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Man, the part of the chapter that I want to start in is there in Ecclesiastes chapter 7 verse 2 where the Bible reads, It's better to go to the house of mourning than to go to the house of feasting, for that is the end of all men, and the living will lay it to his heart. Sorrow is better than laughter, for by the sadness of the countenance the heart is made better. The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning, but the heart of fools is in the house of mirth. It's better to hear the rebuke of the wise than for a man to hear the song of fools. And the title of my sermon tonight is suffering makes us better. Suffering makes us better. It says in verse 3, Sorrow is better than laughter, for by the sadness of the countenance the heart is made better. The Bible says that by having sadness enter our lives that actually makes us a better person. By the sorrow of the countenance, the sadness of the countenance, the heart is made better. Flip over if you would to Hebrews chapter number 2. Hebrews chapter number 2 in the New Testament. And while you're turning there I'll read for you from Psalm 119 where the Bible reads, It is good for me that I've been afflicted that I might learn thy statutes. So David there is saying that he's glad that bad things happened to him, that he went through trials and tribulations and afflictions because it caused him to learn God's word. The Bible says in Hebrews chapter 2 verse 10, For it became him for whom are all things and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings. Notice that, to make him perfect through sufferings. Flip over to chapter 5 in the same book. Hebrews chapter 5 verse number 8. The Bible reads, Though he were a son, yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered. The Bible also says, you don't have to turn there, but in 1 Peter chapter 5 verse 10 the Bible reads, But the God of all grace, who hath called us unto his eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after that you've suffered a while, make you perfect, establish, strengthen, settle you. So this is a theme over and over again in the Bible where it talks about hard times, afflictions, trials, tribulations, making us better. And that the sorrow and sadness that we go through in our life actually makes us a better person. Now obviously none of us likes to go through pain and suffering and sorrow and tribulations and things like that. But according to the Bible they make us into better people. And without these things we would actually be horrible people. All of the things that I went through when I was growing up that were difficult and that I didn't want to do or just bad things that happened to me. You know, looking back I'm thankful for all of them because I understand that sadness and sorrow helps us to become a stronger person, helps us to become a better person. And that people who don't go through any suffering, they don't go through any hard times and everything is handed to them, they actually become wicked people. They become ungodly people. Now if you would, where did I have you turn? Anywhere? Go to Isaiah chapter 48, Isaiah chapter 48. See a lot of times God will actually put us through hard times for the express purpose of making us a better person. Purifying us, maybe cleansing us of some bad things in our life, burning away the dross, refining us, purifying us. The Bible talks about how every branch that is in Christ that doesn't bring forth fruit is cast away. But every branch that does bring forth fruit, the Bible says that he purges it so that it will bring forth even more fruit. And sometimes that can be a painful process in our life, being purged of things and having things cut out of our life and having things removed that don't belong there. But in the end it causes us to be a more fruitful branch. It causes us to do more for the Lord in the long run. Look down at your Bible chapter 48, verse number 10, the Bible says, Behold, I have refined thee, but not with silver, I have chosen thee in the furnace of affliction. So affliction, tribulation, hard times are a furnace that will purify us and strengthen us and cause us to come out better. That's why Job said in chapter 23, verse 10, But he knoweth the way that I take, when he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold. Flip over if you would to Romans chapter 5. Romans chapter 5 in the New Testament. While you're turning there, the Bible says in Titus chapter 2, verse 13, Looking for that blessed hope and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works. So God wants us to be not the same as everybody around us, not like the world around us, but he wants to purify unto himself a peculiar people. A group of people that are different than those around them and he wants us to be zealous of good works. And the way that he purifies us is that he refines us in the furnace of affliction. Romans chapter 5 talks about this same idea that tribulation brings about good things in our life. It starts in verse number 3, it says, Not only so, but we glory in tribulations also, knowing that tribulation worketh patience, and patience experience, and experience hope, and hope maketh not ashamed, because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us. So if we're going to have patience and hope and all these good attributes, we're going to have to go through some tribulation in our lives. Of course the famous passage in James chapter 1 says, My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into diverse temptations, knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. But let patience have her perfect work, that you may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing. Go back if you would to Zechariah chapter 13, toward the end of the Old Testament. Zechariah chapter 13. Zechariah 13, while you're turning there, I'll read for you from Malachi chapter 3. The Bible says in Malachi 3, too, But who may abide the day of his coming, and who shall stand when he appeareth, speaking of Jesus Christ? For he is like a refiner's fire and like fuller's soap, and he shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he shall purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer unto the Lord an offering in righteousness. The Bible says in Zechariah 13, verse 7, Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, and against the man that is my fellow, saith the Lord of hosts. Smite the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered, and I will turn mine hand upon the little ones. And it shall come to pass that in all the land, saith the Lord, two parts therein shall be cut off and die, but the third shall be left therein, and I will bring the third part through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined, and will try them as gold is tried. They shall call on my name, and I will hear them. I will say, It is my people, and they shall say, The Lord is my God. Go to James chapter 4 toward the end of the New Testament. James chapter 4. So it's not God's plan for our life that we just live a perfect life, a smooth life, total comfort, no tribulation, no persecution, no hard times, no problems, no struggle. That's not what God has in mind for us, and if that's the life that we live, we would become terrible people. We would become soft, and we would become spoiled, and we would become entitled, and we wouldn't understand the Lord or anything that He has for us. It's like it says in Proverbs 30 where he says, Give me neither poverty nor riches, lest I be full and deny Thee, and say, Who is the Lord? Or lest I be poor and steal and take the name of my God in vain. People that are given everything, people who don't go through any suffering or hard times, they become prideful, they become arrogant, and sometimes God has to take us down a notch and take us through some hard times, humble us, and purify us, and get some of the dross out of our heart and out of our life. Look at James chapter 4 verse 8, it says, Draw nigh to God, and He will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners, and purify your hearts, ye double-minded. Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to heaviness. Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He shall lift you up. Look at James chapter 5, just the next chapter, James chapter 5 verse 10. Take, my brethren, the prophets, who have spoken in the name of the Lord for an example of suffering, affliction, and of patience. Behold, we count them happy, which endure. You have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord, that the Lord is very pitiful and of tender mercy. Notice what it says there, we count them happy, which endure. Happiness is found in serving the Lord and enduring hard times. Going through the struggles, going through the trials and tribulations, going through the temptations, enduring the discipline that God has in our lives, going through that refining process, being purged, and coming out like gold. Not just sitting back and enjoying the comfortable, easy ride of the Christian life. But this is what a lot of people are seeking in their Christian life. They want a Christianity that's easy, that's comfortable, that's smooth. All they want is joy and peace and gladness. But the Bible says unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe on Him, but also to suffer for His sake. When the Apostle Paul was first called to go out and do a great work for God and go out and preach to the Gentiles and win many people under the Lord, one of the first things that it was said unto Ananias, the man that was supposed to win him to Christ and preach him the Gospel and baptize him and sort of introduce him to the brethren, it was said unto Ananias, I will show him how great things he must suffer for my sake. Even before the Apostle Paul had even gotten saved or even started his ministry or even done anything for the Lord, God was already planning suffering in his life. I'm going to show him what great things he's going to suffer for my sake. Why? Because if someone's going to be used to the magnitude that the Apostle Paul was used, God's going to have to put them through some suffering. And he's going to have to strengthen them. If they're going to do such an amazing work for God and be able to endure all the things that Paul endured, where he was shipwrecked, he was out in the sea, a night and a day in the deep, where he's beaten with rods five times, where he keeps receiving beatings of the Jews, where he's stoned and literally left for dead, and yet he just keeps on going, keeps on serving God, and he said, none of these things move me. And that's why he was able to preach to the Corinthians, be steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord for as much as you know that your labor is not in vain in the Lord. But a person who's going to be used of God like that has to have some ruggedness. They have to be tried and tested and strengthened and built up to that point. They're not just going to be that way automatically. And the type of person who does great works for God isn't going to be someone who always has three perfect meals a day, and they always have the perfect place to sleep, and the perfect situation, and everything handed to them. People that have everything handed to them, they end up like King Solomon, where they destroy the whole kingdom. I mean, think about it. David, he grew up, and he's sleeping outside, he's taking care of the sheep, he's fighting off a bear, he's fighting off a lion, he goes up against Goliath, he goes through all these things, and then, after he's an adult and he's in the military, King Saul turns on him, and now he's on the run from King Saul. He's living in caves. He's living in the woods for a very long time. When he became king, he ruled righteously. Obviously, he made mistakes and did wrong things, but he was a man after God's own heart, and he did a lot of great things for God. He brought the kingdom together. He brought the northern kingdom and Judah together, because there was even a rift in that, even toward the beginning of his reign. But he brought the other tribes, Benjamin and the rest of them, back in to the kingdom. He united the kingdom, and he ruled over them for forty years, but then he hands everything to his son on a silver platter, Solomon. He grows up with just all the wealth, all the benefits, all the blessings, and he's the author of Ecclesiastes. Everything was handed to him, and what did he do? He ended up marrying a bunch of strange wives, being greedy, being lustful, gratifying the flesh, and he ended up causing the kingdom to be divided, and it was never united again. It was divided, and his son, Rehoboam, only was able to inherit just two tribes, and the whole rest of it was lost, because the one who was handed everything, he went soft. He was too comfortable. He had it too easy. He hadn't earned anything. The Bible often used the illustration of the Christian life being like unto an athletic competition, like running a race, or striving for the masteries in athletics. And obviously, if someone's going to be a great athlete, they don't become a great athlete by taking it easy, by having a comfortable life. No, they get up early, they push themselves, they work hard. As the saying goes, no pain, no gain. They go out and they suffer out there running, and when other people are resting, they're out running, and they're lifting weights, and they're going through all kinds of punishments, and working hard, and disciplining their body, and going through all kinds of austerities, and what they eat, and what they don't eat, so that they can win the prize. And that's what the Bible compares the Christian life to. We have to be willing to go through some trials, and testing, and training, if we're going to win the gold of doing great things for the Lord. And we can't just expect to just go through an easy life, and be used greatly of God. That never happened in the Bible. Everybody who did something great for God, suffered. Now, to the guys that are going out and starting churches now, they have a lot of benefits that I did not have, or that Brother Jimenez did not have, when we started our churches. Because we have a lot of momentum now, as a church, when we send guys out to start a church, there's usually already a group of guys waiting for them. You know, we sent Brother Romero to Fort Worth, there were already 40, 50 some people just waiting for him to get there. So he was able to get there, and boom, he's already got 40 or 50 people there, which is great. Because then he can skip the hardest part, which is getting from like 0 to 50, you know. And guys like Brother Tyler Baker, when he goes out to start the church in Jacksonville this August, he's got a big group waiting for him. You know, of people that are just ready to go to the church. I think he's probably got about 75 people just waiting for him to join that church. And so that really helps. You know, when I started the church, it was just my family in the living room, and just whoever I could just drag in from just knocking doors. You know, I got here, I knocked a bunch of doors, and we had 4 visitors the first service, so we started with 9 people. And then that night we had 7, and then by Wednesday night we were down to just my family again. And then on the next Sunday morning, we'd grown from 9 to 8. You know, it was a hard, it was a struggle. A year later, we'd grown from 9 to 7. So that was growth after one year of working hard and struggling out there. So the point is that the guys that are starting the churches now, where, you know, they're starting with a little bit more of a head start. They're starting with, you know, already having a bunch of church members there waiting for them. And when we send them out, you know, we furnish them liberally out of our wine press and out of our threshing floor with, you know, we're buying them chairs and song books and Bibles. And getting them all set up, hey, you know, starting them out with the nice camera and the nice microphone, wireless, you know, set up and everything. Not like when we started the church, you know, in the kitchen, in the living room, you know, the kitchen counter was the pulpit. There was no video camera. We didn't even record the audio for the first few months. We certainly didn't have a, you know, a YouTube channel. YouTube hadn't even been invented yet, believe it or not, I don't think. I think it started like a year later after we started the church. And what I'm saying is that these guys that are starting churches now, they need to understand that unto whom much is given, of him shall much be required. And they need to push themselves and work hard and struggle and fight and do the best that they can. And not to just try to have an easy time of it. Just a comfortable kick back, lay back, take it easy. No, no, no, take those advantages, take that head start and do something great for God right from the get go. Run scared, push yourself, work hard and don't just say, oh, well, look what I've just inherited, piece of cake. I can just kind of coast. Wrong, because if you do that, if you take it easy and you coast, you're going to go the way of Solomon. Where you're going to be enticed after the things of this world and you're going to get out of the fight. You have to always keep a little bit of pressure on yourself. You know, you've got to push yourself. You've got to work hard all the time and go through hard times. If you're going to achieve anything that's worth achieving, if you're going to build something or do something with your life, you're going to have to suffer. You're going to have to work hard. You're going to have to endure chastening. Now, a lot of people, they don't want to endure any hardships or hardness, but the Bible says, Thou, therefore, endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. Endure hardness ought to be our motto. We ought to be willing to do things in our life that are hard, that are difficult and push through these hard times and these trials and tribulations. And not only that, but the Bible says we should rejoice in these things. Rejoice in trials and tribulations. Glory in tribulations. Knowing that tribulation worketh patience. When the trials come and bad times come, we need to realize, hey, this is making me a better person. This is making me stronger. This is testing my faith in the Lord and this is building character in my life to go through this difficult situation. Whatever that difficulty is. And not everyone's going to go through the same hard times. Some people are going to be tested and tried and pushed in different ways. It could be a financial testing, you know, where you're struggling to make ends meet. It could be a health issue that you're brought through. And that's obviously the hardest kind of testing, because Job, even after he lost his wealth and even after he lost his family, and even after his children died, he'd gone through so much, the devil put forth the notion to the Lord. He said, well, if you touch his body, though, he'll curse you to your face because all that a man hath will he give for his flesh. And of course, Job did go through that physical testing where he went through the hardest thing, which was a terrible health problem where he had boils all over his body, literally from head to toe. He's covered in these boils and just the itching and the burning and the inflammation. And he took a potsherd and scraped himself. I mean, can you imagine anything more miserable than just being covered in itching, burning boils and scraping yourself? And so, Job went through all that, but he said, though he slay me, yet will I trust him. He said, when I'm tried, I shall come forth as gold. And that's an example for us today, when the Bible says you've heard of the patience of Job. He said, we count them happy, which endure. You've heard of the patience of Job. You wouldn't expect Job to be a poster child of happiness. You know, hey, think of the happiest person in the Bible. Who is the happiest person? Which Bible character would you choose to represent happiness? Oh, well, that's easy, Job. I don't think anybody would say that, would they? I mean, that's not what would pop into your mind, right? If you think happiness, what would you say? You know, you'd probably think of somebody who had a lot of blessing, a lot of good things happening to them and so forth. But the Bible says, we count them happy, which endure. Well, I mean, you've heard of the patience of Job. What? That's the guy that's happy? We've heard of the patience of Job and have seen the end of the Lord, that the Lord is very pitiful and of tender mercy. You know, in the end, Job was very happy. And I'm sure he's very happy right now up in heaven. He's with the Lord. He's enjoying all the rewards. He's enjoying all the blessings. And he has that badge of having endured the hardest trials and tribulations and coming forth as gold and being an example and an inspiration to millions of people after him, even to this day in 2017. And so we need to understand that suffering, trials, tribulation are a part of our life that makes us better. And without them, we would be terrible people. I would be a terrible person. You would be a terrible person. I guarantee you, if I would have grown up good looking, wealthy, all the best clothes, all the talent, the best at sports, right? Nothing bad happening in life. Never getting sick. I'd be the worst human being on this planet. I'm not kidding. You'd be a horrible person. You'd be so proud and arrogant. You'd never have any empathy of what other people are going through when they suffer. And you'd be self-absorbed and self-centered. You know, there are things that we go through in our life. You know, I remember when I was growing up, there were things that I didn't like about my life and things that caused suffering in my life. But looking back, I'm glad for every single one of them. I wouldn't change any of them because those things actually kept me from becoming a horrible person. And I was thinking about some of the things when I was a child that I, you know, that I went through. Like, for example, when I was a child, I was very short for my age. Now, that might seem like a silly thing, obviously. And it does seem silly when you're 35 years old looking back. But here's the thing. At the time when you're a kid in school, you don't like being the shortest kid in the class. You know, you're getting made fun of and called shrimp and everything. So when I was a kid in school, I was like the shortest kid in the class. And in the class photos, I'm right there in the front center, you know, because I'm one of the shortest. I had these two other kids. And those were my two friends, by the way. And we're all up front. And we're, you know, we're really short. And I would get teased and called shrimp and so forth. And for the first few years in school, I was a year ahead for my age. So that made me even shorter, you know, because I was a year younger than everybody. So, you know, that was something where I endured a lot of ridicule and teasing and stuff like that. But you know what? I'm glad. Because you know what? It caused me to be someone who didn't want to ridicule and tease other kids who weren't as cool because I knew what it was like to be on the receiving end of that, you know. And then, you know, around the time I was 12 years old, I shot up and, you know, became normal height. I'm like, yeah, I'm the height of everybody else now. You know, now I can be cool. I'm at the right height. Then my face got covered in acne. You know, just as soon as one problem ends, then you get another problem. You know, and then you're self-conscious as a teenager because you got the acne and everything like that. And it's just, you know, it's just one thing after another like that where God is just keeping us humble. He doesn't want us to get all arrogant and puffed up and think that we're so cool because we all have that tendency in our heart and in our life. If the flesh were allowed to take over and if we didn't have the trials and tribulations and the thorn of the flesh, what did Paul say? He said, lest I should be exalted above measure. Because of the abundance of the revelations that were given unto him, he was given the thorn in the flesh. And he besought the Lord three times to take that thorn away from him. And God said, my grace is sufficient for thee, for my strength is made perfect in weakness. And Paul said, therefore, I'll glory in tribulation. He said, I'll glory in my infirmities because when I'm weak, then am I strong. And so the Apostle Paul, he literally wrote half the books of the New Testament. So God's going to give him all that inspiration to write half the books of the New Testament if he's going to be considered the greatest of the apostles who labored more abundantly than they all and lifted up all over the world as one of the greatest Christians who ever lived or maybe even the greatest Christian who ever lived, the Apostle Paul. God had to do some things in his life to keep him humble. He had to give him some infirmities and he had to go through some ailments so that people would not exalt him too highly or that he would not exalt himself too highly. So if you want to do great things for God and be used greatly of God, you should expect God to sometimes bring some hard things into your life just to humble you and keep you from getting too puffed up or exalted and so forth. Now if you would go to Proverbs chapter 23, book of Proverbs chapter number 23. And maybe you today, maybe you're a young person today and you can kind of relate to my story. Maybe you're a little short for your age or maybe you have something else wrong with you physically and you think, oh man, I hate the fact that I look this way or maybe you're not good at sports or whatever that causes you to be ridiculed and made fun of. But here's what you have to understand, that's making you a better person because the guys who went through high school and they were cool and they were in shape and they were great at sports and they looked good and they had all the friends and they're popular, they're the ones who go to college and they start getting drunk and they start taking drugs and they're partying and they're fornicating and they've ruined their lives right now. And the people who might have been a little bit outcast or a little bit disliked, those are the people who the sadness of their countenance made them better. And God might just be making you better right now and he might know that he has a great plan for you in your life so that's why he gave you a physical ailment or he gave you sickness or he gave you some physical attribute about yourself that you wish you could change. You know, you wish you could be taller, you wish that you could be thinner or you wish that you could look different or whatever. So maybe God has great things in mind for you, he wants to use you greatly but he just had to make sure that you just weren't too perfect or too cool because then maybe it would be too easy for you to just get caught up in the cares of this life and just ride that wave of success and popularity and everything's going so good for you and you have so much money and you look so good and you're having so much fun and you just ride that wave into ruin because the prosperity of fools shall destroy them. Prosperity of fools shall destroy them. It's the sadness of the countenance that makes our heart better. I don't know about you but I want to have a better heart. I want to be used by God. I want to be a good person. I want to be a sympathetic person. I want to be a person who has real love and charity in my heart for other people and who cares about other people that can rejoice with them that rejoice and they can weep with them that weep. I don't want to just be some really cool guy who just succeeds in everything he touches. Why? Because it's going to make you into a bad person, that's why. Now one of the ways that we can apply this lesson is obviously to endure troubles and trials and whatever cross that the Lord has given us to bear to endure it patiently, to have a good attitude and rejoice in the hard things that we go through in our life because we know that it's helping strengthen us and make us a better person, a more humble person, a more godly person, a more sympathetic person, a person who loves other people more instead of just being self-centered and self-absorbed. But another way we can apply this concept is to understand that when we raise our children we're doing them a great disservice by shielding them from all suffering and trying to make sure that they never go through anything hard in their life. Now many parents, they think that they're doing their children a great favor by giving them every advantage, right? And they'll even say things like, well, I don't want my children to have to go through the struggles that I've been through. But what you're saying when you say that is, I don't want my children to be as good of a person as I am. I want them to be a self-absorbed jerk. That's pretty much what you're saying. Because that's what you're creating. You're creating a monster. I mean, this is where the term spoiling your kids comes from. You spoil, you ruin them. How do you spoil your kids? How do you ruin them? It's by giving them everything that they want. They need to suffer need. They need to suffer hardship. They need to suffer lack. They need to know what it is to go through hard things so that they can, by the sadness of their countenance, have a better heart. They need to go through actual discipline too. Look what the Bible says in Proverbs 23 verse 13. It says, withhold not correction from the child. Now I love the way that God words that because he uses the word withhold. And the word withhold is used when we're holding back something good, right? Something that you deserve or something that would be a blessing to you if it's being withheld from you. That's something good that's being kept back. He said, withhold not correction from the child. Don't hold back what the child needs, which is correction. For if thou beatest him with the rod, he shall not die. Thou shalt beat him with the rod and shall deliver his soul from hell. Now that's a pretty powerful verse right there. And when you stop and think about the implications of this verse, when he says thou shalt beat him with the rod and shall deliver his soul from hell. You know what that's saying? It's saying that chances are if you don't spank your kids, chances are they're going to go to hell when they die. Why? You say, well why would not getting spanked cause somebody to go to hell? Because not getting spanked is going to cause them to grow up without the fear of the Lord. Because they're not going to have any fear of their parents. They're not going to have the proper respect and fear of their dad. And then when they look up to their father which is in heaven, they're going to think that he's the same way. That he's just all talk. That there's no bite. There's no discipline. There's no boundary. There's no consequence. There's no correction. That just anything goes. Well here's the thing, God's not like that. Now if that's how your dad is on this earth, well sorry but that's not the dad that you're going to run into at judgment day with the Lord. Because our God's a consuming fire. So a father on this earth that corrects you, that disciplines you, that beats you with the rod, is going to prepare you to face a God that's a consuming fire. One day. But those who are not disciplined, sadly, will often go to hell. Because they will not believe on the Lord Jesus Christ as their Savior. They don't think that they need Jesus to save them. Because they think that they're fine. They're okay. They don't need that. They'll do that later. Not important. Not a big deal. Not a priority for me. Whereas those that grow up actually disciplined by their parents are more likely to say, You know what? I'll bet you God's got an even bigger paddle than my dad does. Because I'm reading in the Bible, he's wiping out entire cities and everything like that. I better seek the Lord and figure out how to please God. And then they find peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Being saved is easy. Being saved is easy. The Bible says that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have eternal life. The Bible says believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. It doesn't say you might be saved. It says you shall be saved. For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. If we believe on Jesus Christ we'll be saved. But the undisciplined, they think, well I don't need that. God's not going to send anybody to hell. Everybody's going to heaven. Or God's, I'm sure God's going to look down and see what a good person I am. And just allow me to just waltz in the pearly gates because I'm such a good person. That's pride. That's arrogance. But prideful and arrogant people, that's the type of people that grow up without discipline, without punishment, without suffering, without enduring anything hard. Children who are just handed everything, they're given all the best brands. They're given all the comforts. They get all the blessings and they get no discipline. They're never told no. And they're not going to grow up fearing the Lord or understanding what it is to endure hardness or suffer. How could they? And look, obviously they could be saved. But it's going to be hard for them to be saved. Just like a rich man can be saved but it's very hard for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God. Even though salvation is so easy. You just believe in Christ. But yet for a rich man that's one of the hardest things to do. Humble himself and receive a free gift. See he's used to paying his way everywhere he goes and taking great pride in that. He has to humble himself and be like a little child and just receive that free gift of salvation. Look at chapter 20 verse 30. Proverbs chapter 20 verse 30. You know when I was growing up my parents didn't give me all the fancy things and the coolest clothes and stuff like that. And at the time I hated it. But now I'm thankful for it. I wish they would have been a little stricter if anything. Why? Because I don't want to be a bad person. That's why. Look when I was a kid, other kids, they had the Reeboks, the Converse, the Nikes, the Air Jordans. The ones who were really spoiled brats. Those things were like hundreds of dollars even back then. The Air Jordans. Who knows what I'm talking about. Weren't they like hundreds of dollars? The Air Jordans. You know kids are coming to school. They got the Reeboks, the little pump. Right? My parents bought me Pro Wings. Pro Wings. It was like the generic Payless shoe source basketball shoe. The Pro Wings. When I was a kid, the last place you wanted to get shoes was Payless shoe source. But now I guess that's a cool place to get shoes. What? Are you shaking your head no? You're the one who told me that now it's cool to get your shoes there. Or maybe you were just trying to tell that to our kids. I don't know. When I was a kid, it was like, mom, hey, can we go to this store? Can we go to that store? She's like, we're going to Payless shoe source. Get some Pro Wings for you. And then the jeans, other kids have the Levi's. And the girls have all the Guess. Right? That was the cool brand in the 80s. Right? Guess. Is that still around? And then we're getting the store brand from JCPenney or whatever. And I remember we got the Arizona brand jeans. So that was prophetic of coming to Arizona. So I got the Arizona jeans. They weren't cool back then. Are they cool now? I don't know. But the point is that I'm glad that my parents didn't buy me all the coolest stuff. Why? Because I would have walked into school arrogant and proud. And you know what I probably would have done? I probably would have made fun of the kid in the Pro Wings. I would have been that guy. But it was better to be on the receiving end of that and to learn lessons about life. And to learn that those things don't matter. And to learn that there's more to life than just a bunch of brand names and fancy clothes and stuff like that. I know my mom listens to this sermon. Sorry mom. I'm not trying to throw you under the bus here. Thank you mom for buying me the cheap stuff. I appreciate it. And we raise our kids the same way. And you know what? Our kids, they don't all have their own room with their own bathroom and their own little apartment. You know what I mean? It's like, I'm not saying there's any... Look, if you're wealthy and you have room for that or if you only have a couple kids, no problem. But I'm saying I don't think that my kids are deprived because of the fact that they have to share a room and stuff like that. Because you know what? It teaches them to have to get along with other people. And that's a good lesson. You know, I mean someday they're going to have to share a room, amen, with their spouse. And then they're going to have to learn how to get along and deal with all the problems of marriage and things like that. And so we don't want to shelter our children and just give them everything and try to give them a life free of suffering. Make them eat things that they don't want to eat, amen. Make them eat not just only chicken fingers and french fries. No! You need to eat the vegetables, you need to eat, you need to try new things and make them eat what's on their plate and finish their plate. Why? Because the sadness of countenance makes their heart better. I can't even count how many times when I was growing up, we had to finish our food. This was a thing in my house. And my parents were strict on certain things and lenient on other things. But one of the things they were strict on was you had to finish your food. And when we would go out to eat, if we ordered something, we better eat all of it. So after church on Sunday mornings we'd go out to some kind of fast food every single Sunday morning. And I can remember a time that my brother endured this and I can remember a time that I endured this. Literally just sitting at the kitchen table. Just get this picture. I'm sitting at the kitchen table with a half-eaten burger staring me down. One o'clock in the afternoon, two o'clock, three o'clock, four o'clock. Because they're like, you're not getting up until you eat this burger. But I was full. You know, either I ordered too much or I don't know what it was. Maybe I snacked or something. I don't remember why I got into that predicament. But I just remember sitting there and literally, you know, four, five o'clock would roll around. And it was like by then you've digested lunch and then now you had room for it. But I'm serious. I remember just sitting there virtually from the morning service until the evening service. Staring down a half-eaten fast food burger. And I remember my brother enduring the same thing. I remember seeing him sitting at the table one time and he had to finish that burger. He said, you're not getting up until it's finished. And they didn't care if hours went by. You sat there and you finished that burger. But, you know, it taught you a lesson. Even to this day I'm real careful what I put on my plate. I'm thinking I'm going to finish this. Or if I don't finish it, I'm wrapping it up. I'm putting it in the fridge. I want to get to that later. Whereas how many other people do you see who just indiscriminately eat half the plate and just, I'm full. Just throwing, just throwing entire meals down the drain. Entire meals going in the trash, right? You know, that's not fun when you're a kid. Because when you're a kid, five hours or three hours at that table, it just, you know, maybe it wasn't even that long. But I do know we got pretty close to the evening service one time, okay? Because I remember my mom saying, hey, we got to go to church in an hour. It's time to eat that burger. It's time to do that. I remember you just put a bite in your mouth and you chew and you chew and you chew and chew. And then you'd have to swallow it finally. And it was like, okay, one more bite to go. But that makes you grow up and have character more than the kid who's just allowed to just load up his plate. Just load it up with just, and then just throw it all in the trash. I don't want this anymore. I've changed my mind. You know, what we do in our house is not as extreme. We don't make them sit there at the table with it. But we wrap it up and pull it out at the next meal, cold or whatever. And that will just keep coming out until it gets eaten. It keeps coming. And eventually they'll get hungry enough, they'll eat it, right? But a lot of parents, they think, no, no, I want my kid to have all the advantages. I want them to grow up without any suffering, any discipline. I want them to just grow up experiencing joy and peace. But they're not going to appreciate it. Because you have to endure suffering to even appreciate pleasure and joy and peace. You have to go through the reverse. Look at Proverbs 20, verse 30. The blueness of a wound cleanseth away evil, so do stripes the inward parts of the belly. See, discipline actually cleanses away evil. It actually does that for your heart. It actually makes your heart better to go through that pain or that suffering. And so today people, they want to put aside the college fund for their child. So that their child can have a totally paid way through college. But then the child's not even going to appreciate that. You know, the one who works their way through college, right, the one who's actually working and they've got the job and they're balancing the job and the school. They're actually working hard. They actually care about doing well. And they actually appreciate it because they're paying for themselves. I mean, if you pay for a class or a book, you're going to pass that class. If you go to work as a young person, think about it. I mean, you go to work and you earn money and you pay that money in tuition, you're going to pass that class. I mean, I remember when I was at Bible college paying my way and it was like $500 a month tuition to go to Bible college. And plus I had to buy books and stuff like that. I think it was like $450 for the tuition. And then on top of the books and everything, it ended up being over $500 a month, the expense of going there. Let me tell you something. I passed every class. I got As and Bs because you're not just going to sit there and, ah, I think I'll just blow off class. No, no, you just paid $500 to be there. You're going to get it done, right? Because you appreciate the things that you work hard for and suffer for that cost you something. And I remember I had it. I mean, working and going to school is a challenge. You know, I had to juggle a lot of things. And I remember I had a little chart of how many times I could be late, how many times I could miss class for sickness or whatever, or just, you know, a personal day or whatever. And I maxed it out every single time. I had this little chart, you know, because I was juggling so many things. But let me tell you, I didn't take one extra day. I didn't, I wasn't late one extra time because I needed to pass because I paid for it. I sure didn't want to pay for it again. But they say, oh, but we want the child to be able to focus on his studies. That's not what they're going to do. You hand them everything it's all paid for. Now they can focus on beer pong. They can focus on fornicating and being a drunk and a fool. And partying is what they're going to focus on. Because they're idle. Because they're not invested in it financially or invested in it with their blood, sweat, and tears of getting there. They're not even going to appreciate it. They're not going to be able to value it in the same way as someone who works and pays himself. Look, I always think to myself, I want my children to have a hard time in life. You say, what? I think to myself, I want my children when they first start out and when they first get married, I want their life to be hard. I want it to be hard. Why? Because I want them to be good people. I want them to love the Lord and I want them to be humble. That's why. I hope that when they start out, they have very little. I hope that they struggle. I don't want them to just be handed everything. I mean, look, when my wife and I got married, we were poor. And I'm glad we started out poor. And I want the same thing for my children. And, you know, I want them to have to work overtime and endure stress and difficulty and sleepless nights. Amen? Why? Because I want them to grow up and have character and not grow up to be wicked people. Self-centered people. Ungodly people. Now here's a great illustration of this. If you would flip over to Ecclesiastes chapter 7. A great illustration of this is the life of Buddha. Now, you say, what has this got to do with Buddha? Well, Buddha is a perfect illustration of this. Buddhism is a false religion. Buddhism is a wicked religion. And one of the most wicked things about Buddhism, aside from the fact that it's an alternative to Jesus Christ, who is the way, the truth, and the life, and that no man cometh unto the Father but by him, despite the fact that it's just a false religion that's just damning people, one of the worst things about Buddhism is that it teaches selfishness. And they go on and on about, oh, caring about others and being so selfless. But it's all talk. It's really a religion that's based on selfishness. It's based on being self-absorbed and obsessed with self. And all of the Eastern religions are like this. All of these navel-gazing, meditating-type religions, they're all based on this. Now, let me just give you the life story of Buddha real quick and show you how Buddha's parents ruined him. And you don't want to raise a Buddha, okay? Now, Buddha's name was Siddhartha Gautama. And legend has it, because of course, you know, a lot of this is probably embellished, right, by his followers. But according to legend, he was born around 500 B.C. and he was born into the family of a king. Now, at this time, India was ruled by lots of little kingdoms. So there were lots and lots of kings and little different city-state-type kingdoms. And so he was born into one of these homes and so he was Prince Siddhartha. And when he was born, supposedly he had these birthmarks on his hands and feet of these wheels. And they brought in a holy man to come and examine these birthmarks to figure out what is the significance of these omens. And they examined these birthmarks and they said, well, it means one of two things. It either means that he's going to become a great king that will conquer and rule over India or even the world. Or he's going to grow up and be a holy man that will bring, you know, great innovations in religion. So he's either going to be a great religious leader or he's going to be a great king. Well, his parents, they wanted him to be a great king. That sounded better than being this navel-gazing ascetic. And so they really wanted him to go with that option of being this great conqueror, great leader, great ruler. Because that's what his dad was. He wants his son to follow in his footsteps. So legend has it that he decided that he didn't want his son to be exposed to any suffering at all. He didn't want him to endure any hardship, any suffering, or even to see any suffering with his eyes. So he kind of kept him in a sheltered life in the palace. So Prince Siddhartha has grown up with all the best food, all the comforts, everything he wants is given to him. And he's never around anybody who's even sick or old or ugly. Just anybody who's experiencing any kind of suffering, he's completely sheltered from those type of people. So he just kind of grows up in this bubble. And he lives that way all the way into his twenties. Just everything he wants is just given to him. Just living a life of total pleasure, total luxury, no suffering whatsoever. Now according to what we've studied in the Bible, is that going to make him a good person or a bad person? I mean is that going to make him a person who loves and cares about other people? Or is it going to make him a self-centered jerk? Right? Well when he gets into his twenties, he decides he wants to go out and see what's outside. He wants to go out and see more of the world. So his father arranges for the town to kind of be prepared for his son to go out there. Because he doesn't want him to see anything weird. Because he's trying to shield him from all suffering. So they try to get rid of all the people that are old or sick or poor or suffering in any way, shape, or form. So they go out and he sees what's outside the palace. It's pretty similar to what he's already grown up with. Everything looks great, everything's well painted, and everybody's smiling and happy and well fed and good looking and so forth. So he gets out there, but somehow, you know, somebody got through who was really sick and diseased. And he sees this person and he's like, what's wrong with this person? And they have to explain to him, well you know, this person is sick and diseased. And they explain to him that that could happen to anybody, even you. Even you could get sick like that and be diseased. So he's curious. So he goes out of the palace on other multiple ventures with his servant and he sees these four sites of suffering. You know, this is really important to Buddhists. These four noble sites that he saw. So he saw the sick person and then he saw a really old person and he was explaining to him, you're going to get old. Like your wife's going to look like that someday. You're going to look like that someday. That kind of blew him away. He wasn't really familiar with that concept. So he saw a really sick person, a really old person, and then he saw a dead body. And then he saw an ascetic, you know, religious guru that was, you know, punishing himself or whatever. So these are the four sites that he saw of suffering. So he decides, you know what, I don't ever want to suffer like that. I don't want to endure this kind of suffering. And people are all going through this suffering and I don't want anybody to have to endure this kind of suffering. So he decided to dedicate his life to figuring out a way to end suffering. He wants to find the cure basically. How he can defeat sickness, old age, death, and all these different things. So he decides that he's just going to leave his family and just go out into the woods and meditate and solve all the world's problems and bring an end to all the suffering. Now keep in mind, Siddhartha is married and his wife's pregnant. Then she gives birth to a baby, his first child. So here he's got a newborn son. The day that his newborn son is born, in the middle of the night, he decides to just ditch his family. So he can go out and bend spoons in the woods and navel gaze. I don't want to say it's a true story, but I mean, this is how the story goes. So he goes into his wife and newborn son. The newborn son is sleeping at his wife's bosom, one day old, less than a day old. And he goes in to say goodbye, but he decides, you know what, saying goodbye would be too hard. I'm just going to walk out. I mean, he didn't even tell her that he was going to buy a pack of cigarettes. I mean, he just left. You know what I mean? I mean, he just in the middle of the night, he just left. Didn't say anything. Now look, is that a good husband? Is that a good father when you're married and you have a kid and it's a newborn baby? I mean, think about when you had your first child born. Those of you that are parents. Imagine the day your first child was born, you just left in the middle of the night. And your wife wakes up the next morning and has no clue where you are. I mean, Buddha was a deadbeat dad. He's a deadbeat. He's so selfish, doesn't care about his wife, doesn't love his newborn son, doesn't even care about his parents or what they want for his life, not grateful for the fact that they bent over backwards, giving him everything perfect, everything on a silver platter, everything that his heart could ever want. No thankfulness to them. No thankfulness to his wife or anything. How about to the Lord for blessing him and giving him a child and so forth. He's not giving praise to the God of heaven. Instead, he wants to go out and discover himself, find the meaning of his life and go out in the woods somewhere on his spiritual quest. I mean, what kind of nonsense is that? And this is the hero of the Buddha's faith. So he goes out into the woods and he starts learning under these different gurus and he excelled at Hinduism. So he's learning all the mantras and all the chants and all the songs and all the Vedas and he's excelling and he's living through all these austerities but he goes through one guru and he gets more advanced than that guru. At what? Meditating and chanting and stilling his mind and all this stuff. Sitting on his butt, he got better at it than the guru. So then he goes to the next guru and he learns everything that that guru has to teach him and he excels beyond that guru. So then he decides he's just going to kind of do his own thing. So he goes out in the woods and he's practicing these severe austerities. This whole process took six years. So he ditches his family. He doesn't say goodbye. He's just out in the woods for six years. This guru, that guru finally gets on his own program where he decides he's going to starve himself to achieve enlightenment. So he gets to the point where he's only eating one grain of rice per day and he just keeps getting skinnier. See, that fat guy statue, that's not really Buddha, by the way. It's not. A lot of people think that that's Buddha. That's a guy who came hundreds of years later. Buddha is the one with the long earlobes and the sort of nappy snails on his head, you know, the weird hairdo and the long ears and so forth. But anyway, he starves himself to the point where he's just skin and bone, where he could reach his hand from the front and feel his spine, you know, through his stomach. So he's literally about to starve to death and he starts realizing, I don't think this is working because I'm actually worse at meditating now because I'm so hungry, I'm so starved that I can't even think properly. So while he's sitting there just starving to death, a little boat goes by on the river and a guy just happens to be tuning his sitar. And he says, if you make the string too tight, it will snap. But if it's too loose, there will be no sound. And then all of a sudden, Buddha realized, I've tightened the string too tight here. You know, I'm going to follow the middle path, the middle way. So then just at that moment, a little girl pities him looking like he's starving to death and brings him a bowl of rice milk. So he eats the rice milk and takes a bath. And he hadn't taken a bath in a really long time. So he takes a bath, he eats the rice milk. And then he had five disciples that had been also starving themselves that are only eating one grain of rice a day. When they see him eating a bowl of rice milk, they're horrified. And they say like, you've betrayed us, you've let us down, you're giving in to the flesh. And he's like, no guys, I've got this new thing, the middle way. And they didn't listen, they walked away in disgust. So he starts eating normal food and he's still living in the woods and meditating. So he goes and he sits under a fig tree, right? He sits under the fig tree and he says, I'm not going to get up until I achieve enlightenment. So he just sits there meditating under the fig tree. He's not going anywhere, not going to do anything, not going to move until he's enlightened. So he sits there meditating under the fig tree. And then this demon comes to him, Mara, and wants to tempt him. Because the demon doesn't want him to reach enlightenment, doesn't want him to achieve nirvana because then he'll share it with other people. So this demon comes and tries to tempt him and brings all of his daughters to come and dance before him and try to seduce him and tempt him. That doesn't work. Buddha is neither repulsed nor enticed. He just has no reaction. Just sitting there, just not, doesn't care, doesn't care what's going on. So then the demon brings this giant army and this huge army comes and they fire like thousands of arrows at him, right? This is all just in the spirit world though, I think. So all these arrows are fired at him and just through his meditation, he turns all the arrows into lotus blossoms. So all these arrows are flying at him and all of a sudden they just start sprinkling like flower petals all over his head. So he goes through all these spiritual battles and all this in his mind for a few days and then he achieves nirvana. And nirvana is just this state where you have no desire and there's no suffering because you don't really care and then you can just kind of die and never come back because that's the goal of Buddhism. Just to die and never come back because they want to escape that cycle of death and rebirth, right? That's what Buddhists teach, you know, because they believe in reincarnation but they don't want to get reincarnated. And what's funny is that when people like us, when we hear about reincarnation, we're kind of thinking as Christians, we're kind of thinking like what's the big deal of keep coming back? We like, you know, we like being here. I mean, I don't know about you but I, you know, I like, you know, but you know why that is because we have joy in the Lord. So we don't just, we don't just live our lives in just complete suffering and just wishing to die all the time. And just, I just wish it would all end and I would just never come back. But these people live such a miserable life without hope, without God in the world, without Christ, that they just think that the best thing that could happen is just to die and never come back, right? Because they have no purpose, they have no meaning. And you know why that is, is because when you're a selfish person, that's how you're going to feel in your life, that you have no purpose, no meaning and you just want to die and never come back. That's why so many of the Hollywood stars and the rock stars, they commit suicide because they're selfish people. And by the way, committing suicide is one of the most selfish things that someone can do. It hurts everyone around them, all the guilt that they leave people with. But the reason why is that when you live your life focused on self, self-absorbed, not loving other people, then you just feel like, oh, there's no meaning anyway, I just want to just leave and never come back. And so he founded this godless religion that teaches that there is no God because according to Buddhism, there's no creator. Although they have various demons that they worship. These ascended masters and Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, sort of like the fat guy that they worship, the laughing Buddha so-called, which is not Siddhartha Gautama. They have all these demons that they worship, but they don't give any glory to the creator. They don't believe in a creator god. That's why atheists love Buddhism. That's why today in America, a lot of agnostics and atheists, they love Buddhism because they can feel spiritual all while rejecting the god of the Bible. And it's a selfish, self-centered, sit on your rear end and meditate and go deep into your own psyche instead of going out and actually doing something that blesses and benefits other people. See, Christianity teaches doing something for others, serving others, living a life to please God and to please others, whereas Buddhism is just a self-centered, navel-gazing, find-myself-out-in-the-woods type of religion. And we see a lot of people in America embracing this philosophy today, of just going out and just being in the woods all the time. Look, we all love camping. We're going camping this week. But I'm not going to live my life out just camping all the time. I want to live my life in the dirty, smoggy, concrete jungle, winning somebody to Christ. And that's why my life has meaning, and Buddha's didn't. Because he's a spoiled brat who's given everything that he wanted, and so yeah, he grows up, ditches his family, ditches his responsibility, ditches his parents, and forms this self-centered, self-absorbed meditation religion known as Buddhism today that never did anything good for anybody. I mean, think about this religion. It thrives in third-world hell holes. It thrives in a communist country. That's where half of Buddhists live. And it thrives amongst drugged-out hippies, and it thrives amongst lazy people, because one of the mottos of Buddhism is this. To cease from activity is the goal of human life. That's one of their mottos. To cease from activity is the goal of human life, to do as little as possible, to just kind of reduce your footprint. You know, I want to leave a giant footprint on this earth, carbon and otherwise. You know, I mean, I've already produced with my wife nine children. We're leaving a carbon footprint. One more child and we'll have a ten-toed, double carbon footprint to slam down on this earth. You know what? I want to do something that benefits other people. I want to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ to other people. I want to do something besides just go out and sit in the woods and end my suffering. Oh, I've got to put it into the suffering. I mean, I know I've been spoiled brat my whole life, but one day I'm going to get old. One day I might get sick. One day my wife's going to get old. See, that's the kind of stupidity that comes from somebody who's given everything they want. So, the moral of the story is this. Don't give your children everything that they want. Don't shield your children from doing anything hard. You know, sometimes, even just something as simple as, you know, if you take your kids on a bicycle ride and sometimes they just start crying, like, ah, that's too hard. You say, hey, finish the bike ride. You take them out hiking and they're crying, they want to be carried. Sometimes you say, you know what, you can walk up that hill, son. You don't just coddle them and just carry them around on a pillow like the Maharaja. You've got to make them do some hard things and do some hard work. You know, you send them out to pull weeds, they come in five minutes later. Ah, I'm tired, it's too hard. No, no, you go out and you pull some weeds. Work! Struggle! Sweat! Let's close where we began. Ecclesiastes 7, verse 2. It's better, verse 2, to go to the house of mourning than to go to the house of feasting. For that is the end of all men, and the living will lay it to his heart. Sorrow is better than laughter, for by the sadness of the countenance the heart is made better. The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning, but the heart of fools is in the house of mirth. It is better to hear the rebuke of the wise than for a man to hear the song of fools. You see, there's a house of mirth Baptist church, celebration church, where everything is sweetness and light and joy. But the wise man knows that he needs to hear some negative preaching, some rebuke, and he needs to understand the suffering of this world and go through trials and tribulations. And his heart is in the house of mourning, the house of fools is in the house of mirth, meaning just partying all the time. And there's a time for partying and having a good time, but there's also a time for suffering and struggle and trial and tribulation. Let's make sure that we endure tribulation ourselves, and that we make sure that our children are not too sheltered and coddled and spoiled, so that we can grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, not become arrogant, self-centered Buddha types. Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer.