The story here in 1 Kings chapter 21 is a pretty famous story, it's about King Ahath and he's the king of Israel and he really wants to buy this vineyard that belongs to Naboth the Jezreelite.
And Naboth was a man who basically had inherited this from his father, that was where his ancestors had been.
And if you go back in the Old Testament, I'm not going to take time to show you, but back in the book of Leviticus, it talks about how you're not supposed to sell the inheritance of your father, you're supposed to keep that.
And so basically Naboth, because of the sentimental value of his land and his vineyard and the farm so to speak, he doesn't want to sell it for any amount of money.
And the government is basically offering him all kinds of money and a better vineyard and so forth and he said no, I don't want it.
Which he had the right to do that, I mean it belonged to him.
Well, Ahath goes home and starts being a crybaby about it and whining.
And you know, I noticed this about evil people in the Bible, they get monomaniacal about just one thing that they can't have.
Have you ever noticed that? Like you remember Haman in the book of Esther had everything, but then just one guy wouldn't bow down to him?
And he's like, all of it availed me nothing.
He's like, the fact that I have 10 children, the fact that I'm rich, the fact that I'm the second most powerful man in the kingdom.
Every time I see Mordecai refusing to bow down to me just ruins everything.
Isn't it amazing how wicked people are never satisfied until they just have everything and they're never going to have everything.
Therefore, they're never going to be satisfied.
But you know, Haman was like that, that's how Ahath was.
I mean, he's the king of Israel, he's got all kinds of vineyards.
He even has better vineyards, because he's even offering Naboth, I'll swap you out for a better vineyard.
But it's just no, I don't want it really close to my house, you know, I really wanted that one.
And so basically, he comes home and his wicked evil wife Jezebel just tells him this horrible idea of just lying and having Naboth arrested and having false witnesses testify against him so that he will be stoned with stones.
And then when he's dead, just take the vineyard from him.
Now, it's interesting because that word Jezreel means vengeance.
You say, well, did you get that out of the dictionary? No.
No, all you have to do is go to the book of Hosea, the Bible actually defines in your King James English Bible, it defines the word Jezreel as vengeance.
I believe it's in the book of Hosea, but he breaks it down and he tells someone to name their child Jezreel because it's vengeance.
It might not be Hosea, but it's in one of the prophets.
And that's what I want to preach about tonight is the fact that God always, he always recompenses the good and the evil in this world.
It's amazing. And the longer that I live, the more I believe this because of the fact that the longer that you live, the more you will see people get what is coming to them.
You'll see, but not only the bad, because I'm going to show you both sides of the coin tonight.
I'm going to start out by showing you how the evil are going to get what's coming to them.
And I'm going to show you how the good will get what's coming to them.
Because it goes both ways, but whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.
Now there have been times in my life when I doubted that that was true because I would see people do good and not receive any good.
I would see people do evil and not receive any evil.
But then the longer you live, you'll just see that it just came a little bit slower than you expected.
Sometimes it's not until many years later, but it is amazing and shocking to me how people reap what they sow.
Just in my own life what I've seen.
And of course it's very clear in the Bible.
But let's look at some examples in the Bible.
This first example is what Ahab did to Naboth.
Look what the Bible says in verse 19.
This is Elijah preaching unto Ahab.
And thou shalt speak unto him, saying, Thus saith the Lord, hast thou killed and also taken possession?
And thou shalt speak unto him, saying, Thus saith the Lord.
Now watch this.
In the place where dogs licked the blood of Naboth, shall dogs lick thy blood, even thine?
So isn't that interesting that he's saying that the exact thing that you've done to someone else is going to come back and get you?
Just like you killed Naboth and the dogs licked up his blood, the same thing is going to happen unto you.
Look what it says in verse 20.
And Ahab said to Elijah, Hast thou found me, O mine enemy?
And he answered, I have found thee, because thou has sold thyself to work evil in the sight of the Lord.
Behold, I will bring evil upon thee, and will take away thy posterity, and will cut off from Ahab him that pisseth against the wall, and him that is shut up and left in Israel,
and will make thine house like the house of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, and like the house of Baasha, the son of Ahimta, for the provocation wherewith thus provoked me to anger and made Israel insane.
You say, what does that mean, piss against the wall?
He's talking about all the men, basically, because that's the difference between men and women.
And he said, there's a little anatomy lesson for you, but he said in verse 23, And of Jezebel also spake the Lord, saying, The dog shall eat Jezebel by the wall of Jezreel,
and him that dieth of Ahab in the city the dog shall eat, and him that dieth in the field shall the fowls of the air eat.
But there was none like unto Ahab which did sell himself to work wickedness in the sight of the Lord, whom Jezebel his wife stirred up.
Now, the thing about Ahab, he was a very wicked king, but he wasn't really totally rotten to the core.
You know, if you've read the Bible, you know that, because when you read through the stories about Ahab, there are a couple of different times,
and even later in this chapter, Ahab humbles himself in fast and praise the Lord.
Ahab was not completely rotten to the core. He was definitely a bad guy.
He definitely did a lot of wickedness, but it was really his wife who was the instigator.
She was the one who stirred him up. She was the one that put him up to the wicked things that he did.
She was the one that got him worshipping Baal. She was the one that got him to bring Baal worship in,
because she was the daughter of the king of the Zidonians who worshipped all these false gods,
and it all came in through her family.
And there are other times in the Bible, too, where you see Ahab do the right thing in a few cases,
but it was his wife that really stirred him up.
Now, when he humbles himself, God basically has mercy on him,
and says that he's not going to destroy all of his family in his days, but in the days of his son.
Look at the last verse in the chapter. It says,
See as though Ahab humbled himself before me?
Because he humbled himself before me, I think I'll just forget about the whole thing.
No. It's still coming. Vengeance is always still coming,
but he just said, I will not bring the evil in his days,
but in his son's days will I bring the evil upon his son.
So, he basically just delayed the punishment, but it's still coming.
Go to 2 Kings 9. We're going to see the fulfillment of this.
2 Kings 9.
Now, 2 Kings 9, I was studying this out and trying to figure out the phonology here,
and it's impossible to say exactly how much time has elapsed, but basically at least 17 years.
We can see clearly 17 years go by, maybe a little bit more than that.
So this is 17 years later.
Basically, when Ahab died, his son took the throne.
That son was wicked, only reigned for two years.
He died, and then his other brother took the throne.
Look at verse number 21 of chapter 9.
It says,
And Joram said, make ready, and his chariot was made ready.
And Joram king of Israel, this is Ahab's son,
Joram king of Israel and Ahaziah king of Judah went out, each in his chariot,
and they went out against Jehu and met him in the portion of Naboth the Jezreelite.
Now, it just happens to be a coincidence here. You see this?
How they just happened to run into Jehu at the exact place of Naboth the Jezreelite, in his vineyard,
because Jehu was coming to basically take over the kingdom,
to kill the king and to take over the kingdom, because that's what God had told him to do.
And it just happened to be, by chance, that he just happened to meet up with him at the exact point of Naboth's name.
You know what else is interesting, just going back in time a little bit,
when Ahab died, the Bible says it was basically someone just drew their bow at a venture and just fired a random arrow.
And it just happened to just plunge into his heart.
Obviously, God guided that.
And so God makes sure that people get what's coming to them.
But look how interesting this is.
They met him in the portion of Naboth the Jezreelite.
And it came to pass, when Joram saw Jehu, then he said, is it peace, Jehu?
And he answered, what peace, so long as the whoredoms of thy mother Jezebel?
So she's still alive, even though Ahab's gone.
And her witchcrafts are so many.
And Joram turned his hands and fled and said to Ahaziah, there is treachery, O Ahaziah.
And Jehu drew a bow with his full strength and smote Jehoram between his arms,
and the arrow went out at his heart and sucked down his chair.
So basically, he just pulls back the bow and arrow with full force and fires this arrow,
and it shoots through the heart of Joram.
It says in verse 25, then said Jehu to Bithar, his captain,
take up and cast him in the portion of the field of Naboth the Jezreelite.
For remember how that when I and thou rode together after Ahab his father,
the Lord laid this burden upon him?
Surely I have seen yesterday the blood of Naboth and the blood of his sons, saith the Lord.
And I will requite thee in this plaque, saith the Lord.
Now, therefore, take and cast him into the plat of ground, according to the word of the Lord.
So these guys were just young men, Bithar and Jehu, when they were following Ahab,
and they heard that pronounced, and then boom, they killed him in that place
and threw him down on the ground, and the dogs licked his blood.
Look at 2 Kings 9 and 30, just a few verses down.
Verse 30, it says, and when Jehu was come to Jezreel, Jezebel heard of it,
and she painted her face and tired her head and looked out at a window.
You know, typical, I mean, how old is this woman at this time?
But she still thinks that she's going to, you know, look so good and paint her face.
She's probably one of those older women that's had all these like,
what's that called when they do this?
Or they look like this?
Plastic surgery is so dumb.
But anyway, the face lift and the makeup and everything like that,
you know, painting your face and all this stuff.
And she comes and looks out the window, and as Jehu entered in at the gate,
she said, Had Zimrai Peach, I hate makeup, by the way,
but that's another thing, that's a whole other thing,
who slew his master, and he lifted up his face to the window and said,
Who is on my side? Who?
And they looked out at him, two or three eunuchs, and he said,
Throw her down.
So they threw her down, and some of her blood was sprinkled on the wall
and on the horses, and he trode her underfoot.
So he's in the chariot, and he pulls up and sees Miss Facelift
up in the window and says, Who's on God's side? Who's on my side?
And these two eunuchs, these two servants come out
and throw her out the window.
She hits the ground, and then they ride over her in the chariot.
It says in verse 34, When he was come in, he did eat and drink.
That was his first priority.
He needed to have something to eat, something to drink.
And then he said, Go see now this cursed woman and bury her,
for she is a king's daughter.
And they went to bury her, but they found no more of her
but the skull and the feet and the palms of her hands.
Wherefore they came again and told him.
It must have been a long meal, but they came again and told him.
And he said, This is the word of the Lord,
which he spake by his servant Elisha the Tishbite, saying,
In the portion of Jezreel shall dogs eat the flesh of Jezebel,
and the carcass of Jezebel shall be as dung upon the face of the field
in the portion of Jezreel, so that they shall not say,
This is Jezebel.
There's not going to be anything to point to to say,
This is Jezebel is what they're saying.
How many people do you think for 17 years looked at that
and said, That's not fair?
You know, Ahab got away with that.
Poor Naboth.
You know, Why doesn't God do something about it?
You see, God's judgment may not always be as swift as we think it's going to be,
but it is inexorable. It will come.
I mean, you can't stop it.
Once God's justice and God's wrath has been set in motion,
it's impossible to stop. You might delay it. You might push it back.
But whether for good or whether for evil,
God's recompense, God's reward, God's vengeance is always coming.
Now, this sermon tonight, turn if you would to Genesis 31,
this sermon tonight can either be a blessing for you
or it can be a curse for you.
It just depends on what you're sowing in your life,
because if you're sowing the seeds of evil and wickedness and sin in your life,
then you've got a horrible harvest coming someday.
You sow the wind and you reap the whirlwind.
But if you're sowing to good, if you're doing right things,
then you should take comfort in this sermon.
It's going to come back to you.
But let me tell you something.
Everything that you do will come back to you, always.
If you do evil, it's going to come back.
If you do good, it's going to come back to you.
And so this is the law of sowing and reaping in the Bible.
And God makes sure that people reap what's coming to them.
I'll read this to you.
You don't have to turn there, but in Numbers 32, 23 it says,
But if you will not do so, behold, you have sinned against the Lord,
and be sure your sin will find you out.
See, God says your sin will find you out.
You can't get away with things.
Amos 5, 19 says this,
And if a man did flee from a lion and a bear met him,
or went into that house and leaned his hand on the wall,
and a serpent bit him.
You know, you can escape the lion, but the bear will get you.
You can run into the house and think that you're safe
and lean your hand on the wall and a snake will bite you.
See, if God is going to bring judgment to you,
if God wants to kill you or if God wants to curse you,
you will be cursed.
There's nothing you can do.
You can't hide from God.
David said, wither shall I flee from thy presence?
God's everywhere.
There's no way to escape God's wrath.
And so we've got to be very careful about the decisions
that we make in our lives and the things that we do.
Because we're always going to reap what we sow.
Ahab reaped it.
His sons reaped it.
Jezebel, his wicked, abominable wife reaped it.
I mean, she died a horrible death, a gory death,
and was trampled in the streets and eaten by dogs.
I mean, you can see it again and again.
That's just one example from the Bible.
I mean, I'm going to show you example after example
of people getting paid back for what they've done.
But look at Genesis 31.
Let's look at the positive side of the coin here.
Look at Genesis 31, verse 4.
Here's Jacob, later renamed Israel.
It says in verse 4,
And Jacob sent and called Rachel and Leah
to the field unto his flock,
and said unto them, I see your father's countenance
that is not toward me as before,
but the God of your father hath been with me,
and ye know that with all my power I have served your father.
Now let me just give you the story real quick.
Jacob, in the Old Testament,
he went to stay with his uncle Laban
because of the fact that
he was just trying to get away from Esau,
was the main thing,
and he also wanted to go back to his family's nativity
in order to find a wife from his own kindred, you know.
He married his cousin.
Is that close enough for you, family?
But anyway, he goes over to Padan Aram,
and he works for his uncle Laban,
and if you remember,
Laban just constantly tricked and deceived him.
Now he was a very hard worker.
He was a very diligent worker,
and he worked for him for seven years
so that he could marry his daughter Rachel,
but then, of course, Laban switches around,
and he ends up marrying Leah by accident,
and then he makes him serve another seven years
in order to marry Rachel,
and then he serves him six years for his cattle,
and Laban is constantly ripping him off, okay.
Now you might have had a job like that
where you did a bunch of work,
you worked really hard,
and you didn't really get paid like you were supposed to,
and somebody maybe ripped you off in a business transaction,
but it says here in verse number seven,
we'll look at verse six again.
It says,
You know that with all my power I have served your father,
and your father has deceived me
and changed my wages ten times,
but God suffered him not to hurt me.
If he said thus,
The speckled shall be thy wages,
then all the cattle bear speckled.
And if he said thus,
The ring straight shall be thy hire,
then bear all the cattle ring straight.
Thus God hath taken away the cattle of your father
and given them to me.
So here we see a hard working guy
being ripped off by his boss, by Laban,
and yet God transferred the wealth of Laban to Jacob anyway
in spite of Laban being a liar,
changing his wages ten times, deceiving him, and so forth.
He says in verse number ten,
And it came to pass at the time that the cattle conceived
that I lifted up my eyes and saw in a dream,
and behold, the ram that was leaped upon the cattle
were ring straight, speckled, and grizzled.
And the angel of God spake unto me in a dream,
saying, Jacob, and I said, Here am I.
And he said, Lift up now thine eyes,
and see, all the rams which leap upon the cattle
are ring straight, speckled, and grizzled.
For I have seen all that will even doeth unto thee.
I am the God of Bethel, where thou anointest the pillar,
and where thou vowest to bow unto me.
Now arise, get thee out from this land,
and return unto the land of thy kindred.
Now it's interesting how he saw everything God did to him,
and he tells him, I am the God of Bethel.
Now if you remember what happened at Bethel,
earlier on, Jacob, on his way to Paderram,
on his way to go to live with Laban,
he stopped at Bethel.
That's where he put a stone for his pillow,
and he went to sleep,
and he saw a vision of angels ascending and descending.
You've heard the term Jacob's ladder.
And basically, at that time, he made a vow to God.
Do you remember that?
He basically said that whatever God gave him,
he would give one-tenth unto God.
Do you remember that?
And he's saying, look, I'm the God of Bethel.
You know, you made a vow to give unto me ten percent.
And he said, because of that, I've seen what you're going through.
I made sure that you actually came out with a lot of money
because I blessed you in that case.
And so we see here that because Jacob was generous toward God,
you know, he was not a tightwad or a cheapskate,
like people who don't pay their tithe.
You know, when God commands us to pay the ten percent,
pay the tithe.
You know, we see that because he was a hard worker,
he didn't just say, well, if I'm not getting paid much,
I'm not going to do my job to the fullest.
You know, it doesn't matter how much you're getting paid.
You should go to work and give it a hundred percent.
Some people have this attitude, well, if you don't pay much,
you don't get much.
So because I'm only getting paid X amount per hour,
I'm only going to work just, you know, fifty percent.
I'm not going to be firing on all four cylinders.
But you know what?
Honestly, if you work hard, God will bless you and pay you back.
You will reap what you sow.
The Bible says in all labor there is profit,
but the talk of the lips, tent, only the penury.
And here was a man who wasn't getting paid very well,
but ended up very wealthy because God saw him working hard,
paying his tithe, giving it a hundred percent,
he ended up wealthy because of it.
Okay, and I know I'm not a prosperity preacher,
but he basically ended up being blessed by God
more than the boss who was ripping him off.
It says in verse number 13,
I am the God of Bethel, where thou anointedst the pillar,
and where thou boughest to vow on me.
Remember, that's the vow that I was talking about,
that he would give ten percent unto God.
Now arise, get thee out from this land,
and return unto the land of thy kindred.
And Rachel and Leah answered and said unto them,
Is there yet any portion or inheritance for us in our father's house?
Are we not counted of him as strangers?
Counted of him as strangers?
For he hath sold us, and hath quite devoured also our money.
So they fell ripped off, you know,
because he was ripping up their husband.
For all the riches which God hath taken from our father,
that is ours and our children's.
Now then, whatsoever God have said unto thee, do.
Go to Ephesians 6, and we'll see this concept in the New Testament.
Ephesians chapter 6 pretty much spells out the same thing
about working at your job and being recompensed for what you do there.
It says in Ephesians chapter 6, verse number 5,
Servants, be obedient to them that are your masters according to the flesh,
with fear and trembling and singleness of your heart,
as unto Christ, not with thy servants as men pleasers,
but as the servants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart,
with good will doing service as to the Lord and not to men,
knowing that whatsoever good thing any man doeth,
the same shall he receive of the Lord, whether he be bond or free.
That's saying that whenever you work at your job,
you should consider it as if you're working for Jesus Christ.
You should consider your boss as Jesus,
not the laban who's trying to rip you off and doesn't give you your hours
and doesn't do what he said he was going to do.
Not the laban, he's not your boss. Jesus is your boss.
And if you'll work hard and you'll give it your best
and serve your boss at work like you're serving Jesus Christ,
he says you will receive payment from the Lord.
God will make sure that you receive what's coming to you
and he'll curse those who rip you off.
But you see, you have to be patient.
You have to have faith to believe that
because it's not always going to be in the short term.
It's not always going to be in the short run.
Jacob got really ripped off in the short term,
but 20 years later, he had it all.
Look at Ahab. Seemed like he got away with everything.
At least 17 years later, judgment came.
Payday came.
And your payday is going to come when you're serving God and doing what's right.
And also serving your boss at work and so forth.
Go to Galatians chapter 6.
Galatians chapter 6.
And while you're turning to Galatians 6, I'll read you Luke chapter 6.
In Luke 6.38 it says,
Give and it shall be given unto you.
This is the sowing and reaping again.
Give and it shall be given unto you.
Good measure, pressed down and shaken together and running over,
shall men give into your bosom,
for with the same measure that ye meet withal,
it shall be measured to you again.
So God is saying, look, if you give, it'll be given unto you.
He said, men will give to your bosom.
He said, with the same measure that ye meet,
withal, it shall be measured to you again.
Now this is very true.
If you are a generous person, people will give unto you.
And it might not be, it's not going to be the same people.
Like if you're always giving things to people,
and being generous with people, and helping people,
those people may never recompense you, but God will recompense you.
The Bible says, he that giveth to the poor lendeth unto the Lord.
And he said, it's like you're loaning money to God,
because God will pay you back whenever you give unto the poor,
whenever you help others, and so forth.
He said, if you give, it'll be given unto you.
I can think of so many times in my life where, you know,
I gave and then it was given unto me.
I remember one time in particular that I gave,
I had a certain amount of money.
I was pretty poor.
This is when I was, actually this was right before I was married.
But I didn't have any money at the time.
I didn't have a lot of money.
But I basically, you know, I reached into my pocket,
and I gave some money to basically some missionaries and so forth.
You know, I was helping these missionaries
that were coming through our church in Sacramento.
And, you know, I reached into my pocket and gave, okay.
And it kind of hurt, you know,
because it was kind of money that I needed in a way,
but, you know, I could live with that.
I could do without it.
So I gave, and I remember literally just a couple days later at work,
I basically got a bonus check from my boss,
because it was around the time of bonuses.
But see, nobody got a bonus except if you were a supervisor.
You know, if you were just the bottom rung guy at Round Table Pizza,
you didn't get a bonus.
And I didn't have any position.
I mean, I didn't have the blue shirt.
You know, I was still a green shirt, you know.
So basically, the boss, and the boss,
this was a boss that hated me and treated me really badly.
You know, this particular manager that took me aside,
the head manager really liked me,
but this assistant manager for some reason just didn't like me.
And he took me aside, and he said,
he said, Steve, I don't know why, but, you know,
this bonus check is here for you.
And he's, and you know, it was from the owner of the company,
and I didn't even know the owner of the company.
I've never even met him.
And he said, he said, I don't want you to tell anybody about this,
because he said, it might make people upset,
because you're the only person who's not a supervisor
who's getting this bonus.
And so I don't want you to tell anybody about this,
because I don't know why they did it.
I don't know if it was a mistake,
or if they just heard something good about it.
I don't know.
But he said, you know, here it is.
You know, it was like 147 bucks or something,
you know, something like that.
You know, which, you know, but when you're 18 years old,
that's a lot of money.
You know, you're like, wow, you know, this is great.
You know, now look, is that usually how it is?
You know, you give, and then a couple days later, you know,
you mail in money to that TV preacher,
and boom, I got it right back.
That's not usually the way it works.
But I think God was just, you know, showing me something.
You know, just trying to teach me to be generous, you know, to give.
And I think God was trying to show me that.
But, you know, other times in my life,
I gave a lot more than that.
And I was a lot more generous, and nothing came in return, you know.
And I remember so many times hearing preaching,
like what I preach to you right now,
and becoming disgruntled by it almost,
because I'm thinking to myself, you know what?
I've always paid my time.
I've always been generous.
I've always given above and beyond.
I gave the missions.
I gave in all these different ways.
You know, and I didn't see God blessing me in my life.
And I even had somebody reproach me with that,
and throw that on my face one time and say, you know,
look at you.
You know, you're not doing well financially at all.
You know, you're poor.
You're doing terrible financially.
You know, I really appreciate it when people say that to me.
But somebody said this to me and reproached me with that,
and said, and look at you.
You know, you give and everything, you know,
and they were basically telling me that, you know,
God's not blessing me,
that God's not going to recompense you if you do well,
you know, if you give, if you're generous.
It's not going to come back to you.
And it kind of hurt my feelings at the time.
And the reason that it hurt my feelings
is because it was so true in my mind, you know?
You know, when people insult you and it's not true,
it usually doesn't really bother you that much.
But when somebody hits you with something
and it was kind of something
that you were already thinking about anyway,
then it just really, ouch, you know?
But you know what?
Years and years later,
I can say that I've received a lot more than I've given.
You know what I mean?
If I look at all the blessings that God has given me
over the last 10 years, I would praise God for it.
And I don't feel at all shortchanged whatsoever.
You know, even though maybe times early in my life,
I felt like, wow, you know,
I don't know why everything seems to go against me.
I can't ever seem to get ahead.
I can't ever seem to turn the corner.
I can't ever seem to, you know, get the desires of my heart.
But yet God will give you the desires of your heart,
but you have to wait.
Evil people will get recompensed in due time.
It just takes time.
And the good will be recompensed in due season.
But you have to wait.
When you sow that seed, it doesn't grow up overnight.
You've got to wait and wait.
It's just a little plant.
Sometimes when you plant a fruit tree,
it doesn't bring forth fruit for years.
You know, we have fruit trees
that we planted years ago at our house,
and they haven't produced any fruit.
And it takes years and years and years.
But eventually, those things will produce...
I mean, now we have so many lemons.
You know, we have a lemon tree that's a dull lemon tree.
We have so many lemons, we don't know what to do with them.
I mean, hundreds and hundreds of lemons.
But you've got to wait.
You've got to be patient.
God will recompense.
Let me just break it down to you simply this way.
You never do anything good,
but that you know that that's going to come back to you eventually.
It will happen.
Any...
The Bible says this.
Knowing...
And I'll read to you again.
We already read it. Ephesians 6, 8.
Knowing the whatsoever good thing any man doing,
the same shall he receive of the Lord, whether he be bond or free.
And that's why the Bible says, you know,
take heed that you do not your alms before men to be seen of them.
Otherwise, you have no reward if your Father waits in heaven.
He said the things that you do...
What he's teaching is that the things that you do that nobody knows about,
the people that you helped,
the money that you gave,
the good works that you did,
the soul-winning that you did,
the praying that you did,
that nobody else knows about,
you will be rewarded by God.
Period.
There's no doubt.
You'll be rewarded in this life.
You'll be blessed in this world.
You'll be blessed in the world to come.
God will pay you back for the good things that you do for Him.
And so we should not be weary in well-doing
because...
Did you turn to Galatians 6?
Is that right in your turn?
Yeah.
Galatians 6 says in verse 6,
Let him that is taught in the Word communicate unto him that teacheth in all good things.
Be not deceived.
God is not much.
For whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.
For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption.
But he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting.
And let us not be weary in well-doing,
for in due season we shall reap if we faint not.
As we have therefore opportunity,
let us do good unto all men,
especially unto them who are of the household of faith.
And so God says,
So God says,
Whenever you do good,
whenever you sow, you will reap.
It will come back to you.
He said,
Let us not be weary in well-doing,
for in due season we shall faint if we reap not.
Or, I mean, we shall reap if we faint not.
And here is the reason why people don't understand this
and why they don't believe this.
It's because of the delayed reaction.
Because here is what happens.
Let's say you've done a lot of wickedness earlier in your life, right?
You've done wickedness for years and years and years and years,
and then all of a sudden you start doing good, right?
And then you expect,
Well, now I'm doing good.
Everything good is going to happen to me.
But the problem is that maybe you're just beginning to reap
the bad that you did a long time ago
because there's such a delayed reaction.
And then you just wonder,
Why do I do so many good things
and so many bad things happen to me
and I'm doing good and bad happens.
I do more good, more bad happens.
You're not having bad happen to you
as a result of the good you're doing.
You're having bad happen to you
because of the result of the bad that you did.
And you reap later and you reap more than you sow.
I mean, you sow a tiny mustard seed
and you get a giant grape tree.
You always reap more than you sow.
But what you have to do is take heart of the fact
that the good that you're sowing now,
later on you'll be reaping all the good.
Other people you'll see doing bad things
and good things are happening, good things happen.
Because in the past they did good
and they're reaping that good.
Look at America.
America is still a very prosperous place right now.
Is it because America is so righteous? No.
It's because America has done good in the past
and because America has been righteous
to an extent in the past,
God blessed that righteousness
and we're still today reaping the benefits of the good things
but we're sowing so many bad seeds right now,
we're sowing so much evil,
we're sowing so much wickedness
that one day horrible things are going to happen in this country
because of the evil that we're doing right now.
So don't sit back and say,
well, why doesn't God judge?
Why doesn't God punish?
God always punishes.
Always.
Every time He punishes.
Always.
Every single time.
Take it to the bank.
And God always, always rewards the good every time.
And so you can't just sit there
and look at circumstances and say,
well, I don't see that happening.
And again, I'm not saying you're going to be rich and drive a Lexus
because you know what?
There are actually more important blessings than that,
than being rich.
That's what life's really all about,
just beholding all these treasures with your eyes,
gold and silver and precious stones and Lexus and mansions.
No.
God will give you the blessings that you desire.
He will do good to you if you do good to Him
and if you do good to others.
You will receive those things
and you'll be rewarded in heaven.
And so you have to get it through your mind
not to look at outward circumstances.
A lot of times people will do something good
and then two days later something bad happens
and they'll say, oh, see, God's not in this.
Maybe the devil's just trying to attack you
because you're doing something good.
I see a lot of people start doing something good
and then bad things start happening more often
because the devil's trying to slow them down
or maybe they're just reaping bad things from the past.
But you can't let outward circumstances
determine your philosophy on reaping and sowing.
You have to let the Bible determine what you believe
about reaping and sowing.
You can't just say, well, I looked around
and it didn't seem like it worked out that way.
No, look at the Bible.
What did God say He's going to do in the Bible?
He said He's going to reward the good
and punish the evil in this world.
And that's exactly what will happen.
But you have to wait for it.
You have to have patience.
You have to trust God.
It might be 17 years, 20 years
before things are settled the way that you want them
to be settled, but it will eventually happen
because God is a just God.
God will always balance the scales.
The symbol for justice is, of course,
who's ever seen the symbol for justice?
Who knows what I'm talking about?
It's a woman blindfolded, right?
And she's holding a scale in her hand
and a sword in her other hand.
And basically that symbolizes the balancing of the scale,
the punishment fitting the crime,
the reward fitting the works that you've done.
And God is a very just God.
He will judge the good and judge the evil.
Look at 2 Corinthians chapter 9 verse 6.
2 Corinthians chapter 9 verse number 6.
It says this,
But this I say, he which soweth sparingly
shall reap also sparingly,
and he which soweth bountifully
shall reap also bountifully.
Every man according as he purposeth in his heart,
so let him give, not grudgingly or of necessity,
for God loveth a cheerful giver.
Now watch this in verse 8.
And God is able to make all grace abound toward you,
that ye, always having all sufficiency in all things,
may abound to every good work.
That is what we desire, all sufficiency,
so that we may abound in all good works.
Not to be rich, not to be too over wealthy.
It might even be bad for us,
as I preached about this morning in Ecclesiastes chapter 6.
But here he's saying,
God is able to give you what you need,
to give you what is sufficient for you,
to give you the food, the clothing,
the things that you need,
so that you can abound in every good work,
so that you can serve God.
I mean, I can look back over my life
and God has blessed me and taken care of me.
Now, did I sometimes have to work harder
than I wanted to work?
Yes.
Did I sometimes have to go without things
and skip meals and skip things?
Yes.
But God has blessed me greatly
and I can look back and say
that God has given me sufficiency.
I mean, I've been able to serve God.
I've had what I needed.
I've been able to provide.
I've always been able to pay my bill.
I've always been able to feed my family.
And what more can I really ask for in life than that?
Amen.
I mean, isn't that all that we...
I mean, if I'm out winning souls and serving God
and I can read my Bible and I can feed with my family
and spend time with my family
and I can feed them and clothe them
and have a roof over my head,
what more can I really ask for than that?
You know what I mean?
But sometimes we just set our sights
a little bit too high on what we think
that God and the world owes us.
But I'll tell you right now,
if you work hard...
And that's why if I didn't have a job,
I wouldn't sit around on my rear end.
I'll tell you right now.
You know, I've never not had a job.
I've never sat around.
You know, I don't know what it's like to be idle, okay?
But I'll tell you something.
If I didn't have a job, I'd find something to do.
I'd find something to work.
And you know, I've noticed too,
a lot of guys in our church that didn't have jobs,
they did a ton of soul winning with me
and they would go out and do a bunch of extra soul winning
and tons of soul winning and they didn't have a job.
And you know what?
God has already blessed some of them with good jobs
and the ones who maybe have not been blessed with a good job,
they will be blessed with a good...
You know, God is going to recompense them.
They are going to get what they need
because of the fact that they're at least working.
You know, you don't want to just sit around idle
and say, well, I don't have a job,
so I'm just going to sit around and watch TV,
play video games and whatever.
No, find some work to do.
Say, well, I'm not getting paid.
It doesn't matter.
You'll get paid.
I mean, look, volunteering to do some work
or helping someone with some work
or going soul winning or doing work for the church
or doing work for other people.
I mean, I would rather go to work with somebody just for free
and just say, oh, just train me.
Why?
Because you're working.
And when you're working, you're always on the clock.
Always.
You might not be on your boss's clock,
but you are on God's clock, and I guarantee you,
you will be recompensed and paid for every minute of work
that you do in this life, all of it.
And so you don't have to worry about it so much.
Just get up every morning, man, and work.
So I don't have a job.
Find something to do.
Work.
Do something.
Do something good with your life.
Do something meaningful
because God is going to bless you
and take care of your financial needs.
I mean, I've experienced this so many times in my life,
even just recently, just wondering
what God was going to do because I lost
the vast majority of my business and so forth recently
because of basically people attacking me
and trying to destroy my business because of my preaching,
turning my customers against me that loved me
and worked with me for years by telling them who I am
and so forth and caused me to lose my whole business
pretty much.
My whole business is pretty much gone.
But you know, it's amazing how God is just provided financially.
Why?
Because I work every day, you know,
and I still have a little bit of fire alarm work
that I'm doing and I've been doing that every time it comes in,
you know, and then other than that,
I've just been working for church and going soul winning
and serving God and I just listen to it.
I work every day and I have enough money to get by
and the money always seems to find a way to come in
because I work every day.
And if you work every day, you'll be able to survive too.
You just got to work every day.
That's what men were designed to do
or at least six days a week, right?
You know, work every day, God's going to bless you.
You know, I looked at, you know, somebody in our church
who basically volunteered down here and helped a lot
with the building program and then his business that he started
just boomed with work like in the next, like a few days later.
You know, you don't always reap that fast.
But Ryan was down here, just worked, did a ton of work,
you know, knocking down these walls, patching things up,
and then just boom, a couple days later,
his business was just flooded with work
and he made all kinds of money.
And I told Ryan, I said, you know, the reason why
is because you were down here working so much,
you know, volunteering for church and then boom,
all of a sudden you just got this huge windfall of business.
You know, you had to go work for it, but thank God.
You know, God will always take care of you if you work.
And so just get this into your mind.
What I want you to get tonight is never to get this attitude,
God's not fair.
My position that I'm in is not what I deserve.
It's not fair.
Look, it may not be fair today.
Maybe it's not fair.
Or maybe it just doesn't seem fair.
But in the end, when all is said and done,
you'll look back and say it was fair.
And you'll understand it, and God will bless
all the good things that you've done in your life.
So don't be weary in well-doing.
Keep doing well, even if things aren't going well for you
and things are not going well for a lot of people right now.
But keep doing right, keep serving God,
and God will bless you eventually, I promise you that.
You will be rewarded.
You will be blessed.
God is able to give you everything that you need.
He'll cause people to give unto you.
He'll cause people to do things better.
I remember one time, this is going back years and years.
Years and years ago, I had a financial need.
And this is going back, I paid like, I don't know.
It was a long time ago, at least seven years, if not.
No, it was longer than that.
It was like eight or nine years.
I had a financial need like eight or nine years ago.
And boy, the last person I ever thought in the world
would help me, and I didn't ask for any help.
Just came to me and just gave me the money that I needed.
And it was just amazing.
And I told my wife, I said,
you know why I think it came from that person?
Was because just so that God was showing me
that it was really Him.
Because the Bible says every good gift is from above
and coming down from the Father of Life
with whom is no variableness, neither shadow attorney.
I said, you know, if it would have been my best friend
that helped me, I would have just thought,
oh, he helped me because he's my best friend.
But you know, it was someone that was the last person
I thought would have helped me,
and I was just like, wow, this is God.
This is God taking care of me.
For God to cause this person to give me what I need.
And so believe me, I've seen it in my life.
I can tell you from experience,
but more than that, I can just tell you
because it's what the Bible says.
You know, you see evil people do you wrong, you'll watch.
I've seen people do me wrong or do other people wrong.
Just do wrong in general.
I've seen everything go great for them,
but then you'll see years later,
you'll start watching God's wrath fall on that person.
I have seen God's wrath fall on the evil of this world,
and it always comes.
And so don't think that you get away with wickedness,
my friend.
And don't think that the people around you
are getting away with wickedness.
It will come and get them.
But take encouragement in the fact
that you'll be rewarded for every good thing that you do.
God is a very just God,
and he will always balance the scales of justice every time,
as far as that word of prayer.
Father, thank you so much for your justice, dear God,
your righteousness, your equity, your fairness.
Thank you so much for the assurance
that we know that when we do good,
it's never going to go on recompense.