We look throughout the chapter, or out throughout the chapter, as I should say this morning, and talked about how Moses preached this long message to the children of Israel. He closes in chapter number 32, and then he blesses the tribes in chapter 33. Chapter 34, he dies, and God gives us the record of his death. And Joshua is leading by the time we come to the end of the book. Thank you, son, for that water. Amen. Again, as I said this morning, He has given them instruction to guide them into the promised land, into the land of Canaan, to live a Christian life, to live a life of pleasing to God. If they will obey God, they have the promise of God's blessing. And if they disobey and won't obey, they have the knowledge that God will judge them and deal with them. I said this morning that many times Israel has looked upon and wondered how could they drift away from God after they saw so many miracles and the things God did. And I said this morning, our nation's only been here 200 some years and it's already gone horribly in the wrong direction. Amen. The danger is you and I are doing the same thing. And the Bible says we need to give them more earnest heed to the things we've heard, lest at any time we should let them slip. I doubt there's a person in this building today that hasn't let things slip. And God reminded you, and you got it fixed, and got it corrected, and got it back in order, amen. And maybe even slipped to the place you saw it do harm to you, and damage to you, maybe to you personally, or parts of your life, your family, whatever it might be. So to pretend we don't need the exhortation of this nature would be foolish, amen. Peter writing in 2 Peter, he said as long as he was in his physical body, he felt they needed to be reminded, even though they already knew everything he was saying. And he said, you need to be reminded again. And he said he knew that he was soon going to pass, that he would soon be leaving like the Lord had showed him, that he would die. But he wanted to, as long as possible, to continually remind them. Amen. God help us. The Bible teaches us this flesh is weak. It's not strong. We need the Holy Spirit daily to help us. Amen. And it's going to be a battlefield from here on out. I feel like the battle is raging in our nation. I feel like it's raging in churches. I listened to some of the news this afternoon. How many churches, even Catholics, standing up and supporting gay marriage. It's unbelievable, amen? It's in the ranks everywhere. I know some of you listened to one of the bishops there in England give a speech. I listened to it. I don't know when exactly it was given, but I listened to it a week or so ago. And I understand he's already been excommunicated because he spoke out against this same-sex marriage and he spoke out against this transgenderism, stupidity or whatever, amen? So we're in a battlefield. It's not just in that area. Everything in our nation is crumbling, and we need the God of heaven to give us strength. So we understand Moses is giving this last message, and we come to the end of it in verse number 45 of chapter number 32. We'll read there and then pray in a moment, Lord willing, and trust God to help us. As I didn't get done this morning, we'll try to recap and give you the closing of the message. Amen? And Moses made an end of speaking all these words to all Israel. And he said unto them, set your hearts unto all the words, which I testify among you this day, which ye shall command your children to observe, to do all the words of this law. For it is not a vain thing for you because it is your life. And through this thing ye shall prolong your days in the land, whether ye go over Jordan to possess it. And the Lord spake unto Moses that same day, saying, Get thee up unto this mountain of Baram, unto Mount Nebo, which is in the land of Moab, that is over against Jericho. And behold, the land of Canaan, which I give unto the children of Israel for possession, and die in the mount whether thou goest up and be gathered unto thy people as Aaron thy brother died in mount or and was gathered unto his people because you trespassed against me among the children of Israel at the waters of Meribah, Kadesh in the wilderness of Zin. because you sanctify me not in the midst of the children of Israel. Yet thou shalt see the land before thee, but thou shalt not go thither unto the land which I give the children of Israel. Let's pray and ask God to help us, amen. Father, in Jesus' name, thank you again, Lord, for this day that you've given us to be in your house. Thank you, Lord, for the sweetness of your love and fellowship. Thank you, Lord, for the care that you show us every day. And Lord, I thank you again for being good to our country and blessing America and giving us, Lord, all these good things. I thank you, Lord, for the many years that the gospel has been preached from this country to the world. I thank you, Lord, for the souls that have been gathered in through missionaries all around the world that's been sent from this place. I thank you for the thousands, thousands, hundreds of thousands of churches that's been planted in America and then around the world, Lord, by people who never give up and never quit and never stop. I pray, Lord, that you'd help us in these days we live to have a heart toward you that we would realize how important it is to serve you today. And I pray now, Lord, you'd help us tonight, open your word to us again, and may our hearts, Lord, receive what you have for us, and we'll thank you for it. Save some precious soul, touch our lives in Jesus' name. Amen and amen. I think the focus of Moses is certainly seen in one verse in a dynamic way in verse number 47. Moses said, for it is not a vain thing for you because it is your life. You see, the focus today many times on church is it's a religion and I'm free and I'll do what I want to do and I don't want to be this or that or something else. But Moses said, you need to understand, he said, this is nothing for me. I'm getting ready to die. It's your life. Your life is what's important. You need to focus on your life. And do you want your life to be blessed? Do you want it to be lengthened? Do you want it to be helped? Do you want to go into the land that God is going to give you and be blessed in that land? Then it is for your life. And you'll prolong your days in the land whether you go over Jordan to possess it. I want to draw attention to the word vain. The word vain has a meaning of just simply being empty, worthless, of no value. Serving Jesus to the world now has become empty and vain and of no value. But to us who are saved, it shall not be the case. And though we know these verses have been preached from hundreds of times, thousands of times, many hundreds of thousands of times, it is still repeating itself to us that we must remember serving God is not vain. Serving the Lord is not vain. Giving your life to Jesus Christ. The Bible says Jesus is speaking to them. Josh used some of those texts this morning. To keep your life is to lose your life, but to give your life to God is to save your life. You've got to decide. Every young person has to decide. Every middle-aged person has to decide. Every parent, every child, every teenager has to decide. No one's going to decide for you. You may be sitting here tonight. You've never come to Jesus and been born again. You've got to decide. Every decision is left to you. God's not going to twist your arm behind your back. to make you serve God. God's gonna twist your arm behind your back to make you do the things that's in this book. He will chastise you, deal with you, but as far as making you a robot, that's never gonna happen, amen. You've got to decide what you're gonna do. I look back on lice that I know, my own life, other lice. Me and my wife got married young, we decided to serve God. We didn't have to serve God, but we decided it's what we do, we serve God. Some in this building got saved while they were young, even before they were married. Some just after their marriage maybe was still young, children and so forth. Brother Dave and Sister Andy celebrating 41 years can look back and thank God they got saved while they were young. No one forced them to be a Christian. No one forced them to decide to separate their lives. No one forced them. They made decisions to serve God. You've got to realize it is not a vain thing. It is you getting the gain. It is you being benefited. It is you being blessed. God is blessing you. And the Psalms, chapter number one of Psalms, I want you to turn there. We're going to read it and just look at it for a second and add it to the message. Amen. Josh preached from it eloquently this past summer. Amen. We thank God for the truth in this chapter. God wants you to understand this is not a life of bondage. I can go do what I want to do. I'm 70 years old. I'm not rich, amen. But I got a good truck and I got a good title, amen. Brother Dave and Andy, they can go do what they want. Brother Randall can go do what he wants to do. Brother Danny can go do what he wants to do. Frankie and Teresa can quit church tomorrow and go do what they want to do. We're not in slavery. We chose this way. We made our mind up. This is what we want. And young people being saved and serving God is not vain, amen. Look around and see the damage I said this morning. We know there's famous people, famous leaders, famous presidents, famous movie stars, famous singers, famous athletes, all kinds of famous people. But look at the end of their life and look where they end up and look what the final blow is to their life, amen. The book of Psalms says in verse number one, is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly." Every day of your life, you're going to be bombarded with drawing you toward the world. Every day, drawing you toward the things that's not of God, drawing you away from the holiness of God, the righteousness of God, the faithfulness to God. But the Bible says, blessed is a man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly. He looks at this world and realizes it's a lie. It's a farce, it's not real, it's not true, amen. It is just a dream and one day the Bible says they'll wake up from that dream. It's a nightmare and they'll be no longer in where they're at, amen. Blessed is a man that walketh not in the countenance of ungodliness, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor standeth in the seat of the scornful. He's decided to serve God. But his delight is in the law of the Lord and his law that he meditate day and night. He decides, I'm going to serve God. I'm going to look at God's book. I'm going to decide what God's will is. And I will make decisions based on the will of God and the word of God. When people say, I see nothing wrong with that, I say, then give us numbers of verses complimenting that. If there's verses that says otherwise, mark your life by the word of God. Mark your life by the will of God. Mark your life to walk with God. He says, but it is the lies and the law of the Lord and his law to the meditate day and night. He shall be like a tree that's planned by the rivers of water. Bring forth his fruit in his season. He leaves also shall not wither and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. Do you want God's blessing on your life? As simple as that. The young man stood here Tuesday night, the missionary. He told his dad years ago, I'm not going to be no missionary. I'm not going to be no preacher. And as soon as I get old enough, I'm going to America, I'm going to school, I'm gonna be rich, I'm not gonna be no missionary. But he's a missionary. And happy doing it. I'm saying to you, God's will is perfect. Nothing God ever asked us to do, will he leave us alone and let us be without help in it, amen. He's like a tree, the Bible said. He's planted the rivers of water, bringing forth his fruit in this season. Moses said, it's your life. It's not me trying to pull you to me or get you to do something. I'm leaving, he said. But he said, it's your life. It's not a vain thing for you. It's your life. Amen. He says, it leaves all that you're not with, and whatsoever you do shall prosper. The ungodly are not so. They're not that way. I've been on the phone with millionaires getting ready to take their life and talk to them. I've sat down with people as filthy rich. I've sat down with people that were saved and had ministry that was great and then turned their back on God and their life was empty and destroyed and wasted, amen. I've seen what sin can do to you, me, or anybody else. Nobody can take sin and not be harmed by it. The ungodly are not so, but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away. As I said this morning, looking at our young couples around our church, do you want your life to end in divorce? You want your life to end to where your children are destroyed because broken up home and parents are against each other and hatred and bitterness and strife and wrath? That's what the world is doing today. That's where the world is going today. Is that what you want? Is that the life you want? Moses said it's not a vain thing for you. It is your life. It is your life. It is your life. It is your life. Serving God should be your life. Amen. He said, therefore, the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment. They're not going to make it. Nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous. They're not going to be a part of that glorious day. For the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous, but the way of the ungodly shall perish. It is not a vain thing for you. You've got to decide. When we make our way to the house of God, it is not a labor to come to the house of God. It's a blessing to come to the house of God. where two or three gathered together in my name, he said, there I'll be in the midst, amen. When you open your Bible, you can't make that a chore. When you call upon the Lord in the morning, some mornings I just sing to him, amen. There's nobody there but me and him, but I sing to him and tell him how wonderful and magnificent he is, amen. It's not a task, it's a blessing. You've got to remember, Moses said, it's not a vain thing for you. It's your life. Your life. It's your life. You can do what you want to with it. These young people can do what they want with their life. We've got young people sitting here that's got great decisions in the future. Morgan and Emily sitting there, you've got great future decisions, but it's your life, what you do with it. You can go haywire, but it's not going to be what you want. Young couple sitting, expecting, looking for a child to be born. You can go which way you want to go, but it's not going to pay off if you go the wrong way. Millions have gone down that broad path, hoping for something better and found chaos and destruction in their life. Moses realized the danger of them crossing into a land where they would have so many things given to them that they didn't have to built or put together or made came in. It wasn't like the pilgrims crossing the ocean, coming to America and finding the wilderness to work in. They actually had cities already built. They had houses already built. They had orchards already planted, vineyards already standing up when they entered the land of Canaan. Matter of fact, when they spied out the country, they carried a pot of grapes on their back. Can you imagine a pot of grapes that maybe hung down 25, 30, 40 pound of grapes? They entered a land the Bible called the land of milk and honey, rich. Moses said, it's not a vain thing for you to serve the Lord. It's not a vain thing for you. So I want to give you some things that just take home with you tonight if you'll put them together. Amen. First of all, just serving Jesus is not vain. Serving Jesus is not vain. Serving in your youth, serving... Someone said this morning, remember the Lord in your youth. I can't remember who. Maybe it's tonight that was said, amen. There's so many verses in the Bible about remembering. And remember the things that God wants you to remember, amen. But God wants you to know that serving Jesus is not vain. The Lord made it clear as He stood upon the earth. He said, the foxes have holes, birds have nests, so the man had no place to lay his head. When we choose to serve Jesus, we're not making a choice for prosperity. We're making a choice for God's blessing. There's millionaires tonight with a child that they're hoping lives through the night. And there's paupers tonight with a child they hope to live through the night. There's multimillionaires with family members that won't make it in the morning. But there's people who have nothing that are in the same boat. And I've used this example before. I read the article when the man who owned this Wrigley Spearmint Gum Company, his last name was Wrigley, when he was dying, he said to the doctor, if you let me live into the morning, I'll give you half of my company. but he died before morning. It doesn't matter who you are. It doesn't matter who you are. What matters is you're right with God when you face God, when you step out of this world, when you make the crossing, amen, when you live and stand before God one day. The Lord can bless everything that we do and the Bible says he can bless what our hand touches. He can bless where our feet sits down. He can touch everything that we do and bless us in every way, amen. but serving God is not vain. Living holy is not vain. Choosing to let things be changed in your life is not vain. Many of us grew up with misguided ideals about life. I grew up with misguided ideals. I learned to smoke cigarettes as a little boy. I learned to chew tobacco as a little boy. I learned to cuss as a little boy. I ain't proud of none of that. I had to make a choice that different things had to go. This had to go, that had to go. Me and my wife dating, just driving down the road, and she puts in a eight-track tape, never thought about before. I pulled it back out. She put it back in. It wasn't nothing like they got today. I pulled it back out. She said, I don't listen to it. I said, we don't listen to that anymore. I throw it out the window. There's choices you have to make. You have to decide, what are you going to do? Are you going to let things be a part of your life that's unethical in the spiritual realm with the Holy Ghost? That doesn't fit the picture of the walk with God? That doesn't make the Christian a better individual? You've got to choose. You've got to make a decision. Living whole is not vain. It pays off. It pays off. All through the scripture, God picked individuals who had holy life to do special things. Anna, that old widow lady in the church, praying and fasting was her ministry. God chose her to touch the baby Jesus and to be blessed. Simeon, an old man of God, what do you want God to use your life for? What do you want God to do with your life? What do you want God to do with you as a young couple, as a young family? Holiness and living holy is not vain. God said, be ye holy for I am holy, saith the Lord. The Bible says holiness is beautiful. Amen. You've got to decide. These are decisions you've got to make. It's not a vain thing. It's your life. It's God that's going to bless your life. It's God that's going to put his hand upon your life. And decide and make choices that you may not want made if you live the wrong kind of life. Amen. It's not vain. He says, look, you're going into Canaan. You're going into this land. God's going to give you this land. God's going to let you have this. You're going to possess it. It's going to belong to you. But you need to remember, it's not vain to serve God. It's your life. It is you doing for you. He had already told them to choose one way or the other. They was going to either be blessed of God and have the blessings of God, or they was going to have the terrible judgments and wrath of God upon their life because they did not live for the Lord and do what was right. He told them in verse number 16 of chapter 30, He says, And I command thee this day to love the Lord thy God, to walk in His ways, to keep His commandments, and His statutes, and His judgments, that thou mayest live and multiply, and the Lord thy God shall bless thee in the land where thou goest to possess it. God said, I want to bless you, I want to bless you. Do you want to be blessed? I understand as I said already. there's a lot of us know what a day may bring forth there's none of us know what we'll face tomorrow in our life our own children's life tragedy can come to any of us i say i thank god i look back over these years and i thank god for the many times i watch god intervene i remember that phone call when they said uh... steve just drugged amanda a hundred yards down the highway underneath the automobile and she's headed to the hospital My, I couldn't imagine the way my heart felt. She was about two, two and a half years old. Can you imagine? And they said, her body's burnt, the mufflers burned her. They told me all kinds of stuff. I'm rushing to the hospital. When I got there, I prayed all the way, trying to imagine what I would see. When I got there, brother, there wasn't a mark on her body. Wasn't a burn on her body. Wasn't a scratch, Sister Wanda. Drug her under the automobile on a little plastic toy down a dirt road. God is good. You're going to need God. You'll have to have him. I'm not saying that there'll never be a problem, there'll never be a care, but I'm saying God wants to bless you. You're going to need Him for your life, your job, your children. As Brother Randall mentioned tonight, just having God's blessings in work and God blessing and putting things together for you and touching things for you. Amen. It's amazing what God can do. He said in verse number 19 of the same chapter we just read, he said, I call heaven and earth to record this day against you. There's no secrets in heaven. God knows whether I or you or anybody else wants to serve him. He knows when we're real. He knows when we look at our life and say, Lord, I really want to live for you. And I don't want to mess my life up. And I don't want to be, I don't want to hurt the work of God. He knows your heart. He knows what you are. It's not a vain thing, friend. Decide. Make up your mind. Say, I want to live for God. He says that I have set before you, wipe my eyes, life and death, blessing and cursing. Therefore, choose life. that both you, that both thou and thy seed may live, that thou mayest love the Lord thy God, and that thou mayest obey his voice, and that thou mayest cleave unto him, for he is thy life. It's not a vain thing to serve the Lord Jesus Christ. It's not a vain thing to live holy. You have to make up your mind. There's no way to trick be smart in my words and get you to where you can do something. That's not going to work. You've got to make up your mind to live for God. You've got to decide, I'm going to live for Jesus. I'm just going to do it. I'm going to live for God. I'm not going to go the wrong way. It was in this book, Moses dealt with marriage, Moses dealt with children, Moses dealt with clothing, Moses dealt with all those things in this last message in Deuteronomy. It's Deuteronomy 22, five, he dealt with how to dress men and women. It's in this last message he covered so much. He knew, Brother Randall, they'd need God's blessing and if they would listen to God, they would be blessed of God. Amen, amen. Walking with God is not vain. How can two walk together except to be agreed? I'll tell you one thing, buddy. It's a good thing to have his hand in yours when the world crumbles around you. I was up on the mountain hiking the other day. I try to walk every morning since I'm so young and I need to stay healthy, amen? And I come to the place where I put that dozer over the edge of that rock cliff and fell about 350, 400 feet. I said, oh, God, I remember this day. And I called on you. You spared me. I remember coming over that, and I remember those logs hitting me in the rear end, hitting the back of the dozer. I said, I've lost it. It's gone. Mitchell was on the dozer. I said, jump, Mitchell, jump. We're gone. And I went over. Just like trees falling and big rocks rolling out in front of me. One flip, I'd have been a piece of hamburger. I'm gonna tell you, you better thank God you got him in your hand. You don't have a lot of time to make decisions. There'll be some time. You ain't got time to say one thing. Except, Lord, help me. Amen. Numerous people in this building can make those statements, not just me, amen. Where God just pulled them through and almost they saw the end of their life and God spared them, amen. Are you listening? It's not a vain thing to walk with God. Know, walk with God and God bless Noah. Others walk with God. Abraham walked with God and he said, am I going to do something and not tell Abraham? Abraham is my friend. He was getting ready to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah, and he said, Abraham is my friend. And I'll do something and not tell my friend. When you're getting ready, when you got a good friend, Brother Dean, and you're in a situation, who do you discuss it with? God said, Abraham's my friend. And I don't want to do something and not tell my friend. You say, preacher, you think that's real? That's as real as the lights in the building shine. I'm telling you, God wants to walk with you. It's not a vain thing to walk with God. He'll tell you things and warn you of things and spare you of things and fix things for you. He'll show you things to protect your children. He'll show you things to keep them out of trouble. He'll show you when they're in trouble. I'm just telling you, Moses said, it's not vain. It's not vain. It's not empty. It's not a valueless thing. It's not something that will not pay off. It will pay off in the long run to serve the Lord Jesus Christ. Make up your mind. You can do what you want. He said, I said before your life and death. He said, heaven is going to witness. It's very, very obvious. We can't hide what we do. Are you listening? It's not vain to serve God. It's not vain to live holy. It's not vain to walk with the Lord Jesus Christ. Walk with God every day of your life. Let Him know how much you need Him, how much you appreciate Him. You'll find yourself spending a lot of time just thanking Him for who He is and what He is, how great He is. Amen. It's not vain. It's not vain. It's not empty. The devil wants you to think it's empty. the place in your life that he'll get on your shoulder and tell you how empty this is or that is or something else. People gave to the missionary. I guarantee the devil done told some of them. Well, you know, you gave. He'll get nothing out of that. But I guarantee that's not the truth. Amen, amen, amen. Moses said, look, it's your own life. It's not just Turkey Ridge Baptist Church. It's your life. It's not Preacher Jones. It's your life. It's not some religious dogma. It's your life. It's your life. What do you want? You want God's blessing or not? It's just as simple as that. It's not tricking you. It's not fooling you. It's not trying to make some game out of serving God. It's just absolute fact. It's not vain to serve the Lord. It's not vain to raise your children godly for His glory. It's not vain to do that. There's many struggles. Nobody would ever say there weren't. There's bumps in the road. There's holes in the road. There's curves you can't see. There's roadblocks. There's all sorts of things that you run into. But if your determination is every day, I want to raise them for Jesus as best I can. And I will try to keep things out of the way as best I can. And you're going to fail at the best. But you say, oh, God, have mercy and help me. I want my children to be raised for you. I don't want them to turn out like this crazy world has become. I want them to be raised for you. I want them to be, I want to instill in them a love for you. May I say this? Don't instill something in your children that's just religion. Make it much more than that. Everything you do, everything you do, everything you enjoy, let God be in the center of it. I can't remember all the incidents, but I guarantee the first squirrel John killed, I said, you know, John, let's thank the Lord for that. That's the Lord who blessed you to have that son. Same thing with deer hunting or whatever it might have been. Same thing with that boy there. I said, now, son, God blessed you with a turkey. We're going to give God the praise in what we did, son. Don't leave God out of that. I don't care if you're fishing. I don't care if you're... I don't care what you're doing. Put God in the center of it. If God can't be in it, you don't need to be in it. If God can't participate, don't participate yourself. Put God in the center of everything you're in because He is your life. The Bible says God is your life. You've got to remember, serving God is not vain. Serving God is not vain. Serving God is number one. Serving God is the most important thing you've ever done in your life. It's good to have a career. It's good to have abilities. It's good to have skills. It's good to have all these things. But without God, it's all nothing. Amen, amen. Moses said, you're going into this land. You're going to be blessed. You got all this. God's going to give you all this. He said, don't ever think it's vain to serve God. It's your life. It's your life. God will bless your life. He sets before you a choice. Death or life. Life or death. Blessing or cursing. It's not a vain thing. Not a vain thing to raise your children for God. There'll be disappointments. There'll be heartaches. There'll be problems. But I'll tell you one thing, you've got God to depend on. I left my vehicle in the Raleigh General Hospital parking lot. I probably shouldn't have done that, but that's a good place to leave it. I rode with somebody else to a meeting down in North Carolina. That night we pulled in late in the night, probably one or two o'clock in the morning. I pulled in and I set my other vehicle. I said, somebody's in the hospital, my family. Kathy's got the car here. And so I went in the hospital, went down to everybody I could think of that would be first. I thought it would be her daddy first. And I went over to other names. No, finally I picked out John's name. Yeah, he's there. Went upstairs, Harry laid in the bed, broke neck. The doctor began to tell us all the issues. We began to pray and ask God. And he's sitting here today. He didn't go through anything they said he was going to go through. You know, why has God done all this? God done all that. God'll save your children from all sorts of messes, ain't he? You can decide what you want to do. Nobody can force you. Nobody can force you. If you're forced against your will, you have the same opinion still. You're not changed. God wants you to decide. God wants you to decide. God wants you to decide. It's not a vain thing. It's perfect. It's right. Preacher, I'm not perfect. None of us is. But God is. His word is perfect. His ways are perfect. His mercy is perfect. Moses said, you're going in. I'm not going with you. He said, you're going. But he said, you've got to decide. You've got to make up your mind. What are you going to do? Is it vain to you to serve God? Does it seem empty and worthless and valueless? Is that what it seems like? Or is it your life? Moses said, God is your life. It's not a vain thing to be ready to meet God. Everybody's not going to live to be old. Everybody's not going to live to have time to maybe spend time with their family when they're dying. Some are going to die instantly. Many have done that. Some are going to die strange deaths. Are you ready to meet God? If you had an accident tonight, your family, you, you say, well, preacher, I'm young, it doesn't make any difference. Doesn't make any difference. Brother Wayne Anderson come out of Mexico with his trailer. There was three children in that family, I believe it was. Missionary to Mexico. Brother Charles Anderson's son. I went to the mission field with Charles Anderson. Something happened on the interstate, they had a wreck. All of his children was killed, and his wife. Does it pay to be ready to meet God? Is it vain to be ready? Is it vain to stay every day, Lord, I want to be ready to meet you? Is that vain? Is that worthless? If it is, then have at it. That's what you'll do. But it's not vain. He said you've got to meet God someday. It is God's plan that you meet Him someday. Heaven and earth will testify against you one day or for you one day. Are you ready to meet God? If you died tonight, are you ready to meet God? Someone testified the other day about Caleb and Joshua Bartley and how their sister died. I think she was, what, 12 years old? And it changed her. It rooted out the foolishness in her heart. It's not vain to be ready to meet God. It's not something that is mechanical and trickery and foolishness. You've got to want to meet God and want to meet Him rightly. The Lord, I don't want to meet you wrong. I want to meet you rightly. I want to stand before you one day. Is it vain to you? You better be making some decisions early in life. Moses said, it's not vain. It's your life. It's your own life. Decide what you're going to do with it. Make up your mind. He said, it's not for them. It's gone on. We're alive today. We're here. We're here. It's us. It's us. We got to do that. Simply obeying this book is not vain. God's word is the only answer that's for you, me, and the rest of this world. You've got to decide what you're going to do with God. You've got to decide what you're going to do with His Word. Choose you this day whom you will serve. Joshua said, you want to serve? Joshua did a similar, just a little short message at the end of his book. He was getting ready to die. He said, choose you this day whom you will serve. You want to serve the gods on the other side? Is that what you want? He said, go serve. Go serve them. The prophet said this. He said, when you need something, go to that statue and ask it for it. He said, when your children are sick and you need something, go to that statue and ask it for it. Go to the NFL and ask them to heal your little baby. Yeah, go to them. Go to the football game and ask all the players to pray your baby will be healed. I tell you what, we better make gods out of nothing. There's only one God. Choose you this day whom you will serve. You'll have to make and reinstate that decision in your heart many, many times. I'm going to serve the Lord. Joshua said, that's for me and my house. We're going to serve the Lord. I'm going to live for Jesus. I'm going to serve God. Is that the decision you made? Have you ever made that decision? The Bible says many in the valley of decision, many. many in the valley trying to decide what to do. Is that where you're at? Make up your mind. Everybody's had to that's ever served God. Nobody's sitting here that's serving the Lord that did an osmosis. They didn't sit beside somebody in the church and rubbed off on them. That's not what happened. They decided, I am going to serve Jesus Christ. I am going to live for God. I am going to live a life that pleases the Lord. I'm going to start my life off for God, raise my children for God, try to separate my life for God. When I flop, I'm going to ask Him to forgive me. I'm getting right back up and going on for God. I'm never turning back. I'm never turning back. I'm not going backwards. I want to live for God. Decide. Moses said, it's not vain. You're going into the land. God's going to give you. God's wanting to bless you. God has set before you blessings and cursing. What do you want? Decide. We've seen people in this church decide to curse him. We've watched it happen. They went the wrong way. We've watched the chaos and the collapse and the horror. You don't have to go that way. You can decide what you want to do. Let's bow our heads and pray.