a couple weeks ago, I'd seen a church marquee and it said, serve the Lord with all your heart. And that's a pretty good sentiment. Of course, you guys know that in the last few years, we've been way over to the extreme side of this business to the glory of God. So with that attitude in mind, I look at that thing and I'm kind of critical of it. I said, serve the Lord with all your heart. Now look, I remember some verses in the Bible And they're along that line. I mean, Luke 10, 27 says, love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and all thy soul and with all thy mind and with all thy strength. That's kind of interesting because you sing that song, you know, how great thou art. The one unique thing about that is he says, then sings my soul. That's great. You know what? This body has no fellowship with its creator. You realize that? This thing here is the enemy of God. This thing here is still the natural man, it's in the flesh, and it continues to sin. There's no connection there. The part of me that's connected is that part where the Lord cleaned it out and living in my soul. And so when you feel any of those feelings toward your God, when you're stirred that way on a level of affection to where you get tears in your eyes or you start getting those goosebumps up and down your arms just thinking about His glory and His magnificence and what He's capable of, That's not your body. Your body likes the stuff that the senses can get a hold of. I like to see that. That's pretty. I like to feel that breeze. That feels so good when I'm hot. I like to touch this stuff. I like to taste this stuff. I like to smell that stuff. That's what your body likes. But that thing with your soul, that is invisible. And the things which are not seen are eternal. Now, that's how you're made. That's part of that fearfully and wonderfully made stuff. Also, I remember another verse, and it says, serve the Lord with gladness, come into his presence with singing. Now, we're gonna do some singing here today, but I wonder if you're actually gonna be singing, or if it's just gonna be some routine duty, you know, or if you're gonna actually connect to what's written down there that somebody else wrote. I don't know how many of those songs are actually inspired by the Holy Spirit. I know that a bunch of them are inspired by the person's affections. You know, it'd be like a six-year-old boy buying a baseball for his mother for her birthday. You say, well, that sounds kind of corny. No, not really. I mean, a six-year-old boy, he doesn't have the rational thought processes to figure the whole thing out, and that's something he really likes. So he buys something he really likes and gives it to mom for her birthday, see? Well, that's kind of like us. There's a lot of songs written in that book that are like that. It's something out of our heart, and it's out of our mind, and we write it out of desire, but it's not directly inspired by the Holy Ghost. You say, how do you know? Because it's against the Word of God. There's a bunch of that stuff in those songbooks that are just absolutely contrary to what God says. And so much of that stuff is just about us, you know. It will be worth it all when we see Christ. Come on, man. What have you had to endure that matches anywhere close to what he did? What have you had to do to earn any portion of it? You can't take credit for a single thing. Worth what, the pain and suffering that you brought upon yourself or some other sinner brought upon you? His yoke is easy and his burden is light, right? Well, anything outside of that's not from him. Well, it'll be worth it all when we finally get out of here and get up there. Worth what? It's he that worketh in you both to will and do of his good pleasure. You can't take credit for his acts and his works. Matter of fact, he goes so far as to say, I'll not give my glory to another, which explains why the Holy Spirit is just gone from so many ministries. I mean, if you actually would see spiritually what's written over the door of many churches, it'd probably be Ichabod. You say, you really believe that? Tongue in cheek, yes. You say, well, he's in there because the Christians are in there. That's right. In here, this is the temple of the Holy Ghost. So wherever you're going, God's with you. But what's God doing in those places? You stick a sign up there that says, serve the Lord with all your heart. Well, that's a good sentiment. But is that really true? I was talking to a friend of mine the other day out in California. He's got problems in his church. He's got a big church out there. It's out there in the hills of West Covina there and just outside of Los Angeles. It's on a campus called Pacific Coast Baptist Bible College, or it used to be. And so here they are out there in this big old church, and they got this big old ministry, you know, and this big Christian school and stuff they're running. And you know what the problems are. You already can imagine them. It's about the church business. It's about how the church is being run. It's about the loyalty. It's about the giving. It's about supporting the ministry. It's about our ambition. What kind of a baseball should we give mommy? Wrong question. Right question is, what do you want, Mom? What would you like? If you had a mother tell a six-year-old boy what she really wanted, it wouldn't be anything that he had to sacrifice for at all. You know what she'd want? I just want your affection. That's what she wants. She didn't raise that kid to go out and go get a job so he could buy stuff for her birthday. She says, I can get anything I want. That's a little bit like God. He can go get anything he wants, you know that? So what's he want from us? He wants us to serve him with all our heart. Not really, not really. That's that Laodicean church mentality. He said, that sounds a little bit strange. I asked Bill and I said, my uncle says serve the Lord with gladness. I said, let me ask you honestly. Now you think about this a minute. How many people in your church would you say they come to your mind in that they serve the Lord with gladness? And he laughed out loud and he said, none. Well, how many people in here today are serving the Lord with gladness? I mean, really, think about it. Is that how you feel? I feel glad to be in church. Well, on occasion, what about when you're doing something for Him? You say, what am I doing for Him? Well, there's a lot of things you can do for Him. But the motive behind it, that's the issue. God doesn't say you're not doing anything. He just said, I know thy works that thou art neither cold nor hot. So then because thou art neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mouth. And he was talking about the church. Born again, blood washed, children of God, adopted into the family, seated together with him in heavenly places. And he said, your works make me sick. Serve the Lord with all your heart. Okay, that is a good sentiment, but there's something wrong. If they're not serving with gladness, there's something missing. Anyway, a lot of Christians are like salesmen, you know? They come into church and they smile to your face and criticize you behind your back. Ain't that how you are? That's how I am. You say, what? Well, sure, you bet. Do I criticize Brother Mark? Sure I do. Does he criticize me? I hope so. I'd hate to think he was more perfect than I am doing a better job than me. Do I criticize you guys? Sure I do. What do I criticize about you? Oh, I don't know, just any old little thing pops into my head. Why do I do that? Because my heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. That's why. And the minute those thoughts come into your head, you say, God, that didn't please you at all, did it? See, you sure told the truth when you told me about my heart, didn't you?" He said, yeah. He said, I like the fact that you even take heed thereto according to the Word of God. Do you take heed to those things? When those thoughts come into your mind and your heart, do you actually respond to them? Does it make a difference? Anyway, I've heard preachers preach on giving. You know what it says? It says, serve the Lord with gladness. Look over in Deuteronomy 28. You think this thing is important about serving the Lord with gladness? So you're finally gonna get into the Bible? You know, some people would think that if I don't open this book up and read directly out of it, I didn't give you anything of the Word of God. You know how many verses I've already quoted to you this morning? You have any idea? You have any idea how much of this stuff you actually get without even realizing you're getting it? And the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life. You want life? Well, you're not going to get it out of a box of cereal. Anyway, Deuteronomy 28. You think it's important to God about this thing with gladness? 28, 47, and 48. It says, because thou servest not the Lord thy God with joyfulness and with gladness of heart for the abundance of all things. You guys have some abundance, don't you? I think he's talking about the Jews. He's not talking about Christians. But look at how he responds to this. Therefore shalt thou serve thine enemies, which the Lord shall send against thee in hunger, and in thirst, and in nakedness, and in want of all things. And he shall put a yoke of iron upon thine neck until he have destroyed thee." How come? Wrong motive. That's all. Were they serving the Lord? Were they doing stuff for God? You quit serving God? No, because thou servest not the Lord thy God with joyfulness and with gladness of heart for the abundance of all things. After Joan got out of that hospital, I felt that joy in the abundance of all things that God had given me back. You think he just gave me back my wife? I can't tell you in such a way that I can communicate what God did. When she was dying, nothing meant anything to me. I mean nothing. I couldn't get any response from my feelings toward anything, no matter what it was. It was like I died inside. So when he says the abundance of all things, he's giving us all things. He didn't just give you a house and some clothes and good health. He gave you friends. He gave you purpose. He gave you future. He gave you hope. He gave you all your senses. He gave you the feelings and the emotions you have. He gave you everything. What do we have that we didn't get from God? Nothing. Anyway, we're supposed to serve the Lord with gladness. Now, millions today are going to hear messages on serving God. And He says, I know thy works that art neither cold nor hot. I wonder how many of them are going to preach to them about that. That's almost counterproductive. The reason you don't hear that is because it is counterproductive in the mentality of the Laodicean church. Laodicean church's attitude is work, work, work, work, work, work, work. That's what's going on. Anyway, you ever heard a preacher preach on giving? If you heard any TV or radio preachers lately, you sure have. Most of those, that's their specialty. Why? Because that TV time and that radio time costs money. They want to reach a whole bunch of people out there. And they'll come up with all kinds of crazy gimmicks. I heard of this one guy over here in Mississippi, Reverend J. Charles Jessup. And he was doing a thing where he collected money to go on over to Jerusalem, you know, and get down in the tomb and pray for all these people and everything. He went down in his basement, got this hollow echo sound, you know, I'm down here in the tomb of our Lord. They caught that guy and they prosecuted him for fraud. What a mess. Reverend J. Charles Jessup, Reverend, yeah. You heard him emphasize the cheerful part of the giving? The Bible says God loveth the cheerful giver, doesn't he? When was the last time you ever heard one preacher ever in your life, when he preached on giving, out of all the sermons you've ever heard, that he emphasized the cheerful part over the giving? You know what God did over there in Deuteronomy? He said, that's more important than anything to me. More important than anything, how come? Because you guys wouldn't serve me with joyfulness and with gladness of heart for the abundance of all things. What? I'm gonna destroy you. Not only that, I'm gonna destroy you slow. By the time I'm done with you, you're not gonna have anything left and all your enemies are gonna get it. And you're gonna be working for them. I kinda feel like that's where we're heading in America. I really do. Anyway, God didn't say he loves those who give, now listen, who give a lot. You know who's respected in the churches these days? The ones that give the most. People like Brother Jack, they have a hard time of it. Why? Because those people are businessmen and they're a major asset to any ministry. That's the truth. It's just the truth. You go over there to Olive Baptist and those business people over there, the more they give and the more they support the church and the more they add strength to this ministry, the more important they become. God didn't say he loves those that give a lot. He didn't say he loves those that give the most. He didn't say he loved those that give it all. How many of you ever heard of give it all Sunday? How many of you ever done it? Come on now, I mean, I know there's some hands in here. I have, my wife has. I'm gonna give the whole thing. What are you saying, everything you make? Well, at least for a week. Give it all Sunday. Why do you do that? because there's a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof is death. And that way has to do with how you treat your fellow man and the things that you do, whether they be good or bad, and they're all gonna be weighed on the scale, and so the more good you do, the better shot you have at it. And that natural man, when you got saved, you didn't lose him. You still got him. As a matter of fact, what happened was, you got a new nature, you got a new creature who were born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible by the word of God. Now you've got this problem, because now you've got this conflict of interest within yourself. And as soon as I got saved, I fell in love with God in a way that I couldn't even describe. My life changed totally and completely. And then they started talking to this natural man over here, saying, well, you love God, you'll start serving him. You can't do enough for God, you can't out-give God. Well, how much should I give? Give Him everything, give Him everything. Where do I give it? Right here. Isn't that right? If you can't put it in a plate, you put in your hours. You come out here and you clean this building and you work out here and you build that for us and you teach these classes and you sing in that choir and you drive that bus. Serve the Lord with all your heart. You know what happened? I started serving the Lord as a natural man. I started serving him because that just seems like the right thing to do. And they played on that. God says, I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot. So then because thou art neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mouth. That's what's going on. And that deceitful heart of ours that's desperately wicked continues to deceive us. And we feel like, oh, I'm doing okay, I'm all right, you're all right. I know of Christians that have broken everything in that Word of God and anything that can be done, they've done it. You say, well, they didn't do it willfully. Oh, baloney. I don't sin willfully. Oh, my goodness, man. Was somebody else shoving your foot down on a gas when you were speeding? It says obey man's laws. The last time you got in a fight with your spouse, husbands love your wives, wives love your husbands. Who was forcing you then? Who had your arm twisted up behind your back saying, fight with your wife, fight with your wife? You say, well, wrestle not against flesh and blood. Yeah, but he ain't doing it by himself, is he? He sure got a lot of help from you guys. It doesn't say give it all. It doesn't say give 40%. It doesn't say give the tithe. It doesn't say God loveth the faith promise giver. You hear that emphasized in faith promise messages? God loveth a cheerful giver. Well, let's look over in Deuteronomy during our message on faith promise. Oh no, we're not going there. How come? Well, it's counterproductive. Oh, that's the Old Testament. Yeah, but you'll sure grab that Old Testament and go back there when you want to prove your point, don't you? How am I trying to prove God's point? How about looking at this thing instead of from your perspective, how am I starting to try to figure out what God says and what God wants and start looking at it from His perspective? How about taking heed thereto according to the Word of God? He didn't put that in there that God loved with a cheerful giver. He didn't put that in there just for the fun of it. He didn't do it. He didn't say, God loveth those who give faithfully. Are you gonna get on everything? He only made one qualification. He didn't say, give to get. I love those that give to get. Do you know the context of that stuff over there where he's talking about that? Is given to get? You know, he which soweth sparingly shall reap also sparingly, and he which soweth bountifully shall reap also bountifully. I heard one preacher preach the message on it, give to get. How'd that work? Well, you see this one little corn kernel, I can put this thing in the ground and here comes this stock of corn up, you know, and it'll have one or two or sometimes, in rare cases, three ears, and there's about 300 of them down there. So you got 600 to one. You want God to multiply your giving? Give it to God. How do we do that? Well, right, payable to the bearer on the man, if his name is God. crazy stuff, and they all talk about that crazy stuff, and they talk about it because they look at this book from their perspective. You look at this thing really just like a six-year-old kid buying a baseball for his mother. You think if it pleases you, it'll please him, and you don't believe it when he says, your ways are not my ways, saith the Lord. And one of these days, maybe if we keep on harping on this stuff and the Lord keeps pounding it into our head and into our hearts, we'll finally start to function based on what He said and take heed to the Word of God. And start thinking, Lord, what do you really want? What do you really want? Mom, what do you really want for your birthday? Son, I'd like to have a week where you just didn't give me any trouble. You clean your room, you do what you're supposed to do. Just make my life a little easier. That's all I really want. Why? because that'll prove more than anything else that you love me. Buying me stuff don't prove you love me. You see how that thing works? Anyway, he didn't say, God loveth those who give out of a sense of duty or guilt. You ever give because you feel guilty not giving? How many times you ever put something in an offering plate or have the thing go by and wonder what the rest of the people think about you not putting something in? How many times you actually put something in and feel gladness of heart? And it kind of become routine, mundane, just kind of a duty. I'll just do it, you know, get it done. You say, well, does that stuff all go down the drain? No, I don't think so. I mean, there's a place over there where he talks about, you visited me in prison, you know, and you brought me water when I was thirsty. And he said, when did we do that? He said, inasmuch you've done this to the least of these my brethren, you did it unto me. When was the last time you put something in that offering plate for somebody else with that motive? See? It's got to be doing it for somebody else. You can't be doing it for you. You're putting it in there because of you. If you're just putting it in there out of a sense of duty, it's counterproductive. It's just kind of like, poof, at the judgment seat of Christ, there it goes. What happened to all them checks I wrote? He said, they just burned up, man. He says, I told you it was gold and silver and precious stones. You know what paper money's made out of, don't you? Wood, hay, and stow. That's the burns. You're pretty tough on us today, aren't you? No, I'm just being honest with you. You know who the tough ones are? They're the ones that'll tell you a lie and make you think that everything's right when it ain't. Is that what you want? You want to just walk out of here feeling good? Or do you want your attention drawn to what God actually thinks and feels I do, and I want my attention drawn to Him. I'm tired of doing stuff my way. I am. I'm tired of thinking, oh, this is going to work fine. If I do this, everything will be great, and then just go ahead doing it with this thought process that, man, everything's fine, when it ain't fine at all. Can you imagine what's going to happen, literally, when the Lord comes back, and they all get up there, and the stuff goes on the fire, and poof. And they say, man, what happened? Years. Man, I was saved for 45 years. I did all of this and this and this. And God says, yeah, I know that works. They were neither cold nor hot. They were just lukewarm. They made me sick. Man, you mean that was all a waste of time? I told you. I warned you. You didn't take heed there, too, according to the Word of God. You just kept on going, doing it your own way, thinking your own thoughts. I told you your thoughts are not my thoughts. When are we going to finally wake up and start realizing we don't think right? We don't do right. We don't understand. We don't know as we ought to know. When's this thing actually going to come down to the point where we start looking at the Word of God and take this serious? He said, when are you going to start doing it? I'd like to. I've got a desire. I'm trying. He told us what he wants over in 2 Corinthians. What did he say? 2 Corinthians 9, 6-7. But this I say, he which soweth sparingly shall reap also sparingly, and he which soweth bountifully shall reap also bountifully. Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so let him give, not grudgingly nor of necessity, for God loveth a cheerful giver. Now you take that verse by itself, And a guy can read that thing on stewardship and make everybody feel really good about, you sow sparingly, you reap sparingly. You sow bountifully, you reap bountifully. But when you go back over there to that thing in Deuteronomy, man, that puts a whole different light on this thing. And the reason it does is because God says, look, this matters to me. I don't care anything about what's on the outside. I look at the heart. You and all the rest of the people like you look on the outside. You look at the checkbook, how much I gave that year for tax deduction purposes and all the other stuff. I don't care anything about that. I'd rather have your two cents with a joyful heart. than to have $200,000 from you just out of a sense of duty, responsibility, just do it because here comes the offering again. How much shall we give? Well, we're just purposing our hearts much and that's what we're gonna do every week. What happened to the joy? What happened to the gladness of heart when you put that money in that offering plate? I mean, honest, tell me the truth. When have you ever felt that when you put money in a plate? God love us a cheerful giver. You really feel that? You know why you don't feel that? Because this has been neglected. You really don't understand who this one is. None of us do. It's giving out a desire. Now, like I told you, that little old girl that was washing those dishes, and for the benefit of you that never heard this before, One of the most perfect illustrations I've heard about God and His children all comes down to this one illustration where a salesman came to a house and was going to talk to the mother of the family, and there was a little girl in the kitchen doing dishes. The mother asked the guy to wait in the kitchen there for a few minutes. And as he sat there, he watched this little girl standing on a chair, about four or five years old, doing dishes. And he watched her working away from the backside. She was struggling with those dishes and struggling with everything. And she got down to the pots and pans where things were really getting hard. And he thought, well, I'll just walk in there and kind of encourage her a little bit. I don't know if that's just her job or got in trouble, mommy making her do it. Who knows what it is? Little old girl like that shouldn't be doing dishes like that. So he walks into her. He said, this is a little bit hard for you, isn't it? And she turned around with eyes sparkling. and a big old smile, she says, oh no, I get to do this for my mommy. You know why we don't feel that when we put money in the offering plate? Because you don't know who you get to do it for. You've been cheated. You've been cheated by preachers. You've been cheated by the church. You've been cheated by Sunday school teachers, and I'm not blaming every one of them, but that's who's cheated us. And the reason we don't feel what that little girl felt was real simple. We really don't know who we get to do this for. And if you understood who it is that made you, who it is that formed you out of the dust of the ground, that made you for his pleasure, if you really had a handle on any portion of that, It would change your attitude toward Him. It would change your attitude for being here. You'd enter into His courts with singing. You would. You'd serve the Lord with gladness. Now, we should serve Him with all of our heart? Yeah, we should. We should. How are you going to get somebody to serve the Lord with all their heart? How are you going to do that? Until they know who it is they're serving, they can't serve Him with all their heart. Until you actually realize the value of something, you can't appreciate it. Somebody give you a cure for cancer, you got cancer? Here, take this pill, it's all gone. People that would appreciate that, why? Because they know the value. You know what's been left out of the churches in the last days? It's that we don't appreciate God. We have been taught to serve Him in the natural man, out of a sense of duty, and the basic three things in church all around the world, get them saved, get them serving, keep them serving. And they'll use almost anything to get those three things done. You know what they're missing? They're missing the heart. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind. You know what's going on when people brag on God? They're starting to get a hold of that mind. You are something that you can do all of this stuff. I've underestimated you, haven't I, God? He said, that's an understatement. That is an understatement. We underestimate him all the time. And the only way you're going to get a handle on that stuff is to try to think more like he thinks and ask him to open your understanding to these things, like a good will of God. It's kind of like, oh, well, okay, I'll take it. If that's the best you got, I'll take the baseball. Unfortunately, we're giving him the baseball, but our heart's not even in that anymore. Let's close in prayer.