For this morning, though, I'm going to ask we turn in our Bibles to Psalm 37. Psalm 37. This should be a very encouraging psalm for us. Psalm 37. We'll read this in its entirety. Fret not thyself because of evildoers, neither be thou envious against the workers of iniquity, for they shall soon be cut down like the grass and wither as the green herb. Trust in the Lord and do good, so shalt thou dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed. Delight thyself also in the Lord, and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart. Commit thy way unto the Lord, trust also in him, and he shall bring it to pass. And he shall bring forth thy righteousness as the light, and thy judgment as the noonday. Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for him. Fret not thyself because of him who prospereth in his way, because of the man who bringeth wicked devices to pass. Cease from anger, and forsake wrath. Fret not thyself in any wise to do evil. For evildoers shall be cut off, but those that wait upon the Lord, they shall inherit the earth. For yet a little while, and the wicked shall not be. He that shall diligently consider his place, and it shall not be. But the meek shall inherit the earth and shall delight themselves in the abundance of peace. The wicked plotteth against the just and gnasheth upon him with his teeth. The Lord shall laugh at him for he seeth that his day is coming. The wicked have drawn out the sword and have bent their bow to cast down the poor and needy and to slay such as be of upright conversation. Their sword shall enter into their own heart and their bows shall be broken. A little that a righteous man hath is better than the riches of many wicked. For the arms of the wicked shall be broken, but the Lord upholdeth the righteous. The Lord knoweth the days of the upright, and their inheritance shall be forever. They shall not be ashamed in the evil time, and in the days of famine they shall be satisfied. But the wicked shall perish, and the enemies of the Lord shall be as the fat of lambs. They shall consume into smoke, shall they consume away. The wicked borroweth and payeth not again, but the righteous showeth mercy and giveth. For such as be blessed of him shall inherit the earth, and they that be cursed of him shall be cut off. The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord, and he delighteth in his way. Though he fall, he shall not be utterly cast down, for the Lord upholdeth him with his hand. I have been young, and now am old, yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread. He is ever merciful, and lendeth, and his seed is blessed. Depart from evil, and do good, and dwell forevermore. For the Lord loveth judgment, and forsaketh not his saints. They are preserved forever, but the seed of the wicked shall be cut off. The righteous shall inherit the land and dwell therein forever. The mouth of the righteous speaketh wisdom, and his tongue talketh of judgment. The law of his God is in his heart. None of his steps shall slide. The wicked watcheth the righteous and seeketh to slay him. The Lord will not leave him in his hand, nor condemn him when he is judged. Wait on the Lord and keep his way, and he shall exalt thee to inherit the land. When the wicked are cut off, thou shalt see it. I have seen the wicked in great power, And spreading himself like a green bay-tree, Yet he passed away, and lo, he was not! Yea, I sought him, but he could not be found. Mark the perfect man, and behold the upright, For the end of that man is peace. But the transgressors shall be destroyed together. The end of the wicked shall be cut off. But the salvation of the righteous is of the Lord. He is their strength in the time of trouble. And the Lord shall help them and deliver them. He shall deliver them from the wicked and save them because they trust in him. Let's pray. Our Heavenly Father, we do thank you for this word of encouragement. Lord, we do praise you for your mercy and grace to your people. Lord, we are well aware of our own weaknesses and our failings, but Lord, we marvel at your consistency, your faithfulness, your goodness. And Lord, while it seems that many evil people prosper, even prosper in oppressing your people, Lord, we know that their day is coming. Their judgment is coming. And Lord, may You refine Your people. I pray that we would stand in the evil day and show our faith and trust in You and in You alone. And Father, we do pray for Your blessing on this service today. We just ask that You would minister to us through Scripture, through the preaching of Your Word. Be with Brother Wingrove as he preaches to us today. And we just pray, Father, that what we do today would be pleasing to you. Help us, Lord, in our prayers and in our singing and in receiving your word today. And even in giving of offerings, pray that you'd be pleased with what we do. Be with those that aren't able to be with us today, minister to them, heal them, Lord, and restore them to our assembly. Pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen. Pastor asked me to back him up today, so here I am. So you have to suffer a bit. When I did my presentation back some years ago, I had a short version of the message that I'm gonna preach to you this morning, but you're gonna get the whole load this morning, okay? Because I didn't have a lot of time, okay? I know this one. What is man? What are you? Are you dust? Are you a descendant of an ape, or a monkey, or a fish, or a muniba? Okay? That's a lot of questions that a lot of times people ask. When I consider the heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained, what is man that thou art mindful of him, the son of man that thou visitest him? David was a shepherd boy and he's out laying in the field at night and as he's out laying in the field at night, he's looking up at the stars after he put the sheep to sleep and he's looking at the stars and he said, when I consider the heavens, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained, what is man or what am I? compared to stars. So in order to understand the passage of scripture, we have to have an astronomy lesson. This is the Earth. Somebody told me we live on that thing. You have to keep in mind the size, the biggest size of the planet that you see. I'm going to show you a series of slags so that you see the size of the planets, okay? This is Jupiter. See size of the Earth now? Okay, keep in mind the size of Jupiter, the size of the Earth. You got that? This is our solar system. This is the sun. You see the size of the Earth now? See that? I can explain global warming. Scientific, here it is. This is the heater. This is what gets heated. It's complicated, isn't it? Somebody parked this 93 million miles from here. was exactly the right place to put it because otherwise we've either frozen or burned one of the two. But somebody was really smart and knew exactly where to put that thing. Some people say, Mel, you know, it's been warmer recently. What have you got to say about that? Well, the sun has storms on it sometimes. This particular coronal mass ejection occurred on May 5, 2011, and when the storm comes off like that, these storm things that come off are like 500 million degrees. That'd be hot, wouldn't it? But we live 93 million miles away from that. So by the time the heat gets to us, it's way below that. This is the size of the Earth compared to a coronal mass ejection. That's a storm on the sun. You remember the last picture that I showed you about the planets, our solar system. You remember the size of the sun? Now the sun is this size. Earth is invisible at this scale. Keep in mind the size of Arcturus. You got that? Now the sun is the size of one pixel. Now, pixel is a way you measure dots that your computer does when it prints, right? I don't know. Let's forget that one. I know what it is, OK? This bilgeus, this is Antares. We're big, aren't we? We think we're big. Our sun is one of 400 billion stars in the Milky Way. That's the galaxy in which we live. Really, it's a small galaxy. There are 350 billion large galaxies, 3.5 trillion dwarf galaxies in the universe. If all the stars in the universe were only the size of a head of a pin, they would still fill Miami's Orange Bowl to overflowing more than 27 million times. if they were all the size of the head of a pin. Somebody made a lot of stuff on day four, didn't they? Lift up your eyes on high and behold who hath created these things, that is, the stars, and bringeth out their hosts by number and calleth them all by name by the greatness of his might, for that he is strong in power and not one faileth. That means not one is missing or gets lost without his design. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord. For the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways. and my thoughts than your thoughts. Now suppose I gave you a little science project and all of the planets and all the stars and all their satellites were already created, but you're going to set them in place in space, in the universe. How many could handle a little jet? Okay, let's try something easy, okay? Every 75 years, the comet Halley comes by. But when we can't see it, it's out flying through space, okay, and every 75 years it comes by. It doesn't get so close to a big planet that it gets eaten up and it doesn't get out of its orbit so that it flies off and it doesn't come by. Now suppose I just gave you one little comet to fly through the universe to make sure it comes back by here every 75 years, how many could handle one little You know, somebody that was really smart put this thing together. And you know who that was? That was God. And you know, he also wrote us a book called Bible. And when you think you're smarter than the book, you're not. Because his intelligence super outweighs everybody here together and everybody in the world together. And when he says, do it this way, it'll work. When I got a better idea, because I'm smarter than him, you know, it ain't gonna work. The reason he designed the book and wrote the book, because he wants things to be well with you, that it may be well with you. For God so loved the world, that's you. That's why he wrote the book. And that's why it says he's a lot smarter than us. That's what the verse says. in Mel's English. For by him were all things created that are in heaven and earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones or dominions or principalities or powers, all things were created by him. And notice the next phrase, and for him, and by him all things consist. Notice why you were created, for yourself, for my own pleasure. So I can do my own thing. So I can run the world. No, you're created for Him. When we live for Him, we find fulfillment. When we live for me, we don't. Because that's not why we were created. When we learn to live for God because of the purpose for which He created us, for His pleasure, not for our pleasure, then we will find pleasure and fulfillment in life. All nations before him are as nothing and are counted to him as less than nothing in vanity. Now when you've seen all those pictures of stuff you understand why they're nothing, right? Because we live in an infinitesimal speck of minus nothing dust in the universe. And that's why he counts them as less than nothing. That's a minus zero for those of you who are math students. Whatever that is, I don't know. Okay? Who hath measured the water in all of his hands, and the heavens with a span, and comprehended the dust of the earth in the measure, and weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in a balance? Rocky Mountain National Park, Estes Park, Colorado, 12,000 feet above sea level. The air is thin. I found out trying to run there is really bad news. Out of breath. One of the mountains that God created, God says he weighed the mountains on a scale, scientific scale that weighs micrograms because he's dealing with a little tiny itsy bitsy speck of dust in the space. But what I want you to see is there are some people on the trail here. You see the people? See these people? See these people? They came out of these cars down here. See the car down there? Can you see the car down there? Okay. Can you see this car down here? Can you see the car over here? This is to tell you something you already know. The further you are away from an object, the smaller it appears to be. How about twinkle, twinkle, little star, how I wonder how big you really are. If you can see it from here, and it's 93 million miles away, or 150 million miles away, it isn't little. Because if it were little, you wouldn't see it. Now the reason I tell you this is because suppose you're standing over here on top of this mountain, Can I see you? Nope. Can I see your house? Nope. Can I see North Carolina? Nope. Oh, magnify the Lord with me and let us exalt his name together. Now, I know a lot of people get this one wrong, so please bear with me just for a moment. Okay, we magnify in two ways. Number one, we magnify with a microscope. Something is so small that I really can't see it with my naked eye, so I put it under a microscope, and I make it to appear to be bigger than it is. I can also magnify things that are way, way far away, and I can hardly see them, or maybe I can't see them, so I magnify it, to make it bigger so that I can see it. But it still is not as big as it really is. Diamond Head, Hawaii. Yes. You've got to try it sometime. It's great. You're looking down from Diamond Head to the lighthouse, and you see the lighthouse down there? Is that how big the lighthouse is? No, that's not how big it is. Suppose I'm standing on top of the mountain and I have a 300 millimeter telephoto lens for my camera. Yes, right, Jill? How'd it work? Whoa, what happened to the lighthouse? The reason I showed you these last three slides is because I want you to know that the next pictures I borrowed the most expensive camera in the world. It's called Hubble Space Telescope from NASA. OK, I'm going to show you some pictures that it took. See, just increase the magnification. One more time. Here it comes. Watch. Increase magnification. Isn't that neat? No Photoshop, whatever that means. 200,000 light years from the top to the bottom across. This is galaxy M100. When they first looked at it, they looked out there and they said, look, there's a little tiny blue star out there. And they said, OK, let's look at it some. And so they increased magnification, increased magnification. And guess what? It's a whole galaxy. And it's actually, every one of these little white spots is bigger than the Milky Way galaxy in which we live. Isn't that awesome? We're just a little tiny itsy bitsy speck. This nebula is called the Eye of God. Now, it's not really the Eye of God, but it's just a nebula that they gave it that name, okay? This is called the Hand of God. These two pictures were downloaded from Smithsonian Institute website. This is Whirlpool Galaxy M51. Now, every galaxy has in the middle something called black hole, okay, which is God's garbage disposal unit for the Galaxy you understand that right I can tell I've lost some of you already But when they magnified the center of it guess what was in the center? There's a cross in the center of it, and it's there all the time Never ever goes away, but it still disposes of stars are supposed to be disposed of This is what they think our universe looks like We live over here on the right in that Virgo cluster. But I want you to see the center thing. Now, if you don't see it, it's OK. But if you do see it, it's OK too, OK? Do you see a face and a crown of thorns? Now you understand why the verses says what it says, right? The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament showeth his handiwork. Day unto day are their speech, and night unto night showeth knowledge. There is no speech nor language where their voice is not heard. Romans says, because of creation, they understand God's eternal power in Godhead, so that they are without excuse. Anybody that lives in God's creation cannot say there is not an omnipotent, all-powerful God. Behold, the nations are as a drop in the bucket. What's a drop in the bucket? Suppose you send your child out to get some water and you hand him a bucket and say, I want one drop. And they look at you like, what kind of a crazy are you? By the time I get one drop in the bucket and get it back to you, you'll probably be evaporating. But to God, it's just a little thing. It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers." Little tiny specks on an infinitesimal speck of nothing called the earth in a little tiny itsy-bitsy galaxy called the Milky Way. There's some people. You know what? These next two verses tell us something about people's ignorance about God's creation. The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against His anointed, saying, Let us break their bands asunder and cast away their cords from us. He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh, and the Lord shall have them in derision. Isn't it interesting? Some people say, God's not going to tell me what to do. Who in the world does He think He is? This is my life. I can do whatever I want. The kings of the earth say the same thing. We don't believe in that God. We don't believe in creation. We have another God. We have all kind of gods. God is not walking up and down the streets of heaven worrying himself to death about that. Okay? He's not. You know what he's doing? He's laughing so hard he can probably hardly stay on the throne. And someday those people are going to find out how wrong they were. But then it's going to be forever too late. Sometimes there's individuals, and because I called and you refused, I stretched out my hand and no man regarded. But you said it not all my counsel, but none my reproof. I will also laugh at your calamity. I will mock when your fear cometh, when your fear cometh as desolation." Remember 9-11? We were scared, weren't we? We were scared. But we got over it. God's not going to scare me. Maybe he wanted some people to come to repentance. Maybe he wanted some people to wake up and say, there is a God. But notice, when we disobey God, when we reject his commandments, his reproof, it says, I will mock when your fear cometh. When you're scared to death because you refuse to obey God and the consequences of that disobedience is upon you, God's just going to be laughing. When I consider the heavens, the moon, and the stars which thou hast ordained, what is man? Did God create those to make you feel little? And God said, let there be lights in the firmament of heaven to divide the day from the night and let them be for signs, for seasons, for days and years, and let them be for lights in the firmament of heaven to give light upon the earth. And it was so. And God made two great lights, the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night. He made the stars also. And God set them in the firmament of heaven to give light upon the earth and to rule over the day and over the night and to divide the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good in the evening and the morning were the fourth day. You know what God created them for? He just needed some light fixtures for the earth, that's all. He did not create them to make you feel little, to make you feel insignificant. He just needed some light things to function for the earth, that little, tiny, itsy-bitsy, infinitesimal speck of dust in the cosmos. Behold, the day of the Lord cometh cruel, both with wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land desolate. He shall destroy the sinners thereof out of it. For the heavens and the constellations thereof shall not give their light. The sun shall be darkened, and it is going forth. And the moon shall not cause her light to shine. And I will punish the world for their evil, and the wicked for their iniquity. And I will cause the arrogance of the proud to cease." You know what? This is an awesome thing if you really think about one day, day four of creation, 24 hour day, same kind of 24 hours we have in a day. God created all that great universe by the word of his power. And he turned on the lights. God says the day is coming when he's going to turn off the lights. And all those people that are yelling about global warming are going to freeze to death. Acts of Psalms chapter 8, for thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and has crowned him with glory and honor. Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands, and thou hast put all things under his feet. Notice what the Bible says. Now please don't forget the second half of the sermon. It's coming now. God created us and crowned us with glory and honor. People, isn't that awesome? That's you. Every one of you. He gave us dominion. He did not give the spotted owl dominion. Sorry about that, Mr. Spotted Owl. He didn't give the whale dominion, okay? Sorry about that, Mr. Whale. He gave people dominion over all those critters and over everything else. Problem we have with some of it, we just messed it up. are not two spires sold for a farthing, and one of them shall not follow the ground without your father. The very hairs of your head are all numbered. We're going to go to Broan, and she's going to fix my hair. And I go in, and she says, what can I do for you, Mr. Wingrove? And I say, I want you to count the number of hairs that are on my head. And about that time, she's ready to wet a towel and smack me with it upside the head. And I wouldn't blame her at all. I know there's a lot less there than you used to be when I was young. That's why I'm bald. But God knows, every one of you, how many hairs you have on your head. And none of us know that number. But God cares about us that much that he knows every single hair, and he knows every count. God says, you're precious. Since thou wast precious in my sight, and thou hast been honorable, and I have loved thee. To God, every single person is precious. Every single one of you. You know, sometimes we say, nobody loves me. We feel like nobody loves us. God always loves you. God always has thought you were precious. Even when we mess up, even when we do bad things, even when we have to come back to him and say, God, please forgive me, I messed this thing up. He still thinks we're precious. And he says, I have loved thee, for God so loved you. Every time you read John 3.16, you ought to substitute the word in for the world. Make it personal. God loves you. The reason he was on that cross is because he loves you. He loves every other person that will ever walk the face of the earth. God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. But when God very deed dwell with men on the earth. Now context of the question, okay, I'm not going to deal with that except to tell you I know where it is, okay, is the dedication of the temple. But God's asking the question, would that God of great creative ability and super intelligence, would that God come to earth? Little tiny, infinitesimal speck of nothing in the universe. And the answer from John 6.51 is, I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If any man eat of this bread, he shall live forever. And the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world. Now the world decided to fall into sin through Adam and through their own actions. Greed got at his heart. But still, in spite of all that wickedness, Jesus came to die. For me that I might have life in the mind, I have life abundantly. That's hard to believe. Yeah, it is. But it's true nonetheless. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son. And whosoever believeth in him shall not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved. Wow. Some people say that's hard to believe. I agree. That's impossible to believe. Almost, I agree. Why would anyone do something like that? Because God is love. When we're saved, God has something for us to do. All things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation, to wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not impeding the trespasses of them, and hath committed us to the word of reconciliation. So when we get saved, God gives us a ministry of reconciliation, Here's an estranged world, and here's a person born of God, loved of God, precious in God's sight, and God says, I've got something for you to do. It's called Ministry of Reconciliation. That's what church is about. That's what ministry's about. That's what Christian's about, is sharing the gospel of Christ Jesus with people. With the ministry of reconciliation comes a position title. Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us, we pray you in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled unto God. Sometimes people say, Mel, what do you do? I say, you know what, I'm the ambassador of the King of Kings, the Lord of Lords, the creator and maintainer, CEO, owner of the universe. That's me. And they look at me and say, no way in the world. And I say, yep, that's true. Of every Christian as well, that's true of you. You also, if you are a child of God, are an ambassador of the King of kings, the Lord of lords, the creator, the maintainer, the CEO of the universe. And he gave you a job to do. It's called Ministry of Reconciliation. And the title is Ambassador of Christ. The day of the Lord will come as a thief, and the night in which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat. And the earth also, and the works that are therein shall be burned up. Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation, manner of life, and godliness looking for in hasten the coming of the day of Christ of God wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved and the elements shall melt with fervent heat. The Bible says the day is coming when God's going to burn all this up. Okay? Suppose God's looking to destroy a little speck of earth, And he's looking for a really big fireball. Oh, there's old soul. That'll do, don't you think? Suppose you drop the earth into old soul. You know what dissolve means, burned up means? It'd be coronal mass ejection. Gone. Just like light and gasoline. It's gone. You're gone. Now the Bible says the present heavens and earth. So suppose God wanted to take care of our entire solar system, burn the whole thing out, create a new heavens and new earth. And he's looking, now the sun itself is one pixel size, and here's a really big fireball, drop the whole solar system into it, poof, gasoline, gone. Understand the Bible says the day is going to come when God's going to destroy the whole thing now that day hasn't come yet God's people aren't going to be here But that's another message, and we're not working on that one today notice verse what manner of persons ought you to be You're loved of God you're precious in God's sight he knows how many hairs you have on your head his son died in the cross for your sins and He wants you to have abundant life of peace and joy. Why not you to be? Notice, holy conversation and godliness. You know, sometimes it just blows my mind the way some Christians are living, like they've never gotten the idea that you're supposed to be separated from the world. Be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by renewing your mind. They miss that. It's completely gone to them. Wherefore, beloved, seeing that ye look for such things, that ye may be diligent, may be found in him with peace without spot and blameless. We're supposed to live clean. God tells us how to live clean because he wants us to have an abundant life. It is a testimony to the world. Be there for beloved. Did I push the right button? Beware lest ye also be led away with the error of the wicked. There's all kind of wicked stuff out there that can lead us away from pure devotion to God. We've got to stay away from that stuff. We're not supposed to be there. We're ambassadors of Christ with a ministry of reconciliation. We're not supposed to let that mess things up. But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Brother Ray is teaching a Sunday school lesson about the discipline of a Christian life, and he's dealing with a lot of that. It has to do with the Word of God and prayer and faithful attendance in God's house. If you're unsaved, How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation, which at first began to be spoken by the Lord and was confirmed unto us, to you, when you heard them? The Bible says in Acts chapter 4, verse 12, there's another name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved. There is no other way. You can make your own religion like most of the world has done. Make their little idol. And I've seen lots of them in lots of countries. It's not going to make you heaven. It'll only make you hell. There's no other way. And if you've not gotten God's gift of salvation, there's no other way. Now I adjusted the verse a little bit for God's people. How shall they escape? If we neglect to tell them of so great salvation, how are they going to escape? Well, I just didn't get around to it. I was busy. Well, I meant to. There's no other way. To open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light and from power of Satan to the God that they may receive forgiveness of sins and inheritance among them which are sanctified by faith that is in me. They're living in the dark world. of unbelief. And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firm, and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars forever. You can be a star. I mean, maybe even a galaxy, a big galaxy. I'm going to show you one more picture, and I'm done. The picture is a picture that Hubble took. It's just a picture, a star cluster. I don't want anybody to do it right now. If you've got your phone, I don't want you to do it. But you can type in on your search engine, Hubble, leave a space, heaven. What do you think? Isn't that awesome? There is a heaven because God says it in his word. And this is not real heaven, okay? But it's a picture that God has in the sky that we've only been able to see because we have Hubble. I go to repair a place for you. God wants to prepare a place for everybody that you and I know. We are the ambassadors of Christ with a ministry of reconciliation. We are loved of God. We are precious in His sight. He has crowned us with glory and honor. And we want Him to hear, we want to hear Him say in the day of judgment, well done, good and faithful servant. Enter thou in the fullness of the joy of our Lord. What is man? Well, compared to the moon and the stars, nothing. Less than nothing. Microscopic speck in the universe. Compared to God's purpose, ambassador of Christ, king of kings, lord of lords, creator, maintainer, CEO of the universe, that's you and that's me. We got a job to do. Shall we pray? Our Father, we thank you that you are the mastermind of creation. When we consider the heavens, the moon, and the stars which you have ordained, and we realize in 124 hours, you created that mass of material. And yet, when man sinned, You loved him still. He was precious still. We pray that you would help us to be the ambassadors of Christ that you called us to be. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.