OK, you got it. Web of TK? Man. Now look, I am a loud mouth. You'll have to. You remember what you did 10 years ago? You may not remember, but I will never forget. Yeah. I ain't going to tell on you. What did you do 10 years ago? October oh four ten years ago. What'd you do? Why don't you say that a little louder surrendered to walk yeah That's one of the greatest bless in my life a good brother All right, let's go to Ezekiel Ezekiel 24. Now look, I might have a rough spot or two here and there. Just deal with it, OK? Just have to bear with me a little bit. Look down at verse 15. I want you to read it for us, Brother TK. I don't know if I can get through it. 15 to 27. Yes, sir. Also the word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Son of man, behold, I take away from thee the desire of thine eyes with a stroke. Forbear to cry, make no mourning for the dead. Bind the tire of thine head upon thee, and put on thy shoes upon thy feet, and cover not thy lips, and eat not the bread of men. So I spake unto the people in the morning, and at evening my wife died. And I did in the morning as I was commanded. And the people said unto me, wilt thou not tell us what these things are to us, that thou doest so? I got it. Then I answered them, the word of the Lord came to me, saying, Speaking to the house of Israel, Thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I will profane my sanctuary, the excellency of your strength, the desire of your eyes, and that which your soul pitieth in your sons and your daughters, whom you have left, shall fall by the sword. And ye shall do as I have done. You shall not cover your lips, nor eat the bread of men, and your tires shall be upon your heads, and your shoes upon your feet. You shall not mourn nor weep, but ye shall pine away for your iniquities. And mourn, notice he says, one toward another. Thus Ezekiel is unto you a sign according to all that he hath done shall ye do. And when this cometh, ye shall know that I am the Lord God. Also thou son of man shall it not be in the day when I take from them their strength, the joy of their glory, the desire of their eyes, and that whereupon they set their minds, their sons and their daughters, that he that escapeth in that day shall come unto thee to cause thee to hear it with thine ears. And that day shall thy mouth be opened to him which is escaped, and thou shalt speak, and be no more dumb, and thou shalt be a sign unto them, and they shall know that I am the Lord. I'm going to ask Brother Pilkington, I believe he's prayed up. Sure does seem like he is. I want you to see if you can get a hold of heaven tonight. Amen. God, I thank you, Lord, for Calvary. Thank you for Jesus Christ. Yeah, that's right. Lord, I pray that the Spirit of God would speak to hearts tonight. God, I pray you'd help my brother to preach. Lord, I don't know what all he's got to say, but God, I pray you'd uphold him through it. God, I don't know who this might be for tonight, but God, I pray, Lord, that whatever's coming down the pike, Lord, that you'd give us grace to deal with it, God. God, that the Holy Ghost would fill him. Lord, I pray for you to help those, Lord, that need something, God, that you give exactly what they need tonight. Lord, we'll give you all the praise and honor and glory for what you're doing. Amen God bless you. Thank you can be seated now I would like to say that we do love this church, and we're thankful for brother peacock miss peacock for all that they've done I want to make sure that I am grateful to you folks for the kindness that you've shown to us before I get started here now I want you to notice in the passage down there in verse 16. It looks like Ezekiel is about to lose something That's very dear to him And let me tell you something, brethren, sometime God might come along and He might say to you, one of these days you're going to lose something that is very, very dear to you. And you can't always predict it. You can't always say why it happens. You can't always put your thumb on it and say, well, it's because of this. It's because I'm having to go through this. Because sometimes, brethren, you just don't know why you're having to go through those things. And let me just drop a little word here. You know, there's some of them evangelistic, the television evangelistic preachers, they'll say, let me drop a word about right now. Well, let me drop a word your way. Be very careful whenever you're dealing with people that's just experienced great loss and make sure that you know that what you're saying is a comfort to them and not a heart to them because let me tell you, you do not know what they're going through. I'll tell you, sometimes I wished I had some of the words back that I had said to several people along the way because I was nothing more than a PBI jerk. I was an idiot. I had no idea what to say to those people. And all I did was hurt them instead of help them. And I would to God I could go back and say something else to them. Well, words go out of your mouth. You can't go back and get them, can you? I tell you one thing, I've been showing kindness this year, and I promise you one thing, I will be showing some kindness in the future. Now God does things to us. We don't always like what it is, but God works on us, and I'm thankful that God treats us as sons and not bastards. In Hebrews chapter 12, He chastens us, He loves us, and thank God He does love us, and I'm glad that He deals with us as sons. And you ought to be thankful for that. Now some of you sitting here tonight, I guarantee you're going through something. I mean, I guarantee you if somebody sitting beside you in those pews tonight are hurting some way, they might not tell you that. And you may not know all the things that they're going through, but everybody's going through something at some time. Amen? Ezekiel was a married man. Ain't nothing wrong with being married. Matter of fact, I recommend it. My wife and I, we just celebrated 30. Man, keep getting older. She keeps getting younger, I just keep getting older. I'm 51, she's 29. Amen? You know what that means right there. If I'd been married 30 years, she wasn't even born yet. Amen? Now the Bible does have plenty to say about married prophets. Abraham lied about his wife twice and got away with it. Don't be lying about your wife. Don't lie to your wife. Sometimes you can't figure out what your wife wants, and you may have to lie in order to get her to tell you what she wants. I guess that's justified lying in some way, amen? I remember one time, the girls, they had this cat, you know, and it was a stupid, ugly cat, and I hate cats. And so I think they're the devil's advocate myself, you know? I just might as well preach on cats, you know. I guess Brother Lynch wouldn't like that, would he? So we had this cat, you know, and we come home one day, and it looked like it had the mange, and Karen said, go ahead, kill that thing. So I said, all right, you know, and I took it up this fella's house, you know, and I took my pistol, and I put that cat on the ground, you know, and it kind of squirmed a couple times, and I shot, you know, and I missed. Well, I was about five miles from the house, and I thought, that cat ain't never going to find his way to the house, you know. So my wife, she had to deal with all the neighbors. What happened to the cat? Well, it died. Well, I don't understand. Well, it had to mange and died, you know. One day I was at work, she called me up and she said, you ain't gonna believe this. She said, that dumb cat done come home. And she said, and all the neighbors know that we're liars. She said, that cat's got a little bit something missing. She said, you did hit, but it was in the ear, and it's got a big hole in the ear. I said, OK. So there is a little bit justified lying every once in a while, you know. I had to go back to my neighbors and apologize for lying to them. It's a sad, sad thing. Moses was criticized for his choice of a wife. Ain't none of nobody else's business who your wife is. I don't really tell anybody who they ought to marry, because I ain't got to live with them. I mean, it's really their business. You want to choose the dumb one, that's your business. Probably some of y'all too. I mean, as ugly as you are, I don't know how in the world you got some of the women you got. Amen? I'm not going to say any names, but I'll get in trouble tonight. Now I want you to notice down in verse 16, it says, Son of man, behold, I take away from thee the desire of thine eyes. Now look, you've got to think about what the Bible says whenever you read the Bible. Now He did not say, I'm going to take away from thee the desire of thine heart. You see, I think Ezekiel was sold out to God, and I think Ezekiel had already made up his mind that no matter what happened, he was going to serve God. And you see, sometimes we love things in this world to an extent to where God might come along, like He did Abraham, and He says, Abraham, how about giving me that boy? I tell you what, that's a test. Test I don't want to go through amen You see if your marriage is set up this way to where that God is number one And everything else comes second Then your marriage might just have a chance Now you see there's no guarantee You know, I mean you my wife she might turn bad and leave you, you know can't be your fault. I We're Bible believers, man, it can't be their, you know, it's gotta be, you know, her fault, I mean, my goodness, you know. I mean, if my wife leaves me, I'll tell you something else, if anybody ever hears that I've done committed suicide, that, well, you better go find that woman, TK, cause she done killed me. Cause I am too chicken to kill myself, amen? She done put the Sinai in the tea, or she has made me drink the Kool-Aid or something, I don't know, it's bad. You know, I'll be honest with you, over the years I've listened to a lot of funerals. A lot of funerals of, you know, pastors and pastors' wives and things like that. And you know, honestly, I don't think that I've ever heard an epitaph quite so sad as this one right here. I mean, you and I, when we lose somebody, we mourn for them. Here poor old Ezekiel, he's lost the desire of his eyes and he can't even mourn. He can't cry. He can't let the people know he's hurting. I tell you what, that's rough, man. Now look down at verse 17, he says, forbear to cry. make no mourning for the dead, bind the tire of thine head upon thee, and put on thy shoes upon thy feet, and cover not thy lips, and eat not the bread of men. I'm telling you, that is a sad, sad funeral. It's sad whenever you can't mourn for somebody that you love when you've enjoyed their companionship for so many years and God says, do not mourn for them. Brethren, that's rough. That's right. I tell you what, I'm glad I wasn't an Old Testament prophet. See, you and I, we read the Old Testament, we think, oh man, we could do just as good as they did in the Old Testament. I'm not real sure about that. I tell you what, if I had to do some of the things that Ezekiel did, I tell you I would have failed. and I would have failed on purpose. And let me tell you something, the Old Testament, it wasn't like it is in the New Testament now. Bless God you didn't just have this justification going on to where you could get away with anything and you could go to God and you say, God, I disobeyed your command, but I love you. Will you forgive me? Well, I thank God for the forgiveness of Jesus Christ. Amen. I'm glad we don't have to live under that Old Testament law. And I'm glad we don't have to do all the things contained in that Old Testament. That's me, you know. You may not be that way, but I like it. I'm glad we ain't got to do that job. I'm telling you, I could not deal with that. I'm not a law keeper. I'm a law breaker. Amen? Come on, can I have a witness there? Yeah, you're law breakers too. You know what Ezekiel was? Ezekiel was a sign prophet. Now we know the signs are to the who. That's exactly right. Now I've got to get you kind of doctrinally straight here before I tear your hide off, amen? I mean, we know who it's going to. We know it's going to the Old Testament Jews. We know that it's dealing with Israel. And we know, but let me tell you something, there's something in this passage that's got a hold of me! I looked at this passage and I remember Danny and D.D. Hall, they'd come over to PBI, you know? By the day he'd get up and he'd tell that story about going up there to see the grave of his daughter, you know, and he'd say, me and mama, we'd drive up there and we'd pull out in front of the church and we'd just sit out there, you know, and she'd cry and I'd cry. We'd say, perhaps today. Then he'd sing about two coats. I tell you, it's sweet to me. I loved it. I go shake his hand. I say, God bless you, brother. That's good. I go to the house, turn the TV on. I mean, it was over for me. I mean, there was a blessing there and I was grateful for it, but it was over because I was not invested. I was in Bible school, learning all the Bible. I knew everything there was, no other Bible. I mean, I can tell you which way the sun is supposed to come up in the morning, you know. That's pretty much about all I can tell you, you know. Look back in chapter 24, look at verse 14. You know, really, verse 14 is the natural introduction to this sermon. It says, I, the Lord, have spoken it. It shall come to pass, and I will do it. I will not go back, neither will I spare, neither will I repent. According to thy ways and according to thy doings shall they judge thee, saith the Lord God. You know what really breaks my heart about this message? Is even after they got the message from Ezekiel and it was so sad the people were unmoved. They were unaffected. They were apathetic. like perhaps maybe some of you. I mean, you don't know what your pastor has to go through in order to bring you one sermon. I remember I was at home one Saturday afternoon and I was trying to get ready for Sunday. I realized I'm supposed to have these sermons, you know, two weeks ahead of time. You know, I understand. And if that's the way it is for you, God bless you. But it ain't that way for me. And so I got in my car, I told my wife, I said, I'm going to ride down the road. I've got to pray a little bit, you know. And I went up by Lake James and I was driving down through there and I said, God, I've really got Ezekiel chapter 24 on my mind, but I said, honest to God, I just can't figure the thing out. I can't see it, Lord. I know there's something there, but I just can't see it. Lord, would you please show me? And I said, I'll be honest with you, Lord, I ain't got no illustration for it either. Could you help me with that? Oh, I can help you. Help you out, buddy. One sermon. You know, it kind of, I'm not trying to be mean and I hope you don't take this the wrong way, but after somebody, you know Brother Elliot, he got up and he poured his heart out. And Brother Knowles got up and he just absolutely poured his heart out. You see, it's passionate. And then Brother Woodard, he got up and you see, he was in the thing. He began to live these things after a while. I mean, it becomes part of you and part of your life. So I was going down there and I was praying and I said, Lord, I just can't understand it. He said, look in verse 15. He said, also, the Word of the Lord came to me saying, I said, man, there's a message. There's a command for a message there. And I'm telling you, for preachers, it is not optional. God called us to preach. And then God begins to work on us and deal with us, show us things out of the Bible. And you know what, Brother Elliot, I remember you from school, you know, and I may not have gotten to know you like I should have while we were down there, and I was probably a jerk. You know, I apologize if I was, but I came across as rude to everybody, you know, and that was my defense mechanism. Because honestly, I don't like people. And I'm sorry. I love you! Okay. Who said that? Okay. Your turn was last night. It ain't your turn no more. And you know what? I've had to learn, learn, learn to like people. Amen. Amen. Amen. Sometimes I just don't like them. Amen. They get on my nerves. Dumber than a box of rocks. Amen. Sometimes I feel like I'm surrounded by stupidity. Amen. Amen. And I'm the genius of the bunch. I'm glad you're laughing. I'm glad you ain't taking this real serious. Amen. But every once in a while, we kind of get to thinking of ourselves of more than what we really are. We ain't quite that special. We ain't quite as good as we think we are. And you know what I've learned over the years that if God's going to use us to get a message out to people, He's going to abuse us. Now you sit there and you do like I did when Danny Hall was telling that story. And you say, oh, amen, I'm telling you that makes for the best sermons. It does. I like them. Ain't no fun going through it, though. You see, our dispositions must always submit to God's directions. Whether we like it or not, the message must be obeyed. Whether we enjoy it or not, God gives us a message so that it'll begin to change us. And you know what? Brother Peacock said something very profound this morning to you young preachers. If you just caught it, we want you to learn from our mistakes so you don't have to go through all the stuff that we've had to go through. I don't want you to have to go through some of the stuff, but I ain't gonna feel sorry for you if you do. I don't want you to pity me either. You know what, our daughter, is she in here? I'm not gonna tell you, yeah. Our daughter, she's 20 years old. She's out living by herself in a trailer. She pays her own bills. Now, I must admit, every once in a while, I gotta give her a little money. I reckon I'm gonna be giving her money until she's 90, you know? But she pays her own bills, comes to church because she wants to. Mom and Daddy ain't making her. She begged us to come down here. I mean, you know, she ain't nothing special. She ain't going to get up here and sing, you know, like Brother, what is your name? Mike what? What? Mike what? Elliot. Elliot, yeah. Brother Elliot's kids, you know, they get up here and they sing. You know, Bailey's not going to get up here and do that. I mean, she just, she's not going to do it. She can sing. She ain't going to do that. That's not what we brought her for. She came down here to get something. I mean, she wanted to see, you know, some of these things, you know, and she wants to be, if you know what a blessing it is for her to be around you folks, hear that shout and that singing, you know, praising God, happy to love Jesus, willing to do something, just fall in love with Jesus, called Jesus being good to you. I want my kid to be exposed to that. I hope you do too. And you see, we've got to learn to obey the commands of God. We've got to learn to obey the messages of God. Sometimes we don't want them. I mean, you know, church is not a pick and choose. Well, this message is for so and so. This message is for somebody else. Listen, this message was for Israel. It didn't say the good ones and the bad ones. It said for Israel. Because they'd done defiled the temple, they'd filthied it up. The desire of their heart was the temple. It was not God anymore. You see, us being in church, sometimes we can become the same way. Getting that little routine? Man, I tell you what, I gotta go to church tomorrow. I'll soon be out there fishing. Why don't you go fishing then? Let the rest of us worship God. Well, I'll just soon be hunting. Go on. And don't bring your bad spirit in the church. And if you want that 20-point buck, go get that thing and come tell everybody about it. And then whenever we try to encourage you to tell somebody about Jesus Christ, you say, well, I'm a little shy. You ain't shy when you're showing me pictures of your 20-point buck on your telephone. You got that, you know, look what I've done. You didn't do nothing. Oh, now, look, man, I didn't do that because you showed me pictures of your 20-point buck last night. I didn't even think about that. I was thinking about somebody else, amen? We ought to always obey God's command and we should be willing to always do what God wants us to do. How many of you ever failed at that? That's it, buddy. I can't even whistle, but if I could, it'd be the referee whistle. We all ought to raise our hand there. Now, if you didn't raise your hand, it's just because you might be a little bit proud or, you know, you just ain't learned yet that you have disobeyed God's command at some point in your life, you know. You know, you just keep on living. You'll learn it after a while. Amen? Now, let's look down at verse 16 and 17. Now, like I said at first, you don't know what your preacher, your pastor, and I like it that you guys call him preacher. I like that. He's your preacher. I had one. He ain't here no more. But that was my preacher. That's what I called him. I can't call Brother Peacock, Brother P, Brother David, David. I just can't do it. It just ain't in my nature. I'm afraid my daddy will come back and beat me to death. I never, ever called Brother Lance Jim. I still don't call him Jim. He's been dead 10 years, I still don't call him Jim. Even when me and Brother Walker's talking, I can't call him Jim. You might not have been afraid of him, but I scared to death of him. I'm still afraid he'll come back and whoop my butt, amen? Behind, behind, I realize you don't say butt around here. I say whatever comes to mind, amen? All right, looking 16, I'm having too much fun here. He says, son of man, behold I take away from thee a desire of thine eyes. With a stroke. That fell out in Kansas one time I was reading through my Bible. I was sitting on a welding bench out there, you know, and I was reading and he come over to me. And I just happened to be in Ezekiel 24 here. He said, you know what? He said, did you know that that's the first stroke in the Bible? I don't really get that, brother. I think that's swift, not like a heart attack stroke. He said, no, that's the first stroke in the bottle. I said, well, if that's what you want to believe. I got a look in that thing, and I thought, ooh, boy, that's quick one. Sometimes you don't have time to prepare for the cost that's coming your way. Amen? Amen. Now if I knew I love my wife, she knows I love her. You know I love her. If you don't, I love my wife, OK? I would have to love her to put up her 30 years. You know what you want? You want me to say that she would have to love me to put up for me 30 years. She ain't preaching, I am. It's my turn to get a little bit of that. You know how we always have to give the wife the honor, you know? Man, I want some of it. I mean, it's about time somebody said, hey, he has put up with that woman for a long time. That's the truth. God help me, I'm going to need a ride home after this is done. Amen. I think Brother Walker is driving us. I'll be good then. Amen. Now let's look here. Why is the cost so great? Why? I mean, God don't have a ticket booth. And you don't get to go up to the ticket booth and say, hey, how much is power? How much is a touch? If you went up to him and said, how much salvation? He'd say, that's free, it doesn't have to be paid for. Say, I ain't talking about salvation! I'm talking about service. Brother Peacock, he used to come up to church and preach, and Brother Massa would come preach, and Dr. Rupp would come preach. We had some good meetings up there, you know. You know, they'd come up there, and I mean, I didn't know what to have, I wanted it. I asked Brother Peacock one time, I said, Brother, I said, would you please pray for me? He said, I'll pray for you. I said, sure, I'll pray for you. And he put them great big, man, he's got giant hands, you know. Put them hands on me, started praying, you know. By the mass that came down, you know, I shook his hand. I said, Brother, I said, would you please pray for me? I said, I would really appreciate it. He said, sure, I'll pray for you. Dr. Robin came up one time, I said, brother, I said, would you mind to pray for me? And honest to God, he took me back in this room, but I don't even know what he said. I was hoping it was one of these, you know, do what the man say, do what the man say, you know. And I was listening to him pray and I was thinking, God, I don't know what the man's saying. Help me. I sure hope he knows what he's saying because I can't figure it out. I mean, I tell you what, I was grateful they was willing to pray for me. You know, today I was just a little bit disappointed. A bunch of preachers in here. Brother Peacock said, if you fellas want to stick around, let's do a little bit of preaching this afternoon. I tell you what, I was thinking to myself, there ought to have been some boys sticking around doing a little preaching. Do you realize where you're at? Do you realize what he's done? Where he's been? They've got opportunity there. You ain't sticking around and learning a little something. That's right. Amen. Amen. I mean, you can do what you want to do, you know, but I was a wee tiny bit at this point. Now, you know, tomorrow he's going to say to anybody who won't stick around, yeah, amen, bless God we'll stay. And we don't want to get berated by the preacher again, amen. It's not that, it's just there ought to be some kind of a desire there. And I'll tell you, there'll be a desire as long as there's glory. But when the cost comes in, everybody wants to freeze. I believe, you know what? Have me excused. I want to be able to preach like Brother Peacock. How much did it cost? I mean, okay, I'm at the ticket booth here. I want two powers, three touches, How much is that? Do we have a blue light special today? There ain't no blue light specials, is there? Ain't no fun in death, is there? Let's not lie about it. Come on now, help me out here. Death ain't fun. We love them. Don't want to see them go. Like hang on to them as long as we can, don't we? I think the last time, or sometime I was here, I preached a message out of, about Martha and Mary, and I made reference to my grandmother. My grandmother, she was a good little old woman, you know, and I mean, she loved me. She told me when I was little, she said, I'm gonna pray that God will call you to preach. She said, because God loves fat preachers. Okay, alright. I ain't letting her down, am I? Amen? Okay, that is not that funny. Okay, let's move on here. I remember she told me one time she started reading her Bible in 1970. By the time she died, she had read it a whopping number of four times. She had a fourth grade education. Her dad was a sharecropper. Moved them all over South Carolina picking cotton. She showed me her hands one time and her hands were so cut up from the husk on the cotton. I mean, her hands, they were mangled. And I say, man, it's awful. I is all right, son. God took care of us. Amen. She didn't make you feel like a dog. I go over to the house, and I take a new girlfriend. I know some of you probably think that Karen is the only girl I ever dated, but that is not the truth. I used to be a stud muffin. Hey, look, I told you, justified lying. I'd take girls over there and I'd say, I'd say, ma'am, I want you to meet somebody. And she'd come to the door and she'd say, oh, honey, how you doing? Are you a Christian? I'd say, whoa, now, hang on here, ma'am. You're kind of putting a kink in the plans here. That's not what we come to talk about. I love that dear, sweet lady. She died about three years ago. What a sad day for me. But now it's OK. I know where she is. I get to see that lady again. You know what I'm hoping? I'm hoping that God, I know this is just surmising and it ain't going to come true, but you know what? I wish God would let Mamaw teach the Bible scholars Bible for just an hour or two. You know, just sit them down and say, well now honey, I tell you, I made it through life with this King James Bible and I just loved it. And it fed me the whole time I read the thing, you know. And I'm gonna show you a few passages out of it that might just help you out in eternity, amen. Now some of you wanted to correct that Bible and bless God, I just believed that Bible. God be on me, amen. I like it. What is the cost of the message? Look at verse 16. It is the desire of thine eyes. Things we love. Things we love while we're here on this earth. I had a young lady in our church. She called me up one morning. I was working at a school and she called me up and she said, Oh preacher, preacher! She said, you're not going to believe this. She said, my nephew, he just got caught in between the bunk beds on the top bunk. And they didn't get to him in time. And he's only four years old. And he hung himself. And his dad made the bed. And his dad's all tore up. And I'm telling you, I said, I'm so sorry, sister. Me and Karen, we went to that. You know, that's the smallest casket we've ever seen. And I'm, oh, it's so sad. Sad, man. I've seen those folks, they pay the price. I've seen those folks really grow in our church. God's really done something for Matt and Carla. Brother Matt's leading there singing now. I'll ask him, I'll say, hey, Brother Matt, I said, you got a specials for him? Yeah. He said, I've been worrying about it all week. He said, I'll tell you, he said, I've been praying about it. Somebody praying about this? Amen. Okay. He said, he said, I don't know if it's right or not. He said, I've been worried about it. He said, it worries me to death. I like nervous people. I think y'all be a little bit nervous. Y'all not be so confident. I ain't being mean. I'm just telling you the truth. One morning God came to me said, Mike Wheeler, can you preach? I said, Oh Lord, Thou knowest, Thou knowest all things. I ain't much at it. I'm not joking. I don't think much of myself. And then he looked at me and he said, Can you suffer? You know, when I was in Bible school, I was down there and I remember, Brother, I can take you to the spot within ten feet. I remember getting down on my knees and saying, Oh God, I want to know you. God come back and He said, Do you want to know me? Well, I remember praying that. I distinctly remember. He said, Do you really want to know me? I said, Yeah, I'm good with you are. He said, let me see how much you want to know me. Let me take a little something from you. You see, sacrifice, it leads to suffering. Suffering leads to sorrow. Sorrow leads to sermons. You have no idea what he pays to preach a sermon. I mean, all you do is you, and I'm not being mean, look, please don't take this the wrong way. You come in here, you sit down, you soak it in. Amen. I mean, it's a good place to soak it in, you know. Amen. I mean, I didn't mean to be rude this morning when I said I put on the CD, you know, and I started walking. I went three hours. You know, honest to God, I'm about as long as he is. I mean, I was looking on Brother Walker's website. He's got a few of my sermons up there. Probably after this, he'll take them down, you know. I got to looking at times and I thought, man, I preach as long as he does. My wife's always told me I was long-winded. You know, the other day she told me, she said, honey, she said, would it be okay if I tell you something? I know where this is leading already. This is the criticism after what I said in church sermon, you know. And she said, I'm not being unkind. You know I love you. She said, but you are not a politician. Nope. Nope, don't lie regular like they do. Nope, I was called to preach. Ain't no doubt I was called to preach. But I tell you what, the knowing him part. You see, we come to church and And we go through things, and we think we've arrived. You know, Paul never thought that he had attained. That's right. He kept on pressing toward that point. Amen. That's right. Amen. Amen. Sometimes we get to the place, you know, I've been in church, what did you say, 16 years? I deserve the opportunity. I won't. And I don't mean that against you, brother, but that's the way we think. Amen. We think longevity. Because of that, we deserve something. And you know, we are a generation that deserves something. We are entitled victims. Everybody is a victim that's entitled to something. That's the generation we live in. I mean, we didn't raise our children to be victims. That's right. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. I mean, we didn't raise them. And they're pretty content. I mean, reasonably content. They're almost content, I guess. Somewhat. I'm about to preach myself out of this one. I think they're content. I'm not sure. But they don't demand a whole lot. I mean, we had a Ford pickup truck that Jordan got first. She drove it till the wheels about fell off. And then I drove it again. And then Bailey got it. And when I sold it had 300,000 miles on when they turned 16. I did not buy them a Ferrari. I'll be honest with you. I ain't buying them a Ferrari if I can't have one. I mean, if anybody's getting a Ferrari, it's gonna be me. I'll be truthful with you. I could not fit in a Ferrari. What I want is a Harley, okay? That's a buffet car. You know what I mean? You can get as wide as you want to be on a Harley and it don't matter. You can just keep on fitting, you know what I mean? As long as you get your big fat leg over it, you're good. I'm going to be honest with you. I'm not trying to scare you out of church. I'm not trying to scare you out of the ministry. I'm not trying to prevent you from doing something for God. But I'll tell you right now, if you're ever going to do anything for God, it's going to cost you. I mean, whenever we get saved, get called to preach, you know, and we get that desire and we say, oh man, I get to go preach. How much do I get paid? I'm afraid, son, you got this all wrong. You're going to have to do the paying. You're going to have to get in front of those people and make a fool out of yourself, and you're going to have to get over the problem that you have of public ridicule. And you're going to have to live through that and learn some things and then you're going to have to fall flat on your face and then you're going to have to get up and fall down and get up and fall down. At some point, you're going to have to ask somebody for a little bit of help because you ain't got it all figured out. Amen? Am I a little bit loud for you? If I am, I'll show you a part. Look, it's the way I preach at home. I don't know any other way to preach. I apologize if I'm offending you or hurting your feelings or making your backside a little bit raw. I apologize, but I don't know any other way to be. The cost is rapid and sometimes we don't always have the opportunity to prepare for that cost. But God comes along and He says, You know what, I've got a great illustration. I've got a good sermon out of Job chapter 1. I've got good sermons now. Didn't used to have, you know, it wasn't that whoopee. You know what the Bible says in Job chapter 1, down verse 21, it says, And I got to looking at Ezekiel and I thought, why did God give Ezekiel? Looked to me like He's taking everything away. Well, before He took it away, He gave Ezekiel a companion. Somebody that he could talk to. Somebody he could confide in. Somebody that gave him a little bit of comfort. You see, the Lord gives. Then the Lord comes along one day and He says, And the Lord taketh away. You know what we wish we could say right there? We wish we could say, ìAnd the devil taketh away.î Donít work that way though, does it? The Lord gave and the Lord taketh away. What we got to learn to do is say, ìBlessed be the name of the Lord.î When He comes along and He says, ìI want the desire of your eyes.î All you can do is say, ìBlessed be the name of the Lord.î When He comes along and He says, I'm going to take a little chunk off you. The only thing you can do is say, and the Lord gave and the Lord take it away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. Amen. Now you take that to your Bible scholar and you tell him to put it in a little pipe and smoke that. I'm going to tell you about a lot of these churches around here that you're worried about competing with. They're never going to pay the price that it costs to be able to bring you one sermon Oh boy, they sure preach up a storm, can't they? They are a legend in their own mind. And they can pack the pews. But you ain't getting no truth. Honest to God, you ain't getting a thing to help you out. And I'm not being mean. Now look down at verse 20 and 22. I want you to notice that there is a cause for the message. And the reason that there is a message and why it's so important is because of the people. He says down there, he says, Then I answered them, the Word of the Lord came to me, saying, Speak unto the house of Israel. Thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I will profane my sanctuary, the excellency of your strength, the desire of your eyes, and that which your soul pitieth. I told you that about Bailey a minute ago. Because I wanted to say this, I don't pity my child because she's going through hard things. I had to go through them. Didn't kill me. You say it built character? Not really. I mean, doing without food don't build no character for me. I don't like it. We had to go to Kansas, you know, and I think the Lord sent us out there. I have no doubt in my mind about it. I mean, I made a mess of it. It's all my fault. I'm going to take the blame for it. But we went out there, we did the best we could with what we had. And I tell you what, I saw my wife, you know, she began to see that God could do something and she began to do some things in the church. We had a, on Wednesday evenings, we would cook for the youth in town there. And the youth would come and we'd have a little meal for them and then we'd teach them Bible. And we had some kids saved through that. I remember one time a guy called me up, you know, he was one of these guys, you know, knew how to do everything, you know, upside down, backwards, you know. He called me up, he said, brother, he said, you remember me, I went to Bible school with you? And I said, oh, yeah, I remember you. And he said, he said, how's your church doing? I said, well, it's doing okay. He said, how many folks you got in your church? And I said, well, I don't know, we probably got 60, 70 folks, you know. He said, well, how many folks you getting saved every week? And I said, well, we ain't getting unsaved every week. I said, we'll get something saved, you know, every once in a while. Doing okay. He said, brother, he said, I'm going to tell you something. He said, I know you're not going to like it, but he said, I've got this thing figured out. I said, oh, I've got to hear this. And he said, he said, the reason your church is not growing is because you haven't went door to door to every house in your town and knocked on every door and told every person in that town about Jesus Christ. I said, you're right, brother, that's the answer. We have went to every door in that town. I personally knocked on every door in that town. I mean, it's just a small town. It was only like 1,300 people or something like that. Man, I'll tell you what, we went up and down the streets knocking on doors, putting tracks in there. I mean, talking to folks, trying to get them to come. Don't tell me we didn't try. Amen. Amen. You know, sometimes it just takes God a while to get you ready so you can deal with people. I mean, I told you, I don't like people. Now, look, I'm not trying to be comical. I'm just, I'm being honest. And I'm telling you the truth. Sometimes I have a hard time, you know, I don't like to be touched. I don't like people to touch me. Don't touch me. I just don't like it. And I'm not being mean. I don't like to hug, you know. I've got a reason I don't like to hug. I love Brother Peacock. He's a big guy, tall guy. Whenever I hug him, my nose ends up in his armpit. And I know, you know, and I'm never gonna say anything to it. And here I'm in trouble. I know I've got to go to the dentist chair after this one, you know, and I mean, I know he loves me, you know, and hey, brother, how you doing? I love you. I'm glad you're here. You know, hello. I'm short and fat. You know, I mean, what do you do? I'm not tall like these guys are, you know, I just don't like to be touched. I'm weird. I like touch other women. Amen. Amen. I don't like to hug other women. I don't mean to, and I know, you know, a lot of people that just mean well and want to die. I just ain't a hugger. Hug. Hug all you want, you know, and I'll hug you back if you hug me, you know. Don't do holy kisses either. God, help us. I can't do it. I ain't going to kiss your own cheek and you ain't going to kiss mine either. I can't do it. Lord, help us all. I'm afraid I'd turn sideways and you'd turn the other way and we'd end up on the lips or something. God, help us. I'm telling you, I think I'd have to cut my lips off or something. I don't even know how in God's name we got off on that. I don't know what it was. The filthiness of the temple, that's what it was. There's a reason that God gives us messages and tries to help folks out. So that you'll grow. Learn. Learn. You know, if you live, these things are going to happen to you too. Now, when they do, what are you going to do? Now let's look. I'm going to tell you what most people do. Look down at verse 23. I'm about done. He says, and your tire shall be upon your heads, and your shoes upon your feet. You shall not mourn or weep, but ye shall pine away. He says that's what most people do. Bad things come on them, they get disappointed. You know, Brother Peacock came up one time and he was preaching about Ezekiel. Elijah, you know, the tree, you know. He said something I will never, ever forget. But I'm telling you, it made an impression on me. And I think you and Brother Massa were kind of bantering back and forth a little bit, you know. And you got up after him and you said, I know about that juniper tree. I've laid down there, my initials are under there. Amen. Well, I've climbed down there too now. I had no idea what you're talking about. I've been under there. I've got it on two different roots now. I got my initials. Scraped them with my finger now. I've been down there. I know what it is. I don't make fun of folks that are depressed and discouraged and downtrodden and disheartened anymore. Let me tell you something, folks going through things like this, it's real to them. It's hurting them, you know. They're having struggles, you know. And I'll tell you what, sometimes I don't have all the answers, but I got a God and He knows how to help me. I can certainly pray for them, I can tell you that. Pine is a disease that cattle and sheep get from an improper diet. You see people, they get to the place to where they just, you know, they're sitting around, Hebrews chapter 12, hands hang down, feeble knees, are hurting. So I got the answer. Really, do you? Come on. Come on, do you? I mean, I know you're in Bible school. Some of you folks go to church here. You know it all. Honest to God, you know some stuff. But do you have the answer? God does. Amen. Amen. God knows how to get them up, don't he? Amen. Amen, sir. Mother loses a baby. Sucks the life right out of them. Amen. I saw my daughter down there in that hospital in Carolina Medical Center. You know, that little baby man, he had tubes all over. I mean, I'm not joking. He had too many tubes. We couldn't even pick him up. And we'd go in there and we'd pray. We'd send out emails and texts and beg everybody to pray. And know what else do? I remember whenever that baby came out of that crib and my daughter held him first time, all them tubes on her. We got a picture of her holding him, you know, and man, she's so happy. We were happy. Doctors come in. Boy, doctors ain't kind. If you're a doctor, I'm not trying to be mean to you, but they come in and say, baby's going to die, but we're going to try this. That's a bowl of joy right there, let me tell you. OK, try it. Try it. Give it a shot. His foot had a blood clot right past his heart there. And his foot was going to, I mean, it was black as black can be. I mean, just purple black. And they said that he's going to lose that foot. So my wife would say, well, we're going to send out a message to all these people. We're going to get them prayed. She got a letter written down in her Bible where she prayed that, today, God, this is my prayer request. His kidneys are not working, and they say that he's going to have to have a kidney transplant. God, is there anything you can do? I read that letter. It breaks my heart. And God answered that prayer. The doctors came in there and said, eh? His kidneys are working, he started peeing. I tell you what, we ain't never been as happy to see pee in a diaper in our lives. I'm not joking, you know. And I mean, all the other babies are crying in the little ward there, you know, and they'd say, let us shut your door. No, don't shut the door. We can't wait till that cries. We like it. It's cool. Been there for six weeks. I mean, tell you man, we saw a miracle. I mean, genuine, bona fide, sent down from heaven miracle. I mean, I think God did something. Them doctors come in there and say, we can't explain it. I sit over in the corner, you know, my wife, she'd say, well, I can explain it. I've got a God that answers prayer. I'd say, preach it, sister, preach it. I mean, it's good, man. It was good. Boy, I tell you what, I saw a lot of families down there that would, I mean, it's sad, lose their baby. That mama did well. It's a pint of weight, man. You been there? Got the answers, do you? You see, they mourned toward each other instead of mourning to God. They were not concerned about their condition. They were concerned about their reputation. And Christians, you know, like that. I tell you what, Brother Knowles hit me last night and, you know, I'm a great preacher. I don't need to go to the altar. But he hit me and I came down. I remember Brother Peacock saying one time that he was up at Brother Lackey's and he crawled to the altar. Is that right? Did I hear that right? Crawled. I couldn't do that. I'm too proud for that. No, I couldn't see them people see me on my hands and knees crawling all the way to the altar, putting my heart on that altar, trying to get things right with the God that made me, answered all my prayers, took care of everything that I've asked Him to take care of. Oh, I made me a straight beeline for that alder last night. Because I was hit. I was hit and I knew it. Sometimes we sit in the seat, you know, and we hear the message. That's just not fair. That might be for Brother Josh or Brother TK or Brother Sam. You know, they want to do something for God. I don't mean... I'm pretty satisfied just sitting here. It'll be okay with me. God never touches me. So much. Almost 930. Can we not just hurry? I think Thursday night football's on. And if we hurry right now, I'm pretty sure I'd make the last half. I'm telling you, man, that's the way Christians are today. And I'm not being mean. You know, you folks may not be that way, and here you are, you're sitting here, you know, just with bated breath, waiting on something else to come out. You may not be that way, but there's a lot of Christians that way. You know what they're doing? They're pining away. Turn over to Hebrews chapter 12. I'm done. Like a tater, stick a fork in it, we'll be through. I couldn't remember this verse. I was teaching on it a couple of Wednesday nights ago. I was trying to get it and I had to ask Brother Walker. He helps me out when I can't remember things. I had to ask him where it was. Hebrews 12, look at verse 12. It says, Wherefore, lift up the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees. You know, here's a guy that's about to get out. He's discouraged, man. He's in trouble. He's having a hard time. He's about to get out. He's about to quit. I sure hope that ain't your case. Everybody says God won't put more on you than you can bear. Keep on living. Keep on living. Sometimes it's that way, folks. I seen my wife really go through it this year. I mean, she loves Jesus. I mean, every time I say, you know, Lord God's been good, she'll say, amen, amen. I'm thinking, where in the world is that coming from? Amen. Where is she getting that? Now, I want to be a help to her, you know, and us comfort each other. Man, sometimes I can't figure it out. About time to give the victory to the Lord. Amen. Lift up them hands. That's right. Them feeble knees. Start walking again. Somebody, I can look at you, I can tell you're pining. Just pine away. Pine away. Something has done sucked the life, the Christian life right out of you. And you think it's sin. Something else other than sin has sucked the life right out of you. You're hurting. You need help. Brother Peacock, you come.