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  IT IS A CONSPIRACY!
  by Anton Bosch
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Summary: This sermon emphasizes the importance of keeping our focus on
Jesus amidst the various conspiracy theories circulating in the world.
It highlights the need to trust in God's perspective over worldly
perspectives, to not be swayed by fear or threats, and to prioritize
seeking God's wisdom over worldly sources. The message encourages
believers to center their faith on Jesus, avoid being distracted by non-
edifying information, and refocus on the centrality of Christ in
preaching and personal faith.

Duration: 56:01 Topics: "Focus on Jesus", "Trust in God's Wisdom"
Scripture References: Isaiah 8:12, Isaiah 8:19, Isaiah 8:20, Isaiah 9:2, Isaiah 9:6, Romans 8:28, Romans 8:29

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DESCRIPTION
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This sermon emphasizes the importance of keeping our focus on Jesus
amidst the various conspiracy theories circulating in the world. It
highlights the need to trust in God's perspective over worldly
perspectives, to not be swayed by fear or threats, and to prioritize
seeking God's wisdom over worldly sources. The message encourages
believers to center their faith on Jesus, avoid being distracted by non-
edifying information, and refocus on the centrality of Christ in
preaching and personal faith.

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CONTENT
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Those members of Sun Valley Community Church who are joining us through
video this morning, and a special welcome to visitors from across the
globe who are also joining with us this morning as we meet around the
Word of God. This morning I want to speak with you about conspiracies at
a time of national, and not all, all sorts of conspiracy theories begin
to float around, and I want to have a look this morning at what they are
all about, but I specifically want to look at what the Word of God has
to say about them. So let's pray before we begin the ministry this
morning.

Father, we are together, even though it's across the airwaves, in the
name of the Lord Jesus Christ. We've come, Lord, to your Word, and we
want to hear what your Word has to say, Lord. We admit that so many of
us have heard so much as to what the politicians and the scientists and
the medical people have to say.

We've seen what Facebook has to say, and Lord, we have been inundated
with all sorts of conflicting information and data, and Lord, I pray
that this morning you would help us to see things from your perspective,
that we might understand what your Word has to say about these things,
and Lord, that we might be able to direct our minds and our thoughts and
our hearts, and particularly our lives, in a way that pleases you. And
so, Lord, I pray that you would help us to understand. I pray, Lord, for
those who have preconceptions as they watch this video, as I'm sure
there will be some or maybe even many.

I pray, Lord, that you would help us to set aside those preconceptions
and to hear your Word this morning, and that we may respond to your
Word, we pray in Jesus' name. So I'm going to begin by reading from the
book of Isaiah, chapter 8, and I'm going to read verses 9 through 18. So
if you have your Bibles with you, and I would encourage you to have your
Bibles with you as much as you do when we meet together here in the
chapel, because I'm going to read and then I'm going to speak about
conspiracies, and then I'm going to come back to this passage, and so it
would be good for you to find Isaiah, chapter 8, and to keep it open so
that when we get here, you're able to follow in your Bible.

So let's read Isaiah, chapter 8, verses 9 through 18. Isaiah, chapter 8,
verses 9 through 18. Be shattered, O you peoples, and be broken in
pieces.

Give ear, all you from far countries. Gird yourselves, but be broken in
pieces. Gird yourselves, but be broken in pieces.

Take counsel together, but it will come to nothing. Speak the word, but
it will not stand, for God is with us. For the Lord spoke thus to me
with a strong hand and instructed me that I should not walk in the way
of this people, saying, Do not say a conspiracy concerning all that this
people call a conspiracy, nor be afraid of their threats, nor be
troubled.

The Lord of hosts, him you shall hallow. Let him be your fear, and let
him be your dread. He will be as a sanctuary, but a stone of stumbling
and a rock of offense to both the house of Israel, as a trap and a snare
to the inhabitants of Jerusalem.

And many among them shall stumble, and they shall fall and be broken, be
snared and taken. Bind up the testimony, seal the law among my
disciples, and I will wait on the Lord, who hides his face from the
house of Jacob, and I will hope in him. Here am I and the children whom
the Lord has given me.

We are for signs and wonders in Israel from the Lord of hosts who dwells
in Mount Zion. I am sure I don't have to tell you what conspiracies are.
We have seen many over the years, and in fact if you go to the Internet
and look at Wikipedia, they have an extensive list of dozens and dozens,
maybe even hundreds, of different conspiracy theories that have floated
around over the years.

I'm just going to mention a few that I've personally come across, and
again it's not a complete list. We would spend the whole day here just
enumerating these, and of course we want to get down to the Word of God.
But there is the whole conspiracy around 9-11, and that it was a planned
demolition by the government for all sorts of strange ideas.

There's the whole conspiracy that man never walked on the moon, and in
fact it was just done in a studio. There's the whole Sandy Hook thing, a
very sad tragedy when children were killed, and many deny that it even
happened because, again, it's just a conspiracy to be able to—so the
government can take away guns from people. There was the whole Y2K
conspiracy, and I remember living through that.

And obviously for those who don't remember, it was when we changed from
1999 to the year 2000. There was this whole idea that the whole world
was going to come to an end, and I may make a reference to that again in
a moment. The whole thing about black helicopters, and if these things
aren't familiar to you, well, you can look at them on the internet, but
they really are not helpful.

There's a whole conspiracy that the earth is flat, and I know that many
will laugh at that, and yet at the same time it's in the same category
as the rest of these. So if you're going to believe in any of the other
conspiracies, well then maybe you should believe that the earth is flat
also. The whole chemical trail thing—airplanes spraying aluminum and all
sorts of stuff in the air to be able to achieve all sorts of sinister
purposes.

The whole Nephilim and super monsters thing, propagated by preachers who
were able to sell thousands and probably millions of books and make huge
money out of this whole thing about these super monsters that come from
the book of Genesis chapter 6 and go through to the book of Revelation.
Some of the latest ones is the 5G thing, and again I'm not going to get
into the specifics, but obviously as you know we currently have 4G on
our cell phones, Generation 4, and they are looking to introduce
Generation 5, and there's a whole series of conspiracies that go around
that whole thing. And then of course the time in which we find ourselves
now is the time of the COVID-19 or the coronavirus, and of course there
are numerous conspiracies running around the source of the thing, where
it came from, what the purpose was, and sources of ideas that there is a
sinister plan behind the release of the whole thing, and so on.

And then flowing from that, from the coronavirus conspiracies, is of
course the conspiracies that revolve around the development of a
vaccine. And so we know that all the nations in the world, probably just
about every pharmaceutical company is working on developing some kind of
vaccine, and so this has been connected to the 5G theory, and the basic
bottom line is that this is a way to control the world, to set up the
world for a one world government, and of course I believe that there
will be a one world government. And so the inoculations are part of
that, and if you accept the inoculation, you are in fact accepting the
mark of the beast.

So these are some of them, and I'm going to come back to this idea of
the mark of the beast in a moment. But in looking at these theories,
they have certain things in common, and all of them have certain
commonalities. The first is, and not necessarily in this order, but the
first of the things that are common to them is that they appeal to a
very specific kind of person in the world and in the church, and in fact
psychologists have done a study of that and they very clearly defined
the kind of psychological makeup that is predisposed to believing these
things.

And I believe that while that may be true, and I think it is true as far
as the world is concerned and as far as psychology is concerned, I think
that it is specifically true as far as the church is concerned. And the
conspiracy theories are particularly interesting and are believed and
propagated by people within the body of Christ who have a particular
spiritual problem. Now don't turn the TV off or the video off.

I want you to hear me out, but there is a spiritual predisposition
within certain Christians for conspiracies, and I trust that as we go
through the message today you will understand why I say that. They are
also all promoted these days on Facebook, certain websites, talk radio,
and sensationalist preachers. Now obviously Facebook is a new thing, it
hasn't always been there, and so before Facebook there was talk radio
and then came the internet, and of course preachers who just love to be
sensationalist and love to stir up controversy, they have always been
there.

And so this is really where they come from and they all have, again, the
same people who promote them. They fall into the category always of
something new or novel or unique. And of course this is not a new
problem, this is a problem that goes back to Acts chapter 17 when Paul
is in Athens on Mars Hill, and it says that the Athenians and the
foreigners who were there spent their time in nothing else but either to
tell or to hear some new thing.

And, you know, this is an accurate description of Facebook today. What
is Facebook all about? It's about people spending their time either
telling or hearing some new thing. And so people pick up a story
somewhere and they rush to post it to their Facebook, and the next
person takes it and shares it, and so it goes and so it spreads, and
pretty soon it becomes the truth, when in fact it has no basis of truth
whatsoever.

And so Facebook is one of the most dangerous places for a Christian to
be today. Of course we can use it for good purposes and we're sharing
this message on Facebook, but we need to be careful. Facebook contains
more nonsense than it contains truth.

We've said this many times and I'm saying it again. Even the fact that
it has a Christian title above the video or above the meme or above the
article does not mean it is Christian. In fact, one of the problems that
we have today is that every Tom, Dick, and Harry has now set himself up
as a preacher on Facebook and on YouTube, and these are people who have
no business of preaching the Word of God or of opening the Word of God,
and yet now anybody who has a cell phone can set themselves up in their
kitchen and begin to broadcast the biggest lot of garbage and nonsense
under the guise that it is Christianity.

And of course together with this comes all of these conspiracy theories.
They also have in common for the Christian that they appeal to a desire
for hidden knowledge. Now again, this is not a new problem.

You'll recognize where this problem comes from. It goes right back to
Adam and Eve. Adam and Eve were tempted by the fact that they could know
something that God had chosen not to reveal to them.

And that's the thing behind every heresy is that people claim to have
knowledge that God has not revealed in His Word, that God has not
revealed through the Lord Jesus Christ, and so every cult leader, every
false teacher claims to have some kind of revelation, some kind of
knowledge, and this is exactly the same principle that underlies
conspiracies. Oh, we're telling you stuff that you won't get on the news
media. We're telling you stuff that the scientists won't tell you.

We're telling you the secret information, the secret knowledge. Remember
what this caused to begin with. It caused the fall of mankind.

Adam sinned and Eve sinned because they wanted this hidden knowledge,
and this is still the problem today. They appeal to our bizarre desire
for the spectacular and for that which is sensational and for that which
is weird and wacky. Somehow there is something within us that is
fascinated by these things, and of course that's the very basis on which
the Coney Island freak shows made their money out of, and that is still
very much the same principle here today.

There are these freakish things that people are just absolutely
fascinated with and fill their hearts and their minds with. The final
thing that they all have in common is that they originate, or those who
originate them, have an agenda. They don't just come from nothing.

There is a purpose behind them to begin with, and those purposes are
twofold. But I want to illustrate this just by a practical little
example, and I don't know whether in your culture you've heard of a
thing called the boogeyman. Well, the boogeyman doesn't exist, but the
boogeyman was created by parents who needed to get their children to do
what they wanted them to do.

Don't go out of the house because the boogeyman will get you. Don't get
up at night when you're supposed to be sleeping. The boogeyman will get
you.

Where did that come from? Well, it came from a desire to control and to
manipulate the child. And then how does that develop? Well, the child
then tells his or her sibling, and they tell their friends, and the
message spreads, and the message is spread probably to most parts of the
world. And I don't know that there are many who are watching or
listening this morning who have not heard about the boogeyman.

It's all a conspiracy to control children, and yet it becomes so real in
the hearts and the minds of those children that they will do exactly
what they are told to do, and they will obey because this fear has been
instilled within them. Now, I said that there are two purposes behind
it. And the first purpose is a political one, which I'm not going to
spend a lot of time on, but we must remember that there are nations and
ideologies that want nothing better than to destroy Western democracy.

And behind many of these theories, behind many of these conspiracies,
are countries and nations that want to impose and destroy Western
democracy. Just do a little bit of research, and you'll find out that
many of the modern conspiracies come out of Russia. Russia still
controls and dominates Facebook to a large extent, and propagates this
false information.

We, in fact, have an old name for it. It is called propaganda.
Propaganda has always been a military tool that has been used to break
the will of the opposing nation or army.

And it is still being used today, and unfortunately, in the process,
many Christians become enemy agents as they propagate the lies of the
enemy. But my concern is really not that much for the political, as I'll
say to you in a few moments again. But my concern is for the spiritual.

And there is a spiritual agenda. And I'm going to come back to this, and
I want to emphasize this, because these conspiracies, particularly when
they have an impact on Christians, there is an agenda behind them. And
the one behind them is the devil himself.

And his agenda is to undermine the Christian's faith, to undermine the
Christian's relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ, to undermine the
Christian's confidence and trust in the Word of God. And so there is an
agenda behind every one of these conspiracy theories, and when we as
Christians continue to propagate them and to promote them, what in fact
we're doing is we're acting as enemy agents for the devil. Now, let me
get back to the Mark of the Beast and talk about that very quickly.

And of course, the reason is because it's very pertinent now, and it's
going to become more and more pertinent in the next few months, as
people will be increasingly badgered by their friends and by other
Christians to not be inoculated, because there is this big conspiracy
that comes from Bill Gates and the secret society behind all of this
that are seeking to use this to control the minds and the thoughts of
people, and ultimately what this is said to be is to be the Mark of the
Beast. Now, the first thing that I need to say, in fact the most
important thing that I have to say on this, is that you cannot and will
not take the Mark of the Beast unwittingly. You will not take the Mark
of the Beast without knowing that you're taking the Mark of the Beast.

Taking the Mark of the Beast is intimately connected and directly
connected with worshipping the Antichrist. So, you can't take the Mark
and be worshipping God. You have to worship the beast or the Antichrist
first, and as a result, you identify with him by taking the Mark.

And this is borne out in the book of Revelation, and I'm going to just
give you one verse, and in fact there are six verses every time, all six
places where it speaks, and just by the way, the number six is not
significant here, but every place where it speaks about the Mark of the
Beast, it speaks about worshipping him. Let's have a look at Revelation
14.9, and the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, if
anyone worships the beast and his image and receives his mark on his
forehead or on his hand. So, he worships the beast and receives his
mark.

And you'll find exactly the same in Revelation 14.11, Revelation 16.2,
Revelation 19 verse 20, and Revelation 20 verse 4, and also in
Revelation chapter 13. So, unless you worship the beast, you cannot take
the Mark. It's not something that's going to just happen without knowing
what you're doing.

Let me give you two examples. In the short time that I've lived, we had
the same conspiracy theory concerning bar codes and concerning credit
cards. When bar codes first came, and if you look at the back of the bar
code, there are three checked digits that help you do the calculation of
the bar code, the beginning and the middle and the end, and they are
666, and so it was said that this is the Mark of the Beast.

But the fact is that we have been using the bar codes now, and I haven't
checked, but there may probably be a bar code in the Bible that you're
using. There is nothing that you can buy today that doesn't have a bar
code. Is that the Mark of the Beast? Clearly it is not, and yet people
said it was some time ago.

But it is not the same thing with the credit card, particularly when the
credit cards came with a smart chip in the back. And I remember that
they came to South Africa many, many years before they came to America,
and many Christians said, no, you can't do that because you're taking
the Mark of the Beast. Well, today we're able to look backwards, the
benefit of hindsight, and we're able to say, no, this is not it.

This is not what it's about. I'm not denying that all of these
technologies are setting the stage and are preparing the way for the
Mark of the Beast. Of course, the technology that we use, maybe the bar
codes, the credit cards, the bank accounts, and certainly as we get
through this coronavirus or COVID-19 crisis, they're already talking
about lifting the restrictions, but one of the things they're going to
be doing in every country is they're going to be tracking people in
order to be able to connect others that have been infected by you or
that may have infected you.

This is a way of being able to isolate the infection. And of course,
does that create a platform? Does that create a technology by which
people can be controlled? Yes, it does. But that does not mean you have
to throw your cell phone away.

It doesn't mean that you have to go off the grid and go and live out in
the desert somewhere, because taking the Mark of the Beast has nothing
to do directly with the technology. Yes, he will use the technology, but
that's not the Mark of the Beast. My big concern concerning that—the
reason I'm spending a bit of time on this is—my big concern is that
these conspiracies concerning the inoculations will prevent believers
from being inoculated against the coronavirus.

Now hear me. And I am not a prophet, but I understand human nature and I
understand what is going on. And there are those who are watching this
video this morning who will be faced with this challenge.

Do I take the inoculation or don't I? Because the inoculation could be
the Mark of the Beast. Folks, this is nonsense. These are conspiracies.

If you are a believer who loves the Lord Jesus Christ and you're walking
in obedience to him and you're born again, then there is no way you will
just stumble into taking the Mark of the Beast by being inoculated
against the virus. Now I know immediately there are those who are
watching this morning who are going to say, well, you know, we trust
God. We're not going to be inoculated because we trust God.

Well, that's a stupid argument, because if you're trusting God, then you
should not be going to the doctor. You should not be taking headache
pills. You should give up your medical insurance right now.

If you're going to trust God to keep you from the virus, well, then you
better begin to trust God now for every ailment and every pain that you
have and stop taking every form of medication. Never go and see a doctor
again and give up your medical insurance. That's the stupidity of these
arguments.

And the problem is that people who go against this inoculation have
already begun to develop a groundswell of opposition to the inoculation,
are the very people who run to the doctors, and many of those are
addicted to painkillers. And so it's fine to be addicted to painkillers,
but it's not fine to take an inoculation. All right, let me move on,
because I really do need to spend time in the Word, but I have a few
more things to talk about very quickly.

The first is, are these theories then not true? Are they not true? Well,
some of them are true or based on truth and some of them are not. The
Y2K thing, I made reference to that a little bit earlier. Was there a
problem with the computers changing from 1999 to the year 2000? Yes,
there was.

The problem was that the old programs had been developed to only contain
two dates in the year code. In other words, you didn't have 1999, you
just had 99. So when you got to 00 in 2000, the computer would not know,
is this 2000, the year 2000, or is this the year 1900, or 1800, or 1700?
That was a problem, and it was real.

The problem was that what we attached to that is, this is the end of the
world, the Antichrist is coming, Jesus is coming, this is the end of the
world. Now, I do believe that Jesus is coming. I do believe that all of
what we're seeing is taking us at a rapid pace towards the coming of the
Lord Jesus, and I do believe that He can and may just come today.

I believe that with all my heart, but I believe it because His Word
tells me that He comes at a time we don't expect. We need to be ready. I
don't believe He's coming tonight, or today, because of some kind of
conspiracy theory.

I believe it because of the Word of God. And so yes, there is an element
of truth in it, but sometimes it's just based on outright lies. And I
made reference to the problem with the boogeyman.

Let me give you a very real current example. A few months ago, a talk
show host had this whole thing about COVID-19, and his conspiracy was
this, that COVID-19 means that there have been 18 other COVIDs, and so
this is the 19th one, and obviously the governments haven't done what
they should have done in dealing with the other 18, and that's why the
19th one have got us. And that's a very rough approximation of what he
said.

This has now become entrenched in the thinking of millions of people in
America and in the rest of the world. And in fact, it was quoted by a
White House spokesperson in this last week, exactly the same argument.
And yet, if you looked it up and you just bothered to ask the question,
where does this name come from, you'll find that COVID is an
abbreviation, but the 19 refers to the year that it first was
recognized, the year it was first diagnosed, the year 2019.

Doesn't mean there were 18 before, it simply means 2019. And yet, so it
is completely false, and yet people will run with that, people will
write blogs on it, people will share it on Facebook, and the list just
goes on and on and on. The fact that there may be truth in something
does not mean that the conspiracy is true.

The devil also speaks truth. He presents himself as an angel of the
light in order to deceive us. He came to Eve and he presented the Word
of God.

He started, has God not said? And he quotes the Word of God, but then he
begins to deviate from that. The fact that there's an element of truth
does not mean that it is truth. Now I said to you earlier that all
conspiracy theories have one source.

They all originate with Satan. I'm now speaking specifically from a
Christian point of view. And he has one agenda, and that's why the
similarity between the political attack on Western democracy is so
pertinent.

The devil has one purpose, and that is to destroy the church and the
believer, to undo the work of God. That is his purpose, and he will use
all sorts of plans. And Paul warns us, don't be ignorant of his schemes,
don't be ignorant of his devices.

And this is one of the devil's devices, to undermine the Christian's
confidence in the Word of God, the Christian's confidence and
relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ. That's behind it. We need to
understand that the devil is trying to get us.

And he does this, first of all, through fear, to get us to not trust the
Lord. Oh no, we can't trust the Lord to keep us. And so we have to keep
ourselves.

We're going to go through the tribulation. I don't believe that we are,
but there are many who believe that they're going through the
tribulation, and many preachers have made millions out of selling all
kinds of preparedness kits, and all kinds of forms of prepping and
shelters and food sources and supplies, so you can make it through the
tribulation, instead of teaching people to have a right relationship
with the Lord Jesus Christ. There is a real conspiracy, and it is a
cosmic conspiracy.

It is a worldwide, international, universal conspiracy. And that is that
the devil has conspired against God and his people. The devil has
conspired against God and his people.

That is the conspiracy. And yet we'll talk about all sorts of black
helicopters and chemtrails and this nonsense and that nonsense, and in
the very process, we are propagating this conspiracy of the devil trying
to manipulate, and not trying to, but manipulating us. Now before I get
to the Word, I want to, or actually transitioning to the Word, I want to
speak about three things that we must understand.

All conspiracies or conspiracy theories are looking at things from a
worldly perspective and not from this perspective of God. They may have
a biblical veneer, they may seem to be biblical, they speak about the
Antichrist, they speak about the Mark of the Beast, they speak about the
Tribulation, but in fact they're looking at things from a worldly point
of view, and not from the point of view of the Word of God, which we're
going to look at in a moment and you'll see how this plays out. The
second is that they're aimed at self-preservation.

In other words, I must do what I need to do to protect myself from the
government, from the conspiracies, from the stuff that's going on, from
Bill Gates, from the Illuminati, from whatever it is that's out there. I
need to protect myself from those things. But in fact what I'm doing in
the process is I'm not putting my trust in God.

And so while they say we're trusting God, we're not going to take the
inoculation. In fact, they're not trusting God. They're not trusting
that God has given men skills to develop certain things, and they're
putting their trust in their ability to shelter themselves from all of
these slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.

And then thirdly, they all deny that God is in control. In other words,
things are just happening to the world. Things are just happening to the
church.

Things are just happening to me as a Christian and to my family, and God
has no say. God is not in control. These things are just happening, and
I need to do the best I can to keep myself informed about the latest
conspiracy so that I can protect myself and my family and my church from
these things.

It's a denial of who God is, and it's a statement of unbelief and
disbelief in the Lord and in his word. I've quoted this verse probably
every time in the last three weeks, and I'm going to quote it again, and
you should know it off by heart. We know that all things, Romans 8, 28,
we know that all things work together for good to those who love God and
those who are called according to his purpose.

Now, I believe that there are preachers who are going around saying,
well, you won't be affected by the virus. God is going to protect you,
that 10,000 may fall on this side, but God is going to keep you through
those things. He has not given us a promise that he's going to keep us
from these things, but he's promised that, in fact, in the same chapter,
in Romans 8, that through all these things, not over or out of, but
through all of these things, we are more than conquerors through the
Lord Jesus Christ.

And so he is using these things for our good, and our good is not our
self-preservation. Our good is that we be conformed to the image of his
Son. That's the next verse in Romans 8, verse 29.

So let's go to the text and see what the word of God has to say. I read
from Isaiah 8, and our text is going to be in Isaiah 8, verse 12.
Obviously, I'm sure you picked that up when we read that.

But I want us to look at the context in which this is said. And I'm
going to begin in Isaiah 6, a passage which we all should know quite
well. And Isaiah 6, verse 1 says, In the year that King Uzziah died, I
saw the Lord sitting on the throne, high and lifted up, and the train of
his robe filled the temple.

Uzziah was one of the best kings that Israel or the Judah ever had. He
was a good king, but he died, and the hope of the prophet, the hope of
the people, was now dead. But the Lord is still on the throne.

And folks, this is the godly perspective. This is the biblical
perspective. This is the perspective that you and I need to have as
Christians today.

God is still on the throne. It doesn't matter what happens to us. It
doesn't matter what happens to America.

It doesn't matter what happens to the economy, what happens to the
virus. God is still on the throne. Then let's go across to chapter 7,
and verse 4. Now, let me sketch you the background to these chapters
very quickly.

Judah was being threatened, and there were all sorts of conspiracy
theories going around. There were two northern kings who were ganging up
against Judah, and then there was also Assyria who was ganging up
against them. And so there were all sorts of conspiracies that Assyria
is going to come, and Assyria is going to wipe you off from the face of
the earth, and all these two northern kings, they're going to become
allied, and they may even ally with Assyria, and you've got no chance.

You're done for. You're going to be totally destroyed. And so there were
all sorts of theories about what was going to happen, how this was going
to happen, and it's in this context, then, that in chapter 7, verse 4,
the Lord says to Uzziah, and say to him, in other words, this is the
message you need to bring, take heed and be quiet.

Do not fear, or be faint-hearted, for these two stubs, these are the two
northern kings, are smoking firebrands for the fierce anger of resident
Assyria and the son of Ramalei. And so don't fear. Be quiet.

Trust in the Lord. And this is true today. Don't fear the virus.

Don't fear the economy. Don't fear Bill Gates. Don't fear the
Antichrist.

Trust the Lord. Take heed. Be quiet.

Do not fear, or be faint-hearted, for these two stubs. These are, it
doesn't matter how rich these men are, it doesn't matter how powerful
the Antichrist will be, he is nothing in comparison to the God that we
serve. And yet we're so concerned about what the world is doing, and
what the world can do to us.

And then if we go to chapter 8 and verse 8, and I'm just picking out a
few verses here, we really don't have the time to go through all of
them, and I'm probably going to be way over time again this morning. But
chapter 8 and verse 8. He will pass through Judah, and he will overflow
and pass over, and he will reach up to the neck, and the stretching out
of his wings will fill the breadth of your land, O Emmanuel. I'm not
going to analyze that verse.

Verse 9. Be shattered, O you peoples, and be broken in pieces. Give ear,
all you from far countries. Gird yourselves, but be broken in pieces.

Gird yourselves, but be broken in pieces. In other words, God is going
to fight for Judah. God is going to protect them, and God is on the side
of his church.

And if you're part of the body of Christ, then he is on our side, and
the devil will be overrun, he will be shattered, he can reinforce
himself, as it says, gird yourselves, but be broken in pieces. At the
end, the devil will be destroyed. At the end, these forces in the world
will be destroyed.

And then verse 10 says, take counsel together, but it will come to
nothing. It will come to nothing. It doesn't, folks, here's the bottom
line.

It doesn't matter what Bill Gates, it doesn't matter what the
Illuminati, if there is such a thing, decide. It doesn't matter what the
deep state decides. It doesn't matter whoever decides.

They can make their counsel, they can make their plans and their
decision. It will come to nothing against the body of Christ. Yes, they
can kill us physically, but they cannot touch our souls, because we have
been born again, and we've been committed to the Lord Jesus Christ.

Speak the word, but it will not stand, for God is with us. God is with
us. And folks, here is the problem, and here's one of the reasons I'm so
frustrated with Christians and preachers who propagate these conspiracy
theories.

They're acting as though God is not with us. That they who are against
us are greater than he who is with us. But in fact, God is with us.

If we are born again and we are his children, he is with us. And we need
to put our trust in him and not fear what the devil and what his cohorts
are scheming and planning and conspiring against us. And then let's go
to verse 11.

For the Lord spoke thus to me with a strong hand. In other words, the
Lord spoke clearly, powerfully to me and instructed me that I should not
walk in the way of this people. I don't know how to get this across more
powerfully, but I believe that God is speaking to his church today.

He's speaking to those who are watching here. I believe he's spoken to
my heart and to the hearts of other brethren that I've spoken with in
this last week. He's instructing us not to walk in the way of the world,
not to go after the stuff that the world is going after, not to have the
world's mindset, but to have our trust and confidence in him.

And then verse 12, do not say a conspiracy concerning all that this
people call a conspiracy, nor be afraid of their threats, nor be
troubled. Are their threats real? Yes, they are real. Is the devil
powerful? Yes, he is powerful, but he says, don't be afraid and don't
obsess yourself.

Don't fill your heart and mind and do not propagate these conspiracies
because what they do is they simply destroy your faith and they generate
fear in the hearts of believers. Don't be afraid of their threats, nor
be troubled. Verse 13, the Lord of hosts, him you shall hallow, make
holy.

Let him be your fear and let him be your dread. Christian, God, I
believe, is speaking to us today and he's saying, don't be afraid of
what's going on out there in the world. God is on our side.

If you're going to fear anything, fear him. If you're going to respect
anyone, respect him. But the problem is that we respect these things in
these theories.

We respect these powerful people in the world far more than we respect
God. I don't know what Bill Gates' agenda is and I'm not interested. I
don't care what it is.

I don't care if there is an Illuminati or is not an Illuminati. What I
know is that I serve a living God and that my concern is with him and my
concern is to fear him and to put him in front of my eyes and in the
forefront of my thinking all the time. Let's jump across to verse 16.

Bind up the testimony, seal the law among my disciples, and I will wait
on the Lord who hides his face from the house of Jacob, and I will hope
in him. Who are you going to put your trust in? Who are you hoping in?
Are you hoping even in a vaccine? Are you hoping in this world? We spoke
about that last week. No, we will hope in the Lord.

And then verse 19. And when they say to you, seek those who are mediums
and wizards who whisper and mutter, should not a people seek their God?
Should they seek the dead on behalf of the living? See, these people
were so fearful. They were so concerned about what was happening and
what was going to happen that they began to consult the witch doctors,
the mediums, and the wizards.

And folk, Christians are doing no different today. When you consult
Facebook for your information, when you listen to the talk show hosts,
when you listen to what the world is saying, you're going to those who
are dead. They are dead in their sins.

They are dead in their trespasses and sins. They are not born again. And
yet you trust them for your information.

They whisper and mutter, should not a people seek their God? Or that we
would spend as much time as we spend reading the conspiracy theories,
reading the word of God, that we would listen to him and not listen to
the conspiracy theorists. Should they seek the dead on behalf of the
living? You're going to the dead world and its fake information instead
of believing the living God. Who's your relationship with? And yes,
there are Christians who are listening and watching this who are
propagating conspiracy theories.

You are conspiring with the dead to promote that which is anti-God
instead of promoting the living God. And then verse 20, to the law and
to the testimony. If they do not speak according to this word, it is
because there is no light in them.

They're not speaking according to the word. Yes, they're twisting the
word of God, but they're not speaking according to the word of God. Get
back to the word.

Christians get back to what God's word. Forget about the theories.
Forget about the conspiracies.

Forget about what Facebook has to say. Forget about the talk show hosts
because they're all liars. Get back to God's word and believe the word
of God.

Unfortunately, there are Christians who can more better quote the
conspiracy theorists than they can quote the word of God. God help us.
We need to get back to his word, to the law and to the testimony.

And if they don't speak according to the word, it is because there is no
light in them. The greatest problem is preachers who are propagating
these theories. Who are propagating the messages that they're picking up
on Facebook and all sorts of other places and not from the word of God.

Instead of preaching the word of God, they're preaching conspiracy
theories. The scripture says they do so, and it's not what I'm saying,
it's what the word says. If they do not speak according to this word,
and I've shown you that what they're speaking is not according to the
word because they're promoting the devil's agenda.

It is because there is no light in them. Now, these are harsh words, but
if the preacher that you love to watch on YouTube and like to watch on
Facebook spreads conspiracy theories, there is no light in him. And if
you're a preacher watching and listening to me today, I'm telling you
there's no light in you because you're propagating darkness instead of
the word of God.

Let's get to chapter 9 verse 2, and I'm almost through. The people who
walked in darkness have seen a great light. Those who dwelt in the land
of the shadow of death, upon them a light has shined.

What he's speaking about is the coming of the Messiah, the coming of
Jesus in his first coming. But we're not reading this as those who are
before his first coming, we're reading this as those who are before his
second coming. And we're in exactly the same place, and we find that
we're walking in darkness, that the world, the internet, the radio
waves, the television is filled with darkness, but we have seen a great
light, and that light is the Lord Jesus Christ.

That light is the one who has come to light up every man who comes into
the world. Upon them a light has shined. And then verse 6 says, For unto
us a child is born, unto us son is given, and the government will be
upon his shoulder, and his name will be called Wonderful Counselor, the
Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Of the increase of his government and peace, there will be no end. Upon
the throne of David and over his kingdom, to order and establish it with
judgment and justice. From that time forward, even forever, the zeal of
the Lord of hosts will perform it.

Folks, this is our confidence, this is our promise that Jesus is coming.
And as much as he was coming 2,000 years ago, he's coming again right
now. And of the increase of his government and peace, there will be no
end.

There will be an end to the American government. There will be an end to
the European common market. There will be an end to every government in
this world.

But Jesus' government will be forever and forever. And we're
establishing our hearts upon that kingdom and upon that government. And
upon the throne of David and over his kingdom, to order and establish it
with judgment and with justice, even forever.

The Lord is going to do this. Not us, not the church, but the zeal of
the Lord of hosts will perform this. The Lord is coming.

Let's have our eyes fixed upon him. You see, one of the things that
these conspiracy theories are trying to do is that they're trying to get
our eyes off Jesus and to get our eyes on whatever is going on in this
world today. You remember Peter as he stepped out of that boat to walk
on the water to meet Jesus? As long as he had his eyes fixed on Jesus,
he was able to overcome and walk on the water, in spite of the fact that
the storm didn't abate at that time.

The storm was still there. The waves were roaring and crashing and the
thunder and the lightning and the wind. But he had his eyes on Jesus and
he was able to walk on the water.

But the moment he took his eyes off Jesus and he put his eyes on the
circumstances around him, he began to sink. And many Christians today
are sinking because they've taken their eyes off Jesus and they put
their eyes on the situation and the things in the world and in these
conspiracies. Get your eyes back on Jesus.

Looking unto him, the author and the finisher. He has begun and he will
complete the work that he has begun in our lives. And then the second
thing.

So there are really two conclusions this morning and I'm done. The first
is keep your eyes on Jesus. Don't look at these things because they will
distract you from Jesus.

And the second is don't be sidetracked into wasting your time on stuff
that does not edify. Yes, I watch the news but I only take in a limited
amount of it because otherwise I fill my mind and I get angry and I get
frustrated at the stuff that is going on in this world today that does
not edify. Let's fill our hearts and minds with Jesus.

Let's keep Jesus central. Let's forget about the conspiracies. Let's
forget about what the government is doing.

Let's forget about whatever is going on in this world. Let's get our
eyes on Jesus. Let's make him central.

And if you're a preacher and you've been preaching conspiracies,
brother, get back with Jesus and make him central to your message. We
have one message and that is Christ crucified. We have no business with
propagating conspiracy theories.

Our business is to preach Christ and him crucified. Let's get back to
him. Let's get back to the centrality of Christ.

Let's get back to the preeminence of Christ. Let's get back to the
centrality of the cross because that's the only thing that matters.
Father, we pray that you'd help us.

Lord, it's so easy to be distracted by the noise and the thunder and the
lightning and the storm and the wind and the waves around us and to
begin to analyze the things around us instead of having our eyes fixed
upon Jesus. I pray, Lord, today that for those who have been walking in
faith, that you would strengthen their faith. Lord, help us to not be
dissuaded from our confidence in the Lord Jesus and in the finished work
of the cross and the fact that he's coming again and he's establishing
his kingdom.

Lord, forgive us for focusing on the Antichrist. And Lord, I pray for my
brethren who seem to be more concerned with the Antichrist than they are
with Jesus, who seem to be more concerned with the tribulation than they
are with Jesus. Lord, help us to get back with Jesus.

Lord, I pray for your church. I pray, Lord, for those who preach your
word, that we may make Christ central again and turn our backs upon the
world. Help us to learn from Judah.

Help us to learn from the message of Isaiah. I pray this in Jesus' name.
I pray that you would go with us now, keep us and protect us and bring
us together again safely.

Lord, I pray that maybe soon that we will be able to meet physically
again and see each other in this chapel. But Lord, I pray that until
then, you would keep us close to you. I ask this in Jesus' name.

Amen.

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Video: https://sermonindex2.b-cdn.net/nSSjM_PPE6I.mp4
Source: https://sermonindex.net/speakers/anton-bosch/it-is-a-conspiracy/
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