Look For What You Don't See

Byron Norrod—March 22, 2025

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Here we are, we're on the road to the spring Holy Days, the first Holy Day season of this year—2025. So, this message has something to do with Passover preparation.

Look for what we do not see; find what isn't there from our perspective. We don't know what's there, so from our perspective we look for it, something that's not there. Why would we look for something that we know that's not there? This will come key a little bit later!

We're going to take a short, a brief survey of some of the good kings of Judah. What I want to do is to show you that the kings did a good job, but God always had an issue with them. There was always a fault most of the time, and they did this, but they didn't do that.

1-Kings 3:3—this is King Solomon: "And Solomon loved the LORD, walking in the statutes of David his father. Only he sacrificed and burnt incense in high places."

So, God is saying, 'Look, he did good, but he did bad, too. I wish that he hadn't omitted these things. I wish that he hadn't done this.'

1-Kings 14:7: "Go tell Jeroboam, 'Thus says the LORD God of Israel, "I lifted you up from among the people, and made you ruler over My people Israel."'"

This is a king of Israel, not necessarily a king of Judah, all the others will probably be Judah.

Verse 8: "And tore the kingdom away from the house of David and gave it to you…. [instead of Rehoboam, Solomon's son] …And you have not been as My servant David who kept My commandments, and who followed Me with all his heart, to do only what was right in My eyes. But you have done evil above all who were before you, for you have gone and made yourself other gods and molded images to provoke Me to anger, and have cast Me behind your back" (vs 8-9).

2-Kings 12:2: "And Joash did what was right in the sight of the LORD… [Yes! Way to go, Joash] …all his days in which Jehoiada the priest instructed him."

So, as long as the priest was alive keeping him in line, then Joash did the right thing.

Verse 3: "But the high places were not taken away. The people still sacrificed and burned incense in the high places."

Now we're talking about Jeroboam; 2-Kings 15:3: "And he did what was right in the sight of the LORD… [Yes! Way to go, man!] …according to all that his father Amaziah had done."

We're kind of doing this a little bit out of order, but with intent.

Verse 4: "Only… [again] …the high places were not removed. The people still sacrificed and burned incense on the high places."

• What's up with these kings?
• Why do these kings continue to allow themselves to those who they rule to continue to sacrifice to evil?

2-Kings 14:3—this is talking about Amaziah: "And he did what was right in the sight of the LORD, yet, not like David his father. He did according to all things that Joash his father did. Only the high places were not taken away. The people still sacrificed and burned incense on the high places" (vs 3-4).

2 Chron. 25—the last book in the Old Testament. We're going to see a clarification on Amaziah, because Amaziah did something that was really interesting. There's a further explanation about Amaziah.

2-Chronicles 25:2—talking about Amaziah: "And he did what was right in the eyes of the LORD, but not with a perfect heart." So, what God is looking for is the perfect heart!

You know, we heard Michael Heiss talk about the Biblical 'lev'—the heart-soul-mind connection that God's looking for with us. Amaziah did some terrible things; he obeyed God, but not with a perfect heart.

We want to be like Uzziah. Now, who was Uzziah?

2 Chronicles 26:4: "And he did what was right in the sight of the LORD, according to all that his father Amaziah did. And he sought God in the days of Zechariah, who had understanding in the visions of God. As long as he sought the LORD, God blessed him" (vs 4-5).

As long as we're with Him, as long as we're with God, then

• God's going to bless us
• He's going to teach us
• He's going to instruct us
• He's going to help us

2-Chronicles 29:2—here is Hezekiah, who was great: " And he did what was right in the sight of the LORD, according to all that David his father had done."

Look, there's no 'only'; there's no 'but.' There's no 'only he did not do this, or only he didn't do that.

"…he did what was right in the sight of the LORD, according to all that David his father had done."

He didn't need the crutch of a high priest to keep him in line. Hezekiah did what was right and good in the sight of the Lord.

2-Chronicles 34:2—we're talking about Josiah: "And he did that which was right in the sight of the LORD, and walked in the ways of David his father, and did not turn aside to the right nor to the left."

This guy's a champion! Yes! We're following David and Hezekiah and Josiah. We want to do these right things, but not like Uzziah who became a leper.

2-Chronicles 26:4—talking about Uzziah: "And he did what was right in the sight of the LORD, according to all that his father Amaziah did. And he sought God in the days of Zechariah, who had understanding in the visions of God. As long as he sought the LORD, God blessed him" (vs 4-5). Now, I read that, but what's interesting is:

Verse 16: "But when he was strong, his heart was lifted up to his destruction… [we don't want that in our lives] …for he sinned against the LORD his God, and went into the temple of the LORD to burn incense upon the altar of incense."

He was being very presumptuous in his sins and taking to himself that which he should not have done.

• Why am I telling you all of this? Yeah, it's a good lesson!
• But what's the point of this?
• What am I talking about here?

By the way, I'll let you know that he became a leper, Uzziah did, because the man of God came and he says, 'What is it that you're doing? You're burning incense! You're taking the authority, the responsibility of a priest to yourself! You shouldn't be doing this!'

Uzziah got all angry and huffy, and he said, 'I'm going to do what I'm going to what I want to do.' And he became leprous right there in front of the priest and they shoved him out and he left himself. So, the rest of his time, he was a leper for his arrogance. We don't need that for sure. As long as he saw God, God blessed him. That's what we want.

You know, you can look back also King Asa and 2-Chron. 15:2-4, good King Asa it says that as long as he was with God, 'as long as you are with God, then God will be with you.'

We can take that lesson to heart. But what are we talking about? They didn't see their sins! They were oblivious to them.

• I'm doing what's right.
• I know I'm good
• I know I'm doing exactly what God wants me to do
• I'm just following my father, David
• don't tell me I'm doing wrong
• oh, but the high places
• oh, but the people are still sacrificing to Baal
• people will be people
• kids will be kids
• I can't keep track of everybody

The leader had a certain responsibility! We're on our way to becoming kings and priests, are we not? We're learning; we're in training to be kings and priests. So, we can take lessons from these priests and see what they were doing and what they were ignorant of, and then look for those things in our lives so that we don't make the same mistakes.

This is the Passover preparation that I'm talking about here. We need to ask God in His mercy to show us our hidden sins.

1-Corinthians 11:24: "And after giving thanks, He broke it and said, 'Take, eat; this is My body, which is being broken for you. This do in the remembrance of Me.' In like manner, He also took thecup after He had supped, saying, 'This is the cup of the New Covenant in My blood. This do, as often as you drink it, in the remembrance of Me.' For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you solemnly proclaim the death of the Lord until He comes. For this reason, if anyone shall eat this bread or shall drink the cup of the Lord unworthily…" (vs 24-27).

• that's our big key
• that's our big worry
• that's our big fear

We don't want to take the Passover in an unworthy manner, because if we take it unworthily,

"…he [or she] shall be guilty of the body and the blood of the Lord" (v 27). So what do we do?

Verse 28: "But let a man examine himself, and let him eat of the bread and drink of the cup accordingly," He's saying, 'Look in the mirror.' Ask:

• How am I doing?
• Am I living up to God's Law?
• Am I performing the way that God would want me to perform?

Fred's been going through the Law recently in Rom. 2 & 3, and he clearly states as Paul did, that we cannot be justified by any works of law! We understand that.

However, when we love God and when we come into a relationship with Him, He expects a certain performance. If we're married, our mate would expect a certain performance that we're not going to continue dating. So, it's not like, okay, we're married now I can do whatever we want to do because there's no law; I can do whatever I want. But that's not the case, and that's what Fred was covering in Rom. 7.

But the symbology that we're looking for here is that we need to search out and find the leavening, and the leavening that we understand is symbolic of sin in our lives. We want to put the sin out; we want to get the Egypt out of us. So, we have to go through and look for the sin.

Thus we're looking for what we do not see! Or we're also trying to find what isn't there. But it might be there. It's there. We just don't see it!

So, it's our perception that we don't understand and that we don't see what's going on there. What we have to do is to ferret out the sin where we don't think it will be.

When you study and you learn and you're asking God to show you things that about yourself and to learn and change, He also gives you new insights and new understandings.

Now, I understand more fully that Joseph represents Jesus Christ. He was in the pit as good as dead and he was lifted out of the pit and he had gone to search for the welfare of his brethren to see how his brethren were doing.

• Joseph's brethren killed him
• humanity killed Jesus Christ

We put Him in the pit, and yet, God raised Him; He was raised the third day!

Look what happened after this. Joseph was as good as dead. His father and his family thought that he had died. But there was a family reunion and they realized he's alive again from their perspective.

But what's interesting is that the two things, there was famine in the land. They went to the brothers, the 11 brothers went to Egypt to get grain, which represents there's no grain in the Jewish community during Unleavened Bread. No wheat, no barley, no rye, no sorghum, things like that. They can't have the grain in there. But they went to get the Staple of Life, Bread, the Staple of Life, which is Jesus Christ! The true manna that came down from heaven.

What happened? They planted the cup. We just read in 1-Cor. 11 that the grain was represented in the wafer. There was still grain there in the wafer, the unleavened cake. The cup is the symbol of the New Testament and of Jesus Christ's blood.

So, those two elements were the grain and the cup that Joseph had installed surreptitiously into Benjamin's bag, and that's what brought the families back together so they could eventually leave Egypt.

Isn't that interesting? So they could eventually leave sin, and this is done by the salvation of the deliverer and the provider of the grain: Joseph, who represented Jesus Christ in all of Israel. Interesting!

We have to look for sin where we don't think it is, because it's there, but we don't know about it. So we're saying, 'God, help us find this.'

Psalm 7:3—David speaking: "O LORD my God, if I have done this—if there is iniquity in my hands, if I have rewarded evil to the one who was at peace with me, or if I have plundered my enemy without cause—" (vs 3-4). What's he doing? David's saying:

I don't know if I did this or not, Lord, if I did any of these things, please show me. I may have. I'm kind of busy, and I'm getting going, and I don't know what all I'm doing necessarily, and I may have offended some people. And please help me, please forgive me. Have them be forgiving of me.

Psalm 19:7: "The Law of the LORD is perfect, restoring the soul; the testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple. The precepts of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandments of the LORD are pure, enlightening the eyes" (vs 7-8);

It doesn't sound like the Protestant perspective that the Law has done away with, does it? It's showing that the Law is pure and good and clean.

Verse 9: "The fear of the LORD is clean, enduring forever; the judgments of the LORD are true and righteous altogether, more to be desired than gold, yea, much fine gold; sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb. Moreover, by them Your servant is warned; in keeping them there is great reward. Who can understand his errors?…." (vs 9-12). He's talking about mankind now.

I don't even know all the things that I do wrong. Who can understand? Lord, I'm sorry. I make these mistakes and I'm sorry. Who can understand all the errors that he makes?

"…Oh, cleanse me from my secret faults" (v 12).

We have to look for what is not there, look for what we do not see! We have to find what isn't there or what we don't perceive to be there!

"…Oh, cleanse me from my secret faults; and keep back Your servant also from presumptuous sins… [Remember Uzziah?] …do not let them… [my presumptuous sins] …rule over me. then I shall be blameless, and I shall be innocent of great transgression. Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Your sight, O LORD, my Rock and my Redeemer" (vs 12-14).

What do we do? So many times the meditations of our heart is foul perversity! We think about things that we shouldn't and then we dwell on them, we mull on them, and then we, or we just go blithely on our way like 'a bull in a china shop' and we're just ramrodding everything going BAM! BAM! BAM!

We run over people's feelings and emotions and harm people. We don't mean to. I don't mean to; I know I've been guilty of this. For those whom I have harmed and I've ram-rodded over and I've been harsh, I really apologize. I sincerely apologize.

Psalm 90:7: "For we are consumed by Your anger, and by Your wrath we are troubled."

Oh God, we do wrong and then we get punished and then we get upset and we think: Why did you punish me, Lord?

Then He shows you your hidden sin and then we say, 'Ah! I get it, I'm sorry. You're right; I was wrong.'

Verse 7: "For we are consumed by Your anger, and by Your wrath we are troubled. You have set our iniquities before You, our secret sins in the light of Your face" (vs 7-8).

They're evident before God. He sees them clearly. He knows who we are. He can look into the depths of our soul, into our heart and in our mind and see us deeply and say,

Byron, wake up, buddy. Wake up! I hope you don't have to be spanked. You know, I'm getting my little paddle out. If that's not enough, here comes the 2x4. What? That's not enough, here's a 4x4! You come take your licks, Byron.

Verse 8: "You have set our iniquities before You, our secret sins in the light of Your face, for all our days pass away in Your wrath; we finish our years as with a sigh."

At the end of our lives, if we live in our sins, we just wither! We don't want to be like that. Have you known anyone who has been solid to the end? I have! I've known people who are encouraging and uplifting right to the very ends of their lives.

• what a blessing
• what a benefit

I want to be like that!

I don't want to have this nonsense of dying with a whimper. I want people to come around me when I'm on my deathbed, and I want to say,

May God bless you! May you have success in your life! May God be real to you! Live! Follow David! Live life! Live with the words of God in your heart!

That's who I want to be; Godly to the end!

Here's what we have to do. This is a huge, huge point. I really want to make this clear because this is super, super important:

• when we ask God to show us our hidden sins
• when we're looking for what isn't there

what we don't perceive to be there

• when we're looking for what we do not see

We have to ask God to show us in His mercy, because it can be overwhelming to us. We have to look at God and say:

God, look, please, in Your loving kindness and mercy, show me my hidden sin. Show me what I need to change so that I'm not… But don't overwhelm me. Because if you give me too much, I can't handle it.

Sometimes that's what we are; that's where we're at!

Proverbs 21:3: "To do righteousness and justice is more pleasing to the LORD than sacrifice."

Romans 12:1: "I exhort you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living sacrifice…"

Remember to do righteousness and justice is more pleasing than sacrifice! But our lives are living sacrifices.

"…Holy and well-pleasing to God, which is your spiritual service…. [that's what we're supposed to do] …Do not conform yourselves to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind in order that you may prove what is well-pleasing and good, and the perfect will of God" (vs 1-2).

Romans 13:11: Now consider this, knowing the time, that it is already the hour that we should be roused out of sleep…"

There's a movement now to be 'woke' as if they're awakened to reality. But actually, the 'woke movement' is even blinding their eyes even more! They're even more jaded, more in the dark. They don't know it's time for you and I to wake up! The time is now!

"…that it is already the hour that we should be roused out of sleep; because our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed" (v 1).

This is the end-time for us, brethren! If it's not the end-time right now, when we die, it's our end-time.

Verse 12: "The night is almost over and the day is drawing near…"

What's Paul talking about? The night time of living in this darkened world and the Light to come is Jesus Christ when He shines on the world and returns to earth!

"…therefore, let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of Light. Let us walk decently, as in the day…" (vs 12-13)—as if it's daytime already right now for us! This is our daytime!

"…not in reveling and drunkenness, not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality, not in strife and emulation" (v 13).

We can't be seat warmers in the Church of God! There's no place for that! God has no joy in that!

Verse 14: "But let us put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and not make any allowance for the flesh, to fulfill its lusts."

Hebrews 12:1: Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great throng of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight…"—anything that's holding us back!

Do you know that swimmers, to gain the nano-seconds, they shave their bodies so that the hair doesn't cause extra friction, so that they can get to the other end and back faster? It's the hair! They shave their bodies to get the hair off of their bodies so that they don't have that little tiny weight!

What weights are important to us that are holding us back?

"…let us lay aside every weight, and the sin that so easily entraps us; and let us run the race set before us with endurance" (v 1).

Brethren, we are to become flawless kings, following the example of Jesus Christ, our Perfect Example!

Matthew 5:48—Jesus says: "Therefore, you shall be perfect, even as your Father Who is in heaven is perfect."

• we have to walk in the Light right now
• we have to lay aside every weight
• we have to ask God:

Lord, please show us our hidden and presumptuous sins so that we can be cleansed of them. But Lord God, please show us in your mercy.

May God bless you all. May God bless you in your preparation for the Passover that's coming. We have a short time left. May God encourage you and help you and work with you and not be too harsh in teaching you. So let us lay aside every weight and let us walk in the Light!

Scriptural References:

• 1-Kings 3:3
• 1-Kings 14:7-9
• 2-Kings 12:2-3
• 2-Kings 15:3-4
• 2-Kings 14:3-4
• 2-Chronicles 25: 2
• 2-Chronicles 26:4-5
• 2-Chronicles 29:2
• 2-Chronicles 34:2
• 2-Chronicles 26:4-5, 16
• 1-Corinthians 11:24-28
• Psalm 7:3-4
• Psalm 19:7-14
• Psalm 90:7-9
• Proverbs 21:3
• Romans 12:1-2
• Romans 13:11-14
• Hebrews 12:1
• Matthew 5:48

Scriptures referenced, not quoted:

• 2-Chronicles 15:2-4
• Romans 1:2-3, 7

BN:bo/po
Transcribed: 3/26/25

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