Last week we were looking at where he says, except you humble yourselves and be as these little children. So it has to do with a humbling thing. It also has to do with as a child of God, trying to grasp some of these things. And for a child to understand his parent, the child has to put forth a real effort. And then that information can only come from the parent. You can't talk to one of the other children and decide what your parents really like or don't like. And you can see that real clear in how God's children treat His work and treat Him, in that they all have their own opinion. And the reason they have their own opinion is because they're making it up in their own mind and their own hearts, and they think God likes what they like. They think their holiness is like God's holiness. The only holiness they really have is His. But they think that they're living right, and they're doing right, and I'm doing what I'm supposed to do, and you're not, because you're not doing what I'm doing. And that's exactly how little children act. You put kids to work out in the yard and one kid will say, I'm doing it right, you're doing it wrong. And isn't it strange? Very seldom do they ever go back to the parent except to justify their position. They don't really go to the parent to find out what do you really want? Why do you have us doing this? I wanna understand what you're trying to get done. Let me help you do it. It's always a matter of, here's what I'm doing for you. I'm right, aren't I? Look at Billy, he isn't doing what he's supposed to do. That's the way it always is. Every bit of that stuff has to do with pride and self-justification and self-righteousness. And that's the stuff that God hates so much that that's the one thing that he condemned and criticized when he was on this earth. He didn't criticize the whoremongers and all the rest of them out there. He's not out there screaming and yelling at the prostitutes and the ones that are doing drugs or whatever else they were doing back there. You know, guys speeding in the chariots. Who was he after? He was after the ones that tried to hold their self-righteousness up and feel good about themselves because of something they had done. And if as a child of God, we're ever gonna understand God, you're gonna have to go to him. You're not gonna get it from me. You know, I may be able to give you something and he might use a teacher, he might use a preacher, the Holy Spirit bearing witness to those words. He will open your understanding or it just will not happen. And he has mercy on whom he will have mercy, and many are called and a few are chosen. But I guarantee you a hand saying, pick me, God will get his attention more than, hey, look what I'm doing for you. And that business of pick me is, I'm not worth it, but I sure would like to do something for you. I'd like to get a hold of this business of your glory that I've been missing out on for so many years. Anyway. you start to understand your parent, and I'm talking about your spiritual parent, your heavenly father, Mark 12, 30 is gonna get really easy for you. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, with all thy soul, with all thy mind, and with all thy strength. When you get to where you begin to understand Him, the personality of God, His desires, what He's all about, why He does what He does, His emotions, His feelings for you, His desires for you, He becomes a whole lot easier to love. And it gets real difficult to understand how somebody could be mad at God when you understand what He's really like. You know why a kid gets mad at their parents? Because they think they deserve more. I didn't get what I want. You treated me unfair. Why does Billy always get to and I don't? That has to do with that child thinking they deserve something. When in fact, whatever's in that parent's control and power and ownership, they can do anything with it they want. I was watching one of them judge programs about a year ago, and there was a couple of them in there where they were fighting over some stuff, and the one kid was being sued by the dad for money that they owed the dad. I mean, you know, 35, 40 years old, and dad's suing this girl, and she's, you know, well, he's loaned so-and-so money, and the kid's sitting over there by dad. He loaned so-and-so money, and he never had to pay it back. Judge looked at her and said, let me tell you something, girl. You may not know this, but whatever he owns, he can do anything he wants with it. He owes you nothing. That's a fact. You know what God owes you? Nothing, man. You ever think about that? You know why we don't think that way? Because we think we actually did something. In our mind and in our heart and our center of our emotions and our feelings, we think we're worth something to God. That's that self-righteousness. The one that says, be merciful to me, a sinner. That's the one that God says, that one's worth something to me. Why? Because you add to my glory because I did it all. You didn't do anything. All you created was problem. Anyway, if you can get to where you actually start to love God more by understanding him more, love is gonna change things. Love actually changes everything. The more you love, The more it changes everything, and I mean everything. The whole thing's different. Look over there at 1 Corinthians 13 again. I don't know that that's one of the greatest chapters in the Word of God, but I think it is. It's certainly one of the salient ones. And the first eight verses are just absolutely amazing. Though I speak with the tongue of men and of angels and have not charity, I am become a sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal. Though I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledges, and though I have faith so that I could remove mountains and have not charity, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing. Charity suffereth long and is kind. Now these things here are the personality of God. Charity suffereth long in his kind. Charity envieth not. Charity vonneth not itself, is not puffed up, doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil, rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth, beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. Charity never fails. Now that is God. That's his personality. That's who he is. God is love. Those things are directly connected to the personality and the feelings of our creator. I mean, you're just reading a description of him through that. Suffereth long and is kind, envieth not. A while back, I couldn't figure out whether jealousy or envy was the worst, and then I realized that God is jealous, but he never envied anybody. It was right there the whole time. Your understanding of this book is gonna come by the Holy Spirit of God because God chooses to reveal it to you. Did you hear what I said? You're not gonna get it because you learn English. You're not gonna get it because you study it. You're gonna get it if he decides to show it to you. But he's a whole lot more influenced by your desire than he is by your self-righteousness and your effort. God would rather have humility than effort from you any day of the week. He would rather have you have desire than results. He can get all those he wants. He can give the increase anytime he wants. He can take a lost preacher and save 5,000 souls if he wants to. He honors his word. He honors the sacrifice of his son. He doesn't honor a self-righteous preacher standing in a pulpit. You realize how many people would get saved if it depended upon the righteousness of the preacher? You know I'm telling you the truth. You know these things are so. It's just the fact that we've been misled subconsciously into thinking it all has to do with how good we are. It does not. It has to do with how good he is. You notice over there in verse four, it says something pretty interesting. Charity suffereth long and is kind. Charity envieth not. Charity vonneth not itself is not puffed up. That last phrase, you know what that connects back to? It connects back to knowledge puffeth up, charity edifieth. You know what happens when you begin to gain in the knowledge and understanding of your creator, the knowledge of God? It's got to be connected with love because that's the only way that knowledge will not lead you to being puffed up. That's the only exception right there. You talk about love changing things, knowledge puffeth up and he wants you to gain in the knowledge of God. Well, you know he doesn't want you to be proud. Well, if knowledge puffeth up, then these things are contradictory. Love changes all of that too. Brother Mark and I have talked a few times about it and how the intensity of what we believe, the doctrinal beliefs that we have and still have probably, how they've lost their intensity. You say, well, are they unimportant anymore? No, they're not unimportant no more than serving God's unimportant. You say, well, listening to you talk for the last six months, you'd think God didn't want you to do anything but lay in a bed, you know? That's not true. What's really the problem is the focus, the attention, everything is misplaced. It's directed towards self and how you feel and what you're doing. It's not where it should be at all. But if you gain in love, all of that stuff changes. Everything changes. Your duty for God changes into pure desire. Have you ever worked on the scriptures? Well, if you don't, you're missing out on a good chance. You say, weren't you gonna try to promote going over there? No. God'll do it without you. You know that? He don't need you. What he's done is he gave you an opportunity if you wanna take advantage of it. If you don't, fine. Without me, Brother Selden and Brother Mark would do it all by themselves, you know? Brother Steve would go do it all by himself. God would stir somebody's heart to go do it. He would. He'd stir the willing, not the ones who wanna accomplish something for God, take a city for God. What do you think would happen if somebody went out and said, I'm gonna take a city for God. And God says, okay, I'll give you the city. Okay, you got the city. Oh, look what I did. My glory will I not give to another. You wanna know why people aren't getting saved, why things aren't changing? My glory will I not give to another. I think we stop God's hand in our life more because we take credit for the things he's done, whether we do it consciously or unconsciously. You feel better about yourself when you do things like that. Man looks on the outward appearance, God looks on the heart. He knows what you're thinking inside. It isn't any wonder we bear so little fruit for it. No wonder. We feel better when we do. I won some soils, man, oh man. I won 10, I made you win. You get down into some of that realm, boy, God's dealing with it on a different level than we perceive that He is. There's no question about that. What love does is it takes us out of the picture. How do you mean that? You ever had Brother Selden take a picture of the church and you're in it? You ever had anybody take a picture of a group of people and you're in it? Where does your attention go when you see that picture the first time? Love takes you out of that picture. It does. All of a sudden, instead of seeing what you do for God, you'll see God. You take my wife and I, I don't know if this is so, but I suspect it is, I do. I mean, I've known her for a long time. You take a picture where we're in it with a group of people, first thing she sees is not herself, she's looking at me. I'll betcha, I never even ask her, but I know. Next thing she'll look at is herself. You say she do that every time? Probably not. Do I look at her first every time? No, but if I loved her more than I love myself, when I look at that picture, I'm not gonna be looking at me first. You see how subtle your self-righteousness and your love for yourself is? You can't determine those responses before they happen. What you wanna do is you wanna see God first. And what? Oh, just anything he had a part in. What would that be? You look in the mirror, who made the mirror? You get to where you actually love God enough, you quit seeing yourself, you start seeing God's handiwork. Once in a while I get a glimpse of that, I really do. In him we live and move and have our being. I still feel that. That's not just words. You know, one guy tells his wife, I love you, honey. I tell my wife I love her, I tell her as many times as I can remember throughout the day, but most of the time when it's really important is when I feel it first and I desire to express those feelings. Not just repeat a phrase because it becomes routine and habit. You routine and habit with God? That's because that love is just way down there low somewhere. You get to where you feel those words when you wake up in the morning, in him I live and move and have my being. He says, hmm, I like that. You have to say it out loud, nope, he knows what's in your heart. What'll kill your fellowship with him is not your sins, it's your self-righteousness. It'll kill it. Because I guarantee you, I'm as much of a sinner as I've ever been and probably more in my own mind and heart than I've ever been in the past. You know how it affected my fellowship with God? Not at all. That may have enhanced it, but I tell you what does enhance it for sure is when I'm thinking about Him, when I'm focused on Him, when my conscious efforts and desires are toward Him. More about God, less about me. I was made for that purpose. Love changes duty into desire, it sure does. You say, how does it do that? You ever go to the restaurant? You ever have a waiter serve you? Love will change a waiter's actions into a wife's actions. He said, what are you talking about? I can't speak for most of you men. You know, I get too close to that. So it's hard for me to diagnose myself, but I can see somebody else much more clearly than I can see myself. So I can take a look at my wife and I can take a look at a waiter in the restaurant and I can tell the difference, man. That waiter's focused on responsibility. I got certain things I have to do and I need to do them right, you know, and all this other stuff. And I feel a sense of obligation, responsibility. And the better the restaurants you go to, the more money the guys make and the bigger tips they've got and the less responsibility they have. You know why? The best restaurant my wife and I were ever in was up there in Providence, Rhode Island. That place was a train station converted into a restaurant. We went in there and had lunch. I can't remember what it was, $180 for three lunches. They had the stock market running around the ceiling. We had a waiter. The guy came up, asked us what we'd like. We didn't even need to see a menu. You tell them what you want, they go fix it. The guy stands off about as far as from here to that wall, and he's just watching us the whole time. He's got nothing else to do but us. You know what he had? He had a sense of responsibility. He had a really good job. He was making good money. He was competing with the other waiters and stuff in the place. I guarantee you, they talked about how many tips they got and what they ended up with at the end of the day. A little bit of sense of competition. They were trying harder. They wanted to please their boss. They'd gotten into a routine. You ever had people dump fresh iced tea into your tea after you got it sweetened or whatever it was the way you wanted it, just about time you get it to where it's right. Coffee's the worst. I'm gonna put a little piece of that cream and a little bit of that sugar, you know, and go from there. They focus on themselves, they focus on the reward, the job, the tips, the self-esteem and the pride. Now they do all of those things and they do them well. I've never had my wife one time sit back and watch me while I ate. I've never had that kind of service. Do I enjoy that kind of service or hers? I take hers anytime, man. I would rather have her look at me while we're sitting there watching TV and say, just out of the blue, no commercial, nothing, just whatever's going on, can I get you something? No, I'm fine. You sure you don't want this, you don't want that? Why, what is that? That's not a duty, it's a desire to take care of the object of her love. You ever feel that way toward God? A desire to take care of the object of your love. Or is that just a matter of him taking care of the object of his love? You love me, don't you, God? Well, if you love me, you'd give me what I want. We don't say that, but that's how we feel a lot of times. He don't give you what you want, you feel slighted. You know he could've. Just like a little kid knows that daddy could give him a dollar. But it ain't about you, it's about him. If that kid's attention was toward dad, he'd a whole lot better chance of getting a dollar without even asking. And it wouldn't stop with that. But it would never get to the point where he gave him enough to where he was thinking about himself first. He knows how to give good gifts to his children. Her focus is on her love and the reward, the reward for Joan is my pleasure. And we were created for his pleasure. We have missed that thing so far. It's absolutely mind boggling to me how far off the track we are. Love changes the focus from self to savior. Your existence is not about what you do. It is and always will be about what he has done. That's what it's about. And if you don't get this thing, it's because your focus is still on you. And it'll come and go, I guarantee you, man. I mean, you get back over to Elisha where he killed those prophets, and next thing you know, he's hiding in a cave. You know what he's saying about that thing with the prophets? It's, let them see who you are, God. Over here, it's, for me, I'm left alone. And that same man can go from that to that just as soon as his attention gets on himself. I guarantee you, if that guy had have said, God, you killed all the prophets of Baal, you lit that fire up there, you did all that stuff, what am I worried about? God would say, okay, I'll take care of you again. And I won't just do it because you want it, I'll do it to show them other people what I really am. That's why God does what he does and especially the way he does it. He does it in such a way a lot of times you can't give anybody else credit. But the children of Israel are a good example to us, how soon we forget. Elijah's a great example, how soon we forget. It's not about the beauty of the sunset, it's about the one who can make one. You see that sunset? If your first thought isn't about the creator, the one that made that sunset, your focus is on the wrong place. It's not about the quality of a rose, it's about the one who made it smell so sweet. You understand that? You grasp that? If you're impressed with those things, you're impressed with the wrong thing. Would you rather have the money or the millionaire? You already have him. All you gotta do is recognize it. You gotta get your mind off the gift and get it on the giver. It's not about what he gives you. It's about what he's already given you. And we just take it for granted day after day. It's not about the fascination of the bird. It's about the one that taught him to build a nest. It's not about the splendor of the fall colors, the Grand Canyon, the Niagara Falls. It's the one that made your eyes and the nerves and the brain and the sense of appreciation you have when you see it that you're just overwhelmed by it. You ever seen the Grand Canyon? You ever seen Columbia Gorge? You ever seen all them falls up through there? Yosemite National Park? You ever seen the aura over Pensacola Beach? It's about the one that made that stuff and made my eyes the most unbelievable camera system on earth. And then gave me the sense to appreciate it. You might even have a better camera than my eyes, but it can't feel anything. It can't be impressed by what God's made. It doesn't have that sense of awareness. You know what the highest level of intelligence is? Self-aware. Dog goes by a mirror, you don't know that's him. You get to the level where you get up into apes, that's a little higher level of intelligence. That's one way they can tell that that animal is smarter than the rest of the animals is because it sees itself in a mirror and starts doing stuff and realizing it's doing it. That's me. You know what our problem is, don't you? Self-aware. That's our problem. It's so much about us, we forget about who he is. It's not about the miracle of a newborn baby, it's about the one that made us part of his creation. It's not about our battles, it's about his victories. It's not about our prayers, it's about his compassion and desire for us to ask him. It's not about our pleasure, it's about his desire to have us love him more. His generosity in your life should make you love him more. If it doesn't, something's wrong. Best thing you can do on this earth after you're saved is to humble yourself by magnifying Him. I taught that a long time ago. That's the best thing you can do. You don't humble yourself by making yourself feel like dirt and trash. I'm no good, I'm just worthless. You don't have to do that. All you gotta do is focus on Him. Do you realize that that woman anointed his feet, wept on his feet, dried them in the hairs of her head? Do you realize that if she'd have felt that way about herself, she wouldn't have felt worthy to get near him and she'd have stayed away? What she had to do is she had to focus on who he was. Her attention was on him, not on herself. You get your attention on yourself, you're gonna be embarrassed a lot of times. You get your attention on him, you don't even worry about that stuff anymore. Doesn't even matter. This is a little poem that I read years ago and I changed a few lines at the end of it. It's called The Indispensable Man. Sometime when you're feeling important, sometime when your ego's in bloom, sometime when you take it for granted you're the best qualified in the room, sometime when you feel you're going would leave an unfillable hole, just follow this simple instruction and see how it humbles your soul. Take a bucket and fill it with water. Put your hand in it up to your wrist. Pull it out and the hole that's remaining is the measure of how you'll be missed. You may splash all you please when you enter, you can stir up the water galore, but stop and you'll find in a minute that it looks quite the same as before. The moral for this quaint example, you must fit into God's perfect plan. Humble yourself and trust Jesus, the only indispensable man. That's one way to do it, but that's not the best way. The best way is right here. I stand in awe of you, O God, how could this exquisite masterpiece that portrays your creation not bring you glory? How could I look at this beautiful work of art and not think of you? I stand in awe of you, O God, for the works of your hands are magnificent, your powers revealed in your creation. The heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament showeth his handiwork and until this morning I didn't understand that. Remember I've asked you over and over and over, what do they say to you? I started writing some of that stuff down. It's not about the beauty of the rose, it's about the one who made it smell so sweet. When I started writing that stuff down, I began to understand. The heavens declare the glory of God. What that's about is the same exact thing. When you see the things that God's created, if all you do is appreciate it, you've missed it all. because if you miss the one that made that stuff, you didn't even get to kindergarten, let alone on up into high school and college degree. When you get to those levels, then it becomes all about Him. You see Him in everything, you appreciate everything that He's done, and then it becomes real easy to fulfill whatsoever you do in word or deed, do all to the glory of God. Let's close in prayer.