Wednesday Night Bible Study
by Billy McCool
First Apostolic Church of Knoxville (Knoxville, TN)
Kind: Bible study
Scripture: Hebrews 8:12, Genesis 8:15-21, Revelation 5:8, Revelation 8:4, Esther 2:12, Genesis 11:4, Genesis 10:8-10, Genesis 11:1-9, Proverbs 16:18-19, 2 Samuel 18:18, 1 Samuel 15:30, James 4:6-10, Proverbs 3:5-7

Source: https://acts238.life/repository/sermons/billy-mccool--wednesday-night-bible-study-106
Published by Acts 2:38 Life from the sermon transcript on that page.
Free to copy and share with attribution.

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praise the lord everyone praise the lord everyone we greet you tonight in that wonderful name of the lord jesus christ what a joy it is to be back in the house of the lord again for another bible study let me uh add a word i said something about this a few days ago we want everyone to feel comfortable with your particular precautions for the pandemic and i know they are seemed like everything that tried to politicize it and make it controversial and as far as as i'm concerned it's not a political issue um for what it's worth sister mccool and i both had both of our vaccinations i got a flu vaccination yesterday and when the booster shot becomes available i intend to get that too and uh but there are others who have their own personal views but don't you feel bad i i certainly don't think it's a religious thing against um getting a flu shot or the pandemic shot whatever i noticed on my arm i've got a big old spot there where sometime way back in my life i got a smallpox vaccination they used to leave a great big old thing on your arm there and um so it's it's not a political issue it's not a religious issue as far as i'm concerned jesus said they that are whole need not a position they that are sick the apostle paul spoke of a friend of his that he left at a certain place sick he raised the dead heal the sick but yet there were some he left behind sick and he wrote to timothy said drink no more water but a little wine for the stomach's sake for thy off infirmities so evidently timothy had a stomach problem that he did not get a miraculous healing form and jesus in his teaching he said there were many uh lepers in the days of naaman but only one got his healing and there were many widows but there was a certain one and he pointed out that not everybody gets a miraculous healing i wish they did and i know there are those who used to go by the the title of divine healers and there's only one divine healer and that's jesus and if he decides to heal you or you have the faith to get healing we believe in that we believe in praying for the sick but i want you to know if i never see another miracle i'll always believe i've never seen streets of gold but i believe i'm going to walk on them one day i've i've never seen the tree of life but i believe it's going to be blooming over there beside the the river of life so it's going to be a great time so i just want to throw that in for your protection or for your consideration an old man meets a young man who asks do you remember me the old man says no then the young man tells him he was his student and the teacher asked what do you do what do you do in life the young man answers well i became a teacher oh how good like me asked the old man well yes in fact i became a teacher because you inspired me to be like you the old man curious asked the young man at what time he decided to become a teacher the young man tells him the following story one day a friend of mine also a student came in with a nice new watch and i decided i wanted it i stole it i took it out of his pocket shortly after my friend noticed that his watch was missing and immediately complained to our teacher who was you then you addressed the class saying this student's watch was stolen during classes today whoever stole it please return it i didn't give it back because i didn't want to you closed the door and told us all to stand up and form a circle you were going to search our pockets one by one until the watch was found however you told us to close our eyes because you would only look for his watch if we all had our eyes closed we did as instructed you went from pocket to pocket and when you went through my pocket you found the watch and took it you kept searching everyone's pockets and when you were done you said open your eyes we have the watch you didn't tell on me and you never mentioned the episode you never said who stole the watch either that day you saved my dignity forever it was the most shameful day of my life but this is also the day i decided not to become a thief a bad person etc you never said anything nor did you ever scold me or take me aside and give me a moral lesson i received your message clearly thanks to you i understood what a real educator needs to do do you remember this episode professor the old professor answered yes i remember the situation with the stolen watch which i was looking for in everybody's pocket i don't remember you because i also had my eyes closed while searching if to correct you must humiliate this is not teaching hebrews 8 12 for i will be merciful to their unrighteousness and their sins and their iniquities i will remember no more tonight's lesson is entitled worshipping the one true god you will remember last week's lesson was concerning the flood noah and the ark and i've repeatedly said you will not hear a greater message about noah in the ark than you heard from pastor whitley so i don't have to go over that if you didn't hear it you need to get it from our archives and listen to it but before we get into tonight's lesson which is entitled worshiping the one true god i would like to look back at last week's closing part of the lesson after the flood after the ark building and you were in on that message and also the lesson then the lesson closed with genesis 8 15-22 and god spake unto noah saying go forth of the ark thou and thy wife and thy sons and thy sons wives with thee bring forth with thee every living thing that is with thee of all flesh both the fowls and of cattle and of every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth that they may breed abundantly in the earth and be fruitful and multiply upon the earth and noah went forth and his sons and his wife and his son's wives with him every beast every creeping thing and every fowl and whatever creepeth upon the earth after their kind went forth out of the ark and noah builded an altar unto the lord and took of every clean beast and of every clean file and offered burnt offerings on the altar and then giving special attention to verse 21 and the lord smelled a sweet savor and the lord said in his heart i will not again curse the ground anymore for man's sake for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth neither will i again smite anymore every living thing as i have done now i've read those passages from last week for this purpose noah not only obeyed god by building this gigantic boat according to god's specifications according to the material god specified according to the the measurements god specified according to the animals that god told him to get but after the flood i've thought a lot about the ark the ark represents the church and that's what's going to save us and i thought about the ark because there's a lot of animals on the ark the elephant was too big ate too much and had too much waste the giraffe he had a long neck was always probably sticking his neck into somebody else's stall there was the laughing hyena always laughing at somebody or something and then there was the there was the uh not only the laughing hyena but the baboon was there and then there was the pole cat can you imagine noah telling chim and ham now go feed the poor cat but be careful don't get too close to him because if you upset him he's sure gonna cause a stink and you can find just about every animal represented in the church today that you have to be but yet god said that he had to have all of them on the ark the clean and the unclean the pleasant the elephant was too noisy when he blew his trumpet there were a lot of unpleasant things on that ark but yet god said to preserve them because i want them to after the flood's over i want you to take them off of the ark and tell them to breed and multiply abundantly go forth and multiply abundantly and when that ark landed noah could have said i'm going to start me a zoo i've got one of i got uh two of everything and but no he said tell them to go on and and cover the whole earth and and multiply and build you an altar and give a sacrifice so when that earth landed no one let down the gang plank and the animals began to scatter and they didn't hover around the ark they continued to do what god told them to do and in as much as they obeyed god the bible said and this is what i want to point out and the lord smelled a sweet savor obedience sends a pleasant aroma up to god god told saul behold to obey is better than sacrifice and to hearken than the fat of rams revelation 5 and 8 and when he had taken the book the four beasts and the four and twenty elders fell down before the lamb having every one of them harps and golden vials full of odors which are the prayers of the saints now get my point when noah came off of the ark and did what god told him to do and gave the sacrifice the bible said it was a sweet savor that went up to god revelation says that the four and 20 elders fell down before the lamb having every one of them harps and golden vials full of odors which are the prayers of the saints now we have what we call a manner of speaking uh we the the analogy of of uh there's i don't say we used to know back in the ketchup uh i i smell a mouse you ever heard that saying that means you there's something suspicious that you're you're suspicious over it don't sound just exactly right and we analogize but if that's a word uh uh of our no smelling i i smell the mouse or such as this to happen and that left a bad taste in my mouth and it's a metaphor was talking about something natural that we're comparing it to something else well now the the odor that went up before god was a pleasant acceptable thing that god desired to smell the saints of god their prayers are like precious ointment and precious odors that goes up to the lord but i want to tell you something there are some odors that some folks have that's not pleasing to god revelation 8 and 4 said and the smoke of the incense which came up with the prayers of the saints ascended up before god out of the angel's hand now this got my attention and i started doing a little study about odors about odors because what noah did was pleasing to god and god compared it to pleasant aroma and a pleasant odor that went up before the lord esther 2 12 when every maid's turn was come to go into king ahazarias after that she had been 12 months according to the manner of the women for so were the days of their purification accomplished to whit six months with oil of myrrh six months with sweet odors and with other things for the purifying of the women six months with oil the most beautiful of all the young virgins of all the province of babylon were to be selected and these were taken out of all classes of people indiscriminately consequently there must have been many who were brought up in low life now we know that those who feed on coarse strong foods i am reading right now from adam clark's commentary now we know that those who feed on core strong food which is not easily digested have generally a copious perspiration which is strongly odorous and in many though in every respect amiable and even beautiful this odor is far from being pleasant pure wholesome easily digested and nourishing foods with the frequent use of the hot baths continued for 12 months the body frequently rubbed with olive oil will remove all that is disagreeable of this kind and will promote health and comfort it reminded me of system cool telling me about in north carolina of course we have right over here at cosby every year they have what they call a ramp festival and i didn't realize when i went on uh the the wykapedia encyclopedia uh how popular ramps were i did the chicago illinois was named after the ramp it was a it was spelled a different way but it was meant a ramp and cosby is the largest uh celebration of the ramp festival has drawn as many as 30 000 at one time and pennsylvania all over the country there are cities and states that have ramp festivals uh now system i had never heard of ramps until i got married and she told me about north carolina and she said if kids came to school after having eaten ramps the odor was so strong they would literally make them stay home from school for two or three days before that odor would dissipate the thing they take in it comes out in the flesh and i got to thinking about that what they ate affect the way they smell yeah and a breath mint wouldn't stop it because it exuded right from the the pores of the skin and that reminded me that there's a lot of folks you can tell they've been eating the wrong thing by the spirit they've got now are you getting me are you understand where i'm coming from i'm not talking about a natural odor i'm using this as an analogy when there's some folks that that just to be around them you get the feeling dirty uh have you ever i feel a bad spirit what what is that that's a an attitude and the the children that ate the ramps they exuded an odor that was offensive and if you stay online gossiping you're eating the wrong thing if you say we used to call it the telephone but now the telephones become almost extinct of the things that you read the things that you listen to the people you talk to you can develop an attitude of gossip you can develop an attitude of a fall finding you can develop an attitude of criticism and and everything you'll say it's going to come out and you it's going to be an unpleasant thing now what happened to esther when they they was looking for a new queen for the king and they brought her and six months they they bathed her in olive oil and other perfumes now if she was from a low class of people and didn't have good food to eat now that in my research it said in a lot of the country folks back then that uh the the ramps was a good food for them because through the winter they were unable didn't have green vegetables uh for for their vitamins and it really was good for their health because at the the the rabs come in in the early spring and they needed something that would give them uh the vitamins that they'd been missing well i don't know what kind of food esther had been eating but when they got done she had six months of being bathed in olive oil do you know what i see folks we need a good bath of olive oil we need some of that precious oil that anthony preached about here a while back that's been crushed that's been taken off of the tree and it's it's crushed for a purpose and i need a good bath and olive oil to take care of the things that i've been eating that's causing me to have a wrong odor noah set up precious odor before god by his obedience now if you want to send up a a sweet odor and a good odor to the lord you just need to to obey him you need to obey him you need to be rubbed good with olive oil and to to remove all the disagreeable kinds of things that that don't promote a good order about you now the focus verse for tonight's lesson genesis 11 and 4 noah obeyed god and they said go to let us build us a city and a tower whose top may reach into heaven and let us make us a name okay watch out now look out nimrod was the great grandson of noah and he was the first man on earth to proclaim himself as being great he was called a great hunter and according to uh the study i've done the animals had had had multiplied so fast that they became a great danger and being a great hunter was a great asset even politically and being a great leader and and nimrod was such a great leader he proclaimed himself as a great man now the one thing that we don't need god said he hates pride pride goes before destruction and a holy spirit before a fall the wrong attitude the i'm the and we kind of have this attitude as a general rule uh you've heard us talk about at the beginning of the football season uh about every team runs out on the the baseball or the football field saying we're number one we've never hadn't been defeated this year yet everybody wants to be the greatest and they said go to let us build us a city and a tower whose taught may reach into heaven and let us make us a name lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the earth the very thing that god said he wanted them to do they wanted not to do god said go and and multiply throughout the whole earth and you know if we're not careful we'll have an attitude of nimrod we want to have our own place we want to have our own throne we want to have our own castle we want to have our own tower and god wants us to scatter through the whole earth he wants us he jesus said go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature he that believeth that is baptized shall be saved he that believeth not shall be damned our lesson text is taken from genesis 10 starting at verse 8 and cush beget nimrod he began to be a mighty one in the earth he was a mighty hunter before the lord wherefore it is said even as nimrod the mighty hunter before the lord and the beginning of his kingdom was babel in the land of shinar genesis 11 starting in verse 1 and the whole earth was one language and one speech and it came to pass as they journeyed from the east that they found a plane in the land of shinar and they dwelt there let's pause just a moment and let us remember this god had commanded them when they come off of the ark to multiply that that included noah's family and that included the beast because the earth had had been reduced to eight living human souls and now then they were to multiply and and and and populate the earth but nimrod the great grandson of noah being the great hunter that he was and called himself great and then they got the idea of what we want to do now we're great but we won't we don't want to get scattered we want to build us a kingdom we want to build us a tower and we want to build us a name it's a stinking thought when we start building our own name it's not our name that counts it's his name that that counts so they begin to say we we need to get it don't matter what god said we want to have a city that'll make us look important we want a city that'll make everybody see how great we are and the whole earth was one language and one speech and it came to pass as they journeyed from the east that they found a plane in the land of shinar and they dwelled there they here we are we're going to not go any further we're going to build us a kingdom right here you've heard me preach this again and again yes we want a great church we built this building as large as we did not to accommodate the people that are here now but we're trying to reach out for more people we want to make room for more but the more people we make room for then in turn we take our vessel and pour it into a larger vessel pastor just got back from up in indiana pastor of whitley just got back from bloomington indiana uh pastor anthony just got back from out in arkansas preaching and then they've been to france they've been to the philippines and everywhere and it's not that we're trying to hold everything under this roof we want a great crowd under this roof but the the reason we're doing that is we want you to help us reach the city of knoxville and then when we reach the city we want the state of tennessee and we want to go around now i may not be able to go myself now my pastor bishop l.a parent tried to entice system of cooling myself to go to school and learn the the spanish language and he wanted us to be missionaries to south america he had a great burden for foreign missions and he wanted us to to go to south america i did not feel that but i have had a great burden for home missions i've had a great burden for evangelism and i as you know this church has reached out to many other cities and we've helped establish other churches we're not just building a kingdom right here in knoxville we are trying to reach the world we've bought buses we've gone to canada we've gone to arkansas we've gone to louisiana we've gone all over the country we've been on the street corners having having church with the young folks we've been on the streets and when it was uh be below freezing reaching out in an evangelistic manner doing street preaching why because we want to reach the whole world he said don't you say go everywhere let's go on and they said one to another let us make brick and burn them thoroughly and they had brick for stone and slime had they for mortar they had uh artificial brick for natural stone and they said go to let us build us a city and a tower whose top may reach under heaven and let us make us a name lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth when folks get the attitude of being conceited an excessive appreciation of one's own worth and virtue we want to love our church indeed i love my first apostolic church and we should but we love each other as a family but that is when we see our little babies being born i see so many of these these grandfathers and grandmothers holding little babies here in this church this is so we there's a feeling there that you can't explain until you become a grandparent and that's a tremendous it's the same way when you see souls being born into the kingdom of god there's nothing more thrilling than to see a revival with people getting the holy ghost speaking in tongues and folks becoming great witnesses and workers for god and we want to see them go i'm glad to hear from brother michael maupin i'm glad to hear from different ones uh sister jamie ball was here over the weekend she and brother matthew were he called me his pastor for a long time they're doing the work and that is part of your work so we're going out and they said go to let us build us a city and a tower who's taught may reach into heaven and let us make us a name lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth and the lord came down to see the city and the tower which the children of men builded and the lord said behold the people is one and they have all one language and this they began to do and now nothing will be restrained from them which they have imagined to do you know it's kind of reminded me lately of the condition of our country and our world uh folks don't speak the same language anymore they everybody's got their own their they may all speak english whatever but there's a there's a failure of understanding having one goal it used to be the pride in your country but it seems like everybody's is is disturbed and that they don't speak the same thing the lord came down and the lord allowed the confusion and the lord said behold the people is one they have all one language and this they began to do and now nothing will be restrained from them which they have imagined to do go to let us go down and there confound their language that they may not understand one another's speech so the lord scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth and they left off they left off the build of the city therefore is the name of it called babel because the lord did there confound the language of all the earth and from fence did the lord scatter them abroad upon the face of the earth proverbs 16 18 and 19 said pride now they were doing this as a result of their their pride in themselves they wanted to be recognized as something great proverbs 16 18-19 pride goeth before destruction and a holy spirit before a fall better it is to be of a humble spirit with the lowly than to divide the spoil with the proud examples of of pride for destruction in second samuel 18-17 now absalom and his lifetime had taken and reared up for himself a pillar which is in the kings dale for he said i have no son to keep my name in remembrance and he called the pillar after his own name and it is called unto this day absalom's place you remember that was the fair-haired son of david and he was a very handsome man he'd cut his hair once a year and even the bible even tells how much it weighed and it was an almost a national holiday when when absalom would have his hair cut and he was ood and odd and put up on a pedestal and it was his fair looks and his winning personality that he won the hearts of the people and actually overthrew his father for a period of time until he himself was trying to get away and his hair had caught in the tree limbs and he was hung there and they killed him with the darts thrown through his heart absent in his lifetime reared up himself a pillar another example of the destructiveness of prideful attitudes is first samuel 15 and 30. then he said it's a saul i have sinned yet honor me it don't matter what i've done i'm really not sorry for my sin but i'm sorry for losing my my uh adulation from the people i'm sorry because i've lost the honor and respect i've sinned yet honor me now i pray thee before the elders of my people and before israel and turn again with me that i may worship the lord thy god third john verse 9 and 10 i wrote unto the church but diotrephes who loveth to have the preeminence among them received us not now donald trephy's he was of the faith he was a leader in the church but he wanted to be recognized and he stood against john and the others because they were accepting gentiles into the church they were getting the holy ghost getting baptized but dialed treaties he made an issue and here's what john said about him wherefore i i wrote to the church but donald trump's who loveth to have the preeminence among them received us not wherefore if i come i will remember his deeds which he doeth praying against us that's aimless jabbering talking and talking against them who doeth praying against us with malicious words and not content therewith neither doth he himself received the brethren and forbiddeth them that would and casteth them out of the church now we we we'd like to say we would like to have a new testament church and certainly we would but i want you to know this is what was going on in the early church there were when they were coming right out from under the the judaism the judaizers that they believed that you had to be circumcised to be saved you had to keep the mosaic lord they didn't accept the fact that grace dispensation had come and then when they were allowing the gentiles to come in there were some that were setting up their roadblocks no we can't accept them and john said they're praying against us with malicious words and not content therewith neither doeth himself receive the brethren these are brethren that's that's that's accepted the gospel and forbid them that would and casteth them out of the church long idle talk against the leadership james 4 6-10 but he giveth more grace wherefore he saith god resisteth the proud but giveth grace to the humble submit yourselves therefore to god resist the devil and he'll flee from you draw night to god and he will drawn out to you cleanse your hands your sinners and purify your hearts you double-minded be afflicted and mourn and weep let your laughter return to mourning and your joy to heaviness humble yourself in the sight of the lord and he shall lift you up would you stand your feet with me please proverbs 3 5 trust in the lord with all thine heart and lean not unto thine own understanding and all thy ways acknowledge him and he shall direct thy paths be not wise in thine own eyes fear the lord and depart from evil the story and the message tonight is we're serving the one true god and to please him is our ultimate goal not to build our own reputation not to build our own kingdom but to build his kingdom not wise in our own eyes but to fear the lord and depart from evil father we thank you tonight for the word of god i pray lord that you will let the word seek into our hearts and may we understand that our kingdom is not ours it's your kingdom and it's your kingdom that we're trying to build and though we love our local church and indeed it's the will of god that we do so but lord in doing so we're doing it that we together are stronger to reach the whole world and i pray god that you'll keep us with that attitude keep us with that thought and that burden to reach everyone we can with every method that we can all this we ask in the precious name of jesus now whatever your uh protocol is you do you you can bust you can bump knuckles or elbows or shake hands or hug necks whatever you want to do lord bless you you're dismissed in jesus name