Covetousness is a dangerous dissatisfaction with what one has, leading to a focus on material possessions rather than spiritual wealth. The sermon warns against this by recounting the parable of the rich fool in Luke 12, who amassed possessions but was called a fool by God because his life was taken that night. The core lesson is that true richness comes from being rich toward God, not in accumulating earthly goods, and that believers should seek God's kingdom and trust in His provision rather than worrying about material needs. The application is to examine one's attitudes toward God, possessions, and the return of Christ, living a life ready for His coming by being faithful stewards.
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I preached in tents for fourteen years. I'm not sure that I really need this thing, but I'll wear it anyway and hold my voice down a little bit. I want you to read with me tonight part of the twelfth chapter of the Gospel According to Luke. I don't get very far away from the twelfth chapter of Luke, and the reason for it is that every time I speak on it, every time I read it, I get something that I hadn't seen before. This is a marvelous chapter.
It's the classic passage in the Scripture on the subject of covetousness. covetousness means not only wanting something that somebody else has, but it means being dissatisfied with what you have. And most Americans see absolutely nothing wrong with that. The Denver Post has a little saying on their banner head, something to this effect, I can't quote it exactly, but something to this effect, that all of the improvement in the world has been wrought by dissatisfied people.
That makes sense, doesn't it? And therefore they put a premium on being dissatisfied. The feeling of most people today is if you don't have ambition enough to go to the top of the heap, then you ought to be at the bottom of the heap. And many a Christian businessman or young executive finds himself under tremendous pressures either to get to the top of the heap by stepping in other people's faces or to hold his face ready for somebody else to step in. That's the kind of a world in which we live.
And our Savior protested against that in the twelfth chapter of Luke's Gospel. I'm not going to read the whole chapter, but I'm going to begin to read at the story, the parable, verse sixteen, of a rich man who was interested in getting more. We'll preface it by the fifteenth verse, and he, the Lord Jesus, said unto them, Take heed and beware of covetousness, for a man's life consisted not in the abundance of the things which he possesses.
That means you don't value a man by what he owns. They say that American people know the price of everything and the value of nothing. And they might be right. I've worked with foreign students. They call them international students now. It seems to please them a little better. But I've worked with foreign students in the universities for the last twenty, twenty-five years. We had a young Japanese fellow stay with us for a year while he completed his education. His father was the ambassador from Japan to Great Britain.
And his uncle was the ambassador to Australia. And he was in this country at the expense of the Japanese government taking special training in order that he might fill a post over there, and he now does so. He was saved while he was in this country, and I got acquainted with him when I was speaking to intervarsity students at the conference in Texas. He came to know the Lord at the Texas University. Some of the students there told him that they believed that he would get some help if he stayed in this country and studied with me, and got a little better grounding in the scriptures because he had Buddhist background, and he misunderstood them.
It's easy to do, you know, when you're speaking in a foreign tongue. And he thought that they said that I had a Bible school. So he packed up and came to Colorado Springs, and I was out of town, and he knocked on our door and told my wife that he had come to attend John Walden's Bible School. And nothing surprises her. She thought maybe I did have one, and hadn't said anything about it, so she called him in. He came in and we made him at home and he spent a year with us. And I went through the book of Romans verse by verse and word by word. And I have never had a more apt student. He really had a great heart for the Word of God.
He also had a pretty good insight into the American people. If you want to know what the United States is like, Ask people from another country. Now, I love our country. I think we ought to love it or leave it. I'm glad for our country. But I don't think it is perfect by a jug full. And I said to this Oriental, what do you think of the United States? And he's smiling, he said, I rather than that say. Oh, I said, come on, we're good friends by now. Tell me what you think.
You must excuse me. But in our country, we say, in America, it is, how big is your house? How big is your car? How big is your bank account? They've got to spot it all right. They know exactly how we think. Everything is judged by how big is yours. The Lord Jesus said, I want you to take heed and beware. You've seen signs beware of the dog, haven't you? All right, here's one. Beware of covetousness. It'll eat you up. Now here's his story.
He spake a parable unto them, saying, The ground of a certain rich man brought forth plentifully. And he thought within himself, saying, there wasn't any prayer about this, he thought within himself, saying, What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits? And he said, This will I do. I will pull down my barns and build greater. And there will I bestow all my fruits and my goods. And I will say to my soul, this fellow was suffering from high strain. He didn't know there was anybody else in the world, but I. I will say to my soul, Soul thou hast much goods laid up for many years, take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry.
But God said unto him, Thou fool. He's a successful businessman, but he's a fool. He is highly respected in his community, but he's a fool. Everybody envies him, but he's a fool. God said he was a fool. This night thy soul shall be required of thee. Then who shall those things be which thou hast provided? So, now get the point. This is the application the Lord Jesus tells us now why he told us this story. So is he that layeth up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God.
Young people, it's either going to be self or God, and you're going to make that decision. And some of you may already have done so. I spoke to a group of young people one time. I won't tell you where, because you might have some friends living there. But I spoke to a group of young people one time about this topic, not from this chapter, but about this topic of whether or not we put God first or whether we live for this world, here and now. There was a young lady there who was in her first year of college, and most of the kids in the young people's group were in high school, and so, of course, she was about eight feet tall, you know, and they really were all go-eyed, and she'd been the way to college, and she was really spreading her knowledge around.
And as all of these young people stood around and listened to the pearls of wisdom dropped from her lips, she said, Not knowing that I was just outside the door in the hallway, she said, Well, that's what he thinks about it. But I don't see any reason why you can't live for the Lord and still have plenty of nice things in this world. Are you surprised when I tell you that that's exactly the way she has lived? She's married now. I saw her last fall. She lives far from the place where she was there and far from the Lord.
And she has lots of nice things. She and her husband are both working, and they both have good jobs because they're both college-trained people. They have a beautiful home. He drives a Cadillac, and she drives some kind of a sports car that I don't recognize. and they're enjoying this world. There's not much of the smell of God about them. You can't do it. It is absolutely impossible for you to have both worlds.
It's either going to be self or God, and you're going to make that decision. That's just what the Lord said. And this man made the wrong decision, and God said he was a fool. And I hope there aren't any fools in my audience tonight. I'm leaving St. George in the morning. That's why I'm so blunt. I try to tell it the way it is anyway. If you live for yourself, my blessed Lord said you're a fool, and you're not rich toward God. and he said unto his disciples now he had been talking to all the people together and knowing that they would not understand what he now has to say he turned to the disciples specifically those who professed to be his followers and he said to his disciples therefore I say unto you take no thoughts and this means worry anxious thought take no thought for your life What ye shall eat, neither for your body what ye shall put on.
The life is more than meat, and the body is more than raiment, clothing. Consider the ravens, for they neither sow nor reap, which neither has storehouse nor barn, and God feedeth them. How much more are you better than the fowls? You'll buy that, won't you? Huh? You're worth more than the fowls, aren't you? Even if you're chicken. Of course you're worth more than many fowls. Well, the Lord said, I take care of the fowls. Don't you think I can take care of you? And which of you was taking thought can add to his stature one cubit?
That's the length from the man's elbow to the point of the longest finger. Approximately eighteen inches on the average. You'd have quite a time adding eighteen inches to your stature. That would make you an all-American center, maybe, in basketball. But you can't get the job done. You do everything in the world you can to stretch a little bit. I beat my dad by a half inch, but I didn't make what I tried to make at all. I had an uncle who was six foot six, and I was shooting for that. But I made six foot and a half inch. That's the best I could do. Well, I don't know that I had anything to do with that.
I just thought I wanted to be tall. But somehow or other, taking thought didn't do the job. You know that. The Lord said, all right, if you care to do that. If you then be not able to do that thing which is least, Is that easy for God? Oh yes, all he has to do is make a little adjustment of the pituitary gland in the back of your brain. That's all. He just twists a little knob there and you get eighteen inches taller. It's very simple. The Lord can do it easily. He said, now if you can't do that, what makes you think you're going to do anything else that's worthwhile for yourself? Consider the lilies, how they grow. They pile not, they spin not.
And yet I say unto you that Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. If then God so clothe the grass, which is today in the field and tomorrow is cast into the oven, how much more will he clothe you, O ye of little faith? And seek not what ye shall eat or what ye shall drink, neither be of doubtful mind. Now I want to call your attention to that expression. be of a mind. Well, that's what I want to talk to you about tonight. I want to talk to you about your attitudes. I'm not interested in what you do, particularly. I'm interested in why you do it.
I'm interested in your attitudes. And you ought to be interested in them, because God is interested in them. And the Lord is saying here, don't be of doubtful mind. Don't have a wrong attitude about things. For all these things do the nations of the world seek after. And your Father knoweth that you have need of these things, but rather seek ye the kingdom of God. And all these things shall be added unto you. Fear not, little flocks, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you eighteen inches more on your height.
Oh, he can beat that. To give you better clothes? Oh, he's going to do better than that. To give you enough to eat? Oh, he's got plans way beyond that. It's his plan to give you the kingdom. How long has it been since you thought about being a king? Did you ever have any plans in that direction at all? Well, you say you have to be born in the right family to be a king. Well, if you're a Christian, you are in the right family. And God is going to make us kings and priests. He says, I'm going to give you not just a little more of the things on this earth. Don't waste your time gathering a little of the dust of this earth.
And after all, gold is dust. Don't spend your time gathering the things of this earth. I'm going to give you the kingdom. Whose kingdom? The kingdom that he's given to his son. We're going to share that kingdom. The Lord Jesus himself said so. He said, if you ever come, that is, if you triumph over this world by believing me, you rise above this world, I'm going to permit you to sit on the throne of me, even as I am overcome and am set down with my Father on his throne. That's what he said. And I believe that literally. And I believe that anybody who goes in for this world has picked the wrong world.
It's your father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell that you have and give alms, that is, help the poor. Provide yourselves bags which wax not old. Money bags. Where do you put your bag? Where do you put your money? Where do you keep it? The Lord said, you better be careful to get it in the right place. A treasure in the heavens that faileth not.
When no thief approaches, neither moth corrupteth. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. Now we're back to that same thing I said we're going to watch for tonight. It's a matter of attitudes. It's not a matter of your treasure particularly. It's a matter of your heart. It's a matter of your attitude. The danger is that we will get attached to these things and our attitudes will be all wrong. Let your loins be girded. That means in those days men wore long kind of robe things, you know, and they hiked them up to their knees and then put a belt tight around their waist, and that way they could walk without this thing flapping around their shanks.
And he said, now get ready to move. We're going to leave this place. That's the way he did the children of Israel back there in the twelfth of Exodus, you know. Get your loins girded and get ready to move. We're going to leave this place. That's the attitude that's right. Let your loins be girded about and your lights burning. and ye yourselves like unto men that wait for their Lord, when he will return from the wedding, that when he cometh and knocketh they may open unto him immediately. Blessed are those servants. Blessed means happy, usually, in the Bible. Happy are those servants whom the Lord when he cometh will find watching. Verily I say unto you that he shall gird himself.
and make them to sit down to meet, and we'll come forth and serve them. And if he shall come in the second watch, or come in the third watch, and find them so, blessed are those servants. And this know that if the good man of the house had known what hour the thief would come, he would have watched and not have suffered his house to be broken through. Be ye therefore ready also, for the Son of Man cometh in an hour when ye think not. And Peter said unto him, Lord, speaketh thou this parable unto us, or even to all.
And the Lord said, Who is that faithful and wise steward whom his Lord shall make ruler over his household to give them their portion of meat in due season? Blessed is that servant, whom his Lord, when he cometh, shall find so doing. Of a truth I say unto you, that he will make him ruler over all that he hath. But, and if that servant say in his heart, My Lord, delayeth his coming, and shall begin to beat the men, servants, and maidens, and to eat, and to drink, and to be drunken. The Lord of that servant will come in a day when he looketh not for him, and at an hour when he is not aware, and will cut him in thunder, and will appoint him his portion with the unbelievers.
Number one, what is your attitude toward God? Well, you say, I'm a Christian. That's a good start. That isn't enough. Christians do not always have good attitudes toward God. I've reared a lot of boys and girls. My wife and I have cared for about five hundred of them in the last third of the century. And some of those boys and girls have called me dad and outwardly seemed to be quite respectful, but inside they were boiling.
In fact, one of them borrowed a twenty-two rifle from a friend of his to shoot me with. and then hid it in the grass out behind the house where he was living, building where he was living. And the Lord guided me to go around there and stumble onto it, and he had to come and admit that it was a borrowed one in order to get it back to his friends. He didn't shoot me. The Lord was looking after me. He's a good friend of mine now. After he served time in the Air Force, he came back home to see us. In fact, when he got his vacation, he was in Paris, stationed there with the Air Force, and they flew him back to the United States, and then they gave him travel pay to Colorado Springs by plane.
And instead of flying to Colorado Springs to see us, we were all the parents that he had. He rode the bus both ways, a pretty rough trip, in order to have enough money left over so that he could buy for mother and me a nice Christmas present. Now, he called me dad both times, the time he had the gun and the time he had the nice desk clock for my desk. He called me dad both times, but you see, the attitude is pretty, quite a bit different. I'm allergic to twenty-two shots. And I was unhappy about that. And I was a lot more unhappy about the fact that he hated me that much.
I found out why. It was a misunderstanding. He just thought that something that happened was my fault and he didn't know any other way to cure it. You say you're God's child, what's your attitude toward God? Let me suggest a few things to you. If you do not pray about your affairs, you make your decisions on the basis of your own adequate gray matter. You do not pray about your affairs, then you are a practical atheist. Does that get you?
Well, that's absolutely true. That's the way some people live. They totally ignore God, as though he did not exist. They're shocked when somebody comes out with a statement that God is dead. But to all intents and purposes, he might as well be for a person who ignores him and doesn't pray about anything. Suppose that you spend your life in trying to gather things. What does the Lord say about covetousness? He says it is idolatry. Now that's a pretty bad attitude toward God. But a person who loves things is an idolatry.
He's not satisfied with God. What about a pleasure seeker? What about a person who lives for pleasures, lives for what he can enjoy in this life? That person says... In effect, God is inadequate. He's not enough. He's like a husband who isn't satisfied with his wife. He doesn't want to spend time at home. He not only wants Friday night out with the boys, he wants Saturday night and Sunday night and Monday night and Tuesday night. He doesn't want to be with her because he is unhappy with her.
He's dissatisfied with her. If you don't spend time with the Lord, if you're not finding any joy in Him, all I can say is that you must be, you must feel, you must think that He is not enough. What's your attitude toward God when something happens in your life that you can't quite understand? Say, some difficulty. You don't get your way about something. Something happens in your life. that isn't the way you wanted it to be. Do you complain at God? Do you ask petulantly, why would God do that to me?
What you're really saying is God is not fair. God just isn't treating me fair. What do you say when you are not willing to give liberally to the Lord? You give stingily and grudgingly. What are you saying? You're saying God is a robber. He wants too much from me. If you're shocked a little by these things, you ought to be. What should be the right attitudes toward the Lord? There are many more of these. I dare you to make a list of your own.
I just dare you to do it. Sit down anonymously, make a list of your own attitudes, your own hard attitudes toward God. What are the right attitudes toward God? Well, first of all, I think this chapter suggests in the tenth verse, we didn't read this, but it talks about forgiveness. I think the first thing is that our attitude toward God ought to be that we really believe that God has forgiven us our sins. You can't be right with God if there's sin between you and God. If you think about God and sin comes up between you, you might as well do something about that sin. Get that matter settled right now, because you will never have any fellowship with God until you get that matter of sin settled.
Two can't walk together except they be agreed. If you've never been forgiven initially, that is, you've never come to the Lord the first time, you've never been born into his family, You've never received Christ as your Savior. It's no use for you to think about a right attitude toward God. You've got that great heap of sins charged to you, and you better get them straightened out. And the only way you can get them straightened out is through the finished work of Christ. Only because the Lord Jesus took your place and died for your sins. That's the only reason that you can be forgiven. And that's reason enough. But even as a Christian, You want to be sure that there is no unforgiven seeing, no unjudged seeing in your life.
That's a right attitude toward God. When you clear the air, get the things out of the way. Whenever I find that I'm not, I don't have very good rapport with one of my boys and girls at the children's home. I try to have a little talk with them. I used to call them into my office, but I found out that they froze up when I did that. So instead of that, I say, I've got to go pick up something. Somebody called and said, we've got some donuts they want to give to the home. How'd you like to go along with them and get it? And then on the way there, I kind of casually bring up these things and and you're going along thirty miles an hour and they can't get out, so you've got a pretty good chance to kind of talk things over, you know, and you do it sort of casually, and pretty soon something comes out.
You find out there's what the trouble is, what's bugging them. And when you find out what it is, you get the thing straightened out, and sometimes it's my fault, sometimes it's his fault, her fault, but whatever it is, get it straightened out, and then we can go back home and good turn. Now you need to do that with your Heavenly Father. You need to know that you're forgiven. And then this chapter says, Little flock, you ought not to have any fear because God is your Father. Did you notice that? We read that in verse thirty-one. Thirty-two.
It is your Father's good pleasure. Is God your Father's Now don't assume that because you were born in a Christian country, quote, unquote, that God is your father. If the cat had kittens in the oven, do you think they'd be biscuits? Just because you happen to be born in the United States has nothing to do with your being a Christian? It has absolutely nothing to do with your being a Christian. When did you receive Christ as your Savior? I don't care when you joined the church.
My father joined three of us before he was saved. He used to be in show business. And he decided when I was coming along, they'd been married for ten years, and he and mother played in the dance orchestra, and he was a vaudeville performer, comedian on the stage. And they decided that the time would come that they ought to settle down and be religious. So he joined three different churches, one after another, and they baptized him at wherever one of them. He was a wetter sinner you ever saw. But he didn't have a sin. He'd never been born again. You can't take sins away by baptism. And my father had absolutely nothing until he heard the gospel and received the Lord Jesus as his Savior.
And when that happened, God was his father. I don't believe in the universal fatherhood of God and the universal brotherhood of man for the simple reason that it isn't in this book. That's my textbook. Is God your father? That's a good attitude. You can say father. People look up to him and say father. I had the privilege of leading an old cowpoke to the Lord out in the West, out in Colorado, rough character. He really was concerned, came to the special meetings that I had and stayed behind in the schoolhouse where I was preaching.
And after the meeting was over, the rest of them had gone. He said to me, you know, I never thought much about these things, but he said, I reckon I'm not ready to meet God. I said, are you a sinner? And he said, I sure am. He said, would you like to get right with the Lord tonight? Well, he said, if I understand it, Christ has already paid my debts, and all I have to do is accept him. I said, that's exactly right. You willing to accept him? He said, I sure am. I'll take him right now for my Savior. Well, he said, hey, I just got saved. I didn't have to tell. You don't have to tell people. Don't put words in people's mouths. If you have to tell them they're saved, they're not. The Spirit of God tells them quick enough.
Whenever anybody knows that they've trusted the Lord, they have no problem at all saying it. And I said, that's wonderful. Would you like to thank the Lord for it? He said, yes, I wish you would. I said, I didn't say that. I said, would you like to thank him? He said, me, pray? Well, he said, man, live. I never prayed in my life. Well, I said, you won't get started any sooner. Let's get down and thank the Lord right now. I said, I'll thank him first. And then you just tell him in your own words that you thank him. Well, said, I'll try. So we got down on our knees, and I thank God for his confession of faith and very simply for what the Lord had done for us. And then I didn't hear anything, so I sneaked a peek to see what was going on. And this fellow had his eyes squinted, tight shut.
He sure he had them good and shut, and he was trying to get his hands fixed right. He knew they were supposed to somehow, they were supposed to get like this, you know. Finally got them all fixed the right way, and then he said, Father, He opened his eyes and blinked and he said, he said, it sure is good to call your Father. Now who told him to call God his Father? The Holy Spirit did. That's who did. You have received the Spirit of adoption whereby you cry, I'm a Father. I didn't have to tell him that God was his Father. I didn't have to tell him to say, Father. The Spirit of God led him to do that. And his life proved subsequently that he really had trusted Christ.
Now, your attitude toward your father ought to be one of trustfulness. If you could trust him to keep you out of hell and take you to heaven, you certainly could trust him about the foods that you need and the clothes that you need and the job that you need and the right school to go to and the right girl or the right fellow to marry. You pray about that? Of course you pray about it. You're pretty conceited if you think you're smart enough to pick out a mate for life. Nobody's that smart. Nobody knows enough to pick the right girl or the right fella to spend the rest of your life with. And it's for keeps. When you get married, you remember that. You're getting married for life.
And you better be praying about it. And I'll tell you another thing. If you're a Christian, you better stay away from the non-Christians. I mean, don't even keep company with them. Be friendly with them, of course, bring them to the meeting. But I mean, don't go with an unsaved person if you're a Christian. because going with them, going steady with them, leads to marriage. And once your emotions get involved, it'll be too late then for you to make that decision. So if you make the decision right now that I'm not going to marry a non-Christian, you may save yourself an awful lot of trouble. Because if you marry one of the devil's children, you're going to have trouble with your father and all.
You put that down in your little black book. That's exactly the way it's going to happen. You're in for real trouble if you marry a non-Christian. But oh, if the Lord leads you into this, he is such a good heavenly father, he can do so much better for you than you can do for yourself. And so, you should trust him as a loving father. And then he says in verse twenty one, you should be rich toward God. Now I have some friends, put a question mark after that, who are rich but not toward me, if you get what I mean.
Now the Lord said, I want you to be rich toward God. Not just rich toward yourself. Rich toward God. What's your attitude toward God? I don't believe in tithing for the simple reason that tithing does not go with New Testament Christianity. Tithing presupposes that you own something, and our chapter says that you're a steward, and the steward doesn't own anything. A steward is a keeper of somebody else's goods. Under the Old Testament law, a man was an owner. If he was a godly Jew, God blessed him by giving him good crops, and a big family and all of the earthly blessings.
But in the New Testament, godly men have starved to death. Paul said, I know how to be hungry and I know how to be full. You think he was more spiritual when he's full and when he was hungry? Of course not. This is something that we may expect in the New Testament. If God gives you blessings of a temporal nature, that's just a bonus. But it's not anything that you can claim. You are a steward for Him. Now, if you tell the Lord that you're going to give Him ten percent, you're saying that the other ninety percent belongs to you, and it just isn't so. If you say, I'm going to give the Lord his day, the Lord's day, at least the morning, but the other seven days belong to me, you're mistaken.
You're a steward, and you're here for Him. And when you believe this, your attitude toward Him will be that of being rich toward God. And then we saw here that you don't need to worry about things because you're part of his little flock. Now, who ever heard of a sheep worrying about where he's going to get his pasture the next week? Did you ever see a worried sheep? And yet Christians are constantly worrying. The reason you and I worry is because we say that's something that we inherited from Aunt Fanny. And it's not. It's a sin. And if you'd call it a sin, you could get rid of it. But you don't call worry a sin.
You call it a weakness. And consequently, you rely on worry. If you'd take this thing to God and say, my attitude is wrong, and I confess it as a sin, and I don't want to worry anymore. I'll tell you, when you've got forty-five, fifty children waiting to be fed, if you're the worrying kind, you're not going to last very long. And yet in the third of a century, my wife and I have reared children. We've had an average of about fifty of them in our care all the time. And it cost a lot of money to feed those children. When somebody said to me, how can you carry a load like that? And I said, who made you give the impression that I am carrying that load?
These aren't my children. These are the Lord's. All he did was to ask me to take care of them. If he asked me to take care of them, I expect him to pay the bills. And he has paid the bills. I'd kill myself off if I worried about that. But because he is a God who can be trusted, I don't mean to just hold myself up as an example. I don't mean to tell you that I haven't any misgivings, and there haven't been times when I have been disturbed. But I say that as I learn God's ways, I am able to say this is in God's hands. That's the right attitude toward God. What's your attitude toward things? Do you love things?
Does it take things to make you happy? Would a bigger house make you happy? Would a bigger car and a newer car make you happy? Or any car, just a set of wheels. What would it take to make you happy? A man? What would it take to make you happy? What do you want? Tell me what you want, and I'll tell you what kind of a character you have. Because desires develop character. You become what you want. Some people go after gold and silver. They go after money until they just, they become so grasping.
That's all they know. They spend their entire days grabbing a little more gold, a little more silver until they finally clink into their coffin. What kind of a life is that? What about people that are constantly reaching out for more and more things? Why, the Lord said, that isn't the way to live. Have your loins girded. Be ready to leave. Don't get your roots down that far. Christ is coming back. You might come tonight. You've got any unfinished business? Would you be ready to leave if he came tonight? That's the question.
And that's the right attitude toward things. Instead of grasping, be giving. Sell what you have and give arms. Lay up your treasures in heaven. It's a wonderful investment to put money into new kingdom real estate because it's constantly increasing in value. Do you think that you could have sold Abraham the first national bank corner in Sodom after the Lord told him he's going to burn the place down? What kind of an investment would that have been? And he believed that the Lord was going to destroy that city, and he had no interest in it except the souls who were there.
He prayed for the souls who were there. Now don't you get your roots down too deep in St. Louis. Don't get your investments too low. In Philadelphia, during the fog, the birds were flying south. And the young birds that had been hatched out that summer were not very strong, and they were flying too low. And in the fog, crossing one of the parks, so many of the birds struck one of those tall statues that they found dead birds around the bottom of that statue the next morning. In the flight, in the fog, they had rammed into that statue, flying too low.
Oh, there aren't any young birds here tonight flying too low. What's your attitude toward the unsaved? Our chapter tells us that we ought to have our lights burning. We ought to be witnessing. By the way, all light is produced at the expense of burning. You know that, don't you? These lights are going to burn out. All light burns, whether it's a candle, incandescent, fluorescence, whatever it is, anything that light burns. And the Lord Jesus said about John the Baptist, he is a burning and a shining light.
You're either going to burn out for the devil or you're going to burn out for God. And you might as well make it worthwhile. You're going to burn out anyway. Why not burn out for him? Why not spend your life for the Lord? Why not gladly give your light? Because this is a dark world. For all you know, there might be somebody in your class at school or living neighbors to you in your neighborhood or working with you in your place of business who will never have another opportunity to hear the gospel except at your lips, who will never learn what real Christianity is except they see it in you. That's a big responsibility.
What's your attitude toward your enemies? While the Lord said in verse thirty-nine, if he had known when the thief would come, he would have watched. You've got some enemies all right. This chapter tells us about some people in the first chapter, in the first verse, who are spreading the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy. You've got to be careful what your enemies teach you. Don't get agglied about your teachers, young people, in high school or college. Don't assume that because this person has a Ph.D., that he necessarily is an authority on Scripture. If he had his Ph.D.
in chemistry, would you go to him to get your watch fixed? What's that got to do with it? Not a thing in the world. He's got his Ph.D. in education. Does that make him capable of telling you how to get to heaven, or whether the Bible is true or not? Of course not. He specializes. She specializes. Believe what they teach you that can be proven. Take the rest out of the grain of salt. If I could tell you, if I have the time to tell you the things that I learned when I studied science. Quite a while ago, and none of your business how long ago. Quite a while ago, I studied science, and they told me a whole lot of things they said was science.
And I tell them to my kids now, and they laugh, and they say, but, Dad, that isn't scientific. I said, I've got a science book in my library to prove that that is scientific. That's what they taught me when I went to school. What was science then is not science now. I mentioned the pituitary gland a while ago, which is a little tiny gland the size of the end of the man's little finger. And it's buried deep inside the base of the brain. And when I went to school, they told us that that is a vestigial remnant, that is something carried over from some time in the past, and it has absolutely no function. And now they find out that's the engineer for the whole body. It's a good thing it wasn't stuck out somewhere like your tonsils or that it whittled them out.
That's what they did with the tonsils. Now they found out that tonsils are very necessary. It's the septic tank for the whole system. We used to take our children's tonsils out by the dozen because it was cheaper that way. But we don't do it anymore. We've learned now that we just don't do that kind of thing. God didn't put anything unnecessary in your body, but that was science. And what is science today won't be science next week or next year. So don't take anything that science says as disproving something that the Bible says. The Bible stands like a rock undaunted. And you can trust it. What's your attitude toward fellow Christians?
Well, one thing I think would determine that. We read about a servant here who was feeding his fellow servants. But then he said, the servant who doesn't believe that his Lord is coming back again will begin to beat his fellow servants. Your attitude toward fellow Christians is either that of feeding them or beating them. And not literally, of course, but figuratively. Let me ask you, Christians, do you ever put a fellow Christian on your dissecting table and take him apart?
That's wicked. That's absolutely wicked. Gossip is an unmitigated evil, and there is no excuse for it. And men are guilty of it just as much as women. If you haven't got anything better to talk about than a fellow Christian, then stop talking. Give your tonsils a rest because you're sinning when you talk about other people. What's your attitude toward the coming of Christ? Oh, my dear friend. I think this is the very touchstone.
I think this is why the Apostle Paul wrote by the Spirit of God that the Lord is going to give a special reward, a special crown for those who love his appearing. I think this is the very touchstone. How do you tell if a wife loves her husband? One of the ways you tell is her anticipation of his return. one of the ways you tell that a Christian really loves the Lord is that he wants him to come back he hopes that he'll come back today and if not today then certainly tomorrow we have some dear friends in Kansas City or did have one has gone home to be with the Lord now we expect to stop tomorrow evening and see Aunt Jess we call her she's an elderly Christian when she and her husband were saved The coming of the Lord was so real to them, but they went to a little sign writer.
They couldn't get a text like this. They had a text made printed on both sides. And on one side of the text it said, He may come before morning. And the other side said, He may come before night. And the corners are worn off of that text from being turned twice a day. It hangs right over their little breakfast nook where they eat together. Every morning they turn that text over so it says, He may come before night. And then as they have their dinner together, they turn it back over again and it says, He may come before morning. And they've been doing that for twenty-five years. Oh, I'd like to get my hands on that little text.
When Aunt Jess is taken away, Chris is gone now. When she's taken away, I'd like to get my hands on that little text. I think that's one of the most wonderful truths I've ever seen for real anticipation for the coming of Christ. And you can go for days without ever thinking about His coming. You've got to get a bad toothache or some problems in your life before you hope that the Lord will come back again. What's your attitude toward his coming? Four words in this chapter. Verse thirty-six, wait. Wait. What are you waiting for? Are you waiting for the Lord to come back? Are you waiting for the Republicans to get out of office and the Democrats to get back in?
You waited a long time for the Republicans to get in. That didn't cure all your problems. Now you hope the Democrats will get back? What are you waiting for? The end of the Korean conflict? Are you naive enough to think that at the end of Korean conflict that everything is going to be just lovely? Do you know that since the First World War, the war that was fought to end all wars, that there has not been one single month of history that there hasn't been war somewhere in the world in the last half century? What are you waiting for?
Are you waiting for a more favorable monetary situation? Some people wanted tight money. They had some to loan. Most others want money to get a little cheaper again, because we need to borrow some. Is that what you're waiting for? Or you say, I'm just living for the day when I can get my new home. Do you know most homes, most new homes, are bought for people that are about ready to leave them? They raise their kids in a rented house, in a little bit of a place where they're all crowded up. When they get to where they've made enough money, they can go out and buy one that's too big for them to take care of, and they do this. You wonder if their heads are screwed on straight.
But that's the way people live. We're not interested in the coming of the Lord. We're waiting to get what we want here on this earth. And the second word is in verse thirty-seven, and that's a better word yet. It's watching. Two fishermen came home. One of them got off the boat, professional fishermen, fishing for a living. One of them got off the boat, and his wife was standing there in the rain, and she took him by the arm, and they went up to their little cottage together, and the other one plodded up the hill, and when he came to his door, lighted up, his home was lighted up.
When he came to his door and stepped inside, his wife said, Oh, hello, John, I was waiting for you. And he said, Yes, I'm glad you were, dear, but Bill's wife was watching for him. Kind of felt that, you know. Unreasonable, I know, but husbands are always unreasonable. He just would kind of like to have found her watching as well as waiting. Are you really watching for the Lord to come? I didn't say watching the signs. Nothing wrong with watching the signs if you want to, but that isn't what we're to watch for. We're to watch for His return. And then the third thing is ready. That's in verse forty.
Be therefore ready. Are you ready for the Lord to come? Did you ever catch a child in something they shouldn't be doing and see the guilty look all over their faces? Were you ever caught in something you shouldn't have been doing? Kind of uncomfortable, isn't it? Would you like for the Lord to come? Well, let's put it in the past. Would you have wanted the Lord to come last night at ten o'clock? Would you have wanted the Lord to come last summer when you're on your vacation?
Would you have wanted the Lord to come When you went out with that other couple, do you want the Lord to come tonight? Are you ready? Now, if you've got any unfinished business, I suggest you get it straightened up. If you're not saved, you're not ready. You can't be ready without Christ. If the Lord Jesus would come this minute, There's a nice new hundred and twenty-five dollar watch that was just given to me by friends who have a jewelry store, people I stayed with out in Portland. If the Lord comes before me, leave this building, you're welcome to this watch if you're left behind.
But I feel sorry for you if you pick it up, because you'll be left for judgment. It's an awful thing to be left behind when the Lord comes. and his coming could take place tonight. I don't know one single thing in the Scripture that has to take place before the Lord comes. And the last word is doing. The end of verse forty-three. Happy is that servant who when the Lord comes will find him so doing. Waiting for the coming of the Lord doesn't mean stand with your neck in a creek, looking up, expect to see the clouds parted. That isn't the way you watch for the Lord.
You're busy about the things that need to be done. Somebody said to me, do you think it's right to put up a hospital building at the children's home when the Lord might come? And I said, I can't think of anything I'd rather be doing when the Lord comes back than putting up a hospital for some of his little children. We got that hospital up twenty-five years ago. If I'd listened to him, I don't know what we've done with the kids all these years. Does that mean that I think that the Lord is not coming because I'm busy about what he gives me to do? Of course not. It means that I want to be doing when he comes. What are you going to be doing when the Lord comes? Are you going to be gathering a few more shekels to yourself?
You're going to be just living to have a little more fun in life? You're still trying to make a name for yourself? What are you living for? What are you doing? Now, if you sleep well tonight, I say it literally. I want to get to you. I want you to do some thinking. I want you to be honest enough to face up to these things in the presence of God and to make a difference in all of us. And I'm going to try to do it myself. I've been through this chapter a number of times lately. And every time I have done so, the Lord has spoken to me about these things. And I want to share them with you. I hope by God's grace.
But your attitude toward the Lord, toward things, toward people, toward the return of Christ will be different from this night forward. Let's pray. I like a little more rope than they got here.
I'm glad the sudden it's drawn straight up and I'm on a horse's back or something. I'd be dubious. I'm going to read you some definitions and not tell you what the word is and see if you can think what our subject is this evening. One of the definitions is this, and this is quoting from the dictionary directly, training to act in accordance with rules. Another definition, instruction designed to train.