Alright, amen. Actually, I meant to have you read chapter one, not chapter three. So,
go over to chapter one. Chapter three is just bonus. You got that for free this morning. So,
you know, if you haven't read it yet in your devotions, you can go ahead and cross that off
on your list, if you were following along, of course. But go keep something there in
1 Peter chapter one, and go back, if you would, to 1 Kings chapter number 10, 1 Kings chapter number
10. This is something I wanted to cover that I really didn't have time, of course, on Thursday
night. So, if you were here Thursday night, you know we covered several different things,
but there's something I wanted to point out and just kind of preach a whole sermon about
out of 1 Kings 10, and that's this idea of developing the finer details of our faith. You
know, we, as Christians, we get saved, and we do one of two things. We either add to our faith,
we either add to the finer details of our faith, or we don't. You know, we just begin to stagnate.
We're still saved, we're still on our way to heaven, but we don't add finer details to our
faith. And what we'll see here this morning is that that's something you really have to purpose
to do in your life. These things aren't just going to happen automatically. That they're,
if you're going to add the finer details of your faith, it's something that you're going to have
to put effort into, you know, and that's part of my job as a preacher is to get up and to encourage
you to do so, and to also instruct on as how to go about doing that, okay. But this is really just
more of a motivational sermon just to try to get you to understand that it's our responsibility as
Christians to add to the finer details of our faith. If you're there in 1 Kings chapter 10,
of course you've been following along the series, you know where we're at in the story.
Solomon has built the Lord's house and his own house, and they've dedicated the temple,
and then you get some of these other details about that time. And it says in verse 11,
and the navy also of Hiram brought gold from Ophir,
brought in from Ophir great plenty of Almag trees and precious stones. Now again this is something
that's taking place I believe after the temple has been built. This is something that continued
to take place even after Hiram had provided all this other wealth, all this other gold,
and craftsmanship to build the Lord's temple, okay. So the Lord's temple had been established,
but then you see here that Hiram helps King Solomon in his navy to go and to collect these
other precious substances so that he could continue to add to the house of the Lord.
It wasn't like Solomon got to, got done building the house of the Lord and just said,
well that's good enough for God. What we see here in the story is that he continued to add on to
the house of God, he continued to add to what? To the finer details of the house of God. And we
should never get to the place where we're just satisfied with our Christian life and say,
well I've arrived. And I'm here to tell you if you think that's you this morning,
if you think well there's just nothing that I can learn at church, there's nothing left in the Bible
for me to learn, I already know it all, I've already got it all figured out, you know what,
you're going to miss out on a lot in the Christian life. You need to learn to add to the finer
details of the Christian life and not think that you've arrived spiritually. No one has,
but the fact is that some people have certainly added more detail to their Christian lives than
others, haven't they? Some people have a prayer life, some people have a devotional life,
some people participate in the church's program, some people make it a point of being in church
on a regular basis, other Christians don't. They get saved and then, you know, they never add to
their faith, they never add anything, they never add any, especially the finer details of their
Christian life. Now notice here one of the first things he brings is the Ophir. He brings, excuse
me, he brings from Ophir gold. He brought gold from Ophir, brought in from Ophir, great plenty
of alamag trees and precious stones. And Ophir is this region, you know, people can debate where it
is, it doesn't, it's really not the point of the sermon, but we understand that it was not nearby,
that there was some effort that went into getting it and that, but what we see in Scripture is that
Ophir is actually some place that's renowned, it's well known for its precious substances.
It's famous for its gold. If you would, keep something there in 1 Kings chapter number 10.
And go back to where you were in 1 Peter chapter number 1, you'll see that Ophir is something,
or excuse me, the gold of Ophir is something that comes up over and over and over again. It's
mentioned in Job, you know, when Job is likening it unto wisdom, right? He's, when he's talking to
us about wisdom in Job 28, he says it cannot be valued with the gold of Ophir. Again in Isaiah,
he said, God said, I will make a man more precious than fine gold, even a man than the golden
wedge of Ophir. So Ophir is this place that keeps coming up over and over again. And it's where we
see that King Solomon, with the help of Hyrum, went out and collected these, this gold and these
Almag trees and these precious stones when he wanted to add to the finer details of the temple.
And it's interesting because our faith is also compared to gold. You probably remember 1 Peter
chapter 3, excuse me, 1 Peter chapter 1, where it says in verse 7, that the trial of your faith
being much more precious than of gold, that parishes. You know, our faith is even more
precious than the gold of Ophir. You know, our faith is likened unto something that is a precious
substance, it's something that's very precious. And boy, you know, the more you go out soul winning,
the more you start to talk to other people about the Lord, you realize how precious your faith
really is. Not just the fact that it came at a precious, you know, the precious place of
Christ's blood, but the fact that there's so few that be saved. You know, it's a precious thing to
have brethren and sister in the Lord. To have a community of saved believers, that's a precious
thing. Our faith is something that's very precious. And I, but you know, that's something we could
go into here in detail, but what I really want to focus on here is these Almag trees that he brings.
Because if you notice, there's several different things that he brings from the land of Ophir. He
brings the Almag trees, he brings the gold, and he brings the precious stones. Now, people want
to debate what kind of tree this was, this Almag tree. You know, that's probably just something
that's lost to antiquity. We're not really going to know. But what we do know about it is it's not
something that they had in abundance where Solomon was. It was something that he had to go and get.
And Solomon uses these Almag trees, this precious substance, to do what? To add detail to the house
of the Lord. If you're still there in 1 Kings 10, keep something in 1 Peter 1. Go back to 1 Kings 10.
It says in verse 12, and the king made of the Almag trees that he, we just went and got, we saw in
verse 11, pillars for the house of the Lord and for the king's house, harps also and salt trees for
the singers. There came no such Almag trees, nor were seen unto this day. So he goes and he collects
these trees and what does he do with them? Well, he uses them for, to make pillars for the house
of the Lord. And I'll explain what he means by that here in a minute. But also he makes these
harps and these salt trees for the singers. So he takes these musical instruments and he makes them
for the people that are, you know, involved in the music program in the Lord's house.
You know, that's a great thing that should show us again that, you know, God cares about,
you know, music in his house and being praised in the house of God. You know, that's a whole
other sermon about how we should sing out unto the Lord. If we have the ability to play one of
these instruments, we should do that. And that's a finer detail that, you know, Solomon is adding
to the house of the Lord. Look, can we have church and not sing songs? Sure. Do we have church and
not have a piano and not have violins or have any other instrumentation? Sure we could, but isn't it
nice having it? I mean, we could do with a lot of, without a lot of things and still have church.
You know, we didn't have to put carpet down. We didn't have to build that wall back there. We
didn't need to paint. You know, I didn't have to get those soft chairs. We could have used plastic
folding chairs. Some of you that were with us at the beginning know that's true. You know,
we used to, I used to sit here and I would just listen to everyone squeak in their chairs, you
know, moving back and forth, right? But those are finer details that we add to the house of God
because we care about those things because we want to beautify the house of the Lord
and to worship God, you know, to the best of our ability, okay? So that's what Solomon's doing
here. He's taking these almond trees and they're precious things. They're not something that you
have in abundance. You know, that's something that we can say. You know, we don't have an
abundance of people with different talents in church. Now, everyone has talents and everyone
can fit in different places, but you know, if you have an ability to do something in the house of
God, you know, especially in a crowd our size, you know, you might be the only one here that has the
ability to do that. You know, that makes you like this almond tree, doesn't it? It makes you
precious. You know, it makes it something that's rare. It's something that's valuable. It's
something that you can add to the house of God. It's not something that should be taken
for granted. But again, notice he's doing this work here after the building has already been
established. We know from 1 Kings chapter 6 that it says that Solomon finished the house
and we read about in the chapters after that how he dedicated the temple and so on and so forth.
But all the thing I want to point out is that you say, well, it says that in verse 12 that he took
the almond trees and he made pillars for the house of God. So what does he mean by that?
I thought if it's already been built, what's he doing making pillars, right? Well, if you remember,
the house of God was built out of stone and out of cedar, okay? And I won't take all the time to
develop it, but in 1 Kings 6-15 it says, and he built the walls of the house within the boards of
cedar, both the floor of the house and the walls of the ceiling, and he covered them on the inside
with wood and he covered the floors of the house with planks of fur. And he built 20 cubits on the
sides of the house, both the floor and the walls of boards of cedar. And he goes on and he talks
about how he built out of wood and he covered everything with wood, but it says in verse 17,
and the house, that is the temple before it was 40 cubits long, and the cedar of the house within
carved with knops and open flowers, all with cedar, there was no stone seen. So we know that
the house of God, you know, was built out of stone, okay? So these pillars of elm trees,
these aren't things that were added to the structural integrity of the building. These
are things that were added after the building was already established and already built, okay?
Because remember, he built these out of like these huge stones and if you remember they had to,
they had to, you know, get them in shape and ready to fit before they could even bring it into the
house of God because there was to be no, you know, a tool of iron even heard in the house of
God. So it gives you a great appreciation for this building that they made. I mean, they're,
you know, they're prefabricating everything and they're just bringing it in and just setting it
right in place. But again, it was all made of stone. There was no mention of these elm trees,
okay? But if you go to 2 Corinthians chapter 9, you'll see what he means by the pillars, okay?
These pillars were actually used to add on to the house of God that had already been established.
And again, they've already dedicated it, you know, the spirit of God's already showed up and blessed
it. Solomon's already prayed, you know, God has already come and filled the temple with smoke,
so much that the priests couldn't even minister in there. They've already had this great feast
of 14 days where they're just slaying thousands and thousands of animals and sacrifice unto God,
so much so that they had to do so in the outer court. They couldn't, the altar couldn't contain
all this has already taken place, okay? But, you know, Solomon needed to say, well, man,
what more could I do for the house of God? I've already, you know, built this, you know,
impressive structure for God. I've already put all this wealth and effort into it. It's taken
me years to build this thing. I've already done so much for God, you know, that's good enough.
You know, what he did is after that was all done, he said, I'm going to raise up a navy.
I'm going to go to the land of Ophir and I'm going to find more precious substance and I'm
going to bring it back here and I'm going to continue to add on to the already finished
house of God. That's what he did because he cared about the finer details of the house of God.
You know, we need to care about the finer details of our faith and not just get this
attitude that we've arrived, that good enough is good enough because it's never going to be good
enough. I mean, we should definitely have a baseline, right? We should definitely have a
baseline, but you know what? We don't want to dip in that. And by the way, that baseline should not
be bare minimum in our Christian life. You know, don't make the baseline of your Christian life the
bare minimum. You know, baseline should just be like, hey, if we're being productive and,
you know, I was thinking about this for the church, you know, our soul winning times,
we operate at a baseline. Our baseline is, you know, Sunday morning, you know, Sunday afternoon,
we have a soul winning time. You know, Thursday before church, there's a soul winning time.
Saturday, that's a good baseline. Now, do we want to add more soul winning times? Sure.
You know, but we're not going to be able, not every single person is going to be able to,
every single soul winning time. That would be us kind of cranking things up a little bit, right?
Like the push we have coming up for the movie night. You know, there's going to be additional
soul winning times temporarily. You know, that's us operating above, you know, a baseline, right?
We don't want to just have this bare minimum attitude. Well, I've given God just, you know,
his due. I've given him just enough. You know, we want to care about, you know, doing more for God,
you know, because he's worthy of it. You know, if you're there in first king, first, excuse me,
did I have you go to second Chronicles nine? Okay, second Chronicles nine is where you should be
anyway. It says in verse 11, this is a parallel passage to first Kings 10, where we were reading
about how he took the Almag trees and made pillars for them, right? And it says that the
king made of the Almag trees terraces to the house of the Lord and to the king's palace and harps
and salt trees for singers. So, you know, if you're not there, you can just listen,
I'm explaining it right now is that, you know, these pillars that were made where it's explained
later in second Chronicles, that they were actually terraces. Now a terrace is like a porch
who's knows what a terrace is, right? It's like something you build onto the outside of a building.
It's not necessary for the building to function. You know, it's not where you put the sink. It's
not where you put the washer and dryer. It's not where the bathroom is. It's not where people sleep.
You know, it's just kind of a luxury. It's just something that some people have and some people
don't. It's not integral to the building itself. It's just something that's an addition. So Solomon,
you know, get the picture he's built. He made this huge building, this beautiful building.
It's fully functional. God's already blessed it, but he says, you know what? I'm gonna get some
Almag trees. I'm gonna make some terraces. You know, that's part of those pillars. Obviously
we're part of that terrace. He's putting up the Almag trees and he's got the lattices over it.
Maybe he's, you know, hanging plants on it or something. I don't know. But he's adding to
these finer details. He's adding these finer details to the work of God.
You know, and we're kind of the same way. This is the point of the sermon is that we need to
learn to add to the finer details of our own Christian life, of our faith. Go over to
1 Corinthians chapter number three. 1 Corinthians chapter number three. You see, our faith is built
upon a rock, right? It's got some pillars in it. You know, it's got a big pillar called Jesus,
right? That's our faith. And we're founded upon that rock. You know, just like the house of God
was made out of what? It was made out of stone, right? It had all these massive stones. It was
established. You know, it wasn't going to budge. You know, it was blessed by God. It was God's
house. He was dwelling within that temple. The terraces, the Almag trees, the additions,
that came later. You know, maybe they replaced those instruments that they had. You know,
they had just some sycamore trees laying around that they made all the violins and everything out
of, the salt trees and what else. He said, hey, you know what would look nicer is if we got the
Almag trees. You know, people would walk in and go, oh, is that an Almag tree, salt tree you have
there? You know, they'd be impressed by that. And you know, that's, you say, well, is our goal in
life to impress everybody? No, but the point is this. The point is to, you know, do our,
if we can do something better for God, then do it. Why would you hold back? Why would we say,
you know, I know I could do better in this area in my Christian life. I know I could, you know,
polish this up. I know that I can make this a better, you know, a fine, I could pay more
attention to these finer details in my Christian life, but whatever. You know, that's a poor
attitude. We should care about the finer details. We should want to make things better if we have
the ability. Our faith is built upon a pillar. It's built upon a rock. And the Bible talks about
this repeatedly, how, you know, we are the temple of God today. Okay. We got to add to these finer
details. Look at verse 16 of 1 Corinthians 3. He says, knowing not that ye are the temple of God.
You say, what's the application of the sermon? Why are you talking about, you know, Solomon's
temple and Almag trees from the land of Ophir? I mean, what does, how does that apply to us?
Well, you know, that was the temple back then, but you know what? We're the temple today. Today,
we're the temple of God. We are built upon a rock. You know, there's some marble and there's some
stone that we're established on in our faith called the Lord Jesus Christ. He said, you know,
ye are the temple of God and that the spirit of God dwelleth in you. You know, we read it in 1
Kings and say, wow, God came down and filled the temple with smoke and his, and his presence was
there. Yeah, but God dwells in you. Are we in awe of that? Are we impressed by that? Do we stand,
ever stand back and say, wow, I'm sealed with the Holy ghost under the day of my redemption
while I'm in dwelt by the Holy spirit of God. Do we ever step back and stand in awe of that fact
that God's not dwelling in a temple made with hands, but he's actually dwelling within our
hearts by faith. It's supernatural. It's spiritual. That's what he's saying here. Look, ye are the
temple of God. Verse 17, if any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy.
For the temple of God is Holy, which temple ye are. Look, we are the temple of God. Today,
go over to 1 Corinthians chapter six. He repeats this over and over again. 2 Corinthians six,
I'll read to you. He says, what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For ye are the
temple of the living God. He's trying to get this across to the Corinthian people. Look,
you are the temple of God today, your body. 1 Corinthians chapter six, verse 19. He says, what?
Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy ghost, which is in you? And I love how he
starts that. He's kind of asking a question. He's perplexed at the Corinthian people. He's saying
how they behave. How they've been conducting themselves. He's like, don't you understand
that Christ dwells in you? That you are the temple of the Holy ghost, which is in you?
Don't you understand that God is dwelling in you, which ye have of God,
and ye are not your own? Go over to 2 Peter chapter one, 2 Peter chapter one.
You know, we are the temple of God today, and we need to learn to add the finer details
to the temple, which is our faith. Now, I'm not saying we need to worry about, you know,
necessarily because we're the temple of God, our body, that we need to worry about
so much about the physical and the outward. But, you know, we ought to worry about our
conversation in this world, how we conduct ourselves, how we're spending our time,
what's important to us, what are our priorities. Those are the finer details of our Christian life
that we need to worry about. And not just say, well, you know, I know, I mean, look,
they had sycamore trees in abundance in Jerusalem. They had, they had, I mean, he goes on and says,
later, he made them to be like sycamore trees. There was so much of them. He's saying, look,
they were as common as the tree that was already there. These rare, precious, almud trees and
cedars and other trees he brought in. He said they were just so common, it was like they were
native there. You know, we already have this body, we already have, you know, this faith,
but we need to learn to add to it, you know, to add these finer things, get these precious things
in our life. And not just say, well, you know, God's already, I've already got the sycamore trees
in my life. You know, I'm already saved. I got baptized. I managed to drag my carcass to church
every once in a while. You know, around the first of the year, I get through the book of Genesis,
you know, and that's it. You know, that's, that, those are sycamore trees. Look, I want some
almud trees in my life. You know, I want some, I want something from the land of Ophir. I want
God to look down at his temple that is my life and say, wow, I could see you're actually paying
attention to what's going on. I can see you're interested in adding, you know, these finer
details to your Christian life and he'll bless that. If you're there in, I had you go to second
Peter one. He said grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God and the Lord
Jesus and of Jesus our Lord. Excuse me. Verse three, according as his divine power hath given
unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness through the knowledge of him that hath
called us to glory and virtue. So stay with me here. Notice he says there that his divine power
has given unto us all things that pertain today unto life and godliness. We already have all
things. It's already available. That's our baseline, right? It's all available. We have everything we
need to live a godly and Christian life. He's already given to all these things that pertain
unto us. But notice he goes on and says, look, you have to add to these things. He said that you, you
that his divine power has given us all things that pertain unto life and godliness through the
knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue. Verse four, whereby are given unto us
exceeding great and precious promises that by these he might be partakers of the divine nature
having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust. And beside this, what does he mean by
beside this? You just read that in addition to, alongside this, you know, you've already been sealed.
You've already got the precious promises. You've got everything that you need to live a godly and
Christian life. So beside this, so knowing all that, add to your, your, your, these finer details. He said
add to your faith. You know, and that's, that's where the effort comes in. It seems to me like even
Paul understood this concept that there's, you know, yeah, we've, we've already got the precious
promises. Yeah, we've already got everything we need to live a godly, Christian life. But we, as
God's people, have to decide whether or not we're going to add to that. That we're going to be like
Solomon and say, hey, the temple's built. It's blessed. It's functioning. We're worshiping in it.
God's blessed it. But you know what? Do I or do I not want to put some, you know, add some more to it?
Do I or do I not want to go to Ophir, take the effort to do that and get these Alamug trees and
build these terraces? Like why build the terraces? Because they look nice. Because it beautifies the
place. Because it's, it's extra. You know, that's the adding to your faith. And he gets real specific
here. He says add to your faith virtue. It's like, look, I'm glad you saved. Now start living a virtuous
life. You know, have some morality. We understand that our morality is what saves us. That we're all,
you know, we're all as an unclean thing. We're all, you know, all our righteousness is our filthy
rag. We're all sinners. We've all come short of the glory of God. We get that. But that's no reason
to not add to your faith. Say, well, I'm saved, but you know, I'm just going to keep being a
fornicator. I'm going to keep, you know, just living a trash life and just doing all kinds of
sin. Look, no, you need to add some virtue to your faith. You know what that is? You know what virtuous?
That's an Alamug tree that you're going to hue and craft and add to, you know, your temple,
which is the Holy, which is your body, which is the temple of the Holy Ghost. Add to your faith
virtue. You know, have some virtue in your life. You know what? And add to your virtue knowledge.
Don't just be like, well, you know, I'm living a clean life, but I don't know why.
Well, read the Bible. You know, get some knowledge, get some understanding, get some
smarts about you. Read the Bible and know what the Bible says. Know why you
believe the things that you believe. Add to your faith virtue and to virtue knowledge.
And you know what? And to knowledge temperance. What's temperance? Self-control. You know,
be temperate in all things. Have some temperance. Control yourself. Don't let, you know, these,
every impulse just take over and run your life. You know, these are the finer details, aren't they?
Look, we can be saved. We might even be living a good godly Christian life. We might even have,
you know, be living, you know, have a good moral upstanding before God and live a pure life. And
that's great. I mean, that's something we're supposed to add. We might even have some knowledge.
We might have a regular Bible reading schedule. We might even show up to church and understand
some things. But you know what? There's still more we have to keep adding. There's still,
there's still finer details that we have to add to our faith. Temperance is one of them. Temperance.
And to temperance he goes, add patience. Well, that's a tough one, isn't it? Say, oh, I want
to be a more patient person. Do you really? Because God will help you with that. You know,
I was thinking about it this morning. You know, you wake up, kids are sick. It's been a long
night. Every, you know, they're throwing fits. They're doing what kids do. And you can either
be patient about it or you can get all stressed out. But you know what? Either way, that's
parenthood for you. That's raising kids. You know, I'd rather just accept the fact and exercise some
patience. You know, and you can apply that to your own life, however you want. What, you know, what's
driving you, going to drive you up the wall in life? What's going to test your patience in life?
You know, traffic for a lot of people, right? I don't know. Maybe something at the job. Maybe
something at home. Who knows? But we need to learn to add these things to our Christian life. These
finer details. And he goes on and says, and add to patience, godliness. You know, live a godly life
and godliness, brotherly kindness. Brotherly kindness. Man, I, you know, I'm living, I'm saved.
I live a clean life. You know, I'm temperate. You know, I don't just, you know, I'm on a strict diet.
I take care of my body. I exercise regularly. I get to bed on time. I don't just give in to every
impulse. I'm very temperate. You know, and I'm very patient with people. You know, I don't say
the things I'm thinking, maybe. You know, I bite my tongue. I try to be a nice person. You know,
yeah, but is that enough? You know, he goes on and says, you know what? That's great that you're there,
but you know what you need to add next? Brotherly kindness. You know, when people walk in,
I actually smile at them and shake their hands. Say, good morning. It's nice to see you,
right? And I feel like we're pretty good about that. But being a kind person, brotherly kindness.
And now look, here's the thing. It's easy to be nice to everybody at church, isn't it?
Brotherly kindness is here. I mean, maybe some of us struggle with it. I don't know.
But it's easy when you're here amongst God's people, Sunday morning. You know,
it's a beautiful day out. You're excited about the preaching the word of God. You know,
you're finally around. So it's easy to love the brethren. And look, we ought to do that.
And that's what he's saying. Add this to your faith. You know, if you struggle in that area,
you need to work on that. To loving the brethren. But you know what? We're to love all men. We're
to love all men. We're to love everybody. That's what he goes on and says, add to brotherly kindness
charity. You know, and charity is just an old word for love. You know, love everybody.
I mean, obviously we're not going to love those that hate the Lord. We get that here.
Okay. But that's, those people are few and far between. You know, we ought to,
and sometimes the world is better at this than even Christians are. At just loving their neighbor.
I mean, sometimes they're a better example than we are of that, unfortunately. You know,
I know I have to work on, be on the lookout to help people out when I can and to be nice and
to love my neighbor. Even if they're not saved. Even if they're, you know,
that's all the more reason to love them. You know, to get them saved.
Notice verse eight, for if these things, what things? The things we just went over.
All these finer details of your Christian faith. Of all these things that you need to learn to add
to your faith. If these things be in you and abound, they make you should be neither
barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. Look, if you add these things
to it, you're going to, you're going to be, you're not going to be barren or unfruitful in what? In
the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. You're going to be more Christ-like. You're going to
be no more what it means to be, you know, like Christ. You're going to have, understand more
what it's like to be like him. Cause look, he was all of these things. But notice that those two
little letters, that one word there at the very beginning of verse eight, for if. That's a big if,
isn't it? That's why I said, look, you need to add these things because you know what,
and then you have for if these things be in you. If. What that tells me is that not everybody adds
these things. Not every Christian adds these things to their faith. A lot of them just say,
well, you know, I've got the precious promise. I've been called, you know, I've been saved and
I'm on my way to heaven and I'm good with that. And they just check that box off and they just,
and it's just like their salvation is just a, you know, a fire escape.
Well, I'm not going to hell. Good enough for me. And look, I'm glad that's the case for a lot of
people. I'm glad there's, you know, at the very least people aren't going to hell, but that's not,
that should not be our attitude as God's people. Well, I'm saved and that's good enough.
And even if we've managed to add some of these things to our life, we should always be looking,
going over that list going, well, how am I doing in this area? I got the godliness. How am I doing
the brotherly kindness? So I got the brotherly kindness. How am I doing the patience? I got the
patience, you know, how am I doing and adding what and adding the finer details to our Christian life.
And yet I'll preach this. People will read it. People will nod their head and they'll understand.
And yet there's so many people that lack in these areas. So many Christians that fail to add these
finer details to the Christian life. He said, why would you fail at that? Why would a Christian,
you know, understand this and fail to do it? I think it's because they lack perspective.
That's the only way I can explain it. And I think that's what Peter is saying here too,
because look at verse nine, he says, but he that lack this lack at these things, the faith,
the virtue, you know, or not the faith, but the virtue, the knowledge, the godliness, the temperance,
so on and so forth. He's that lack at these things is what is blind. He can't see what does he lack?
He lacks perspective. And notice what he, and it says, and he cannot see a far off. What's it mean
to say a far off? You can't see what's a distance away from you, a far off. And has forgotten that
he was purged from his old sins. Now I don't think this is talking about the fact that, you know,
he forgot he got saved, but he's not understanding. He's lost sight of the fact that Christ, you know,
the great price that was paid for his soul, that he's what it means to be purged from his sins.
He's still saved. He still knows he's saved, but you know what? Maybe it just doesn't have as much
of an impact on him as it used to. You know, and that's something that happens to Christians is
the longer they get saved and the older they get, it seems like, well, you know, I got saved 20,
30 years ago. Hopefully, you know, it has as much of an impact today as it does back then.
I mean, we, sometimes people get saved. There's like, wow, they can't believe it. They're,
they're just, it's so, they love God for it. They're so appreciative of their salvation.
But you know, if we lose perspective, people can just say, yeah, I'm safe.
Yeah, I'm going to heaven. It's been that way for a while. That's, you know, they can't see
it far off. They've lacked perspective. And people who just kind of are, you know,
hemming and hawing about their salvation, just like, yeah, I'm saved. You know,
you really think that's a person that's going to add all these other things to their faith?
No way. That's what he's saying. Look, they, they, they lack these things because they can't
see it far off. They've forgotten that they're personal. That has, you know, the impact has
worn off. I mean, what motivation is there? They cannot see it far off. You know what else they
can't see? They can't see the day of the Lord coming. And look, it's coming. In fact, you're
one breath away from it. You're one breath away from standing before God. It's right there.
And you can't, if you can't see that, you know, then you're not going to be moved to add to these
things to your faith. It's people that only live in the present and only for the present and to
gratify the flesh in the moment. You know, those people, they, they, they, they are blind. They
can't see it far off. They're not going to add to their faith. You know why Christians don't do it?
It's because they lack perspective. And it's because, look, it takes effort to add these
things to your Christian life. It was easy. Everybody do it. If it was easy,
Peter wouldn't have to write about it. If it was easy, I wouldn't have to get up and preach about
it. People, if it was just natural and everyone just did it, you know, then there'd be no need
to preach about it or write about it. But the fact is, is that it's difficult. Are you still
in first Kings? If you go back to first Kings chapter nine, first Kings chapter nine, look,
we like, I'm sure everybody that walked and saw that temple said, wow, are those Almag trees?
I've heard about those. Where'd you get this gold? Ophir? Man, these precious stones are nice,
man. Those are from Ophir too. I've heard of that place.
But you know what? That the truth about those substances is that it took effort to get them
there. Didn't it? In fact, it took a Navy to get them there. If you, if you read first Kings nine
verse 27 and Hyrum sent in the Navy, his servants, shipmen that came, that had knowledge of the sea
with the servants of Solomon and they came to Ophir. I mean, wherever this place was, it took
a Navy to go there and get all this stuff. And they fetched from thence gold 420 talents and
brought it to King Solomon. You know, that's why so many people fail to add these finer details to
their faith because it's going to take effort. It's not going to happen by accident. You're
going to have to want to be a better Christian if you're going to be one. It requires effort,
it requires purpose, it requires intention. And look, everyone gets that. Everyone understands
that. You know, and I'm just preaching this morning because I don't want people in this
church to just be satisfied, well, good enough. To just be satisfied, well, good enough. I mean,
do you want me to be like that as a preacher? Well, I mean, I can get up and scream and yell
for a few minutes. You know, I can, I can, I can phone one in every now and then and say,
well, it's good enough. Got you edified, didn't it? Or would you actually like me to take the
time, you know, to do my job right and dig into the word of God and, and actually feed you some
meat? That's what you'd want, right? And that's what we would all want. And we should all want
for our Christian lives the best that we can give God and not be satisfied with good enough.
You know, those are, that's a very detrimental attitude to your Christian life to say, well,
it's good enough. I'm not going, I don't want to be satisfied with good enough. And I don't want
you to be satisfied with good enough. You should be satisfied with your best. And look, I understand
our best will never be good enough for God. But that's no reason to not put forth your best effort
when it comes to the things of the Christian life. And when it comes to this idea of adding
to your faith, of adding the finer details, oh, it's just so much work to get a devotional life
together. It's just so much work to get to church on a regular basis. It's just so much effort to
have to go and learn how to win souls and do the work that God has given us to do. It's just so
much effort. Well, I'm sorry that God asked me to do something hard. But you know what? If you do
those things, God will bless you for it. And God's worthy of it. Did I have you, you should be go
back in First Peter chapter one, First Peter chapter one. He said in First Peter chapter one,
verse three, I'll begin reading First Peter one three. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord
Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again into a lively hope
by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to inheritance incorruptible and undefiled that
fadeth not a way reserved in heaven for you, who are kept by the power of God through faith
unto salvation. You know, you need to get, if people are struggling to want to add to their
Christian life, if they've, like you said in Second Peter, become blind and no longer can see
afar off, if salvation has lost the impact it once had on their life, you know, maybe you should need
to dwell on these verses. That God, according to his abundant mercy, you know, God didn't have to
save us. It wasn't like, well, of course God saved me, he had to. Oh no, he didn't. You know,
it was according to his abundant mercy that he's begotten us again, unto a lively hope by the
resurrection of Christ from the dead. Mercy is getting something that, not getting what you
deserve, right? It's a very merciful thing for God to come say down, come down here and say,
you know what, I'll send my only begotten son to live a perfect life, to die for you and save you
so that you don't have to go to hell, which is where you deserve to go. That's what it
means by mercy. Verse four, and not only that, he saves us from hell and then he goes, and to an,
what did he save us to? To an inheritance. I mean, I would, at least if you're not at hell,
I mean, couldn't we just say, well, that's good enough. Good enough. I mean, it truly,
if that's all I ever got out of the deal, I'd say good enough. I don't have to spend a second in hell
because of Jesus Christ. You know, Jesus will have spent more time in hell than I ever have,
because when he died, the Bible says that he went down into hell for three days and three nights
and came back. Think about that. He's been in hell longer than you ever will be.
And I would say, well, that's good enough for me. But you know what? God didn't have,
that's not his attitude. Well, good enough. You're not in hell. When we get to heaven,
it's just, it's just, it's just dull, boring, and it's not going to be.
But what if it was? It's all attorneys, just, you know, just plain,
plain Jane heaven, nothing real that, really that fancy, you know, like Texas.
Right? What if heaven was just El Paso, Texas the whole time?
I'd say, well, at least it's not hell. It's close.
You can say good enough, right? Was that, was that, but is that God's attitude with us?
Well, good enough. At least you're not in hell. No, he saved us. Yeah, he saved us by his mercy,
but he saved us to something, to an inheritance that's incorruptible, that's undefiled, and that
fate is not a way reserved in heaven for you. And look, we've talked a little bit recently about,
you know, the new Jerusalem and then, you know, we have a new body that's coming. I mean,
we're going to be rewarded for our works. I mean, heaven's going to blow our minds,
but, you know, why? Because God didn't have this attitude of, well, good enough.
You know, God cared about, you know, giving us more on top, giving us his best,
you know? And so it's, you know, when we look at our Christian life and say, well, it's so
much work to add these details. Well, you know, God's, it's a pretty good trade-off.
I think, I think it's a pretty good investment. I think you're going to, you know, not only are
you going to get all of that incorruptible inheritance that's reserved for you, but you
also get all the blessings that come in this life. The blessings of, you know, not having
the problems that the world has, not having the addictions and the sins and everything else that
comes with, you know, living a sinful life. You get all that and you get rewarded on top of it.
So don't be satisfied with God enough. Go to 1 Corinthians chapter 9, 1 Corinthians chapter 9.
I'm almost done. God wasn't satisfied with good enough. He didn't say, well, you're not roasted
in hell, you know? You should just be, look, we should be appreciative of that. And I'm sure we
are. The point is this, is that, you know, he went above and beyond that and said, well, not only
that, I'm going to give you, you know, in my house, there are many mansions, you know, that
we're all going to be changed in a moment, the twinkling of an eye that, you know, this, this
corruptible is going to put on incorruption. We're going to get that new body. Look at 1
Corinthians chapter 9, verse 24. Because again, the idea that the thrust of the sermon is about
you adding to your faith, you about caring about the finer details of your faith,
giving attendance to those things and what? Putting forth effort to add those things to
your life, to add the virtue, the knowledge, the godliness, the temperance, the patience,
all of these things. And there's more. That wasn't an all inclusive list, the brotherly kindness and
all, and so on. That's the idea of the sermon is we need to learn to do that, to add these things.
Now look at 1 Corinthians 9 in that mind, it says in verse 24, know ye not that they which run in a
race run all but one receive at the prize, so run that you may obtain. He's like, look, run the race
to win. Don't, don't live the Christian life you can just slide in last in heaven. They're like,
well, I made it. And every man that striveth for the masteries is temperate in all things.
Now they, right, he's talking about people that run that, you know, that, that compete in,
in worldly competitions on this earth, carnal physical competitions, literal competitions
on this earth. They do it to obtain a corruptible crown but we an incorruptible. He was liking it
unto a race, right? He's saying I therefore so run not as uncertainly so fight I as one that beat at
the air, but I keep my body under and bring it into subjection, right, exercise some temperance,
lest by any means when I have preached to others I myself should be a castaway. And what I want
to point out here is that Paul's using this comparison and he said he's liking our, you know,
our spiritual race, our Christian life, and he's comparing it to those that run a physical race.
He's saying, look, they, you know, they do it, they strive and they're, they're temperate in
all things. They do it to obtain a corruptible crown. I mean, look, look at what the, what the
professional athletes do. Look what these Olympians do in order to achieve the, some
corruptible crown, you know, a little, a little wedge of gold, like a little disc of gold or
silver or bronze if they're lucky, or just the honor to have represented their country, right?
Look at what, what lengths they go to. I mean, I can't hold a candle to any of that. I'm going to
try, right? And that's what, and sometimes the world is better at chasing some corruptible crown
than God's own people are at getting an incorruptible one. They put more effort,
they, they care about more, about more of the details of their life and the things that they
need to do to achieve what they're trying to achieve than God's people do about what, you
know, about their incorruptible crown. I mean, these professional athletes, they'll, they'll
sit there and they'll, they'll, they'll count every macro nutrient there is, they'll, they'll
make, they'll make sure they eat at the right time after they do this exercise, they drink this
thing after, they do all kinds of crazy things. They're measuring their output of this and input
of that. I mean, they got all this data there. I mean, they, they put so much effort and all
they're trying to do is just achieve some worldly accomplishment. Well, and then God said, and then,
you know, Peter says to us, Hey, add to your faith virtue. Well, I just can't do that. Well,
that's just too much to ask. Knowledge, oh, memorize scripture, know the Bible, show up
for pre I just can't do all that. And, and he's trying to get you to strive for an incorruptible
crown and one that's reserved in heaven of you that fadeth not away. And sometimes God's people
are outdone by the world when it comes to this idea of trying to strive for the mastery and to
achieve and to win. I mean, the world, they, I mean, they optimize, they hack, they streamline,
right? They do all these things to be more efficient and better. You know, they, they
start studying the neuroscience behind every little thing and they try to, you know, these
entrepreneurs and stuff like that. You know, they, they have this, this morning regimen, this evening
regimen. They know if they, you know, if, if they stare at the sun for 15 minutes, first thing in
the morning, and then they drink their coffee 90 minutes after that, that they're, the caffeine's
going to kick in and they're going to be their most productive hours are going to be between nine.
I mean, they really get into this. Why? So that they can, you know, manipulate a stock market or
something, or get in the best trades, or, you know, they, they spend two hours on Instagram to,
you know, get themselves out there. Look, they put a lot of effort into these things. Don't they?
They optimize, they hack, they do all these things. They, they pay attention.
And yet the faith of God's own people sometimes just languish. It languishes, it decays, you know,
it's just some bare bones temple. Yeah, the marble's there. The rock is there. It's solid.
It's not moving, but you know what? It's empty. It's unfurnished. There's nothing attractive about
it because they haven't taken the time to put forth the effort to go, you know, get that navy
built, build those ships, go to the land of Ophir. Yeah, it takes a lot of effort.
Get those album of trees and add something to the temple of your faith. Build a navy,
get something done. You know, I, I didn't really, I'm not going to take the time to develop all
this, but the other thing that they brought was precious stones. You know, precious stones are,
you know, I believe symbolic of, of, of souls, you know, that we should, we should, you know,
we're going to be rewarded, you know, if our work, our work's going to be tried by fire,
and if any man's work shall abide, you know, the gold, silver, and precious stone, right?
The precious stones, I believe those are the souls that we preach to and get saved.
You know, if you're going to, if you're going to have some precious stones at the end of this life,
so these finer details of the Christian life, you have to put forth the effort to make that happen.
And I understand I'm preaching the choir. We've got soul winners in here that are dedicated and
do it, but you know what? There's others that need to, that need to work on this finer detail
and care about this, but it's so much effort. I know, I know, but it's worth it.
You know, another way to, to, to, to get these things is to, you know,
go through the heaviness, go through the trials, go through the tribulations, put forth the effort.
Exercise your faith is what I'm getting at, because if you don't, it's going to atrophy.
You know, and you're going to end this life and there's not going to be anything
to adorn your life before God. There's not going to be any adornments. There's not going to be
that terrace in your life. You know, I don't want to get, get there and just say, well, God,
you gave me this temple. It was indwelt with the Holy Ghost, but you know, I was too busy,
you know, playing video games or making money or doing whatever to, to add anything to it.
You know, and that's what I'm trying to encourage you to do this morning. You know,
and if you're already doing it, great. You know, maybe there's some other finer detail
in your life that, in your Christian life that you need to pay attention to. I mean,
maybe it's one we've already, you know, we had it polished up in the past and then we moved on to
this detail. Next thing you know, it's collecting dust over there. I mean, we live, we should all
know something about dust living in Arizona and it's just a constant battle, right? You're just
always dusting here. At least you should be. All right. That might be the thing, you know,
maybe you got really good at this. You know, man, I focused in on this finer detail. I got
my Bible reading down, but now my soul winning's gone. I worked on my soul winning, now my Bible
reading's gone. Oh, now my prayer life. You know, there's all these things that we have to add,
all these things that we have to pay attention to. That's what I'm trying to get you to do this
morning is to understand that there are things in this Christian life that are worth paying
attention to. These finer details are important. They're not, they're not necessary to function.
The terrorists there in the house of God, that wasn't necessary. You know what? But it was,
it was something that, that beautified the temple. It was something that Solomon was saying,
I'm going to put forth some effort and not just be satisfied with good enough. And we don't want
to be satisfied with God, with good enough in our Christian life. We want to make sure,
ask yourself, am I doing my best for God? That's what God is worthy of. That's what we want to
present the Lord, our best. We do so by paying attention to the finer details. Let's go and pray.