(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] ["Pomp and Circumstance"] Good evening, everybody. Welcome to the St. Louis Baptist Church. Great to see you all here for Sunday evening's service. Please have a seat and grab a hymnal and open up that hymnal. It's song number 18. We can begin the secret service by singing song number 18, Take the Name of Jesus with You. Song number 18. ["Take the Name of Jesus with You"] Take the name of Jesus with you, Jealous, our own and our own, It will joy you come forgive you, Take him, deliver him, come, Precious name of our King, Hope of earth and joy of heaven, Precious name of our King, Hope of earth and joy of heaven, Take the name of Jesus ever, As assured from heaven's name, In temptation found together, We now hold him in prayer, Precious name of our King, Hope of earth and joy of heaven, Precious name of our King, Hope of earth and joy of heaven, Hope of precious name of Jesus, How it throws us on the ground, When his love will not deceive us, When his love will not deceive us, Precious name of our King, Hope of earth and joy of heaven, Precious name of our King, Hope of earth and joy of heaven, From the cave of Jesus' house, A way across the country, We now hold him in prayer, Hope of earth and joy of heaven, Precious name of our King, Hope of earth and joy of heaven, Precious name of our King, Hope of earth and joy of heaven, When the name of Jesus' house, A way across the country, We now hold him in prayer, When our journey is complete, Precious name of our King, Hope of earth and joy of heaven, Precious name of our King, Hope of earth and joy of heaven. Father God, thank you for this day. Thank you for the soul winners, and thank you for the souls that God won today to you, and thank you for this evening's service. Father God, please bless this evening's service, and thank you in Jesus' mighty name. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Michael inside my Savior be, and give my sovereign life. Would He give all thy sacred land, for such a world as thine. Was it your Christ that I had done? He broke upon a tree. Amazing grace, a home, and love beyond the grave. Thou mightest shine in darkness' light, and shine in glory's aim. May Christ the mighty neighbor die, for man and of angels sing. I will last the crops of wheat in every way, the dead above my own. Dear Lord, I give myself to Thee, to sow all that I can sow. Amen. This time, we're going to go with the announcements. We're going to do the following, and we're going to do the song number 34. All right. If you'd like a bulletin, we're just glad to slip up the handle. I'm going to bring you one. As always, our service times are in the upper left-hand side. We'll be back this Thursday night at 7, going through Acts chapter number 15. And then, of course, we've got the soul-winning times beneath that, both the church-wide and regional, salvation, the baptisms. Quick note about the church, and then don't forget the five-year anniversary's coming up in just a couple of weeks. Continue to sign up if you're going to be bringing a dish, if possible. And then also, there's going to be the soul-winning marathon the Saturday prior. So we'll be here at 10 AM, kind of organized, dispersed. Go out for a couple hours, come back, have lunch. Go out for more in the afternoon. If you can't do both sessions, totally understandable. If you can only make one, or maybe you can't make it at all, I understand that as well. But you could take your pick here before or after, or you can do the whole thing. Just let me know. Well, don't even let me know. Just show up, OK? So I'm sure we'll have plenty of food and everything else. Also, don't forget to sign up for the cleanup is back there if you'd like to volunteer to help clean the building. And then also on the back, just some notes about our different soul-winning activities been taking place. We had the Toronto soul-winning results, 187 salvations and 36 soul-winners. So that was a very, very profitable trip. And it also looked very fun, too. I know brother Rob, who lives up in Toronto, always does a great job putting these things together. And there was a lot of fun that was had. Also, below that, there's the FWBC Germany church plant that had 11 salvations and five soul-winners out yesterday. And then don't forget the big missions trip to St. Lucia. Also, the note there, if you have any photos or videos that you would like to share with me so that I might be able to include them in the I'm putting together a five-year anniversary kind of montage video that will play that Sunday morning, just to kind of look back over the years. And so if you have that, you can share that with me. If you have Apple products, if you use iPhoto, that's probably real easy to just make a library and then just add me to that. And it'll just come through the cloud. That way, you don't have to worry about handing me a drive or anything like that. But there's other ways we can get it. But the sooner, the better on that, just so I can get started working on that project. So if you have anything, I know there's people out there that got a lot of videos and things like that, some pictures. It'd be great to include as much as we can in that video so that I don't have to preach that morning. No, just kidding. So it'll be good. So that we have, you know, it's not just my photos and things like that, so that I can actually be in some of the photos. You never know. But anyway, not that I need to be, right? Maybe that's for the best, I'm not. Who knows? But anyway, if you got that stuff, go ahead and share with me one way, shape, or form. Let's go ahead and count up the soul winning going back to Friday, if there's anything from Friday. And then was there anything from yesterday? There was, wasn't there one yesterday? And then I heard we had a great group out today, 19 soul winners, so praise the Lord for that. And then we had what, six salvations? Anything outside the group for anybody? I think the whole group's here. That's a six, so praise the Lord. And then keep up the great work, soul winning. We'll go ahead and sing one more song before we get into the preaching tonight. Song number 34, I Know the Pirate Beaver Living. ["I Know the Pirate Beaver Living"] I know the pirate beaver living, and the lord of the earth will get your scent. I know eternal life he gave, and that Christ is well. Our name is Ben. I know, I know, that Jesus living. And on the earth will get your scent. I know, I know, that I can give in, by grace and love, all in his hand. I know that his promise never failed. The word is being. You cannot die. No, you cannot live with what God's just saying, and you cannot just sing. I know, I know, that Jesus living. And on the earth will get your scent. I know, I know, that I can give in, by grace and love, all in his hand. I know, I know, that Jesus living. I know, I know, that Jesus living. I know, I know, that Jesus living. And on the earth will get your scent. I know, I know, that Jesus living. And on the earth will get your scent. I know, I know, that Jesus living, by grace and love, all in his hand. Amen. It's time to pass the orphan plate. I'll take this around. Let's turn our bodies to Proverbs chapter 1. That's Proverbs chapter 1. As always, we'll read the entire chapter. Please follow along slightly. We'll be giving the receipts from Proverbs chapter 1. Proverbs chapter 1. Verse 1, the Bible reads, The problem of Solomon's son David, King of Israel, with no wisdom and instruction, is to perceive the words of understanding, to perceive the instruction of wisdom, of justice, of judgment, of decadence, to give subtlety to the simple, to the young man knowledge and discretion. A wise man will hear, will increase in learning, and a man of understanding shall attain unto wise counsels. To understand the problem of interpretation, the words of the wise and the dark sands, the fear of the Lord's beginning knowledge, the fool of despising wisdom and destruction. My son, hear the instruction of thy father, and forsake not the law of thy mother, for they shall be an ornament of grace unto thy head, and chains about thy neck. My son, your sin is enticing, and set thou not, but they say, Come with us, let us lay weight for blood, and let us work privily for the innocent without cause. Let us swallow them up, and lie as the grave, and hold, so that they go down to the pit. We shall find all precious substance which shall fill our houses of wood, cast them out among us, let us all have one purse. My son, walk not thou in the way of thee, refrain thy cooking from their path, for their feet run to eat them, and make haste to shed blood, surely in vain, and then spread on the side of anybody, and they lay weight for their own blood, and learn privilege for their own lives, and throw their ways where every one is greedy in great pain, and shaketh the way of life and the owners of it. Wisdom cried without, but she uttered the voice in the streets, and she cried from the chief place in the opening of the gates, and the city she uttered for words, saying, how long you said it was, we love simplicity, and scorners do lie in your scorn, and fools hate knowledge. Turn thee on my way, behold, I'll pour out my spirit unto you, I'll make known my words unto you, because I have called, and you have refused, I have stretched out my hand, no man to guard you, and yet said, and not all my counsel, and with none of my approval, I also will laugh at your calamity, I will mock when your fear comes. When your fear cometh as desolation, when your destruction cometh as a whirlwind, when distress and anguish come upon you, then shall they call upon you, but I will not answer, they shall seek me earlier, they shall not find me, for that they hated knowledge, did not choose the fear of glory. They were none of my counsels, they despised all my reproof, therefore, shall immediately approve of their own way, and be filled with their own devices, for the turning away of the simple shall slay them, and the prosperity of fools shall destroy them. The fools so hard can attend to me, shall dwell safely, and shall be quiet in fear of evil. But Adam is faithless, for whom the Father shall take you today, Lord God, and draw you new for us, and just give you the glory and honor, Lord, and bless you to bless the rest of your service, Lord God, and bless the preaching, Lord God, until you give us your spirit, and just give us an understanding of your word, Lord Jesus, holy name we pray, amen. Amen. Amen. In Proverbs chapter 1 there, I want to look at just a few verses to begin with where it says in verse 7, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of the world, and the fools despise wisdom and instruction, and I want to preach a sermon tonight, a real practical sermon, just looking at the fear of the Lord in the book of Proverbs. Of course, this is something I talked about this morning to some degree, and hopefully I didn't kind of ruin tonight's sermon. I was kind of reluctant to preach this just because I feel I kind of covered this topic this morning, this idea, this topic of the fear of the Lord. Obviously, this morning we looked at how the fear of the Lord is something that is commanded. It's somebody that we ought to fear, but the great thing is that it's such a practical book. There's so much practical application, so we can look at the fear of the Lord in a more practical manner this evening. We can look how this kind of plays out in our lives, the importance of it, why we should fear the Lord, not simply because it's commanded as we saw this morning, but because there's great benefit to ourselves when we fear the Lord, and also what it's going to take to be somebody who fears the Lord, okay? So we're going to look at the fear of the Lord in Proverbs tonight, and if you look there it says that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge. So if we want to be people who have knowledge, who have understanding, who have wisdom according to God's word, it begins with the fear of the Lord. Without the fear of the Lord, we're not going to have knowledge. That's why it's the beginning of knowledge. We need to have that as our basis, that's the starting point in order to become a knowledgeable and wise person is to have the fear of the Lord in your life. If you look there again in Proverbs, it says in verse 29, we'll look there, it says for they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the Lord. And she of course is talking about this is the response of wisdom, replying to those that would not hearken unto her cry and she stood out in the streets in the chief places of concourse saying to the simple ones, come and turn unto me and I'll give you wisdom. But of course it says that they set at not all of her counsel and had none of my reproof. And then notice in verse 26, the reply of wisdom personified. It says I also will laugh at your calamity. I will mock when what? Your fear cometh. So one of the things we can learn right out of the gate here about fearing the Lord is that you're going to fear something in this life. As a Christian, if you're somebody who decides not to fear the Lord, you're going to be fearing other things and you're going to be afraid of the calamity and the fear that will eventually come into your life because you're somebody who lacks knowledge and because you're somebody who lacks wisdom, you're going to fear eventually, right? And what is it that's going to come upon you is the calamity, the sin, the judgment, the wrath, the consequences of sin, the things that come as a result of having set at not all the counsel of God and saying, you know, I don't need to hear this. I don't need to listen to this. This doesn't apply to me. I'll be fine without the Bible. If we set all that on the side, if we learn if we decide not to fear the Lord and not have that knowledge and that wisdom, you know, eventually we're going to end up fearing the results of it. We're going to be afraid of what's going to happen to us. Isn't that what it's kind of saying here? Right? It's starting out in the chapter saying, hey, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. But then she talks about all the people who set aside her counsel, right? And eventually, she's going to have their fear is going to come. And what is she going to do? Fear. What is the Lord going to do? I will laugh at your calamity, right? I will mock when your fear cometh. You know, if we are people who scoff at the Bible, we mock the things of God, we don't take the things of God seriously, when our calamity comes, when the consequences of having that attitude finally come to fruition in our life, you know, God's, you know, might just sit back and say, hey, now it's my turn. Now it's my turn to scoff and mock and ridicule and kind of just disregard, you know, the things that you expect. You know, God wants things from us and if we don't give them to him, you know, we can't really expect to get things from God in return. Look at verse 32, it says, the turning of the way of the simple shall slay them and the prosperity of fools shall destroy them. You know, the simple person who says I don't need knowledge and wisdom and turns away, you know, they're going to be destroyed eventually because they're not going to go through this life with the knowledge and wisdom that they have. You know, and this happens all the time in the world. People who live their lives, you know, apart from scripture, you know, they eventually are destroyed, if not in this life, ultimately in hell, you know, the ultimate destruction. But they even along the way managed often to make just a complete mess out of their lives. They make bad decisions, they do sinful things, and they get themselves painted into these corners that there's just no way out of sometimes in life. Why? Because they did not choose the fear of the Lord. If you look there again in Proverbs 129, for they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the Lord. You know, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, but it's not something that's just going to come upon you. You know, the fear of the Lord is something that you have to choose. You have to say, this is something I want in my life. I want to be somebody who fears the Lord. I want that knowledge. I want that wisdom. I want that understanding. I don't want to be somebody that has calamity come into my life. I don't want to be somebody that, you know, is fearing the results of, you know, putting off the things of God, not regarding the things of God. You have to choose that. That's an attitude you have to have. That's something you have to determine to do every day. You have to wake up and say, today I'm going to fear the Lord. I'm going to crucify the flesh. I'm going to walk in his commandments. You have to choose it. But again in verse 29, it's showing us that they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the Lord. You're not choosing the fear of God. What you're really saying is, I hate knowledge. You know, I want to be stupid is basically what you're saying. Now obviously a lot of people today aren't just going to come out and say that, hey, I just want to be dumb. I just want to be stupid. I just want to make dumb decisions and do stupid things. But you know, when you, when people reject the Lord, when they choose not, choose to not fear God, that's essentially what they're saying. When we say, you know, I don't need church. I don't need the Bible. I don't need to do the things that it says. What we're basically saying is, I want to be a fool. I want to be somebody who just hates knowledge. Because, you know, knowledge and the fear of the Lord, as we're seeing in chapter one, what it's showing us is that these things go hand in hand. If we want to have knowledge, we want to have wisdom, we want to be instructed, it starts with fear. You know, one comes before the other. We can't skip over the fear of the Lord and then expect to be people that have knowledge and wisdom and understanding. You must start with the fear of the Lord. We don't want to be people who hate it and who decide to not choose it. Look at verse, chapter two. Look at verse one. It says, My son, if thou wilt receive my words and hide my commandments with thee so that thou incline thine heart unto wisdom and apply thine heart to understanding. Right? This inclining, you know, like you think about an incline is kind of like having an angle on something. If you think about if you were to get on, you know, a treadmill, I know probably none of us would ever do that, right? But if we would abase ourselves thus, you know, if we would do ourselves the dishonor of getting on a treadmill. I'm just kidding to anybody that gets on a treadmill, okay? Probably standing on a treadmill, right? But one of the settings on the treadmill is what? It's the incline, right? You can increase the incline on the treadmill, right? You're putting an angle on it, right? So when he's saying if thou wilt incline thine ear, he's kind of saying, you know, if you put an you know, you kind of hold your head down low. Have you ever tried to lean in to hear what somebody had to say in a noisy room or something? You kind of lean in, you kind of incline it. That's what he's saying there. You know, if thou wilt incline thine ear, you know, that's something you have to choose to do. That's something you have to purpose to do. That's something you have to choose just like we saw in the end of chapter 2 or chapter 1. You have to choose the fear of the Lord. It's something you have to want to bring in your life. It's something you have to incline yourself unto. He's saying if thou would incline thine ear unto wisdom and apply thine ear unto the heart. So you can kind of see how these are, you know, there's kind of a theme going here in the beginning of the book. When it comes to the subject of wisdom and the fear of the Lord, it's something you have to apply yourself to. You have to incline it yourself to. You have to want it. You have to choose it. Right? I mean, think about the great lengths that people go to to get, you know, treasures. Gold, silver, things like that. People go to great lengths for that. They'll go way out of their way to, you know, find some gold. Think about the gold rushes in California, the things that people did there. You know, they would leave everything they were familiar with back east, you know, and head out to a new land and try to make it and strike it big. And they would risk everything that they had. And they would go into these, they'll dig mines into the earth and hopefully it doesn't, they'd be, you know, cave in on them and they'd go out and they'd handle dynamite and swing pickaxes. And then they'd go nuts. They'd get gold fever and they just, they just, they gotta have it. But, you know, what the Bible is showing us is what's way more precious than that is knowledge, wisdom, it's understanding. That's the real value. That's what's really gonna profit us in life is if we have knowledge and wisdom and understanding. But in order to do that, you know, we have to apply ourselves. We have to want it. Right? You have to cry after it. We have to seek it. Right? If thou seekest her as silver and searchest for her as for hid treasures. Now notice in these verses, if thou, right, there's this if then thing that you always see in Scripture. There's the prerequisite to verse five. Right? The understanding that will come. First, it's if thou will receive my words. If thou cryest after knowledge. If thou seekest her as silver. So again, the, you know, the, the, it's being put upon us to seek these things, to do these things, to choose these things. You have to do it. You have to want it. You have to choose it, cry after it, but notice the promise there. Verse five. Then thou shalt understand the fear of the Lord and shall find the knowledge of God. Right? If you would keep your finger there, let's go over to James chapter number one. You know, this is a great promise in the word of God. You know, wisdom, the Bible says, is profitable to direct. Wisdom is a very profitable thing. It's something that we want in our lives. We don't want to, we don't want to live our lives as fools. We don't want to set ourselves up for failure. We don't want to set up ourselves so that later in life, after we've made a ton of bad decisions that, you know, wisdom, as we saw in Proverbs, is, you know, proverbially laughing and mocking at our calamity and saying well, you know, you kind of reap what you sow. We want to learn to sow good seed. We want to learn to make smart decisions and have wisdom in our life and have the wisdom and knowledge and the discretion that God gives. It's a great promise in the word of God that it's there. That's what it said in Proverbs. Then thou shalt understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God. You'll find it. If you seek it, if you cry after it, if you search for the knowledge of God, you know, you're going to find it. You're going to understand the fear of the Lord, okay? And notice again that the fear comes before the knowledge. You'll understand the fear of the Lord and then you'll find the knowledge of God. Again showing us that one comes before another. If you look there in James, look at verse 5. If any of you lack wisdom let him ask of God to giveth to all men liberally. Okay, obviously today when we say the word liberal, there's a different connotation. You know, we think about some you know, green haired you know, baby murdering you know, whatever, abortionist or something, right? Some Democrat. But the way the Bible is using it is saying it's being very liberal right, meaning it's being very generous. And that's why we call them liberals today because they're very generous with other people's money, right? They're very lax and general with their, you know, their ways of living and things like that. They're very loose and very liberal with it, okay? But obviously what he's saying here is that if you lack wisdom and ask God you know, let him ask of God and it shall be given, excuse me, that giveth to all men liberally. God's not stingy with these things. God's not stingy with wisdom. It's not like God's like holding out on wisdom. Like he's you know, let me see if I got any left. You know, he's scraping the barrel of knowledge and wisdom and understanding. You know, God has this infinite resource of knowledge and wisdom and understanding and he just wants to pour out onto us and give to us in abundance. He wants to give it to us liberally. That's how it's using that word there, liberally. And it breadeth not. You know, if we ask God for wisdom, he's not going to be like what are you asking me for that for? You know, how dare you, right? He's not going to bread us for that. He's not going to get upset and angry. He's not going to bread us and he says and it shall be given him. It shall be given him. You know, we can have the knowledge and wisdom and understanding that we need in order to live a godly life that is pleasing unto God. We have a knowledge and wisdom and discretion that's available to us in order to understand how to raise our kids or, you know, run a business or run a household or run a church or just live our lives. You know, there's so many myriad examples that we could, you know, talk about in life, but look, every aspect of life the Bible touches and God has wisdom to tell us what to do. You know, and those are the things that we should be seeking after. That's the wisdom and knowledge that we should try to understand it with our lives and apply our hearts to and incline our ears unto. And now, you know, people get so caught up sometimes in some of the silliest things, right? And I get it. People get curious about things, but it's like they'll ask these just bizarre far out questions sometimes about what does the Bible say about this or what does the Bible say about that? And it's just like it has no bearing on their life whatsoever. It's like, you know, the answer isn't going to make, you know, any difference. It's just a curiosity. And there's nothing wrong with that, you know, and having those questions, but let's make sure we're not, you know, in lieu of that for going, you know, all of the knowledge and wisdom and discretion and understanding that we need to have in our lives to actually live up, you know, practically in this world and to actually know what it is that we ought to do in certain situations. Know what it is that God expects of us to have that knowledge. You know, but what's that going to require in order to have that? Fear. You know, it's going to require us actually fearing God. And actually, you know, being afraid of the results of not having that in our lives, the calamity that comes. And asking God for it. Crying after it as, you know, for, you know, searching for his treasure. Crying out after it. That's what it said in Proverbs, right? To cry after these things. You know, that's like strong, you know, crying out is like, you know, lifting up your voice. Give me wisdom, God! Give me knowledge! Give me understanding! I need it! That's the kind of, you know, that's the picture that it's painting in Proverbs. And that's what we're seeing in James, too, and he's saying, look, if you ask, it shall be given. If you seek for it, it shall be found. You will have the understanding. You will have the knowledge. It's there. You'll know what it takes. You'll know what to look for. You know, when you're making all these decisions in life. And look, you have big decisions to make in life. And it's not like any of us is ever going to get to a point where we're done making decisions in life. You know, we're all going to have to make decisions and have to sermon how to handle situations and everything. Life is complicated. We need the wisdom. And he's saying again, look, ask him. It shall be given. Look at verse six, but let him ask in faith. You know, you've got to believe that God's going to give you this wisdom. You know, sometimes I wonder if the reason why we lack faith and wisdom is maybe it's not even because we're not asking. Maybe it's just because we're not asking, going, well, you know, I know if the Bible says if I pray that I'll get wisdom, but I'm not really sure. I really don't know if God would actually help me have knowledge and wisdom and understanding. But, you know, there's examples of this. Like in Exodus where they're, you know, or is it Exodus? I'm not sure exactly, but where they're building you know, different parts of the scripture, where they're building out the temple and they're building out, you know, the tabernacle and doing different things. Like God sends men to Solomon. God sends men to Moses. You know, and even early on in Genesis, there's a guy Tubalcain, you know, who was an artificer in brass. And it says that God filled these people with knowledge and wisdom and that skill. Right? God just filled them with these skills. You know, God will give us the wisdom and knowledge and the understanding that we need. It's so many different endeavors in life. Right? If we just ask, but that's a problem we don't ask. And we need to learn to go to God and ask for the wisdom that we need. He shall give it, but let him ask in faith nothing wavering, for he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed. Let not that man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord. A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways. So we need to make sure we're asking in faith. Look, it's there for us. The fear of the Lord is where it starts. We've got to make sure we have that in our lives. Don't go ask God for things if you have no fear in your heart. Because you're not going to get it. You know? You don't have the faith to believe, you know, what the Bible says. Okay? Look at Proverbs chapter number 3. We'll be in Proverbs all night. But Proverbs chapter number 3. Actually, you know what? Go to Romans 12. I'll just read to you. Go to Romans 12. It says, Be not wise in thine own eyes. Fear the Lord and depart from evil. So again, we're just looking at the fear of the Lord in the book of Proverbs. And it says here in Proverbs 3 verse 7, Be not wise in thine own eyes. You know, this is why a lot of people choose not to fear the Lord. This is why a lot of people decide they don't need the wisdom of God. Because they have their own wisdom. They have the wisdom of their own understanding. Like, I don't need the Bible. You know, I don't know what the Bible says about this subject or that subject. You know, I've got so and so to teach me how to do that. You know, or I'll figure that out on my own. They're wise in their own eyes. They think they're smarter than God. It's crazy that people think this. They just write off the word of God. They write off the biblical preaching because they think, well, I've already got that figured out. You know, they think, oh, I don't need to know what the Bible says about child rearing. I don't need to, you know, know what the Bible says about marriage. I don't need to know what the Bible says about finances. I don't need to know what the Bible says about work. I don't need to know anything about what the Bible says about anything because I already know it all. You know, and these are adults that talk like that. And you know what they sound like as a teenager. I already know everything. Got it all figured out. But they, you know, they might know something. They might have the wisdom of this world. But what does the Bible say about the wisdom of this world? That's earthly, sensual, and devilish. Right? You know, the wisdom of this world, they might teach you some things that you could actually apply, but where is it going to lead you? Right? What path is it going to take you down? It's not going to take you down the path of fearing God. You know, the world will teach you how to, you know, chase money and chase women and you know, just be a party animal or whatever. Right? They'll teach you how to do that. They got a lot of wisdom on how to do it. They figured it out. But what's the end of it? It's not fearing God. It's the calamity that's going to come, that God's actually going to mock and laugh at. I had you go to Romans chapter 12. You know, we need you to learn to not be wise in our own eyes. It says, Be not wise in our own eyes. Fear the Lord and depart from evil. You know, if we really feared God, we'd begin to depart from evil. And whenever evil popped up its ugly head in our lives, we'd go running in the other direction. But you know, if we're just, every time evil comes into our lives, we just throw our arms around it and embrace it, can we really say we're fearing God? Right? Because here's the thing, you know, God chastens his children. I know I preach about this all the time. But Hebrews chapter 12 teaches us that he chastens every son and he receives. So if we just go around as God's child just disobeying the rules and not keeping them and just, instead of departing from evil, just running towards it, you know, how can you say you fear the Lord? We depart from evil because we're afraid of what God's going to do to us if we don't. That's what he's saying there. You know, but a person who's wise in their own eyes says, ah, I can get away with it. No you can't. You know, that's a foolish thing. We need to learn to depart from evil. What does it say in Romans chapter 12 verse 1? I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable unto God, which is what? Your reasonable service. You start reading verse 1 and you think, man, well that's heavy. Present my body a living sacrifice? You know, obviously God's not literally suggesting that you, you know, light a bunch of candles and, you know, get some robes on or something, hold some of the séance or you're going to get on a stone altar with a knife and ah, you know. But he's saying, hey, mortify your members in the earth. He's saying don't just give in the lust of the flesh. Have some temperance, have some self-control. You know, rule your body. Rule your spirit. And present it as a vessel unto God. The Bible says you're not your own, you're bought with a price. You know, as with the blood of a lamb, as the precious blood of a lamb. We've been redeemed by God and we are not our own. Right? It's actually his body. We just need to present it to him as a vessel that he can use. Right? And fill and use. And so it sounds heavy, right? Present your body as a living sacrifice. Holy and acceptable unto God. Which is your reasonable service? It's like, God's not asking anything unreasonable. Right? God's not asking anything, he's not suggesting anything that's far out when he says, hey, fear the Lord and depart from evil. And what does departing from evil look like? It means you're not just going to give in to the lust of the flesh. It means that you're actually going to present your body unto God. Look at verse 2, and be not conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. Right? Don't be wise in your own eyes. Don't just adopt the world's philosophy. And if you have, say, you know what? This is wrong. Reject it and be transformed by the renewing of your mind. By the wisdom that God will give us. You know, if we fear him, if we seek him, God will literally change our minds. We'll have a totally different perspective on life. I remember after I first got saved, you know, one of my family members came to me and said, the you of two years ago would laugh at the person that you are now. They would mock them. And I said, I know. But what happened was that my mind was transformed. I changed. My outlook on life, you know, the things that I, you know, used to do, I stopped doing. The things that I would have, you know, ridiculed others for doing, I started doing. Go to church, read your Bible, pray. You know, I used to mock those things. But then, you know, after I got saved and, you know, presented my body that living sacrifice and just saying, hey, not perfect in every way by no means. Still haven't arrived. But I at least was presenting myself and saying, Lord, you know, help me to understand. Give me wisdom. Give me knowledge. I mean, I read the book of Proverbs. I was in Proverbs a lot, especially when I first got saved as a young man. And I highly recommend that especially young people make a habit of reading the book of Proverbs repeatedly. Read a Proverb a day. Read a Proverb a day. There's 31 Proverbs. You know, it's about usually typically about 30, you know, 30 days in a month. I know there's a few that are a little off. So maybe one day you'll have to read two or not. I don't know. I'm not going to figure out the math right now. But just read the book once a month. Just get it done. It's not that big of a book. And look, the things that you read in Proverbs are so practical, they'll stick with you. You know, it'll give knowledge to the simple. It'll give understanding. Right? And it'll teach you the fear of the Lord. And if you start with that, you know, your mind will be transformed. It'll be changed. You'll stop being wise in your own eyes. You'll actually start to see the way we think sometimes for what it really is. Stupid. You know, sometimes we might look back in the ways we used to think and the things we used to just go, what an idiot! I mean, sometimes we all think about the, you know, the proverbial time machine we wish we could get in and just go back to when we were a younger person and just slap that guy around. Give him a swift kick in the pants. Right? What happened? Our minds were transformed. At the time, everything we were doing seemed perfectly sane. Yeah, it makes sense to do this. It makes sense to think this way and to act this way. Makes perfect sense. Why? Because we were walking according to the course of this world. According to the prince of the power of the air that now work in the children of disobedience. Right? But once we got saved out of that, you know, our minds have been transformed if we've presented ourselves that living sacrifice. Okay? So don't be wise in your own eyes. Fear the Lord. Depart from evil. Go over to Proverbs chapter 18. Proverbs chapter 18. And say, you know, why doesn't everybody do this? Why doesn't everybody just depart from evil? Why doesn't everybody stop being wise in their own eyes? Why doesn't everybody just admit that they're wrong? Right? You know, it sounds nice, but the reason why people don't do it is because of basically pride. You know, it takes humility to admit that you're wrong. It takes humility to say you know what? I need to have my mind transformed. I need to stop thinking the way I'm thinking. I need to stop doing the things that I'm doing. I have to start seeing the things that are evil in my life as what they are. Evil. And depart from these things. You know, it takes humility to do that. That's why a lot of people don't do it. The Bible says the fear of the Lord I'm just reading in Proverbs 15. I'll just read. The fear of the Lord is the instruction of wisdom and before honor is humility. Right? The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. And before honor is humility. That's where it starts. You know, the fear of the Lord will teach us humility. This is why so many people don't choose to depart from evil. That's why they don't want to stop being wise in their own eyes. Because it's an admission that you're wrong. That the way you're thinking about things is incorrect. You know, and this is why pride is such a wicked sin in Scripture. And it is. Okay? Look at Proverbs 8 verse 13. The fear of the Lord is to hate evil. Now, I want to just kind of take a minute and just part, you know, just kind of narrow this down a little bit. The fear of the Lord is to hate. Let's just forget about the evil part right there for a minute. Because some people need to figure that out. Oh, God would never hate anybody. God, we were not, we shouldn't hate anything. Right? This is out there. This philosophy that's just permeated Christianity today. That, you know, hate's a bad word. It's real strong language. It's like, yeah, I know. It's a strong feeling. You know, and it's a feeling that's perfectly natural to feel, by the way. You know, I remember I said once I hated something. And it was like something just nonchalant. You know, it's just like, I hate, you know, like that kind of food or something. Not that there is a food I hate. Right? But I can't even remember what it was. But I remember saying this and I said, whoa. That's a strong word. And they were dead serious. I'm like, it's not like I'm going to go burn across in their yard or something. You know, it's like I hate dominoes. It's like I'm not going to go vandalize dominoes. It's just saying I don't prefer it. And I was just using that term loosely. Hate. Right? But that's what's out there, people. So you can't even use that word loosely. It's like a bad word. It's like the new four letter, it's a new four letter word. I mean, it literally has four letters. But it's like, you know what I mean? Right? Like, oh, it's like a cuss word now or something to say hate. Well, you know, it's a word that's in the Bible quite a bit. Okay? And it says here that the fear of the Lord is to hate evil. You know why some people won't depart from evil? Because they don't hate it. You know, the reason why people won't depart from evil is because they don't hate evil. You know, and this is a big turning point in the Christian life is when you actually learn to hate sin. The reason why we sometimes don't get sin out of our lives is because we don't hate it. We like it. I mean, the Bible says there's pleasure and sin for a season, right? It's for a season, right? But when sin has conceived, it bringeth forth death. With sin when it is finished, with lust as conceived, it bringeth forth sin, and sin when it is finished, it bringeth forth death. Lust leads to sin, and sin leads to death. Right? You need to learn to hate it. Whatever that sin is in our lives, we need to see it the way God, how do you learn to hate it? You've got to see it the way God sees it. You've got to have the humility to fear God and see things, God's, we have to have your mind transformed. You've got to be, you know, just start with humility. Start with the fear of God. Present your body a living sacrifice unto God. Have your mind transformed. Right? Have your mind transformed and no longer be conformed in this present world. Then you'll actually start to see sin the way that God sees it. Then you'll actually start to hate it. And then you'll depart from it. And then you'll have fear, and you'll understand and have knowledge, and God will give you wisdom. Right? Obviously none of us is going to live a perfectly sinless life. But we can't just have sin in our lives habitually. If we expect to have wisdom, if we expect to have the fear of the Lord being a part of our lives, we need to depart from evil. We need to have humility and we need to be able to hate pride. The fear of the Lord is to hate evil. Pride and arrogance are the top of God's list. Right? And the evil way and the forward mouth do I hate. Now who's speaking there in that latter half? I believe it's the Lord speaking. It's the Lord saying I hate pride and the arrogance and the evil way and the forward mouth. God hates pride. And isn't it ironic that these haters of God, that's their big banner that they wave, their pride flag. That's what they've chosen to name their movement. Pride. Right? You know, tell me that isn't ironic. That's no coincidence, friend. That's demonic at its core. The devil's like, what are we going to call this? What does God hate the most? Ah, pride. Being proud about the most filthy and abominable thing there is. That God has just literally destroyed people over. Rained fire and brimstone. Not only are we going to do that, but then we're going to be proud about it. It's like they're doubling down on things that God hates. Right? Anyway, let's not get caught up in that, right? The Bible says in Proverbs 29, I'll read to you that a man's pride will bring him low. Right? If we don't have the humility to stop being wise in our own eyes and to depart from evil, it's going to bring us low. Through pride. Okay? Go to Proverbs chapter number 14. We'll hurry up and just get through a few of these here. You know, a man's pride shall bring him low. But, you know, if we want to live a life that's blessed of God, you know, and we have the fear of the Lord, we must have the fear of the Lord if we want to live a life that's blessed of God. And when we actually do have the fear of the Lord, it's going to benefit us in so many ways. Right? The Bible says in Proverbs 10, I'll read to you, verse 27, the fear of the Lord prolongeth days. It prolongeth days. There's so many different ways you can apply that. How does the fear of the Lord prolong days? Well, one, if you fear the Lord and you depart from evil, you're not going to hang around people that might end up cause you to come to a short end in life. I mean, that's what we read in Proverbs 1. Right? He's saying don't cast in your, you know, don't have one purse with these people. Don't lurk privately for innocent blood. Don't be a mugger. Don't be a robber. You know, don't go out and abuse people. Don't get, don't run with people that do. Don't join a gang, is what he's saying, basically. Right? That would be kind of bring it into the modern vernacular. You know, don't be a gang banger. Cause a lot of gang bangers, you know, they got a lot of pride and they're brought pretty low when they're sitting in the state penitentiary. Doing life for 10 to 20 or whatever. Right? Or they're, you know, they're brought pretty low when they're lowered six feet into a grave. Cause they, you know, they went out and got shot or whatever. Right? Cause they had to represent. Right? They were in the wrong colors or whatever. I don't know. But that's what he's saying. That's one way that the fear of the Lord will prolong your days. You're not gonna go, you're gonna depart from evil. I mean, you're not gonna hang out with an evil bunch of people. You're not gonna get involved in sin. Right? It's gonna prolong your days when you don't go out and get drunk and get behind the wheel of a car. Right? You're not gonna be the guy who crashes into a pole and goes out in a, you know, burning wreck. It's not gonna bring you loaded apart from evil when you're not the guy who's paralyzed from a drunk driving accident. You know, that's what they don't show you. On, you know, the beer commercial. What do they show you in the beer commercial? Everybody running up and down the beach with a, you know, a six pack in their hand and a six pack on their stomach. Those things don't mix, friend. That doesn't go together. One does not lead to the other. They're all got, you know, this forty-eight age vertical playing volleyball and swilling Bud Light or something. You know, that's, you know, most athletic people aren't getting drunk on cheap beer and, you know, alcohol at all, right? But that's the picture that they paint. You know, but, you know, the Bible tells us that, you know, they that tarry long at the wine hath woe. They have wounds without cause. You know, that's what the Bible pictures, it paints a very different picture about alcohol than what the world will. So if we depart from evil, if we take and say, oh, I'm going to stop being wise in my own eyes. I'm going to stop just believing what the world has to say about the subject and actually be transformed in my mind and actually just, you know, humbly just entreat the Lord and say, he's right, I'm wrong, present my body a living sacrifice. I'm going to fear the Lord and depart from evil. It's going to prolong your days when you don't end up with, you know, some liver disease. From drinking alcohol. These are just the practical ways in which the fear of the Lord will prolong your days. Right? And there's other applications that we can make. It says, the fear of the Lord prolongeth days, but the years of the wicked shall be shortened. You know, we go out and just live a wicked sinful life, you know, there's a real good chance that our life is going to be a lot shorter than it had to be. Look at Proverbs, do you go to 14? Verse 26. In the fear of the Lord is strong confidence. Strong confidence. You know, the angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear him. When we're walking, when we're right with God, man, it's such a confidence that we can have. To know that God's going to bless us, that God's pleased with us, man, it gives us such confidence. And his children shall have a place of refuge. You know, we know that God's going to keep us safe. God's not going to be laughing and mocking at our calamity when it comes because we have departed from evil because we fear the Lord. Look at verse 27. The fear of the Lord is a fountain of life to depart from the snares of death. You know, it will prolong your days, the fear of the Lord. The fear of the Lord is a fountain of life. The fear of the Lord is not something that is taking from us. Again, this is, you know, that's people being wise in their own eyes. Well, if I fear the Lord, they sit there and they go, I won't be able to do this and I won't be able to do that and I won't be able to go there and hang out with them and blah, da, da, da. And they just start to think about all the things that it means that they're going to have to depart from. But what you need to do is get over that and see everything that the fear of the Lord is going to bring into your life that is good. The prolonging of your days, the fountain of life that it's going to bring into your life, into your life, brings life, right? And look, it's not like it's going to be one day or the next either. Let me just, you know, don't set yourself up for that disappointment. It's not like, you know, I'm going to quit running around and doing all these things and just the next day I'm going to have this godly family just hand it to me. That's not how it works. I mean, maybe in some instances it might. But you know, as we live for the Lord and we're faithful and God will begin to bless us, as we begin to have the fear of the Lord and wisdom and knowledge and just, you know, these blessings begin to come into our lives over time and over the entire course of our life. You know, I really don't try to make, you know, use myself as an example too much, but it's the best one I know, okay? You know, I look over the course of my life and I was just thinking about it today. If you would have told the guy, you know, even just 10 years ago that I'd be doing what I am today, I would have, you know, told you to, you know, slap me and, you know, call me Susan because I wouldn't have believed it. I would have said, no way. You would have come to me and said, hey, you know, you just keep serving God and being faithful, move your family out to Tempe, Arizona, get involved in that church, you know, start soul winning and just serve God out there the best way you know and eventually you're going to be the deacon at Faith Word Baptist Church, you're going to be pastoring your church in Tucson, living there in this beautiful city with the best Mexican food in the world, you know, like, I mean, okay, sorry, I get a little excited when I start thinking about my Tucson. Can I get an amen, right? But if you would have told me that, I would have been like, no way. And when I'm saying it, you know, but that didn't happen the day after I got saved. I got saved at, you know, 21 years of age. You know, just before my 21st birthday in November, you know, it took me a couple years to even just a year or two to just get faithful going to church and then learning about the Christian life. I mean, years went by. I was saved and in church for seven years before my wife, you know, came around. And then it was like, what, another two years before we finally got married? Something like that? Don't say anything. I'll be embarrassed. Like, I can't believe it took that long, right? But that's how long it took. And then it's like, but here's the thing, it didn't stop there. You know, it's just like, steadily increase the blessing, the fountain of life that God has just opened up. Obviously, there's been, you know, struggles and failures and shortcomings along the way, but man, and I'm not saying this trying to big myself up, I'm just trying to, I'm using myself as an example. It's the best one I know. But what I'm saying, that's available to anybody. You have no idea what God would bless you with if you would just start to fear God, depart from evil, and just walk out in His ways. And just allow yourself, you know, to be transformed by the pain in your mind. But it's going to take humility. It's going to take a, stop being wise in your own eyes and just admit you're wrong and just start living for God. And, you know, over the course of time, over the course of years, over the course of a lifetime, you'll be able to look back and say, God has blessed me, God has blessed me, God has blessed me, God has blessed me. The fear of the Lord has been a fountain of life to me. And not only that, you will be a fountain of life to others. You know, when you are fearing the Lord, when you're obeying God's commands, when you're preaching the gospel, you know, you'll go out and you'll have salvations. I mean, six people are going to heaven tonight because there's people in this room that feared God enough to just obey the command to go preach the gospel. You know, that's being a fountain of life to other people. It's a, it's a, it's a well of life of water springing up onto life eternal, okay? That's what the fear of the Lord is. Well, we gotta, I gotta move along. I was gonna have us turn over to 1 Peter, but you know, we'll just go there. Let's go to 1 Peter chapter number 3. Let's see why I wrote that down. 1 Peter chapter number 3. I'm curious. 1 Peter chapter number 3. Yeah, verse 10. For he that will love life and see good days. I'm not gonna even ask for a show of hands. Because I, you know, I already know every hand would go up. Hey, who here wants to, who, who here loves life and wants to see good days? Not me. Right? We got one hand. No, I'm just kidding. Boy, you guys. You know what I'm preaching next Sunday, right? You know, but he that would love life and see good days. What does it say? Well, what's the secret? You know, what's the secret to a prosperous life? You know, is this some, is this Tony Robbins, is that the big motivational speaker? Is this gonna be a quote from him here next? Is this something, you know, no, of course not. Let him refrain his tongue from evil and his lips that they speak no guile. Let him eschew evil and do good. What does it mean to eschew? It means to depart from evil. To avoid it. Stop doing evil and start doing good. Let him seek peace and ensue it. Look, if we want, if we love life and we want to see, you know, as it says there, good days, not evil days. You know, then there's some things we have to learn to avoid in this life and some things that we need to learn to pursue. We need to depart from evil, stop being wise in our own eyes. We need to seek peace. We need to seek good and we need to do it. Right? Let him seek peace and ensue it. Look at verse 12. For the eyes of the Lord are over the righteous and his eyes are open unto their prayers. The face of the Lord is against them that do evil. You know, and that's the thing about the Christian life. God's either for you or against you at that point. I mean, I say it all the time. God's not neutral and you can't be neutral with God. God's not just going to be like, see, you start doing evil, you start doing sin, he's not going to go, oh, okay, I'm just going to look the other way now. Let me know when you're done. Let me know when you're finished and then we'll talk again. No, he's going to see that and then he's going to come down on us. That's what he says. The face of the Lord is against them that do evil. Except for Christians. That's who he's talking to. He's literally writing that to Christians. I don't want the face of the Lord against me. You know, God just frowning on my life. Just angry at what I'm doing. Why? Because I love life. You know, I want to see good days. Not just days of God doing this to me. All the way through my Christian life. Ahh! Ahh! Obviously there's going to be some of that in our lives, but let's not make that the overarching theme of our life as a Christian. Well, what did you do with your Christian life? Well, I got whooped. What did you do to spend your time on earth for God? Well, I spent my time just getting whooped by God. That sounds great. Yeah, it was real fun. Would you call that good days? Of course not. But that's, you know, that's kind of the theme you see throughout all scripture. The if-then. And it all starts with what? The fear of the Lord. You're not going to depart from evil if you don't fear God. And what I'm trying to get across is that God's something to be afraid of. Kind of made that point this morning. I'm just kind of driving it home tonight. The eyes of the Lord are over the righteous. When He watches over them and His ears are open in their prayers, you know, ask God for wisdom. It shall be given. But don't forget also that the face of the Lord is against them against them that do evil. Okay? And that would include us. That might not be the immediate context of that passage, but it applies. Let's move along here. Let's go back to Proverbs. We figured out what I was doing in 1 Peter 3 and it worked out. Praise the Lord. It's the fountain of life. Go to Proverbs 19. Proverbs 19. The Bible says in Proverbs 16, by mercy and truth, iniquity is purged. By mercy and truth, iniquity is purged. You know, what's mercy? Like not giving somebody what they deserve. Not getting what you deserve. You know, it's God holding back. It's mercy and truth. Iniquity is purged. Right? And by the fear of the Lord, men depart from evil. How do men depart from evil? By fearing God. Look, that's where it all starts in the Christian life. Fear the Lord. You can see how practical the book of Proverbs is. You know, it's really easy to just get up and preach, hey, you should fear God. You know, Bible commands it. We looked at it this morning. But what does it mean practically to do that? It means to depart from evil, folks. It means having to separate company. It means having to get sin out of our lives. It means having to just start presenting our bodies, not living sacrifice, and just doing what God told us to do, whether we like it or not. Okay? That's what it means to depart from evil. Look at Proverbs 19, verse 23. The fear of the Lord tendeth to life. Again, it's a great verse about what the fear of the Lord will bring to you. So again, don't be one of these people that just sits there and thinks about all of the sin that God, you know, God's just, you know, speaking away. Like God, you know, the whole point of Christian life is God will just spoil all your fun. That's not it. God is sparing us, sparing you a bunch of heartache. Okay? The fear of the Lord prolongeth day. The fear of the Lord is a fountain of life. The fear of the Lord tendeth to life. And he that hath it shall abide satisfied. When you look at somebody that's fearing God and has been fearing God and living for the Lord for decades, you know what? They're not lamenting the fact that they've done that. They're not looking back going, man, you know, what a wasted life living for God. Man, you know, I wish I would have been like these other people, just gone out and just sown my wild oats or whatever you want to call it. Basically, go out and live a wicked lifestyle. Right? I mean, there's some Christians that have never done certain things. They've just never done it. You think they sit around and are just like, man, you know, I wish I had done that sin. No, they abide satisfied. But the people that just spend their life chasing after the pleasures of sin, year after year after, they're never satisfied. Ever. And it never will satisfy. Doesn't it sound nice to be satisfied? Wouldn't it be nice to have good, you know, to love life and see good days and to abide satisfied? Well, it begins with the fear of the Lord. He that hath it, what? The fear of the Lord shall be satisfied and shall not be visited with evil. One of the most satisfying things about the Christian life and fearing God is knowing that God's not going to whoop me. I'm safe from the fear of evil. God's not going to do me harm. Because, you know, evil could just mean harm in the Bible. It doesn't necessarily mean something sinful. I'm not looking over my shoulder like, when's God going to get me? Is he around this corner? Is he going to show up now? That's not a fun way to live life. Flinching. You know, the preacher turns to a certain passage, you know what's in there, and you're like, I knew I shouldn't have come today. You know, you want to slither out the door, right? I like not being visited with evil. You know, that's a pretty satisfying thing. How do you get it? The fear of the Lord. Go to Proverbs 23, and we'll end there. Proverbs chapter number 23. The Bible says in Pro- you know, just go to Proverbs 22. There's just two more to look at. Obviously I'm not looking at every single verse in the Proverbs that deals with this topic. We're really just looking at that phrase, the fear of the Lord, in the book of Proverbs. It says, by humility and the fear of the Lord are riches, honor, and life. So it's just- it's just this theme in Proverbs. You want- you want what, prolonged days, a fountain of life. You want to, you know, have the- not be visited with evil, to abide satisfied, to have a good life. Fear the Lord. But what's it going to take? Again, humility. What does that humility look like practically? You know, being able to say- to stop being wise in your own eyes. To just say, I'm wrong. I'm wrong. The Bible's right. Let me just get on God's program, and do things His way. That takes humility. That's why a lot of people don't do it. And that's why pride is the thing that God hates the most. Because it just robs people of His blessing. He says, humility and the fear of the Lord are riches and honor and life. You know, the fear of the Lord will make you successful. You're honest in your business dealings. You're straightforward. You pray God for the wisdom that you need. Man, it'll bring abundance. I believe that. It'll bring you honor. It'll bring you life. Look at Proverbs 23. We'll end there. Because I think this is really a key verse when it comes to the fear of the Lord. It says, let not thine heart envy sinners. And this is especially something that maybe people have to deal with a little bit more when they're coming out of the world. Right? Or, you know, when we're younger. This is something that we might be more prone to do. To start to actually envy sinners. Especially in this culture, where sin is just dolled up. Right? Where they just put this facade out there and say, oh, this is what this is what a sinful light looks like. It's not that bad. Don't let that Bible tie you down. Don't let those old fuddy duddys down at that Baptist church spoil all your fun. Look at all the fun we're having. We're fine. And that's what Christians will start to tell them. That doesn't look so bad. I wish I could do that. I wish I could get away with that. You know, one thing that a lot of Christian young people don't understand is that the reason why those people are out there having, you know, look like they're having so much fun and getting away with it is because they're unsaved. They're unsaved. You know, they're going to have a real good time all the way to hell. You know, Proverbs 73 or Psalm 73. There is no Proverbs 73. But Psalm 73, man, you live in that one sometimes. That lived in that chapter. You know, until I went in the sanctuary of God, then understood I their end. Surely thou didst set them in slippery places. You know, sinners, the wicked, the unsaved, man, they've got one foot in a banana peel and the other one in a grave. And they're that close to just slipping right into hell. Why would I envy that? I have salvation. You know, maybe I'm not going to go out there and enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season, but I'm also not going to deal with the consequences and I have eternal life. I have a fountain in life given unto me. I am a fountain of life. Man, they should be envying me. You know, and it's funny, it's a lot of times eventually those tables usually do turn. When you actually don't screw up your life, when you do, you know, start raising a godly fan, then they start, they're like, oh man, anyway. You know, I know I made fun of you early on, but now it seems like you actually, you know, have got some things figured out and you're not dealing with the problems that I have. It's like, yeah. So who should be envying who? Why would I sit there and envy sinners? Let not thine heart envy sinners. But you know what, that's something our hearts often are prone to do if we're not careful. How do you fix it? But be thou in the fear of the Lord all the day long. Just be in the fear of the Lord. Some temptation comes our way, we start to envy some sinner. You know what, we should just have some Bible verse memorized. We should just, you know, be in the fear of the Lord and just remind ourselves, you know, of all the good things that come to us through the fearing of God. All the bad things that are going to not come into our lives. All the evil we're not going to be visited with. Just remind ourselves of that. And be in that fear. And not to envy sinners. That'll help us to not envy sinners when we are in the fear of the Lord all of the day long. Let's go ahead and close the word of prayer. Dear Lord, again, thank you for the wisdom and the knowledge and the understanding that is at our fingertips in the word of God. Thank you for the discretion that is given to us through it. Thank you for the filling of the Holy Spirit that is available to every single one of us. Thank you for the salvation that's been brought to us through Christ. Thank you for that throne of grace that we can go to when we have need, Lord, that we can come boldly before your throne. Lord, that we can ask you for the wisdom that we need in this life and it shall be given us. Lord, help us to believe that. Help us to pray it. Help us to have it, Lord, so that we can live it. We ask these things in Christ's name, Amen. Alright, we'll go ahead and sing one more song before we go. Let's open up our head to song number four. Song number four, The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross Leads Up. The Way the Cross