of the problems with the – even the Christian churches of Corinth is that, well, a lot of the religious leaders were very boastful and many of them had become quite popular and wealthy and they were flaunting their wealth obviously. a lot of the religious leaders were very boastful and And many of them had become quite popular and wealthy, and they were flaunting their wealth, obviously.
We can deduce this, by the way, from some of the later chapters in 2 Corinthians.
But it's very clear that some of the religious leaders were all about themselves.
They were not humble.
They were boastful.
They were not living in poverty.
They were flaunting wealth.
And many of them were quite narcissistic.
Even though they were recognized by the church there, and in essence they were recognized by the state as religious leaders, but they did not walk in the path of God, and they violated many of the tenets that are necessary to be true communicators of the Word of God.
And so in 2 Corinthians, Paul speaks to this and he talks about what are the requirements to share the Word of God.
Now, before we get to reading those passages, I would like to add something quite amazing about the founding of America.
That America was founded as a Christian nation, but with religious freedoms clearly protected from the wiles of government, we'll say.
Instead of the wiles of the devil, like the armor of God protects us, I guess.
But we'll say the wiles of government.
And so, you see, in Britain, the church, well, and even before Britain, in the history of Western Europe, the church had merged with the state.
And the state determined who could be a minister or a preacher or a pastor or who could run a church or launch a church or who had the right to speak on behalf of God, at least from the point of view of the authority of the state.
And when the colonists broke away from the King of England in the Revolutionary War, And then a few years later, they penned the Bill of Rights.
The very first right that they put to paper is, of course, the First Amendment, which many people think only protects freedom of speech, but actually, freedom of religion comes first.
Freedom of religion and freedom of speech and freedom of the press and so on, freedom to peaceably assemble and to voice your complaints about government, things like that.
Those are all things protected by the First Amendment, but the freedom to establish and practice religion is the very first right that is written in the Bill of Rights.
And this has been reaffirmed time and time again with numerous Supreme Court decisions over the years.
And what is sort of generally known as the separation of church and state.
Why that's an important pillar of freedom in America is because when the church and the state merge, then the state can determine who is allowed to have a church, or who is allowed to preach, or what version of the interpretation of the Bible is allowed to be stated.
And that's a very dangerous thing for the government to control.
And that's why in America today, you need no license to preach the Word of God.
You need no permission from government to start a church, even.
You need no permission to be a priest.
Now, granted, there are many churches through which permission is earned or granted through the Catholic Church or whatever.
Every religious organization tends to have its own process for training and ordaining ministers and things like that.
Or, as we saw recently with the Catholic Church, how to excommunicate those who are speaking a little too much truth That the church cannot tolerate, or at least that church cannot.
So churches do have their rules and so on, but according to the United States Constitution, you can start your own church and you can preach the Word of God in whatever way that you believe is in alignment.
Now, it doesn't mean that everybody's going to accept your church or your version of Christianity or your interpretation of it.
And so then you might ask, well, what, okay, if the state doesn't license teachers of Bible verses or teachers of religion, there's no licensing required.
You know, unlike a license for a doctor or an attorney, you have to pass the bar exam, you have to be licensed by the bar, which is a private organization, by the way.
That's not even really the state.
But every state has a medical board, and you lose your medical license if you offend the medical board, even though the medical board does not answer to the needs of the people, but rather serves the interests of the pharmaceutical giants.
But when it comes to religion, there is no power by any state to restrict you from starting a church, being a pastor, preaching the Word of God, And in fact, any such effort by any state would be struck down as unconstitutional.
It would be thrown out of any federal court immediately.
Why?
Because it is the First Amendment in the Bill of Rights.
The most important freedom is the freedom of religious expression.
Now, with that as context, then, understanding that technically any person can share the Word of God, then you might ask, well, what is morally required?
What is ethically required?
What should be sort of the common sense requirements to be someone who is able to teach the Word of God with some sense of authority?
And there are many answers to that.
Paul speaks of some of them.
We'll get to that as we quote verses here in 2 Corinthians.
But my takeaway from his words and others is very simple.
Number one, you must do so with a sense of humility.
So to become boastful, to become wealthy, to flaunt wealth as you are attempting to share the word of God is a living contradiction.
It doesn't mean that you can't command wealth or become a hub of redistributing wealth.
As my own organizations have been blessed with a lot of donations, a lot of support, and we have become a conduit of redistributing a lot of wealth and making a lot of donations and stockpiling supplies for communities and sending out donations and so on.
And that is, I think, one of the proper roles of those who have been blessed is to be a hub of redistribution of resources and assets to those who are in need and to those who can leverage those resources.
But if you are hoarding wealth, then you are disqualified from teaching the Word of God because you're not walking with humility.
And Paul himself was, of course, mostly led his life in poverty.
And so he was not a fan of these relatively wealthy preachers who were boastful and sometimes better speakers than was he.
But there's another requirement, and that is to be called to being a teacher of the Word of God, to be called to it.
And this is something that's very personal.
And in different ways, different people are called to the church or to...
The sharing of the Word of God in many different ways.
And for some people, like for me, it was a very gradual process that took place over many, many years.
It's funny because over the years of all my public teachings and podcasts and so on, I've heard so many times, countless times, comments from people that would say, Mike, you should be a preacher or you should be a pastor or your words remind me of this pastor.
And then many times those people are amazed to find out that my great-grandfather was an ordained minister with the Assembly of God.
And he had quite a following himself in his day.
In fact, I have his Bible.
I'm going to grab it.
Hold on.
So I'm holding in my hands...
The Holy Bible.
I have a family history as a separate page, a standalone page that's just held here in the front of the Bible.
And when I open up the Holy Bible, here it is.
It was given to my great-grandfather, and I'm not yet ready to share his name because it's on my mother's side and it would reveal my mother's maiden name.
But I will tell you that it was given to him by his wife on Christmas 1959.
And then on the other side of the very first page is a picture of a painting called Samson in the Treadmill.
Judges 16.21.
This is the King James Version of the Bible, Old and New Testaments, and it has handwritten notes from my great-grandfathers, like at the very beginning.
It says,"...end times Zechariah 14, for also rest of chapter." Like, it's just written in pen sideways.
I'm like, okay, well, that's interesting.
And then at the very front cover of this is a worn yellow sticky note with a handwritten message.
It says, give to Mike.
And that's me.
And There are many, many handwritten notes throughout this text.
This is my most treasured family heirloom, is this Bible from 1959.
I'm flipping through it right now, and there are pages that are earmarked, and there are pages with notes, and this is the Bible that, wow, all kinds of notes here at the beginning of the New Testament.
Okay.
He was born in 1891.
And he passed away in 1966.
Wow.
Anyway, I'm not going to go through all of this.
I mean, these are treasures of my family history.
And I will probably share more and more of this with you over time.
There's another log that I will be acquiring here.
There's a log that he and his wife went through.
From church to church in the Midwest, that's where they were operating.
That's where I was born, in the Midwest.
And they would go from church to church, and there was a log of which cities or towns they went to and what donations they raised.
And I remember seeing one of the notes say, you know, they were at this city on so-and-so, such-and-such a date, and it said $10!
They raised $10!
And that was a big deal in the 1950s or the 1940s.
You know, $10.
Think about what you could buy with $10 back then.
Quite a lot.
But there is a history of ministering in my family.
And it's not a path that I thought that I would follow.
And yet, here I am.
So sometimes you don't know how God will lead you through a series of events.
And you might be in a similar situation yourself.
You don't know what God will call upon you to do tomorrow or next year, for that matter.
But whatever He calls you to do, it is important to listen to God and His plans for you.
Now, in my own history, And I've shared this publicly before, but it's especially relevant here.
My life was saved by an angelic voice when I was in college.
I was on campus.
I didn't have a vehicle.
I would always walk everywhere on campus.
It was a pretty large campus in the Midwest.
And there was an ice storm.
An ice storm in the Midwest, it's characterized by Well, it was a freezing rain, I should clarify.
So by freezing rain, what happens is all the trees and their branches and the streets and sidewalks are way below freezing, but then a rain comes down, a liquid rain, and then when it hits the tree branches or the sidewalks, it freezes.
And this causes then the tree branches to become encased in an ever-thickening capsule of ice You could have, let's say, a tree branch that maybe is one inch in diameter, but then the ice would start to build up around it, and that ice might make it two inches in diameter or three.
And as this freezing rain falls, then the branches get heavier and heavier.
Now, visually, it's a beautiful scene because the trees are just covered in this spectacular ice.
But in terms of public safety, it's very, very dangerous because, of course, as tree branches get heavier, they begin to break and they begin to fall.
And one evening I was walking back to my dorm room on campus and it was in the middle of this freezing rain and I remember it was quite late.
And I was walking along a sidewalk, and there was a particularly large tree in front of me that had been encased in this ice.
Now, the freezing rain had stopped, so I wasn't being rained on, but the roads were slick, the sidewalk was slick, and the tree was just encased, you know, in this white ice, and it really reflected.
It shone.
The streetlights were still working, and I remember seeing just this image of just so much White reflection, you know, a frosty tree right in front of me.
And the way the tree was situated, it was just to the right side of the sidewalk that I was walking down where the tree branches went over the sidewalk and also over part of the road.
And as I was walking along this sidewalk, and I was, I don't know, maybe 40 feet from the tree, something like that, a voice said to me, Walk around that tree.
Don't walk under it.
Walk around.
And, I mean, here I was in college, not at all a religious person, not even a believer at that time.
But I heard a voice.
And I remember looking around, and like, there's nobody here.
I was by myself.
It was literally, the streets were abandoned.
I mean, you can imagine they were all covered with ice.
I mean, who's crazy enough to be walking around?
Well, I was.
And so I decided, since this voice told me to walk around this tree, I decided that I would.
Like, what's the harm, you know?
I'll just detour around this tree, so be it, right?
So I listened.
Even though I did not have faith, I did not have belief or trust in God at that time, I trusted this voice.
And so I began to walk around the tree.
And so I veered to the left.
I stepped onto the road.
And as I walked to the outside edge of where the tree branches were extending over the road, I heard a cracking sound and a massive explosion.
Massive tree branch, one of the main big limbs that might have been over a foot in diameter itself before the ice.
But also encased in ice, it split off the main trunk from a significant height.
I don't know, 30 feet, 40 feet, whatever.
It came crashing down, shattering the ice with an ice fall and branches cracking and breaking until it thudded onto the sidewalk right where I would have been.
I would have been underneath that branch.
I would have been crushed with no one around.
No one to save me, no one to see me, no one to call for help from.
No one.
I would have been probably killed.
And yet, as close as I was, and seeing it, and hearing it, and being frightened, I was at a distance of complete safety.
So I was utterly untouched.
And I knew in that moment, of course, I watched for a moment, I watched, I was in amazement.
I continued walking.
And I began to ponder what had just happened.
That something had intervened to save my life.
And that there were literal angels that were watching out for me.
Which meant that there was a purpose for me to live.
And that moment stuck with me, of course, my whole life.
And over time, I grew closer and closer to faith in the Word of God.
And over time, was called to do what I'm doing right now.
But what's interesting is that what I am doing now, sharing and teaching the Word of God, has been a common thread through my work for the last 20 years.
If you think about it, you think about my message.
What has it been?
Do not kill.
Treat all creatures and people with respect, with divinity, because all lives matter.
And even when I've talked about topics like firearms and self-defense, you notice what I've said every single time.
I don't hunt animals.
I don't kill animals.
Why?
I only shoot steel targets.
Why is that?
Because it's my religion.
It's my philosophy.
It's my belief.
I don't kill for sport.
I have compassion for all living systems.
Including plants and animals and ecosystems as well as other people.
And so the spirit of the Word of God grew within me over these years and decades.
To the point where, not long ago, something clicked.
And it was a calling, and it was an undeniable calling, and it was time.
It was time.
And then I realized why this is exactly the right time.
And by the way, Paul speaks to this.
We'll get to some of the verses from 2 Corinthians.
But why this was the right time for me to share the Word of God is a very simple answer to that.
Because over the last 10 years, I have been subjected to so much persecution and suffering.
I have been subjected to censorship and defamation and campaigns of lies waged by governments and deep state.
You know that my organizations have filed suit against the federal government.
We sued the Department of Defense.
We sued the Department of State.
We sued officials like Alejandro Mayorkas.
We sued over collusion of deep state censorship and punitive targeting of myself and my companies because I've been persecuted over all these years.
And I realized that I could not understand at all what the Word of God was saying without going through that persecution.
I could not read these words from Paul and make sense of them until I had lived through a tiny little slice of what Paul himself endured.
Because when he says he has been persecuted, he has been attacked, he has been defamed.
How can you know what that means unless you've lived it in some way yourself?
Well I've lived it my friends.
I've lived it in spades.
And so The Word of God and the teachings of the Apostles, Paul included, are now personal to me.
And although, of course, I don't have his background as a Bible scholar or a scholar of the old scrolls of the Torah and so on, and I can't read and speak Hebrew, but I have another modern day experience that but I have another modern day experience that is parallel to what Paul endured.
And so in the modern day, because I'm called to this and because the Word of God resonates with what I have been teaching this entire time, natural food, God's molecules, preventing disease, rejecting man's synthetic toxins and toxic rejecting man's synthetic toxins and toxic medicines and the jabs and the false authority of the fake government and all of these things.
Because of these parallels, God calls me to teach His Word today in this era using our words in our time.
Thank you.
And if you feel so called to share the Word of God in our time with your people, and if you are willing to humble yourself before God, and you are willing to pursue this task, this calling, In honoring God, honoring what He demands of us, then you too are qualified.
No one can disqualify you from the earthly realm because only God qualifies you.
You see, when you are in alignment with God, you are qualified.
And when you have shared these experiences of persecution, then suddenly it resonates with you.
So now we get to 2 Corinthians, the words of Paul, chapter 2, verse 14.
Now thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph in Christ, and through us diffuses the fragrance of his knowledge in every place.
That's a beautiful saying.
I'm kind of curious about the original word of fragrance.
I'm not sure what that was, but he's talking about all the different flavors of the teachings of God in all the different places into which it is diffused.
In other words, it is distributed.
The teaching of Christ is not centrally controlled, and it's not centrally authorized by the state.
It works through all kinds of different people in all kinds of different places.
It's a beautiful thing.
Verse 15, For we are to God the fragrance of Christ among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing.
To the one, we are the aroma of death leading to death and to the other, the aroma of life leading to life.
You see, because of what we stand against, which is Satanism and destruction, And then because of what we stand for, which is life and light and truth and righteousness.
He continues, and who is sufficient for these things?
He's asking.
He's like, who's qualified to share the word of God?
Right?
Verse 17, for we are not as so many peddling the word of God.
And there are different versions for the word peddling.
But I'll use that version.
We're not peddling the Word of God.
In other words, we are not sidewalk salesmen with cheap trinkets of the Word of God.
He continues, but as of sincerity, but as from God, we speak in the sight of God in Christ.
You see, that when we live it, when we speak it, when God speaks through us and uses us as vessels to share His Word, then...
We are authentic.
We are genuine.
Then we are qualified to share the Word of God.
Now, in chapter 3, he talks about other qualifications for being someone who shares the Word of God.
And this is funny because he's talking about...
He's asking...
The other religious leaders, like, does he, Paul, does he need to produce letters of recommendation?
It's funny to hear his words.
I really admire the writings of Paul.
It's just brilliant.
He says, do we begin again to commend ourselves, or do we need, as some others, epistles of commendation to you?
Now, epistles are like formal letters.
And it reminds me of the word in Espanol, which is apostille, right?
Apostille is like an official seal from the state.
So in English, the word is epistles, E-P-I-S-T-L-E-S. Epistles of commendation to you or letters of commendation from you, he asks.
You are our epistle written in our hearts.
What he's saying is you, the congregation, you are our letters of recommendation.
You, your existence.
He continues, Known and read by all men, clearly you are an epistle of Christ, ministered by us.
Us, he's meaning the leaders of the church.
Written not with ink, but by the Spirit of the living God.
Not on tablets of stone, but on tablets of flesh.
That is of the heart.
Can you hear the power of his words?
Wow!
What he's saying is that we don't need letters written in ink because you, the living embodiment of the teachings of this church, this community of the church, this ministry, you are the living proof that we are messengers of the spirit of the living God.
Your existence here, those are the only letters of recommendation that we need, you see?
Just powerful.
And he continues, And we have such trust through Christ toward God.
Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think of anything as being from ourselves, but our sufficiency is from God.
Now, see, what he's saying here is that very often the words that we speak are Are just given to us by God.
And this is for many of us who have ever said that, you know, I just finished a podcast or I just finished a sermon and it was so powerful and I could feel the Spirit of the Lord just moving through me.
The words were just given to me.
I can't even take credit for those words because they didn't come from my mind.
They didn't come from my creativity.
It's not me.
It's Him.
It's Him moving through me.
And when you've had that experience, and perhaps many of you have in your own expressions of creation, maybe you're an artist, maybe you're a writer, maybe you're a musician, whatever the case may be, you've no doubt had those moments of the spirit of creation moving through you to where you can take no credit for it.
Right?
I can't tell you how many times as a musician myself, That words have come to me or music has come to me for which I take no credit.
Can't.
Because I know right up front, that wasn't me.
All that happened there, that was just me allowing Him to move through me.
Allowing, opening up and saying, God, give me the words.
God, give me the notes.
God, give me the message.
And that happens so often.
It happens...
For myself, by the way, that kind of process has become the norm, not the exception.
It's like...
It's why when you hear my sermons or you hear my podcasts, they are not scripted.
How could they be?
Because I have no idea what's going to enter.
I have no idea what's going to come.
I may have a starting point, like today I have a starting point.
I know we're going to talk about 2 Corinthians here in chapter 4, we're about to get to.
I know that.
Yeah, I've got a couple of bullet points.
I may have a title in mind, I have a theme in mind, and that's it.
And from there, what happens next?
That's God's wish more than my own.
I'm just a vessel.
And this is what Paul is saying.
So let's just back up again, 2 Corinthians 3, verse 4.
And we have such trust through Christ toward God, not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think of anything as being from ourselves, but our sufficiency is from God.
And then continuing, who also made us sufficient as ministers of the new covenant, not of the latter, but But of the Spirit.
For the letter kills, he says, but the Spirit gives life.
Wow.
Wow.
Now, I think what he means by that, this is my interpretation.
Clearly, he's saying that a letter cannot make you a minister, right?
Or, nor can a government stamp on apostille, nor can a government license, right?
That's what I'm saying.
The letter kills.
The procedural approval by some central authority, that kills.
That is destructive.
But the Spirit gives life.
So it's the Spirit of God that makes us ministers.
That's what Paul says.
It's the Spirit of God that makes us, quote, sufficient as ministers.
No letter can do that.
And by the way, no letter can take an evil person and make that person a minister by decree, by dictate.
The government can't come along and just say, you know, grant, okay, this person's a minister now because we say so.
Well, what if that's an evil person?
What if that's a boastful person?
What if that's a sinning person who is sinning now?
Not just in the past for which forgiveness was given, And humility was demonstrated after whatever passed because every person has sinned.
I'm talking about someone who is an active sinner right now today.
Who is just a horrible person, a boastful person, braggadocious and arrogant and saying that they're better than you and their church is bigger than your church and they have more money than you and they have a fancier house and fancier clothes and fancy rings and fashion purses and all this nonsense.
No letter of permission can make that person a minister of God.
Isn't that great?
That's great!
So, and now skipping ahead just a little bit to chapter 4, verse 5.
For we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord.
And ourselves, your bondservants, for Jesus' sake.
So again, he's saying the same thing, that we are vessels for the intention of the word of Christ moving through us.
He continues, So what is he saying?
He has shined a light through our hearts to give the knowledge of God.
Or the glory of God manifested through Jesus Christ.
You see, it's actually, this isn't complicated.
There's a lot of language, you know, throughout the Bible, obviously, that's really complex.
This is not one of those.
This is very straightforward.
It is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shown in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God.
Right?
And And so that applies to you if you are sharing the Word of God with one person or two people or a hundred or a million.
If you are authentic, if you are called to this task, if you are authentic in your dedication to the Word of God and if you are humble and if you accept in your spirit The presence of God in our life and in our world and the miracles of creation all around us, then you are qualified to share the Word of God.
You know, even before I began these sermons, many months ago, you may have, if you followed any of my other work, my pre-sermon work, you would have heard me say that, I was talking about the fact that I do not attend a church.
I don't go to somebody's church, you know, somebody else's church, right?
And throughout my life, although as a child I did attend some church services from time to time, but as an adult I never regularly attended any church service.
What I said, though, about that is that every day I walk in nature, every single day, This is something that I do almost without fail.
I mean, in a given year, 365 days, I might miss two days because of severe thunderstorms or like a torrential downpour of rain or sometimes insanely cold temperatures that are uncharacteristic for Texas.
That's happened a couple of times.
But by and large, I'm walking in nature.
And for me, this is a very spiritual experience.
And this is also a time when I ask for God's guidance and when I give thanks to God.
And this is a time when I'm walking with Jesus.
And what I've said before is that I see the miracles of God all around me as I'm walking through nature or as I'm gardening or as I'm working in the laboratory, by the way.
When I'm doing food science, I see the miracles of God expressed through the molecules of the food.
My experience of walking with God in my life is a constant reminder.
It's observing God in so many things all the time.
Here's an example.
Right now, I bought a pear tree, a bare root pear tree, many months ago.
And I planted it in the ground and I thought I did a great job putting soil around the roots and spreading the roots out just right.
And then I watered this pear tree with some very special water that I have pumped from a pond on the property.
And so this water is imbued with all the nutrients that come from the fish that live in the pond.
And so this is actually like...
Like fish pond water, which is more nutritious for plants than just city water, let's say.
So I have a special setup where I can pump the pond water to several of these trees.
And I pump water to this tree.
And it started out, it arrived with a few leaves.
Not many, because a tree going through a bare root transplantation is going through quite a lot of shock.
And it lost most of its leaves within the first two weeks after I planted it.
And then after that, it seemed to be completely dormant.
And I thought, I was so saddened because this happens to be a giant, I think it's a Giant Korean, like Asian pear tree.
And I'm a big fan of Asian pears, by the way.
So I had purchased, this is a very special tree.
This is actually also an expensive tree.
But I was very saddened by what I thought was this tree dying.
And I didn't know why.
Why is this tree dying?
What?
Huh.
What have I done wrong?
Because, you know, good soil, good water, protection, I had a little cage around it and everything.
What have I done wrong?
And because I care about all living systems, it brought me sadness to see this tree apparently die.
And of course, I also wanted the fruit, the Asian pears, you know, one day, however many years that takes.
Yeah, I would love to have fresh Asian pears, right?
Well, I watched it for months.
I watched it for months.
And as of a couple weeks ago, and it's been through much of the very hot summer of Texas, and I figured this tree is done.
It's gone.
And I'll just pull it up in the fall, and I'll plant.
I'll just get a potted pear tree and replace it in the fall.
But I kept watering it just in case.
And wouldn't you know it, About three days ago, all up and down the branches, and this is about a six foot tall tree.
Again, it's a very expensive bare root tree.
All up and down the branches, it's beginning to bud new leaves.
And I thought, oh my goodness!
This is alive.
This tree is alive.
And it's coming back.
It was like a resurrection of a tree here.
I mean, it's been months.
It's been like four months.
I thought for sure it's dead, but it's coming back to life.
And watching this, I thought, once again, this is a miracle of God working through this tree.
And maybe it sounds simple or silly, But to me, when I'm witnessing this, it's a miracle of God.
How can this tree die and come back to life?
You know?
It was dead.
It had no leaves for months.
And now the leaves are coming back.
Where did it get the energy to do that?
I don't know.
By the way, some grasshoppers, and we're trying to eat the leaves, so I mixed up a little spray with some neem oil and some clean, non-fragrance dish soap.
Mix that up with water, spraying it now every night because I can't let the grasshoppers eat these precious, precious leaves that are coming out of this tree.
And so I'm watching this tree come to life now, and it's joy.
It's joy!
It's like I can't replicate that joy by purchasing anything.
I can't replicate that joy by having a fancy car or a boat or a jet ski or a cruise ship vacation or anything.
I can't replicate that joy because there's so much joy in watching nature perform its own miracles.
I'm sorry if you think I'm going on too much about this, but To witness the miracles of God every single day all around us, it infuses in me a feeling of incredible love and protection.
To know that everywhere we look in the natural world, God is with us.
Everywhere we look.
Because if we look into man's artificial world and we go into a city, an overbuilt city where they've destroyed nature, well, if a bridge starts to break down and die because of lack of maintenance or something, does the bridge heal itself and come back to life and sprout new bolts and connections?
No.
That never happens.
The bridge just deteriorates and dies and eventually falls down is what's happening all across America.
But in God's world, and remember I've talked about God's economy in previous sermons, in God's world, it gives you back more.
It creates.
It produces.
It regenerates.
It resurrects.
So we can see the theme of the resurrection of Christ in much smaller ways, but significant ways all around us, in our own bodies, with our own healing, with the regeneration of organs like the liver, for example, or with the healing of nerves and the restoration of nerve function, or the healing of muscles and tendons or skin, or the healing of brains or bones or whatever the case may be.
There is healing that is infused in us.
And it mirrors the healing and the resurrection that we witness in the world around us, in the natural world.
Like right now I also have a volunteer cantaloupe plant that just started growing in a place that I did not expect.
I very nearly ran over it one day in my ranch buggy.
Whoa, that's some kind of melon!
You know, and looking at it, that's a cantaloupe.
And so now I'm watering it.
It's like, effortlessly, God provided food.
I don't even know, did I even have cantaloupe seeds?
I don't remember having cantaloupe seeds anywhere near that area.
So...
Probably maybe a squirrel got some of the seeds in my compost pile where I had put cantaloupe and then the squirrel moved it around and then it ended up in this spot and that spot just happened to catch water and then it sprouted and then it grew and then now it's like, you know, 10 feet across.
I'm like, God provides.
There are miracles every day all around us.
All we have to do is open our eyes and see them.
And then, in order to share the Word of God, all we have to do is allow those miracles to flow through us.
That's what Paul is speaking about.
And I feel sorry for someone who can't see God in the world around them right now, every day, in some way.
If you can't see God, then you are truly blind.
Because God is working through us, and with us, and around us, constantly.
In every blade of grass, in every tree, in every honeybee pollinator, in our own bodies, in every heartbeat, in everything, in every sprout that sprouts, in every drop of water.
Water is a miracle of God.
By the way, did you know that water is not just H2O? Did you know that?
Did you know that you can't just look at A bowl of water under a microscope and see a bunch of standalone H2O molecules.
Did you know it doesn't work that way?
It's not just H2O. Water is always flowing.
It's releasing and reforming chemical bonds constantly in a dance, a celebration of the living.
Liquid water is an expression of God.
That's why water has amazing properties that other substances do not have, such as the fact that it expands when it turns into a solid.
When it freezes, it gets bigger.
Most things get smaller when they freeze, like almost every metal, for example.
Water gets bigger when it freezes.
How is that possible?
It doesn't contract, it expands when it gets colder.
Because of that, ice floats.
And because ice floats, then oceans can remain warmer under the ice as the ice is on top, but it's liquid underneath.
And so that allows aquatic ecosystems to function.
And I mean, this gets deep because there are amazing, miraculous properties.
And remember how I've said that it's the expression of God that works through the table of elements and through all the laws of chemistry.
If you're a chemist and you've studied the laws of chemistry, did you know you've been studying God's laws the entire time?
If you're a physicist and you've been studying the table of elements, you've been studying God's atomic laws, by the way.
Oh, the electron spin states.
Yeah, who came up with that?
God did.
Oh, the outer shell of SPDF or whatever.
Oh, the orbital patterns.
Yeah.
God's laws.
That's what you've been studying.
You've been trying to figure out how God's mind works.
Or if you're an astronomer and you're studying, oh, the planets and the stars and the speed of light and the lensing effect of light around distant stars and, you know, all these things.
All you're studying is It's God's creation on a larger scale.
The chemist, the botanist, the physicist, the astronomer, and even the philosopher.
What are you studying?
You're studying God's laws, God's creation.
Because he expresses himself through all of these things.
And sometimes he expresses his will through us.
And when we allow that to happen, then we become vessels for sharing the Word of God.
And thank God that no government is required to license that, nor can any government take that away.
Because, of course, God sits above all other authorities, including governments, including worlds.
God sits above it all because He is the authority.
And so I'll end this by quoting 2 Corinthians 10, verse 3.
This is big picture stuff.
Paul sprinkles this kind of thing throughout his writings.
He says, He's saying that as messengers of the Word of God, we are in a cosmic battle.
That's beyond the body, beyond the flesh, beyond the material.
He continues, verse 4, See, he's saying we're at war with the forces of evil and destruction and deception that are Satan.
And he even continues, but verse 5 again, casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of God.
And the word captivity there, I would rephrase that as alignment.
Bringing every thought into alignment to the obedience of Christ, which is the rules of God of the universe, of the cosmos.
So, Alignment to the obedience of Christ or the obedience of God.
And being ready to punish all disobedience when your obedience is fulfilled.
Basically saying, to fight against that which is in opposition to the Word of God and the laws of God that govern our cosmos.
So, big picture stuff today here, folks.
I will never give you a small-minded sermon, that's for sure.
We are going to cover the big issues boldly.
We're going to have a big picture perspective far beyond ourselves or our very limited lives, but a cosmic perspective of what's at stake and the power of God as the Creator and how He moves through us and how we can serve in the defense of life and light, truth, righteousness by allowing ourselves to be vessels for God's teachings.
So it is a humble but important calling to be someone who chooses to share the Word of God.
And again, it doesn't matter the scale of it.
It could be with one other person.
It can be with a family member.
It can be with a friend.
It can be with anonymous people in an online video.
However you are called to share the Word of God, Let that guide you in your actions.
Just as I was guided by the voice of that angel one day, or I would have been dead decades ago, that guidance can not only save your life physically, that guidance can save you, your soul.
You can be saved by listening to the plan that God has laid out for you.
And we are all blessed To live in His presence, to live in His cosmos, to live in what He has constructed for us so that we may explore it and we may gain the knowledge and experience and wisdom of what we are, who we are, where we came from, why it matters, and where we are headed next.
This is a cosmos of miracles and we are living miracles of God.
And We can't help but be expressions of God if we simply allow ourselves, allow Him to move through us in whatever way that is for you.
So I'll wrap it up there.
It's a little bit on the long side here.
I apologize for that.
But often, as you know, when we get into these issues, it's not a subtle thing or a simple thing.
But I deeply appreciate your support for our mission.
And for our community here, all of you listening or joining us in our community in what we are.
We are a church.
We are a ministry.
Just the fact that we are together and sharing this and learning from this and supporting each other.
We are a ministry in the most holy, most authentic definition of what that means.
We are sharing the Word of God and we are sharing the seeing of God, the recognition of God in everything around us.
So live God daily.
And let God live through you.
Let Christ live through you.
And then your life will be filled with miracles.
It cannot be otherwise.
So thank you for listening.
I'm Mike Adams.
God bless you all.
And if you'd like to hear the other sermons, I've got a hundred in this set.
Just go to the same place where you heard this sermon, and you'll find the others there.
And there's much more to come, because there are more mysteries to unravel and much more wisdom to gain.
So God bless you all.
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