Alright, we're in third, John. Before we get started, one thing I forgot to mention.
If you're here to get baptized today, what you can do is, when I'm praying, right after the sermon,
while I'm praying, if you want to go change in the men's restroom or ladies restroom, if you're here to get baptized,
and then once you're ready, then we'll do the baptism over there.
So we'll be basically right after the second service, and so that's one thing I forgot to mention.
Now, we're starting our series on biblical health,
and this sermon is just kind of an introductory sermon, and we'll talk about a lot of different things,
but let me say that when it comes to sermons that I haven't really heard preached a lot,
I'd say health is probably the thing that you never hear preached in churches.
That's really like the sermon that's like the untouched sermon that nobody ever preaches on,
but quite honestly, I think it's an important topic because, honestly, we all think about our health all the time.
It's obviously very important to all of us, and that's why every single New Year's,
everyone has all these New Year's resolutions to get in better shape and things like that.
So obviously our health is very important to us,
and I believe that the Bible has the answers to all of the questions.
It seems that when people try to get in good shape,
like the first thing they often do is they just kind of go on Google and just see all these different methods,
but quite honestly, with everything, what we should do is go to the Word of God,
and you'd be surprised, and you will be surprised how much the Bible talks about it,
not just with our diet, but also with exercise and every topic.
The Bible does have the answers to us in life,
and as Christians, when we believe in the Bible, that ought to be our first thing to determine things.
And like with all topics, the world is basically in contrast with the Bible on a lot of stuff regarding this.
It doesn't matter what the topic is.
You know, last week as I preached on preparing for marriage,
look, the world has completely different ideas than what I preached. Isn't that true?
See, the world is always going to come in conflict with God's Word.
So during this sermon series, you might hear things, and you might say,
hey, I've never heard that before, but does the Bible teach it?
You must keep an open mind and realize that the Bible does have the answers to our questions in life.
Now, the first thing I want you to notice is in 3 John, starting at verse number 1, the Bible reads,
the first point is just basically this. Our health is important. Our health is important.
3 John 1, verse 1,
The elder unto the well-beloved guys, whom I love in the truth, Beloved,
I wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health, even as thy soul prospered.
Now, when he says that thou mayest prosper, I believe he's basically mainly referring to financially.
Then he says be in health, and that's obviously referring to your physical health, your physical well-being.
And what he says is this. I want you to have good health.
Above all things, I want you to have good health.
Now, this makes sense because, quite honestly, when I pray for people at church, these are kind of the two things I pray about.
Outside of them living for God, I pray that financially they'll be okay and that they'll have good health.
That's kind of what you pray about for people.
When we do our Wednesday evening prayer time after church, when somebody's sick, guess what?
We pray for them to recover. Our health is very important.
And it's very important to John just for somebody else, but how much more is your own health important to you?
I'll be honest, my health is very, very important.
It's one of the most important things for any of us.
Now, an example of someone who... There's a guy named Andrew Carnegie who was a very rich person.
I don't know if you guys know the name. He was a rich millionaire.
Probably in today's world, he'd be like a billionaire with a translation of money.
Very rich person, and guess what? He was in a wheelchair.
Now, it doesn't matter how much money you have, if you're in a wheelchair your whole life, how happy is he going to be?
He'd much obviously rather get rid of some of that money and have better health.
And I'm not saying that as anything against him.
I'm not saying this sermon series, if you have struggles with your health, this sermon series is meant to help you.
And we'll go through all kinds of different topics and talk about this, but basically, our health is very important.
Let's turn to Romans 12.
Now, let me say this, that there aren't really too many topics that I'm more opinionated about than in regards to our health.
When it comes to diet and exercise, I have extremely strong opinions, but quite honestly,
my job as a preacher is to kind of get rid of my opinions and just show what the Bible says specifically.
So I'm just going to show you things straight from the Bible.
It's not going to be my opinion mixed in, you know, there's going to be very little opinion.
And if I do tell you my opinion on a topic, I'll say, hey, this is my opinion, you decide for yourself.
But this whole sermon series is going to basically be straight from the Word of God.
And I think there's a lot of verses we just kind of read over really quickly and we don't really think about what it's actually saying.
Now, notice what it says in Romans 12, verse 1.
See, the Bible says that our bodies are a living sacrifice.
The way we live our lives, it matters to God.
Now, obviously, if you're living a life of sin that really matters to God, which is how we take care of our body matters.
Our bodies are a living sacrifice. We are meant to take care of our bodies.
This is the body that God gave us and we're only going to get one.
We are meant to take care of it while it's on earth.
Turn to 1 Corinthians 6.
And so we're not really talking about diet in this sermon, but you say, does God really care about what food I put into my body?
I would say, yes, he does. Our bodies are a living sacrifice.
Now, look, I'm not up here telling you that I have a perfect diet.
I'm not saying that, man, I'm in better shape than anybody in the world.
I'm sure there's people in this room that are in better shape than me.
But look, I preach on a lot of topics that I'm probably not the best at at this church, but I'm just here to show you what the Bible says.
But I am going to show you that the Bible is very clear about these things and how we should take care of our bodies.
1 Corinthians 6, verse 19.
What?
See, we oftentimes say, hey, we need to glorify God with our spiritual side.
No, he says glorify God in your body.
It's not just the spiritual aspect.
God cares more than just that you read the Bible every day.
He cares more than just that you're praying.
He cares more than just that you're going to so many.
No, he actually cares about how you take care of your body.
That's what it says in 1 Corinthians 6.
You say, why?
Our bodies are the temple of the Holy Ghost, the Bible says.
It matters to God how we take care of our bodies.
And I can tell you why the subject is never preached on.
By and large, because most Baptist pastors don't really take care of their bodies anymore.
And so they will never preach on it.
And look, the common joke in Baptist churches, which Baptist pastors will often preach,
boy, us Baptists, we love to eat, right?
Now look, that's not a bad joke if you're not in bad shape.
But if you look like Charles Spurgeon, if you look like D.L. Moody, then it's not that great of a joke.
D.L. Moody was the man that was known as, they said he shook two continents for Christ.
It's like, well, is that literal or figurative?
Look, it's not a funny joke if you don't take care of your body.
And look, I'm not saying I take care of my body perfectly and I still need to work on things,
but we're seeing what the Bible says.
It does matter to God.
Our bodies are the temple of the Holy Ghost.
It matters how we take care of our bodies.
It matters what we eat.
It matters whether we exercise.
These things matter.
Turn to joke two.
And the reason why I mention that, the people that I just named, I don't really like to call them pastors,
they're these hardcore repentant of sins heretics.
And it's like if you're telling people that they've got to repent of all their sins to be saved,
then it's just like, you know what, that includes everything.
You say, yeah, you've got to quit drinking to be saved.
It's like, yeah, but you're looking at pastors who don't take care of their bodies.
If you're always smoking a cigar, Charles Spurgeon in all the pictures,
it's like it doesn't really look like you're taking care of your body.
And so if you're going to tell everybody that they have to repent of all their sins
and quit lying and do everything perfectly, then it's like, you know what, how about start with yourself?
How about actually make sure that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost?
You're saying you've got to repent of your sins, then hey, go ahead and repent of all your sins.
Now, turn to joke two.
And in joke chapter two, not only do we see verses that health is important,
we say, well, Brother Stuckey, I don't know.
I don't know if our health is that important.
Say, I don't know if it's that big of a deal to God.
I don't know if it's that big of an issue.
Well, let me say this.
There's somebody who's probably a lot smarter than you that believed that health was important.
And I'm referring to the devil.
Notice what it says in joke two.
If you're familiar with the story, in joke chapter one,
Job lost all of his money and he lost all of his children.
Okay?
It doesn't get much worse than that, but he stayed faithful to God.
But even after that, the devil still had a plan.
Okay?
What he did next in joke two was he destroyed the physical health of Job.
And he believed that if he destroyed the health of Job, Job might curse God.
Job two, verse four.
And Satan answered the Lord and said,
Skin for skin, yea, all that a man hath will he give for his life.
But put forth thine hand now, and touch his bone and his flesh, and he will curse thee to thy face.
Okay?
So, the devil had a plan to get Job to curse God and to basically turn his back on God.
He said, if I can destroy the body of Job, it's going to make him so mad that he's going to curse God.
Why does the devil think that?
Because our health is very important to us.
We know that's the truth.
It matters to us what kind of health that we have.
Okay?
Now, look at joke two, starting at verse one.
Now let me say this, that our health is important.
But let me say this very clearly, that just because you have health problems,
it does not mean that you're in sin, and it does not mean it's your fault.
Now it could mean that it's your fault, but it does not mean necessarily that it's your fault.
Okay?
Notice joke two, verse one.
Again, there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord,
and Satan came also among them to present himself before the Lord.
In verse number one, we see that Satan is also coming with the sons of God.
That shows you that Satan is not a son of God, which means the sons of God are not fallen angels.
Okay?
The Satan is coming also in addition to the sons of God, meaning he's not a son of God.
That's what is saying in joke two, verse one.
That proves that the angels, the sons of God, are not fallen angels, like some people like to say.
Verse two, and the Lord said unto Satan, From whence comest thou?
And Satan answered the Lord and said, From going to and fro in the earth, and from walking up and down in it.
And the Lord said unto Satan, Hast thou considered my servant Job, that there is none like him in the earth?
A perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth evil.
And still he holdeth fast his integrity, although thou movest him against him, me against him, to destroy him without cause.
And here what the Lord says to the devil is that Job is a perfect and an upright man.
Now, perfect in the Bible does not mean that you're sinless.
It basically means you're complete.
So when he's saying you're a perfect and an upright man, he's basically saying that Job is a really good Christian.
Basically, he reads the Bible, he prays, he goes sobering. He does everything.
He doesn't live a life of sin. He's a perfect man.
That's what it's saying there.
But what he says is that, you know what, Job hasn't done anything wrong.
So when Job ends up losing his health, it's not because he committed some sin.
So just because you have health problems, that does not mean that you're in sin.
Turn to 2 Kings 13.
And look, we do not believe in the health of both Gospel programs.
And look, you can be perfectly right with God and have financial struggles, and you can have problems with your health.
That does not mean that you're living in sin because you have health problems.
So I want you to keep that in mind as I preach the sermon series.
That is, I'm preaching various different things.
I'm not saying you're necessarily guilty of something and that's why you have bad health.
I'm just saying that, you know what, as we go through the sermon series, what we do does make a difference, though.
It is possible that choices you're making are causing your health problems, but it's not a guarantee.
2 Kings 13, verse 14, the Bible reads,
So Elisha, does he die of old age or does he fall sick and die of sickness?
He dies of his sickness. Isn't that what it says in 2 Kings 13?
Now show me the verse in the Bible that Elisha does something wrong.
Because the Bible doesn't really mention him doing anything wrong.
I mean, obviously he's a sinner like anybody else, but show me where he's sinned in the Bible.
Show me that he committed some terrible sin and God struck him with sickness.
You're not going to find that.
Say why?
Because you can have health problems even when you're living for God.
He falls of a sickness and he dies of that sickness.
God allows him to die of that sickness.
You say why?
Look, I don't have the mind of God.
I don't know why everything happens.
But what I do know is this, that he did not do anything to have health problems.
But he does have health problems.
He didn't commit some terrible sin.
Turn to 2 Kings 20.
2 Kings 20.
Look, it's pretty foolish to say that if you have health problems then you're automatically at fault.
Because look, babies are born into this world sometimes with health problems.
And yes, I understand certain choices parents might make might affect that.
But quite honestly, sometimes babies are born and they just have health problems for whatever reason.
And we don't know why that is.
Now did the baby commit some terrible sin in the womb to make that happen?
Did the parents automatically commit some major sin to make that happen?
No, sometimes people are just born and they have problems.
It just is what it is.
So look at 2 Kings 20 verse 1.
In those days was Hezekiah sick unto death.
And the prophet Isaiah the son of Amaz came to him and said unto him,
Thus saith the Lord, Set thine house in order for thou shalt die and not live.
So Hezekiah gets sick and he is going to die the Bible says.
Now Hezekiah was a pretty good character to fire.
In fact, Hezekiah is the only one that stood up to the Assyrian empire.
Everybody else just backed down and said here's all my money take whatever you want.
Hezekiah is the only one who stood up to the Assyrian empire.
Look, he was a pretty good king.
He was a pretty godly guy.
But yet he gets sick and he's going to die from that sickness.
That's what he's being told.
Verse 2, Then he turned his face to the wall and prayed unto the Lord, saying,
I beseech thee, O Lord, remember now how I have walked before thee in truth and with a perfect heart,
and have done that which is good in thy sight.
And Hezekiah wept sore.
You know when you have major health problems in your life,
the best thing you can do is pray to God like Hezekiah is doing here.
We're going to see the end result of this, but Hezekiah has major health problems.
He is sick unto death.
He is going to die, but you know what?
Hezekiah, praise to God.
And he says, you know what, I've walked before thee in truth.
Basically, I've tried to live for you, God.
I've done my best.
And he's begging God to spare his life.
Verse 4, And it came to pass before Isaiah was gone out into the middle of the port,
that the word of the Lord came to him, saying,
Turn again and tell Hezekiah, the captain of my people.
Thus saith the Lord, the God of David thy father,
I have heard thy prayer, I have seen thy tears.
Behold, I will heal thee on the third day that thou shalt go upon in the house of the Lord.
And I will add unto thy days fifteen years,
and I will deliver thee in this city out of the hand of the king of Assyria.
And I will defend this city for mine own sake and for my servant David's sake.
And so basically the Lord grants His prayer requests.
And He says, I'm going to add to you fifteen years.
You're going to live a longer life.
I'm giving you fifteen more years.
Why?
Well because Hezekiah had lived a pretty godly life,
and then he prays and God answers that prayer request.
Now turn to James 5, James 5.
And let me say this when you're looking at Hezekiah and his prayer request.
It's obvious that Hezekiah was living a righteous life because God hears his prayer in the honors.
I've heard a priest in church before that Hezekiah didn't really mean it.
He was just faking it.
The reason why the pastor said that is because afterwards you see that Hezekiah basically is not right with God.
Basically he says, hey it's good in my days, I don't really care what happens to my son.
Which is obviously a terrible attitude to have.
But look, he didn't fool the Lord into blessing him.
He honestly means it.
He says I have lived a godly life and God grants that prayer request.
Obviously the Lord wasn't fooling.
Obviously he was right in what he was saying.
He was living a godly life. He had not done anything wrong.
Now James 5, notice what it says in verse 14.
The Bible says, if you have committed sins.
What does that tell you?
It means it's possible that he's committed some sin that has led to bad health.
And it's possible he just happened to have bad health and it's not really his fault.
It could be one of those things.
You say, well how do I know in my situation?
When you're looking at somebody that is not yourself, you always assume innocence.
Don't just assume, well somebody must have committed some major sin.
Somebody must have committed adultery on their life.
That's why they have bad health.
Okay, hello Job's friends.
Maybe I'd go back and read the book of Job and see that guess what?
Sometimes people have health problems.
So if somebody else has health problems, it's a foolish thing to start trying to think.
I wonder what they might have done wrong.
Let's go gossiping and ask everybody and see what sin they committed.
Look, don't worry about other people.
Just worry about yourself.
But when it comes to you as an individual, you need to think in your life and figure out.
Is there something I've done that's wrong?
Is there some mistake I'm making that is causing me to have bad health?
And it could be that you're doing something, but it might not.
It could just be that's what happened.
Now turn to Deuteronomy 28.
Deuteronomy 28.
And the third thing I want you to see is this, that our health is often manifest.
It's something that is visual. It's something that people can see.
This is why this makes it an important topic, because our health is actually something that can be seen to some degree.
Deuteronomy 28, verse 45 in the Bible reads,
What exactly is a sign?
We at our church, we have a sign out front.
What's the purpose of that sign?
So people that are visiting this church for the first time can see Verity Baptist Church Manila.
And then they come and visit our church.
It's something that can be seen.
Isn't that what a sign is?
The purpose of a sign is that you can say, hey, this is where we are.
So a sign can be seen.
And so when it comes to these curses, these are things that are evident.
People can see them.
And what God says is, you will be cursed, and it's going to be obvious to everyone that you'll be cursed.
It's going to be a sign. People are going to be able to see this.
Turn to Job 16.
And in Job 16, listen to verse number 7,
which is a witness against me, and my leanness rising up in me beareth witness to my face.
And so here are a couple things I mentioned.
For one, he says, thou hast filled me with wrinkles.
Wrinkles are something that you can see.
If somebody starts getting wrinkles, that's evident.
Now that doesn't mean that Job committed some sort of sin or anything like that.
The truth is that if you have kids, you're going to be filled with wrinkles.
This is part of having kids.
You will be filled with wrinkles.
So I'm not saying, hey, if you have wrinkles, that means you've committed some sin.
No, if you have kids, you have wrinkles.
That's the way it works.
But he says, thou hast filled me with wrinkles.
And then he says this, and my leanness rising up in me beareth witness to my face.
And what he's saying is, leanness is not having much weight, basically not eating much.
And when it comes to this series on health, this is not a weight loss scenario.
Because usually when people think of biblical health, that's all they think about.
But quite honestly, if you look at average lifespans, people that have very little weight
actually live a shorter lifespan than people that maybe have a little bit too much weight.
And you can look that up for yourself.
What I'm saying is the truth, that sometimes being too skinny can be a bad thing.
And so he talks about having leanness.
Why is he lean?
Because when you're going through trials and tribulations in your life, you basically do one of two things.
Some people eat a lot. Some people don't eat anything.
I have two parents, and one of my parents, when they go through problems,
one of them eats a lot, but one doesn't eat anything.
And so not eating much, though, that's not good on your body.
The leanness is not being mentioned as something that's a good thing.
It's something saying, yeah, obviously he needs to be eating more.
Now turn to 2 Samuel 13.
So let me say this, that when it comes to if you're trying to lose weight,
starving your body is not something the Bible talks about as being a good thing.
That is not the secret.
Say, well, I'm just going to go five days without eating.
No, I mean, the Bible mentions leanness as being a bad thing.
It's not mentioned as being a good thing.
That's not the secret plan.
Just go without eating.
Look, that's not going to be good on your body.
2 Samuel, and we'll talk about diet here in a couple sermons,
but in 2 Samuel 13, notice what it says in verse 3.
But Amnon had a friend whose name was Jonadab, the son of Shimei, and gave his brother.
And Jonadab was a very subtle man.
Now, Jonadab represents the devil, okay?
He says he's a very subtle man.
The devil was very subtle, okay?
Notice what it says in verse 4.
And he said unto him, why art thou being the king's son, lean from day to day?
Wilt thou not tell me?
And Amnon said unto him, I love Tamar, my brother, Absalom's sister.
So basically, Amnon has a pretty wicked idea where basically he's in love with his half-sister,
and basically it's causing him not to eat.
He's lean from day to day, and it's very evident to this wicked Jonadab,
which obviously reprobates a picture of the devil.
He's obviously a really bad person, but it's very obvious that he's lean.
Being too lean is not something that's mentioned as a good thing in the Bible.
Turn to 1 Samuel 16.
1 Samuel 16.
And so when it comes to our health being manifest, here's what you need to understand about this.
Man looks on the outward appearance.
In fact, I'm going to show you a verse here in 1 Samuel 16 where it's directly said that man looks on the outward appearance.
Verse 7. 1 Samuel 16, verse 7.
But the Lord said unto Samuel, look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature.
Because I refused it.
For the Lord seeth not as man seeth, for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart.
Now, this is not in direct reference to our health, but it's just stating a fact that man looks on the outward appearance.
Our health is something that's the outward appearance.
You can see what our health is like.
Let me give you an example of this.
Let's look at two things that are sins.
Murder is obviously a sin, right?
Doing drugs is a sin. Would everybody agree on that?
Which sin is worse?
Murder, right?
Which sin is evident, though?
Doing drugs.
Say why? Because if you did drugs six hours ago, I would look at your eyes and know you got drunk or did drugs.
I would look at you shaking around like crazy.
It's something that's evident, okay?
Obviously, murder is worse than doing drugs.
But look, if you did drugs this morning, it would be very obvious to everyone that there's something wrong with so and so.
And so look, is murder worse? Absolutely.
I'm not saying not taking care of our bodies is the worst sin, but I will say this.
It's something that's evident, though.
And that's why this is important because in all areas, we are supposed to be a good depiction of the Lord Jesus Christ.
We're trying to take care of our bodies at the temple of the Holy Ghost.
That's what the Bible teaches.
Now turn to Ecclesiastes 12.
Now look, I'm not saying that our church, man, we just need to start training for marathons and triathlons.
And then after this sermon, I want you in the gym three hours every day.
You know, actually, the opposite.
I don't want you to waste your time just, you know, only caring about your body, okay?
I'm not saying that. I'm not saying, man, we've got to try to compete in all these competitions.
We're going to get together a basketball team and compete against whoever wins the title or whatever.
I'm not saying that.
But I am saying that God does care about our outward appearance.
He does care about how we take care of our bodies.
It is the temple of the Holy Ghost.
Now when it comes to taking care of our bodies, our weight is not the only thing that matters, okay?
Somebody can look very healthy, but not be very healthy, okay?
And let me give you an example, then I'll mention this, you know, in a later sermon.
But let me give you a group of people that by and large are extremely unhealthy, but they look very healthy.
Bodybuilders are extremely unhealthy, but they look very healthy.
Actually, having too much muscle is not necessarily a good thing.
Because your body needs more oxygen to be pumped to your muscles.
And so, oftentimes, bodybuilders, they will die at a very young age.
Now, when it comes to people that are bodybuilders, look, I've never been a bodybuilder.
I'm never going to.
I do have friends, though, that did it before and stuff, so I do know a little bit about it.
But this is what they would do to their bodies.
They would basically say, well, it's bulking season right now.
And so, basically, they'd have a big bag of M&Ms, and they'd just be downing the M&Ms,
and they'd be eating all this junk food and everything like that,
and they literally would gain like 60, 70, 80 pounds, okay?
And then what they would do is basically eat no carbohydrates for like two and a half months
to get ready for the bodybuilding competition.
Where they basically, they have this fake tan, you know, they have this spray-on tan that they do
because if you have darker complexion, it makes your muscles look bigger.
So they all put this fake tan on themselves and everything, and in two and a half months,
they will lose 60 pounds, okay?
Say, is that possible? Yes, it is.
Look, if you eat no carbohydrates, you will lose so much weight.
That doesn't necessarily mean it's healthy on your body.
Do you really think it's healthy to lose 30 pounds in 30 days?
Look, I know plenty of people that have done that, okay?
I know plenty of people that I've seen that just lost crazy, crazy amounts of weight.
There was a guy who was the world's strongest man like five times or so.
They took away some of the awards because he got caught on some sort of drug.
His name was Marius Pujanowski. Does anyone know that name?
Probably not. Marius Pujanowski.
This guy's diet was some, I can't remember the exact amount,
but basically in the morning, he would eat 18 slices of bacon.
He would eat like 15 eggs.
He would eat a ridiculous diet, and he was 300 pounds completely ripped.
There was no fat on him whatsoever.
Do you think that guy's healthy, though, eating 18 slices of bacon every morning?
He looked healthy. He was the strongest man,
but look, he's going to probably die of a heart attack in a couple of years.
He's only in his 40s, but look, that's not good on your body.
When we talk about diet, we see what the Bible says about eating things with lots of fat,
and the Bible does talk about it.
Look, that's not good on your body.
Just because you look, man, you're so strong and you're so fit,
that doesn't mean that you actually are.
You could be in this room right now, and you could look like you're in great shape,
you're thin, you look active and everything.
That doesn't necessarily mean you're in good shape.
This is not just simply a sermon series.
It's not a weight loss series.
This is overall health, and honestly,
how much we weigh is only really a small part of it.
There's a lot of aspects to our health.
In Ecclesiastes chapter 12,
this is the famous chapter that talks about basically the aging process in life.
The last point we have in this sermon is just simply this,
that the quality of our life is important.
It's not simply how long you live,
but also your quality while you're here.
The Bible speaks about living basically 70, 80 years.
By reason of strength, it says you can live 80 years,
generally around 70 years.
Quite honestly, in today's world, that's still about the same.
It hasn't really changed that much.
But what I do know is that with modern inventions and things like that,
people are able to not really necessarily have good health,
but extend their life.
Now, look, our quality of life is important.
It's not just simply that you live to be 80 years old.
It's like how good was your life while you were on earth.
Obviously, that's important as well.
Ecclesiastes chapter 12, verse 1.
Remember now thy creator in the days of thy youth,
while the evil days come nigh,
nor the years draw nigh, when thou shalt say,
I have no pleasure in them.
And the Bible tells us in verse number 1,
we ought to remember our creator in the days of our youth.
You ought to care about your Bible reading and your prayer life
and soul readings and service to God when you're young.
Don't just wait until you're older in life.
You say, I'm in this room and I'm only a teenager.
Hey, care about those things now.
Care about serving God now before the evil days come.
Now, look, next week's sermon,
as we talk about the number 1 most important thing to our health,
is quite simply living for God.
And I can prove that left, right, and down the center from the Bible.
The most important thing to our health is living for God.
So, yeah, you ought to remember your creator in the days of your youth.
Whatever age you are, remember your creator.
Remember God. Why?
Because eventually, evil days are going to come.
What are evil days?
It's basically talking about the aging process.
We now shall say, I have no pleasure in that.
Look, aging is not fun.
It is what it is.
As we get older, there's certain things you can't do anymore.
Look, I'm by no means old, but look,
there's things I can't do that I used to do.
I used to play sports just hours every day,
don't stretch and everything.
You wake up, you just go again.
Now, if I work out for a couple of hours,
I wake up and my back's sore, and it's like, man, I should have stretched.
Look, the aging process isn't fun.
But it is inevitable.
But what you need to understand is,
you can speed up the aging process of life.
The way you take care of your body,
you can make the evil days come 20 years early.
Look, I have people that are in my extended family,
that when they were in their early 50s,
they were in a wheelchair basically the rest of their life.
And people can be in a wheelchair, it's not necessarily their fault,
they could have had a car wreck,
but the people I'm thinking about, it was choices they made in life,
it's not what they care about.
You don't want that to happen in the year of the 50s.
You don't want to destroy your health.
You don't want those evil days to come upon you sooner.
As late as possible, the better.
It's sad sometimes when you see people that are really young,
but their health is gone.
It's not something that's fun to see.
We want people to have good health.
You'll see some people that,
obviously God's blessed them to some degree to have good health,
but they'll be in their 80s and 90s and they're still moving around
and they're in good shape.
It's like, that's what I want to do one day.
When I lived in West Virginia, our neighbor,
she lived to be like 105 or 106 years old.
Now look, no matter how well you take care of your body,
there's no guarantee.
There's no golden ticket to living to 105 years old.
But I will say this, that every single day when she was in her 90s,
because I knew her, I met her when she was in her 90s.
Remember, I lived in the mountain state
and she was walking up and down the hills every single day in her 90s
and she ate vegetables every day.
She ate bread every day.
She ate fruit every day.
She ate a balanced diet.
She didn't destroy her body.
I think it would be foolish to say that the choices she made
didn't help her out.
I mean, she was in her 90s.
She was very flexible.
You know, you see some people, once they start getting age,
they can't even bend down to pick things up.
And I'm not saying this, you know, if you have health problems,
look, this series is meant to help you.
You could have health problems.
It might not be your fault.
But look, if you can help your health out,
it's something you want to do.
You don't want those evil days to come upon you
because once those evil days come upon you,
it's only going to go downhill from there.
If the evil days start upon you when you're in your 40s
to the choices you make,
look, you're not going to prevent that from happening.
It's a downward spiral pretty much.
It's basically the point of no return, okay?
You don't want that to happen at a young age.
You want to extend your life and quality of life as long as possible.
Verse number 3, what does the Bible say about these evil days?
In the day when the keepers of the house shall tremble,
the keepers of the house shall tremble.
What is that referring to?
It's referring to your hands.
If I was using metaphorical and symbolic language in Ecclesiastes 12,
it says the keepers of the house, that is referring to your hands.
Why? Because when people get older, their hands start to shake.
They're not that steady.
When you're young, you drink a glass of water, no big deal,
when people start getting older, their hands won't often shake.
It's part of life.
It's the evil days that will come upon you.
If you live until you're in your 90s,
you're going to have these evil days come upon you.
But you don't want this to start happening when you're 45 years old.
You want to extend this as long as possible.
Now look, you could do everything right and have health problems.
I've said that 20 times.
I'm not saying you can't have health problems,
even if you're living godly and even if you're taking care of yourself.
But if you can try to make choices in life
to prevent that from happening at a young age,
then you want to do that.
You don't want this to happen when you're in your 40s.
Here's an article, a secular article from Essential Tremor.
Why are my hands shaking?
It may have happened when you were stressed or angry.
Or illness could have brought it on.
Stress, fatigue, and too much caffeine can worsen it.
At some point, eating, drinking, writing, and all the other daily tasks
to do with your hands can become a bigger challenge.
So this is basically written towards people that are younger
that their hands aren't at that point
where they're shaking or not in those equal days.
But it says, you know what, if you've had too much caffeine.
That's true.
When people drink a lot of caffeine, their hands start to shake.
Their body starts to shake.
Look, that's a sign from your body that you're doing something wrong.
That's not a good thing.
It's not something that's like, yeah, we're not Pentecostals.
Remember I preached about the Quakers or the Shakers, as they called them?
Look, we're not the Earth Quakers here.
It's not part of our religious and church services.
That's not something you want to happen to at a young age.
Why? It's going to make your daily tasks more difficult.
And yes, things like illness, stress, fatigue, too much caffeine can bring it on.
Look, if you start to do that at a young age, it's probably very possible
that when you are in your 50s, that's going to come upon you sooner.
Maybe God's giving it to you as a warning sign to say,
hey, you might want to make some changes.
You don't want this to be a permanent condition.
Notice what it says, and the strong men shall bow themselves.
The strong men shall bow themselves.
What is it referring to when it says the strong men shall bow themselves?
Now, I looked this up in the Bible because I kind of had a thought,
and I heard somebody else preach, and I kind of think it's both of these thoughts put together.
It says the strong men, which is plural, I believe it's referring both to your legs
and also to your upper body as well.
Now, I do think it's referring to your legs
because when you think of the strongest part of your body, it's going to be your legs.
When I used to go to the gym and lift a lot in college,
I could leg press about five times as much as I could bench press.
Look, I used to leg press 760 pounds, which is the most I maxed out on.
Look, if I bench 760 pounds, though, that's almost like a world record.
You can leg press a lot of weight.
You cannot bench press that much weight unless you're probably on steroids or something.
So when you think about your strongest part of your body, it's basically your legs.
That's the strongest part of your body.
But I think there's a dual meaning because when I talk about bowing yourself,
as people get older, they start to kind of naturally bow in their posture.
Part of the process of aging is you're not upright as much.
You start to bow naturally.
But when you look up bow in the Bible, it refers to a lot of things.
Sometimes it's just bowing your head.
Sometimes it's like bowing like you would think of.
But also sometimes it's mixed with being on your knees and bowing,
which would be both your lower body and your upper body.
I believe it's referring to both those things.
That basically as you get older, your muscles aren't as strong,
and you start to naturally bow more.
Basically your legs and your upper body, they lose strength.
It's inevitable. It's part of life.
It is the evil days, as the Bible says.
Now, here's an article from the Columbia University Medical Center.
Here's their summary.
It says,
Researchers have discovered the biological mechanism
behind age-related loss of muscle strength
in identifying a drug that may help a person's process.
Now, I'm not saying I advocate this drug that they're using.
I don't know anything about the drug.
But what they say is that there is age-related loss of muscle strength.
Look, you will lose strength in your muscles automatically as you age.
It's a guarantee.
People, when they're young and in shape,
or maybe late 20s and 30s, some people,
they do things like they dump basketball or something like that.
Look, people that are in their 70s and 80s don't dump basketball.
Unless they're really tall.
None of us are that tall.
When you get older, your muscles naturally lose strength.
It says here, physically inactive people can lose as much as 3% to 5% of their muscle mass
each decade after age 30.
Even if you are active, you'll still have some muscle mass.
As you get older, if you do not do anything active,
you will lose 3% to 5% of your strength per year.
In one year, that doesn't seem like much.
But if you spend 10 years as a very inactive person,
you basically lost half your strength.
That's a lot.
If it's 5% per year over 10 years, that's 50% of your strength.
I don't know if this number is accurate.
But that is a lot.
It's going to make everything in life a little bit more difficult.
I personally enjoy working out.
I like to stay in shape.
But no matter how much I take care of my body, I'm going to lose some strength.
But I don't want to lose more by not being active.
When Ecclesiastes 12 was written, most people lived pretty active lives.
In 2019, people don't live as active with lives.
A lot of people, their job is just simply being at a computer all day and typing.
There's nothing wrong with that job.
That's the job I had when I lived back in Easton, Maryland.
But look, if all you're doing all day is sitting and typing,
you might want to start getting some exercise.
Because if you don't, you're going to lose a lot of muscle strength
and everything is going to be more difficult in life.
Yes, as you get older, you're going to start to naturally bow.
You'll lose strength in your legs.
You don't want that to happen at a young age, though.
You don't want to lose all of your strength.
And look, a lot of people, that happens to them.
You see people that are very young, they've lost all of their strength.
Now, if you stay active, you're not going to keep all of your strength.
But you know, you won't lose as much.
I'll tell you what, if you come to the other side for now, 20 years,
and you remember the sermon, and you don't take any advice from the sermon series,
and you lose all that muscle strength, you're going to regret it.
Now look, it's not always fun working out for 45 minutes,
and I'm not saying that that should be the point of your life,
but you know what, you're going to regret it if you don't take care of your body at all.
Now one great thing we do as a church and as Christians is we go soloing.
And going soloing, you are getting some exercise.
You're out there walking around, which is a good thing.
I believe, honestly, God built in things that would give us exercise kind of naturally.
But in today's world, most people's jobs is not out of the field or they work.
It's just typing at a computer desk all day.
That's what I did. Those were my jobs out of college.
And if that is your job out of college, you might want to make some changes,
because otherwise, you know what, you might lose a lot of your muscle strength.
And if you lose a lot of your muscle strength,
you're just not going to have the ability to do things.
Three percent to five percent is a lot in one year.
Even if it's just three percent, that is a lot of muscle strength.
At the age of 30, you start to lose.
It's like I'm 34, which means I could have lost 12 to 20 percent of my muscle strength in the last four years.
That's a lot.
Now it says here, I don't know how to pronounce this, it's sarcopenia.
This is a medical condition.
It says a factor in frailty in the likelihood of falls and fractures in older adults.
As you lose muscle strength, you are more likely to end up having falls as you go.
You know, when people get older, oftentimes they don't have as much muscle strength.
My grandmother, like four or five years ago, she had a major fall,
where she was basically kind of this high on the ground.
She was walking on stairs, and she didn't have the strength,
because she was in her late 80s at the time, obviously, she was older.
But basically, you don't have as much strength just to walk up the steps.
And you start leaning on the rail more, and she didn't have as much strength,
and she kind of slipped off, and she fell when she was in the hospital.
And even to this day, she has permanent repercussions for that.
That is what happens when you get older.
Now, when you're young in this room, it seems hard to believe.
You say, man, I can't believe that would happen to me.
But look, a lot of people, as they get older, they have trouble just doing basic things
like walking up and down steps.
It's not as easy.
And if you lose all of your muscle strength, it's going to be a lot more difficult.
You don't want that to happen at a young age.
Then the Bible also says this, the grinders cease because they are few.
The grinders cease because they are few.
What does it mean by the grinders cease?
That's referring to your teeth.
Your grinders cease because they are few.
When you get older, oftentimes you lose a lot of your teeth.
And look, when it comes to losing your teeth, according to an article I read,
this gives you facial and cosmetic problems.
You deal with shifting of teeth.
You can have headaches and changes in speech when you start losing teeth.
It's not something you want to have happen.
You see, the other day I was walking and I bumped into a tree
when I was walking down here to church and I had a bruise here.
Look, when you have a bruise, what your body is doing is telling you, hey, something happened.
It's kind of like a warning sign.
When you're having problems with your teeth, it's saying something didn't go right.
It's part of naturally aging.
I'm not saying it's not, but if you start losing your teeth at a young age,
something didn't go right, whether it's your fault or not.
But you don't want these things to happen to you at a young age.
You want to extend the quality of your life as much as possible.
Another thing he mentions is this.
Those that look out of the windows be darkened.
That is referring to your eyesight.
When people get older, they don't have as good of eyesight.
It's naturally part of aging.
Now, I am personally, without my context, and I am legally blind.
I probably have the worst vision in this room.
I cannot recognize people from more than two feet away.
I have context, so that corrects that.
But as you get older, you can have vision problems that are uncorrectable.
It doesn't matter what surgery you have. You can do nothing about it.
At my age, I just put on glasses or contacts, and I see fine right now.
If I take these out, then I'm going to be like this, searching around, trying to grab on to stuff.
As you get older, you'll have vision problems that are not able to be corrected.
If you do not take care of your body, these things can happen earlier.
In this sermon series, I'm not going to go super in-depth in explaining my opinions.
You can read stuff on diets.
If you eat this certain food, it's going to fix this problem, fix this problem, fix this problem.
That's honestly outside the scope of the sermon.
This is not a diet seminar or anything like that.
What I'm going to show you is that if the Bible says a food is good, it means it's good.
We don't necessarily know how it can help you, but I believe it can help you with all of these things.
I believe it can help your eyesight.
I believe it can help your muscle strength and things like that, even if we don't know why,
and even if the medical world doesn't know why.
Look, the medical world changes their opinion on diets all the time.
You know what they said 20 years ago?
Avocados are like a really unhealthy food.
Now they call it a miracle food.
Why they call it really unhealthy?
Well, there's a lot of fat in avocados, so it must be a really terrible food for you.
Now, avocados and coconut oil are like the most healthy food alone for you.
They don't know what they're talking about.
The Bible does know what it's talking about.
The Bible will give you the answers to these questions.
Like I said, it's going to come in contrast with the world's advice.
When I say during this sermon series, a lot of stuff is going to be different from what the world says.
The world changes their mind on things all the time.
One last verse.
Verse number 5, Ecclesiastes 12, verse 5.
Also, when they shall be afraid of that which is high, and fear shall be in the way,
the almond tree shall flourish, and the grasshopper shall be a burden,
and desire shall fail, because man goeth to his long home, and the mourners go about the streets.
And the Bible says here, the almond tree shall flourish.
Now, what I've heard people say about the almond tree flourishing,
they say it's referring to you basically eating white bears and bears.
Because an almond tree is basically, I guess, a white tree when it buds.
I don't think that's what this is referring to, though.
And I'll tell you why.
Because in the same verse, right after it says the grasshopper shall be a burden.
Why is the grasshopper a burden?
Basically, as you get older, it's harder to kill the basic bugs in your house is what it's saying.
The grasshopper's a burden to you because you can't kill it.
It's moving quicker than you are.
And so I believe what it's been talking about right before is related.
Almond tree shall flourish.
Basically, if you have a backyard and you have trees,
the maintenance on just keeping your trees clean, it gets more difficult as you age.
My grandfather and my grandmother, they had many acres, they had lots of trees and stuff.
And as they aged, my grandfather was not able to take care of them.
He had to get people and pay people to help him to trim the trees
and to throw out the branches and things like that.
You say, why?
Because the evil days eventually come upon you.
And the almond tree is going to flourish in your backyard,
and the grasshopper in your house is a burden.
Okay?
When it comes to just daily getting rid of the bugs in your house,
unfortunately, you know, you're going to have bugs in your house sometimes.
But if you do not take care of your body,
the grasshopper's going to be a burden to you when you're in your 40s or your 50s.
You don't want that to happen to you.
You want to have good quality to your life.
You say, does the Bible teach us how to have good quality of our life?
I believe it does.
I believe the Bible has the answers to all questions.
Now, look, you can have bad health and it doesn't necessarily mean it's your fault.
I know people that have specific reading programs and they cannot fix it.
It's not necessarily their fault.
But at the same time, the Bible does give us a lot of advice on our health.
And if we are wise, including myself, we'll hear what these sermons say,
see what the Bible says, and apply it to our lives.
It's close to the word of prayer.
If your Heavenly Father paid for our Bible to be here today
and asked me to help us to apply this sermon to our lives,
God help us to try to take care of our bodies the best we can
and something that all of us, including myself, can work on,
God would ask me to help take care of our bodies.
It is the temple of the Holy Ghost.
And it's not just yours.