What Is God's Heart Concerning Sexual Immorality? (Episode 29)

0:00 Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty. The whole earth is full of His glory. Welcome to Gems for the Journey, Wisdom from the Word of God. Hey, God bless you, everybody. Welcome to Gems for the Journey, Wisdom from the Word of God. And we're your hosts, Matt and Stephanie Garrity. And we're founders of River of Heaven Ministries. And we have a three-fold vision to rebuild and restore, equip and empower, and revive and heal.

0:44 Through these broadcasts, you're going to be touched, rebuilt, and restored, equipped and empowered, and revived and healed. And you're going to be functioning like never before as a kingdom man or a kingdom woman. Amen. Great to be with you today for another episode of Gems for the Journey, Wisdom from the Word of God. We'll buckle up everybody because this is going to be a very, very interesting and potentially maybe controversial podcast today. We're going to talk about what is God's heart regarding sexual immorality in the land, transgenderism, homosexuality, alternate lifestyles, if you will.

1:24 All these different definitions that come up from time to time in our society. And it's very interesting. There are a lot of people these days who say, well, I was just born this way. But my response to people when they say I was born this way is that you need to be born again. Hallelujah. Everybody thinks that, oh, this is it. I'm just going; what you're going through is deception. You're going through deception. Something happened when you were younger. Something happened that your sexuality was exploited in a way that it should not have been. And you were introduced into some type of perversity. That's oftentimes what happens.

2:06 Or there is some type of struggle with identity, and that identity is only discovered truly in your creator, in the one who created you. And so many are searching for their identity in all types of things these days. And all they're finding is hurt and pain and anguish and confusion because the fact of the matter is, beloved, the only one who can truly affirm our identity is the one who created us. And that's God. That's the Lord. Hallelujah. But we're going to talk about God's heart regarding sexual immorality today. Now, there's no question that when people are in sexual immorality, or they've repented for it and they've received Christ, and they've come out of that lifestyle, you know, God loves everyone.

2:55 He loves people. If they're in that lifestyle right now, he still loves them. If they've repented of the lifestyle and come out of it they are considered born-again believers. But what is God's heart? What is God's heart regarding sexual immorality? We know that the Old Testament is the shadows and types of what's to be fulfilled in the New Covenant, in the future. But we understand that there are principles in the Old Covenant that speak of God's heart concerning something. And interestingly enough, if you look in the Book of Numbers, chapter 24, we read about Balaam. And Balaam is a soothsayer.

3:49 There was a time, though, when he started to, I guess you could say, take up a prophetic call and embrace his destiny in God and try to come out of sorcery But something's always not quite right there. There's a mixture. Balaam had some decent prophecies at one point. He had some prophecies when the Spirit of God moved upon him. But the problem was that Balaam, it says in Scripture, even though he could not curse God's people like Balaak wanted him to, he taught Balaam how to lead God's people into destruction.

4:30 And how was that? It's very interesting. It's found the Numbers chapter 25. So we talked about Balaam in Numbers chapter 24, but in Numbers chapter 25, it says this, Now Israel remained in Acacia Grove, and the people began to commit harlotry with the women of Moab, with the Moabite women. They invited the people to sacrifice to their gods, pagan gods, and the people ate and bowed down to their gods. So Israel was joined to Baal of Peor, and the anger of the Lord was aroused against Israel. So the first thing we see here is that there is enticement.

5:12 Another area in Scripture actually says that Balaam told Balaak how to get God's people to come into idolatry, how to get God's people to come down the path of destruction. And it was with what? It was with sexual immorality. They committed harlotry with women of a pagan society. And that was the entry point, and that's attached to that idolatry. They started bowing down to their gods, and God's anger was aroused against Israel. In verse 4, it said, Then the Lord said, Take all the leaders of the people and hang the offenders before the Lord out in the sun, but the fierce anger of the Lord may turn away from Israel.

5:52 Again, we know that we fight not against flesh and blood, that God just doesn't kill people instantly in the new covenant. Jesus Christ has died for our sins; if people repent and believe in Christ, they're saved. But in the old covenant, when you engaged in sexual immorality when God said not to do something, when God said, I want my people to be pure, and they committed acts of harlotry with these women from Moab, God told Moses to destroy them. Have them all destroyed. So Moses said to the judges of Israel, Every one of you kill his men who were joined to Baal of Peor.

6:34 So the punishment for joining with a false God, especially through a sexually immoral practice, was death in the Old Testament. It was death. We know the Bible teaches that the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ. So again, Christ has become our sin substitute. He's become the sacrifice, right? He took our sin, right? He died for our sins, but this whole idea that I'm trying to bring forth an understanding about... I'm trying to bring forth today is what is God's heart on this matter though? What is God's heart concerning sexual immorality? And really, you could throw idolatry in with that. Let's go to verse six, Numbers chapter 25, verse six.

7:16 And indeed, one of the children of Israel came and presented to his brethren a Midianite woman in the sight of Moses and in the sight of all the congregation of the children of Israel who were weeping at the door of the Tabernacle of Meeting. Now, when Phinehas, the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest... So Aaron's grandson, when he saw it, rose from among the congregation and took a javelin in his hand. A javelin is a long spear. And he went after the man of Israel into the tent and thrust both of them through the man of Israel and the woman through her body. So he speared this man and woman in this tent who had committed or were committing this sex act, the sexual immoral act.

8:01 So the plague was stopped among the children of Israel, and those who died in the plague were 24,000. Look at verse 10. Then the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, Phinehas, the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron, the priest, has turned back my wrath from the children of Israel because he was zealous with my zeal among them so that I did not consume the children of Israel in my zeal. Therefore say, behold, I give to him my covenant of peace, and it shall be to him and his descendants after him a covenant of an everlasting priesthood because he was zealous for his God and did this act of atonement for the children of Israel.

8:48 Now, we know again; let's not confuse this... We don't fight against flesh and blood but against principalities, powers, rulers, spiritual hosts of wickedness in heavenly places, right? Drive out demons, right? That is found in Ephesians chapter 6. And we know that Jesus Christ made the complete atonement for everyone's sins, right? He brought back the fractured relationship that fractured relationship with Father God, everything that's been fractured has been restored, right? But look at what God says. He says that this guy Phinehas, Aaron's grandson, in the priesthood; he has turned away my wrath from the children of Israel because he was zealous with my zeal among them.

9:32 So God was commending him for taking a spear and destroying the ones that we're going to see here in a minute were responsible for starting the sexual sin in the camp of Israel. Look at verse 14 and on. Now, the name of the Israelite who was killed, who was killed with the Midianite woman was Zimri, the son of Salu, a leader of a father's house among the Simeonites. So he's from the tribe of Simeon. And the name of the Midianite woman who was killed was Cosby, the daughter of Zer. He was head of the people of a father's house in Midian. Then the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, harass the Midianites and attack them, for they harassed you with their schemes by which they seduced you in the matter of Peor and in the matter of Cosby, the daughter of a leader of Midian, their sister, who was killed in the day of the plague because of Peor.

10:33 So in other words, what started this whole thing was that there was a plan. There was a foreign plan in the Midianite camp. And we know in the book of Judges that we've got Gideon that goes against the Midianites as well, you know, and has to drive them out. And again, we know that story from the book of Judges, but there was a plan here all the way back earlier in Scripture that we read about in the book of Numbers that there was a plan, and the plan was between Balek on one side. He starts to bring these Moabite women in. But even before that, even before all these Moabite women come into the camp and things like that, what started the whole thing, what started the sexual immorality, was that there was also a plan of the Midianites, who was one of the enemies of Israel as well.

11:27 And the plan was that we just read about it here. It says that this woman, Cosbi, okay, she was the daughter of Zer, and this man, Zer, he was the head of the people of a father's house in Midian. He was a leader in Midian. And so there was this ploy, if you will, which can be likened to the enemy of God. And the Midianites were likened to the enemy of God. So there's this plan by the enemy, and then you've got Balak, who's the king of Moab, people ruling from that place of the enemy's camp, trying to entice Balam, and eventually he gets Balam to teach him how they can bring them into idolatry and bring them into immorality.

12:13 And then on the other side, you've got the Midianites, and then you've got this woman Cosbi, which was part of a ruling house in Midian, and she and this Israelite man come together. And again, so from two sides here, the enemy has a ploy to bring God's people who are separate to him into idolatry and into sexual immorality. And God says that this is such an issue, you're going to corrupt the whole camp. In other words, if we don't stop this from happening, if somebody doesn't stop this, it will destroy everyone. That's why he told Moses to destroy those people. He said everyone guilty of this should be destroyed.

12:56 And so again, in the New Covenant, we understand we don't fight against flesh and blood. We're not going to spear anyone. We're not going to murder anybody, okay? However, what are we called to do? There is a principle here that I believe the Lord is bringing forth for such a time as this, and that's this. Regarding sexual immorality, idolatry, regarding any of these things that are contrary to what the Lord has called holy, and what the Lord has called good, we need to be that Phinehas, if you will. And we need to take that javelin, that spear and thrust it through, not people.

13:40 We don't wrestle against flesh and blood, but what do we need to thrust it through? We need to thrust it through these ideologies. We must thrust it through this disgusting teaching they're trying to teach our children about. We need to thrust it through all these doctrines of demons for such a time as this. We need to thrust it through these spiritual hosts of wickedness, these spiritual rulers, these spiritual demonic powers. And how do we do that? With the Word of God. Again, the javelin is a weapon. The sword, the Word of God, is called the sword of the Lord, right? That is a weapon. Our weapon, okay, is the Word.

14:21 So what do we do? We speak the Word. We declare God's Word. We bind, and we loose. Amen? We use the sword. We use the javelin. And we destroy the works of darkness. And I believe that the Lord is raising up a people, many individuals like Phinehas, if you will, in this time, who are not just going to stand around when they see sexual immorality. They're not just going to stand around when they see this stuff going on. And by the way, hate to break this to everybody, but this was going on where? Not just in the pagan societies. This had infiltrated into where? The camp. This had infiltrated into a shadow and type of the church.

15:01 And so I hate to say this, but let's be honest. A lot of times, you will not hear a lot of messages about fleeing sexual immorality from pulpits across this nation or the nations. Maybe some, but by and large, you're not going to hear those messages. You're not going to hear many messages about turning away from your homosexuality. You won't hear messages about turning away from prostitution and harlotry. You're hearing these days a lot of the gospel that you hear preached by and large is a me-centered gospel. It's a me, my, I. What's in it for me? What's better for me? What could make my life better now? And again, God wants us to have an abundant life. No question.

15:46 But the gospel is a gospel of self-denial. The gospel bids us to come and die to the old... That we might come and dine in the new. Everyone wants to come and dine, but there is no coming and dining with Jesus until we've come to and through the cross. The apostle Paul said that I am crucified with Christ. I no longer live. The life that I now live is in Christ. How could he say that? The great apostle Paul, there's no question. He dined. There's no question. He there was refreshing of the Lord. There was no question. There was the power of God, and there was an increase. There was abundance. There was breakthrough. There was fruitfulness in that man's life but also suffering.

16:29 There was also a death to himself. There was also like Jesus did, so to speak. There was a garden of Gethsemane experience where every believer or person needs to go. Following Jesus to the garden. And what does that look like? I feel you drawing me, Lord. I feel like I'm supposed to, you know, lay down my will. I feel like I'm supposed to surrender. But Lord, I don't really want to. Nevertheless, Lord, let it not be my will, but thy will. And that's the step. You follow Jesus to Gethsemane. Then you follow him to the road of suffering. But then you follow him to the cross, and then you follow him to and through the cross.

17:14 The cross is not just some adornment in our culture and modern Christianity that we wear around our neck. The people say, wow, that's a nice cross. You must be a Christian. The cross symbolizes death. The cross was there for one reason. It was to destroy someone. It was to kill someone. Have we lost what the message of the cross is? The cross is not to make you comfortable. The cross is to slay the sinner. We must come to and through the cross. We must be crucified with Christ. The old us dies. The old us dies on that cross. The old us follows Christ to Gethsemane.

17:58 Follows Christ down the road of suffering. Follows Christ to the cross. Dies on that cross. And then it is in the tomb, but then we're also raised to life with Christ. And now, what is our existence if we're born-again believers? We're now seated at the right hand of the Father with Christ. The word in the Greek is seen, synkathidzo. It means to be seated together with Christ. Assures you're seated right now. As sure as you're sitting down, your spiritual reality is that you are also seated in heavenly places with Jesus Christ. Try to wrap your mind around that one because it's not easy, but it's reality. You're seated with Christ. Our inheritance is in Christ. Our royalty is in Christ. Everything is in Christ.

18:42 But again, everybody gets that part. Wow. We're royal sons and daughters of God. Wow. We're, joint heirs with Jesus Christ. Wow. Dominion authority and all these things. Yes. But how did that come about? Do you know how it came about? Because you came to and through the cross. And there was a funeral for the old you on that day, or there should have been when the old you died. But yet these days, oftentimes in the church, we've got messages like, oh, God loves you no matter what. And that's true. But God doesn't really care. Sin's not the issue anymore. And God loves you and beloved. There is such a perversion of the gospel that's gone on. Yes, God loves everyone.

19:27 He loves the dirtiest sinners, which we all were, and sometimes still feels like we might be because we are imperfect human beings. Like the apostle Paul said, I'm the chief sinner. I've sinned probably more than all of you have. But the grace of God is not a license to sin. It's divine favor and enabling power from the Holy Ghost to resist sin. Again, if we sin, we don't lose our salvation. Right? But Jesus says, do not sin. He says, don't sin. But if you do sin, I'll be faithful to cleanse you from all righteousness. But the point I'm trying to make today is this, going back to the zeal, the zeal in that in that man Phinehas, the zeal of Aaron's grandson, the zeal of the priesthood.

20:14 What was the zeal of the priesthood that God said was precious in his sight? It was those who have a heart to destroy those immoral practices. But have we really, are we really those kind of priests? We're kings and priests. Everyone understands that. But what kind of priest are you? The job of the priest, which meant whether you could be a good priest or not, was you had to show people the difference between the holy and the profane thing. And if you couldn't, you couldn't be a priest, or you were a corrupt priest if you couldn't do that. And so our priesthood, represented by the priesthood garment, was worn under the kingly garment. It's the one that was closest to the skin. When David removed the kingly garments, he danced in the priestly garments.

21:00 So our greatest calling is the priesthood. What is the priesthood? Worship and prayer. What is the priesthood? Intercession. What is the priesthood? A zeal against the things of corruption, the things of the kingdom of darkness. A zeal for the holy things of God. What is the priesthood? Giving. What is the priesthood? The ministry of reconciliation. We know what kingship is, decree, declare, take dominion, rule, reign, govern, all those things. But the priesthood... I would encourage you to be a priest like Phinehas or be a man in the line of the priesthood like Phinehas, Aaron's grandson. Be someone like Phinehas. You're not spearing people, but you're spearing ideologies.

21:46 You're spearing false doctrines of demons. You're spearing all these things that are trying to destroy our children. All these things that are trying to destroy a generation or generations of people by telling them that they can have Jesus Christ, but you can also have sexual immorality simultaneously, which completely disregards Scripture. The Bible says in Corinthians, it says that you cannot have Christ and demons. You can't be simultaneously at the table of the Lord and the table of devils. The Bible says in Acts 3:19 that there is no refreshing without first times of repentance. Times of repenting bring about times of refreshing. In 2 Chronicles 714, the Lord says, if you want healing of the land, if you want me to forgive the sins and heal the land, then you need to humble yourself and pray and seek my face and turn from your wicked ways. Hallelujah. People forget that.

22:41 They say, oh yeah, I will humble myself and pray. I'm going to worship you, Lord. But they forget... they leave out turn from wickedness. That's repentance. That's being a Phinehas. That's going after the things that have a corrupting influence in this world, and they better not corrupt the church. We better not be guilty of allowing them to come into church. If you're a pastor, if you're a leader, if you're a five-fold leader, and you're listening to me We must stand for righteousness, pastor. We must stand for holiness, leaders. And whatever is going on in the camp, we're responsible as leaders. And we need to be those like Phinehas. We need to be the ones that will deal with those hard issues to deal with. We need to be the ones that are going to spear those false ideologies.

23:23 If people are practicing sexual immorality and thinking it's okay and thinking they're going to heaven and living that lifestyle, they're deceived. If they think they're practicing sexual immorality, and they will go to heaven.. And they've not repented, turned to Christ, and been delivered from that lifestyle, they're decieved. There's a difference between stumbling every once in a while and having sin reign over you. Before you were born again and were a believer, you had no power over sin. You served that ongoing compulsion. When the enemy called, he just tugged the chain, and you came. You were in bondage to it. But once you've been born again, there's now the power to resist sin. There's the grace of God.

24:05 The Holy Spirit's enabling power is living within you to resist sin. Are you always going to be perfect in doing that? No, but you're not in bondage. You're not living a lifestyle of sin any longer. You're repenting. The sin you used to love to do, now there's a hatred for it. Now there's a war going on inside you because of it. Because the spirit of God is warring against the flesh that's trying to return from the dead. The flesh is trying to return and rear its ugly head again and say, hey, remember me? And how does the flesh try to come back? Whenever you feed it...you start to feed it. Disgusting things that you watch on TV. You start to feed it. Gossip...

24:45 you start to feed it. Stealing, you start to feed it. See, those, your flesh and demonic things, they, they have to exist somehow. And so, how do they live when you feed them? If you don't feed them or starve your flesh, it's like Paul said, I die daily. That man could have never said, I die daily until it was first understood that he needed to starve his flesh daily. And he needed to resist the devil, the demonic powers trying to wrestle with him. And so, friends, I pray that this really blessed you today. I pray that you have a zeal in your heart like Phinehas more than ever before to spear and destroy the works of darkness, the false ideologies and the doctrines of demons out in this world that have even tried to find their way even into the church.

25:40 May the Lord bless you today. May he keep you. May his face shine upon you. May he be gracious unto you. May he lift up his countenance upon you. And may the Lord give you his peace. He's empowering you to be a Phinehas today. If you feel a tugging on your spirit, go out and destroy the works of darkness and help to set the people free. Help to set the captive free as the Lord ministers in,to, and through your life. In Jesus mighty, holy and precious name. Amen. If you'd like to connect with us, you can go to our website at www.riverofheaven.org. River of Heaven Ministries is advancing the kingdom of God on earth as it is in heaven through various means.

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