and save England, have a blessed day. And I hope she still feels that way after camp. I think she will. And I want to look at all of our young people and our teenagers. All of y'all are going to have the greatest time, and you're going to have the greatest of attitudes. Can I get a witness? Oh my. Let's try that one more time. How many of you are going to camp? Would you raise your hand? And so let's try tonight. How many of you are going to have a great attitude and you're going to say you have a great attitude by shouting an amen tonight on three? One, two, three. Amen. Very good. All right. We're going to have a great time and we appreciate them coming. Would you open your precious Bible tonight to the gospel according to Luke chapter five? And I want to wrap up what we started this morning. Before I do, As you're turning there, opening your Bible there to Luke chapter 5, I want to say the first song they sang in that second set. As I told my wife the other day, I said, now look, I'm not going to give you a sob story, but I'm 50. Y'all are supposed to go, ooh. And I'm going to be 51 this month. So I know I'm, you know, many of you are saying, oh, I wish I could be 50 again, and I wish I could be 20 again. But here's why I say all that. I said this earlier today. I want to give what I have left and make a difference. I do. I want to invest in people that want to be invested in. That's what we desire. And the Lord's given us a great run here. And I hope the Lord will allow us to stay here till he comes back, amen? And I appreciate you allowing us to invest in you. And I'm thankful for how he's worked in all of our hearts. That was a very encouraging song. Luke chapter five, we focused on three words. Verse five, I hope you marked them. At thy word. And Simon answering and said unto him, Master, we have toiled all the night and have taken nothing. Nevertheless, at thy word, I will let down the net. Heavenly Father, I pray you'll help us tonight. Speak to us in Jesus' name, amen. We talked about this morning, Peter came to a great dilemma. because now this man Jesus has stepped on the scene. They have fished all night, they've caught nothing. By the way, in that day, that's when you fish. It was at nighttime, they drug nets. They did not use fishing poles, they drug nets. All of you know the apostle Simon, and of course the Lord Jesus surnamed him Peter, we know that him and the sons of thunder were fishermen by trade. So they were not only doing it because they enjoyed it, obviously they were doing it to take care of their family. They did it at night. Now Jesus comes on the scene, all of these people are thronging them, him wanting to hear the word of God, so he comes by no way, just by happenstance, divine, God's divine will, Jesus, was to meet Peter. And there they were, finishing up, fixing up, cleaning up their nets, he said, hey, I need you to thrust me out a little bit, this crowd's gotten so big, I need to teach. And so he goes, he starts to teach, and about that time, the Lord Jesus says those magical words, boys, let's go fishing. But here's the dilemma, Peter had already fished all night long and it wasn't the right time to go fishing. So Peter's dilemma was, our dilemma, I've learned in our life and in this day that we have so many reasons not to obey God's word. We say it's not the right time, Lord. It's not making any sense, Lord. I know what I'm doing with my life. I'm the fisherman here and we've fished all night and we've caught nothing. Now you've asked us to go out here and fish and it's not even the right time. But oh, they didn't know who was in the boat. I want you to understand, Peter had a dilemma. He could have allowed fear to keep him from following the Lord. He could have allowed embarrassment because he'd already fished all night. Now all those other professional fishermen went around. Now all that other crowd that came to hear Jesus, they're all around. So Peter and the boys go out to go fishing and they bring in nothing again. They say, I'll tell you right now, they're not very good. So we talked about Peter's dilemma this morning, that he could have chosen not to listen to the Lord. And it's the same dilemma we have today. There are so many reasons why we can choose not to obey the Lord, but nevertheless, at thy word. Three little magic words that will change your life. At thy word, Lord. If you've spoke to me, Lord, if you've commanded me to do something, Lord, I'm just going to obey you and do it. As I shared when I was in Bible college, I did not like to tithe. I was not brought up in a church that we taught tithing like a Baptist church does, so obviously I wasn't crazy about tithing, so my wife and I, we went to crown, we started hearing all these messages on tithing. On purpose, I wouldn't tithe. Brother Nate talked about when they were young in their Christian faith that sometimes they forgot to tithe. I said, forgot nothing, I on purpose didn't do it. Man, I'll never forget one day, I was sitting there in church in Knoxville, and man, the pastor started to preach, and he preached on tithing that particular morning. It was proved to tithe, and man, the Lord Jesus spoke to my heart. And my wife, to my, didn't even know, but she was tithing anyway. She was doing it anyhow. But finally that day, boy, I'll never forget it. I still have the book. I still have the note taker's journal, and I wrote it in big old letters. It is conviction. It's final. From this point on, I'm gonna be a practicing tither. Why? Because God said do it, and I said at thy word, Lord. Oh, but Lord, you don't understand. There's more going out than I got coming in. At thy word. Do it. Can I tell every young person here, every, I think about all these folks who just gotten saved recently, can I just say to you, there's gonna be a lot of things that's not gonna make sense to you. He's good for it, just trust him. Just do it. You'll be shocked. He's good for it. So we've seen his dilemma. Number two, we see his decision, Peter's decision. Notice what he said in verse number five. He said, nevertheless, Lord, at thy word, I will let down a net. Praise God, thank God for people that just do what Jesus says. Amen? Thank you, young lady, for just doing what the Lord asked you to do this summer. And by the way, Peter could have been guided by his experiences. Lord, it didn't work. We didn't catch anything at night. Why do you think we're gonna catch anything today? He could have said, oh, by experience, I done tried Jesus. That don't work anyway. He could have used his circumstance and said, Lord, I'm tired. I've been up all night. Do you not know what you're asking me? He didn't allow that to deter him. He just did it. He obeyed. He could have used his fears to decide his fate. He could have said, oh no, Lord, all these people are looking. We've done failed. We didn't catch anything last night. If we go out there again today, oh no. By the way, I've learned there's a lot of Christians that just won't obey the Lord because fear keeps them from trusting. At thy word, Lord. Those are three magic words, aren't they? At thy word. Nevertheless, at thy word, because you said so, Lord, hey, he trusted the Lord, not knowing exactly what would have happened. You know, that's what's exciting about serving the Lord. You know, if you know what's gonna take place, that's not quite as exciting as stepping out and just trusting, because you never know what he's gonna do. I'm gonna share this real quick, I know the church has heard it, but I was at Crown, and I'd never been in a lot of ministry in my life, and so there was a, we went into the ministry, I went into the jail ministry, and I'll never forget, me and Fred Hart was there, and we were going down in these pods, and I know the church knows this story, but it's just exciting serving the Lord. We went down there in this pod, we preached in the pod, and about that time before we left, this security guard comes up to us and says, hey boys, would y'all like to go down and do some ministerial work with a guy down in lockup? He said he's down in solitaire. We said sure. We jump in the elevator, they start taking us down to the solitaire confinement place, and the security guard looks at me and Fred, we're just young, and they said, hey now boys, now listen, this guy you're going down here, he said, he's crazy. I said, well I thought all of them were if they're in here. And he said, you didn't hear this from me, but he said he's a pedophile. And then he said, and boys, don't let him touch you because he's got AIDS. He said, y'all still want to go? Me and Fred looked over each other and said, well, God died for him. We went on down there in solitary confinement. By the time that guy got in there, I mean, that guy was crazy. But man, we witnessed to him, talked to him about the Lord. And so then, after months came by, we switched from the jail ministry, and I started driving a van, going downtown, South Knoxville, picking up homeless people, and picking up people in halfway houses, and picking up people to mission. And we're driving down there in South Knoxville, man, we pull up to the mission, all these guys get in. Now Vernon gets in, and Vernon, his elevator didn't go all the way to the top. But we's glad to have him, he got in the van, and man, all of a sudden, all these homeless guys piled in. Then we go down to the South Knoxville there, and we go down one of them streets, and we're pulling up to a halfway house, and these are guys that just got out of prison. Now I'd just been in prison about three months before, and I look up on that porch, and about that time, y'all never guess who I seen coming down to get in our van. That same God we'd met down there in the... Well, while we're doing that, and I'm sitting there going, Eric, Eric, this guy's the guy that was up in prison. About that time, this guy was walking down the middle of the street. He had this big box of leisure suits. They were electric, lime, green, blue. I mean, they were like 1970 classics. That guy stopped, threw that box down on the ground in front of that band and all them homeless men and they said, he said, hey boys, free for the taking. And I mean, they piled on that band and old Vernon, there he is standing in South Knox, ain't got a stitch of clothes on, slapping them lime green leisure suit on. I said, praise God, we're going to church now. And while you say all that, you ain't gonna get that much fun unless you serve the Lord. Can you imagine the stories? I told my wife today, it is addictive serving the Lord and just trusting him, because you never know how and where and when he shows up, but I promise you he will. And it's exciting to find out, isn't it? So he just trusted him. He said, all right, Lord, nevertheless at thy word, I'm just gonna do what you tell me and I'm gonna throw a net out. And guess what, he threw a net out, and I want you to know, the Bible says they caught a great multitude of fishes. That was blessings, amen? Hey, but wait a minute. Keep in mind, I want to just say this real quick. Keep in mind, it's not always easy when you obey the Lord. You say, how do you know that? Well, they had some broken nets and they had so many blessings, the ship started to sink and they had to get help. But I've learned this, as you obey the Lord, sometimes you encounter problems and things have to be fixed and sometimes you gotta get some help. But listen to me, I'm sure that Peter did not say, oh, I tell you what, boys, we went in the hole, we have to fix these nets. I tell you what, I wish we wouldn't have went fishing. Now I think that was a small price to pay for the multitude of fishes. And by the way, they knew once all those fish came in, their needs were taken care of, and I've learned when we trust God, he just takes care of our needs. At the word, Lord. The ships were so full of fish, they began to sink, and obeying the Lord, as they started to sink, and obeying the Lord in his word sometimes creates more work. More help, more problems. I've learned around here, man, y'all like problems. How many of y'all don't like problems? Well, I'll tell you what we do. Let's not go out and try to win anybody to God. Let's not run any buses, because you know what? We just had to take one of our vans down there, and I won't even tell you how much that cost. But I'll tell you what, I think it's a small price to pay when you hear a testimony like you did tonight. And Helen, she's gonna be going to camp this week, and Helen has grown up in our church, and by the way, her whole family comes here through our bus ministry. Small price to pay, at thy word, Lord. So around here, we're just gonna do what he tells us. And it might create more work, it might create more problems, it might have to get us to get some help, but you know what we're gonna do? We're gonna do it. Because the blessings are worth it. Can I get a witness, church? And let me just say this, the cost of obeying God's word is never higher than the alternative. It's never higher than the alternative. Let me tell you what that is, broken lives, broken dreams, broken hearts. How about we just obey the Lord? At thy word, Lord. That means that all their needs would be met at thy word. Our greatest need that needs to be met is salvation. And I'm thankful tonight the Lord loved us so much that he sent his own son to die on the cross for us and he paid for our sin dead on the cross. And the Bible says that Jesus Christ is our gift of salvation. It's not something you earn, it's something you trust. And I'm thankful he's paid our sin debt in full on Calvary. And he gave the receipt when he raised from the dead. And now he tells us that if we'll trust his son as our personal savior, we'll put our faith, we'll just trust, at thy word, Lord, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life at thy word, Lord. I'm thankful when I was a five-year-old boy, I trusted Christ, I'm glad I had a mother that knew the Lord, she led me to the Lord, and I'm thankful when my mother gave me truth, I said, Lord, I trust you. I wish I could say all through my life that I've obeyed him on every occasion, and I sadly cannot do that, but I desire to have thy word. So we see Peter's dilemmas, Peter's decision, then I wanna close, Peter's devotion. Look at verse 10. I love it. Y'all remember this morning I told you when I was young, I was 21, God was working in my heart, I heard a preacher preach on that verse right there. From henceforth thou shalt catch men. And here was the thought from here on. From here on. You know what we like to do? We like to talk about all of our past and all of our failures, but God wants to look at our from here ons. And he said from henceforth thou shalt catch men. I've learned I love catching fish. How many of y'all like to fish? But it ain't nothing like fishing for men. And here's what he said, from henceforth thou shalt catch men. And if you keep reading there, here's what the Bible says, they forsook all and followed him. They didn't drag him nets with them. You know what, a life-changing thing happened in Peter's life that day. This is the first day they met him. The Lord Jesus had just started his earthly ministry, and he shows up to these rough fishermen, and if anybody was convinced, it was Peter. Because he'd done this all his life. He knew he needed a fish at night. He knew the fish could see. the nets a day, and they knew that all of the fish would school at night, and they knew when to do it, and he's like, oh, nevertheless, I'll do this just to appease this man, but boy, he learned something. He learned that the man on the boat knew better than he did. And I've learned in my life, he knows the way through the wilderness, all I have to do is follow. Years ago, Father and I and my brother-in-law, we went down to Santee Cooper. We hired a guide. We went down there to catch a bunch of blue cat. And man, we did. We caught a bunch. I'd say what, Dad? 250, 300 pounds. I mean big ones. Brother Scotty, big ones. I think the biggest we caught, dad caught one about 30 some pounds. And man, we filleted a lot of those things up, brought them home. And we know a little bit about fishing, but you know, we hired this guy, and his name, just a cool name, it was Buster Rush. I mean, you know anybody that's got a name like that, he's a good guy. Buster Rush. And he was a South Carolinian, so you know, he taught, it wasn't tournament, it was toonament. It was, we'd get on it, he said, I fished toynaments. I mean, I loved how he talked, but we paid this guy. Now, let me ask y'all a question. How foolish would it have been for me and dad and my brother-in-law to pay Buster to take us and guide us on that lake? And we said, oh no, we just need your boat. We'll make the choices where we're gonna go. Now, we might have caught a few dinkers, but Buster knew where the good ones were. Y'all know why? He was the guide. We ought to just trust the God. And our heavenly God is the Lord Jesus. And see, Peter's devotion was in verse 10. He said, they returned to their ships, no doubt rejoicing. They forsook all and they left the old life behind, did not drag their nets, and they followed him. That's the Christian life. Just following him. You know why we can follow him? Because we can trust Him. So I want to just close tonight with this. They trusted Him. Will you trust Him tonight? I'm not talking about your salvation. I hope all of you know Jesus and you've trusted Christ for your salvation. But I'm talking now, if you're saved, you ought to be trusting Him for every decision in your life. Are you trusting Him? We ought to be devoted to him in such a way that we trust him. And then, here's the other thing the disciples did, they learned of him. That's the Christian life. I'm 50, gonna be 51, and you know what? I'm always learning more about the Lord. I'm learning so much, even now, at this stage in my life. And man, I've learned so much. I told someone today, I've learned more about me, I've learned more about people, but more importantly, I've learned more about the Lord. He's always ready to teach us. We ought to learn of Him. And then, here's the last one the disciples did. They were so devoted, they wanted to trust Him, and they did. They forsook all and fled. They learned of Him, but then they tried to be like Him. You know what's wrong in America today? We got too many Christians not being like Jesus. We ought to be so devoted to Him that we want to be like Him. How many of y'all wanna be like him? Oh, listen, there's so many times I've said in my office and a car will pull up in the parking lot and I'll have seconds because I know by the look of the person's face or maybe I'll get a call and I'm saying, Lord, these people are getting ready to come into this door and they're gonna ask me for help and I'm gonna say, Lord, I don't have it. I need you. I need you to give me wisdom these next few moments. I need you to give me help these next few moments. Oh, we need him, don't we? But I want to be like him. And Lord knows that I have failed, but even when we counsel people, we ought to be like him. I think so many times the way he spoke to people. I think about that lady that he met, the woman at the well. Everybody knew who she was, but he was so loving and kind to her. And then he dealt with the Pharisees in a totally different way because he knew their hearts. And to be fair, if someone didn't know the Lord, they would think, man, he is an awful rude man. I mean, who is to ever think that he would call someone white in sepulchers? But he knew their hearts. I pray that God would give us wisdom here at Tiftoni Baptist Church to be like him, even in our speech. Don't follow the world's way. Don't follow your way. Don't wait. This is the time. At the word. Young people, I wanna give the last application to y'all. The Lord's already worked in y'all's hearts in a miraculous way this summer. Youth Congress, y'all had a wonderful time. God worked in your heart. Now you're gonna go to a camp. You're gonna be separated from all of social media and all God's people said. I know they didn't. But I'm gonna promise y'all something. I'm gonna promise you something. You're gonna be in a safe environment. You're gonna be around young people. It's gonna be safe for you to let the Lord work in your heart. And when he does, just do it. At thy word, Lord, yes. It's the only way. At thy word. Y'all remember the pack? I appreciate all of y'all tonight. I'm gonna close. Y'all are probably too young, but when I was a boy, you used to become blood brothers. You can't do that today because you'll get COVID. You get killed. Back when I was a boy, you know, we'd take something, poke our fingers, and we'd become, y'all know what I'm talking about? Y'all ever done, y'all ever heard of that? Well, I lived in West Virginia, so we fished with hellgrammites. Helper mites are these black ugly looking things and they've got real long pinchers, but they go into a morphing stage and when they come out they can fly and their pinchers come from like this long and they become like this long. I mean they're like real long on both sides. And there was one of them flying around that night, so me and Greg, I said, well, he said, let's just get one of them, we'll become blood brothers. And I mean, them things, pinchers are that long. I said, all right. He said, man, I told the churches, but they gotta hear it. And I took that, about ripped my finger off. but got blood coming out. Well, then after he seen how gory and how bad it was, he was looking for a sewing needle. He would go prick his finger and do it. I said, oh no, big boy, get the thing here. You gonna do it too. And so, man, we went like that. We've been forever blood brothers. And I ain't seen him or heard from him in 30 years. We're blood brothers. We swapped that blood, amen? And we made a pact. And I asked our church this morning if they might make a pact, and here's the pact. And y'all can make the pact with me tonight. If God speaks to you, just say yes. How about we just do what Jesus tells us? Will y'all make a pact as Tiftoe Developers Church? Y'all stick your fingers up like this right here. How many of y'all make a pact? Listen, if you know that you can trust him, then why don't you be devoted to him? And if he speaks to you, just say at thy word, Lord. I'll let down the net. I'll go wherever you want me to go. I'll do whatever you want me to do. I'll say whatever you want me to say. I'll go to church faithfully because the Bible says, but exhorting one another and so much the more as you see the day approaching, do not forsake the assembling of yourselves. Thank y'all for making a pact tonight. Now how about we just do that all the time with Tiftoni Baptist Church and how about we just do what Jesus said. Can I get a thumbs up? At the church. We'll promise you this, I've never had a soul come in my office and say, Pastor, I'm gonna tell you right now, I've been listening to your preaching, and God's been speaking to my heart, and I've been obeying his word, and I just want you to know I've ruined my life. I've never had a soul do it. But I'll tell you what they have come in and said, Oh, Pastor, I didn't obey the Lord and my life's a mess. How about we just make a pact and we just trust the Lord, amen? Those are three magical words at that work. How many of y'all picking up what I'm throwing down? Let's stand our feet At the word Obedience is the very best way show that you believe Action is the key. I missed it. Let's do it again obedience is Joy! How about we just obey, amen? They're gonna play something on the piano. Why don't you, maybe the Lord's speaking to you. Let's get around these young people tonight, these young people. I'm gonna ask, I'm not gonna make the teenagers and the people come, but if you are going to camp, why don't you come around the altar tonight? Let's just let us pray around you, and let's ask God to do something special in your heart. Some of you willing to do that? Would you come? Let's have others come around them, but let's just pray around them and ask them, say, Lord, at thy word. At thy word. Parents, come on up with them. You're welcome. Come on up. Let's pray around them. Church folks, come on together around them. At thy word. Maybe an adult's wanna get in on this. Say, Lord, we wanna obey you. We wanna do what you have us to do. Please, Lord. Maybe there's someone here tonight and you say, I have a family member. They need to obey the Lord. Why don't you pray for them? Ask God to help them. At thy word, Lord. Heavenly Father, we come to you tonight. Lord, we ask you, Lord, you help us to obey you. At thy word, Lord. We know that brings life of blessings. Lord, we understand it doesn't mean that we're not gonna have trouble. We're not gonna have problems, we're gonna have problems to deal with. Maybe it will require more work, more help, more money, But Lord, these disciples weren't complaining. They went home rejoicing. They forsook all and fled, and they followed you. And Lord, I pray you'll help us to follow you. That's the Christian life that will trust you in all things, will learn of you in all things, and Lord, we'll want to be like you. I pray you'll work in our lives. Be with this camp this week. Lord, do something special in all the hearts. I pray you'll give everyone safety now this week. Please put edge protection around us and all the young people, the workers, driving back and forth. I pray you'll crown it with thy goodness. We'll thank you for what you do, for we ask it in the precious name of Jesus, amen, and all God's people said. Amen, well I know this group, y'all probably wanna get back, y'all got CDs? They have CDs in the back? How many of y'all like good music? Then you need to purchase the CDs and y'all got other things back there. And so let's give them a moment and let them get back to their table and you can greet them and let them know how much you appreciate them. We appreciate y'all being here tonight and we're looking forward to getting to know them a little bit more this week. And please, now, if you want to come up, 7 o'clock each night, you're welcome to go up to the camp. But remember, Wednesday night, we're all going to be up at the camp at 7. All right? Yes, sir. All right, Brother Jim Beeler has volunteered. If someone needs taken up to the camp on Wednesday night, see Brother Jim Beeler, and he'll be more than happy to get you up there. All right? God bless you. Have a great night. We'll see you Wednesday, if not sooner.