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Men, this morning I want to preach on that phrase, the evening and the morning. The title of the sermon is the evening and the morning, that phrase that comes up over and over again in that chapter. The evening and the morning were the first day, the evening and the morning were the second day, the evening and the morning were the third day. Now when we read that chapter, one of the things that probably comes into our minds is that that seems a little backward to us. We would think of the morning coming and then the evening. The day starts with the morning and it ends in the evening. But flip over if you would to Isaiah chapter 55 and we need to understand that everything in the Bible is there that way for a reason. And we often look at things in the Bible and think that they're backwards or they don't really make sense, but it's really just our perception that's backwards. We're the one that's not making sense. And God says here in Isaiah chapter 55 verse 7, let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts and let him return unto the Lord and he will have mercy upon him and to our God for he will abundantly pardon. Verse 8, for my thoughts are not your thoughts. Neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. And we live in a narcissistic day where people think of themselves as God. Whether they will say that or not, that's really what's going on in their minds. They decide what's right and wrong and then they say, well, I don't believe in a God who has a different opinion about that. You know, they only believe in a God that agrees with them on everything. They start with what they believe. They start with what they think is right or wrong. They start with their own conscience and they say, well, that's right and wrong. Now let me find religion or God or a scripture that matches what I think. They've made themselves God. They're a deity in their own mind. The Bible says, no, my thoughts are not your thoughts. Say, well, I'm sure God thinks this way because that's what I would do if I were God. Wrong. Your thoughts are not God's thoughts. Your ways are not God's ways. We need to approach the Bible not looking for the Bible to validate things that we already believed or we already thought. We need to approach the Bible and let God correct us. Let God get us on his program so that we can think about things the way he thinks about them and we can start doing things his way because our own way is not his way and our thoughts are not his thought. So why is it that God says the evening and the morning were the first day? I'll tell you why, because the day starts in the evening because God is right and everybody else is wrong. Okay? See, God was right in Genesis chapter one, the first chapter of the Bible when he lays down this principle where he says, first you have the evening and then you have the morning. It doesn't matter what any calendar says. It doesn't matter what any clock will tell you and I'm not against calendars and clocks that we use. We have a pretty good system in the United States of America with our times and measurements. Let's stay with those miles, amen? Forget the kilometers. But anyway, the point is though that God is right here. Now what is the significance of the day starting with the evening? Well this teaches us some powerful truths that I'm going to expound to you this morning about the evening first and the morning second, right? The evening and the morning were the first day. First of all, we need to understand that the day starts with the evening. Secondly, we need to realize that how your day goes today has to do with how you ended the day yesterday. How your evening goes is going to determine how your morning goes and if we look at it this way, maybe we'll spend our evenings a little bit differently if we realize that your evening is a setup for your morning. The evening prepares for the morning. How do you go about having a great morning? By having a great evening. You go to bed early. Think about how many times you've had something important to do in the morning. You've had some tasks that you were going to perform. What do you do? You lay out your clothes the day before, right? You get your clothes ready. You get everything ready to go. You prepare everything. You make your lunch. You do all that stuff and it's all ready to roll and then you wake up in the morning and suddenly you find yourself having a good day. Why? You're well slept. You went to bed on time. Your clothes are laid out. You get up and you're very thankful to the you of yesterday for making everything so nice for the you of today, right? And then you start out the day on the right foot, but you don't start out the day on the right foot in the morning. You really started out in the evening when you prepared all that. You made the plans. I mean, why did we have a great day soul winning yesterday? Because of the preparation that was done in the evening that prepared for the morning. I had my clothes laid out. I had everything ready to roll. You know, that's why I was able to execute and, and, and so were you. And so the evening and the morning were the first day. We start with an evening that determines how good our morning is going to be. Amen. Now let me give you some scriptures on this. Go if you would to Psalm 63, Psalm 63. There's a concept in the Bible of seeking the Lord early, you know, rising up early and praising the Lord and seeking the Lord. The manna, if you remember, had to be gathered in the morning before the sun was hot. See, if you just weren't a morning person back in the days of the Exodus, when they're wandering the wilderness for 40 years and you want to hit the snooze button and sleep in till late in the morning, you weren't going to eat because if you went out to gather the manna after the sun was hot, it was all gone. You had to get up early and go out and gather the manna. What did the manna represent? The Bible says it represented the word of God. It said man does not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeded out of the mouth of God. If you go back to the source of that quote, Deuteronomy chapter 8 verse 3, it says that he fed thee with manna that thou mightest know that man does not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeded out of the mouth of God that man lived. So we see there that the manna represented God's word. We need to seek the Lord early, the Bible says. While you're turning there, I'll give you Proverbs 8, 17. Wisdom says, I love them that love me and those that seek me early shall find me. Isaiah 26, 9, with my soul have I desired thee in the night, yea, with my spirit within me will I seek thee early for when thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness. Look down at Psalm 63 verse 1, oh God, thou art my God. Early will I seek thee. My soul thirsteth for thee, my flesh longeth for thee in a dry and thirsty land where no water is. And you say, Pastor Anderson, how do I wake up early? How do I get up early? What's the secret? What's going to do it? It's real simple. You go to bed early. You say, oh, how can anybody get up at five in the morning? How could anybody get up at four in the morning? How could he? Look, it doesn't matter what time you get up. You can do it and it can be painless if you went to bed on time, if you went to bed early. And look, I'm not one of these people that's telling you, you know, do on as little sleep as you can, you know, just sleep three, four hours a night. I think that God gives his beloved sleep and I don't think there's anything wrong with getting a good night's sleep. I think it's healthy to get a good night's sleep. You can often be more productive and, and, and, and think better and perform better on a good night's sleep. I personally sleep about seven and a half to eight hours every night. You know, people think, oh man, Pastor Anderson's crazy workaholic, doesn't that. But you know what? I sleep eight hours a night. I'm not, you know, there are times obviously when I'll have to stay up all night or sleep a short night, but in general I sleep a full night. Now there are other people who can get by on five, six hours sleep, no problem. And they feel good, they're healthy, five or six hours is enough for them. And that's great. And I'm not against that. Everybody's different. But me personally, I need, you know, seven and a half, eight hours of sleep. Now there have been times in my life when I didn't get it, when I was busy and, and, and, you know, burning the candle to both ends. But in general, I think that early to bed, early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise. You know, I think that that is actually a pretty true maxim in general. And so if you want to have time to get up early and read your Bible, if you want to be able to seek the Lord in the morning, if you want to spend time praying or, or singing hymns or, you know, walking with God or doing other things that you need to do of just exercising or just work that needs to be done, being productive at your job, you know, you got to go to bed early if you want to get up early. You can't stay up partying until 11, 12, 1 in the morning. And then you wonder why it's so hard to get up in the morning. You wonder why you're groggy. You wonder why you're rushing to work. You're late to work. You don't have what you need. You don't have lunch. You don't have this and that. You know, haste makes waste. You got to plan the night before to have a good day. And even if you don't go to work as a man, what about the wives and mothers? You know what? They need to plan in the evening too. My wife is often in the evening getting breakfast ready. She cooks breakfast the night before a lot of time. She has it all whipped up and ready to roll. And then in the morning, she just has to put it in the oven. You know, in the morning, she just has to finish it off and, and she has as much chopped and prepared the night before. Get your clothes ready the day before. Get everything ready to roll the day before. You can start out a great day in the morning because you did it in the evening. So think of it as the evening and the morning are the first day. So it turns out God was pretty smart when he put it that way, wasn't it? Now, not only that, but how about this? The year starts with the end of the previous year, when we think about going into the new year, New Year's Day. And of course, that's what we're thinking about right now because Tuesday is the first day of the year. But some people, what do they do on the last day of the year? Basically the stupidest possible things that they could do. Oh man, I'm going to have a great year next year. Things are going to be great next year. I'm going to do all these resolutions and I'm going to fix this. I'm going to improve on this, but let me just be the biggest idiot I can on the last day of 2018. And then they expect to have a good day on January 1st, 2019. It's not going to happen, okay? It's not going to happen. If you want to have a great year, you need to end this year well. You should already today be in that mode of doing the right things and fixing things and have an attitude that says I'm going to finish strong, I'm going to build the right habits in December, I'm going to end the year right so that next year can be better. We're in the evening of the year right now, right? This is the evening and the morning comes on Tuesday. Well, what you're doing in this evening is going to determine how you do in that morning. Say, oh man, January 1st, I'm going to start reading my Bible cover to cover. You know what? Are you prepared? Because you're not going to do that unless you have the chart already ready. I mean, it's December 30th. Do you have your Bible reading chart prepared that says what you're going to read on January 1st, what you're going to read on January 2nd, what you're going to read on the 3rd? You know, you can read through the Bible in a year. Brother Sigur and I were just talking about this. I always get up and say from the pulpit, hey, if you read it for 15 minutes a day, you'll get through it in a year. Okay? I get up and say that and that's for an average reader. That's not some kind of speed reading. I don't speed read. I don't believe in speed reading. And I've said that over and over. You know, he was actually calculating it this week. We were talking about it. And really, if you go by the way Alexander Scorby reads it, the speed that he's reading it, we came up with like 12 minutes a day. Okay? Now I say 15 because I don't want to exaggerate or I understand that sometimes you might get distracted or maybe you're a little slower of a reader. But look, in 15 to 20 minutes a day, you can read through the Bible cover to cover in a year. That's not unrealistic because he was telling me it takes Alexander Scorby 72 hours. Do the math. It's like 12 minutes a day. So it's possible to read through the Bible in a year. Yet I would venture to guess that 99% of saved children of God have never read the Bible cover to cover even one time. I know that's true. Just talk to them. See how they know the Bible and you realize that 99% of Christians, I'm talking about Christians that are actually saved, who actually believe the Gospel, who have the Holy Spirit living inside of them. I would venture to guess that maybe one in a hundred has read the whole book cover to cover. If you're out there and you're saying, Pastor, I've never read the whole Bible cover to cover. Well, guess what? You've got company. So don't beat yourself up about it. But you know what? If January 1st, 2020, you still haven't read it cover to cover, then shame on you because you're lazy and because you don't care. Because you're being told right now the answer, you're being handed on a silver platter the answer to why you don't know scripture, the answer to why you don't know the Bible. And I'm trying to help you today and tell you that in literally 15 to 20 minutes a day, and that's giving you a lot of grace because it might even be 12 minutes a day, you can read through the whole Bible in 2019. And you can end 2019 saying, you know what? I've at least read the Bible cover to cover one time. I'm the 1% at that point, literally. Look, I was saved all through my childhood and teenage years. I didn't finish the Bible cover to cover until I was 17 years old. I know people who've been saved and in church and loved the Lord for 20, 30, 40 years never read the Bible cover to cover. But went to church and participated and served God and followed his commandments in many ways, but yet hadn't read it cover to cover. I'm telling you, it's an epidemic today of people not reading the Bible cover to cover. And then you wonder why you get up and preach sermons and people freak out and can't even understand how can you preach these negative things because they've never read Jeremiah. They've never read Leviticus Numbers Deuteronomy. They don't even know what the Bible is even like. Look, the first time I read the Bible cover to cover, I was shocked. Again and again and again, I was shocked by the things that I read. I was like, why did church never teach me this? Why has Sunday school never covered this story? We keep hearing the same stories over and over again. There's so much in there that isn't even being touched. And look, I try to preach the whole Bible and I'm going through chapter by chapter on Wednesday nights, the whole Bible. And so far, we're 13 years in and it's going to take 23 and a half years to preach verse by verse through every chapter in the Bible. But let me tell you something, look, there's stuff that I haven't touched yet because it's just 31,000 some verses. You got to read the Bible yourself. You got to read it cover to cover. And it starts now. It starts today. It doesn't start Tuesday. It really should have started a week ago. You need to get on that program. You say, what do I do? You download a chart. It's not hard to go online and just type, read through the Bible in a year. There are all kinds of charts and schedules. Print that out or make it, you know, the way I do it is actually a spreadsheet. I don't use a physical chart. I have multiple spreadsheets and I have the dates and what I'm going to read and how I'm going to, you know, and I have it all planned out. I've got 2019 planned out for my Bible reading and Bible study. Look, that stuff starts now. You say, well, what do I read now? You know, jump onto the chart and read the end of Revelation. That's not going to hurt you, right? Jump in and read Revelation and read Malachi and then be ready to roll into it on January 1st, Genesis and Matthew and go from there, right? But you might as well, why not? Is it going to hurt you to read Revelation and Malachi over the, and at least start getting warmed up for it? But what do most people do on New Year's Eve? Pretty much the dumbest thing they could possibly do, get drunk. Isn't that what people are doing today? They say that the most dangerous time to be driving is going to be from 6 p.m. on Monday to 6 a.m. on Tuesday is going to be the most dangerous time on the road. Why is that? Because of everybody just starting out their new year, right? By getting drunk, puking their guts out, kissing a stranger at midnight, or whatever other stupid thing that's become a tradition in this country, to just ruin your night and then wake up the next morning. You're tired, you're hungover, you're depressed, and then it's like, all right, here we go. And then you wonder why you don't meet your goals. Wonder why you have a bad day. Look, I know this isn't going to be popular. I'm not staying up till midnight on New Year's Eve. Now look, if you want to stay up till midnight on New Year's Eve, go ahead. I'm not against you. I'm not against that. We've done it before. I've done it before. But you know what? I'm going to go to bed. I want to go to bed on time. Because I want to wake up and start off my new year seeking the Lord early. You know what I mean? And I know that I just lost every kid and every teenager. They all hate me now. But, you know, oh, it's so cool to stay up late. Well, you know what? I think it's pretty cool to get up early and actually do something with my life. I think it's pretty cool to get up and go to work. I think it's pretty cool to actually accomplish something. I think it's pretty cool to work hard and excel at my job and excel in Bible reading than to just go out and drink and party. And look, there's a place for having fun. There's a place for good times. There's a place for fellowship. But you know what? It doesn't need to involve alcohol. OK? It doesn't. And you know what? It can also take place even in the daytime or in the evening or the morning. You know, there are a lot of bad things that take place at night. And I guarantee you that most fornication is happening at night. Most drinking is happening at night. The Bible says, they that sleep sleep in the night, and they that be drunken are drunken in the night. That's what the Bible says in 1 Thessalonians chapter 5. But let us who are of the day be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love and for an helmet to hope of salvation. Let's cast off the works of darkness, and let's put on the armor of light. You think teenagers being out in the middle of the night bodes well? Be home by 1 AM. Be home by 2 AM. You think that that's a godly thing that's going on out there at 10, 11, 12, 1, 2, 3? That's the works of darkness, my friend. OK? And anybody who knows me knows that I am not a stuffed shirt. I am not a stick in the mud. I am not one of these Presbyterian types or Puritan types where no fun allowed, no laughter, only seriousness. Look, I like to have fun. I like to eat good food. I like to play games and have a good time and get out and do stuff. But you know what? There's sinful stuff that's going to go on on New Year's Eve, and you need to abstain from that stuff if you want to please God. Don't drink that. Well, you know, I don't normally drink, but since it's New Year's Eve, I'll have some beer. Since it's New Year's Eve, I'll drink the champagne. Since it's New Year's Eve, I mean, come on. It's just once a year. Yeah, but you know what? It's kind of a significant time of year. Ah, it doesn't matter, because next year is going to, no, no, no. How you end the year is going to determine how the next year goes. How you end your day will determine how good your day is tomorrow, the evening and the morning where the first day ought to be our philosophy. Start right in the evening so you can have a good morning. But not only that, flip over to Revelation chapter 22. Not only that, but how you live your life now, and specifically how you end your life now, is going to determine how your next life is. Think about that. I'm not talking about reincarnation, folks. You only get one shot at this. But when you die, that's the evening, right? The end of your life is in the evening of your life. Those of you who are older, sorry, you're in the evening of life, okay? And how you end your life, and by the way, this could be my evening. You know, I could die tomorrow, right? We never know when we're going to die. Let's say this is my evening. Well, you know what? That's going to determine how my morning is. And when I say morning, I'm talking about the next world, the next life. I'm talking about living forever in heaven with the Lord on the new earth. I'm talking about going into eternity. How you are going to be living for eternity is determined by how you end this life. So this evening prepares for that morning. Look what the Bible says in Revelation 22, 12. Behold, I come quickly and my reward is with me to give every man according as his work shall be. What does Jesus Christ say he's going to do? He's going to give you according as your work shall be. When you get to heaven, when Christ sets up his kingdom on this earth, the millennial reign of Christ, when we get to the new heaven and the new earth, hey, that is a payday for the work that you're doing now. That is a morning that's going to be determined on what you do in the evening of life. His reward is with him and he's going to give everybody the same because he loves everybody the same. He rewards everybody the same. I mean, going to heaven's going to heaven and there's no difference and we're all equal and it's, you know, Karl Marx will be proud. Is that what the Bible says? No, the Bible says he's going to give every man according as his work shall be. That means that if my work is different than your work, he's going to give me different than what he gives you. He's not going to give us all the same. He's going to give every man according as his work shall be. And of course, this is not a new concept in Revelation chapter 22, which hopefully you'll be reading this Monday. But it says in Isaiah chapter 40 verse 10, it says, behold, the Lord God will come with strong hand and his arm shall rule for him. Behold, his reward is with him and his work before him. So Isaiah 40 verse 10 says the Lord God's coming and it says his reward is with him. Another great proof for the deity of Christ, of course, because obviously when we're talking about the Lord God there and even the God is in all caps, capital G, capital O, capital D. Look, that's talking about Jesus. Because of course, Jesus Christ is deity. Jesus Christ is the Lord God, amen. And so it says his reward is with him. Isaiah 62, 11 says, behold, the Lord had proclaimed unto the end of the world, say ye to the daughter of Zion, behold, thy salvation cometh. Behold, his reward is with him and his work before him. So not only is Jesus the Lord God, Jesus is also our salvation. Because he said our salvation is coming. That's talking about Jesus is coming. But the key thing in these verses in Isaiah and in the verse in Revelation is that his reward is with him. And he's going to give us based on our works. The Bible says in Matthew 16, 27, in case you're still not convinced, for the son of man shall come in the glory of his father with his angels and then he shall reward every man according to his works. He will reward every man according to his works. There are all kinds of parables about this, right? Where the guy comes home and says, okay, you've done well, thou good and faithful servant, be thou over 10 cities, be thou over five cities, be thou over two cities, good job, well done. Here's the reward based on what you have done with what I gave you, how good of a steward you are with what the Lord gave you. Go to 1 Corinthians chapter 15. 1 Corinthians 15, what's the title of the sermon? The Evening and the Morning. What have we learned so far? Number one, the day starts with the evening. Doesn't matter what a calendar says, doesn't matter what the clock says. God said the evening and the morning are the first day He started with an evening. When he started out this world and he began time, he started out with an evening and then he had a morning and he said, that's the first day right there. Evening and the morning, that's the second day. So what do we derive from the fact that the day starts in the evening is that we should get a mentality where we start our day in the evening, where tonight in the evening, I'm already saying, okay, we're onto the next thing, we're onto the next day. Let's start planning, let's start preparing, let's go into this day right. The evening and the morning were the first day. And then we're gonna extrapolate that out to the year. How about the year? How about we start thinking about next year now and preparing for next year now and start the mentality that it's already starting? Because the end of this one determines how the next one's gonna go. Why don't we start the Bible reading now? Why don't we start eating and drinking right now? Why don't we start taking care of our jobs and the things that we need to do now? And why don't we not take the last day of the year and make it all about being as big of an idiot as we can possibly be by getting drunk, staying up too late, going out and doing something stupid, kissing a stranger, all these other dumb things that people do, right? Not gonna do it. You say, do you like New Year's Eve? Do you like, I love it. I love, I thank God for the fact that he gave us a new day every morning. What if the day just never ended and we never went to sleep? That'd be stressful. It's great when you're having a bad day that it ends and you can start over, right? You can push a reset button and start up. And I think it's great when we punctuate the years. I love this time of year because I love to look back over last year and say, okay, here's what I did. And I was, a couple days ago, I got out my list of goals that I made at the beginning of the year and I had a bunch of things on that list that I accomplished and I was able to check it off. Did it, did it, did it, did it, did it. And then I had a bunch of things that I failed at. Didn't do it, didn't do it, didn't get it done, didn't get it done. And then I looked at that and I evaluated that and then I made a realistic goal list going into the year of, okay, well, here's what I wanna change, here's what I wanna fix. I wanna continue this, this worked, this didn't work. And, you know, revamp everything for the church, revamp things in my personal life. You know, we need to push the reset button in our lives and that's why God gave us the sun, moon and stars for days and for months and for years, the Bible tells us, to be signs in the heaven to help us punctuate our life. So it's not just a man-made construct that we have punctuated life into days, weeks, months, years. Those things come from the Bible. And not only do they come from the Bible, they come from the natural world. The moon goes through a cycle to tell us, hey, this is a month. The sun goes through a cycle to tell us, this is what a year is. And we can punctuate our life based on days, months, years and so forth. So we apply that same principle to the day, to the year and then we apply it to our life. This life and how we end it, determines how we go into the next world, how we go into eternity with the Lord because he's gonna reward us based on how our work shall be. Look at 1 Corinthians 15, I'll illustrate that further. It says in verse 39, all flesh is not the same flesh, but there's one kind of flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, another of fishes and another of birds. There are also celestial bodies. Celestial is just a fancy word for heavenly. Celestial bodies. What are the celestial bodies? The celestial bodies are the sun, the moon and the stars. And then he says, there are also terrestrial bodies. Right, do you see that? There are also celestial bodies and bodies terrestrial. Terrestrial just means earthly. But the glory of the celestial is one and the glory of the terrestrial is another. Now, what does terrestrial mean? It means earthly, okay? And you say, well, what does glory mean? When we think of glory, we often only think of the metaphorical meaning of glory. Like somebody doing something for the glory of it means like they're looking for acclamation or boasting or just some kind of a glorious thing. But we're not thinking of a literal glory. The Bible, when you use the word glory, it often uses it as a literal shining or brightness. Okay, now obviously there's a metaphorical meaning of glory of, hey, he really shines the light of the gospel or that's a great shining example of this or that or that church really shines the light. But then there's also a literal shining like the sun shines, the moon shines. I'm not talking about moonshine, okay? But the moon shines and the stars shine, right? Now, what does that mean? That means that that is their glory. So the glory of the sun is not a metaphorical glory. It's a literal glory saying the sun is bright, it shines. Everybody understand that? Now let me ask this, is the glory of the sun the same as the glory of the moon? Huge difference. Did you know that no matter how bright the moon is, you can stare right into it, it will never hurt your eyes. You can take binoculars and stare right into it, won't hurt your eyes. You can look into it with a telescope, not gonna hurt your eyes because the glory of the moon is so much lower than the glory of the sun. Because sometimes the moon can seem really bright on a really dark night or your eyes are not adjusted for it. And you're kind of like, whoa, the moon's really bright. Are you looking at the binoculars? Is this hurting my eyes? So I looked into it and it doesn't hurt your eyes because it's so much less than the sun. Now, if you look directly into the sun, that can damage your eyes because the glory of the sun is just way more than the glory of the moon. And then the stars, they have their glory, but not only that, the stars differ one from another in glory. So you have some stars that are brighter than others. But then you, not only do you have bodies celestial, but you have bodies terrestrial. We have the planets. The planets are not stars. Earth is a planet. There are other planets in the sky. Mercury and Venus and Mars and Jupiter and Saturn and Uranus and Neptune. And then of course, you know, nobody knows anymore, I guess, whether Pluto's a planet. Is it a planet this week? Yeah, because when I grew up, it was nine planets. You still believe it's a planet? All right, amen. I don't know. I don't know if it's a planet or not. They're saying it's not, but I guess that's hotly debated. I don't know. The point is though that the planets, they don't look the same as the stars. They have a different glory. If you look up at the sky at night, it's very easy to tell the difference between a star and a planet, okay? This is how you can tell the difference. The stars, they're constantly changing color, and this is that twinkle that you see. And stars twinkle, and you'll see like all different colors. For a split second, they look red. For a split second, they look blue. For a split second, they look green. They're just like... Who knows what I'm talking about? They twinkle, and they're going from color to color to color to color to color, right? Whereas when you look at the planets, they are a solid light. They don't twinkle. It's just a light. Now, when you look at Mars, you'll see that it's kind of orangish, and it's a solid light. So when you look up in the sky, it's pretty easy to identify Mars because it's a solid, bright light. It's close to the Earth relative to some of the other planets, and it's not twinkling, and it has a little orangish hue to it, and you look at that and say, okay, that's Mars, right? The three planets that you can typically see in the evening or at night when you go out at that time, you can typically see Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn, okay? And obviously, Jupiter is huge, but it's a little further away. Saturn is huge, but it's much further away. So Saturn is much smaller, and you'll see Mars and Jupiter as being more distinct, bright planets in the night sky. They're not twinkling. They have a different glory than the celestial bodies, and they differ one from another in glory. Mars doesn't look like Jupiter, doesn't look like Saturn, and those are pretty much the three planets you're gonna be looking at, because anything beyond Saturn, you're not gonna see with your naked eye, typically, and the planets Venus and Mercury, you're not typically gonna see them at night because they're too close to the sun. Mercury you'll almost never see. Venus you'll sometimes see in the morning. You ever driving in the morning and there's just this one bright light in the sky? Who knows what I'm talking about? That's typically Venus. So Venus has sometimes been nicknamed the Morning Star because it's that one bright planet that you see in the morning, but it's not a star. It's a planet, and it's Venus, okay? So these different bodies, celestial stars, bodies, terrestrial planets, they differ one from another in glory. You know, if we were out in space and looking at the Earth, the Earth would be shining. Right? It wouldn't just be dark. It would be shining. It would have its own glory or brightness of Earth. So that's what this scripture is talking about, these different variances in the glory of bodies terrestrial and body celestial. Now let's apply that. Now that we understand that, let's move forward here. It says, there is one glory of the sun, verse 41, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars, for one star differth from another star in glory. So also is the resurrection of the dead. Do you see that? The resurrection of the dead is like that. It's like what? It's like the fact that stars, the sun, the moon, the terrestrial bodies, they differ one from another in glory. That's the way the resurrection is, according to the Bible. It is sown in corruption. It is raised in incorruption. It is sown in dishonor. It is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness. It is raised in power. It is sown a natural body. It is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body. Now go to Daniel chapter 12. Daniel chapter number 12 in the Old Testament, toward the very end of the Old Testament, Daniel chapter number 12. Jesus said that his reward is with him, and that he will give every man according as his work shall be. He will reward us according to our works. And then he said, look, in the resurrection, just as the sun, moon, stars, and terrestrial bodies, and celestial bodies, they differ one from another in glory, or how bright they are, or what that brightness is like, so it also is in the resurrection. Not everybody's gonna have the same glory. Not everybody's gonna shine with the same brightness, he's saying. And look at Daniel, Daniel chapter 12, verse two. And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt, and they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament, and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars forever and ever. So the Bible says that if we are wise, and if we turn many to righteousness, we will shine as the brightness of the firmament, we will shine as the stars forever and ever. So let me ask you this. What if we don't turn many to righteousness? And what if we're not wise? Are we gonna shine the same as the guy who was wise and did turn many to brightness, or unto righteousness? The answer's no. Isn't that obvious from this scripture? So in the resurrection, everyone's not equal. Everyone's not the same. Everyone doesn't get a participation trophy. Everyone doesn't get the same reward. No, there are gonna be people that are greatly rewarded, and then there are gonna be people who suffer loss of rewards. Now look, when it comes to getting to heaven, it's just about faith. It's not about works. The Bible says, by grace are you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast, for we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, that God hath before ordained that we should walk in them. So we are saved by faith, not of works. But God has works that he commands us to do, and if we do them, we will be rewarded. And the reward is based on the work that we do. First Corinthians three is a great chapter on this, where he says, look, your works are either gonna be gold, silver, and precious stones, or they're gonna be wood, hay, and stubble. And if your work is burned up, the Bible says, you will suffer loss, but you yourself will be saved, the Bible says. I mean, it flat out says, look, if your works are burned up, all your works are wood, hay, stubble, you'll suffer loss, and it says, but he himself shall be saved, yet so is by fire. So it's possible to be saved without having any works that you're rewarded for on Judgment Day. It's possible to get into heaven on faith alone, by grace alone, through God alone, or to God alone, be the glory, and to get there and not get any rewards. There are gonna be people who get to heaven and don't get any rewards. Other people are gonna get rewarded greatly. Do you think that the apostle Paul and the thief on the cross are gonna be the same level in the resurrection? You think they're gonna have the same glory? You think that they're gonna get the same reward? You think that they're gonna have the same type of lifestyle or work or responsibility going forward in the millennial reign of Christ? You know, the 12 disciples are gonna sit on 12 thrones judging the 12 tribes of Israel. What's the context of that? Peter asked them, hey, Lord, we've forsaken all and followed you, what shall we then have? And he said, look, you've forsaken all, you've followed me, here's what you're gonna have, you're gonna sit on 12 thrones judging the 12 tribes of Israel. That's a pretty cool reward. How'd they get it? By forsaking everything and following it? It wasn't just given to them as a participation trophy, they earned it. Now, do we earn our salvation? No. Do we earn the ticket to heaven? No, it's totally by grace, it's totally of God, we don't earn it, we don't deserve it, we can't boast about it, it's all him, it's not us, but what about the rewards? That is something that we earn. We work and earn rewards. And so rewards are distinct from going to heaven. Two different things, big difference. So all that to say this, what we do in our life is preparation for eternity. So you say, well, I'm saved, I'm going to heaven no matter what, so I'm just gonna go out and do whatever. Okay, go out and do whatever, but see how happy you are when you wake up in the morning, in heaven, with Christ, and all your rewards are burned up, you don't get anything. I mean, think about it, that's like my kids saying, you know what, I'm gonna be dad's son no matter what I do, so I'm gonna go out and break all the rules because I'm gonna be his son no matter what. Well, are they gonna be happy though when they wake up the next morning and they don't get to go on the fun trips, they don't get the rewards, right? They don't get to enjoy, they're put on this duty and that duty and made to work and miss out on this, miss out on that, and eat bread and water or something? While everybody else is having a corn dog, you know, organic homemade corn dogs, amen? And yes, they exist. I've eaten them many times. You know, there's nothing in the Bible that says I have to give my kid a corn dog or that we have to give them a slice of cake or that, you know what, maybe when everybody else is having pancakes and syrup, you know, they might be eating dry oatmeal if they wanna disrespect their parents or disobey the rules. You understand what I'm saying? So look, you can be a child of God and you can still be in the doghouse and you can still be in trouble. You can still lose out on blessings and that's what I'm talking about. So how you live your life now is the evening and how you live for eternity is the morning and it's the evening first, morning second. But not only should we worry about how we live our lives because of the fact that it's gonna determine how we live our morning up in heaven or on this earth in the millennium, but also how we live our lives determines how the next generation is gonna live their lives. So our evening, when we get old and when we pass the torch to the next generation is gonna determine how good their morning is. Let's go, if we would, to Isaiah chapter number 39. And while you're turning there, the Bible says in 1 Chronicles 22, five, and David said, Solomon, my son is young and tender and the house that is to be builded for the Lord must be exceeding, magnifical of fame and of glory throughout all countries. I will therefore now make preparation for it. And watch this last phrase. So David prepared abundantly before his death. Why did David prepare abundantly for his death? Because he wanted the next generation to do well. His evening was gonna lead into their morning and he wanted to prepare for them. Just like in the evening, I'm gonna lay out my clothes and get everything ready for the next day so that I can roll out of bed and be effective, have everything ready, have my Bible ready, have my chart ready, have my work ready, have everything ready to roll. You know, David said, you know, I wanna prepare for someone else's morning. My evening is your morning as he was an old man. Die, and so he prepared abundantly before his death. Now the opposite of David is Hezekiah. Hezekiah was the guy who didn't give a rip about the next generation. Look down at your Bible in Isaiah chapter 39, verse one. And at that time, Merodach, the son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent letters and a present to Hezekiah. For he had heard that he had been sick and was recovered and Hezekiah was glad of them and showed them the house of his precious things, the silver and the gold and the spices and the precious ointment and all the house of his armor and all that was found in his treasures. There was nothing in his house nor in all his dominion that Hezekiah showed them not. Then came Isaiah the prophet unto king Hezekiah and said unto him, what said these men? And from whence came they unto thee? And Hezekiah said, they are come from a far country unto me, even from Babylon. Then said he, what have they seen in thy house? And Hezekiah answered, all that is in mine house have they seen. There's nothing among my treasures that I've not showed them. Then said Isaiah to Hezekiah, hear the word of the Lord of hosts. Behold, the days come that all that is in thine house and that which thy fathers have laid up in store until this day shall be carried to Babylon. Nothing shall be left, saith the Lord, and of thy sons that shall issue from thee which thou shalt beget, shall they take away and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon. Then said Hezekiah to Isaiah, good is the word of the Lord which thou has spoken. He said, moreover, there shall be peace and truth in my days. Look at that attitude. Oh, my son and my grandson are gonna get their manhood chopped off? Good, long as it doesn't happen while I'm alive. Who cares if my sons are eunuchs? Does everybody know what a eunuch is? Who knows what a eunuch is? Is that what you want for your son? Is that what you want for your grandson? You want him to be a eunuch? You want him to be a slave? You want him to be disfigured and mutilated in that way? No, you don't. And he says here, oh, well that's good because there's gonna be peace and truth in my days. Everything that's been gathered up by all your fathers, starting with who? David and his son Solomon, right? And his son Rehoboam and his son Abijah. You know, all the way down the line, all that stuff that everybody has handed down to you, this that you've inherited, that's been passed down for hundreds of years, it's all gonna be gone. And Hezekiah's just like, well, long as it's after I'm gone, who cares? You know, that's the attitude of a lot of people today. It's the attitude of a lot of pastors, a lot of churches. God forbid that I would ever have that attitude when I become old, and I am not yet old, I'm still young, I'm in my prime. But look, I'm talking about these pastors that are 60, 70, 80, and many of them, they do not care that they are flushing the next generation down the toilet. They don't even care. I mean, they look out across their auditorium, and what do they see? It's all gray heads. How many independent Baptist churches have I been in? Everybody's gray-haired, it's all gray heads, the church is dying, the church is not growing, the church is not reaching people, it's not doing anything, they've backed down on their stance, they don't care about the fact that when they die, the church is gonna die with them. Because they're all gonna get old, and they're all gonna die, and what's the next generation gonna be left with? You know that one little token family that's in the church that's not 70 years old? What are they gonna be left with? Nothing. The church is gonna fail, the church is gonna die because everybody's old and dying, and they're not preparing for the next generation. And so, look, the same old story happens over and over again. Pastor gets old, he dies, everybody's old, everybody dies, and what you're left with is a giant building worth a million dollars, you got 12 old people left in the church, they're all dying, and then they basically liquidate the church and take that million dollars and put it in some bank account, some trust fund somewhere. Look, I could tell you story after story after, we could go all over the city and find giant high steeple few people churches that have 10 old people in them, and a million dollar building. And they're just running it into the ground. That's what they're doing, they're just running it into the ground. They're not growing, they're not reaching people, there's no youth, there's no children, there's no babies being born. What do they think's gonna happen? And you'd say, are they doing any introspection and soul searching and saying, why is this church dying? They don't care. Because they're like, well, when it dies, I'll be dead. So what? As long as they're paid unto the bitter end, that's all they care about. So they would love to take that money, put it in that trust fund, they don't mind selling the building, putting that million dollars in the trust fund so they can get paid every week, until they die. They just wanna get paid unto the bitter end, that's all they care about. And you know what, from a spiritual perspective, there are many pastors today, they're not fighting against the Sodomites, why? Because they don't care. They don't care. Look, America's not Sodom and Gomorrah yet. Have you read the Sodom and Gomorrah story? We're not there yet. San Francisco's getting there, but we're not there yet, okay? So, because we're not there yet, because we're not to that point where it's just completely everywhere in our face, and it is getting there, that's the trend. They just sit back and think, you know what, I'm not gonna fight this battle, because you know what, I'm comfortable, my family's comfortable, the church is paying me, everything's cool, I'm just gonna keep my mouth shut, because I wanna have peace and truth in my days, I just wanna go to the grave in peace, all I wanna make sure I do is not rock the boat of my pension, I don't wanna rock the boat of my retirement, I don't wanna rock the boat with the man, I don't wanna get in trouble with the law, I don't wanna, you know, they don't wanna fight. They don't care that their grandson's a eunuch, or a metaphorical eunuch, queer little sissy or whatever. They don't care, because they're just like, well, as long as there's peace and truth in my days, hey, they need to understand the evening and the morning. They are creating a horrible morning because of their lame evening. Because of refusing to preach hard on sin, they're ruining the next morning, they're ruining the next generation. Because of their refusal to win people to Christ and bring in new blood, they're just basically just sealing and signing the death warrant on the church. Because if there's no new blood, the church will die. If we're not reaching people every year, the church is gonna get smaller, period. We have to bring in new blood. And then those of us that are in the church, we have to actually procreate, right? We have to have kids and reproduce. Why? Because if we don't, it dies, okay? We're gonna be the end of our family line unless we get married and have kids. And unless we go soul winning and bring people in and reach people with the gospel and preach from the housetops, the church will die. I mean, if we just stopped reaching people right now, this church would still be a big church, you know, for the next 30, 40 years until we all start dying. And then we'd all start dying and then it would die. And so we need to prepare for the future. We need to sow the seeds in the evening that we wanna reap in the morning. For ourselves, yes, but also for the next generation, for other people as well. And let me just close on this thought, one last thought that we can learn from this concept of the evening and the morning, is that if you're going through a dark place right now in your life, let me just explain to you that it will pass. Because the Bible says, weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning. Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning. So what else can we learn from this idea of the evening and the morning where the first day is that the suffering comes first, the joy comes after? Suffer first, joy later. The darkness comes before the light. God didn't create something that was light and then it got dark. God created something that was dark, right? And then it became light. He started out with an earth that was without form and void and darkness was upon the face of the deep and God said, let there be light and there was light. So he started with the evening and he ended with the morning. So, if you're going through a dark place right now in your life, understand the fact that it will come to an end. Every night ends, think about this. Every night, no matter how dark it is, always ends. Has there ever been a morning where the sun just didn't come up? And I'm not talking to you in Alaska tonight or you know, northern Canada or northern Norway or something like that. You know, if you live in Arizona, the sun comes up every single morning. Now, look, if the sun did not come up one morning, I would be alarmed and you oughta be alarmed. But you notice the sun always comes up every single morning without fail. Well, this is also teaching us something about our lives is that when we're going through a dark place, there's always hope. There's always hope. Weeping may endure for the night but joy cometh in the morning. But we have this attitude sometimes when our life is going bad to just think, well, it's always gonna be like this. I'm never gonna get out of this rut that I'm in or I'm never gonna get out of these problems I'm going through or you know, relationship problems, money problems, health problems. And you know, every time I get sick, I just feel like I'm gonna feel this way for the rest of my life. I mean, I'm never gonna be well again. Who's ever felt that way when you're sick? I will never be normal. You know, I got sick nine days ago. I don't think I'm ever gonna recover. But sure enough, you always do, don't you? Hopefully, right? Now, that's not as reliable as the sun coming up in the morning. But you understand what I'm saying. Weeping may endure for the night but joy cometh in the morning. First, we go through the suffering. Then, we experience the joy. Don't try to take all your joy now like the prodigal son. No, no, no, go through the suffering now so you can enjoy later. Make sacrifices in the evening that you're gonna thank yourself for in the morning. Because if you party in the evening, you're gonna regret it in the morning. You get drunk in the evening, you're gonna regret it in the morning. You go out and do stupid things in the evening, you're gonna regret it in the morning. But you know what? If you read your Bible in the evening, you're gonna be thankful in the morning, right? You lay out your clothes the night before, you're gonna be thankful in the morning. You pack your bag, you pack your lunch at night, you're gonna be thankful the next morning, right? So, do the work first. Don't put off till tomorrow what you can do today. Jesus, for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross. And so we have to endure the dark places of our life, the tribulations, the trials, the low points, so that we can get to that morning when it's all okay. And you know what? Maybe your marriage is in a dark place right now. Maybe right now your marriage is in the darkest hour and you're in a midnight of your marriage and you're in a dark place. But you know what? Morning's coming. So how about this? How you go through that dark place is gonna determine what your morning's like. You say, oh, I'm in a really dark place right now. Okay, well, if you're in a dark place right now and you decide to go drown your sorrows in a bottle, well, guess what? You just screwed up your morning. Oh, man, I'm going through a really dark place right now. Well, you know what? If you quit serving God, you quit the church, you quit soul winning, you just screwed up your morning. Morning is coming. All you have to do is what? What do you have to do to make the sun come up? You just wait. That's all you gotta do, right? I mean, you don't have to be like, oh, God, please make the sun rise, please. All you have to do is just Google. What time is the sun gonna come up? It will come up at that time that Google tells you. If Google says sunrise is gonna be at 556 a.m., it'll be there. You don't have to beg God for it to happen. It's gonna be there. It's coming. The morning is coming. You say, I don't know, I'm just in a dark place. I don't think it's ever gonna be right again. Just wait. It will come. But what you do now in the dark place is gonna determine what that morning is like because you know, the sun coming up doesn't guarantee that you're gonna like it because you know what? If you go out and get drunk, then the sun coming up is like, ugh, right? So the point is, let's say you're in a dark place right now. I'm not gonna ask for a raise of hands, but I promise you there are people in this auditorium that are doing great right now. They're happy right now. Everything's going great. They're joyful. They came to church in a good mood. They're looking forward to the new year. They're looking forward to today. They're looking forward to tomorrow. Whoo! That's how I feel right now, by the way. Just to be honest, be perfectly honest. But you know, I guarantee that there are other people today under the sound of my voice that right now you're like, pastor, that's me. I'm in that dark place right now. I'm in a dark place in my marriage. I'm in a dark place in my walk with God. I'm in a dark place physically. I'm in a dark place financially. I mean, I feel like it's midnight. I'm hanging on by my fingernails. I'm hanging on by the skin of my teeth. I mean, I just feel horrible. I'm depressed. I'm sad. I'm upset. Let me just tell you right now, look, morning will come. Weeping may endure for the night, but joy cometh in the morning. But how you spend the midnight, how you spend the evening and the night and the pre-dawn hours is gonna determine how your days, because you know what, if you stay up all night, you're gonna be tired the next day. You need to decide right now, you know, I'm in a dark place, but you know what I'm gonna do during this dark time? I'm gonna wait. I'm gonna hang in there, and I'm not gonna do anything stupid. You know what? And when I, you say, but I can't sleep. Hey, when I used to be in bed and I couldn't sleep, you know what my mom used to tell me? And I don't know if this is true or not, but this is what she told me, and I still believe it and live by it. But here's what she told me. She said, you know what, Steven? She said, even if you don't sleep, if you just lay in bed with your eyes closed, you're doing something good for your body. And you know how kids are. They're not necessarily satisfied with that. So I said to my mom, I said, well, what exactly do you mean by that? I said to my mom, I said, I want you to give me a formula. How many hours of laying there with my eyes closed, not sleeping, how much sleep is that equivalent to? I wanna know the ratio of the formula. And my mom told me, she said, for every hour that you lay there, that's like 15 minutes of sleep. She just made that up, okay? It wasn't based on anything. She said, so if you lay there, even if you laid there the whole night, it's like you slept for a couple of hours, because it's like four to one. And so I would be like, okay, all right. So I would lay there and tell myself, hey, at least I'm laying here. At least I'm getting something, some kind of rest and recovery. And I don't have trouble sleeping anymore because I actually started working. And that's another sermon about how to sleep at night. I've preached on that before. But the point is, the point is, you know what? You say I can't sleep, then lay there. But don't get up and start watching crap on the internet. Are you listening? Don't get up and go to the bar. Don't get up and go to the casino. Don't get up and do these wicked things. And obviously I'm speaking in parables, I'm speaking in metaphors. I'm saying to you that if you're in a spiritual night, if you're in a spiritual darkness, don't say, oh, I'm gonna quit the church. I'm gonna quit reading my Bible. I'm gonna go back into a life of sin. No, wait, hang in there. Morning's coming, just hang in there. I don't feel like going to church. Just drag yourself to church. And just sit there like this and just listen. Just be here, amen? I don't feel like going to so many. Just get out there and be a silent partner and just try not to screw up anybody else's day. You know what I mean? Just try not to embarrass yourself or your silent partner or put him in a bad mood. I just don't feel like reading my Bible. You know what, then just read a little bit. I can't read the whole 15, 20 minutes or whatever hour that I was gonna read. Then just read it for five minutes and just bite down and clench your fist and say, I'm gonna get through this. I'm gonna get through it. Hang in there. But don't quit. Don't throw in the towel. Don't give up. Keep trying, right? Because morning is coming. The evening and the morning is the first day. You know why God said the evening and the morning is the first day? He's trying to show us. You start with the darkness and then you end on the light. You end on the light. You start with the darkness. This is why, so basically, God was right. The day really does consist of the evening and then the morning. And if we start looking at it that way and we look at our days that way and our years that way and our lives that way, we're gonna be enriched spiritually by actually getting on God's way of thinking and living our life in preparation for the next stage. Let's borrow this word of prayer. Father, we thank you so much for this great chapter, Genesis chapter one, Lord. I pray that we would apply this principle to our lives. I pray that those that are in a dark place would see it through and see the light at the end of the tunnel. I pray that we would all, Lord, end this year strong. Let's end our day strong. Let's end our day strong today, Lord, so we can have a great Monday. And Lord, help us to end our year strong so that 2019 can be the best year of our lives from a standpoint of serving you and pleasing you. And in Jesus' name, we pray, amen.