So, so far we've seen the ant, the locust, and the spider as examples of good workers.
Now, whenever I read this verse, Proverbs 30 verse 28, "The spider taketh hold with
her hands and is in king's palaces," I've heard people kind of interpret this verse
in different ways.
It's kind of a cryptic verse, but I'll tell you what I always think of when I read this
verse, how working hard actually takes you into a lot of really cool places.
You get to go interesting places if you work hard.
See, the spider taketh hold of their hands, referring to the work that the spider does.
So the spider works hard, and as a result, it dwells in king's palaces.
Even the fanciest home or the fanciest palace will have a spider web up in the corner.
You'll see it no matter how wealthy they are, right?
It gets in there and it builds the web.
And I was thinking about in my life, through various jobs that I've had, the cool places
that I've gotten to go.
And I thought about how when I used to work on alarm systems in residential homes, how
I went into some of the wealthiest, fanciest homes imaginable.
I remember we would do jobs in Napa, California, the wine country, and we'd go in there, and
I mean some of these neighborhoods were so mind blowing, I didn't even know that such
a neighborhood could exist.
Because I've seen fancy houses, I've seen mansions and nice places, but I mean, you'd
go into some of these neighborhoods, and I mean the houses were literally like castles.
They had like a drawbridge, and I'm not even joking.
I literally saw a house that looked like a castle and it had a drawbridge.
And I mean other houses looked like these jungle fortresses.
They were made out of like these logs, and they had like a wood, greenery, jungle look
with plants growing all over it.
Just these exotic, it almost looked like an amusement park or something, this neighborhood.
Just the super fancy, ridiculously expensive, just multi-million dollar homes.
Now here's the thing, I'm never going to own a home like that.
I don't have a desire to own a home like that.
You know, I wouldn't spend my money on such vanity if I had that kind of money, but I'll
tell you what, it was cool to go there for one day and to work in that house.
You see, fancy things that you own, after a while you get bored with them anyway.
You know, I remember I had a good friend when I was in high school, and his parents were
very wealthy and they lived in a mansion.
And I remember the first time I went to his house, I was just mind blown by this mansion
they lived in.
And the second time, it still blew me away.
But after I'd been to his house three, four, five, six times, it got to be where it's just,
this is Ryan's house.
And you didn't really think anything of it.
You didn't really, it didn't knock your socks off like it used to.
So spending your life seeking after wealth and riches and money so that you can live
in a house with turrets and a drawbridge, you know, is a waste of your life.
The Bible says labor not to be rich.
The Bible says they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare and into many
foolish and hurtful lusts which drown men in destruction and perdition for the love
of money is the root of all evil.
Which while some covet it after, they've erred from the faith and pierced themselves through
with many stars.
But I will say this, even though I don't want to live in a palace or anything like that,
I don't think that that's the desire of any godly Christian, it's still cool to get to
visit places like that.
And I enjoyed working in these fancy homes.
You know, I got to have the best of both worlds.
I'm living a life that matters where I'm serving the Lord and I'm having children and I'm raising
them and I'm having my priorities in the right place, but yet I got to enjoy the palace as
well.
I got to be in the king's palace.
I met the spider taking hold of my hands, you know, working on that alarm system up
in the corner somewhere of that house.
Just getting to enjoy it.
But not only that, you know, I've done fire alarm systems in art museums and in other
just interesting places.
I've traveled for business, you know, sometimes work will send you on business.
Who here has an example of cool places that you've gone in the course of work?
Where is it cool?
Where did you get to go?
Redwood Forest, Botswana, yeah, that's true, I got to go there in the course of my work
too, that was pretty cool.
Who else got something, yeah.
Beverly Hills, wow, okay, so he's a pool service man, he's going to houses that have an airport
in the backyard, yeah, all the plant life and everything, yeah, and I mean, in the back,
inside a nuclear reactor, hey, let's get the Geiger counter on him before we leave and
make sure he's not spreading any radioactivity.
But the point is that, you know, you get to go cool places with your job, a lot of jobs,
you end up getting to see things and experience things and go do cool things and see cool
places and I, you know, I've been interesting places, you guys have been interesting places
and look, these aren't, some of our jobs that took us there weren't even the most glamorous
job imaginable, you know, being an electrician, being a pool man, being a carpenter, whatever,
but we get to go cool places, you know, God blesses you when you work hard with some good
experiences, you get to see some neat things, and other people even who have a job that
doesn't really take them anywhere, let's say they're just in a cubicle in front of a computer,
but a lot of those companies will have like an employee getaway or vacation, I think Brother
Fairchild's job is like that, right, they get to go somewhere once a year for morale boost
or whatever, and not only that, but if you work hard, you know, you can actually make
a little money and go on vacation with some of the money that you made.
The point is, you know, working hard, it brings a lot of blessings and it brings a lot of
experiences to you that you don't get by sitting around and being lazy.
You know, the people who sit around and they're lazy and they don't work hard, they miss out
on all these great experiences and on all these cool things that life has to offer.
And again, I'm not talking about being rich, I don't think it's right for us to seek to
be rich, but I'm just talking about going to work, putting in a good day's work, working
with your hands, doing a good job, being like the ant or the locust or the spider and getting
something done and God's going to reward you for that.
You're going to have a house to live in, a modest home, you're going to have food to
eat, you're going to be able to support your family.
It feels good to be able to do that and also God will bring you to interesting places and
And you get to experience things and do fun things that you'd like to do.