Marks That Make a Difference — Proverbs 22

0:00 I was with an organization long time ago that that specialized in preaching in the open air. And while on staff at that organization, I... It was just it was just really, we were doing a seminar and a fella from a bible college in the South, we were having the seminar at the Moody Bible Institute, and this fella came up, he wanted to be... He wanted to take the seminar. He wanted to be what they called student staff while in college.

0:38 And in Bible College, wanted to be represent the the organization while in Bible College. And so he wanted to be on student staff. And so I thought, okay. We need to talk to him. The kid...

0:50 The guy was a nice guy. I mean, tremendous guy. I mean, wanted to preach in the open air, wanted to really share his faith, and excellent. It was really cool. But he had a problem, and the problem was he had a hygiene problem, and he didn't smell real good.

1:10 He really didn't. And I thought to myself as as he... You know, we'd sit in a hot... It was during the summer in a hot van, and we'd go into the open air, and I... You know, I'd sit next to this guy, and it was it was...

1:25 You gag. Literally, it was that bad. And to the fact of, you know, everybody knew that. And so towards the end of the seminar, the powers of the the higher ups of this organization wanted me to interview him to interview him for student staff as well as talk to him about his hygiene problem. And I thought to myself, why are you telling me to do this?

1:54 Why don't you do that? You know? Why why is it falling on me to talk to him about this? And... But they said, oh, we really want you to do it.

2:08 How do you how do you tell somebody? And I thought, oh, man. What am I gonna do? So we sat in this chapel at Moody Bible Institute, and I said... It's just he and I in this chapel, a little smaller than this place right here.

2:22 And we were up front, and I said, I think, I'm thinking, okay, how do I how do I transition? Know? I said, tell me tell me a little bit about yourself. And he did. I said, tell me how you trusted Christ as your savior.

2:37 I thought this is a good bridge. You know? Just give a good good interview like that and tell me how... So he he told me. He said, was raised in a Christian home.

2:46 He said, my my... Both my parents were Christians, but I never espoused their beliefs. I did not believe in Jesus Christ as my savior that... When I was little. Did not do it.

2:55 I rejected it. He said, and when I grew up and I was a teenager, he said, at the end of my teen age years and my high school years, he said I got out of high school and was drafted into the United States Army and was sent to Vietnam. He said I was a I was just a regular grunt, and I just was rifleman on the... In a platoon, and we were slugging our way through the paddies, the rice paddies and the marshes and all this kind of stuff and saw combat, saw a lot of combat. And he said one day, we were fighting...

3:54 He said, Chris, and we were fighting, and they were coming on like a wave on us. And he said, I was just taking my m 16, and I was firing, firing, firing. And he said there was a a hole from a shell, from a more... Not a mortar shell, an artillery shell, big... Like a trench.

4:12 And as they were fighting, they knew that were gonna make a human wave. These guys, the North Vietnamese regulars, were gonna make a human wave at us and wipe us out. He said, so I pushed my radio man into the hall. I I, you know, literally threw him into the hall. And he said, and I started just a fire at the Vietnamese.

4:33 And he said, then all of a sudden, boom, he said, I got hit right in the forearm. And he said, I thought my arm was blown off with an AK-forty seven shell. Just hit them like this. And he said, I thought my arm... He said, I caught my M16 in my other hand, and he said, I put it on spray.

4:55 And he said, I fell backwards into the hole on top of the radio man. And he said, I knew it was all over for us because they were about to make this wave. And he said, as I was falling back, he said, it all came back to me in terms of how to trust Christ and what it meant to trust Christ in those milliseconds, and he falls back and he asked Jesus to be his personal savior. Be my savior right now. Forgive me of my sin.

5:25 Be my savior. I accept you as my savior. And he falls back and he waits. No human wave came. He said they didn't come.

5:37 They would have wiped us all out. But they didn't come. And then he takes his sleeve like this and he goes like this and he had in his forearm massive scar. It didn't blow his arm off, but it blew a hole right through his forearm. Massive scars, these these incredible scars and marks all over his forearm.

6:11 All I could say to that guy, I didn't even mention his hygiene. I didn't even bring it up. I just said, thank you. That's all I said. Thank you.

6:53 He smelled good to me. And I just thought to myself, this this fellow is willing to give his life for this country. He smells really good to me. I don't care about anything else. Marks that make a difference.

7:09 And I'd like us to look at this passage that we're going to... Psalm one, if you would turn there with me. Psalm one. We're going to look at we're going to look at the first three verses, but we'll read all six. It says this, and I'm reading from the King James version of the Bible.

7:29 It might be different in yours, but follow along anyway. It says, blessed is the man who walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in his law doth he meditate day and night. He shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth its fruit in season. Its leaf also shall not wither, and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.

8:01 The ungodly are not so, but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away. Therefore, the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous. But the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous. For the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous, but the way of the ungodly shall perish. When we look at this passage, you you know, you see here in this passage, we see three marks of a fruitful life.

8:52 And notice what he says here in verse one. Blessed is the man who walketh not. Notice the notice the construction here. Blessed is the man who walketh not, who walketh not, right, or sitteth not. Right?

9:07 It's a right posture in his walking, standing, and sitting. And I I just think it's really interesting because I think the psalmist gives us the... Takes a negative approach in the sense of the grammatical action of this, who walketh not, who who sitteth not, who standeth not, to get a positive result for us. And notice what he says, blessed is the man. Now that's an interesting word, blessed.

9:34 It's from the Hebrew word, Ashir. The English is blessed, but it means to be happy. It means, oh, how very happy. Oh, how very happy is the man. Now think about this just for a moment.

9:55 I was riding to Michigan State University to preach in the open air, I I saw... You know how sometimes these guys risk their lives to spray paint signs on sides of bridges? You know, they do that. They'll hang. I don't know how they do it.

10:09 I mean, maybe they're elastic man or something like that, and they'll they'll spray on the side on the bridge. They'll have... They... You have to hang on this. You have to get off.

10:18 You gotta hang, and you gotta spray this message for whatever it is, you know? Your girlfriend's name or whatever. Well, I'm driving, and I just thought it was really funny because as I'm driving, I look at this sign, this spray painted on the side of this bridge, and it says, Helios mom is a grump. This guy risked his life to put up that this guy's mother is a grump. And I thought...

10:48 I I mean, they cracked me up for 90 miles. I thought that was so funny. This guy's risking it because he must have really... That lady must have been a real grump for this guy to spray paint it on a bridge. And she must have seen it because maybe she drove from one exit and saw that thing.

11:06 I don't know but I just thought it was really kind of funny and I thought to myself, it is so true. It is so true. I think to myself that when we when we look at this verse, blessed is the man. Oh, how very happy. Isn't that the Christian life?

11:25 Isn't that the Christian life for us? So if I am not approachable, if I'm grumpy, if we we... You know, we... That's called sin, really, because I mean, I'm... Wow.

11:36 What's the matter? I didn't have my coffee. I didn't... You know, we use all these excuses, but we're grumpy. We're not we're not happy to be with or we're not even approachable.

11:48 Do you ever you ever meet people like that, just not approachable? I'm thinking to myself, if if I'm not approachable in the sense that people look at me and they go, oh, you're just you're just too much. You're just... I I don't even wanna go near you. You're so negative.

12:06 You're so down. You're so grumpy. You're so unapproachable. I'm asking myself the question now, what kind of Christianity do I have? You know?

12:19 I mean I mean, I'm not talking about I'm talking about over a protracted period of time. I'm not talking about, you know, you slam your hand in the door and somebody goes, you know, you got your keys with you or something like that, you know. And you just... Your hands are in the door and it hurts like a mad dog or you... Somebody hits you, hits your broken foot and you're going, that type of thing.

12:41 I'm not talking about that. I'm not talking about a once every once in a while. I would never mention Texas at all but you know, but I mean, you know what I mean. You know what I'm talking about. You're talking about a talking about a disposition of a person.

12:58 And if they're like, salt and grumpy, this is a cure. Oh, how very happy. For what? Oh, how very happy is the man who walketh notice the negative action here, the grammatically speaking, walketh not, who walketh not. Now, when I...

13:21 This this word means to walk assiduously or carefully, perseveringly. I always think when I think of this word walk in this passage, I think of a New York person from New York City. Do you ever see those guys? It's like a honking track meet. I mean, you've gotta have you gotta have good shoes on.

13:42 You walk with those people. I mean, I walked... I followed a lady one time. Was trying to give her a piece of literature, and she had her purse, the thing across the shoulder, the purse tucked underneath her arm like this, and she's walking like this. And I'm walking right next to her going, Jesus loves you.

13:59 She didn't even look at me. I said, I... I'm here. I really do exist. I am somebody, you know, and I've followed her.

14:08 But that's... This is what it is. It's like a walking. It's walking really hard. Who walketh not after the counsel of whom?

14:18 The ungodly. Who walketh not after the counsel of the ungodly. Now, this word ungodly, we look at this and it's really depicting here an issue, the counsel, the advice of the ungodly. The ungodly, you know, the advice of the ungodly. I think of people, you know, who will follow everybody but the word of God.

14:46 They won't take the advice of the word of God, thus taking the advice of God. They'll follow doctor Phil. They'll follow Joel Osteen. They'll follow Del Carnegie, power of positive thinking, all these kind of things. They'll follow all these different people.

15:06 They'll even follow ungodly advice. They'll follow the... Well, I heard that we should... Whatever. And and and I'm thinking to myself, hi.

15:16 Do that? You follow that kind of advice? You're not gonna be happy. You won't do it and you won't be productive. It's actually counterproductive because god knows the best way for us.

15:29 He knows the best way and how to let you live and how to help you live in terms of what exactly should I do? How should I raise my children? How should I understand this situation? How should I invest money? What should I do?

15:46 The word of god is clear on these issues. Teaches us how to live and that's exactly what Paul writes to Timothy. Timothy gets sound advice, big time sound advice in in terms of not only the word of god in terms of its nature. We look at this passage and we say, well, this is the word of god. We say it's god breathed for sure but all scripture is given by inspiration or god breathed and is profitable for what?

16:17 For teaching, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. Why? That the man of God may be mature, thoroughly furnished unto all good works. So how do I live? How can I live?

16:33 I don't follow the advice of the ungodly. I wanna follow the advice of God. I wanna take God's word, take him at his word, and follow it. And when I do that, blessed is the man who walketh not. Now, now you've got the try thing here.

17:13 He was told, you sit in that corner right now and and because of whatever infraction he did and he goes, he sits in there. He's sitting in there. He goes, I may be sitting in the corner but I'm standing up inside. This is what a lot of people are like. Standing in the way of sinners.

17:31 And way is the is the trodden path here. It's the path of least resistance and there's a lot of folks who are walking this way. So, it's a it's it's a well worn path and they're standing like this. Like a statue, actually. The Hebrew is really good on this one.

17:49 It talks about how they stand there like this and they're just standing like a statue facing it. I'm doing that. Now, that's a heart condition actually. Because this is metaphorically telling us, what is our heart like in terms of, you know, walking after and sinisterly after the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the way of sinners. Standing in this way, allowing these things to come into our lives and having all this stuff encroach.

18:20 Folks, it's unbelievable today. Barb was telling me when we were driving down Ohio from Michigan, she was telling about Steven Jobs and how he won't... He he... When he was alive, Steve Jobs, the founder of Apple Computer, the the designer of this little guy. Right?

18:41 He'd only let his kids be on this thing for just a short time each day. He made made him read. Made him do that kind of stuff, you know, because he didn't want that. But we we get so much information. Don't we?

18:57 I mean, it's unbelievable. We have so much information. You can watch today's game between the Browns and the Steelers on an iPhone. You can watch that whole thing. You can pay for it but you can you can do this.

19:10 You can get there and then they advertise that. Never missed it. Never missed a game. You can get cable with 14,000,000,000 channels. You know?

19:21 I mean, who can watch all that? You know? You'd have to be there all the time. Right? They're saying a lot of kids today aren't even going outside and playing.

19:32 You know? They got these big public service announcements. You know? 60. 60.

19:38 Just get your kids out for sixty minutes to play. I was talking to Murphy, Greg Steigelman, and when we were kids, you couldn't you couldn't get us in. You know, my mom would crash. It'd be dark. You know, we're still playing whatever catch like a moron in pitch black, you know.

19:57 You know? But we'd be out there playing and all this kind of stuff and not reading, of course. But it's just so much information, so much standing in the way of sinners, listening to all the information, missing the mark. That's what exactly what it means. To miss the mark and to stand there and say, you know, I'm going to hold to this.

20:27 I got friends of mine who are the crew of 52, who are shifting in terms of their doctrinal positions, listening to what the world has to say instead of what the Bible has to say. And I got the posture when I was talking to one of my friends like this that he's not budging. I don't care what the Bible says. This is it. That's standing in the way of sinners.

21:03 That's what it is. It's taking sides and standing there like a statue and going, here's what it is. It's not right. It's absolutely flat out wrong. But notice what it says.

21:17 The converse would be true. Unhappy is the man that stands in the way of sinners. Unhappy is the man that walketh insidiously after the counsel of the ungodly. Unhappy would be the person who sits in the seat of the scornful. And that's parking yourself.

21:39 You know, that's that sitting there and going, you know, and I'm right here in the seed of the scornful. Now, the seed of the scornful are guys who mock, who mock people, who mock religious things. And they think it's really funny. They mock it and they think it's really... That's, you know, really a lot of fun.

21:59 It's really, really funny. And it's scornful. The Bible says in Proverbs twenty two ten, to remove the scornful man. And then your way will have peace. But he tells us not to walk in this in the...

22:19 He tells us not to sit in the seat of the scornful. The mockers, the scorners, the... Who deride and mock. Blessed is the man. Right posture is really incredible for us.

22:36 And if you think, well, you know, it doesn't really... You know, this isn't me, Chris. This is not me. Why? Praise God for that.

22:44 If that's true, praise the Lord. That that... Praise God for that. But it could be. I mean, you think of of the the...

23:09 His nephew Lot the opportunity, what did he choose? Thompson Chain reference Bible talks about how the steps the step down, the steps that Lot did that went down to an ungodly life. And his decisions were that he he made these awful decisions. He chose the best part, you know, that he thought was the best. He went into Sodom and Gomorrah.

23:38 I mean, think about this born again, the saved guy, it is according to Peter anyway. The saved guy says to says to his guest, he's wants to send out his daughters. To have sex with these guys at, you know, anything but don't let my guests have that. Don't let these men, these homosexuals coming into the wall, pounding, almost breaking the door down. He goes out and thinks he can reason with these folks.

24:08 And we know that these two guests of Lot were angels. He grabs them and they blind them and they stagger around blind. Well, this is what it is, folks. Lot made bad decisions. We, as Christians, can make bad decisions based not on the word of God, not because we've sought the face of God, not because we've aligned our hearts and our minds with the word of God, but we've done it with the world.

24:45 Now, I want to ask you a question. What do you think? Who who can run your life better? You? Your friends?

24:55 Or God? Who can run your life better? And that was the big that was the big issue with my friend that led me to Christ. He said, I want my life to count. He said, is your...

25:08 He wrote... He didn't even save. He was just... He read Schweitzer, Tom Dooley. He read all these.

25:13 He read every biography, Abraham Lincoln. This guy was really a smart guy. He read everything he could get his hands on, every biography of of people who made a difference in this world. And he says, is there anybody else? I mean, he must have read a lot of guys.

25:30 Is there anybody else? He said, oh, I haven't read that biography of Jesus yet. So he's, where would I find that? He goes, oh, I'll read the bible. He started Matthew.

25:42 He read the New Testament. And by the time he got to Romans, he slipped out of his bed and kneeled on the side of his bed and said, forgive me for being a sinner. Forgive me. Be my savior. Because he realized that only Jesus Christ could make his life count.

25:59 Only Jesus Christ could make his life prosperous. And this is what the psalmist is telling us. The psalmist is doing. We need to do this all the time. We need to have the word of God always into us.

26:12 Blessed is the man who walks not. Oh, how very happy. I mean, Paul tells us this very thing. Paul tells us this very thing in the book of Philippians chapter four. When we look at Philippians chapter four, and I love this passage, although I I'm not sure if I'm really doing it very well.

26:34 It says, finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there be any virtue, if there be any praise, think on these things. Think on these things. How many things do we have that would match this that we think? When we look at verse eight, Philippians four verse eight, how many of those do we have in our life constantly? I'm just asking.

27:17 Just asking. Because if you're like me, I mean, you you you've you've come this morning because, well, maybe your parents made you come or you're here, you wanna be... You know, you say, I want the word of God to instruct me. Lowell, let's let the word of God instruct us. Let's let the word of God get to us.

27:39 Are we doing what God would ask us to do? You know, as I read the Bible, I read the Bible through and as I read the Bible, I can't tell you how many times God has asked me to trust him. Just trust me. Isn't that amazing? And I'm I'm...

27:58 You know, sometimes, you ever have this when you're in in your Christian life? You ever feel this way? You ever feel like, god, why don't you just talk to me? Like a friend would talk to you walking along and Chris, this is what you should do. Chris, I just wanted to let you know.

28:14 I felt like the Lord just saying to me, Chris, I've told you I love you. I do love you. My word tells you I love you. Believe me. I've shown you how to live.

28:34 Trust me. Take it in. Think about it. I'll give you wisdom even in thinking about it. I'll minister to you.

28:44 I'll bless yours. Didn't say this, but socks off. I said that. I don't think there's a Hebrew on this one. You know?

28:54 Bless your socks off. Socks. You know? But, you know, I just... He'll he'll do that.

29:01 We just take him at his word. We just take god at his word. You know, I love Campus Crusade for Christ now called crew. But in the old days, they had this little booklet. And people criticized this.

29:15 Evangelists have criticized this booklet, Fourth, Spiritual Loss. I don't know why. You know? Oh, we can't say that to people, that God loves them. No.

29:26 They're under the thumb, under the wrath of God. Well, wait a second. Isn't it true that God does love us? Isn't it true that God does love us and sent his son to show that love? So what's wrong with me telling a sinner that God loves you and does have a wonderful plan for your life?

29:50 First base being trust in Jesus Christ as your savior. And what's wrong with me telling somebody that God does have a wonderful plan for your life if you follow that plan as outlined in the Bible? Blessed is the man who walketh not. Oh, how very happy is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scornful. Folks, this is what...

30:20 This is the Christian life. Do you remember when you first got saved? Weren't you like thrilled? Weren't you... I got saved at 18.

30:27 I'm telling you, I'm going, God. God loves me. Are you kidding? Is there anything too hard for God? No.

30:38 Is fantastic. Where did I go wrong? Why hasn't that stayed with me? Why isn't that joy of my salvation continuing all the time? Or do I let the cares of this world and the things of this world encroach?

31:00 And am I starting to do what the Psalmist doesn't want me to do? I don't want to do that. I want to I want to let god be god in my life. I want to not delight But I don't... I do not wanna walk in the counsel of the ungodly.

31:23 I don't wanna stand in the seat of the the way of sinners or sit in the seat of the scornful. But notice that in verse two, because we we have a a rich program that God has given us. A rich program. And notice what he says in verse two, but his delight is in the law of the Lord and in his law doth he meditate day and night. It's a program of saturation.

31:59 I'm I'm a chocoholic. Hi, Chris. Feel like I gotta go to meetings or something. I love chocolate. I mean, put that Dove chocolate in front of me.

32:09 I'm like shaking. And if you really... If you're a chocoholic, never hang with the Hiltons. I even know where the secret stash is. I do.

32:24 I know it's right in the corner. Do you still have it in the corner? Oh, okay. I'm sorry. Okay.

32:29 I won't won't mention it anymore that I've loved their house, especially near that secret stash. You know? And I let... Oh, you know, and I... You know, Fantasy Fudge does it for me.

32:44 I... I've told you about Fantasy Fudge. I mean, I just... I I take Fantasy Fudge, and I've made it no nuts. But you just take that Fantasy Fudge, and you just put it in your...

32:53 And you go, mhmm. Now this is bad news. I mean, this is like four cups of sugar, two or three sticks of butter, and, you know, or olio or whatever. Oh, yeah. Bad.

33:05 Yeah. But, I mean, we're talking like the the pancreas the pancreas is going, what? Insulin, insulin, and we're going into a coma. That's what I'm going into and I'm going, oh, man. But I tell you what, the initial shot of this, you just put it in and go, I want to gargle with this stuff.

33:26 You know what I'm talking about. You know exactly what I'm talking about. I just want it. And you can tell when I've been to Fantasy Fantasy Land with Fantasy Fudge. I got the thing around here and my eyes are doing this.

33:40 I'm going, how's it going? And I start feeling listless. Maybe I got a problem. I sure do. I sure do.

33:50 But this is the word delighting. But but he delights in the law of the Lord. He delights in the law of the Lord. Delighting in the word of God. I I I wanna tell you my experience.

34:09 The less I read of the Bible, the less I want the Bible. The more I read of the Bible, the more I want the Bible. And the more I read of the Bible in terms of quiet time, whatever, I say to myself, and I really find out to myself, what a fool I have been for not having this in my life more. What a fool I am. I'm a fool for doing this.

34:35 His delight is in the law of the Lord. Did you ever walk at night, now I live in the country, did you ever walk at night and just look at the stars and go, I mean, the timing of it, NASA works on the timing of this. And I'm thinking to myself, you know, that moon is reflecting the sun. And I'm thinking, wasn't that beautiful? Look at that moon.

34:57 It's a full moon. It looks almost like daytime, almost, you know? And you look at this and you go, Oh, this is fantastic. And then I see Orion, and then I see Andromeda, and then I see the Big Dipper. And I think to myself, Abraham saw the same thing.

35:15 Joshua saw the same constellations. And in the desert situation, it's like you can just try to pick them out the sky. And you go, Wow, the magnificence of this. And then you see that little band, which is called the Milky Way, which is that platter. And you go, Oh, this is magnificent.

35:40 You who put this in the heavens, love me. You who hold everything together and have free millenniums? Can you hold my life together? Can you work in my life? The answer is yes.

36:06 The answer is absolutely yes. And he wants to and he will. And he will do that. But he... And then so when we think about that, we muse on that.

36:16 We delight in that. We say, how great is our God? And you start singing that song. How great is our God? Let me tell you how great.

36:28 Right? And you just... You get a little emotional about this because God is great. And we have relationship with him. He knows me, but I know him.

36:43 This delight is in the law of the Lord and in his law doth he meditate day and night. I... We we were teaching a class in open air evangelism. We were at this place and was in the country. It's called the fellowship deaconry in New Jersey.

36:58 I don't know. It's off of I 78. And it was really funny because we were allowed to rent their premises and they have a nice school building and all this kind of stuff. Our students were housed there and we were doing a class in this classroom and I gave them a test, you know, a regular test. And I remember going to the...

37:20 As they were taking their test, I'm going to the outside just looking out the window as they were testing. And at the fellowship deaconry, it's a farm and they have a lot of head of cattle. And I was looking at this one cow. I'm not a cow person myself, but I was looking at that and I said, what an utter shame. That was a joke.

37:46 Okay. This cow comes out of the gate and he just lumbers. I mean, the head's like massive. And he just lumbers and he I mean, it wasn't they weren't playing monopoly deal or anything. I mean, they weren't even hanging out with the other cows.

38:07 He's just by himself. He did this. Are you ready? And I'm going. Now I understand cows have four stomachs.

38:27 It's gross. Four stomachs and what they're what the cow was doing was natural. It was called chewing the cut. You never see a cow attack a tiger. Their jaws are not built for this.

38:43 They're grinders. They take it, swallow it, let some juices, whatever that is, and then come back up and grind, grind, grind, grind. They're getting as much nutrient out of that as possible. And I thought to myself, and in his law, does he meditate day and night? Spiritually speaking, we've got grinders.

39:10 We've got molars. We're to chew on the word of God, spiritually speaking, by thinking about it. Meditating. The word muse is to means to think. It means to think.

39:23 Amuse means... It means not to think. No thinking. That's why we have amusement parks. And we don't have to think.

39:33 We just ride the roller coaster and get sick. And we don't have to think about that. But this, we are to meditate day and night. And actually, the Hebrew word on meditate can mean to mutter. To mean to mutter.

39:49 And, you know, I wouldn't have a problem. I really wouldn't really have a problem if you were walking around under your breath muttering scripture. Muttering praise to God. Thank you, Lord. I just wanted to thank you so much for your grace.

40:04 Know? I don't think any... Except maybe the psychologist might have a hard time with it. But if you were to mutter this or to muse on this and to think about it, and thank you, Lord. Thank you for this.

40:15 We take so much for granted that God has given us and we never thank him. We never thank him. We can thank him. We can muse. We can think how great he is.

40:27 And this is exactly, but his delight is in the law of the Lord and in his law doth he meditate day and night. And then we have not only a right posture and rich program but a resultant prosperity. Notice verse three. And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water. Talk about abundant fruit.

41:26 You may hit a ball, play the piano, play the violin. We might be incredible, unbelievable. My another Dan Majeski. But I tell you what, it's all a loss if it's not in his will. But as David Livingston once said, you are invincible in the center of God's will.

41:52 I want my life to count. Don't you? Then turn it over to the one who can make it count. Read his love letter to you, the Word of God. And I want to tell you something, your outlook on life, if you got a sour outlook on life, I don't blame you.

42:14 Listen to, you know, listen to the news. It sours you right out. It does. It does. I mean, the different things that can really be, you know, we have to focus, we have to really think about what we're doing.

42:26 We have to muse on these things and think about how lovely he is. When we compare his countenance to this world, everything is ugly compared to him. It is. It's just ugly. We have to do that.

42:47 And I think to myself, we have to focus on this. It's a decision that we make on this. We really do. And the leaf, our leaf will have abundant fruit, will have abiding frame. He will keep us, you know.

43:01 He will keep us. His leaf shall not wither. It's no dry rot here. But whatever he do shall prosper. God will bless our lives.

43:11 It's not the prosperity gospel. It's not at all that. What it is truly what it is is that god will bless your life beyond your wildest dreams. God will minister to your life. He will bless your socks right off.

43:29 And isn't this what you want from him? Isn't this one of the reasons? This is one of the reasons. As I'm gonna, I want to be, I don't want to go to hell for sure. And I want to have my sins forgiven.

43:41 But I want my life to count. Don't you? He's telling us how to live. We have people telling us, don't tell me how to live. How you doing about it?

43:59 How's it working out for you? He's telling us how to live. And he gives us the power to do it. This is wonderful. This is the greatest.

44:15 And this is really the bottom line. Whatever little course we take and all the little things that go along with that course in terms of education, whatever it takes, you know, but is this the course that God wants me to go? I want to do it Because he'll bless it. He will bless it. Would you know today that God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life?

44:47 And he wants that feeling of peace in your heart and your mind over to other people. He really does. You're going down to the mission today. This is exactly what those guys are looking for. They're looking in a bottle or a needle or whatever, but that's what they're looking for.

45:13 We need to give them Jesus. We need to live Jesus. We need to have that in our lives. I hope you would agree with this. I really do.

45:23 I hope you would agree with this because this is really, really the bottom line. I don't know if I ever shared this illustration with you. It's always tough to know why you shared what you shared. But, true story, where a man, they called him a Tommy. He was a British soldier during World War II.

45:54 They called him Tommies like they called us Yanks. They called them Tommies. And he had his... He had just come back from France and his uniform was bloody and muddy and everything. And he gets on a London trolley car type of thing.

46:13 And he gets on and he's right... He plates his his bag and puts it above and his weapon above. He's got his weapon with him and he's got it. And so he sits down and he could feel he could feel people staring at him. This is during World War II.

46:33 He could feel them just staring at him. And nobody was really talking on this bus or trolley car. And it unnerved him. And so his stop came and he gets his bag, he gets his weapon, slings it over his shoulder, and he makes his way towards the doorway. And he stops right before the door opens, he stops.

47:01 And he looks at the people on the vehicle. And he says to them, he says, What are you looking at? Then he became indignant. He said, what are you looking at? And a shaky, elderly hand from a gentleman came and put it on his forearm.

47:30 We're looking at you, Tommy, because you're the only one worth looking at. And we've got a savior with the marks that made a difference in my life. The blood and the mud and the brutality of Calvary. The scars on his forehead, the holes in his hand, the sides on his feet, he is the only one worth looking at. Father, help us to keep our gaze on him.

48:12 Through your word, help us in our hearts and in our minds to revel in him. We thank you for your word that tells us how to live. Continually teach us, oh God, and help us, oh God, to rejoice with joy and full of glory. Help us to be blessed. Blessed is the man that walketh not in the council of the ungodly nor standeth in the way of sin and we ask you to help us.

49:08 And we ask these things in Jesus' name. Amen.