We're honored and privileged to have Brother David Gibbs with us this morning. I was reading the proverb for the day today, this morning, Proverbs 22. And what's verse one say? Proverbs 22. One. Anybody know it? A good name is rather to be chosen than great riches. When I read those words, good name, I thought of Brother Gibbs. He's a man who has had a good name and who has been greatly used of the Lord to help other people establish or reestablish a good name when a lot of times they have been sued or charged with various things because of their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. And we're very grateful for God raising up a man and a ministry like CLA that has been helping churches and helping Christians. ever since 1969, I believe is when they first started out, and many people have been blessed. He's a great blessing to us. We went through a legal battle a few years back over the occupational license, and thankful that we won that case, and God brought great victory, and many others around the country and world. How many of you get Brother Gibbs's newsletter? every month. All right. Several of you do. I'm sure we'll have an opportunity to later on to to give you the opportunity to sign up for that. There's no cost for it. He'll tell you about it later on. But he puts in there some of the different cases and things they're going through. And we have the opportunity to pray for them and just to ask the Lord to help. I pray for Brother Gibbs that God would give him health and safety and that God will give him favor with the judges and the the juries and that the Lord will give him wisdom, and God has done that in using him in a great way. We're honored to have him here with us today. You listen carefully as Brother Gibbs comes and speaks to us. Thank you, Pastor. What an honor to be here. If you have your Bibles, please, would you turn to the book of Ecclesiastes, Chapter 5. Ecclesiastes, Chapter 5. These are passages of Scripture that I love to preach from because I need to hear them myself. And at this time of year, we're about to look at a subject that invades our society, it invades our world, it sure invades America, and it's a very serious subject because it has spiritual consequences. Charles Haddon Spurgeon, the great preacher in London, England, often called the Prince of Preachers, said that Christianity can survive anything but prosperity. He said, when you read the history of the church, he said, nothing but nothing has destroyed or undermined or hollowed out Christianity like prosperity. You see, the problem is, when we get prosperous, we don't need God to meet our needs, because our needs are just taken care of. We start wanting God to meet our greeds. all the things we would just like to have. And all of a sudden, our relationship with God changes. And Christianity through the ages has had a real battle with the issue of prosperity. And God gives us incredible instruction as his people as to how to handle it. Now, in Ecclesiastes 5, written by the wisest man who ever lived, the richest man who ever lived, Solomon, we get God's instruction as to how we're to address prosperity. And I want to tell you up front, every time I read Ecclesiastes 5, I want to say, I know that's me, but I don't want to admit that's me. I understand God wired us, He created us, He knows us, but somehow God, that's not me. Ecclesiastes 5 is every one of us. But at the time we're done with Ecclesiastes 5, we're going to go over to the book of 1 Timothy and find out what God's instructions are for us. Prosperity is a wonderful, wonderful thing if we handle it God's way. It is an absolute disaster if we don't. Let's start Ecclesiastes 5. We're going to start at verse 10. The Bible says, he that loveth silver shall not be satisfied with silver, nor he that loveth abundance with increase. This is also vanity. Okay. Now let me paraphrase. It doesn't matter how much you have. It's never enough. you always want more. He that loveth silver shall not be satisfied with silver. Oh no, Brother Gibbs, there's an amount I'll be satisfied with. No you won't. By declaration of God, there is no amount you will ever, ever, ever be satisfied with. Now, when my wife and I got married in 1965, we just celebrated 48 years of marriage. In 1965, our budget for food was $5 for the week. And I remember telling God, Brother Schilling, God, if you just let me raise that to $10 a week, you don't ever have to give me anything else. How many of you understand how stupid that was, right? It doesn't matter what you have. You say, no, no, Brother Gibbs, if I had a million dollars, I'd be happy. No, you won't. You see, you have bought the lie. He that loveth silver shall not be satisfied with silver, nor he that loves abundance with increase. It doesn't matter how much it increases. Your prosperity can never fill that hole in you. Only God can do that. I had a friend of mine come to me a number of years ago now, and he said, David, I got this idea for a business. What do you think? And he told it to me. I said, well, Bob, boy, I don't know. That's pretty unique. He said, well, will you set it up for me? And we did the legal work to set it all up. Boy, has his business ever taken off? I saw him just a little while ago. His take-home pay, his take-home pay, after all, taxes are paid. is a little over 2.2 million a month. That's his take-home pay. How many of y'all like to try living on that, right? Two million a month, not a year, a month. That's his take-home. I said, Bob, that's unbelievable. That's enough, right? He said, no. He said, what you don't understand, David, is there's always somebody got more than you. And he said, you need a bigger guy. and a larger jet, and you need a fifth home. And he said, David, it's never enough. Whoa. Let's read what God says again. He that loveth silver, say it out loud in unison with me. He that loveth silver shall not be satisfied with silver. Whoa, just start right there and understand the abundance, the blessing of the prosperity we have. It will never satisfy. Now, once again, I think many of you are like me. I believe that because God said it. It's in the Bible. I believe it's true. But there's just something in me that wants to say, no, no, no, if I just had You know, if I just had my house paid off, if I just had, what? If my 401k was just funded out, if then, no, God says, uh-uh. Don't you fall for that. Don't you fall for it. Look at the next thing he says, verse 11. When goods increase, they are increased that eat them. Now, this is really important because we see this in our ministry every day. The more you have, somebody's going to try to take it away from you. When goods increase, they are increased that eat them. Somebody's going to go after it. Nobody wants to sue a poor man. But just get something and watch the people line up to try to take it away from you. I saw a really interesting program. I believe it was on CNN because it was in the Atlanta airport, if I remember right. I'm watching this thing. They had a panel of probably 20 people, maybe more. And every panel member up there had won a million or more dollars in the lottery. Several of them had won $100 million. And so they introduced them all. So the guy that's running the show says to this panel, since you've won all this money, what's the biggest change in your life? And they responded in unison. He said, what's the biggest change in your life? And they said, we keep getting sued. One guy held his hand up. He said, my mother sued me. You see, you want all the thought of that prosperity. But I promise you, you're not understanding the aggravation that goes with it. These guys that have a lot, a lot of wealth have dozens and sometimes hundreds of lawyers who do nothing but defend them full time. When goods increase, they're increase that eat them. Look at the next thing that he says, And what good is there to the owners thereof, saving to the beholding of them with their eyes? Isn't it amazing? All you can do is look at stuff. That's what God says. Let me show you my new car. Let me show you our house. Let me show you my shotguns, my golf clubs. That's all you can do is look at it. Henry Ford, at the end of his life, one of the richest men in America, they said, what's the lesson all your money's taught you? I love this. He said that you can only wear one pair of pants at a time and all you can do is look at the rest. That's right. All you can do is look at it by decree of God. Mercy. Verse 12, the sleep of a laboring man is sweet whether you eat little or much, but the abundance of the rich will not suffer him to sleep. Now, I want you to underscore the rich because immediately you're going to say, that's not me. No, I promise you if you're in this room, you're the rich. You're rich if you're here. You say, Brother Gibbs, what do you mean by that? Worldwide. Remember, this is addressed to the world. And when you think rich, you're thinking of oil sheiks or Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, guys with billions and billions. This is addressed to every child of God. Statistically, if you make $20,000 a year, including benefits, $20,000 You are in the upper one and a half percent of all salaries paid on planet Earth. If you make $40,000 a year, including benefits, you are in the upper 1% of all salaries paid on planet Earth. Do you understand? If you make $40,000 a year, including benefits, 99% of the people on this planet make considerably less than you do. We are rich. In fact, that's why so many people want to get to America. They're not so enamored with our liberties. They're totally enamored with our prosperity. And God says the abundance of the rich will not suffer them to sleep. Oh, Brother Gibbs, my 401k now is a 101k, and I'm upside down in my house, and all of a sudden, the blessings will not suffer you to sleep. Mercy. I live on a street where there's a number of flight attendants and whatnot that work for airlines. An airline, it was a pilot, came up to me. He said, David, I've got to talk to you. I said, what's up, Toby? He said, I can't sleep. I can't sleep. He said, we're merging, and I think I'm going to lose my retirement. I'm telling you, I can't sleep. I can't sleep. He said, what I thought was going to be such a blessing is killing me. I said, man, you need to read Ecclesiastes 5. He said, what's that? He didn't even have any idea that Ecclesiastes was a book in the Bible. Do you know what God says? Blessing, prosperity is a wonderful thing, but it will never satisfy. And all you can do is look at it. And the more you have, the more people are going to try to take it away from you. And it will steal your sleep. It will grab it away from you. Look at the next thing he says here. There is a sore evil which I have seen under the sun. Now underline sore evil in your Bible. This was the word for a festering wound that was so diseased, so festering, so full of infection, that it's killing people. It's a sore evil. There is a sore evil which I have seen under the sun. Namely, riches kept for the owners to their hurt. But those riches perish by evil travail, and he begetteth the sun, and there is nothing in his hand. God says, if you have stuff, you can't do anything more foolish than to try to hang on to it. Now that's by decree of God. Riches kept, let's read it again, riches perished by evil travail, namely owners thereof to their hurt, riches kept for the owners thereof. God says, you try to hang on to it. Remember, not one thing in your pocket belongs to you. It was put there by God, and it belongs to God. We're just stewards. So when we say, my car, my house, my bank account, my 401, when we do these things, the bottom line is, all of a sudden, we start treating it as if it's ours. and it's not ours. Look at the next thing, verse 15, as he came forth of his mother's womb, naked shall he return to go as he came, and shall take nothing of his labor which he may carry away in his hand. Now you want to put a star by verse 15, put a star by it. Please remember, the day you die, the stuff you thought was so hyper important here, stays here. Lester Roloff, how many of you remember that name? Lester Roloff, great evangelist, great man of God. I heard him preach. I had the privilege to preach with him quite a bit. And Lester Roloff said this 500 times. And I understood what he said, but not like I do now. He said, remember, folks, you've never seen a U-Haul behind a hearse. Do you know why you've never seen a U-Haul behind a hearse? Because you've got nothing to haul. The day you die, everything you thought was so meaningful stays right here. Wow. That's the story of the very rich man, and it's a true story. A very, very rich man who was very stingy and accumulated mega amounts of money, and they said the day he died, what did he leave? because nobody gets to take one penny with them. Now this is coming in a minute. Remember, the only thing you truly get to keep is what you gave. That's all you get to keep. That's yours for eternity. What you hung on to here stays here. Now again, Ecclesiastes 5, I know that's me, I know that's you, because it's declaration of God, but there's just something in me that's unsettled with that. And God doesn't leave us there. Turn in your Bibles, please, if you would, to the book of 1 Timothy chapter 6, and let's look at how God wants us to handle this. Prosperity is a wonderful thing, a wonderful thing, if we handle it God's way. It's an absolute disaster if we don't. Boy, at this Christmas season, when we're so hyper, hyper focused on all the prosperity and the giving and the getting, these are verses we want to remind ourselves. Now, 1 Timothy 6 has a Bible verse in it that is probably, for unsaved people, the most off-quoted verse in the Bible. People who never read the Bible somehow know this verse and it's found in chapter 6 and it's verse 10. It says, for the love of money is the root of all evil. Now somewhere they heard that and they picked that up and that's not the verse we're going to look at but that is found in this chapter. That is indeed a Bible verse. We're going to start, if you would please, at verse 17. And God says, if you have prosperity, he said, there are four things I want you to do. Four things. And they're right here in this passage, and we're going to go through these four things. Because again, prosperity is incredible. Incredible. If we handle it God's way. But boy, it will hollow us out spiritually in a heartbeat if we don't. Verse 17, charge them that are rich in this world. Now, there's that word rich again. Circle it, remember? I gave you the statistics on, boy, if you make $20,000 or $40,000. And by the way, if you make a salary of $50,000 or $60,000 between... And by the way, those are family incomes. If you and your wife make $50,000 or $60,000 a year, You are just up in the economic stratosphere in the world. Now, you may not be in the stratosphere compared to rich, rich people in oil lands or rich, rich people in America, but as to the world, oh my word, are we ever up there. Do you understand? Most of the world, the price of gasoline is irrelevant. Because 60% of the world, their dream is to own a bicycle. And they'll never get one. The only reason gasoline bothers us so much is we have two automobiles. So charge them that are rich in this world. Now, this charge them is a responsibility. Paul is talking to Timothy. And it's a responsibility that goes to your pastor. And permit me to make sure you understand, God tells your pastor to make a really big deal of this. He is supposed to emphasize this, charge them. Have you ever been to where we ordain somebody to the gospel ministry? And when we ordain, how many of y'all have ever been to an ordination? Hold your hand up. Okay. When we ordain someone, we have a preacher come and his job is to give the charge. Okay. That's this work. That person is there to tell that candidate who's being ordained, here's what is going to be a big deal in your life the rest of your life. That's the charge. Well, God says make a really big deal of these four points. Here you go. Number one, charge them that are rich in this world, here's the first one, that they be not high-minded. That they be not high-minded. What does that mean? You're not your stuff. You're not your stuff. If you think you're something because of the car you drive or the house you live in or the You're high-minded. You are not your stuff. If you've ever gotten to travel to third world countries and you go over there and people come to church who have nothing. They don't have shoes. They come dressed in their best, but we would say they're in tattered rags. God loves them ever bit as much as he loves you. And just because we have something doesn't mean that makes us something. If you think your stuff makes you anything, you are shattering this command. You are high minded. Wow. Well, boy, if I just had a car like that, Brother Schilling. Well, if I just lived in a house like that. Well, if I could just take vacations like that. No, no, no. That's high-minded talk. It amazes me now, the young people when they get married, where they want to take their honeymoons. They want to go to Aruba or Hawaii or because you're nothing if you don't do that. That honeymoon doesn't make you anything except poorer. We were at a Valentine's banquet, and they said, tell us about your honeymoon. Tell us about your honeymoon. I said, well, we got married on Saturday afternoon at 1 o'clock. The church put on a little reception with cake and mints in the hall. After that, we got in the car and drove to Detroit, from Cleveland to Detroit, about 140 miles. We stayed that night in a Holiday Inn, which was a big deal. Next morning, we got up and we went to Temple Baptist Church, and they made a big deal over us being in church the first day we were married. Sunday afternoon, we went to the Henry Ford Museum. And preacher, we really debated whether we should do that on a Sunday. But Sunday was the only day we had. So we went to the Henry Ford Museum. That night, we went back to church. After church, we drove back to Cleveland. And Monday morning, I went to work. And when I told this to them, the young people there said, oh, that's terrible. What are you talking about? It was wonderful. And it still is wonderful. That honeymoon doesn't make you anything. Now, Brother Gibbs, are you against nice honeymoons? No, I'm not against them, unless it makes you high-minded. If you think the trips you take or the places you go make you something, prosperity is ruining you. Do not be high-minded is a command of God. Can I remind you, for all eternity there's going to be people who have very little, if anything here, who are going to be way richer than you in heaven forever? Your prosperity here stays here. Wow. And the only thing you get to keep is what you gave. And so, don't be high-minded. Now you say, well, move on. That's real easy for me. Well, if it's easy for you, pray for me. Because I find this to be challenging. All of a sudden, we think we're something because we have something. We're not. Look at the second command. Number one, charge them that are rich in this world that they be not high-minded. Number two, Nor trust in uncertain riches. Now, underline uncertain riches. All riches are uncertain. People say money talks. It sure does. Most of the time it says bye-bye. That's what it does. Cashy question. The economy collapses and you have nothing. That's happened. You have nothing. What you thought you had is gone. If you're not trusting in it, you're fine. But if that's what you're trusting in to bring you comfort and security, then you're violating this command. Wow. All riches are uncertain. Now, I was in a very poor country, and the people who come there, they just don't have hardly anything. And I'll never forget, a pastor came up to me, and he said, Brother Gibbs, we don't have anything. But he said, I think in a way we're better off than you. And I'm like, what are you talking about? Very godly man. He said, we don't have to worry about trusting in uncertain riches. All we have is God and he's all we need. And he said, the truth is all you have is God. You just don't realize he's all you need. Boy, I stood there with my breath being taken away. Do not trust in uncertain riches, but in the living God who giveth us richly all things to enjoy. In any measure, my confidence is in a bank account or retiring or whatever, a salary. I'm violating that verse. God, don't let me trust in it. My trust is in you, you. That's why Spurgeon said Christianity can tolerate anything but prosperity. He said most Christians, the minute they get something, want to put their trust in it rather than in God. And that's a sin. That's a sin to do that. Number one, don't be high minded. Number two, don't trust uncertain riches. Verse 18, that they do good, that they be rich in good works. Now, God wants you to be rich. He wants you to be rich. He wants you to be rich for all eternity. But the way you get rich for all eternity is not by banking here. You get rich for all eternity by banking in heaven with good works. How much banking in heaven did you do last week? How much banking in heaven did you do last year? What's your plan for good works? My wife, Gloriana, my son, Jonathan, and my daughter-in-law just walked in. They know Gloriana, my wife. She's a list maker. And she'll say, honey, you're so busy. You're running so hard. Let's make a list of the good works we're going to do, because we won't do them by accident. We need to plan them. Would you put this in your mind? You never do good works by accident. You do them by decision and by design. And what's on your good works list? You say, well, Brother Gibbs, I don't have much money. People with no money can do good works. That doesn't take money. It takes decision. Now, we had a lady. We were out repairing our driveway when we lived up in Conneaut, Ohio. Had a long gravel drive and it had holes in it. We're trying to fix it. And it's just a miserable day, a miserable day. It's not quite freezing, but this mist coming down was freezing and sticking to stuff. And all of a sudden, here comes a lady down the street. The wind is howling. And she's bent into the wind. She's got a shawl around her and a scarf over her head, and she's dragging a big pan, like a wash tub, and she's pulling it by a rope. It's just a strange sight. And she starts up our driveway, and I told my son Matthew, go see what she wants. Well, Matt brings home and says, the lady wants to know, is this where the Christian man lives? And I told her, yeah. The lady comes up to me, and her face is all chapped, her hands are swollen pulling that rope. And I said, what do you need? She said, do you have manure? And I said, I got 60 cows and none of them are potty trained. I got a lot of manure. I'm loaded with manure. I said, what do you want manure? Is that what you want in that tub? She said, yeah, please. I said, what do you want it for? She said, for my good works. I said, for good works? Come to find out her husband's last illness took all their money. And all she had was a little tiny house that's fallen down, but every square inch of her yard is a garden. And she raises all those vegetables, all those fruits, cans them, puts a gospel track on them from her church, and gives every bit of it away. She said, can I have some? I said, where's your house at? She had walked a little over five and a half miles to get to me. Can I help you? She is going to be so rich for all eternity. Because God watched every one of those steps. Everyone What good works Have you focused on? Now remember these are commands God didn't say it would be nice if you were rich in good works. He commands us to be rich in good works That's how you bank in Heaven that's how you do it Whoa. Don't trust in uncertain riches. Wow. That's huge. Be rich in good works. That's huge. Let's look at the fourth and final thing. Charge them that are rich in this world. Don't be high-minded. Don't trust in uncertain riches, but in the living God that they do good, that they be rich in good works. And here's the fourth and final thing, ready to distribute, willing to communicate. Circle that word ready in your Bible. This is a really neat word because you know this word. Did you ever line kids up for a race? And what's the first thing you say? Ready. That's this word. Do you know what God says? I want you to be anxious to give. anxious to give. Now, there's no way you'll be a cheerful giver if you're not anxious to give. I wish you could sit on the platform and watch an offering be taken. There's people who look like they're in pain. It's like they're saying goodbye to a friend. You know what God says? You ought to come to church and say, Brother Schilling, will you please let us give? Come on, get at it, get at it. Man, I am anxious to give. Can you imagine if on Christmas morning somebody came to you and said, I got a gift for you, but man, I'm kind of hoping we don't get around to having to give it. No, no, no. Man, what makes the gift so is the heart that gives it. And you're anxious to give it. My wife, Gloriane, and I, when we got married, I'm a semi-truck driver, a radio announcer, and a law school student. My wife is a schoolteacher and a Howard Johnson's waitress. How many of you remember Howard Johnson's? They're gone now, but that was us. Back then, there were no credit cards. Tips were changed, left on the table. The waitresses had aprons on with a pouch in front, and they'd scoop the change into the pouch. And she'd come home every night, and we'd go through it and count it all. And when she wasn't looking, I took some of it. I squirreled it away. Now, I wasn't stealing it from her. I wanted to save some up to get her a Christmas present. We got married June the 12th, and we're going to do our first Christmas together. And if I remember right, I had squirreled away $11, which was a lot of money to us then. Now, it's a week or so ahead of Christmas, and I said, honey, when you weren't looking, I took a little of that change, and I got $11, and I want to get you a gift. She said, oh, that's wonderful. She said, I know exactly what I want. I said, terrific. What do you want? What do you want? I got 11 bucks. She said, I want you and me to find somebody who has less than us, and let's give it to them. I said, no, no, no, no, no. This is for you. Never forget what she said. She said, anything you give me here, stays here. If you do this for me, that will be mine forever. Forever. Do you understand? All you get to keep is what you give. You get Christmas presents for the gifts? No, we give a lot of them. But make sure you do some banking in heaven. It changes everything. If the Lord tarries, this will be our 48th Christmas together. And last week, we just gave our gift. 48 times. I can't wait till we get to heaven because I know she's got a punch waiting. Be careful. Prosperity is a wonderful, wonderful thing if you handle it God's way. It is a disaster if we handle it the world's way. This season What a nice thing to give gifts and love and remembrance. That's all great. But don't be high-minded. You're not your stuff. Boy, number two, don't trust in uncertain riches. What's something today can be nothing tomorrow. Number three, be anxious to give and be rich in good works. How many of you are thankful God has given us this instruction? Oh, indeed. That pastor I told you about, we were talking with him in that third world country. And I want to share in closing one other thing he said to me. He said, you know, it's sad. You don't ever have to pray your food in, do you? I said, what now? He said, you don't ever have to pray give us this day our daily bread, do you? And I said, no, we don't. Because we have money. And we're not trusting in God for that bread. We're trusting in what's in our pocket. We just have money. Boy, remember, all you get to keep is what you give. If you say, Brother Gibbs, I wouldn't know how to give and go to your pastor. And just say to him, we want to give unto the Lord. He'll show you where to go. Christmas, what a great time to bank in heaven. Father, thank you for your word. Thank you for this wonderful Sunday school class. What a privilege, what an honor to be here. Now God help us not to be spoiled, ruined by our prosperity, I pray in Jesus' name. And all God's children together said, Amen. God bless you.