back to ThinkTech, talking tax today, talking tax with Tom Yamachika, president of the Tax Foundation of Hawaii. We're going to talk about keeping cool in the schools and how good a job, or maybe not, we've done about that. Welcome to the show, Tom. Thanks for having me on the show, Jay. We're going to talk today about cool in the schools and how not to do it. Well, I remember David Ige was responding to, I guess it was sort of a community request that the schools be cooler. And my first reaction was, you know, we have an architecture show, and a number of architects have pointed out that Hawaii's best architecture is open architecture, where the trade winds come through, and cool things that way. This is the best thing that we have, that we've done. But now we're going to, I guess, close up the, under this program, we're going to close up the classrooms and put air conditioners everywhere, and not really do much in order to deal with the aging infrastructure of the schools. And he spent a lot of money. Can you talk about the money he spent for that? Well, I mean, open architecture is, you know, fine and all that when their trade winds blowing, but the trade winds don't blow all the time. Sometimes we do have rain, and sometimes we got corner winds. So things work sometimes, but not all the time. And, you know, we want kids to be, you know, in classrooms and reasonably comfortable and not sweltering. Okay, well, I never said we agree on everything though. All right. But I guess what you did point out, and I think what we can work and start is this issue was focused on a lot by, you know, the prior administration, Governor E. Gay, in 2016 under his, I would say leadership, I suppose, the legislature appropriated a hundred million dollars toward heat abatement upgrades, and in 2022 another 10 million dollars went there. And, you know, people in the communities were willing to help, too. You know, there were businesses and people they were willing to contribute. They said, okay. They said their conditioners. Yeah, they wanted to contribute their conditioners. Can I comment on that for a moment? I sat on the neighborhood board for a few years, and they would come to us every year and say, you know, the school don't have enough pencils and pens. Could you people in the neighborhood board, could you contribute your spare pencils and pens to the schools? And my God, you know, the DOE has the largest budget in the state. It's getting hundreds of millions of fund education, and they're coming to it, you know, a dozen people on the neighborhood board for pens and pens. And I suppose when you go out and say, can you give us your tired, your huddled air conditioner units and help us put them in the schools, there's an absurdity about that. What kind is it? What make? What model? How old? Does it work? Does it not work? What kind of electrical requirements does it have? So these guys, you know- Well, you see, there's the thing, because when people volunteer to give their conditioners to the schools, the response was, we can't take them. Because the school's electrical capacity, you know, you plug one or two of those things in, circuit breakers trip. You think that good planning would require a statement of the specifications of the air conditioners or an analysis of that. I guess they didn't make that enough. Well, I mean, once they started putting them in, they kind of figured out the problem. And the problem is that the circuits for, you know, schools built 50 or 100 years ago, wouldn't, you know, couldn't handle the enhanced load. So classroom, you know, classroom circuit breakers tripped out. Sometimes the circuit breaker that tripped out was for the entire wing of a building. So they said, oh, please don't donate air conditioners because the school doesn't have the capacity for it. Okay. Well, so far, that's what you want to call it a stumble point in that initiative. So, but the geniuses at our Department of Education facilities folks, they figured out a way around it. And you know what that was? I'm all game. Yes, what? Solar powered air conditioners. So they put in a bunch of solar powered air conditioners and they started running those at a cost of $122 million. Yeah, that's way more than just that, you know, ordinary air conditioners, which you connect up to your electrical circuit. Oh, yeah, ordinary air conditioners cost maybe $2,000 a classroom. The solar powered jobs cost $138,000 per classroom. I know that if you and I were in the business, we could do it cheaper. I know that. Oh, but that's not the half of it. Because solar powered air conditioners are designed to operate for like maybe four and a half hours. The school day is eight hours plus. So around midday, guess what happened? No more air condition. And the afternoon is hot. The afternoon is hot. The afternoon is very hot. So there was some problem with that solution, as you can see. Indeed. So what happened? I mean, they found out that you can't do that or that it would be too much. And did they start putting solar on the, you know, the roofs of these dated school buildings? Yes. As I mentioned, they spent $122 million on it. They actually spent the money. They spent enough money to wire 800 and something classrooms with these solar conditioners. And where in the process did they find out it was a bad idea? You know, that is the most mystifying thing about it, because if they installed maybe one or two and found out it didn't work, they could have kind of, you know, put the brakes on the plan right there. But no. They went through the, you know, entire process. They bought the $122 million. They wired up 800 and so classrooms and found out the plan didn't work. Let me do the math here. So the legislature gave them $100 million in the first branch, and then $10 million in the second one, but your number of $122 million, I'll go on record about this, is more than $110 million. Can I get that right? Yeah, of course. So there are other facilities funds that they tapped as well. Okay. So let me now tell you how they fixed the problem. Mm-hmm. Because at that point, some other real geniuses from the facilities branch got involved. The schools were, you know, had old fixtures, right, including lighting fixtures. They had incandescent bulbs. So you know these days that you can't even find incandescent bulbs in the stores anymore because you can pick up an LED bulb. And I have one right here. Let's take your word for it, Tom. It's a 100 watt bulb, so it puts out a 100 watt equivalent, but it takes 15 watts. Mm-hmm. So it saves 85% of the energy that otherwise would go to lighting. And provides the same lighting with better than before. Right. So what the schools did was they swapped out their lighting fixtures. They could plug in the air conditioners and they worked. But what about lighting? The lighting's fine. They have LED bulbs and they have light that's as good as or better than before. Okay. It doesn't sound like there's a downside, except the cost of swapping out the bulbs. Yeah. But with, you know, the swapping out of those light fixtures. You mean the fixture or the bulb? I'm sorry, the bulbs. Okay. The energy consumption from the lights went way down, thereby freeing up the capacity in the aging wires so they could accommodate the air conditioners. Got it. So they took the solar powered air conditioners, they disconnected them from the solar, they plugged them into the wall, and they worked. Problem solved. Well, the problem that wasn't solved is $122 million. That had already been spent. So there's all this solar equipment on the top of the schools that really isn't doing anything now. Plus the air conditioners are getting the power from the regular power system, the non-solar power system, right? That's right. They're plugged into the wall. They get the power from the regular grid. Send it back, send all the solar cells back. I think they wish they could. So how many schools were involved in $122 million of solar? 880 classrooms. 880 classrooms. Is that everything? I'm not really sure what you mean by everything, but... Every school, every classroom? No, no, no. No, we have quite a number of schools and classrooms statewide. But 8 or 8 was a big dent in it. But now, I get this right, the solar equipment is sitting on the roofs of 800 schools doing nothing. 880 classrooms, I don't know how many schools that is, but it is doing nothing. Well, has that been in the newspaper? Because that's really scandalous. Yeah. It did break on Hawaii News. Now, Rick DeSog broke the story. He's been following it for some time. So Rick DeSog has been a reporter at the Hawaii News now for some time. Unfortunately, he's leaving that part of the industry. He's going to join the governor's office in his policy team. He's an excellent reporter. Oh, he lost. Well, I lost there, but I think it would be a good asset to the governor's policy team. I agree. Yeah. So there are a lot of questions that I think need to be asked in this debacle. Let's ask them, yeah, again, what are they? The big one is, why didn't they test the dam plans before ruling it out to 800 state 880 classrooms and spending $122 million? I doubt there's an answer to that. I mean, when the question was put to one of the assistant superintendents, his answer was, oh, we got schooled on that. Because classrooms operate more than four and a half hours. I guess they didn't know. I mean, wouldn't there have been technical specs on the solar power air conditioners that say, oh, these are designed to run for four and a half hours? You know, it sounds like this was done by people who were not qualified to make those decisions or who were not motivated to make them even identify them. I mean, I don't hear the sound of engineers, for example. I don't hear the sound of electrical people weighing in on it. I'm not sure that the solar people weighed in on it. They were happy to have the contact.  That too. And by the way, I know you're not going to completely agree with me, but they probably didn't talk to architects either. I have no idea if they did or not. I mean, if they did, I would imagine that somebody would have figured out that this was going to be a colossal failure. So where are we now? I mean, I certainly agree. It has been a colossal failure. It was a query whether it was a good idea to start with. But let's assume there was value in the idea, at least in keeping the kids cooler because they study better and listen to teachers better and so forth. And $120 million would have bought a whole bunch of pencils. So where are we now? So the air conditioners are working. The solar is vestigial. And what's the plan? Now, is the initiative done? Is it finished? Where are we going from here, except to lick our wounds? Well, the DOE has deployed a new program. And what they say is that they have a new process designed to more quickly deploy air conditioning units in buildings that can accommodate the increased energy use. So it's up to the school to get an electrical assessment from the facilities folks, which will use no additional money because it's already paid for by state and federal funds. And then the school will have a range of options to move forward. So they're trying to kick it back to the schools and kind of like cover up the fact that the central facilities administration just immediately screwed this up. Well, okay, they should be criticized for it. Maybe heads should roll even. But the larger question is, how are we managing education in this state? Not to say that she was right or wrong, but Linda Lingle's initial platform position was, we should put the schools out in the counties, like in most other states. That didn't happen. And now we continue to run the schools through an enormous bureaucracy that costs, as I mentioned, hundreds of billions of dollars, hundreds of... No, it's huge. I forget the exact number, but the budget of the schools, huge. I think it is over a billion dollars. Over a billion dollars. It's the largest single item in the state budget. Are we doing a good job in managing education through 12? Are we growing up other parts of the educational system and overspending for them? Are we handling the teacher issues and the book issues and the computer issues and the maintenance issues the way we should? Is there enough money there? Well, I mean, before you talk about money, you got to talk about basic competence. I mean, you can throw a whole bunch of money at whatever problem, but if the person on the other doesn't know what to do with that money, then nothing's going to happen as we see here. Well, I hear what you're saying is a connection. That is, if they can't manage what appears to be a relatively simple program, how are they managing the more sophisticated ones, all the other ones, where Hawaii needs to catch up? How are we doing? How are the grade points for the kids doing? How are they doing on national scores? How are they doing in the marketplace? Can they tell you who the vice president is? All that stuff, civic education, which is so important. I suspect that the answer is on the educational level and on the other aspects of the facilities level, you know, we is not doing very well. Yeah, I mean, there have been studies on some of these things. I mean, we at the foundation have been writing about some other aspects. Like, you know, a lot of resources went toward mental health. You remember the Felix Consent Decree from some years back. One of the things that we've written about before is that there's some federal money to be pulled down for giving students the mental health support that they need. They just need to submit certain information to the feds, and then they can pull down a bunch of money. And we haven't been doing that. So, you know, my point is, well, look, how much does it cost to hire a couple of coders who can, you know, get the medical records into the shape that the feds can understand and submit those so we can actually get some money for this that we taxpayers in Hawaii don't directly have to pay for. So, you know, I think it's a good idea to do that. And so far, nobody's given me an answer for that.   Mental health, yeah. Is mental health an obligation of the Department of Education? We have a health department with well over 3,000 employees who go out into the field, and they do lots of things, including, you know, things that we don't have to pay for. Lots of things, including, you know, family health, family social health. Isn't that where mental health should be handled? Well, actually, it's in both places because if you're talking about students in the classroom, the DOE has some responsibility. So both departments do have obligations to deal with the issue. Redundant, you will agree with me. Redundancy is generally not efficient. Right. Okay. So, you know, who spots this? You know, I'm really happy that we're here together and that the Tax Foundation of Hawaii looks at this and reports on this and expresses concern about it. But the auditor, is the auditor involved? Other committees in the legislature, like on education, a billion-dollar business in the state who are involved? Who sets up the guardrails on waste? Well, the last time we talked about the auditor and the legislature, they were fighting each other. So, I mean, it's unfortunate that, you know, we, the taxpayers, have to pay both sides of the people on the fight. And when they're fighting, they're not really producing anything that's usable for, you know, for us in the state of Hawaii. I mean, somebody should just kind of get in there and lead on the law and say, look, you know, you guys, you guys behave, otherwise we'll take the sandbox away. Well, what about the governor? I mean, let's assume he's listening to this show. Let's assume he is aware one way or the other of what happened. I mean, Josh Green now. Let's assume, you know, as a good governor, he would look at what his predecessor did and see if there's anything he ought to do to tune it up. What could he do? What should he do about this? Well, what I hope that he can or would do is make sure that the people in our DOE who are dealing with this kind of issue are competent folks and the ones who aren't should be, you know, given other jobs. That's a problem. If it's a civil service job, it's not like you can say, take a hike. You know, then they'll have to deal with something about civil service. I mean, we as taxpayers in Hawaii need competent work by the people we do hire. I mean, it's not just, you know, putting any warm body into a spot. They have to be able to do, you know, the job that's asked of them. What about the education committees in the legislature?  Lord knows they deny enough requests for funding. Lord knows that, some of which arguably are very good and better than solar that doesn't do anything. But what about the legislative committees? They're there to examine. They have staff. Sometimes a lot of staff. They're capable of doing research as much or better full-time as you and me. And somebody appears in front of them and says, we need $110 million. How about it? And they, and they, they, they agree to that. And query whether they should have dug a little deeper on this. Well, I think they certainly have that power. The, the legislature, I mean, we have in the legislature several examples of recent clashes between the legislature and the administration that, you know, that the legislature won on, HTA being, you know, a very recent example of this Hoy-Tourism authority. The, they are certainly capable of putting a lot of pressure on, on that point so that the people who are there decide it's not worth for, not worth it for them to stay there and they get the heck out. And, and hopefully that means somebody, you know, somebody else in somebody competent gets put in the job. Hmm. Yeah, but what, what about actually, you know, researching these kinds of questions themselves? Is the legislative, legislator able to do that? I mean, if I'm a legislator, say I'm the chair of the education committee in one house or the other. I said, wait a minute, you know, that's a lot of money. I want to be satisfied. I want to report. I want an engineers analysis. I want an electrical analysis. I want an architectural analysis. Forgive me for mentioning that again. Why can't, why can't that person, that legislator ask and get an answer? Do that in Congress, or at least they should. Well, they, they, they do, but then, then you have an equal, equal number of detractors saying, you know, we're just, we're just going to study the issue. Come on, we need action. Yeah, the kids, the kids are burning. Yeah, the kids, the kids are burning up with, with temperature. Yeah. I mean, the kids are roasting in the meantime. Come on. Can't you be more compassionate than that? Yeah. And what's so complicated about air conditioners anyway? That's right. You know, you know, Tom, this is, of course, this is the largest element in the state budget, but it strikes me that if we find this kind of, we want to call it, decision-making problem in DOE, and it certainly lies in DOE. What about other agencies? Is this kind of all across the board? Are there other agencies that operate in the same way where they make a request for funding they really should not have made? Where they, where the legislature gives them that money without really delving into it, asking all the right questions. Is this something, is this a phenomenon that exists in other agencies and other initiatives the same way? Actually, no. A lot of other agencies are, I mean, and DOE to some extent is, is hidden by special funding. So you don't have the kind of scrutiny in the appropriations committees that, that you would if it's a normally funded agency that if that's funded by general funds. Because in a special fund, basically it's up to the department head to decide whether the money is consistent with the objectives of the special fund and if, and if it is, you know, it can, you know, the money can be spent. Well, that's the answer to the question then. It doesn't go in front of the legislature because it's tucked away in a special fund. A process you and I have talked about many times and the decisions about whether to spend it, how to spend it, the guardrails, if you will, there are no guardrails because the executive in the agency can make those decisions without a whole lot of vetting or analysis. And so the answer is, you know, you and I have actually been talking about this for a long time. We've been talking about management in state agencies, which is spending money without making good decisions. I think that's what I hear. That's right. There are two problems involved. Number one, you have an agency with a lot of special funds, which DOE has. Two, the agency is too big. There are several layers of bureaucracy, you know, bureaucracy and public bureaucracy. Then it goes up to an elected board and decisions by committee sometimes you have people under the committee that kind of really make all the decisions and just kind of go to the committee for rubber stamp. You know, you need to have clear delineated lines of responsibility and when incompetence happens, that's got to be corrected. Well, it's easy to say it. You know, one other big factor in Hawaii education, which is not known the world over for excellence is the University of Hawaii. And my recollection is we give the University, we give the University a lot of money, a lot of money. Could it be even more than DOE? And what about the decision process there? Is that any better? Or is it worse? What is it like? How does it compare? Well, there are a lot of similarities. You have an elected or appointed with confirmation committee that is at the top of it, the Board of Regents. And you have a Chief Executive, President of the University and lots of bureaucracy under it. But I don't think it's quite as bad as the DOE. At least there's more transparency, at least as in my experience there is. Presumably the Board of Regents that come from other places, they're not stuck in career patterns that require them to just buy into a program. They have the opportunity to say no, hopefully. So yeah, I agree there's a difference there. But in general, I guess I would ask you as a matter of policy, how important is education to us? How important is it that we provide schools that are comfortable, that we provide all of the things that give our kids excellent education? How important is that in the larger picture, in the picture of looking forward? I think it's a very critical thing. We start in the schools to learn to be productive members of society. If we can't do that job right, then how can we expect our kids to be productive members of society? And can you compare for us the process that we have identified and discussed today over air conditioning in the schools of the public schools and DOE as against the private schools of which there are several in Hawaii? Well, in the private schools, usually you don't have governance by committee. Usually there's a chief executive, so there are definite lines of accountability. And there are competitive pressures because there's more than one private school. And a school has to demonstrate its value in light of the fact that parents in Hawaii can send their kids through the public school system and not pay for it. Yeah, well, they write checks to the public school and they are their own control. If they write checks and they see the public school, I'm sorry, they write checks and see the private school throw the money away as here, they're going to say something and they can vote with their feet. Yeah, they can pull their kids out, which is something that DOE can do. And one other thing comes to mind is in the middle of all that, there's the charter schools. Did the charter schools fall in the public school category here for this kind of discussion? Yes, charter schools, employees are all DOE. How about the air conditioner? That I don't know. Really wonder. Well, let's go back to my point over architecture just for a minute. Okay, let's assume that you can build a school that is open to the trade winds in a way that it's sustainable. I mean, so that if it rains, it's not going to rain into the classroom. And I think any good environmental architect will tell you that you can do this. And if there are no trades, well, you can still open it up well enough so that there's refreshing air going into the classroom. And you can do that with residents, as I know. We've had many shows about this subject on our architecture show. So it leads to the whole question of the infrastructure. If you want to provide kids in this state with an enviable environment where they can feel good about their schools and you mentioned schools that are what? 60, 70, 80, 100 years old in this state. Isn't it good to refurbish our classroom and include air conditioning and or open air architecture? Are we doing that? Are we going around saying, this one's old. We have to redo this one. My understanding is that we have backlog deferred maintenance not only at the schools, but also at the university and at several other agencies, like the legendary problems at the airport. That's some department of transportation. Yeah, I mean, we have a deferred maintenance issue. Yeah, deferred redevelopment issue. I mean, I mean, I've seen schools look that they were built in 1900. Have they probably were? Yeah. I'm sure if you went to a modern city, a well-funded city in the U.S. or Canada or even Asia or Europe, you would find that the schools are considered a treasure by the community. They are a statement of the future. They are a statement of the way the community feels about their children. I'm a little concerned that our schools are not a pretty statement about how we feel about our children. Yeah, I think it's a valid concern. Yeah, but then all of that is a, again, it goes back down to getting our priorities right, getting our priorities reflected into our budgeting and not bypassing our budgeting with special funds and other artifacts like that. I mean, we have to have a line of accountability between the people who our government is supposed to serve and the services that our government, in fact, provides. Well said. Tom Yamachika, President of the Tax Foundation of Hawaii. A very important discussion. I hope we can carry it forward. Thank you so much. Thank you very much for watching Think Tech Hawaii. If you like what we do, please click the like and subscribe button on YouTube. You can also follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and other social media platforms. You can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn. Check out our website, thinktechawaii.com. Mahalo.


The title of our sermon this morning is He is Faithful. He is Faithful, Romans chapter three, verses one through eight, particularly our texts this morning is gonna be verses three and four as we're working through this text and the objections that are raised here to the apostle Paul, Romans chapter three, verses one through eight. We find ourselves this morning at the beginning again of chapter three, and as Paul is approaching the end of what has become a scathing indictment of all mankind under their sin. We're rapidly nearing now Paul's closing statements that began in chapter three, verse nine, and the inescapable conclusion of Paul's argument that began all the way back in chapter one, verse 18, where Romans reads for the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness. And Paul has been unpacking that statement from chapter one, verse 18, and will continue to do so through chapter three, verse 20. Prior to his explanation of the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ as the only remedy for man's sin, Paul intends through this case to see to it that the gospel, that diamond shines in its proper context, which is the hell-darkened heart of fallen men. The conclusion in which Paul is leading us is this, all the world is guilty before God. All the world is guilty. There is none righteous, not one. All have turned aside. Paul says that all have become worthless, quoting the prophets. There is no one who does good, no, not one. Therefore, the conclusion that will come to is that there is nothing that you can do to justify yourself in the sight of God. Nothing that you can do to reconcile yourself to God. You must turn from your sin and repentance, submit yourself to the one provision that God has graciously made for your sin and put your faith and trust in Jesus Christ alone. When you do, when you do, his perfect righteousness becomes your perfect righteousness. And it's on the basis of that righteousness then that we are justified, declared righteous in the sight of God and forgiven of all our sin. Apart from the gift of that righteousness through faith, all men are condemned to die under the righteous judgment of Almighty God. All men have suppressed the truth in their unrighteousness and God is just, God is righteous himself in pouring out the fury of his wrath upon ungodly sinners for their sin against him. You and I, we have suppressed the truth in our unrighteousness. Do you acknowledge that this morning? You and I have sinned against God and God is just.  You and I are accountable to God for our sin. We're accountable for how we live the life that God himself has given to us. We're accountable to God. And if we were to be honest with ourselves this morning, you and I have failed to live our lives fully for his glory. We have sinned against him. Now, Paul understands our fallen condition. Paul understands that well. He wants us to understand it well. And we are often like bugs that scamper for a dark corner whenever the light is turned on, right? Light has come into the world, but men love darkness rather than light. Why is that? It's because their deeds are evil. And the light comes on. The searing spotlight of God's word comes on. And what do fallen, sinful men, bugs, have a tendency to do? We have a tendency to run for a dark corner. And why is that? The Lord says it's because our deeds are evil. And Paul understands that. Paul understands that. And so Paul takes care in these opening chapters of his letter to the church at Rome to illuminate every dark corner so that there is nowhere for the sinner to hide. You see what Paul's doing? He's going to shed a light in every dark corner so that we have no place that we can hide. What would be the purpose for that? Why would Paul take us through that exercise so that we flee to the light? We flee to Jesus Christ for salvation, right? There's grace that is woven into the fabric of these chapters, even though sometimes it doesn't feel that way, right? Paul is going to confront us in our sin. He's going to expose our sin. The reason for that is to drive us to the Savior. So in chapter one, God has given abundant and gracious, abundantly gracious revelation of himself in creation.  It's revelation that is sufficient enough for all men to know God, even his eternal power in deity. Sufficient for men to glorify God, sufficient for men to worship God with gratefulness, with gratitude on their hearts. And what do men do? What do sinful men do? Although they knew God, chapter one says, they did no such thing. They did not glorify him as God. They were not thankful, but they rather suppressed the truth of God in their unrighteousness and they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, worshiping and serving rather the creature than the creator. Chapter two, God has given abundant, gracious revelation of himself through man's conscience and the work of the law written upon the heart of every man, knowing then through the work of conscience that the wages of sin against God is death, knowing that the judgment of God against sin is according to truth. They, sinful, fallen men, not only practice such things themselves, but approve of those who do.  With that, Paul then turns to the abundant and gracious revelation that God has given of himself in scripture. It's not merely the one who possesses the word of God, who can boast of right standing with God. With or without the scriptures, sinners will perish for not the hearers of the law, not the hearers of the Bible are just in the sight of God, but the doers of the law will be justified. And then Paul turns his spotlight on the dark corner of religious formalism. Those who put their confidence in their religious observance to justify them before God, to give them peace with God. They believe they're right with God because they go to church on Sunday. They believe they're right with God because of the things that they do. It's where many a Jew in Paul's day, where many a false professing Christian in our own day have attempted to hide. And Paul places his light on that dark corner and says that you cannot place any confidence in your religious practice. Don't be foolish. You can't place any confidence in your religiosity. Paul knows that we are like scampering bugs looking for a corner to hide in, to justify ourselves. We'll labor to placate a guilty or accusing conscience by hiding behind those false things. And we often scamper into the corner of a church somewhere in attempt to hide. And Paul says you can't do it. Paul says if your conduct is such that you are a breaker of the law, then all your religious observance is of no consequence.  Romans chapter two, verse 28, why is that? It's because he is not a Jew who has won outwardly. We might say he's not a Christian who has won merely outwardly, nor is circumcision that which is outward in the flesh, but he is a Jew, he's a Christian who has won inwardly. And circumcision is that of the heart in the spirit, not in the letter whose praise is not from men, but from God. In other words, if the outward observance is not accompanied by an inward renewal, then the outward observance is absolutely meaningless.  For neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything but a new creation. In other words, true religion, Paul says, is a matter of the heart. True religion, true religion is a matter of the heart. You must be born again. True religion is not something that people can fake. In other words, it's going to flow. True religion only flows from a heart that has been transformed by God. It cannot be faked. God sees the heart. Men look on outward appearance. You can show up at a church and you can play church weekend and work week out. You're not playing anything with God. God sees the heart. God understand God's note, God knows. It is a matter of the heart. You must be born again. Your decision to walk an aisle, your decision to pray some prayer, your decision to rededicate your life for the fourth, fifth, sixth time, your decision to be baptized means nothing. Means nothing apart from a transformed heart. These things, listen, these things are far too important to leave people hiding in that corner, hiding in the dark, far too critical to allow you to continue gripping to some false assurance, laying hold of some false confidence. So what does Paul graciously do? What does the Lord graciously do through texts like these?   There's too much at stake.  We're not playing games around here. There's too much at stake. Paul doesn't want you running into a corner to hide. Consider the condition of your heart. Acknowledge your sinful condition before God and flee to Jesus Christ in faith. He alone is our hope and stay. And the Lord Jesus Christ is willing, and able to forgive you of all your sin and to cleanse you of your unrighteousness if you will turn from your sin and trust him alone, do you see? The Lord is willing. However, what do bugs do when they run out of corners to hide in? Bugs start raising objections. They start raising objections. That's what we see in Romans chapter three verses one through eight. Paul anticipates here in our text a series of objections from what we've come to know as the Jewish formalist or the religious formalist from the hypocrite. And we consider the first of those objections last Lord's day in chapter three verse one. What advantage then has the Jew? Or what is the profit of circumcision? Paul, if you're saying that I'm not a true Jew as a physical son of Abraham or I'm not at peace with God through the covenant that God himself established, the sign of which I bear in my own flesh through circumcision, if you're saying that I'm no better off than an uncircumcised Gentile, then what does it matter? What is it all for? What's the purpose of having an ethnic physical people called Israel? What's the purpose at all of circumcision? What's the benefit, the advantage of being a Jew? So Paul answers that objection in chapter three verse two. Much, be sure, much in every way. Chiefly Paul says of first importance because to them the Jews were entrusted the oracles of God. There is great benefit Paul says in every respect to having those religious privileges, those religious benefits. The Jews were entrusted, committed special revelation, the living utterances of the true and living God, the foremost advantage of the Jew. Chief among the profitable benefits of his circumcision in covenant with God was his possession of the word of God. That same blessing, brothers and sisters, is foremost among the many blessings that we enjoy in our own day. You see? It's estimated that between 1815 and 1975, more than five billion copies of the Bible have been printed and many think that's a low estimate. Five billion copies of the scriptures. By far, the Bible is the world's best selling and most widely distributed book. I think the next most published book was a communist red book from China, about one billion copies, a lot of Chinese people. So one billion copies out there. The Bible, five billion copies, okay? The number has skyrocketed certainly since then and doesn't include the wide availability we have to the Bible online on the interweb. And yet a tragic state of affairs today is that a vast majority of people today are biblically illiterate. Biblically illiterate. Do not know the Bible. Do not know the gospel. And listen, that's most preachers. Most people in full-time ministry do not know the gospel. Don't know their Bibles. And so what has been the result of that? People were given to superstition. People were given over to heresy, false teaching. The Bibles, those Bibles, four billion, 900, some odd number of them collecting dust on shelves, never, if ever read. But with much privilege comes much responsibility, right? With much light should come much heat. Peter says, we have the prophetic word confirmed and we do well to heat it as a light that shines in a dark place, right? As a light that shines in a dark corner. Well, having anticipated and then answered that first objection, Paul now anticipates and answers the second. The second objection will be the focus of our sermon, our time together this morning. First, consider with me the objection anticipated. And we see this objection in chapter three, verse three. And here it is. For what then if some did not believe? What if some did not believe? Will their unbelief make the faithfulness of God without effect? That is a loaded objection. I want us to understand what Paul's getting at here. So we're gonna break this text down. Chapter three, verse three, that little word four at the very beginning of verse three connects this objection to what Paul said in verse two. Now, note with me, verses two and three. The Greek word translated entrusted or committed in verse two is the same Greek root translated believe in verse three. And you can connect those two words. And the same Greek root referring to the faithfulness of God in verse three. That word, that same Greek word can be translated as belief. It can be translated as faith. It can be translated believing or faithful.  And you get unbelief, unbelieving or unfaithful, do you see? So here's the train of thought. If those words from the same Greek root meaning the same, basically the same thing, verse two says that the Jews were entrusted with the oracles of God. In other words, they were to be faithful to the word of God, verse two. Verse three. So what if some were unfaithful to the word? Do you see the connection? What if some were unfaithful to the word? Will their unfaithfulness set aside or abolish God's faithfulness? So we see the translation sometimes makes it difficult to understand what Paul is saying. We have a case of that here in verses two and three. What if some were unfaithful to the word? Will their unfaithfulness set aside or abolish God's faithfulness? Will their unfaithfulness diminish or undermine God's faithfulness? Will their failure to be faithful to the word? Verse two. Undermine and validate, nullify the faithfulness of God. That word translated in verse three without effect, make the faithfulness of God without effect, means to abolish. It means to set it aside, to nullify it, right? Now this objector knows that not all Jews were unfaithful. He certainly wouldn't believe that he himself was unfaithful. I certainly have not been unfaithful. What if some, what if some were unfaithful to the word? Would that be a reason for God to abandon his faithfulness to his covenant? Do you see what the objection is now, right? Verse three. For what if some were not faithful to the word? Would that mean that God is unfaithful to his covenant? Would their unfaithfulness make the faithfulness of God without effect? Now, our imaginary Jewish objector raises this question as a rhetorical question and expects a no answer. He expects a no answer, right? Absolutely not, the Jewish objector would say. And interestingly enough, that's exactly what Paul says. Absolutely not. Absolutely not. To the Jewish objector, the objector would sit back and say, even if we or any of our countrymen are faithless, even if we are unfaithful, God remains faithful. He cannot deny himself, meaning to the Jewish formalists, even if we deny the covenant, we still inherit the promises because God cannot deny the covenant. You see? It's difficult, a difficult thought process. Once you have it straight in your head, we can understand the rest of the flow of the text, okay? Even if we deny the covenant, even if we are faithless, even if we are unfaithful, God remains faithful and we will inherit the promises. We're going to heaven, no matter how we live, because God cannot deny the covenant. Makes sense, okay? If we're unfaithful, it doesn't matter. Sin it up. Sin it up because God is going to keep his promises no matter how sinful, no matter how faithless, no matter how unfaithful we are. That's what this lawless objector is asserting. Well, God is faithful to his promises, isn't he? God absolutely is faithful to his promises. Second Timothy, chapter two, verse 13. If we are faithless, he indeed remains faithful, he cannot deny himself. We're on common ground with this Jewish objector.  The religious hypocrite, the Jewish formalist, this objector has taken the skin of that truth and he has stuffed it with a lie. And I want you to see that. Today, we would characterize this lie as antinomianism, living lawlessly against anti-Namas, the law, living as if there were no law, living as if opposed to the law. Others might refer to it as easy believism. You'll hear us talk about that term on a regular basis as well. Easy believism, a predominant feature of most of the modern professing evangelical church today. Antinomianism, easy believism. Basically living with little or no regard, little or no accountability to the law of God. Paul says that what matters is circumcision of the heart. What matters is circumcision of the heart.  Not, there are those who have a form of religion, a form of knowledge, but deny its power. God doesn't save mankind by sweeping his sin under the rug, turning a blind eye, winking at it and saying, that'll be okay, and saving us in spite of our sin, God saves us and remains just himself by dealing with our sin biblically, by dealing with our sin according to his law. And what Paul is saying is if you look at the New Covenant for example, God saves as part of the New Covenant by causing us to walk in his statutes and judgments, causing us by his spirit to obey living for him, devoted to him, do you see? He does that by transforming our hearts, by filling us with his spirit and by causing us to obey him. Paul says what matters is that circumcision of heart. What matters is that heart transformation. What matters is a change of man's nature by the spirit whereby man is made able to obey the law, preserved in obedience through spirit wrought faith in Jesus Christ. That is what salvation is, what salvation attains to. The Jewish formalist is objecting. He's saying it doesn't matter how we live. It doesn't matter how we live. You're in the Covenant through circumcision.  If you've not been circumcised, you're out. You see? If you're in the Covenant, then you're headed for heaven. In Abraham is standing at the gates of hell, not allowing any circumcised Jew to enter there. If you're in Covenant with God, by praying to receive Christ, if you're in Covenant with God, quote, unquote, by saying the sinner's prayer, walking in aisle, by being born in a Christian family, being born to the right dad. It doesn't matter how we live, says the Jewish formalist.   That's the objection that is being raised here. God cannot deny his promises to Abraham. And so we're in, no matter how we live, because I'm a Jew, because I've been circumcised. Next, then, the objection answered. The objection answered. How does Paul, in our text, answer our religious objector? He answers with the strongest negation possible in the Greek. May it never be God forbid. What if some did not believe? Will their unbelief, will their unfaithfulness make the faithfulness of God without effect? Paul agrees with the Jewish objector. Absolutely not. May it never be God forbid. Even the notion that God's faithfulness in any way is undermined or diminished by man's unfaithfulness is abhorrent to the apostle Paul. May it never be. This is where Paul finds common ground with our Jewish objector, okay? But although Paul may agree with our objector on this basic premise, Paul vehemently disagrees with our objector on the implication, the implications that our Jewish objector raises. God is faithful, even if we are faithless. That's true. That's scripture. God is indeed faithful, even if we are faithless. But the objector argues from that truth that God is then obligated by God's own faithfulness to save us even those who are unfaithful to his word. That God is obligated by his own faithfulness to save even those who are unfaithful. And Paul argues from that truth, that same truth, that God will absolutely remain faithful to his word by judging those members of the covenant who are unfaithful. Do you see the difference between the two, okay? The objection is raised. God's gonna save us because we're circumcised. God's gonna save us because we're in covenant and God's going to be faithful to his covenant no matter how we live, we're in. Paul agrees, God is absolutely faithful even when we are faithless, but his faithfulness is not faithful to save you despite how you live. His faithfulness is to his promise to judge you if you do not live according to the covenant, right? That's essentially what Paul is arguing here. Paul argues from the same truth that God will remain faithful to his word and his word and his word, he has promised to judge those who are faithless. Peter would say it this way, God is not slack concerning his promise as some count slackness. Peter just got done discussing the flood where every man, woman, and child on the planet, save eight, were killed in that deluge, right? Judged by God for wickedness. And Peter says that God is not slack concerning his promise as some count slackness. He is long suffering toward us, not willing that any of us, any of his elect should perish and will certainly visit judgment upon the wicked. No matter a mark in their flesh, God will judge the wicked. No matter who their dad is, we have Abraham as our father. No matter, God will visit judgment upon the wicked. No matter that they walked in Isle and said that prayer 100 times if they said it once. No matter, no matter the church they attend, no matter what they do, no matter their religious observance, God has promised to judge the wicked. God will judge those who are unfaithful and unbelieving. Do you see? Now how does Paul frame this answer for our religious objector? First, he agrees with the premise, God is faithful. Will the faithlessness of man render the faithfulness of God without effect? Absolutely not, God forbid. But then he adds emphasis, listen. Indeed, Paul says, let God be true though every man were false. That's the way we can understand that. Indeed, let God be true though every man were false. Let's not merely stop at some who are unfaithful to their covenant obligations. Indeed, even if every man was faithless and found to be a liar, God would still be found true to his word. Do you see how that fits? Even if every man of the objector says, well, what if some, what if some were faithless? What if some were unfaithful to the word? Paul says, no, literally if even every man was faithless, if every man were found to be a liar, God would still be faithful to his word. God would still be true. Now this is where common ground with the Jewish objector ends. Common ground ends in verse four. God is faithful even when we are faithless. Indeed, God is true though every man were false. And so where's the disagreement? What is the ground of the disagreement? The disagreement comes in, comes in what they understand God to have promised. The disagreement comes in what they understand God to have promised. Now the objector protests, God has promised to save me because I'm in the covenant. God has promised to save me. I'm a son of Abraham. God has promised to save me. I've been circumcised. I have the law. God has promised to save me. Even if I should be utterly faithless to God, God will be faithful to the promises that he made to Abraham and I will be saved. Let me ask you, is that what God has promised? No. That's what the Jewish objector has come to believe that God has promised. That God never promised to save all of Abraham's descendants. He certainly never promised to do so apart from faith in Jesus Christ. He certainly never promised to do so apart from the fruit of faithfulness that flows from faith, evangelical obedience. He never promised to save them regardless of how they lived. So many examples of this is scripture. So many examples. Turn with me to Hebrews chapter three. Let's look at one in particular. Hebrews chapter three and look there beginning at verse seven. Hebrews chapter three, verse seven. In this chapter, Paul is begun by speaking of the faithfulness of Jesus Christ and he is exhorting to us, exhorting us to faithfulness and following the Lord's example. The heading over my text says be faithful. There's an exhortation there to be faithful, okay? He just gets done speaking of the faithfulness of Jesus Christ. Paul is exhorting us to faithfulness and he says in verse seven, therefore, as the Holy Spirit says today, today if you will hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion in the day of trial in the wilderness where your fathers tested me, tried me and saw my works 40 years. Therefore, he says, I was angry with that generation and said they always go astray in their heart. They have not known my ways. They have not been faithful to my covenant. This is reminiscent of Paul's words in Romans chapter three, right? They have all turned aside. They have all become unprofitable, right? Everyone has gone astray in their heart. They've become unprofitable. They've not known my ways. God says verse 10, they have not been faithful to the covenant, in other words, verse 11. So I swore in my wrath. God says, I promised. I promised they shall not enter my rest. Wait a minute. What about your promises to Abraham? God is faithful to his promise. God is going to keep every word that he has promised. God is faithful to the promises that he made with Abraham. But nowhere did God ever promise that every son of Abraham would be saved. I swore in my wrath. I promised God said, they shall not enter my rest.  Paul says, beware brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God. Unbelief bearing the fruit of faithlessness, of unfaithfulness. Do you see? 13, verse 13. But rather, exhort one another daily, exhort one another daily while it is called today. This is what we do in the church, right? This is what brothers and sisters, I am my brother's keeper. I care about what happens to you. I care about your soul spiritually. You, I know you care about mine. Why? Because we love each other in this way. We're exhorting one another. We talk to one another. We're invested in one other's lives. That's what the church is supposed to be doing. I had a brother text me last week and he said he talked to a pastor in his church about this very thing. And the pastor said they won't do it because if you do this, you uncover trouble. May we uncover trouble on this side of eternity so you don't face trouble on that side of eternity, amen? This is what the church is to do. Exort one another daily while it is called today. Why? Why would we do that which is hard to do? It's not easy to do. Why? Blessed any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. For we have become partakers of Christ if and only if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast to the end. If we bear the fruit of faithfulness, do you see? That's not because we're working our way to heaven or because we're somehow earning a place in heaven based upon our own steadfastness. No, no. It's because God by his spirit uses this means to preserve us in the faith. God is the one who preserves, do you see? God is the one who is doing it. He is the one bearing that fruit. While it is said, verse 15, today, if you will hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion. For who, verse 16, having heard, rebelled. Indeed, was it not all those Jews, right, who came out of Egypt led by Moses? With whom was God angry for 40 years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose corpses fell in the wilderness? You could say to the Jewish abjector, do you not remember the Exodus? Do you not remember the first generation? That entire emancipation generation died. Their corpses are lying in the wilderness. Verse 18, to whom did he swear? To whom did he promise that he would judge them? To whom did he promise that they would not enter his rest? But to those who did not what? Obey. Some translations you'll see believe, obey. The same word, same root word used back in Romans chapter three, verse three and four, right? Same root word. So we see they could not enter in because of unbelief, unfaithfulness, unfaithful. They did not enter, they did not render the obedience which flows from faith. That obedience, it's not man powered obedience as gritting it out in our own power and obeying in order to earn salvation. This is the obedience that flows from faith, the obedience of faith. That evangelical obedience that flows from faith in the life of every true believer. Did God promise that every Jewish-born son of Abraham would be saved? No, he didn't. What did he promise? He promised that every faithless, unbelieving Jew, regardless of their place in the covenant through circumcision, would be judged together with unbelievers. That's what God promised. Was God faithful to his promise? Was God faithful to that promise? Yes, he was. Yes, he was. And every one of that first generation, the emancipation generation, every one of them died except for Caleb and Joshua, the children. Every one of them died in the wilderness. Not even Moses was allowed to enter the land. He died before the inheritance generation, that second generation, took the land under Joshua. Now think about it with me. Think about the numerous examples of this in the Bible. The two sons of Abraham, Isaac and Ishmael, both of them circumcised, one of them a child of promise. One of them, one of them a child of promise. The two sons of Isaac, both Jewish, both circumcised, but one Jacob, a child of promise. Romans chapter nine, verse 13, as it is written, Jacob I have loved, but Esau I have hated. People wanna play that down in our day and age as if the character of God is somehow under assault because God faithfully judges sin and they'll want to play verbal gymnastics with that text to somehow spare the character of God, the notion that he would hate Esau. Where is Esau today?  There's no, there's no way to put that lightly. Jacob I've loved Esau I have hated. One was the child of promise. Hebrews chapter 12, verse 16 says that Esau for one morsel of food sold his birthright. For one morsel of food sold his heritage. Gave it up as a common thing. We might say in our context, he trampled the blood of the covenant, the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ underfoot as a common thing. And afterward, when he wanted to inherit the blessing, he was rejected. He was rejected, why? Because he had counted the blood of the covenant a common thing. Scripture calls Esau a profane man, a fornicator. He found no place for repentance though he sought it diligently with tears. God is faithful to his promise, not only faithful to his promise to save, faithful to his promise to judge. What about Korah and all those rebels under Korah who went down alive into the pit? What about Jeroboam, son of Nebat? What about Ahab in the days of Jezebel? What about Amon? Search the Bible, search the Bible cover to cover and you will find no quarter for the wicked.  There is no salvation for the one who persists in his sin. There is no warrant given in the Bible for anyone just to live as they please. Listen to the preaching of John the Baptist. Go back to Matthew chapter three, Matthew chapter three and look there at verse seven and the preaching of John the Baptist to Israel. John the Baptist, Matthew chapter three, verse seven. But when John saw many of the Pharisees, saw many of the Sadducees coming to his baptism, John preached the baptism of repentance, of turning from sin, a baptism of repentance. He said to them, these Pharisees, these obsessively religious people, he said to them, brood of vipers. Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? The wrath was coming upon them, in other words, do you see? Verse eight, therefore bear fruits worthy of repentance. Do not think to say to yourselves, we have Abraham as our father. I'm a Jew of the stock of Israel, circumcised the eighth day. Do not think to say to yourselves, verse nine, we have Abraham as our father, for I say to you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones. And even now, you wicked Pharisees and Sadducees, you brood of vipers, the ax is laid to the root of the trees. And what is the measure? What's the measure by which they will be judged? Therefore, verse 10, every tree which does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. That is a promise. And an objector in our day raises up and says, are you legalist?  You're saying we've got to earn salvation by fruit bearing. Nope.  So you can placate your guilty conscience with a promise that God never made. Don't comfort yourself with promises that God never made. No, this is not salvation by works. This is salvation that works. This is the fruits of saving faith. Every tree which does not bear good fruit. Listen, you can take it to the bank. That tree is cut down and thrown into the fire. That's a promise. And does God keep his promises? Yes, he does. Even if every man were found unfaithful, God is indeed faithful to his word. I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance, John says, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.  That is a promise. Back in Romans chapter three, where the Jewish objector put all his confidence in a promise that God never made, Paul drew application from the faithfulness of God for a promise that he certainly did make. Do you see? God absolutely will be faithful, but not in the way that you're surmising. Not in the way that you believe that God has promised. God has promised judgment upon the wicked. God has promised to judge everyone according to his works. God is no respecter of person. God is impartial. His judgment is impartial. Whether Jew or Gentile, God has promised to judge the faithless and unbelieving, whether pagan, Gentile or Jewish formalist or professing Christian. And we know that from Paul's quote in Romans chapter three, verse four, Romans chapter three, verse four, let God be certainly faithful, even though every man found to be faithless as it is written, that you may be justified in your words and may overcome when you are judged. If you look at that, that's a quote, a quote from King David, Psalm 51, verse four, turn there with me to Psalm 51, Psalm 51, verse four, from the words of King David, as King David bitterly mourns his sins against God in the matter of Bathsheba and Uriah the Hittite. David is pouring out his heart in conviction, pouring out his heart in confession over the sins over his sins of adultery and murder and he cries out to God, pleading for God's mercy in Psalm 51, verse one. Have mercy upon me, O God. According to your loving kindness, according to the multitude of your tender mercies, God blot out my transgressions. This is what David's prayer is, do you see? Wash me, God, thoroughly from my iniquity, cleanse me from my sin, for I acknowledge my transgressions and my sin is always before me.  So that, here it is, you may be found just when you speak and blameless when you judge. And what is David saying? All right, what's David saying here? He's saying, he's acknowledging that God would be righteous. God would be just to judge him according to his sins. Do you see? I know I deserve hell, David is saying. I know it and God, you would be just, you would be righteous to send me to hell for my sin. God would be entirely faithful to judge me for my sin, even though I have been entirely faithless. He's not appealing, notice. He's not appealing to his circumcision. He's not appealing to Abraham. David was a son of Abraham like the rest. He's not appealing to his religiosity, his religious observance. I'm a king in Israel, he's not doing any of that. My sin is against you, God. It's against you so that you may be found just and you may be found righteous when you speak, blameless when you judge. There is no plea bargaining going on here. There's just acknowledgement of divine truth. There is no excuse for his sin. There is just the acknowledgement that God is faithful to his promise. David doesn't attempt to cover his sin. He doesn't attempt to cover his sin in religious practice, in religious privilege, in religious heritage. All he can do, David knows, all that he can do, all that he can do is just appeal to God for God's mercy. All I can do is just go to God, God be merciful to be the sinner. Do you see? He's got nothing else. David is bankrupt before God, bankrupt of his own righteousness, bankrupt of any hope in himself. And he just appeals to God for mercy. Well, Paul in Romans 3 picks up on this context, picks up on that thing of God's faithfulness, that theme of God's faithfulness in judgment, God's righteousness in judgment, and he loads all of that context, all of that heart. He loads with those words, with that quote, he loads that into Romans chapter 3 verse 4, and his dialogue with the Jewish objector. God is absolutely faithful to his promises, he tells him. He is justified in his words. He overcomes when he is judged. He's blameless, and he is just as faithful to judge the Jewish formalists as he would have been to have judged King David for his sin, do you see? And David is the one found to be repenting here. David is the one repenting. Certainly that context would have been on the mind of Paul or the Jewish objector. David is repenting of his sin, pleading with God for mercy. This Jewish objector is making excuses for his sin, covering his sin in his religion. John Murray, Dr. Murray says this, so far from detracting from the justice or faithfulness of God, sin as against God, sinning against God promotes the vindication and exhibition of God's faithfulness in the judgment that he pronounces with reference to it. In other words, it has the very opposite effect that the Jewish objector believes that it has. So far from undermining or nullifying the faithfulness of God, understanding or acknowledging that all of our sin is against God and against only God, it vindicates his faithfulness when God judges it, right? It vindicates his faithfulness in the judgment that he pronounces against it. So far from the Jewish objector's accusation that God would be unfaithful to judge him for his sin, so far from that, his sin against God actually serves to prove that God is faithful precisely because God will judge the Jewish objector for his sin. So many religious formalists, so many quote unquote Christian hypocrites point to David as justification for their own sin. I can't count how many times I have heard that objection, that excuse for sin. David is the one repenting here. Do you see David's heart? They point to David as the grounds on which God will be merciful to them in their sin. But what's the difference here between our Jewish objector and David? What's the difference between the religious hypocrite in our own day and David? It's the broken and contrite heart over his sin. A broken and contrite heart. David isn't hiding his sin. David isn't making excuses for his sin. What's the difference? It's the true repentance that produces the fruit of a changed mind. The true repentance that produces the fruit of a changed will, changed affections, changed emotions and changed actions, a changed life. And we see it in the heart of David as he pours out his heart pleading with God for mercy. Verse seven, listen, purge me with hyssop God and I shall be clean. Wash me, I shall be whiter than snow. Make me hear joy and gladness that the bones you have broken may rejoice. Hide your face, God, for my sins blot out all my iniquities. Created me, God, a clean heart, renew a steadfast spirit within me. Do not cast me from your presence. This is desperation, do you see? Do not cast me away from your presence. Do not take your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation. Uphold me by your generous spirit. All you can do is go to God and plead God's character, God's faithfulness to his word. All you can do is plead God's mercy, God's grace. Then David says, I will teach transgressors your ways. What is the fruit? What's the fruit of forgiveness? What's the fruit of a transformed heart? What's the fruit of faith? Then I will teach transgressors your ways. Sinners shall be converted to you. Deliver me from the guilt of bloodshed, O God, the God of my salvation, and my tongue shall sing aloud of your righteousness.  Lord, open my lips and my mouth shall show forth your praise. I will worship you. You do not desire sacrifice or else I would give it. You do not delight in burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and a contrite heart. These, O God, you will not despise.  I sin, that's what I do. God forgives, that's what he does. Don't believe a lie. Don't believe a lie. Second Timothy chapter two, verse 11, Paul says, this is a faithful saying. For if we died with him, we shall also live with him. Die to sin and self in Jesus Christ. Set aside living life for yourself. You've made a wreck of it. Live for Jesus Christ and trust yourself to him. If we died with him, we shall also live with him. If we endure, we shall also reign with him. If we deny him, he also will what? Deny us. If we are unfaithful, he remains faithful. He cannot deny himself. God has promised to judge. You know what else God has promised? God has promised to save. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son. If you will turn from your sin, if you will put faith and trust in Jesus Christ, abandon any hope in yourself, abandon any reliance upon your own works, your own doings, your own religiosity, your only religious observance.  Abandon that. Put your faith and trust in Jesus Christ. And God promises in his son to save. He'll forgive you of all your sin. He'll reconcile you to himself. He'll be declared just, declared righteous in his sight. A son in his household. It's absolutely astounding, amazing. And if a son, then an inheritor of all the promises that are yours in Jesus Christ. God has promised that by his spirit, we will then bear the fruit of faith, bear the fruit of faithfulness. God has promised that by his spirit, he will preserve us in that faith. Nothing can snatch us from his hand. All that God has promised as well, amen. And all of those promises are yes and amen in Jesus Christ. If you'll simply entrust yourself to him. If we deny him, he also will deny us because he cannot deny himself. All praise, honor, glory and blessing be to him who is alone, faithful to his word, amen. Pray with me. Father in heaven, we indeed praise you and worship you and thank you Lord that you are faithful to your word. You have given such glorious promises in every reason, every reason for us to abandon living lives for ourselves and fleeing to Jesus Christ to live wholeheartedly, heart, soul, mind and strength for you and yet Lord, we often find ourselves in the same thought, process or condition as the Jewish objector from Romans chapter three arguing with what your word teaches and fabricating false hope for the sake of placating a guilty conscience or cultivating circumstances under which we can continue to live in our sin. Please Lord, I pray, please forgive us this ignorance, this foolish errand that we can find ourselves on Lord and I pray by your spirit, hold us fast with eyes of faith toward Jesus Christ and help us Lord to put our faith and trust in him alone. Keep us Lord from the lies of this world, the lies of the religious hypocrite and help us Lord to focus our gaze on eternal and unseen things in the heavens. We love you, we thank you for the glorious promises that you have made Lord and keep us mindful of the promise that you have made to judge those who through unbelief depart from the living God and help us to heed the warnings that you give us in scripture to that regard and keep us Lord, preserve us we pray. Help us Lord to be faithful with the gospel that not one here would perish Lord but that through the preaching of your gospel all of yours would be saved. And we pray this Lord for the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ, yes he is worthy. Glory of your name Lord and for your everlasting praise and worship. We pray all these things in the blessed name of our great God and savior Lord Jesus Christ, amen.


Hi everyone, happy Wednesday. I'm Joe for jaspeascasegraves.com and we're coming at you with some 2020 Panini National Treasures baseball Love this stuff pick your team number 32. We've done a lot of these From a fresh case right here big. Thanks to all of these lovely people here for getting into the action on Wednesday the 13th You can see there's some number block randomizers too. Those are in separate videos Richard Miller had the official last spot mojo star next to his name Here's the first set So it's just like a serial number break those number block breaks that you see on our site But only for those specific teams and only for this break right here Thanks, everyone Over here and we've got another one featuring even more teams all of those teams here in this particular break and All of those are in separate videos if you want to see exactly how those randomizers work out and here's the fresh case here National Treasures baseball I guess major league baseball says everything's on schedule. We should see spring training happen You know pitchers and catchers should be reporting fairly soon Maybe in three or four weeks and all the hitters maybe a week or so after that We'll see how the season goes And we'll see if the we'll see if the Mets are done dealing Oh, we're gonna start off with a one-of-one. There's the book on the bottom. The one-of-one is gonna be four The st. Louis Cardinals, there's Dylan Carlson Nice that'll be four. That's a Phillies are a number block team or no Cardinals check that Cardinals are a number block team But on different lists that is The Cardinals are part of the Yankees White Sox Dodgers group st. Louis one Brian Crouch Brian All aboard the Big Head Express Oh, yeah, well Jack was saying he's going to a Phillies spring training game in Clearwater in March There you go. Nice way to start things off Here's a former Cardinal Albert Pujols 84 out of 99 for the halos that'll be for Chris Phelps and the Angels Got the Angels straight out.   So that goes to Dodgers 8 right there And that'll be for Nick Stover 8 out of 10 Nolan Ryan Houston Astros picked up by Kevin game gear materials and Game worn dual relic and autograph. You got a piece of Keston here as lumber as well 6 out of 10 for Milwaukee Mike Rosinski With the Brew Crew. Nice City of Angels Patrick Sandoval 27 out of 49 Nice jersey and autograph for Chris Phelps and the halos Another nice patch coming up. This is 22 out of 99 Three color patch and autograph Aristides Aquino 22 out of 99 That's Mike Grzinski with the red legs. There you go Mike More Reds 5 out of 10 his teammate Nick Sanzel 5 out of 10 autograph for Mike and we got a cut signature booklet coming up 7 out of 10 It's Robin Roberts. I don't know what what document that is right there But there it is Robin Roberts Robin Evan Roberts 7 out of 10 cut Otto going to the Phillies and that will be for that's a number block team That's the raise braves cubs Mets blah blah blah number block So it goes to Philly 7 and that's gonna be for Townsend. All right next box We have Jaspie's logo iron-on decals. Oh, that's not a bad idea maybe maybe some Maybe some patches that people can put on their leather jackets or denim jackets However, you want to do a redemption on the bottom. We've got a colossal relic for the cubs Nico Horner 13 out of 99 cubs Right smack in the middle of a rebuild, but Nico Horner should be a big part of that rebuild Cubs 3 so we go by that digit right there cubs 3 is gonna be Jeremy Port There's Goldie 25 out of 99 for the st. Louis Cardinals Cardinals 5 is gonna be for Townsend Yeah, someday Jack someday these shirts will end up on the end up for sale Don't know when but someday 71 out of 99 cc. Sabathia Yankees Yankees number one is gonna be Brian Crouch And we got Ted Williams 93 out of 99 Piece of his Red Sox Jersey going to Michael. Here's your AL rookie of the year one out of 49 Jersey and auto Kyle Lewis Wait, who won NL rookie of the year? Why am I blanking on NL rookie of the year? Seattle Mariners are a number block team and that's Mariners number one Mariners one Brian Crouch. There you go, Brian We got Matt Heiss three-color patch and autograph 18 out of 25 angels Chris Phelps halos and Devin Williams won the one Williams really just flew under flew under the radar. Oh, he was the oh, he was the Brewer's pitcher. I got it for the Oakland A's three-color patch and autograph 25 out of 25 Sean Murphy goes to Shannon Yeah, he went four and one one point five five ERA and sixty seven strikeouts You know in a pretty short and seasoned right here nice Sean Murphy and a Nice Casey Meis. I was just watching half watching his MLB network interview five out of 25 two-color patch and autograph For the Tigers that's gonna be for Arthur King Former first overall pick I believe Should be a big part of their their future as well Wow Franchise line-ups Platinum booklet, this is gonna be one happy person and one two three four five five unhappy people look at this Franchise line-ups Platinum booklet, which I think is a one-of-one Andres Galaraga Cody Belanger Fernando Tatis Jr. Justin Turner Larry Walker Steve Garvey So that'll be a randomizer. We'll have to look up Galaraga what team he's supposed to be on but Dodgers Padres Dodgers Rockies Dodgers I'm assuming that'll be Rockies. Andres Galaraga That's pretty awesome Matt Medlin saying rock. It's gotta be Rockies edition, right? I'll double-check just to just to make sure that's gotta be Rockies edition I think you're right All right, so if if let's see Rockies are picked up straight up by Sherry the Dodgers are a number block team So Ed you have a shot at it zero Tatis Jr.'s on the other number block page Brian Crouch You have a shot at it zero gets any in all redemptions Justin Turner So you got another shot Ed and then Larry Walker. So yeah, it's gonna it's gonna be fun We'll do that at the end of the break. Those are autographs to him Can be pretty crazy halfway through this break Good luck everyone. We've got five out of eleven greats relic Mel Ott For the New York baseball Giants That's a piece of his cleat right there old-school cleat. That's awesome David Chan With Mel Ott's game use cleat. He has the Giants. It's pretty sweet We've got Big Cat eight out of 99. There's Andres Galaraga Rockies for Sherry 13 out of 99 Ronald Acuna Jr. for That's it for a number block team Braves are part of the Tampa Bay Number block group that goes to three Atlanta three Jeremy Port with Atlanta three pair this Harold Baines piece of his Jersey nine out of 25 for the White Sox White Sox nine Will be for Jesse Jesse way bright Nikki Lopez Jersey and autograph five out of 60 for KC picked up straight up by Kyle Harper Five out of 50. We've got Randy. I was a rain. Yeah, nice five out of 50 triple relic and autograph for the Tampa Bay Rays Tampa Bay Rays are a number block team Rays five Is Nick Stober with Rays five Another nice A's patch coming up nine out of 25 Sheldon Newsy is Oh, are those Iranians RPA cardinals are raised. I'm not sure that was just that was the triple relic in auto That's Rays edition. I Think some of his stuff can be cardinals too. I think there was a little bit of a crossover when they were producing this Two out of 50 piece of his lumber and autograph Donnie baseball Don Mattingling Yankees to Yankees to is Jernigan.  There's Arzirania Cardinals edition 94 out of 99 Piece of his Jersey and autograph this one's on card Yeah, so they must have gotten the on card ones back from him first Then he must have gotten traded then they used his stickers to put on some on the Rays stuff So that's st. Louis four Adam Wilson with st. Louis four and at the final box Good luck boys and girls Think we've got flawless coming up right after this So we've got some nice baseball products coming up We'll go through a bunch of orders and see what else we can get on the schedule Could have used a little more color in that Arzirania though. We've got another look at this thick book on the bottom Joe Adele is your game gear Seven-way relic here two four six and the piece of his lumber on the top Crowning the other relics there Chris Phelps with the halos got Hunter Harvey For the Orioles, that'll be for Carlos got the O's straight up There is Fernando that this junior three out of 99 Colossal Jersey for the Padres Padres are a number block team So it will be Padres three San Diego three is gonna be Jeremy Port. We got Mike Schmidt 24 out of 25 thicker card stock on this one piece of his old Phillies Jersey Phillies four on a larger top. Looker Phillies four will be for Townsend 31 out of 99 Justin Dunn social signatures for Seattle and Seattle one is gonna be for Brian Crouch one's doing pretty well on that side rookie autograph Dylan Cease 90 out of 99 White Sox zero Will be for Ed at Aaron's 59 out of 99 for Houston Brian Abray you Three color patch and autograph for Kevin there's weekend Autograph Boba shut 47 at a 99 Blue jays picked up straight up by Michael Karris and Toronto and here's the book Triple legend trios 31 out of 49 a little bit of weight to it, too There's Miller Huggins Billy Martin and Joe Tory all Yankees managers nice some lumber some jerseys all of that is for the Yankees and That's gonna be Yankees one Brian Crouch what a break for you Brian that number block worked out really nicely for you All right, so that's for the Yankees And there you go ladies and gentlemen now time to make some people happy and sad Not not my favorite part, but Got it got to do the randomizers. That's how it goes No worries Brian. Thank you for getting in just double-checking on that Andres Galaraga So this is franchise lineups Yeah franchise lines confirmed is Rockies All right, so let's flip back to the screen right here. Yeah, we'll get them next time on that one Richard There it is franchise lineup booklets Andres Galaraga Rockies So that's Andres Galaraga was first Cody Bellinger Los Angeles Dodgers for now to teased junior San Diego Padres Justin Turner Dodgers Larry Walker Rockies and Steve Garvey Dodgers One two three four five six One two three four five six All right, let's roll it. Let's randomize it name on top team on top after five two and a three gets it Obviously if it lands on a number block team, it'll be zero because it's a redemption And it's a it's a platinum booklet. That's a one-of-one right there, too Whoever wins it I would love if you would redeem it because I want to see what that looks like must be pretty awesome two and a three five times team on top after five one two three four and Once more fifth and final time. Good luck team on top is gonna be the Dodgers little Dodger Joe mojo So that goes to Dodgers Zero and Dodger zero is for Ed errands. There you go, Ed If you redeem it definitely send us a picture. I'd love to see what what that ends up looking like once you get it as pretty nice All aboard the big hit Express And there you go boys and girls that was 2020 Panini National Treasures baseball pick your team 32. I'm Joe for Jasper's case breaks calm We'll see you next time for another one. Bye. Bye


Hello, my name is Sherry Saines. I'm a subject librarian for the social sciences at Alden Library at Ohio University. Today we're going to do an article deep dive. We're going to go to the database Scopus. Look at one article description and find out what all is there that will help us find even more stuff. We're going to go to Scopus. Scopus is a database of articles, one of hundreds that we subscribe to. It's set up to be especially good at making the connections between scholarship, which is why we are using it in this article. So you find it by searching for the name of the database, Scopus, on the library homepage. When you open, you may need to log in before it gets to this point. I've already typed in the article that I want to investigate with you. Here it is, Reconciling Religion and LGBT Rights. And we're going to find that article by searching and it comes right up. So let's open the article record. This is the description of the article and Scopus gives us lots of really good clues where to go from here. First let's look at what's here. We're going to look at the seven signals of significance. The first signal, journal, title, author, publication, info, date. All of that is always right up on top. The first question is, is this on our topic? We're going to assume that it is. We're going to assume that our topic is covered by this article. So the title sounds good. Publication itself might be an indicator of importance. So if social currents is a journal that we're aware of, we could say, oh, this was published in social currents. Secondly, we have the author themselves, Jay Cooley in this case. We want to know who this person is. Here are their credentials. They're from the Department of Sociology and Anthropology in Longmouth College. Well that's good. This is an anthropologist or a sociologist and that's the point of view I was considering in my question. They're hired by a university. That's a credential. They can still be wrong. They can still make mistakes. We still have to come up with this article with our brain turned on, of course, but Jay Cooley has some credentials that we can lean on. Another question is, can I name this person's intersectional identity? It is often hard to discover this unless the author does so on purpose. This has happened increasingly in social science writing and seeking out diverse authors can be a strength in our own. The third signal of the significance is what's in the abstract. I want to read this abstract. It's going to give me a clue about whether this article is something I really want to spend time on. It usually covers the basic ideas, methods, and conclusions from the article. Note the diction. I can understand this but hear this quote from another article I was looking at. Epidema II shows Neanderthal-like features, a continuous thick and rounded super orbital tourist with no break between the glabalar orbital and lateral regions. A lack of break in plane between the glabalar and lateral regions and superior view and etc. I don't understand that abstract. Does it mean I shouldn't read it? Not necessarily but it does show us that an article in an academic journal might very well be using diction or jargon that is a little bit beyond us. We are gradually learning the language of the field and we hope that by the time we're a senior abstracts like these make complete sense. The fourth signal of significance are these keywords. We want to track keywords. We want to make sure that we have written down every possible way of saying the most important ideas on our topic and these author keywords are some of them. So the author says some of the most important ideas in my article are culture wars, LGBT rights, social movements, and etc. That's very interesting. We might not have known that. Right under the author's keywords are the Seindal topics. This database has its own set of subject headings that are assigned by human beings which group like articles together very precisely. These topics are clickable and that brings us to the topic analysis page. The topic analysis page has more things we can delve into. It has representative documents. Look it says here are some more articles that seem to have the same set of subject headings as the one you were reading. We might want to read these. Then it says here are some of the top authors. Here are some of the people who were working in this field on this topic. All of these are clickable and we can go discover what they have written. At the bottom is a word cloud. This gives me even more words to track, more ideas about related and important terms having to do with my topic. In a word cloud the words with the biggest text are the ones that occur more frequently. In this particular word cloud the blue words are in decline are being used less often and the green words are being used more often between 2016 and 2020. This is really really helpful if I'm tracking a new topic or a topic in which the terminology is not yet changed, not yet settled. This gives me some clues. The fifth signal of significance is the funders. This particular article doesn't have the funders listed. That's probably because many social science research gets done without being funded by associations or the government the way most science is funded. Many social science researchers like Jay Cooley obviously did their work on their own. If the funders were listed we would want to be watching for conflicts of interest. What if a toothpaste company paid for toothpaste research? That was kind of obvious but some connections are not as clear. If we are suspicious we could use Google to dig into the author or the funding agency. Be aware that even if the author is not funded by others there are many costs involved in doing research. There's personal time and institutional time. There are materials, GAs, that sort of thing. Much unpaid labor goes into academic articles. The sixth signal of significance is over here related documents. This is like more like this on Amazon right? We like this. You might like this. Oh you might like this. You might like this. These are more articles we can invest in. After we've done all this looking we're probably ready to go see if we can find the full text. If everything is checked out so far we're going to run over here and look at the full text. In this case I'm finding it on the lib key link and here is the whole article. The abstract and the keywords are repeated and now we can read the introduction. We can skim the methods. We can fast forward to the conclusions and say well yes actually this is something. Yeah this is really good. I need to read this in depth. Back at the article description I want to show you three more places we're going to dig in a little deeper. We're going to do this in class in discussion but I want to show you where these places are so you can find them. The first is the reference list which is the bibliography or the citations at the end of the article. This shows us where got their information, what they read, what informed their work. The second place is the cited by documents. So this article is written in 2017 and after 2017 19 other people thought this article was important enough to include in their reference list so that's these people. 19 documents here. The third place we're going to investigate is the metrics. The metrics measure the importance of the article by a bunch of different philosophical numbers and percentiles. What we're going to look at though is the Plumex details. The Plumex details follow this article through social media and news and that sort of thing. So it says one mention in news and if I click out I can read it and it was tweeted 14 times and if I click out I can read them. So that shows us that the article is being read, tweeted, passed on, and used by many different people. Everything we've learned about the scientific process applies to the social sciences as well as the heart sciences. We often think of social science research being more qualitative and quantitative but all the same rigor applies and here we can see it in the description of the article and the many places that can take us.


Welcome folks, we have the Dow Industries trading up $6.79, we got the Nasdaq up $3.26, S&Ps are up $9.98. That's a gain right now folks in the Nasdaq composite of $2.8 and the S&P 2.5 and the Dow Industries 2.1. Gold, gold contract flat $1,708, we got Silver down $0.17 at $0.18.67, sweet cruise up $0.40 at $1.041, notes and bonds, a 10-year note, down $0.17 ticks trading $1.1730, the 30-year off $20 at $1.38, $20 in Kingdollah. Kingdollah is down $665 ticks at $106.702, the Euro is at $102, the Yen is at $130, where are you baby, where are you, $138, and the British pound is at $119 to $1 US dollar. We get over and take a look at the S&P folks at bottom line, you're going to run this happening out here and you know we'll see how this baby shakes out coming into the close. I don't, my take is that we're not going to back off at all because this is a nice trend that's been going on and we just had this little downdraft for a few minutes here and I suspect it's going to go right for the highs once again. That's on the intraday, we take a look at this daily, what you're going to see up here is that the bottom line is that the spy does need more volume, you know you're going into the swing point of the $290.64, that had $72 million, we're not going to do that, bottom line I don't think it's going to care in the market because the swing that we're actually trying to go for right now is $393.16 which has $86 million. So I suspect what we're going to do is this, you're going to get up here somewhere, you're going to stall before you get into that swing, wake up tomorrow morning, it's going to try to take that swing out tomorrow morning. MDX 100, that's leading the charge. Well the SMH is leading the charge, hit the MDX, and the X is grabbing the S&P, taking it with it. But you got it with the Q's, you're up $8.14, the swing point, the Q's, we're over it, it's $296.57, you're over it, bottom line is that it's going to be, yeah it's going to be closer to volume, might have the volume, we need $55 million, we're faulty right now. So Q's running up to the swing that's established out here on the 20, no June 2nd. And I suspect the June 2nd is your benchmark folks, June 2nd that's where we're going, that's my take on this thing, it's going to be fast, furious, and going after it. Stay right there folks, come right back.