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Would you take your Bibles, please,
and turn with me in the Word of God in the New Testament to
the Gospel according to Matthew, the 19th chapter. And we'll begin
reading with verse 27, from Matthew chapter 19 and verse 27. I want
you to imagine, if you will please, the most well-groomed, well-dressed,
articulate, well-to-do person you can imagine, very young,
but yet an adult. And when you have that type of
person fixed in your mind, I want you to see them in your mind's
eye walking up to Christ and saying to the Lord Jesus, Good
Master, what good thing must I do to have eternal life? And
the Lord Jesus replied to him, saying, There is none good but
God. Are you recognizing that I am God by calling me Good Master? If you are recognizing that I
am God, then you should be willing to do whatever God wants you
to do. The very moment any person recognizes God for who He is,
that moment we ought to be willing to say, Lord, whatever you want
in my life, it's what I want to give you. And Jesus went on
to speak to this young ruler, this rich young ruler, and told
him what he should do. But the Bible says when he heard
Christ out, when the Lord finished speaking to him, that he rejected
the Savior. And with a sad countenance, he
walked away sorrowfully. The disciples were standing near
enough to watch the whole thing take place. I'm not sure that
they could hear the conversation, but at least they knew that here
was a very wealthy young ruler who had turned away from Christ.
And as they saw him walk away, they thought within themselves,
he's keeping everything he owns. He's going back to the same house.
He's going to be wearing the same clothes. He's going to have
the same bank account. He's going to have everything,
everything that he came with, he's leaving with. And they started
thinking about themselves. And they thought of all they
had forsaken. Some, their fishing business. Others, their responsibility
as a tax collector or whatever. And they pondered and thought
of all they had given up to follow Christ. and where it was all
leading and finally they couldn't stand it any longer and one of
them had to speak and when he did this is what he said in verse
27 of Matthew chapter 19 then answered Peter and said unto
him behold we have forsaken all and followed thee what shall
we have therefore Jesus said unto them verily I say unto you
that ye which have followed me in the regeneration, when the
Son of Man shall sit in the throne of his glory, ye also shall sit
upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.
And every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters,
or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for mine
name's sake, shall receive a hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting
life." The Lord answered him, Peter said, what are we going
to get? What shall we have therefore? We've left everything, given
it all up. What shall we have therefore?
And the Lord told them what they would have in eternity and that
their return on earth would be a hundredfold. I don't know if
you have a savings account or some sort of investment account
or not. I have no idea. Some of you no doubt do. But
there's no way you're going to go to somebody and tell them
that you want to make an investment And they're going to guarantee
you that in this life you're going to get a 100% return on
it. A hundredfold. A hundred times. I'm talking about a hundred times
what you put in. Jesus said, I'm going to tell
you how it is. You men are going to sit on thrones. You men are
going to judge the twelve tribes of Israel. You men are going
to have everlasting life. I'll tell you something else
here. Everything you do for me here. I'm going to multiply a
hundredfold a hundredfold Now the Lord goes on to tell them
a story And in that story he drives a great lesson home to
their hearts and before I read the story that Christ Told them
I want to ask you this question. What do you want for your life? What do you want for your life?
I'd like to line up every person who's employed here, who's a
staff person here. As we may say, they draw a paycheck
from the Temple Baptist Church, or from Crown College, or the
Temple Baptist Academy, or they work at the camp, or they work
publishing the paper, whatever they may do. I tell them often,
we don't work for institutions, we work for individuals. All
of us, ultimately, are serving the Lord. I love the beautiful
story of how David wanted a drink of water from the well in Bethlehem
and just the mention of it caused three loyal soldiers who loved
him to break through the lines of the Philistines and to risk
their lives to get David a drink of water from the well he had
gone to often as a boy. and when they came back with
the water and handed it to David at first glance it looks like
he did a foolish thing but he took that water and he poured
it out as an offering to the Lord and in doing so was saying
to those men what you do for me and oh how deeply I appreciate
what you're doing for me but I want you to know what you're
doing for me in reality you're doing for the Lord this is for
the Lord And it would be a great day in the lives of all of those
who serve in some way in a ministry to realize what they're doing.
They're doing for the Lord. They're doing it for Christ.
Say, I want to make the man I'm working for happy. I'm glad you
do. But what you do as a Christian servant, you should be doing
for the Lord. No doubt about that. But what
is it you want for your life? If I could have dreamed the most
wonderful dream, if I some way had the capacity as a child or
as a young man just to think and dream of the most wonderful
thing I could ever imagine being able to do. I could never have
had a dream so wonderful as the reality of my life. I could never
have dreamed that God could allow me to do such a thing as He's
allowing me to do. We have a wonderful Savior. A
wonderful Savior. At some point in life, everyone
faces, maybe with greater degree some than others, but at some
point in life, everyone deals with what you exchange your life
for. If you're a housewife, thank God for you. No matter who you
are, as a lady, if you're married, your home should be your main
business. You may be forced to work. My
mother was forced to work to raise four children. I remember
my mother asking me one day, about what she should do. She
had the opportunity to work in a place that sold alcohol. And
she says, I don't want to do that and I don't think you want
me to do that. And I said to my mother, we didn't know a whole
lot, but I said to my mother, no, I don't want you working
there and I know you don't want to work there. She said, I know
I can make so much more money. It was just a restaurant that
was going to sell alcohol. But she said, I know you don't
want to be telling anyone that your mother works where they
sell alcohol. And I said, you're right, mother.
And she worked for lesser pay. But you know, God made up that
difference. And He'll do it. God's people ought to do things
that honor the Lord. And I can think of my little
mother and what she gave her life for, rearing her children. And probably somebody could have
said to her, you know, Ruby, you're too devoted to this. Without
a husband and whatever. But I think she finds great joy
today that two of her sons are preaching, and of course she
loves her daughters and her grandchildren. My wife's mother, after the death
of her husband, he was a Baptist preacher, killed in an automobile
accident when my wife was only five years of age. And she gave
her life just to raising two children. She worked, she had
to work. She worked in a school cafeteria.
I don't think her children were ever embarrassed that she worked
as a cook at a school cafeteria. I certainly wouldn't think they
would have been embarrassed about it. I thought they were very
proud to say that their mother was working as a cook at a school
cafeteria, especially when she was giving them a little extra
helping as they were coming through the line. But look what God has
done to bless her. No matter who you are, at some
point in time in life, you're going to think about what you've
given your life to, the exchange you've made of your life. It
may be when you get a little older. It may be as you stand
on the threshold of what you might call the beginning of your
earning years or whatever, and what you're going to give your
life to. But at some point in time, at some point in time,
you're going to think about What you've done with your life, what
you've exchanged for your life, because once you live it, it's
lived, it's spent. If I could say to you that your
life could be represented by this bill that I hold in my hand,
this five dollar bill I hold in my hand, and I could say to
you, that there are 50 dimes in this five dollar bill and
this is your life and you can spend each one of them and you
spend one and you think I've got 49 left and two and I've
got 48 left and I've spent 10 and I've got 40 left and I've
spent 20 and I've got 30 left and I've spent 30 and I've got
20 left when you start getting down to when you've got just
a handful of them left You're going to give some real serious
consideration to what you've done with it. What do you want
for your life? What is it you desire for your life? What is it you desire for your
life? Somebody says, I want to make a mark in this world, someway,
somehow. Let me show you something. Turn
with me, please. You want to make a mark? Turn
to what the Lord says in the book of 1 John. As God brings
this passage to my mind, in 1 John chapter 2, The Bible says, Love
not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any
man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust
of the eyes, the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is
of the world. And the world passeth away, and
the lust thereof. But he that doeth the will of
God abideth forever. Everything you do for this world
is written in sand. And the seas of time will wash
it from the shores of life. What you do for God is written
in eternal granite and will endure forever. You may be a banker
or a lawyer or a doctor, or you may be an insurance man, or you
may be involved in retail sales. Whatever you're doing, that is
not your life. That's what you do for a livelihood,
to earn money to support your family, and to support God's
work. That is not your life. If it
is your life, I feel sorry for you. If it's your life, I feel
sorry for you. Because one of these days, somebody's
going to say, thank you! Here's your watch. It's engraved
on the back that says you've given us your life. Now we've
got somebody else to sit at your desk. If that's your life, I
feel sorry for you. I really do. I feel sorry for
you. If some of you women, God forbid, I wish we'd get the word
career out of our vocabulary and replace it with the will
of God. I was talking to someone the
other day, a preacher, and the preacher was saying to me, I'm
dealing with a young person about her career, her career, her career.
If he said it once, he must have said it 20 times, her career,
her career, her career. Now, I don't think he was trying
to to do or say anything that was out of place, and it's a
commonly accepted term, but Christian people ought to be saying, what
is God's will for my life? What is God's will for my life?
If you're married to a man that's married to his job, you're married
to a man that's not going to make you much of a happy woman,
if that's his life. That's not your life. That's
where you work. I didn't ask you where do you
want to work the rest of your life and how much money you want
to make. I want to ask you what do you want for your life? For
your life. What do you want to do with your
life? Some folks have the privilege to not only be employed in what
we call full-time Christian service, but to do that as a livelihood.
And I think we ought to try to take as good of care of them
as we possibly can. And don't ever be the kind of church that
begrudges that. I think I have a look at things. Think if your
son or your daughter or your grandson or your daughter or
granddaughter had that job, how would you want them to be cared
for? Think of it that way. And you ought to love them like
that and hope that they're cared for as well as possible. But
some folks have the privilege to work in the Lord's work that
way and just to give their whole life to it. Their whole life
to it. But you know, they face a great
temptation too. They cannot equate God with the church and the buildings
and their routine. It's a little different kind
of temptation than folks who work outside of church ministry. It's
like saying, well, you know, I gotta be down there all the
time. I'm down there with God all the time. No, you're not
down there with God all the time. You're down there with the preacher, and
he's certainly not God. And you're down there with somebody who
works in the college or the academy, and that's certainly not God.
I'm saying, let us come to grips with this question, what do you
want for your life? The Bible says, man that is born
of woman is a few days and full of trouble. A few days are full
of trouble. 14th chapter of Job. The 90th
Psalm says, if, if our days exceed 3 score and 10, if by reason
of strength they be 4 score years. Now think when that was written.
Moses, 120 years old. What? Here's the Bible teachers,
1400 years before the birth of Christ, talking about people
living to be 70 or 80. If by reason of strength it be
four score years, yet is there strength, labor, and sorrow,
for it is soon cut off, and we fly away." What do you want for
your life? Peter said, Lord, we want to
know something. What are we going to get out
of this? We're following you. What are we going to get out
of this? So Jesus told them the story. Let me read you the story,
and I'll make a quick application of it. That is, as quickly as
the Lord will allow me. And I don't want to infringe
upon any more of your time than is necessary, but I do want to
get the message out that God has put in my heart. The Bible
says in chapter 20 verse 1, For the kingdom of heaven is like
unto a man that is a householder, which went out early in the morning
to hire laborers into his vineyard. And when he had agreed with the
laborers for a penny a day, he sent them into his vineyard.
And he went out about the third hour, and saw the standing idle
in the marketplace, and said unto them, Go ye also into the
vineyard, and whatsoever is right I will give you. And they went
their way. Again, he went out about the sixth and ninth hour,
and did likewise. And about the eleventh hour he
went out and found others standing, idling, and saith unto them,
Why stand ye here all the day idling? They said unto him, Because
no man hath hired us. He saith unto them, Go ye also
into the vineyard, and whatsoever is right, that shall ye receive. So when even was come, the Lord
of the vineyard saith unto his steward, Call the laborers, and
give them their hire, beginning from the last unto the first.
And when they came that were hired about the eleventh hour,
they received every man a penny. But when the first came, they
supposed that they should have received more. And they likewise
received every man a penny. And when they had received it,
they murmured against the good man of the house, saying, These
last have wrought but one hour, and thou hast made them equal
unto us, which have borne the burden and heat of the day. But
he answered one of them and said, Friend, I do thee no wrong, didst
not thou agree with me for a penny? Take that thine is, and go thy
way, and I will give unto this last, even as unto thee. Is it
not lawful for me to do what I will with mine own? And I'll
stop reading there. And by the way, just so there's
no misunderstanding, I want you to know, I could not begin to
express to you how much admiration I have for a man, like a man
I'm thinking of in our church, who worked as a custodian in
a hospital for 25 years without missing a day of work, who was
a faithful employee, a wonderful Christian witness, I admire that
man just as much as I admire a preacher of the gospel because
of his faithfulness in working and keeping his testimony and
a man of character doing what he ought to do. I don't want
you to think that I'm trying to get everybody in God's work.
What I'm trying to say to you is your life is more than your
job. Don't ever let it become your
life. It'll be a very dissatisfying, unhappy life if you do. Jesus said, I'm going to tell
you a story. And to understand this story, I think there are
certain things you ought to mark so that when you go back and
read through it, you'll have an easier time remembering them.
Notice in chapter 20, verse 2, the Bible says, when he had agreed
with the laborers. In verse 4, he says, whatsoever
is right. Verse 10, the Bible says, they
supposed. They supposed. Now, when the
Jews divided their day, Their day did not begin in the morning.
Their day really began in the evening. The evening and the
morning were the first day. And they had four watches in the
night. They had a first watch from six
until nine. then a second watch from 9 until
12, then a third watch from 12 until 3, and then a fourth watch
from 3 until 6 in the morning. So they talked about something
happening in the first watch of the night, which is from 3,
sometime from 3 to 9. If they said the beginning of
the first watch or the end of the first watch, you would know
if it was the end of the first watch, it was near 9 o'clock.
Or if they said it happened in the fourth watch of the night,
then you knew it was sometime between 3 and 6 a.m. are near
the end of the fourth watch, near the beginning of the fourth
watch, so the night was divided into four watches. Four watches. Are you with me so far? I'm not
talking about Citizen or Timex, I'm talking about watches of
the night, periods of time. Are you still here? Still in
the same building, same frame of mind, we're still in the same
story. Good. When they divided the day, they
divided the day into 12 hours. That was before the Day of Unions.
Please, Lord, help me not to get on that. Oh, I know. Let me split the church, you
know. But they had 12 hour days. So if they started at 6 in the
morning and they got to 7, they finished the first hour. 8 o'clock
the second hour, 9 o'clock the third hour, 10 o'clock the fourth
hour, 11 o'clock the fifth hour, 12 o'clock the sixth hour. This is about when you thank
God that you've got a little clarity of mind. At 1 o'clock the seventh
hour, 2 o'clock the eighth hour, 3 o'clock the ninth hour, 4 o'clock
the tenth hour, So far so good. 5 o'clock, the 11th hour, and
at 6 in the evening, the 12th hour of the day. So, understanding
that 7 is 1, and 8 is 2, and 9 is 3, and 10 is 4, and 11 is
5, and 12 is 6, and 1 is 7, and 2 is 8, and 3 is 9, and 4 is
10, and 5 is 11, and 6 is 12, and that you've got a first watch
from 6 to 9, the second watch from 9 to 12, and a third watch
from 12 to 3, and a fourth watch from 3 to 6. Now we've changed
the way we do business, and we're back to the Jews, and this is
how they did business. So the fellow has got a job to
do, Jesus says. By the way, Peter, you did say,
what shall we have therefore? And I did ask you. But I'm going
to tell you this story. And he says, the kingdom of heaven
is like unto a man that is a householder which went out early in the morning
to hire laborers into his vineyard. And when he had agreed with the
laborers for a penny a day, he sent them into his vineyard.
So he went out early in the morning. He went out about the third hour,
that's nine o'clock in the morning, and saw others standing out in
the marketplace, and said, then go you all from the vineyard,
whatsoever's right. Now the first group said, we're
not going to go until we get a contract. Never going out there. Oh, we need a job, sure, I know
there's work to do, but we've got to know what we get before
we go. If we don't know all the answers,
we're not taking one step. If you can't tell us what we're
going to get out of it and where it's all going to wind up someday,
then we're not going to work. They had to agree. Now the next
group at nine in the morning didn't fuss about that kind of
thing. He just said, whatever's right, whatever's right, whatever's
right. And the Bible says he went out about the 6th hour,
that's at noon, the 9th hour, that's 3 in the afternoon, did
likewise. Finally goes out, 5 o'clock in
the afternoon, the 11th hour, he went out and found others
standing idle, said to them, why stand ye idle all the day?
And they said, because no man has hired us. He said to them,
go ye also into the vineyard and whatsoever is right, no contract,
whatever is right, just got an hour left, get out of there,
guys! There's very little time left! Very little time left! Get out there! Whatever is right! I'll take care of it, just get
out there. The day closes. So when even was come, the Lord
of the vineyard saith unto his steward, Call the laborers, give
them their hire, beginning from the last unto the first. So the
last was a guy that went out, people went out at five in the
afternoon. They're first, they're going to get paid first. And
then the folks who were at three, the folks who were at noon, the
folks who were at nine, the folks who went out early in the morning.
By the way, you see the line here? The front of the line,
the fellow that went at 5, right behind him, the folks that went
at 3, right behind them, the folks that went at noon, right
behind them, the folks that went at 9, and back there at the back
of the line, the folks that went out earlier in the day. And the
difference between the folks that went at 5, 3, noon, 9, and
earlier in the day, was the folks that went at 9, 12, 3, and 5
didn't fuss about what they were going to get. But the people
that went earlier in the day said, we're not going anywhere
until you tell us what we're going to get. By the way, Peter, do you remember
asking the question for the whole crowd? As a matter of fact, if
you look at the language here again, back over to that question,
the Bible says, what shall we, plural pronoun, what shall we
have, what shall we have therefore? I think it was speaking for everybody.
So Jesus told them this story. And they started paying people.
They paid the people that went at five, they paid the people
that went at three, at noon, at nine, And then they paid the
people that went out early in the day. And they exploded. Did
you hear me? Did you hear me? They exploded.
There's something wrong with anybody that explodes about money.
They exploded. I'd hate to guess how many churches
have been torn up because somebody exploded about money. Wouldn't
you? You know, we can handle a lot of things better than we
can handle that. There's going to be so many surprises at the
judgment seat of Christ. So many surprises. So many surprises! You're going to find out folks
that had nearly nothing that gave almost everything they had
to God. You're going to find folks that had nearly everything
and gave nearly nothing to God. You're going to find folks that
had everything and gave nearly everything to God, and folks
that had nearly nothing and gave nearly nothing to God. You see,
that's all God's work. But that crowd that wouldn't
work until they knew what they were going to get who had no
faith, they blew up over the whole thing. And they murmured
against the good man of the house, and they said, we can't believe
this. We, we, we, we, we have borne the burden here today.
We've done all the work. We've been here all day long.
And we get what they get. It's not right. It's just not
right. It's not fair. And he said, wait
a minute. Didn't you tell me you would
not go until you knew what you were going to get and you were
perfectly all right with what you were going to get or you
wouldn't have gone? Let me stop and ask again. What
do you want for your life? Where do you see yourself here?
May I make a few applications? Really, every great parable,
every parable should have one great lesson. Let me make these
applications. Write them down, would you? Laborers
are needed. Laborers are needed. Let me apply
this directly, in particular, to this church. There are other
churches who are attempting to do what we're doing. There are
other churches that are not attempting to do what we're doing. If you've
come from a place where it took just two or three people to get
it done, you've come to a place where it takes hundreds and hundreds
and hundreds of people to get it done. I know there are people
with bigger ministries than this and lots of things going on,
but I asked one day, how many ladies work in our nurseries?
And somebody said, oh, somewhere over 200. Work in the nurseries. Work there. Labors are needed. They need it everywhere. We're
not trying to reach just one community. We're trying to reach
the world, in our generation, trying to evangelize the world.
We believe the world can be evangelized in our generation. May God help
me never lose that dream, that idea, that vision. Years ago,
my wife was visiting her mother. We were living near the New York
City area. She was visiting her mother in East Tennessee, and
she had our two boys in the car with her, and she had an automobile
accident. A man pulled in front of her. It wasn't her fault.
She'd never done anything wrong in her life. We'll go out for a
hamburger later, darling. All right? And you can have cheese
on yours just because I'm being nice, and I'll have a... We'll
have a good time, all right? She's never done anything wrong,
God bless her! Well, not much wrong, but it
wasn't her fault. Fellow pulls out, boom! She runs
into him. At an intersection, a fellow diagonally across from
the accident runs out to help her. I'm so glad he did. Another
fellow right on the other side, right across from him, runs out
to help her. I'm so glad he did. And my wife, wouldn't you know
it, God bless her, she starts witnessing to him. She finds
out the fellow at Hipster is saved. She finds out the fellow
who was dying across the road is saved. She finds out the other
fellow is saved. And she finds out one of those
men is not saved who lives just across the road from the other
fellow. And she says to the man who lives dying across the road,
listen, shh, shh, shh, let me tell you something. Your neighbor,
just diagonally right across the road, he told me, wasn't
a Christian. You told me you were saved. I
don't live here, or my husband, I'd come by and see him. We're
going to have to go back to New Jersey. But after I'm gone, I
tell you what I'd like to do. Why don't you go try to win him
to Jesus? And he said, he's not on our church field. And he went
on to explain that he attended a certain Baptist church in town,
and the other man was on the field of another church in town,
and it wasn't ethically correct for him to walk across the street,
because that's where the churches had divided the line, and that
was, right? That was their field, and he
couldn't get on it. I don't know where you've come
from, but I didn't come from there. The whole world needs
Jesus! This whole county needs Jesus.
We ought to knock on every door and see everybody and flood the
campus downtown and go to every apartment building and do everything
we can in the mail and put ads in the newspaper and give out
thousands upon tens of thousands upon hundreds of thousands of
gospel tracts and run buses everywhere and tell everybody that Jesus
saves. And that takes laborers. Laborers
are needed. And if you come to a place like
this and just want to sit around, you're not going to have a good
time. Laborers are needed. Laborers are needed. Laborers
are needed. Laborers are needed. The Lord
said, go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. 3,200 counties in America, 50
states, 230 countries in the world. I'm telling you, 6 billion
plus people, this world needs Jesus. Laborers are needed. Be a laborer. You say, I work
at the bank. I have an insurance company.
I do a retail route. I'm a milkman. Whatever. That's
what you're doing for a living. What are you doing with your
life to serve God? What's your purpose? Find a place
to labor for Jesus. It may even be that something
you do can be done to help enhance something in God's work. It may
be that nothing you do like that fits into something they're doing
in the work of the Lord. But you fit in the work of the
Lord by giving your life to it. And you go earn a living to support
your family, support God's work, so that you can give your life
to the cause of Christ. Labor is needed. Let me tell
you a second thing. And this is where probably half
of you are, and where I am half the time. Looking at other people
will wreck your life. It'll wreck your life. There
are men in this church that are unhappy, that get unhappy all
the time because you can't get your eyes off people and on the
Lord. There are men in this church that are unhappy because they
look at other people. There are women here. Women!
And young people who are unhappy, not because Jesus isn't what
he's supposed to be, but because somebody else you think is not
what they're supposed to be. Well, the truth of the matter
is, you've probably got a bigger problem than they've got. Something wrong with their
kids, something wrong with their home. Look, if the devil can
use that to wreck your life and keep it stirred up, he'll do
it all the time, every day you live. I work with people. People aren't perfect, and I
have a hard time with that. My high school principal said
to me, he said, Clarence, if you don't do something, if you
don't do something about your attitude, about people and their
imperfections, you're going to be a miserable man all of your
life. I remember him saying that to me. Such high expectations. You don't want to cut anybody
in slack when they don't reach that high expectation. And you know, the
truth of the matter is most of us are dealing with our own problems.
And that's why we're acting that way. Oh, I'm not a psychologist. Lord, help me. You know, pull
up a chair, get a couch, lay down, tell me what's on your
mind, you know? I'm not a psychologist. I'm not a psychiatrist. I'm not
a sociologist. I'm a preacher. At least I'm
trying to be. And the problem in between our
ears is in our heart. And here they are. Watch them.
Watch them. We're not going to work until we know what we're
going to get. The other crowd, they just hear him say, whatever's
right, whatever's right, whatever's right, whatever's right. And
then he starts paying them off at the end of the day. And that
crowd, they're not standing in line. Hey, don't kid yourself. They're not standing in line.
Don't kid yourself. They're peeking around every
corner. They're standing on top of something. They found a rock
to look on. They've got to see what he's handing everybody.
They think they can't be happy if they don't know what everybody
else is getting. Oh, Lord, help us. My pastor, God bless him,
Brother Dillard Hagin, said years ago, most Christians are like
little bainy chickens. They just dart here and there,
and then they wish to God a thousand times over they hadn't seen what
they saw or heard what they've heard. Isn't that the truth?
So they look in and say, do you see what he got? Yeah. Do you
see what he got? Mm-hmm. Do you see what he got? Sure did. Do you see what he
got? Yeah. What? We have more than the virgin
heath a day. And this is all we get? You know what wrecked their lives?
Not the fact that they didn't get what they agreed to get,
but watching what everybody else got. And there are people who
will never serve God, who will never do what's right with their
life, who will never get involved in the church, who will always
carry a chip on their shoulder, who will have a tainted mind,
They'll be somewhere sitting in a parking lot, or standing
on a street corner, or in a corner of an office, or back in a corner
booth in a restaurant, talking about somebody else, because
they cannot, they just can't get away from it. They're watching
somebody else. They're watching somebody else. Or they can watch a movie today,
and bring somebody's furniture, and they'll think, hmm, how'd
they get enough money to buy a new something? Yeah, must be robbing
God or something, you know? How can they afford to have all
them kids? You know? Think of anything. How they drive
that car. Here I am driving this... It's
not the car. It's your heart. It's your heart. Can you never be happy? Can you
never be happy? Can you never deal with your
life, what you ought to do? You never will as long as you're
looking at other people. And if you think for one moment that
preachers don't have this problem, think again. Think again. The fellow gave us $10,000 of
the day. $10,000! I said, glory to God! Thank you, thank you,
thank you, thank you, Jesus, thank you! Then he said to me,
yeah, I got $30,000 of the day and I decided I'd give three
different schools $10,000. I said, what? To myself. Why didn't we get the whole $30,000?
You know? That's what I'm thinking. Why
didn't we get the whole $30,000? And I guarantee you that there's
something in the heart of those other guys when they find out
I got part of theirs. They're going to be thinking
the same thing. You know, that's a part of all of us. Look at
me. We have to fight that every day we live. Every day we live,
we have to fight that. Looking at other people will
wreck your life. that people in this church that
once served God with a whole heart and had joy. I mean, you
had the joy of the Lord. It was your strength. You just
had a spring in your step. You were excited. You had the
joy of the Lord. But not now. You know why? Because
you got your eyes on somebody, off of Jesus, on somebody else.
And it just messed you up. That's what happened to him.
Third thing. By the way, Peter, did you ask
that question, what shall we have therefore? I think he's
hanging his head in shame by now. And we ought to be hanging
our heads in shame. Labors are needed. Looking at
other people will wreck your life. Third thing, the Lord is
trustworthy. He's trustworthy. He says, is
it not lawful for me to do what I will with mine own? Can I trust
Him? Can I trust Him? You know what
I gave up for Jesus? Brother Mike, you know what I
gave up for Jesus? Did you know that I could be a manager of
a Roses 5 and 10 cent store today? I'm talking about having my own
dime store. Now, I think they probably have
collapsed, but I was going to be a manager of a Rosa's 5 and
10 cent store. And do you know, I was going to managers training
in North Carolina, how they train managers in North Carolina. Excuse
me, I didn't mean to say that, but I was going to North Carolina
to be a manager, to be trained to be a manager of a Rosa's 5
and 10 cent store when I told the man who had enlisted me for
his company that God had called me to preach and I needed to
go to college and train to be a preacher. I gave up a lot for
the Lord. I tell you, I sure did. I could
have my own counters, you know. My own toy department, you know. By the way, nothing wrong with
being a manager of a Rosen 5 and 10 cent store. I think that's
a great thing to do. If you do that to earn a living, to give
your life, to serve the Lord in your church. I said to my
wife, We're going to leave the Southern Baptist Convention and
become independent Baptists. Live in a new house. Drove a
new car. People said to me, you'll never
have another place to preach as long as you live. The Association
of Missionaries. You haven't lived if you met
one of them. The Association of Missionaries says, I'll make
sure that you never come back to this area to ever preach again
in East Tennessee. I think he's in heaven. He's
dead. I think he's in heaven. I hope
he is. His wife tried to have me arrested
for giving out tracts in town. It's an amazing thing. He said,
are you bitter? Lord, I hope not. I want to be able to pray.
I hope not. Lord, help me. I'm just telling
you. I thought, here we go out the door, honey. I'm going to
take a job at Wampler's Meatpacking Company in Chattanooga. We're
moving out of this new house. We're going to move into a four-room
apartment. It's got fleas. The kids are going to ask every
night, when can we go home? When can we go home? When can
we go home? Can you trust Jesus to do that? Remember the Lord
burdened us to go to New York City. Just after I started talking
to my wife about going to the greater New York City area to
pastor a church, we had a missionary from New York City who came to
the church and gave a slide presentation, and he said, one of the things
we do for enjoyment, this is the truth, God is my witness,
I only really need to say yay or nay, I understand that. I'm
just sort of getting silly at this point in the message. He
came and he showed a slide presentation and he said, what we do for fun
is we take 22 rifles down in the sewers and kill wharf rats.
And he showed pictures of big rats and how they went down and
hunted rats in the New York sewers. Boom! Boom! Boom! You know? And my wife said to me, if you
think for one minute I'm going to hunt rats in the sewers in
New York, that's the truth? He said, everybody
interested in New York City, come, we're going to have slides.
And we came in the room and sat and watched the slides. Come
on, baby. This is God speaking to us. Come on in here. You know,
he's going to show some slides on New York. We're burning about
New York. He said, let me show you something interesting. Big
rats, you know. Standing in the yard, telling
my mother-in-law goodbye. I know there's all kinds of mother-in-law
jokes. I've told a lot of mother-in-law
jokes, but they're all in love. I've got a wonderful mother-in-law.
God bless her. I really have. The Lord has blessed
me with a wonderful mother-in-law. She's still looking for a husband,
by the way. She's been married twice. Both good men who love
the Lord. She's married a great wife. She's a wonderful cook.
She's still healthy and strong. She can work all day long. I think she's very nice looking
for her age. You know, women 90 years old have a hard time
getting married. But I remember standing in the
yard with my wife and watching my wife hug her mother and kiss
her mother. And I hugged her mother. And
I probably kissed her. And I love her. And I hate to
say goodbye to her. And I was just too young and ignorant to
realize what she was doing when she hugged my children and told
them bye. And we drove away, 700 miles
away. I was just too stupid to realize
what was going on in her heart and how much she loved those
kids. Can you trust Jesus and do something like that? Is he
still trustworthy? Now, you know, it's easy to say
in hindsight, you look back over the whole thing and say, if I
had to do all over, I'd do the whole thing over again. But you know,
you've got to sing the songs of victory on the front side,
knowing the Lord is going to take care of you. I want to promise
you something. The Lord is trustworthy. So how
do you know? How do you know God will take
care of everything? How are you going to live? How are you going to
live? When I left the church in the
North City, wonderful people, God bless them, I loved them.
I've loved every church I've pastored, and they loved me.
I can go back everywhere I've ever been, sit under the table
of the people who are leaders in the church, and eat with them,
and rejoice and have a good time. And I like it that way. God took
care of me. But we left with no promise of
a salary, no promise of anything. He said, can you trust the Lord
to do that? Let me give you some proof. Would
you open your Bible to the book of Romans? Chapter 8. Let me
give you some proof. In verse 31, the Bible says,
What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who
can be against us? That's not it. In verse 32, the
Bible says, He that spared not his own son, but delivered him
up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us
all things? Would you look right here? Let's
imagine you came to my house. You came to my house, and for
some strange reason this happened, I couldn't explain why, but you
said, I'm really needy, feeble, helpless, and needy. And I said,
well, what do you need? You said, well, I need more than
money, I'd run out of money. I need more than furniture, it'd
wear out. I need more than food, it'd run
out. I said, you know what? You got two sons, don't you?
Brother Saxon?" I said, yes. Let's imagine he said to me,
if you just give me one of your sons, just give him to me. Let me have somebody that would
work and earn a living, provide our food, our livelihood, strong,
able-bodied. Let's imagine I walked over and
looked at my two boys and said, here, you can have him. Do you
think if I gave you my son, I wouldn't be willing to give you a can
of tomatoes, or a month's rent, or a car payment? Do you think
if I gave you my son, that I wouldn't be willing to give you food on
your table? Do you think if I was willing
to give you my son, I wouldn't be willing to come to you in
an hour of need or distress? God says, will you understand
this? There is nothing you'll ever
need! that I will provide for you. I've proven it to you. I've already given you my Son. Don't you understand? I'll freely
give you all things. The Lord is trustworthy. What do you want for your life?
Let me tell you what I want for mine. I want to go through this
lifetime with a faith in God. that brings a peace in my heart
to know that whatever I am supposed to do that God wants me to do
is the thing I'm to do, and the Lord will take care of me. I
want a faith in God. A faith in God. Peter, I'm glad
you asked that question, but you didn't need to ask. You didn't
need to ask, what shall we have there for? Oh, I'm glad you asked
it, because we got this answer, but you didn't need to ask it.
Because if you could pile it up and pile it up and pile it
up and pile it up and pile it up, you still couldn't pile it
high enough. You couldn't think of enough. You couldn't count
blessings long enough and far enough. You couldn't add the
joys up that God will give you when you give yourself to Him.
What a wonderful, wonderful, wonderful, wonderful Savior we
have.
What Do You Want for Your Life?
| Sermon ID | 113091546491 |
| Duration | 44:42 |
| Date | |
| Category | Sunday - PM |
| Bible Text | Matthew 19:27 |
| Language | English |
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