welcome to real Christianity mission is to bring the church back to the Bible my name is Dale Partridge and I'm the president of relearn. Org and Reformation Seminary the premise of the show is simple the culture is growing darker the church is in need of sound Doctrine and many Christians are hungry for the truth join me here each week as we look to scripture and discover what it really mean to be a Christian
welcome to the show we are finally doing audio and video if you're watching this episode on YouTube welcome we are finally getting these things back in video format last week we talked about Romans chapter 1 verses 18 through 23 we learned the difference between General Revelation and special Revelation General Revelation is sufficient to give Humanity knowledge of God's existence is sufficient to condemn Humanity because they know that God exists but it's not sufficient to reveal the Plan of Salvation this is why we need special Revelation special Revelation is the act of God revealing himself through scripture through Christ revealing the day of redemption The Plan of Salvation so we need General Revelation and spiritual Revelation General Revelation allows us to know that God exists in the things that are made we learn that
 sweets and then we know that special Revelation is the gospel revealed in Jesus Christ now these distinctions are important because we learned that ultimately Humanity has no excuse for the rejection of God because God can be seen his eternal attributes even in the things that are made God himself really reveals himself through all these things in the sense the governing of the Galaxy through the seasons through that you know I said last week the evaporative water systems that the functionality of our body all these things can be realized from our brains to understand that there is a Creator who is wise and eternal and all-powerful and as a result for this there is no excuse for atheism that's essentially what Romans chapter 1 18 through 23 tells us is that there is no excuse for atheism we also learned that
 I want Humanity reject God we know that Humanity understand that there is a God and the reason we know that is because of the thousands of religions that exist and also just this act of worship that we see in everyday life we see people that are worshipping from you no new age worship to religious worship through also the reality of we worship our Idols we worship money we worship materialism we worship sex we worship whatever it may be but we worship where worshipping people see humanity is not unwilling to worship we're just unwilling to worship the one true God. That's really what we have to get our heads wrapped around and Paul says in Romans 1:22 223 is claiming to be wise they became fools and the exchange the glory of The Incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man kind of birds four-footed animals and crawling creatures
 parts of the next two verses are going to be the verses that we're focusing on which is verses 24 and 25 and he says therefore God gave them over in the loss of their hearts so that their bodies would be Dishonored among them for the exchange the truth of God for a lie and worship and serve the creature rather than the Creator who is blessed forever amen okay so this passage really speaks of God's consequences for their rejection of him and their false worship they're exchanging the worship for the Creator to the creature and this is speaking of the consequences and the punishment as a result of those things so we're going to learn of God's response to Rebellion we're going to learn what God does to those individuals who reject God and worship idols in as results and we're going to see in next week's episode where I talk about
 content we get some context for this passage in the following passes the really linked together that the content of this passage is really the Catalyst for rampant sexual immorality so this this passes were going to learn about today will really be the Catalyst of why humanity is indulging in rampant sexual immorality in other words you can see the connection between the rejection of God and a sexual or lifestyle of sexual sin now before I begin I just wanted to briefly mentioned a couple things as you guys know I were Ministry and has a few things that we do as a Ministry one of them is I read books and so this book is brand-new it just came out in the last 30 days it's called the manliness of Christ in in a world is absolutely bankrupt of biblical masculinity this book will really help men restore what it means to be a man and we look at that because we know that
 Christ is the ultimate man if you hate masculinity that you're going to hate Jesus because Jesus is the most masculine men man that ever lived the Earth you can pick up a copy of this little book you can see it if you watch it on video it's not that big it's 4 x 6 it's about seventy or eighty Pages you can read it in about an hour and we also have an accompanying study guide that you can use for individuals or small groups like a men's group and you can pick up that as well for us as a couple extra bucks you can buy both of those at our website at relearn. Org forward slash man again that's relearn. Org forward slash name all right let's let's start today with verse 24 32 one more time it says therefore God gave them over in the loss of their hearts to impurity so that their bodies would be Dishonored among them now the word therefore could be translated as a result as a result
 the rebellion and idolatry God handed them over to this lifestyle of self-serving this lifestyle of sexual sin is we're going to see Paul qualifies that desire that he says that he handed over the Loess are headed over them over to the loss of their hearts to impurity and so Paul is saying that because of the rejection of God and their desire for idolatry that the Lord handed over their hearts to be ruled and not by the natural Grace of the human conscience and the conviction or of the Holy Spirit but to be ruled by their emotions to be ruled by their hearts we know that the heart is deceitful among all other things it cannot be trusted I always tell people when they say follow your heart at the garbage don't follow your heart follow the word of God that is what we need to be focusing on now this is not saying
 that God is handing them over in the sense that he is causing them to be more sinful no God simply withdrew his grace upon their life and as a result in this is a result of their rejection of him and idolatry so one of the most fearful consequences that God could ever inflicted upon a person is to leave them to themselves and that's really too no longer intervene in their life through the convictions their conscience or through you know that I would say the restraints of common Grace but to leave them into who they are I think about Jacob and Esau Jacob these are twin brothers and God allows Esau to be Esau but he does not allow Jacob to remain as Jacobs Esau he allows him to permit him to go and do and seek his own desires and he he pulls his presents away from Esau his life but he doesn't allow Jacob to remain as Jacob Jacob
 sanctify Jacob has grown Jacob is his brought further into the truth in the presence of the Lord God convince him of Cindy discipline to me shows him that he loves him through his righteous conviction of his hearts into this distancing from East off and I bring it in close of Jacob and we see that clearly in the scriptures now we know that we're not going to see this happen to Christian to the since we're not going to see an abandonment of God in our lives because Philippians 1:6 says and I am sure of this that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion of the day of Jesus Christ Jesus himself actually talks about this idea when he's in John chapter 10 verses 28 he speaking to eternal security of Believers into this idea that he's never going to force a cuz he's never going to leave us he's never going to allow us to perish this is a really great passage of scripture for those people who don't believe in the preservation of the Saints who don't believe that or who believe that you can lose your salvation
 are you can walk away from God it is not true cuz Jesus says so right here verse 28 and chapter 10 of Johnny says I give them eternal life and they will never perish and no one will snatch them out of my hand and so for those who have rejected God the existence of God they're they're taking that atheistic route they traded over to Idols God removes his sin restraining Grace from their life and that being said God does not ever pull back completely from sinful Humanity if he did society would cease to exist at the illogical speaking this is really getting an idea of common Grace basically got in his love for the church always made some type of degree of control and Order among the lost as a way to restrain evil in the world to protect his church to continue his purposes in the world
 you guys may have seen a William golding's famous book Lord of the Flies and this is a clear representation and demonstrating the savagery of human beings obviously throat showing through children and not that a specific narrative without government if you have no governance if you have no restraint we turn into absolute Savages and that's kind of the same concept that we see in common Grace unfortunately self-love is blinding and he people think that you Manatee is genuinely good in this is a false way to think what we don't understand is that humanity is treacherously evil and that even the good works that are permitted to occur are only happening because of God's Restraint of their sinful nature for the sake of his will and for the church in the world through, great doctor sandstorms once said quote common Grace means god not only restrains the full manifestation of the evil
 Genesis of the human heart but also on a more positive note and Abel's the non-Christian to perform Deeds of relative good and quote so this handing over to the loss of their hearts to impurity isn't without purpose of a text says that's a purpose quad it says so that their bodies would be Dishonored among them okay he's saying that essentially I'm going to read this passage to you just one more time so you guys can grass this therefore God gave them over in the loss of their hearts to impurity so that their bodies would be Dishonored among them one Theologian said heathenism always leaves it stamp on the body another words spiritual sin always transmitted to physical paint our sinful actions are eventually always going to result in physical painful consequences are emotions
 Parts on our bodies and there's a reason for the mountain of human misery related to sexual misconduct okay from disease and despair from suffering and suicide we know that the dishonoring of the body for sexual immorality is a painful way to live we know that and as a pertains to the forthcoming contexts of not just sexual immorality What specifically homosexuality this act of God to again purposefully permit them to dishonor their bodies goes far beyond just physical decimation what you got to pay attention to hear God's withdraw from their lives to this emotional governments to this desire to follow their hearts to the removal of a common grace to the removal of the conscience and the conviction of the conscience in the removal of the dictation at work direction of the holy spirit that leads to sexual immorality specifically homosexualities we're going to see in the following
 versus he's talking about this specifically how God's withdraw is because of their Disobedience and their their rejection of him and their idolatry and as a result he hands them over to the desires of their conscience he hands them over to the desires of their mind and he he allows them to dishonor their bodies so that there's a purpose there that their bodies would be Dishonored among them in in a sense this isn't just physical detriment this isn't just physical pain the gods inflicted upon them and it says it's a curse of reproductive suicide and in really the end of their entire family heritage it's not just just physical pain physical since it's actually really a reproductive suicide in the end of their entire family line in a very real way God you backed out of a person's life eliminating
 the conviction of sin and willingly allows them to pervert their own bodies and their preferred their own sexual acts and what's happening here as a pertains to homosexuality is really the removal of their completes progeny it allows the progeny to Parrish and for example if my great-great grandfather decided to live a homosexual lifestyle I wouldn't be here right now we need to understand the connection between living a homosexual lifestyle and not just the physical element of it actually affecting us physically or our decision to send but it's actually a decision to end your progeny
 it's 2-2 to remove all of the future lineage that could come through your reproductive act and so when we remove all of our kind of modern takes our political takes for just a moment and we look at what happens when a person trade the biblical design the traditional design of heterosexuality for a homosexual lifestyle in a very real way they are eliminating the reproductive capabilities and abolishing their entire family line and so this is something that is happening here when got hands people over to their own desires and as a result of their own simplest a result into a lifestyle of sexual sin or homosexuality it is not just a sin against them but it's actually a sin decimating the rest of their family line so yes
 God walking away will cause pain to the body that's absolutely sure it's going to cause disease and emotional emotional Despair and suffering and depression all those things with the most painful result is the multi-generational destruction the devastates not only themselves but the many generations that will never follow as a result so we have to see the sin of sexuality in the Sin of homosexuality is going much further than just the individual I think of Psalm 34 16 which states the face of the Lord is against those who do evil to cut off the memory of them from the earth or some 3728 again these are not direct references to to this but this is it kind of the general principle of Psalm 37 28 that says for the lord loves Justice he will not forsake his Saints they are preserved forever but the children of the wicked shall be cut off so again we often look at homosexuality is this the sinful simple
 simple decision that affects only the individuals that are partaking in it but the Bible sees it as one of the consequences of God's desertion from a person's life truly it is an Affliction of absence did you hear that for a second sexual sin sexual lifestyle is it in specifically homosexual lifestyle is really a result of rejection of God I worship you have sell for worshipping of idolatry God pulling away so that there would be a dishonoring of their bodies and not just their bodies but it would actually as a result of their own simple choices this is God doing this but it's God's pulling away they would be decimated their entire spiritual or their entire physical lineage because they sacrifice their reproductive capabilities when they go into a homosexual lifestyle rather than a heterosexual lifestyle so this is this is important deep stuff here that we can't pass over self Paul again tells us that they will be left of the state for a particular reason
 it's a sin 2 verse 25 it says because this is the ground because the cause the cause of claws because they exchanged the truth of God for a lie and worship and served the creature rather than Creator who is blessed forever amen now if we turned just for a second over to Romans and we look at that house and I'm going to read in the ESV and we're either because he can you want to have that context of the homosexual stuff that I just spoke about if you read 26 and 27 I'll read them for you real quick it's for this reason again it's this line of cosmic closet so it was there for because for this reason so we're getting this connection here in Burke 26 is for this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions for win for their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to Nature and the men likewise gave up natural relation
 with women and were consumed with passion for one another men committing Shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty of their are now we're going to talk about that next episode but that is the context of this is all kind of connected to you and you need to understand this is what the Bible teaches again verse 25 but they exchanged the truth of God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator who is blessed forever amen the offer is really three reasons for God's Exodus from a person's life number one is the exchange the truth of God for Ally at least people who have been handed over to sexual immorality and sexual impurity they've substitute of the evidence of God that's so plainly seen creation for fiction okay they gave what was due to God to Idols they gave their worship the things that were made include themselves including their own desires including
 carved images in and natural creation and it was not only that they did not one thing I want to make clear cuz it says here and verse 25 it says the exchange the truth of God for a lie so this means that it's not that they didn't know the truth you can exchange the truth if you don't have it no they had the truth they knew the truth and exchanged it anyways and this is what the whole 8223 so I can but they know that God exists the world yells and screams that there's a Creator but they knew the truth of any turn on all powerful God they were ejected him anyway and this is why we have no excuse for atheism but namely they preferred lies a preferred lies because serving life permits them to maintain their sinful lifestyle and this is what we know it because John chapter 3 verse tells us exactly why people don't come to Christ and they don't come to a theistic view of God
 or they love God and respect God they love their sin and why he says he reverses Chapter 3 of John 4:19 4:20 this is the Judgment that the light has come into the world and Men loved Darkness rather than light for their deeds were evil for everyone who does evil hates the lights and does not come to the lights for fear that his deeds will be exposed okay as a result we get to Point number two of that three-point list I was talking about so they worship the creation or they worship the creature that's Point number to the first thing is they exchange the truth of God for Life number to is they worshipped the creature okay Humanity has within itself the intrinsic impulse to worship you can go all over the world and you're going to find churches and synagogues and worshipped in temples and places because we have an intrinsic desire to worship this is the reason why there's thousands of religions in the world we have an intrinsic desire to worship the impulse of worship is given to us
 maintain our relationship with God yet we have perverted it in our sin but that is why we have intrinsic desire to worship now people worship all types of things that people worshipped money people worship sell people wash their emotions people worship Comfort but people also worship other things and Paul saying that they worship their projected the truth of God they redirected their worship tour the creature toward treated things that I live here in Sedona Arizona if you don't know this is the new age capital of the world and there are people here that are worshiping the moon and worshipping the sun worshipping the universe and are praying to the rocks and making sacrifices at temples and this is probably the closest thing you can get to International Ministry in the United States is here in Sedona Arizona and if you go over to India you're going to see people actually bowing down before things that were carved with human hands and some people do this stuff right they absolutely hand over their worship to create a thing so ultimately people
 have fabricated fabricated a God for themselves a guy that they want so that they can worship without the responsibility of sin and that's just that's what they want to do they want to be able to live without it wouldn't be God themselves they want to dictate what is right and wrong but it dition to this Paul says they don't just worship actually served the creature that is worship the creature they served it and this is you know this is interesting because they worked for these things these creatures that instead of the Creator they work they Labor Day slaved for these things that were created which makes no sense this is essentially full-blown delusion and it tells us the damage that has been done to us and since that's how delusional people have got because of sin they will worship things that they made with her own hands they will worship a rock and worship His Son they will worship the moon they will worship the universe all these things are
 created yet we are worshiping worshiping that because we are delusional and we love our sin so we're truly when will we see that's where truly unable to come to Christ on around we do need that special revelation of faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of Christ we need the gospel sin has really utterly destroyed our distorted and destroyed and perverted the minds of the human in our hearts and our souls are dead were dead and trespasses and sins we see that in the fusions to second link and more importantly the point I was making here is that God's will is it his creatures worship him and him alone we know that we have a jealous God Exodus 34:14 which reiterates the first commandment which is no other gods but he says for you shall worship no other God for the Lord whose name is jealous is a jealous God so God is just unwilling to share his worship or share his glory with another person with another Bean or with anything
 so he alone is worthy of our worship and our servitude so which leads me to really to the conclusion of this episode here for you just a handful of points to be as we close out of your number one humanity is not unwilling to worship we actually are willing to worship we're just not willing to worship the one true God that that's really the lesson that we learn here the rejection of God the phone number to the rejection of God will lead to an abandonment from God not fully but pulling away is light from your life as a lost person and an onslaught as a result an onslaught of sinful desires will flood into your life and you will have no more pain to your conscience will be seared at the conviction of common Grace will move away and an onslaught of spiritual desires for wickedness will come upon your life
 the manufacturing of a version of God whether I can physically a carp Shrine or an emotional you know definition of God that you wanted to produce is idolatry Jesus said that we must worship God in spirit and in truth and to any perversion or production of a God that doesn't align with the god of scriptures is idolatry and it's not going to lead to a presence of God is going to lead the withdrawing of God upon a person's life and handing them over to their sin phone number for and I want to make this point clear is it while I do believe that the Lord will not permit this to occur in a full extent to a Christian to be completely abandoned because he knows that he will preserve us and sanctify us for those that who are his I will say I do believe the Lord permits Christians to experience a form of God's absence from their lives as a way for the consequences of their Sims of their sins to cause them to come back to the way of
 their master and so I'll give you an example of this if someone is a Christian is walking in ramp it's in God will maybe pull back allow them to experience the consequences of their sin so that they will springboard back to him as a result of the conviction of the holy spirit is in this happens all the time with our children we come walk back away for children let them experience the consequences of their foolishness and then we know that we will hopefully see the conviction and bring them back in so again a born-again Believer is going to be guarded from complete abandonment but we are still capable of bringing this upon ourselves significant and painful consequences when we follow sin instead of following Christ William Barclay once wrote there is a Redemptive purpose said that stand behind the wrath of God by letting men and women go their own way
 God is Not Just punishing them but is also allowing them to see The Emptiness of life without him and quote so ultimately you guys we have to be vigilant we have to be vigilant over our own lives we have to be careful on the way that we walk we have to be pursuing a holy a lifestyle that really is quick to repent of your sin and we should be hating sin Romans 12:1 reminds us do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind that by the testing you have our by testing you may discern what is the will of God what is good acceptable and perfect so this is our way we are to walk in a way that we are constantly Vigilant over our own life and also this gives us again an understanding of how the world is so lost why is the world so Loth why is the world allowing to get dark
 are the center to get darker and darker and darker when we know that when people reject God when people trade the worship is due to the Creator to the creature that got hands them over to a conviction list lifestyle that leads into sexual immorality that leads into a way of life that that produces sexual lifestyle Sims like homosexuality which is not just a present painful issue and decision of that individual but really A decimation of their entire family line this is this is kind of spiritual
 the theological anthropological issues that are going on behind the scenes that the Lord permitted us to see partially In this passage that we find here in Romans so I'm not no thank you guys for listening to this episode of real Christianity I hope that you guys are enjoying these episodes especially that they are here available now on video If you haven't subscribed to our podcast on iTunes or Spotify you can do that also if you haven't subscribed to our YouTube channel you can find us where we learn. Org you are on YouTube and we are constantly trying to create biblical and Theological tools to increase literacy in the church we have a church that really needs to understand sound Doctrine and that is a resource that we're continuing to offer them if you're watching this episode Again on YouTube or Instagram or Facebook or Twitter again would you subscribe follow come on board their we'd love to have you
 I on the journey in the next episode I'm going to be teaching on Romans chapter 1 verses 26 to 27 and addressing the issues we talked about dinner pertaining to homosexuality as it's presented in scripture on that note I'd like to close in prayer and we will see you guys next week father we thank you Lord that you have given us wisdom that you've given us an understanding of your word and we thank you that you have protected us and kept us close Lord for not abandoning us Lord and keeping us a consistent and convicted and Sanctified. We pray for those who don't know you that they would see you in creation or that you would bring conviction upon their spirit and save them or they would not turn to the creature but they would turn back to the Creator again thank you Lord for Paul thank you for the writings here in Romans has been a blessing to us in Jesus name amen thank you my name is Dale Partridge this is real Christianity and we will see you
 thank you for joining me on this episode of real Christianity Christianity is a listen to audio Ministry of relearn. Org our mission a tree there. Or days to bring the church back to the Bible we achieve this through strengthening Christians and biblical and Theological literacy find biblical articles podcast sermons and videos at our website at relearn. Org our team is small but our mission is large and we need your help if you'd like to support our ministry financially you can always do so at relearn. Org forward slash donate thank you again for joining me today and I hope to see you next week for another episode of real Christianity