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I'm going to slip out just for a second to get my Bible. I forgot it in the office, but I'm coming right back, okay? I say that because I'm not skipping out of church like some of you yardbirds do, okay? I'll be right back. And we know that he does have memory issues. I think I met Pastor Monty, I sat beside Pastor Monty and Brother Fielder, I think it was in 2003 in a class at Pensacola and that's where I met Pastor Monty and Dr. Fielder. Then, I believe in 2004, 2005, we joined Faith Baptist Church and were commissioned and sent out from here. And it was a good two, three years after that before he learned my name. I have an assistant pastor that works with us in Korea. His name is Brother Kim Hyun Hoon, and he was also a student at Pensacola. And Pastor Monty and Brother Fielder went over with me to their house for lunch once, and so they said to say hello. It's it's very good to be back, and it's always a blessing to be here at Faith Baptist Church And see the folks here that are very dear to our heart I listen to the the sermons every sermon that pastor money or whoever is in this pulpit preaches from the The podcast I don't I don't do the down the the the live video streaming because it's in the middle of the night in in the soul is 13 hours ahead, so It's about 8.30 in the morning there, and so I don't like Pastor Monty quite enough to want to watch him in the middle of the night. But I do listen to all the sermons. In fact, I like to listen to them on the subway as I'm riding the subway to the church. I live about an hour by subway from where our church is. The city of Seoul is a big city. And there's 15 million people in the city of Seoul. And of the roughly dozen or so independent Baptist missionaries, I'm the only one that works in the city of Seoul. And a lot of them, apparently, they don't like living in the big city. And I was born and raised on a farm just outside of Holland, Michigan. And I never thought that I would like living in any kind of a city. But the Lord changed my heart and we feel more at home in Seoul, South Korea than just about any place else in the world. We were on furlough, the only furlough we've ever taken was in 2012 and a little bit of 2013. And we were here then, we've been on the field for 18 years. And before that furlough, we spent 13 years working with the Korean pastor David Youngjin Um in establishing and building up the Seoul First Baptist Church and then also Seoul Baptist Bible College and Seminary. And I'm still academic vice president. of Soul Baptist Bible College and Seminary. But while I was here on furlough in 2012, a friend of mine who used to pastor the Yongsan Baptist Church, which is a military ministry, a ministry to the U.S. servicemen who are stationed in the Yongsan Army Garrison in the middle of Seoul, he called me and said, Rob, the Yongsan Army Garrison is going to be closing down. And he said, I'm starting a new church about two and a half hours south of Seoul. And he said, our church members have asked if you would consider coming and taking the church and leading them through transition as the military people leave. And so I prayed, the Lord led me to do that, and I've been pastor of the Young Psalm Baptist Church now for three years, and things are going wonderfully. When I took the church in 2013, there was about 75% of the membership was active duty U.S. military people, and now it's less than 10%. But the church has grown. Last Sunday, we had people in our church from 12 different countries around the world. We had people from the United States, from England, from five countries in Africa, Cameroon, Ghana, Nigeria, Congo, and South Africa. We had people from Australia. We had people from the Philippines. We had people from Hong Kong, from Singapore, from China, and, of course, from Korea. And I tell our folks, Yongsan Baptist Church is what heaven is going to look like. people from every nation and tongues. I said, when you go back home, you're probably going to go back to good churches, but that's not what heaven looks like. Heaven looks like Yongsan Baptist Church. But God's been blessing, and folks have been getting saved. We had folks that were saved and baptized every month of last year from May through November. And so God is doing some really wonderful things there in Seoul, South Korea, and we really appreciate the ministry that the Lord has put us in, we really appreciate the opportunity to be part of Faith Baptist Church and the missions program of this church. Because, you know, South Korea is not a closed country. But we have people who are members of our church who are from close countries. We have members of our church that are from the country of China. We've had people attend our church who have been from Vietnam. And we have had people saved in our church and go back to Iran. And so I think that we're having an influence that goes beyond just the country of South Korea and just beyond ministering to U.S. military people. And so I hope that encourages your heart to hear what the Lord is doing over there in South Korea. And it certainly is exciting. We have sometimes, you know, one group of people over here speaking in Xhosa, people over here speaking in Chinese, people over here speaking in Tagalog, and people speaking English and, of course, Korean and other languages, Xhosa, and different Lingala and sometimes French. And so, but we're all serving the same Lord. We've all been saved by the same Savior. And I'm really thankful for what the Lord is doing. I'd like to ask you, if you would, take your Bible and turn with me to the book of Ecclesiastes. Ecclesiastes chapter 7, and our text is going to be the first 10 verses. Let me read these verses, please, and you follow along as I read these. A good name is better than precious ointment, and the day of death than the day of one's birth. It is better to go to the house of mourning than to go to the house of feasting, for that is the end of all men. and the living will lay it to his heart. Sorrow is better than laughter, for by the sadness of the countenance the heart is made better. The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning, but the heart of fools is in the house of mirth. It is better to hear the rebuke of the wise than for a man to hear the song of fools. For as the crackling of thorns under a pot, so is the laughter of the fool. This also is vanity. Surely oppression maketh a wise man mad, and a gift destroyeth his heart. Verse number eight. Better is the end of a thing than the beginning thereof, and the patient in spirit is better than the proud in spirit. Be not hasty in thy spirit to be angry, for anger resteth in the bosom of fools. Say not thou, what is the cause of the former days were better than these. For thou dost not inquire wisely concerning this. I'd like to speak for a few minutes this evening about the better things in life. The better things in life. You know, the Holy Spirit of God inspired Solomon, King Solomon, to write some very difficult things, I think, in this passage of Scripture. And they're not difficult in the sense of hard to understand. I don't think it's difficult in the sense of, you know, scholars maybe argue what the interpretation, but rather they're difficult things for us to sort of wrap our own minds around. They're difficult things for us to maybe accept as a fact in our own personal life. But I want you to notice here the repeated use of the word better in these verses. There are some things that it says that are better than other things. Now, something that is better has more going for it than something else. For instance, I think that maybe most of you would agree with me, two pieces of pie, two pieces of pie is better than one piece of pie, amen? It's not that one piece of pie is a bad thing. I'm all about pies. But two is better. That's how it's working here. So what we're considering in our text is not necessarily something that's bad, like asparagus. Sorry, if you like asparagus and Brussels sprouts and all of those, you know, bitter vegetables, I'm more of a pie guy. That's kind of obvious. But it's not something bad like asparagus against something like pie. God wants to draw our attention to that which is commonly pursued, or maybe even thought to be good, or at least useful. But then he contrasts that with something that is even better. That's even better. I wish that every decision that we faced was as simple as choosing between one piece of pie and two. Or maybe between pie and pie a la mode. But we all know that life involves some very hard decisions. And God wants us to make the best choice. He doesn't want us to settle. for things that are less than that. And God wants us to make the best choice, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's going to be an easy choice. I'll tell you, being a missionary, maybe when you first start out it seems like, you know, you get idealized a little bit and you think, oh, yeah, I can do that. But after 18 years on the field, And you see, you know, my parents both died since I became a missionary. And I really didn't get to spend much time with either my father or my mother in their final days. Because I wasn't here. And sometimes the decision that God says is the best decision in your life, it's not an easy decision. But I'm not promising you that making biblically based decisions isn't going to require faith and courage. If we make the best choice, it'll still require faith on our part. It's still going to require courage on our part. Because you might even find yourself being opposed to the decision that you make. Maybe you find yourself in the opposition to the very truth that's presented to us in this text. But if you want to know the way, which the Bible says is the better way, then God's Word is going to show us that. And I'd like us to think about that tonight. Let's pray and ask God's blessing on the service. Lord, thank you for the opportunity for me to be back home here. at Faith Baptist Church, and I pray, God, that you'd just help me to communicate clearly this message from Scripture. Lord, what could we want more than to do your perfect will? And so, Lord, I pray that through these things we can be instructed in making the best decisions. Lord, I pray you'd be glorified in our midst, and we thank you for all that brings glory to your name, and we just pray that you'd help us to be able to do more of the same. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Well, verse number one says that a good name is better than precious ointment. A good name is better than precious ointment. So, I think what scripture is saying here is that a good testimony is better than popularity. Having a good testimony is better than popularity. Now, it says they're better than ointment. Ointment in the Bible was kind of a thick liquid perfume and it was always something very expensive back in those days. You remember that Mary, the sister of Martha and Lazarus, she anointed the Lord Jesus with that spikenard ointment that was valued at nearly a year's wages in those days. And ointments and perfumes were often included in the treasury of kings in those ancient times. Not only did the ointment smell nice, but it also could have a medicinal effect to it. So it was something that they greatly valued. But it says here that a good name is better, better than precious ointment. You know, people, I remember hearing, I think it was last year or two years ago, there's a baseball player, I think he's the catcher for the Kansas City Royals, and he wears, every game, he puts on a perfume from Victoria's Secret. Yeah, he wears a Victoria's Secret perfume, and he was being interviewed by a sports writer, and they said, why do you wear that perfume? He said, well, the umpires like it. He said the umpires, they often comment to him that he smells nice. And so he thinks, well, if they like the way I smell, maybe they'll call those balls and strikes. Better. And also, he's kind of a superstitious guy. And well, it's worked out pretty well for the Kansas City Royals. And so he's going to keep on putting on the victorious secret perfume every single game. Frankly, I don't care how popular it would make me. Nothing from Victoria's Secret is going to go on this body. Nothing at all. But I think the Holy Spirit wants us to understand that a person's testimony, and really their inner being, is more important than the outer fragrances. those outward things. And this, of course, collides with pride. But it's better for people to respect us than it is for them to like us. It's an unworthy and it's a shallow goal for us to seek men's approval when what we really ought to be seeking is God's approval. And I think when our testimony is right in God's sight, we're going to gain the respect of this world even if they don't like us. And that's, I think, what every Christian should strive for. We should strive to have a good name and a good testimony. You know, people in Korea, they often ask me, what do you think about the elections in America? And I said, I try not to think about them. Because no matter who wins, I'm ashamed. No matter who wins, America comes off looking pretty bad. And I wish that there was a politician that had a chance of winning this election that was somebody who has a good name. Not somebody who's, you know, looking for popularity. Not somebody who's trying to gain the vote, but somebody who's trying to do the right thing. And so, we see first of all in our text that it's better, it's better to have a good testimony than to be popular. But go on. Look at verse number two. It says there, it's better to go to the house of mourning than to go to the house of feasting, for that is the end of all men, and the living will lay it to his heart. Now, I'm pretty sure that deep down, we all know that sorrow is better than laughter. I know Reader's Digest says laughter's the best medicine. But that doesn't, you know, really bear out if you look at the Bible. You know, I'm in the shoes of probably everyone else here. I would rather laugh than I would weep. And sometimes I think the people who have to listen to me preach every Sunday, you know, I suppose they're good at sorrow. But Jesus said in his Sermon on the Mount, blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. But how does that really affect us where we live? You know, I read that when I was in Bible college, I read the Life Journal of David Brainerd. And I don't know if you've ever read the diary of David Brainerd, but I recommend that you do that. It's one of the great works of Christian literature. David Brainerd made it his habit to spend daily six to 10 hours in prayer. six to ten hours in prayer. And after six to ten hours in prayer, David Brainerd would just be almost crushed with this overwhelming sense of his own wickedness and his own vileness. He's probably one of the most godly men who ever lived, but yet at the same time, when you read his diary, all he could do was weep that he was not a better man. that he couldn't be a more useful servant to his master. David Brainerd never learned to speak the language of the Algonquin Indians and the Indian tribes that he ministered to, but in a ministry of less than three years, he saw tens of thousands of them come to Christ, and the interpreter was drunk most of the time. I've got a pretty good Korean pastor that works with me. He's never drunk. He's never drunk. And he does quite a good job. And we have a good team that we're able to get a lot of things accomplished together. And normally I preach, and he gives the interpretation. We do that on Sunday morning on our afternoon service. Then he does simultaneous translation in the sound room, but we don't have enough of the digital receivers for the morning service. And so while I'm gone, it's the other way around. He's preaching in Korean, and one of our military guys is going to be reading a translation of his message. But it hopefully that'll all work out pretty good. It's never been done in the history of that church before young son Baptist churches I think it's a 28 years old it was actually started by by two US Army officers not by missionaries because there wasn't an English-speaking fundamental church that that the soldiers could attend but That got me way off track. That's not what I was talking about at all, but I still love talking about Young's Unbaptist Church, too. We're talking about sorrow, and listening to preachers who can't stay with their notes is kind of trying. But, you know, whether we like it or not, the Bible reveals to us the truth that sorrow is better than laughter. I wonder, you know, if we sometimes don't use laughter to hide our own shame. I did a missions internship in Suriname, South America in 1988. And the folks down there in the jungles of Suriname, they're all black, and they're great-grandparents, great-great-grandparents were descendants, they were slaves that the Dutch had brought over to work the plantations in Suriname, which was formally called Dutch Guiana. And eventually they gained freedom and they went back into the jungles in there. And when I was there and the preachers were preaching, they would preach on a sin that would touch the lives of the people and they all giggled like little schoolgirls. I never saw anything like that. But usually, you know, I've seen people squirm. Baptists squirm a lot. And in our church, they do that. Sometimes you've got to like coax the amens out of them. But the folks down there, they would just giggle like little schoolgirls. And I talked to a missionary afterward. I says, I don't understand why they're giggling when you're preaching like that. And he said, they didn't understand it for a long time either. But then it was explained to them that because they're black, they can't blush. they can blush so they laugh instead uh... i i don't know that doesn't really work for me but i i do think sometimes that that that people laugh to hide their shame or to maybe cover up their their their own shame uh... and uh... there certainly we see a lot of people denying responsibility for their sin and you know isn't isn't this is something we live in a culture that wants us to laugh all the time It does not want us to mourn. As soon as somebody is grieving or mourning, then they say, you need to get some help. You need to find some grief counselor who's going to make that period of grief or mourning in your life as short as possible. But mourning can be very healthy for us, according to what the word of God is saying here. I don't think that it's a good idea to listen to those false prophets of psycho-heresy that want to relieve men of their responsibility in their sin. The world may sing, don't worry, be happy, but the Holy Spirit admonishes us in this passage of Scripture that by sadness of the countenance, the heart is made better. Laughter isn't bad, but sorrow is better. And there are things that ought to grieve us. There are things that we ought to mourn over. Sorrow is better. In verses 5 and 6, we see that rebuke is better than praise. And it says, it's better to hear the rebuke of the wise than for a man to hear the song of fools. For as the crackling of thorns under a pot, so is the laughter of the fool. This is also vanity. Now maybe I might make some people mad, but rebuke is tough for us to take. I don't like to be rebuked any more than anybody else, but I have been. Dr. Loader's rebuked me a few times. Dr. Loader married my wife and I 29 years ago. He tied a pretty good knot. And I've known him since I was about 15 years old. And he's had to get up in my face once or twice. I'll tell you, we don't really like it when it happens. Maybe sometimes it comes around in a veiled terminology. Somebody will say constructive criticism. From my point of view, I don't know what you think, but I think constructive criticism is usually a way of saying my idea is better than your idea. But I don't really think that's what's meant here. That word rebuke is kind of a strong word. It doesn't mean a pat on the back, do better next time. It's a slap in the face. That's really, I think, more of what it is. And, you know, praise is something we do like. Praise is, you know, we all want to be puffed up a little bit now and then. And, you know, there's a lot of flattery in this world. I remember meeting the ambassador to Papua New Guinea. I don't know if that's a great position to be the ambassador of Papua New Guinea, but he gave me his business card. There was about a whole paragraph of superlative titles. The Great and Mighty Potentate. I'm not kidding. All of these things, but I guess in the Foreign Service world, those kinds of titles, those kinds of meaningless flattery titles are fairly common. And everybody, you know, it's just a way, I guess, of pumping people's egos up. And every now and then we all like to have our ego pumped up a little bit. I had that, there was a Navy pilot that has come the last two weeks to our church. He's got five kids and they came out to visit our church on Saturday. And we showed them where to park and we're walking to the church from there. And his oldest son was walking along beside me and they had been in Japan. They had come from Japan. And he looked at me and he said, pastor, he said, you look just like my pastor in Japan. He was a jolly fellow too. I looked at him and said, ho, ho, ho. I mean, yeah, everybody wants their ego pumped up now and then. Pastor Monty, I was listening. I was coming from the church with my daughter, Amanda, after she had a clarinet lesson. And we were listening to your Wednesday night message on the iPad. It was the introduction message to the book of Isaiah. And you were stressing there, as Mandy and I were listening with earphones, that You know, the prophets of Israel, their message had to be right. If it wasn't right, then it wasn't of God. If it was wrong, it wasn't of God. And while we're listening to this, there was a drunk guy staring at us. A lot of drunks in Korea. And this Korean guy, he was staring at us. And it was not like looking. I'm used to being looked at. In Korea, I stand out. And I'm used to that. But this guy, he was giving us the stare down. And finally, after a few minutes of him just, you know, bearing down at us like this, I took it out and I said to him in Korea basically the equivalent of, what? What do you want? And he looks at me and he says, you're from Europe. This does not look European. No. There's no mistaking that profile as a European profile. I said, no, I'm from the United States. He says, oh, I thought you were from Holland. My daughter looks at me. How did he know? I'm from Holland, Michigan. He said, I thought you were from Holland. I thought you were Dutch. That's where you get a good name like Utman. But even though they're right, that doesn't necessarily mean they're of God. But that's the only moral of that story. We're talking about pumping up egos. But anyways. We like to have our egos pumped up a bit now and then, but really the Bible teaches us that we ought to desire the best thing. And sometimes the best thing is for us to weep. And I'm getting near to being out of time here, but I wonder, If we spent a little bit more time sorrowing for lost souls, if God might not use us more to reach the lost. Sometimes when I look out over the city of Seoul, we used to live in an apartment building that was 23 stories high. And we lived on the 13th floor. And they had kind of like a garden up on the roof. And I could go out, and I could look at that, and I could see the homes of at least 5 or 6 million people. And I would look out over that in prayer, and sometimes God would just stir my heart. I know deacons that don't want to minister and serve in their churches. I know Sunday school teachers that don't want to pray for their students and visit them. I know pastors that have grown cynical and cold. And I think it just comes down to the fact that we don't really mourn and sorrow, but it will give us a better heart. That's what God's Word says. Verses 7 through 9 real quickly teaches us that the long haul is better than the shortcut. The long haul is better than the shortcut. I think that all these verses in 7 through 9 are teaching the same truth. There's always a temptation in life to take shortcuts. People take shortcuts economically. They use a credit card instead of saving their money until they have enough to buy what they need. Some gamble because they're hoping to have that elusive jackpot at the end of the rainbow where they can get all of their heart's desire without the sweat of the brow. Some seek career advancement and they take shortcuts by doing unethical things. There are people who take spiritual shortcuts. There's all kinds of ways that we can take shortcuts in our life, but the Holy Spirit warns us that the end of our labors and goals has to be in view at all times. There's a proverb in Korean, it says, well begun is half done. That sounds good, but I know people that started out well in their Christian life, but they didn't end well. That unnamed prophet in 2 Kings 13, 1st or 2nd Kings, I can't remember, but I know he started out well. I know he stuck his finger in Jeroboam's face, and God used him in a mighty way, but he ended up with a lion standing over his dead carcass. We can all succumb to the temptation to take spiritual shortcuts, but the long haul is better. The long haul is better. Let me finish just with this. This is a great verse. Verse number 10 teaches us that today is better than yesterday. Say not thou what has caused the former days were better than these, for thou dost not inquire wisely concerning this. You know, in the Bible there doesn't seem to be that old nostalgic pining for the good old days. The Bible regularly reminds us that time is running out, and when time is finished, eternity will begin. That's why Paul urges us in Ephesians 5.16 that we should be redeeming the time because the days are evil. That's why Moses prayed in Psalm 90 in verse 12, so teach us to number our days that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom. So when the days seem too difficult and the cost of Christian discipleship seems too steep, and you long for the good old days before maybe you really committed your heart to Christ, I hope you'll remember the words of the Apostle Paul in Philippians 3 and verses 13 and 14, and this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind. I press towards the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. Whatever good or ill may have happened yesterday, we can't go back and change it. But today, we can make the decision to be better. Today, we can make the decision to do the things that are best, the things that are God's will for our life. There are things that the Bible teaches are better things, and we all need to take some time I think on a regular basis and check our life, are we doing those better things? We may be too busy doing good things that we're not giving the best things the time that they need. Pastor Monte, do you want to come close?
Better Things
讲道编号 | 3301620378 |
期间 | 36:32 |
日期 | |
类别 | 祷告会 |
圣经文本 | 宣道者書 7:1-10 |
语言 | 英语 |