Ex 22:22-24, You shall not afflict any widow or orphan. If you afflict him at all, and if he does cry out to Me, I will surely hear his cry; and My anger will be kindled, and I will kill you with the sword; and your wives shall become widows and your children fatherless. 
	We are continuing with our study of this passage in Exodus which shows the Lord God Almighty as very personally investing Himself into the care and the protection and the oversight of those who are considered as nothing by the social structure. Widows and orphans were seen as a drain on the resources of the community in general, and since they had no one else to protect them or provide for them, they were often just ignored at best or abused and afflicted at worse. God, however, shows that He places a great value on them as His created people, reflecting His image. Therefore, He makes it abundantly clear that widows and orphans deserve to be honored in their own right, as beloved by God. 
	We pick up with the following declaration by the Prophet Isaiah as recorded in the very first chapter of Isaiah, verses 16-20. Isa 1:16-20, "Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean; Remove the evil of your deeds from My sight. Cease to do evil, Learn to do good; Seek justice, Reprove the ruthless; Defend the orphan, Plead for the widow. "Come now, and let us reason together," Says the Lord, "Though your sins are as scarlet, They will be as white as snow; Though they are red like crimson, They will be like wool. "If you consent and obey, You will eat the best of the land; "But if you refuse and rebel, You will be devoured by the sword." Truly, the mouth of the Lord has spoken. 
	Notice how the benefits to Israel were tied together with the treatment of the widows and orphans. The nation was called to wash itself and cease doing evil and reprove the wicked in their midst. They were to plead for the widows and to defend the orphans. This was all tied together with the fact that if they would take this to heart, God would wash away their iniquity and give them the best of the land. 
However, if they chose to continue their vile deeds, including those precipitous and evil actions against those who were helpless, then the nation would die by the sword. There is not much leeway in the direction of what God seeks for the sake of His people’s treatment of one another, especially those who are without any other means of support or protection. 
	The prophet continues with this declaration in verses 23-28 of this first chapter. Isa 1:23-28, Your rulers are rebels, And companions of thieves; Everyone loves a bribe, And chases after rewards. They do not defend the orphan, Nor does the widow's plea come before them. Therefore the Lord God of hosts, The Mighty One of Israel declares, "Ah, I will be relieved of My adversaries, And avenge Myself on My foes. "I will also turn My hand against you, And will smelt away your dross as with lye, And will remove all your alloy. "Then I will restore your judges as at the first, And your counselors as at the beginning; After that you will be called the city of righteousness, A faithful city." Zion will be redeemed with justice, And her repentant ones with righteousness. But transgressors and sinners will be crushed together, And those who forsake the Lord shall come to an end. 
	The manner of the treatment of the widows and the orphans had become so despicable and contemptible because the hearts of the leaders and the judges no longer considered that they ruled by virtue of God’s ordination and installation. Rather than serving the people in the manner which reflected their obedience to God, these rulers and judges were seeking after their own gain and fame and fortune. They were taking bribes and their decisions were weighed, not in justice, but in how they would benefit personally. The plaintiff with the most to offer received the corrupted officials’ blessing. Widows and orphans were discarded and ignored because they had nothing with which to bribe the officials who were supposed to be impartial.
	Note the severe result from the voice of God as He proclaimed what He would do. "Ah, I will be relieved of My adversaries, And avenge Myself on My foes. "I will also turn My hand against you, And will smelt away your dross as with lye, And will remove all your alloy. This was a severity in dealing with these rulers and judges that would utterly reduce them to a most fiery and awful melting away to the very core of their beings. When God was finished, there would be nothing left of the discrimination and the corruptness and the favoritism and perversion of justice. As the Lord stated very precisely, But transgressors and sinners will be crushed together, And those who forsake the Lord shall come to an end.   
	Again hear the Prophet Isaiah as he voiced God’s utter revulsion with the leaders and the rulers and the judges who made the widows’ and orphans’ lives all the more miserable. Isa 10:1-3, Woe to those who enact evil statutes, And to those who constantly record unjust decisions, So as to deprive the needy of justice, And rob the poor of My people of their rights, In order that widows may be their spoil, And that they may plunder the orphans. Now what will you do in the day of punishment, And in the devastation which will come from afar? To whom will you flee for help? And where will you leave your wealth? 
	God made it very clear that in the day of wrath, when destruction and violence comes forth in retribution for the vileness and the perversion of these positions of power, those rulers and leaders will have no where to go. Think about it. In our lives, when everything just seems to collapse, we always have the Lord to see us through. This reality of God’s provision and grace and mercy was very distinctly and publicly revoked, by God, from these rulers who so defiled and abused God’s chosen people. 
Another Prophet who declared this very same heart of God against the corruptness of the leadership was Ezekiel, as recorded in Ezek 22:6-8. Ezek 22:6-8, "Behold, the rulers of Israel, each according to his power, have been in you for the purpose of shedding blood. "They have treated father and mother lightly within you. The alien they have oppressed in your midst; the fatherless and the widow they have wronged in you. "You have despised My holy things and profaned My sabbaths. 
Again, God put this ill treatment and terrible consideration of orphans and widows and even parents on the basis of how these leasders so despised and defiled the very things of God. The heart of these fraudulent officials showed utter disrespect and disregard for that which represented God and His Lordship over His people. They were so self-centered and self-important that God, and His honor, meant absolutely nothing but lip service and public displays of hypocrisy on their part. 
Another prophet, so caught up in this showing forth the heart of God against the injustices done to the widows and orphans was Zechariah. Please follow along in his writing, Chapter 7, verses 9-14, as he relayed what happened to those rulers who practiced such dishonesty and disregard for the helpless ones of God’s heart. Zech 7:9-14. "Thus has the Lord of hosts said, 'Dispense true justice, and practice kindness and compassion each to his brother; and do not oppress the widow or the orphan, the stranger or the poor; and do not devise evil in your hearts against one another.' "But they refused to pay attention, and turned a stubborn shoulder and stopped their ears from hearing. "And they made their hearts like flint so that they could not hear the law and the words which the Lord of hosts had sent by His Spirit through the former prophets; therefore great wrath came from the Lord of hosts. "And it came about that just as He called and they would not listen, so they called and I would not listen," says the Lord of hosts; "but I scattered them with a storm wind among all the nations whom they have not known. Thus the land is desolated behind them, so that no one went back and forth, for they made the pleasant land desolate." 
	Zechariah told of how the Lord carried forth His judgment against those foul leaders who deliberately hardened their hearts against both God and the lonely and desperate ones. Those officials were scattered abroad, left with nothing of their filthy lucre and wandering and homeless in a desolate land because of their own evil devices.
	The Lord Jesus Christ also dealt with this heart of hypocrisy and treachery toward widows in the hearts and actions of the religious leaders of His day. Throughout the Gospels is recorded the very same warning given against those who were so insincere and duplicitous in their religious fervor. 
At the same time, in contrast to this warning, in Mark 12:38-44, Jesus pointed out the example of the poor widow and her giving of the two copper coins. Mark 12:38-44, And in His teaching He was saying: "Beware of the scribes who like to walk around in long robes, and like respectful greetings in the market places, and chief seats in the synagogues, and places of honor at banquets, who devour widows' houses, and for appearance's sake offer long prayers; these will receive greater condemnation." And He sat down opposite the treasury, and began observing how the multitude were putting money into the treasury; and many rich people were putting in large sums. And a poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which amount to a cent. And calling His disciples to Him, He said to them, "Truly I say to you, this poor widow put in more than all the contributors to the treasury; for they all put in out of their surplus, but she, out of her poverty, put in all she owned, all she had to live on." 
	What a means by which to show the manner in which this widow, having nothing, gave everything to God out of her love for Him and the assurance that God would meet her every need. She knew Him as her Provider and her Sustainer, holding onto the promise which God personally gives to each widow and orphan. Jesus recognized this and the Lord gave her a place in scripture describing the trueness and the genuineness of one who loved the Lord God with all her being.
	In another warning against the defilement that would continue to grow and be manifested as the days grow toward their final times, The Apostle Paul warned Timothy, in 2 Tim 3:1-8, about what would take place. In the course of the catalogue so given, the Apostle listed the fact that these arrogant and deceitful men would take advantage of the weak women, which would fully include widows, in order to captivate them in their lies and fraudulent abuses. 
2 Tim 3:1-8, But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come. For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God; holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power; and avoid such men as these. For among them are those who enter into households and captivate weak women weighed down with sins, led on by various impulses, always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. And just as Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses, so these men also oppose the truth, men of depraved mind, rejected as regards the faith. 
	In his first letter to Timothy, Chap 5, verses 3-5, the Apostle Paul gave Timothy very specific instructions regarding widows, reiterating that which would please God in their treatment and care. While widows with families should be honored and cared for by their families, those who were widows indeed are the specific obligation of the church. 
1 Tim 5:3-5, Honor widows who are widows indeed; but if any widow has children or grandchildren, let them first learn to practice piety in regard to their own family, and to make some return to their parents; for this is acceptable in the sight of God. Now she who is a widow indeed, and who has been left alone has fixed her hope on God, and continues in entreaties and prayers night and day. These widows offer a service unto God with their hope fixed upon Him and their continual prayers and entreaties unto Him. They were to be honored by the church and dealt with in love and in provision and protection as would fully honor the Lord’s directive.
	Finally, please open in your Bibles to James 1:23-27. Here we have the description of what it means to be those men and women of God who truly seek to please and to honor Him. This is the core heart of what true religion involves. It is not a manner of earning anything or of becoming worthy of our salvation. It is simply the practical outworking of the heart of Christ which is endued in each person who truly has called out to Him for salvation. James 1:23-27, For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his natural face in a mirror; for once he has looked at himself and gone away, he has immediately forgotten what kind of person he was. But one who looks intently at the perfect law, the law of liberty, and abides by it, not having become a forgetful hearer but an effectual doer, this man shall be blessed in what he does. If anyone thinks himself to be religious, and yet does not bridle his tongue but deceives his own heart, this man's religion is worthless. This is pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and Father, to visit orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world. 
Because we are saved, we desire to please Our Savior and to honor His heart after those who are in such need. Therefore we practice those things which we know bring glory and honor to His name, including the upholding of the widows and orphans, as detailed throughout His Word. So be it!
You shall not afflict any widow or orphan. If you afflict him at all, and if he does cry out to Me, I will surely hear his cry; and My anger will be kindled, and I will kill you with the sword; and your wives shall become widows and your children fatherless. Amen.

This morning’s benediction is Ps 92:1+2. It is good to give thanks to the Lord, And to sing praises to Thy name, O Most High; To declare Thy lovingkindness in the morning, And Thy faithfulness by night… Amen.