Grab your Bibles, go to James chapter 1. In your Bibles, James chapter 1. I don't know that I've ever heard a message preached on this particular title. with this subject as far as the whole message, but I felt like it was something that I've received a real blessing from through the years, and I thought it might be something that some of you, if you realize what you're missing, and also the benefits that it has for you as well, because most people always ask what's in it for me, and I can tell you that the area I'm gonna cover tonight, I have received far more than I've given, and I've given a lot in this area, but I can't even come close, what I've given in this area hasn't came close to what I've received back. Tonight we'll look at James chapter 1, notice verse 27. Now notice the part where it says to visit the fatherless and the widows in their affliction. Tonight I want to speak on this thought, the benefit for caring, or the benefits of caring for widows. I want to speak on that tonight, the benefits of caring for widows. Let's pray. Father, bless now this evening. Pray, Lord, that you'd help to get across what you've given me and what's been on my heart, Lord, that I might be able to make it clear and get it across to the folks here at Liberty Baptist Church. Many, Lord, are already being a blessing in this area. Many are missing out on a blessing in this area because they don't realize, they didn't ever realize how big a blessing it can be. to care and to love and to spend time with widows. And I pray, Lord, you'd help us tonight to realize the importance of it tonight. Speak through me, use me, and you might get the glory from it. In Jesus' name, amen. Now, I brought this tonight. I'll speak about it in a moment in my message, but some of you wonder, one of the kids asked, why did I bring a shotgun? This reminded me, years ago I saw this. Can anyone tell me where I saw it at? Henry. Mrs. Holland's house, one of my yard customers that we mowed her yard for years. We mowed her yard for 20, 25 years, my kids and I. And my kids, when my daughter first, when we first started working for her, my daughter was probably, I don't know, six or seven years old. I don't even want to ask her how old she is today because it just makes me feel old. But they were really young. Mrs. Holland always favored Rachel. The boys would be out mowing, Rachel would be out picking up trash. Next thing we know, Rachel would be gone. And I'd ask the boys, where's Rachel? And they'd say, Mrs. Holland came out and got her. I'd go knock on the door and I'd say, is Rachel in there? And she'd say, yes. I mean, she looked like she was a little hot, so I had her come in to get a drink or give her some ice cream. And Rachel's inside while we're all out working. She's inside having ice cream and sitting talking with Mrs. Holland. But Mrs. Holland had this shotgun up on the wall. And it reminded me of my grandpa, because my grandpa had one of these years and years ago, a lot more rusty than this one, but hanging up above the mat right above his door when he walked in his back door. He had a double, this is what they call a double barrel shotgun. It's an old 12-gauge shotgun. I said, Brother Block, have you ever shot it? No, I'm kind of scared to shoot it. I'm scared it might blow up in my face. But I didn't like it because of that. I liked it because it reminded me of my grandpa. And it's an old weapon. Again, it has one of those things that this is how you cock it. It has two triggers here, if some of you of seeing the triggers, you'd understand. It has two different triggers, and it's very, very heavy. It also has no cushion here. If you shot this, if you've ever seen the TV shows where someone shoots a shotgun and you see them fly down the hill, that's probably because they shot something like this. Especially if you pull both triggers at the same time, the old 12-gauge, you pull both triggers at the same time, it is going to kick you like a mule, and you will know you shot the shotgun. The noise, they'll know you shot the shotgun, and you'll know because it will probably tear your shoulder half off. But she had this for years hanging on the mantel, and long before we really knew her very well, I just told her, I said, man, that's really neat. It reminds me of my grandpa, and I told her the story, and I said, one of these days, if you ever want to get rid of that, I'll be glad to buy it from you. So a year or two before she died, one day, I was mowing the yard and seeing her, And she said, you still want that shotgun? I said, you do, I want that shotgun. She said, take it home with you when you leave today. So I got that double-barreled shotgun from Mrs. Holland. And again, it was such a big blessing. But I'll talk about her again in a moment. But that's why I have that, because that's something I received from a widow for, again, just the fact that we befriended her and did stuff for her. Benefits of caring for the widows now first you notice in your verse there that it mentioned to visit the fatherless That's one of the reasons I love the bus route Because we have we pick up a lot of kids that don't have a dad at home They don't have and some of them don't have they're not even being raised by their parents at all They're being raised by grandma or an aunt or an uncle But again, that's one of the reasons I think God blesses Liberty Baptist Church is because of our care for the kids that we pick up in our community and bring. And again, I don't even know how many thousands we've had saved. Many times we'll have someone that will tell us, I rode your bus when I was a kid, and we're talking about a 30 or 40 year old kid, 30 or 40 year old adult, and they rode the bus when they were a child, and they're sending their kids. And sometimes we have someone that I mean, it's a grandparent sending their grandchild to church, and they used to come to church on the bus, because we have adults that ride the bus as well. But when you think of the widow care, the benefits of caring for the widows, the very first thing I want to get across to you is this. Widow care is very important to God and the church. Now, in your Bibles, go to Acts chapter 6. If you know the offices in the church, there's pastor and there's another guy or another group of fellows. What are they called? And the reason deacons were even made in the first place, the reason deacons were chosen in the first place, is talked about in Acts chapter 6, notice verse 1. In those days when the number of the disciples were multiplied, there arose a murmuring of the Grecians against the Hebrews, notice the next phrase, because their widows were neglected in the daily ministrations. Now the church was so busy, they had so much to do, that the elderly were not being taken care of. And so they pitched a fit about that, and in verse 3 notice what happens. The Bible says in verse 3, So the church actually, God cared enough about the widows, and the church cared enough about widows that the other office besides pastor, was made to mainly to take, I mean, to help take care of the widows in the church, the elderly men and women in the church that could not take care of themselves. And so, again, it's a very important, it has a great importance to God and the church. When you read James chapter 1, it tells us that God, again, He says, if you want real religion, you want the, you want, you want real religion, you want to be the right kind of person, because He called it pure religion and undefiled before God. He said, you want, you want that pure religion, you want, you want the good stuff, That comes from caring for the widows and the fatherless. So again, it holds a great importance to God and the church. The second thing I want to see, and I'm speaking quickly because I have a lot of territory to cover, and so I need you to listen quickly. The second thing I want to get across tonight is this truth. Widows got a lot of attention in the Bible. Now, if you look up widows, if you look up your Songs of Exhaustive Concordance, you look up widow or widows, and you'll see that widows got quite a bit of attention in the Bible. First off, In Deuteronomy, flip over to Deuteronomy chapter 24, we're going to read several verses in Deuteronomy chapter 24, then we'll read a couple in Deuteronomy chapter 26. I could have chose several texts. There's lots of texts that talks about widows, but this one covers enough that you can see where I'm going. Now again, back in that time, there was times that food was left behind just for them. It was left for the widows, and it tells us that in Deuteronomy chapter 24, verse 19. "...when thou cuttest down thine harvest in thy field, and hast forgot a sheath in the field." You look back over there, and you missed a stalk. He said, "...thou shalt not go again to fetch it. It shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, and for the widow, that the Lord thy God may bless thee in all the work of thine hands." So he said, you know what? You leave that. Now, I understand if he went back and got that, he'd have made some money, but he said, you leave that. I'll take care of the money you're missing. You leave that for the stranger, you leave that for the fatherless, you leave that for the widow. Notice verse 20. When thou beatest thine olive tree, thou shalt not go over the boughs again, it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, for the widows. He said when you picked over the fruit and you look back and there's some you missed, you step back, he said don't go back and pick those. Leave those for the stranger, for the fatherless, for the widow." Notice verse 21, "...when thou gatherest the grapes of thy vineyard, thou shalt not glean it afterward. It shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, for the widow." Now, if you know anything about farming or fruit, you pick stuff, there's a time that most of it's ready, and then a few days later or a week or so later, some more will come on. And what he says is, don't go back through those fields. I know you harvested it. You got most of it. You got the bulk of it. Leave the rest of it. Now again, normally you'd think to be a good steward, you'd go back and clean your field. You don't want to let that go to waste, but back then it didn't go to waste because the stranger, the fatherless, and the widows, that's how they survived. That's how they, again, we didn't have Social Security, didn't have the system that we have set up in America, and America is a very, again, The elderly here may not have all the benefits that they like, but trust me, compared to other countries, folks here, even the poorest people in America are well taken care of. But he said, leave that for the stranger, leave that for the fatherless, leave that for the widow. Notice Deuteronomy chapter 26. We'll read verse 12 and 13, Deuteronomy 26, verse 12. Notice verse 13. According to all thy commandment, which thou hast commanded me, I have not transgressed." He said, I didn't break your commandments, neither have I forgotten them. So again, he was even talking about the tithe that went to the Levites. It also went to take care of and to supply the needs of the fatherless and the widows, which is what he told us gives us pure religion in chapter 1 of James. Also notice in your Bible, 1 Kings chapter 17. Now I said widows got a lot of attention in the Bible. There it mentions them quite a lot, and I could have read several verses. Elijah was cared for. by a widow. Notice in 1 Kings chapter 17 verse 9 and verse 10. 1 Kings chapter 17 verse 9 says, Now understand, she probably was just able to care for herself. But God had intention of not only taking care of Elijah, but also because she took care of Elijah, God would then take care of her. So the truth is, this is one of those symbiotic relationships in the case that both benefited. Elijah benefited from this widow lady that was able to take care of him, had a place for him to stay. Again, her family was grown, her husband was gone, so she had room. And then she took care of him, which in turn, because he... She took care of him, God took care of her. Notice verse 10. So he arose and went to Zarephath, and when he had come to the gate of the city, behold, a widow woman was there gathering of sticks, and he called to her and said, Fetch me, I pray thee, a little water and a vessel that I may drink. We don't know, again, how old Elijah was. You typically think it's not very nice for a guy to ask a lady to do something. But understand, many times God checks folks out, puts them to a test. In this case, she had the right heart. She did what the man of God asked her. By the way, then she got blessed because of the fact that she took care of the man of God. So again, I said food was left behind for them in the harvest. Elijah was cared for by the widow. One of the greatest examples of giving in the Bible. Guess who gave us that example? The widow lady. Notice in Mark chapter 12. Mark chapter 12 in your Bible. In Mark chapter 12, one of my favorite Bible stories. When I act out Bible stories in children's church, this is one I like acting out. Because this little widow lady. Now, Jesus was standing over next to the treasury watching people bring money. Some put in a lot. Some put in... I mean, the Bible says... He mentioned they gave out of their abundance. But notice what he says about her in Mark chapter 12, verse 42. And there came a certain poor widow. She threw in two mites, which makes a farthing. And he called unto him his disciples, and Seth unto them. So he pulled them over. He said, Come here, guys. I want to show you something. I want to tell you something. Verily I say unto you, that this poor widow hath cast more in than all they have cast into the treasury. Now, unlike, I mean, the disciples were just like Jesus, they saw her cast her stuff in. And their mind is like, wow, why did she even, I mean, that's not worth much. That was their thought, but that wasn't Jesus' thought. By the way, they also seen the guys put in 10, and 100, and maybe $500. They seen people put in a lot of money. And in their mind, it was like, whoa, boy, those guys gave a bunch. But Jesus, I mean, he contradicted that. He said, no, you know what? You know who gave the most? She did. And the reason she gave the most, the Bible teaches, she gave all that she had. Which, by the way, is one of the principles God expects of us. He expects us to give Him everything we've got. By the way, God's not selfish. He will give back to us. We give to Him, He gives back. We give to Him, He gives back. And that's how we're blessed, by obeying the Word of God. But one of the greatest examples of giving was from a widow lady. By the way, one of the greatest examples of prayer. ...was from a widow lady. Notice in your Bible, Luke chapter 18. Luke chapter 18, we'll read verse 3 and verse 5. Again, one of the greatest examples of giving was from a widow. One of the greatest examples of prayer was from the widow. Notice Luke chapter 18. Now she came to the wicked judge. Notice verse 5, "...yet because this widow troubles me, I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming she weary me." Now, and then he told us, I want you to pray like that lady prayed. I want you to act like that. You just keep coming, and you just keep coming, and you just keep coming. Now listen to me, God's not like the unjust judge. The truth is, the unjust judge says, you know what? I don't care about her. I don't care about God. I don't care about her. She's wearing me out. I'm getting tired of this. So he said, what do you want? And she told him, and he took care of it. And it teaches us, Jesus used that as an example about prayer and told us how we ought to keep coming to God and coming to God and coming to God. So again, I said widows get a lot of attention in the Bible. The third thing I want you to see tonight is widow care has many benefits. Many benefits. Widow care has many benefits. I did something a while ago. It's always important to pay attention to what you're writing. I put the benefits of caring for a widow on one of my pages, and then on the next page, because I wasn't thinking, I put how to care for widows, and it's not quite the same thing. Widows and widows are not quite the same thing, so I had to blot that out and change that to widows. Only one extra letter, but it changed things quite a bit. Otherwise, we'd be talking about taking care of widows tonight when we want to talk about widows. So, widow care has many benefits. Notice in your Bible in 1 Timothy chapter 5, 1 Timothy. chapter 5 in your Bible, 1 Timothy, chapter 5. The Bible tells us there, honor widows, chapter 5, verse 3, I'm sorry. 1 Timothy 5, 3 says, honor widows that are widows indeed. So he said, I want you to hold them in high esteem. I want you to, just as a child is supposed to honor his parents, and just as you and I are supposed to honor God, he said, you know what? I want you to honor widows. So, the benefits of widow care. First off, and I want you to understand this is very important, it makes us obedient to God. Makes us obedient to God. So if you did it for no other reason, if I did it for no other reason, I ought to do it because God told me to. Now there are a lot more benefits, a lot more reasons to do it besides that, but that's one of the most important ones, just to do what God tells you to do. Because when we obey God, if we get blessings from nowhere else, we get blessings from God, because God blesses obedience. Now, he appreciates sacrifice, but if you know your Old Testament very well, you know that he appreciates obedience more than he appreciates sacrifice. Saul found that out when Saul thought he'd bring back a big sacrifice, and God said, you know what? I don't need all that stuff. What I wanted for you to do what I told you to do. So again, if we honor the widows, the benefit of honoring the widows is it makes us obedient to God. The second thing it does for us is it teaches kids important lessons. Now, I'm very privileged, and one of the reasons I'm speaking on this night was I had a father who was not a pastor, at that time was not even deacon, but my dad taught us by his example to care for elderly. My dad was a carpenter, my dad was a farmer, and we had many, many folks that we took care of, and a lot of them were older men or women that could not take care of themselves. My dad would do stuff for them. I mean, whether it was cleaning out their gutter, or chopping down a tree, or fixing their toilet, and many times he didn't get paid for it. Many times it was just a thank you. But again, he taught us something. He taught us children something. My dad had a nursing home ministry. Wasn't a pastor, wasn't a deacon at the time, but we had a nursing home ministry. We'd go every week to the nursing home, and we'd go up and down the halls and visit people. Then he would teach a lesson to them. Mom would make cookies or something, and again, taught me to care for old folks. I love old folks. That's good because I'm becoming an old folk, and again, but the truth is my dad taught me that lesson. I try to pass that lesson on to my children as well, but it teaches kids important lessons. We used to go Christmas caroling, and we still do many times. We go to the older folks at the church because, again, they enjoy the visit. They enjoy the singing. Years ago when we had the yard service of my children, we had several elder people that we mowed for. One of them, I mowed her yard for $12. Now, you say, why'd you mow her yard for $12? Because I asked her what she could afford, and that's what she told me. And for the next, I don't remember, 7 to 10 years, we mowed her yard for $12. I probably paid to mow her yard. I mean, that probably cost me more than $12 to mow her yard. But the fact is, my dad had taught me from little bitty on up, you take care of the widows, you be a blessing to them, and God will be a blessing to you. And though I charged her less, I had other customers, and they'd say, how much do you want? And I'd tell them 25 bucks, and they'd pay me 30 or 40. And again, I really believe the reason they overpaid me and they paid me more, not only because it was worth it, because my kids were, I mean, we were, we did, we do, and again, they knew how to mow yards and did a good job. But not only that, but I believe it was God blessing us back for taking care of that little widow. We had many of our customers, many of our customers, we mowed their yards till they died. Many of them, I never, they never attended Liberty Baptist Church, but I preached several of their funerals because I was one of the only preachers they knew. But again, my dad taught me, and it's something I try to pass on to my children. An important lesson to kids is to care for the elderly. Again, something else in widow care, the benefit, is you receive their wisdom. When you spend time with the elderly, you get to know them. I don't mean you just go by and say hi, but I'm talking about you spend some time with them. You get to know them. You will receive their wisdom. One of the reasons now, I learned a lot from my dad, but the truth is when I was a kid at home, I did stuff with my dad and handed him stuff, but I wasn't paying much attention because at that time I was a kid and all I was, I mean, I always had someplace else I'd rather be. But I learned a lot from Brother Elliot. How many of you remember Brother Elliot? I learned a lot from Brother Elliot. I followed Brother Elliot around again, but that time I was an adult, young adult, but I was a, I mean, I followed Brother Elliot around. He showed me how to change the ballast in the lights. He showed me how to change stuff in the toilets. Because Brother Elliot used to do a lot of repair work around Liberty Baptist Church. Now, I would, or Brother Perry, or Brother Moss, or some of the rest of you do it. But that time, Brother Elliot did, he did the bulk of the work at Liberty Baptist Church. He was retired, and he was a carpenter. And again, you can always tell a good carpenter, because he's missing at least one finger, sometimes one on both hands. Brother Elliot was like that. I remember Brother Elliot, he had, I don't remember, one finger or two fingers. He was missing at least one. Had the nub, and he used to take that. It was really fun. He would do the little jokes, you know, but he didn't really have a finger there. And he'd do that, yeah, whatever thing that is, but he thought that was hilarious as well. But I learned a lot from Brother Elliot. I mean, I learned stuff that saved me hundreds of dollars. And in turn, then, saved Liberty Baptist Church hundreds of dollars because I learned it from Brother Elliot, spending some time with the elderly. You get their wisdom, their practical wisdom. You get their financial wisdom. Now listen to me. Some of them worked in a day where they was getting 50 cents an hour or a dollar an hour. I remember one time Brother Perry, I remember he was one of our older folks in the church, one time Brother Perry did some work for him. And again, understand, he had not... He had not had a job in years, he was retired, and he had not paid anyone for years. So when Brother Perry had to do, I think it was, a roof leak, I mean, a bullet had went up, someone had shot a bullet up during January 1st or December 31st, or what it was, and it came down, it came down through his shingles, down through his sheetrock, and landed on his kitchen table. Of course, Brother Perry sent his roofer to fix the roof, and then his other guy to patch the plastic, the stuff on the ceiling, and to paint it. And when he gave this man the bill, this man said, did you see this? See this? This is highway robbery. That's what he said. This is highway robbery. He might as well just stick a gun in my back and rob me. And I said, you haven't been out much lately, have you? And then he would tell me one of his jokes. the day when I used to work for, and by the way he worked for 25 cents an hour, 50 cents an hour, so to get a bill for 50, 100 dollars, that's a lot of money. But I understand, and I told him, I said, brother, I said, you just, I mean, you haven't kept up with the times. I said, I mean, kids nowadays make, I mean, make as much in a week as you made in a month, maybe even as much as you make in a year. I said, times have changed quite a bit. But understand, they were thrifty. Brother Nicholas used to say his mom could, I mean, she could get, she squeezed a penny so hard, I mean, whichever president's on it would squeal. I mean, she knew how to handle her money. I remember for Christmas, every year for Christmas, I got the same thing from my grandma. It was three crisp $1 bills. She gave that to all the grandkids. Now, the other way, back then $3 is more than it is today, but back then it wasn't like we was getting rich with three bucks. Back then it was, it did buy more than $3 today would buy, but, because we're talking about 40 years ago, 45 years ago, but the truth is $3 still wasn't much to each of us, but realizing that grandma was giving this because she had nine children. And my dad had four kids, most of them had three and four, so she was giving out to 25 or 30, 35 grandkids. But she would save all year long, and then she would go to the bank and get these crisps, and it was always a big deal to me because they were completely brand new. I mean, you know, cereal, the numbers one after another, but she'd go get these brand new dollar bills, and each of us would get three $1 bills. But again, she knew how to handle her money. I mean, back in the day when they, I mean, she might have grossed $200 a month or $250 a month, and she used that and still paid all the bills. You can learn financial wisdom from them. You can learn wisdom about your kids and raising your kids. from them. You can get lessons and wisdom about life from them. When I came to Texas, I was a Missouri boy. So one winter, I was struggling, the hay prices went up, and I was struggling feeding the cows. And Brother Barnes told me one time, he said, you got prickly pear? I said, sure. He said, get a pear burner. Now, I had no idea what a pear burner was. Never had seen a pear burner. We don't have prickly pear in Missouri. I mean, well, if we do, someone might have it in their little ornamental gardens, but it's not something that's out in your fields. And when he said, do you have prickly pear? So I went and priced a prickly pear burner, and my brother Craig had bought it, and I would go around with a propane tank and burn prickly pear as soon as I turned that thing on. Now, it was fun for two reasons. One, who doesn't like to play with a flamethrower, okay? So, now, you do get tired of it. I can tell you do it enough, it gets to be a job just like anything else. But for those of you who've never done it, come on out. I'll let you burn prickly pear. You can have a good time, and I'm tired of it already. But, I mean, I'd burn that stuff. The cows would hear me crank that thing up, because you can hear it. as it blows that stuff out and it burns all those spines off all the parrots. Then the cows come over and fight over eating it and they love it. And by the way, next year it grows right back and you can do it again. So it just keeps renewing itself. But I learned that from Brother Barnes, spending some time with Brother Barnes. I learned a lot of stuff from my grandma and my grandpa, from Mrs. Holland. But again, you will borrow a little wisdom. That's a benefit of widow care. Another benefit of widow care is you get a prayer warrior in your corner. Notice in your Bible in Luke chapter 2, Luke chapter 2. I like what Luke chapter 2 says, and it's very, very true. Notice what it says in Luke chapter 2. Luke chapter 2, verse 37. She was a widow of about four score and four years. That's 84 years old. Which departed not from the temple. She stayed in church all the time. What was she doing? But served God with fasting and prayers night and day. You know what she was doing? She couldn't do much else. But she spent a lot of time on her knees. And I've often said this, and I've been privileged again because I love old folks and I care for old folks. I've got a lot of old folks praying. They'll tell me, Brother Block, I've been praying for you this week. I need that. It's nice to know you have someone in your corner. And by the way, someone who is in your corner that God listens to. I mentioned this lady. She didn't even hardly leave the temple. She just spent, I mean, day and night. I'm talking about, I mean, again, think about day and night. That's tough. But day and night, she spent time praying. Notice in your Bibles, in Luke chapter 18, verse 5. Yet because this widow troubled me, I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming she weary me. Again, this lady would be someone I'd want praying for me. Because she got the ear of this mean judge, she also guaranteed to have the ear of God. So it's nice. One of the benefits of caring for widows is you'll have a prayer where you're praying for you. Now, because you know what? During the day, they're not much interested in TV. Although some old people amaze me. Some old people are stuck on those soap operas. I mean, as the shadow turns, or as the belly turns, or the days of our lives, or all those, I mean, I've been to visit. And Grandma Nichols used to love WWF wrestling. You'd go to her house. She was in there. She loved that wrestling. And she'd be, oh, oh, ah! I mean, she was, I mean, you know. So, I mean, she'd be sitting there acting out the wrestling stuff. But, so sometimes they do watch a little TV. But most of the time, they're not interested in TV. They don't eat much. They don't require much sleep. You know what they do? They do a lot of thinking. And it's nice when they're thinking about you and I and thinking about you and I to God on our behalf. Again, it is great to have a prayer warrior in your corner. Another benefit you receive from caring for the widows and the elderly, you receive their love and their gratitude. And Mrs. Holland spoiled my kids. Mr. Largent, one of my yard customers, spoiled my kids. I have several that, when they graduate from high school, I know one, they sent out stuff to the church folks and got money back, but most of you have families. But Mr. Largent gave one, one of my kids got 50 bucks, one time they graduated, one got 100 bucks, they got married. I mean, so it was always nice to have those yard customers, because those yard customers treated my kids like they were their kids, like they were their grandkids, and they spoiled them. Again, you received their love and their gratitude. If Rachel Block was here tonight, Jacob's Rachel, not my Rachel here, but Jacob's Rachel, years ago he got ready to get married. And at that time I was doing the storage unit stuff, buying some storage units and reselling stuff. That was one of my side jobs. And it's a lot of fun. It's a lot of work, but it's a lot of fun. And so I had got some gold from some of them. So Jacob said something like, he said, Dad, you know you got some of that gold? He had made up this design of the ring he wanted. How many of you have seen Rachel Block's ring? I don't know what it looks like either, but I remember at the time. But, I mean, he had this great, big, beautiful design for the engagement ring and the wedding ring, and he was going to have this guy make it. But if he supplied the gold, it was much, much cheaper, because then this guy would just melt the stuff and make the ring. So I had some gold, but when I gave Jacob the gold that I had from the storage units that I'd saved, he took it to the guy, and the guy said, that will save you this much money, but we're still short. Now, I knew Mrs. Holland had some, because there's been times she'd show me. She had old rings and coins, and I mean, and I'm a coin guy, and the gold, I mean, it was something that was interesting to you. So, she had showed me that stuff. So, I went to her one day, and I said, I know you have some broken stuff and some gold in your thing. I said, would you sell it to me for melt value? And she said, why do you need it? And I said, because Jacob's getting married, and he wants to be able to make up his ring. And she said, Jacob needs it, just take it. So she opened up her safe and pulled out some gold, gave it to us, we took it over there, the guy melted it down, and Jacob got this beautiful ring that would have cost thousands of dollars and got it for much, much less than that because we supplied all the gold. But Mrs. Holland, when I told her that Jacob needed it, and again, she loved Jacob because we'd been mowing her yard for years, and so he got a benefit. I mean, he got a beautiful ring. that was made for his wife that didn't cost him near as much as it would have cost him. He would never have been able to afford that probably on his own, but because of the fact that we had some, and because Mrs. Holland had some, he received that as a benefit. And that was because she loved him, and he got some of her love and gratitude. Understand... When you care for the widows and the elderly, you'll get their love and their gratitude. Another blessing, another benefit of caring for the widows is it's doing something that's dear to the heart of God. I didn't write them all down because there's dozens, but if you read in the Old Testament, there's dozens of verses that talk about the widows. And again, it's dear to the heart of God, just as it was in the verses that I already showed you. There's many more besides that. Another benefit of caring for the elderly is your kids will grasp love, care, and ultimately even death, because you know what widows do? They're old. One of these days they're going to die. And by the way, that's a lesson that kids learn, and it's a lesson that, I mean, again, and it's not, you say, well, they love them, and it's gonna hurt them some. Yes, it will. And by the way, that's, but that's part of life. That's, I mean, we're all gonna face that. Most of us in this room have faced, we've faced love, and we've faced life, and we've faced death. But again, it was something that my, one of the benefits in dealing with the elderly. Another benefit is sometimes God blesses you for it, sometimes they bless you for it. Now, there's some of the widows that we took care of that had nothing. There's others that actually had, I mean, because they spent very little on anything else, because they don't have very many cares and very many things they want, very many habits. I mean, they, many times, I mean, they would do stuff for us. I got that shock from Mrs. Holland. After we cared for Brother Barnes for years, and then he passed away, his daughter came to me afterwards, and she said, Brother Block, she said, I want to do something for you. And she had heard me, I mean, during the time that, the last few days of his life, There was a time she asked me to do something and I said I can't because, I mean, I don't know if it was our dryer that broke or our washer that broke, but one of them had broke. And I said, I got to try to get that thing fixed because with four kids, I mean, every day you're washing clothes, several loads of clothes. And so I said, I've got to figure out, I've got to find some time to get over and look for a washer or dryer. And he died. I did the funeral and she came to me and she said, She said, what are you doing? I think it was like Monday. What are you doing Monday? And I said, what do you need? And she said, I need you to go with me. I want to do something for you. And I said, you don't have to do anything for us. I said, Brother Barnes was a big blessing to us. You don't owe us anything. She said, no, no, no. You need a washer. I don't know which one it was. I think it was a dryer. You need a dryer, so you need to go with us. I mean, my husband, I want to get you a dryer. So I go over, and I have to do what I always do when someone wants to buy something for me. I went in, she took me to, I don't know, one of those places, Costco, or I don't know, one of those up that way. And we walked in there, and there's all these washers and dryers, and I mean, the nice ones and the cheap ones, which is what I would have bought for myself, one of the cheap ones, because that's all I could afford. So I go over and start looking over here. I'm over here, she's over there. And I'm over here looking at these, and seeing what the prices were, and they were like $240, $250 for a dryer, and $199 for the, you know, for the cheap one. And she says, what are you doing over there, Chris? And I said, I'm looking at dryers. She said, get over here. So I go over there, and she said, why are you looking at those? You've got a big family. You need one of these big ones. And I didn't even know they made big ones. And by the way, I can tell you, even the big ones, you can overload them. I know from experience, you can still put too much in the big washers and dryers. But they do hold a lot more. So I go over here, and I said, no, no, no. And she's looking at a pair, and I said, I said, we can get this one. And she said, no, we're going to get you two. She said, I'm not going to get that because it's not going to match the one at the house. And I said, we don't have a matching set now, so what is it? She said, wives like have matching set. And I already knew that because my wife had already made a comment about how it'd be nice to have a matching set, but I didn't want to say anything to her. And again, I only needed a driver, so that's all my wife was going to get. But she said, need you pick these out. And the other way, then she bought the extended warranty, and then she had it delivered, and they came out and hooked them all up. And now, I didn't do it for a washer and dryer, but taking care of Brother Barnes and all the things I learned from him, after that, we got it. And by the way, washers and dryers, if you know anything about them, they last a long time. You come to my house today, you know what's back in the back? Washer and dryer that I got from Brother Barnes has been dead for, I don't know, a long time, years. But they last a long time. Again, benefits of caring for the elderly. Number four, where to adopt or where to find your widow. Again, everyone ought to have one. If you don't have one, you ought to get one. Here's where you find them. Could be your own parents or your grandparents. You know, there are a lot of folks that don't even take advantage of their own moms and dads or their grandparents. By the way, shame on you if you're not, but you ought to care for your parents and your grandparents. Number two, another place to find an elderly that you can fall in love with and spend some time with would be at Liberty Baptist Church. Now, we still have a lot of young people at our church, but we have some old folks, too. I mean, when the guys in their prime are 55 years old, I'm not even going to ask you how old some of these other people are that are a little past me, but I mean, when I got here 30 years ago, some of them were already old, so you can add 30 years to that, and you realize they're much older now. They're four score and a few years old, or maybe not quite that, but there are some folks here at Liberty Baptist Church. You'd be a blessing to them. And by the way, I guarantee you, they'd be a blessing to you, but you'd be a blessing to them to get to know them, to spend some time with the elderly here at Liberty. By the way, another place you can find someone like this would be your local nursing home. You know, there are hundreds of people in nursing homes. Most of them get this many visits per year. That's how many visits they get per year. I'm not talking about per week. I'm not talking about per month. I'm talking about per year. Many of them have been put in there and never had a visit by anybody. But again, you can find it. You say, well, I'm not a pastor. You don't have to be a pastor. I mean, you don't have to. By the way, you don't even have to have a service at the nursing home. You can just make up a batch of cookies and go over to the nursing home. Now you have to be careful. You might want to find out ahead of time who needs the sugarless ones and so on and so forth. Now they worry about that a lot. Years ago, none of us worried about any of that. But now you have to be careful about the salt and the sugar. But the truth is, you can make sugarless cookies. And homemade cookies are good. I don't care whether they're sugarless or not. But you can make some cookies and take them over there. Oh, by the way, you can go over there at Christmas time and do some Christmas caroling. Or you can just go over there, you can, I mean, you can, I mean, you don't have to take them nothing, you just show up. You just go out and you just go sit next to somebody. I mean, a total stranger, and visit with them for a little bit. Maybe feed them, help them eat. Or maybe put the blanket back over their legs and push them down the hallway. Have a race or two with some of them, and you'll find some of them are pretty fast in them wheelchairs. I know, because I've raced some before. Now, I can tell you, some of them cheat. So I mean, you have to be very careful, because some of them are cheaters when they go racing in their wheelchairs. And I mean, they're like those race car drivers. They try to cut you off. So I mean, you can't get by them. But the truth is, you can find one at the local nursing home. Might be an elderly neighbor. You might have a neighbor, a house or two down, that's old and can't do stuff. Brother Terry Angel, our kids know him from youth conference, and some of you have heard his name before, but Terry Angel and his kids had witnessed to the neighbor many, many times, dozens of times, he said, through the years. And then this older man got, he got hurt, I don't know if he broke a leg, he got hurt, but he was down and he was in bed. And the angel kids just went over, and again, they weren't getting paid for it, it snowed there, so they had a bunch of snow on the driveway and the sidewalk, and his boys went over there and cleaned the sidewalk and cleaned the driveway, and he came to the door and he motioned them inside. And that day, he got saved. And here's the reason he said he got saved. You priest at me a lot, but you know, Christians do that all the time. They're good at shoving their religion down your throat. But you guys, I mean, you're different. You actually, you live it. That's what he told them. So because of the fact that they got the snow off his driveway and the snow off his sidewalk, he got saved. That's what helped lead a guy to the Lord. But again, because he realized they had the real thing. They had that pure religion. The fifth thing, and I'll be done. Things that you can do for them. Notice in your Bible in James chapter 2. James was big on works. Here's what he said in James chapter 2 verse 17. So again, don't just talk about it, but these are some things you can do for the elderly. And by the way, you can give them rides. You can do that. That is a benefit to you and to them. Now, here's what I mean by to you. When you drive for them, they are no longer driving themselves. And thank God, that would be a blessing to some of us if some of the elderly folks would stop driving, okay? Because they really shouldn't be driving. I mean, some of you have seen them. I mean, and I'm back to that point today. You know, they're sitting there and they're staring. I mean, they can't see like three feet in front of themselves, and they're driving. And they don't get in accidents themselves, but everyone, I mean, there's wrecks. I mean, there's 20 wrecks behind them. I mean, of all the folks who got accidents because of them. So you can be a benefit to them and to you by driving them. Take him to the doctor. I don't know how many times I took Brother Barnes and Mrs. Holland to the doctor and some of the others as well. Take him to the store. Now you have to be patient. I'm not a shopper. I'm one of those guys that goes and gets my stuff and I'm ready to go. So I just carry a book because I like to read. So I'd take them to the store and I would sit and read while they shop. So that way I don't get impatient with them because otherwise it'd be like, are you about done? And I had to learn that's a bad thing to do, especially when you take your wife shopping. If she finally got you to take her shopping, the last thing she wants to hear is, hurry up. So I had to learn to read a book or go crazy. But the fact is, you can take him to the doctor, you can take him to the store. By the way, you can take him for a joyride. Now what I mean by that is this. Brother Barnes used to love, because he loved the country, Lots of times on a Sunday afternoon, he'd say, what are you doing? And he'd set it up ahead of time. Now, he wouldn't let me take him unless he paid me. So the fact is, he would say, come, I need you to drive me. And he said, my car needs to get out, because he always thought it ought to be started every few weeks, and that's a good thing to do with an old car. But he had one of those cars that was like 10 years old and had like 5,000 miles on it, because he hadn't driven it except when I took him to the doctor. But he loved to go out in the country. And as we'd drive out in the country, he knew every wildflower. I've learned a lot of wildflowers from him, because he would say, he would name the wildflowers. We'd go out and he'd say, I saw that guy ten heifers one time. And he said, they had no more got out of my trailer than the neighbor's dog. I mean, the dog came out and chased them, and he said, they may still be running yet. I mean, but we'd be driving around, and he'd be showing all the different places. But he loved to go out for a ride. He loved to especially go out toward the lake. He loved to go out to the lake, because he used to drive out that way. So take him for a joy ride. By the way, they'll enjoy it, and you will, too. So you can take them to the doctor, you can take them to the store, you can take them for a joyride. The second thing you can do as far as things you can do for them besides rides, you can invite them to your house or you can go to theirs for the holiday. We've taken birthday cakes to their house. Now, many times, they won't want to get out, because when they get stuck at the house, a lot of times, like with Brother Barnes, his legs would get so swollen up, he couldn't. I mean, he slept in that chair. He made it basically from the chair to the bathroom and back to his chair. He lived in that chair. He slept in that chair 24 hours a day. It was one of those things. At first, it was just an old chair, and then you got one of those that raised him up and all that stuff. But his legs would get about that big, and his feet would crack. And so he hardly ever got around. So if we wanted to do something with him, we had to go to his house. But there's times we've had folks come with us, and again, it is great to see them smile and laughing, and then they tell stories, and you can learn a lot. But it's a blessing to them and a blessing to you. Invite them to your house for holidays, for birthdays, etc. By the way, you can do yard care or housework for them. My relatives... My nephews and nieces are still benefiting from the people that my dad took care of. It was just a few years ago the last one died, but my nephew would go deer hunting on their property. They let no one else deer hunt, but they let my brothers and they let my brother's kids hunt on the place because dad took care of her for years. Used to clean her gutters and repair stuff at her house. So Mrs. Moraine had about 20 acres that was in prime deer hunting territory. If you know anything about Missouri deer, they're not like Texas deer. They actually are big. They weigh a couple hundred pounds and they got a big old rack on them. And so my nephew, and some of my cousins and my brothers got to hunt on her property, simply because she loved my dad, because my dad did stuff for her for years. Again, benefits, yard care, house care, carpentry. Another thing you can do with them is just spend some chat time, just some time. They get very, very lonely. Now, some of you are not people persons, so some of you don't mind being lonely. Now, when I say that, I don't mean that to be mean. My wife's not. I'm an outgoing person, so I like people. If you find a crowd, I'm usually probably in the middle of it. If there's any trouble, I probably started it. I mean, that's where I'm at. But my wife's not like that. My wife is just completely happy. I mean, if no one ever came to my house besides the kids and the grandkids, she'd be tickled pink. So if you're ever waiting for an invite from Mrs. Block to come, and by the way, if you ever got one, you better mark it on your calendar, because my wife's just not a people person. She's just, I mean, now, some of you are such a blessing to her, because some of you are really good friends to her, and she appreciates that, but the fact is, she's just not a people person. I am. But you know what? There's all these people that, I mean, years ago were out, they did all kinds of stuff. I mean, you listen to some of them, and they were out and about. Now they're stuck in a chair, or stuck in their house, and they can't get out. They get lonely. And it's nice to have someone just to come and visit. Sometimes, by the way, not to even say much, just go and sit with them. Brother Barnes, we used to go visit him almost every Thursday night. You know what he always did for the teenagers? It'd be K his age, what did he used to do for us? buy his doughnuts. At the end, he'd say, now he always passed around, he always had a candy jar, and he'd pass that candy jar around. That was those stupid peppermint mints, I mean, which I don't like anyway, but he had those mints. Some of you know I'm talking about those little red and white striped ones that I don't like, but he'd say, pass them around, everybody get a piece of candy. So we'd pass around, one or two kids like them, they'd take them, the rest of us, you know, just say thank you and pass it on. Should have got some good candy, then we'd have ate it, but he had those peppermints. And, but almost always at the end he'd say, he'd pull out five bucks or ten bucks and he'd say, take the kids by and get some donuts. So we'd go by Dunkin' Donuts and get a dozen donuts. Now those we liked, because we'd stand in and all of us would get to pick out whatever flavor we wanted. So I'd get Boston Cream Filled or I'd get the caramel one, the one with caramel on top. But, I mean, they'd all get to pick out whatever flavor they wanted, and we'd all get a donut. Brother Barnes would do that for us because he appreciated us coming by and visiting, and singing, and spending some time with him. So again, I said, spend some chat time. They get very lonely. By the way, the very last thing, and I'll be done. Be there at the end for them. One of the, I guess you could say, one of the saddest things is for someone to die alone. To die with no one around them. No one cares. Now listen to me, it's nice when you go to know that there's someone in the room that cares about you and that loves you, that's gonna miss you. I remember Mrs. Holland, her last request of my wife and I, and some of the ladies got to care for her as well, because toward the end when she couldn't get up and do anything, she asked us to have the ladies, so during the day some of our ladies would take shifts, and she wouldn't do it, she wouldn't let it happen for free. She had money in the bank, so she paid all of our ladies $10 an hour to come and sit. So they'd take four hour shifts, I'd lay out a schedule and they'd take four hour shifts. And they'd go and sit in her house. Most times she didn't want them to clean or do anything. The house was fine. I mean, again, she wasn't going to get around. She just wanted to sit there and just be with her, be there with her, because she didn't want to be alone. So she paid folks. And then it got where my wife would, she would, my wife would take the shift from about 8 o'clock at night when the last lady checked out till 8 o'clock the next morning when the next one started. So my wife would sit there for 12 hours. It got where I wasn't seeing her because she was at Mrs. Holland's, because this went on for days and then turned into weeks. So finally it got now, finally I thought, I'm going to see my wife." So I went and I slept either on the floor or slept on a cot there. My wife would have the couch to sleep right next to the little hospital bed. But Ms. Holland had asked us, please don't let me die alone. And she didn't. But again, We spend a month, month and a half every night at her house. Now listen to me. It is a blessing to you, and you will be a blessing to them if you care for the widows, care for the elderly, besides the fact that you will receive blessings from God for doing that as well. It has great benefits. You'll receive benefits on this earth. Then you'll receive benefits when you get to heaven. By the way, the other thing you have to be very, very sure of, one of these days, unless you die or I die, guess what we're going to do? We're going to grow old. And I can tell you this, and I've said this to people all the time. If I ever get broke down on the highway, I won't be waiting long. You know why? Because the Bible says you will reap what you sow. And there have been many times I've stopped to help people broke down the highway. So guess what? If I'm broke down the highway, what God promises me helps on the way. When I get old, I'm not going to be alone, and I won't be all by myself, and I won't be without a visit. You know why? Because I cared for the elderly. And you know what the Bible says I'm going to do? I'm going to reap what I sow. Now some of you, by the way, who don't care for folks who can't do anything for you, one of these days you may not be able to do anything for anyone else. You better hope you don't reap what you sow, because if you do, you're going to be pretty lonely, pretty miserable. Old people usually either grouchy or really sweet. The grouchy ones is usually because no one cares for them. They get sweet when someone gets into their heart, wins their heart, shows them they love them, shows them they're not there because they're trying to get something from them, but just cares about them. And by the way, you'll receive blessings on this earth, and I guarantee you'll receive blessings up in heaven. And you'll learn some lessons from them that will be a benefit and a help to you. Father, thank you for tonight. Thank you for the Word of God. Thank you, Lord, for the experiences you've allowed me to experience and the things you've helped my kids to learn from this particular area. Lord, I pray that you'd help us. Lord, in society today, people are typically always out looking for what's in it for them. Lord, we're selfish by nature, and it doesn't help if we let the flesh get the best of us.