You know, I haven't said anything, but I am married. This is my wife, Carolyn. Carolyn, could you stand? And this is my... I always tell her I'd marry her a hundred times over. And I don't know, she seems to get depressed when I say it, but I mean it, you know. It's one of the greatest pains in life is to be disappointed in love. And it's never safe to love. You always run the risk that, If you love anything, it can break your heart. But mine has not been broken, it has been filled for the 52 years that I've known her. What a gift. God knew how much help I needed. Amen, all you men? That was really weak, I'll tell you that much. This church needs a marriage conference. They need help. I want to use 1 Peter 4 and we're going to look at practical words for perilous times. I grew up on prophecy. I mean, even when I was unsaved, I was scared to death about prophecy because my dad was kind of a Oh, prophecy addict. I mean, he was studying Ironside, Clarence Larkin, charts, the beast. As boys knew that, because I was unsaved as long as I could be in that home. And we never wanted to introduce our girlfriend to our dad. You know, here I'm getting ready to go out with this girl hoping for a lip lock. And he starts in at the kitchen, have you heard of the tribulation period? Have you heard of the Antichrist? Did you know we're in the end times? Jesus, the rest of the evening, the poor girl was a wreck. And so my brothers, keep your girlfriend away from your dad. He'll tell her enough about Revelation to scare the daylights out of her. So I grew up on prophecy, something to help me come to Christ. We were having the Suez Canal conflict in the 50s, if you remember that. and this is a generation that would. I was 14, Adlai Stevenson at the UN. We're at the Suez Canal. Russia is gonna fight for Egypt. The United States is on the other side. They're gonna start pushing bombs, and I'm scared to death. All I'm hearing at the house, Armageddon is about to start. The tribulation's gonna... I grew up on prophecy. And then growing up in a war town like Richmond, we had an air raid drill every week when I went to Richmond schools. Getting under your desk, fallout shelters. You know, my family remember the blackouts when you had all the lights out in the shipyard project. All of that. Grew up with that. And so, it's amazing how many people get caught up with prophecy. I know of two men right now. One came to me, needed counseling, about to lose his marriage. Because all he does is study prophecy while his wife works and brings home the check. He starts a blog and keeps up on the latest prophetic event. He can name the toes of the beast. He knows everything. There's another man I know right now has left his wife because he started a prophetic blog and all he's up on is prophecy, prophecy, prophecy. And I say, so what? What should we do if it's all about to end? Let's see what Peter says, okay? Let's see if he has any balance. 1 Peter chapter 4. I'm listening for paper. or do you all have an iPad? Makes me sick. I'm listening for, all right. I just got rid of our rotary phone the last few years. Verse seven, the end of all things is at hand. Therefore build a fallout shelter and start a blog on the name of the Antichrist. No, the end of all things is at hand. What does that mean? From a biblical point of view, from the time Christ went back to heaven, his return has been imminent for 2,000 years. Any moment, nothing has to happen to keep him from coming back to take his church home, nothing. We're not waiting for this sign to be fulfilled. You see, the rapture of the church is a signless event. We need no sign. His coming back to the earth to set up his kingdom has preceding signs. Antichrist, 2 Thessalonians 2, a lot of different things have to be in place. But for him to actually come and catch us away takes the church away, 1 John says, we're living in the last kind of hour. Gets it all the way down to an hour. And so we are living in what would be called eschatological prophetic times for 2,000 years. The next event is he's going to show up again. And no matter what your timetable is, you think we're going through the trip, not going through the trip, there is no trip, it doesn't matter what you think. Prophecy it's imminent any moment and the idea of the word James said Don't be fussing with one another for the judge is at the door and in the Greek It's the next thing that will happen. He's going to step through the door. I mean, it's that close So we're living that way and you must get that framework in your mind. He is coming any moment Be ready Be ready, it can end any moment. And what you find out very quickly, even if you don't think it's happening quick enough, I'll tell you, your end is close. You keep having these birthdays, your end is close. We've just done a series of funerals at the church, different dear men, 73, 39-year-old boy jumps off the Golden Gate Bridge, different things. I mean, these deaths, we don't know when they're going to happen. The end of all things is near. He doesn't tell us when. It's kind of like my grandmother Meek. She lived in LA. She would tell my mother, I'm coming to see you. Good. When? Sometime in October. It was torture for the kids. Us. Because my grandmother had ten children on a dirt floor in the hills of Oklahoma and you could eat off the floors. She was such a clean freak. Guess what? Every day we had to do housework. Mama's coming. Why don't you say she's coming the 15th? We'd only get it cleaned up on the 14th. And he says, I'm coming. You better have your life in order. Well, what do you want me to do? What should we do? Prophetic conference. Do something. We've got to do something radical. You know, it's the year 2000. We had people in our church that already had caves they'd fill with food. They were ready for all the computers to crash. Any of you get ready for 2000? There was this panic. Our most intelligent members were acting crazy. It's going to happen. Now, watch what Peter said. Practical words. See how practical? Watch. Right here. Therefore, be self-controlled and sober-minded. for the sake of your prayers. You almost want to say, come on, good night. Can't you say something a little bit more radical? No? I'm going to just start out and say be, first of all, this word, be self-controlled. It's really sound-minded. And the idea is keep a cool head. Keep a cool head about it. Keep your wits about you. Don't go crazy. Keep thinking clearly and then he goes to another word and be sober minded and it's just as you would think. It was an opposite of an intoxicated mind. Intoxication, you lose discernment, judgment, distance. You can do things as a drunk man that said, I didn't know I hit him. I didn't know I had the accident. I didn't know I laid $1,000 on the table at Reno. I was so drunk, I didn't know how much I was betting. When you're drunk, you can do a lot of stupid things. And wake up, my brother woke up in Placerville. He was a gambler, drinking at Reno. Somebody put it in there. He woke up in the backseat of a car in Placerville with a sign that says don't come back to our table again. He was a winning poker player. You could drink enough. You can make some crazy judgments and do some crazy things. A lot of our girls in our universities are being raped after they've been made drunk because judgment is gone. They don't know what happened. He's saying, keep your mind free from being intoxicated so that you make stupid decisions and stupid judgments in light of the end times. Don't act stupid and keep your head about you. It's not a time to panic or to be living off of ups and downs and emotion. It's a time to be using your head. Think clearly, think clearly. We're in perilous times. That's what he's saying. And then he says, what's an interesting thing, keep your head clear so you can pray. Isn't that interesting? If you don't think clearly, you know, that's the hardest thing about having a prayer life. I gotta be in a right frame of mind to really pray. Do you know how to pray? Jesus taught us how to pray. I give a little template when I teach in our church how Jesus did. These kind of categories. See, praying, I used to think, as a Pentecostal boy, it was loud and long. wonderful, very spontaneous, very emotional. But as the years went on, I found my prayer life, I would hit dry spells and I just didn't feel like praying and sometimes my mind would wonder. And I finally started learning to pray the Psalms, primarily through Eugene Peterson's influence on me. And then as I finally looked at the Lord's Prayer, I finally got it. And all the Lutherans know it because they begin the services with it. Our Father which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done. on earth as it is being done in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors." You quote that and say, that to me, that's what Jesus taught us to pray? So if I just read that every day and quote it, I've prayed the Lord's Prayer. No, no, no, no, no. What he did, he named categories, categories that he wants you to bring to him. Prayer ought to have categories to deal with. Here's the first one, praise. We call it adoration if you were doing acts, kind of navigators, you know, adoring, confess sin, give thanksgiving, suffocate. Jesus said, first of all, praise, adore the Father. Our Father which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Second thing, priorities. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done. If you're not in a frame of mind that the will of God is what you want number one in your life, you're in no frame to pray. And that's a battle every day. Because sometimes the will of God might be for you to drink the cup. Drink the cup. I'm not going to remove this trial. I'm not going to remove this thorn, but I will give you grace. Are you praying the right priority? God's will over my will. That's submission. That's a battleground. Priorities. Thirdly, provision. I need provision for daily sustenance. In biblical times, they didn't eat meat as a whole. It was all grain because they were under the Romans, highly taxed. They didn't get meat. The only way to sustain life was bread. And so he said, give me those things necessary to maintain life. Provision. Fourthly, pardon. One of my greatest struggles is to figure out whether I'm going to choke them or forgive them. So I need to be praying, God, forgive me as I'm willing to forgive them. And I am amazed that us Christians battle with forgiveness, but we sure love to get it, but we don't like to give it. You rascal. You would never go to heaven if God wasn't a forgiving God. When in the world are you going to become a forgiving person? No, I'm a grudge bearer. I can't get over it. You hurt me, I'm never going to let you forget it. Oh, drop dead. When did you start playing God? God can forgive you of everything and you can't forgive them of anything. Wow, you pontifical deity. Like you're in charge. Wouldn't you think if I've been forgiven millions, I could forgive dollars? Jesus gave that parable. One's forgiven huge, in the billions of dollars, they say. And he couldn't forgive a man for a few thousand dollars. Forgive me, Father. And in the Greek, it's as I have already forgiven them. And you got to keep up in prayer on your people account. Who am I ticked with? Who am I mad at? Who am I? And I'm going to tell you, if you just live long enough and work with somebody, there'll be some kind of misunderstanding. It even happens, I understand, in families. I'll look at the Bible. I don't want to see the face. You know, my early marriage, it was amazing. If we went to bed on a spath, our bed immediately had the Berlin Wall in the middle of the bed. I mean, we didn't even want a toad to teach you. Get over. No. Do not even do, no. And then in the early days, she would whimper. She couldn't work it out. Now I look for mines. I look for, you know, arsenic in the tea, you know. Lady asked her one time, told Churchill, if you were my husband, I would put arsenic in your tea. And he said, if I were your husband, I would drink it. So, you know, keeping up marriages, keeping up families, you know, keeping up in a marriage isn't the art of making out. It's the art of making up. It's the art of selling the differences. How do we solve conflict? Then he says we need to pray for divine protection. We have an enemy every day that is determined to destroy you, your testimony, and your family. Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. And according to 1 Peter 5, every day the devil loves lamb chops. And he's looking for someone to devour. And he's looking for you and me. I, it scares me a bit, but it's true. I have an enemy that hates me and he hates God. And he was spared. If it was not for my intercessor and for my divine high priest, I would already been food for the devil. Only Christ's hand around your life has kept you. Without divine protection, none of us have a chance. What an amazing thing. To be in his fold is our only protection. Sheep can't protect themselves. They got to have a shepherd. That's why you've been protected from so much. The shepherd, the shepherd is watching over us. That's our prayer life. And he's saying in Peter, do everything you can to protect your mind in this world so that you can go vertical with God. Don't worry, but pray. Don't bear a grudge, forgive. Don't worry about what you'll eat tomorrow, pray to him to provide. Don't worry about your will, be concerned with his will. All through, teaches to pray. So keep yourself clear-headed so you can pray. And then he goes on, above all, keep loving one another half-heartedly. What does yours say? A what? Fervently? Earnestly? How many have earnestly? Okay. It's earnestly, but what does that mean? Let me give you the word. The word earnestly, it's a little Greek word, ektenes, and it means this, strain at it. Be intense. The Latin translation was be vehement in your love. And I love it. It meant stretch out to full capacity. Stretch yourself to love people. Isn't that amazing? Man, love isn't supposed to be hard. But this is what he said. He said, be earnest in loving, which is stretch yourself. And let me give you some more word pictures. It was used of a horse in full gallop. just going. It was used of an athlete that when they, you know, when you do stretches, and right here in the back muscle, you're stretching. And it was of a guy running across a finish line with the muscles taunt, and he's in full, full stretch. Stretch yourself to love people. Well, shoot, if it's that hard, forget it. Work at loving people earnestly. Why? The end of all things is about to take place. You've only got a little time to love. And I want you to love. I want you to work at loving. Well, you don't know what my home life is about. I don't know what your home life is about. You don't know what's been done. I've been through a divorce. I don't know about that. I've been through this. I've been through that. It's hard for me to love. It's hard for all of us to love. We're self-centered from the womb. We're about us. We're selfish. We're good at lust. We're terrible at love. And I wrote three contrasts between love and lust. Love puts others first. Lust uses others for ourself. Love puts others first. I love you. I'm going to treat you with priority and kindness. Lust, I'm going to use you for whatever that goal is. Two, love with sacrifice. I don't want to hurt you. I want to do something that enriches you. Lust never sacrifices. never. That's what's so terrible about some guy using a girl and she has to bear a baby or have an abortion and he's down the road. Once he finds out she's pregnant, he's out of there. That's called lust, not love. Love is even if she has the baby, even if she has a stroke, even if we get old together, I'm going to be there because I'm not using you for my purpose. I'm devoted to your good. Totally difference between youthful lust and real mature love. Love lasts. Lust is only temporary. It's for the moment. And so he's telling us, love, work at it. Strain yourself to do it. Have you ever had to work hard at loving somebody? My son-in-law, he married my oldest girl, and she had this little brown girl, her firstborn, the girl's head out of wedlock. African-American father and the daughter. Well, her husband is just short, stocky German boy, geesey. I mean, come on, geesey. You got to be German. It's a German family back here. It's just a staunch, her, his dad was Ephraim. You talk about, they are a very strong German family. Well, he's like any dad. He wanted someone to look like him. He inherited this girl. And she went, they got married when she was about five. And she didn't like this white guy. She didn't like her mama get married because I'd been her father. She lived with us. And she said, mama, why do you have to get married and move me from grandpa's house? I don't like this. And boy, she was stubborn, hateful, uh, rejecting of Sean, put him out, just stiff-armed him. He couldn't get in, resented it. Well, time went along, and I never knew until several years later, I noticed my secretary Every once in a while, there'd be a package on her desk. We'd get all kinds of mail at the church. Think nothing of it. She has a bunch of grandchildren. None of my business. You'd better just see it there. Never thought a thing of it. And after about two or three years, I don't know how old she was, Shawn, every month or so, would send an anonymous gift to this girl pushing him out. Love gifts from an anonymous admirer. And the anonymous admirer was a stepdad that was wanting the little girl to call him dad. I call that stretching. I call that stretching. You know, on the human side, I said, you little brat, if you don't appreciate having me, tough, get over it. What does he do? He stretched himself. And today she lives with him. And today she calls him dad. And today she said, he's one of the best things that ever happened to me. Have you ever overcome hate with love? I had a black preacher friend that pastored in Berkeley. And on the streets of Berkeley back in the 40s, a man met him and he said, I hate you, nigger. And old brother Brown, a beloved family friend, he said, I thank God I don't hate you back, because I don't have any hate in my heart. I could love you in Jesus' name. regardless of what you do with it. You remember the famous line of C.S. Lewis, love anything and you risk being hurt, whether it's an animal, whether it's any human relationship. You know, you dream, we're going to have children and they're going to become doctors, scientists, summa cum laude grads. And then you start to cry that they just passed the eye test. You know, you just, and when they graduate, it's Lottie, how come? And you say, I don't like you. I don't want you in my, she says, wait, that's not what we were thinking. That's when we wanted children. You took the risk to have them. I'm going to get married and I'm going to be happy for life. And so I've said it's been the greatest heartbreak of my life. So Lewis said, if you risk loving, you always risk being hurt. But if you refuse to love, your heart will be, as it were, hardened and be put in a coffin, and you'll lose the ability to love. And then he says the famous line, for the only place safe from the risk of love is hell. There will be no love in hell. So to love anything, to love a church, to love a man, to love a woman, to love a child, runs a risk. God ran the risk. He said in Isaiah 1, I had children and they rebelled. Isaiah 1. You mean God's got kids that rebel? Well, he fathered you. Have you rebelled a few times? Still in the family though. head to chasing, head to correct, but he won't give up loving this. So he says to us in these last times, keep your head clear that you may have a vertical prayer life going and the outworking of this full heart is you can earnestly love people, make the effort and all people are not easy to love. We know that. Sometimes we're not easy to love. Well, let's go on, this is too convicting. And then he says, love covers a multitude of sins. Had a pastor friend of mine, a board was about to fire him. They were real picky, a lot of stuff going on. And he told me something that I thought was beautiful. He said, you know what? He said, if that board member that's real critical of me now, if he had a recording of my week, He would pick things apart. He said, if my mother had the same video, she couldn't see anything wrong. Why? My mom loves me deeply. And love can cover a multitude of sin. And look at that very thought. God loves you, but look what all he's had to cover. Did he just break it under the carpet? Oh, no, no, no. He nailed it to Calvary and he made his son become your sin. He dealt with it, but he found a way to cover it. And as a good Hebrew God, he would say, I'll kafir it. I'll atone it. I'll cover it. The word kafir, covering. Because ever since Eden, man has been running naked away from God. And it's not until you come to Jesus, you get clothed and He clothes you in His righteousness. We're running cold, naked, scared until we fall in the arms of Jesus. Then we get clothed. We no longer have to run. And when I blow it, I don't have to be so ashamed I can't come to the Father. He says, I know how to cover it. I've made a way. I've got you covered. I've got you covered. You know, I grew up as a boy that we didn't believe eternal security so we can lose our salvation anytime. You need to live that way a while to just be miserable enough to appreciate being secure. You were always on probation, always on probation. And if you didn't live it right, and we all had this famous story, and we'd always ask, what if I should get drunk on the way from church Sunday night and have a wreck? Will I go to heaven? And we always said, oh no, sin cannot enter there. Okay, end of discussion, I just lost it. But when I finally found out, that Christ did not just pay for my sins up to the moment I believed, but He paid for every sin I'll ever commit. He didn't have to die twice. Once for the ones I committed before I professed Him, and then once for the sins I commit since I... No, He died once and for all for anything I'll ever do wrong. There is nothing that's ever gonna separate me from the love of God in Christ Jesus. Nothing. Nothing. He's got me covered. And he says, if you love, you don't have to keep reminding people of all the faults and all the failures. When I go to God, he doesn't read off a list of all of my faults. And every time I failed him, it doesn't even come up. I bring it up and the devil brings it up, but he doesn't. And my accusers bring it up, but not him. And so God said, why don't you act like me? Why don't you forgive them? Why don't you cover it? Why don't you release it? Calvary will take care of it. If I can forgive it, you ought to be able to. Love is a covering kind of love. Man, if it cannot give and take with all the human frailties that we all bring to our humanity, how can we ever stand anybody? Especially how can you stand to look in the mirror and stand what you know you are at your weakest moment? Wow, only Calvary has me covered. I can't even cover myself. I'm my worst critic. I've never get anything beyond a C minus. Because I'm hard on myself. But God gives me an A in Jesus. I am accepted in the beloved, and you are too. Breathe heavy if you believe this. Anybody believe this? Am I talking to myself? My church, we amen a lot. We're very spiritual. Show hospitality to one another without grumbling. And the hawks haven't grumbled yet, so we're moving out tomorrow to let them heal up. But see, if you didn't have hospitality in the New Testament, you wouldn't have churches. The love of strangers. All churches for the first 200 years, first three years of the church, met in churches. Or rather, in houses. They didn't own property. They didn't pay mortgages. Hey, okay. Just because you don't like the point, don't cut me off. Just cut it out. Is that hospitality, the early missionaries could stay in motels. They were all brothels. The only place they could stay was with other believers and be safe. The early churches. I went to Cuba a few years ago, took a couple of our men and we support a missionary that is a Spaniard that has citizenship in the United States and in Spain. So he gets into Cuba freely. We went over there. He's a part of, they've planted a thousand churches. And I said, I want to see it. We went over there and they won't allow them to build church buildings. So what happens is they, a Cuban comes to the Lord and they start building onto their house. They'll start enclosing maybe their garage port. They keep doing all this because they become house churches and they're all over Cuba. And I mean we met in you talk about some terrible facilities carports very hot Buildings that you wouldn't hardly want as a chicken coop That was their church and you might have 50 or 70 believers packed in there They're all over Cuba. It'd be amazing what the church can do now that we're reestablishing relationships hospitality the love of strangers You know, I'm amazed at how many of us believers own thousands of dollars of real estate that we never used for God. I mean, I seldom eat in a believer's house. Oh, let us take you out to dinner. Well, no, no, no. Is there, does anyone cook at home? I mean, if our microwave goes out, I'm panicked. I'm afraid I might go into malnutrition. You know, have you heard of home cooking? No, no, people are a mess. You know, they kind of dirty up the house. They kind of, I know my grandchildren come over. Cost $100 every time they visit. You know, so you quit having them. And you got the finest houses you've ever had. There's seven of us that grew up in a 600 square foot house. Seven. One bathroom. Two girls. Three brothers. Mom and dad. And then they would keep people in our house. Our seats never cooled off. You get out, they'd fall in. All my mom's brothers and my dad's, they would all ship out to the war out of our house. I mean, and there were Okies. You had to eat if you went to the house. You have to sit down and eat. The food's going all the time. You eat, you don't just come to our house and have a cup of, no, no, we're having beans, cornbread, potatoes, and cobbler pie. I'll still crave it. You gotta eat with us. It's an insult not to be fed in our home. Who does that today? The early church, he said, be given to it. Love strangers, love strangers. As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another as good stewards of God's varied grace. Whoever speaks as one who speaks oracles of God, divine revelation, whoever serves as one who serves by the strength that God supplies, in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to him belong glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. He finally gets to the matter of service. Be serving if you believe it's the last days. Why should I serve, Lord? Number one, I gifted you to serve. I've given to every believer a spiritual, a divine grace ability to edify the body in some way. The clergy don't have the monopoly. God deliver us from clergyism. We are believer priests, every believer. There's nobody in here that God paid any less for than me. He didn't pay more for me. I'm just, I am not the boss. I work for the boss. My father used to always tell me, he said, you preachers act like you own a sheep. And he said, Jesus is the only one that owns any sheep. Right? I don't own you folks. I don't own Valley Bible. I won't get to have a company and after 44 years say, by the way, elders, I'm going to cash out this. We've now got $20 million worth of assets. I started in dance hall. Would you cash me out? I'm going to sell the church, sell the company. No, no, no, no. I'll just walk off someday and said, I did this for the boss. I did this for the owner. I'm not Lord. I'm a servant of the Lord. all my treasures ultimately will be transferred to there. But it gave you a gift and me a gift and it would be some church if everybody was doing their giftedness instead of a few of us keel over with a heart attack because we're trying to make up for everybody's lack of service. You remember Epaphroditus, Philippians 2? He said he'd worked himself to the point of nearly death trying to make up for their lack of service. God has gifted you. And Peter says that since God's gifted you with a grace gift, use it to serve one another and you will be accountable to the stewards of his grace. And that means you dispense what he's given and you're given accountability. Those who have speaking gifts, one kind Serving gifts all gifts served, but he puts them in the speaking gift. You either got a speaking gift evangelist exhorter teacher apostle a prophet tongue-talking the early church prophecy Then you come over you get serving gifts administration organization giving mercy Helps and here we go, but you've been gifted with some kind of ability to edify the body to make a contribution I would hate to think all church life for me was go give my offering and Every once while grown out in a man And in some churches, you don't even have to say a man just find a place where you sleep. I Mean that's church. I want out I I grew up in a small church. There was no more than 60 of us. But man, it was wonderful. I was saved. I was taught to pick up the psalm books after service. My brother taught me how to greet people at the back door. He told me, you never wait for someone to shake your hand. You take the initiative. You say, how are you? He told me how to shake their hand. Don't take just a dead fish. You got to grip. And with him being an iron worker, he always broke a few knuckles. He would tell, you're friendly, you're outgoing, you lock up the windows after church, you do this, you do that. None of this passive, well, I just come to be served. Oh, honey, get over it. Where do you serve in this body? Well, I critique the sermon. No spiritual gift to criticism, honey. What do you contribute? Well, and I've got them at Valley. I've been trying to find my gift. Well, it's been 30 years. Yeah. I said, your gift is passivity. There's no place to, it's the end times, you know. Remember the context. You ought to be loving. You ought to be praying. You ought to be thanking, right? You ought to be forgiving. You ought to be serving because God's gifted you to serve and you'll never be fulfilled until you express it. It may be mercy. It doesn't matter, it doesn't have to be everybody know you, you're not a frontliner, you don't have to be on the platform. We gotta, I mean, I think of this precious sister in our church, Marian. When I met Marian 40 years ago, gray-headed, she's thoroughly gray-headed then. And so when I met her, she had to be in her 50s. Gray-headed, just one of the most beautiful women. She's got a million dollar Jesus smile. She just radiates Jesus. I was with her when she was trying to pray her daughter out of alcohol. I was with her when another daughter was going, but she's never lost the joy. And now 93, some physical infirmities, but she still climbs up the stairs in our building that has no elevator, because she has to be with the unwanted kids and hear them quote their verses. She's gotta be there on Wednesday night. I gotta be with those precious children. Why don't you know, Marion, that God quit choosing you after 70? Why don't you get the clue, honey? You oughta be just sitting around and talking about the old days. She said, I can't, I gotta one on Wednesday night. Boy. Kind of, my sister retires. She said, at 84, or 74, I had to fire her for being my secretary. I never wanted to see secretaries, so I hired my sister, and she was like going through a bodyguard. Single, just lived for the Lord. And then we finally said, honey, you got to retire. You need to rest. 74. And she broke down crying one day. I said, honey, what's wrong? You're 74. You've earned it. Let's go. She said, this is going to affect my giving. I can't give like I used to. I said, Hazel, the church will make it. God knows when you're losing your income. God knows. But she says, I'd love to give to his name. I'd love to serve him. I've done so little for him. If I could just serve him a few more years, six years later, we buried her. What are you doing for Jesus? Let me tell you, just because you're gray-headed, just because you got AIDS, God's not through with you. When he's through with you, you'll know it. You'll be seeing him face to face. In the meantime, quit taking up space. Do something for him. It's the end time. We need you. We need you. We need you, everyone. Contribute whatever you've got to contribute. Be friendly. Be loving. Be hospitable. Be praying. Be clear thinking. Then he goes on. He finally says, serve. Notice this. Whoever serves, serve exhausted and haggard because it's all in your strength. Does God energize the people he wants to serve? What does yours say? And serve by your strength in which you're flat, disgusted, and mad half the time. Why am I having to do this? No, serve in another strength. I used to threaten to put kind of vitamins in our baptistry. so that folks could get a shot of energy to serve God. They could stay in a bar till 2 o'clock at night and get up and go to work by 7 in the morning when they're unsaved and they get to church and they're yawning at 7.30. What's your problem, honey? Go back to the bar after church and see if you can still keep up. Because Satan energizes you when you're unsaved. You can drink all night, party all you want, still go to work. I know I had a brother live with me. I watched him do it. Wore shades when he went to church because he drank too much at night. But boy, he'd get in late, go to work at seven, work two jobs. I saw him. Climb steel and fight fires. Where'd you get that energy? The God of this age was driving me. He drives you hard when he's taking you to hell. And they get saved, and no energy? There is energy! God energizes his people to serve him. It's not our strength, it's his strength. And as Peter said, if you're keeping your head clear, if you're talking to your God, and you're not carrying grudge and resentment and an unforgiving spirit, if you are stretching yourself to love, God will energize you to serve him until he's ready to give you your reward. Serve, pray, Love, think right, it's the end times. It's no time to quit serving, no time to quit loving, no time to quit being hospital, no time to start thinking crazy thoughts. Keep our minds clear that we might do the practical things in perilous times. What a practical word in such a prophetic truth. It's gonna, oh man, What should I do? Let me tell you. There it is. There it is. Are you doing it? How's your prayer life? Do you pray for this pastoral team, this church? Do you pray for fresh revival? Can God do a fresh work in Santa Rosa Bible? Are all of its best days gone? Or is He waiting for a people asking Him for something fresh and new today? Are you serving? Where are the servants in this church? Of course, I don't know. You've got to have some. You wouldn't have gone all these years and had the impact. May God keep it going with people energized by the Spirit. Our Father, please let us keep our minds in these perilous, dangerous, tumultuous, changing times. Keep our hearts right so we're willing to make the effort to love. Let our hearts be the kind that's willing to cover faults and offer the grace of God that is greater than all of our sins. And Father, while we still have breath, while we still have life on this earth, You haven't called us to do any distinct service in heaven. I'm not sure what all we'll be doing. I know we'll be worshiping you. I doubt you'll let me preach in heaven. It will get better there. Surely you'll have the apostles preach. Maybe Jesus will preach. I don't know, but I won't be pastoring anymore in heaven. I won't be doing any more evangelism. I won't be any more offerings. There'll be no more offerings in heaven. I can only do it now. Would you help us to be faithful until we have an eternal rest and we have the eternal reflection and contemplation of the face of Him who has been wounded for us Oh, that will be glory, glory to me, when by His grace I shall look on His face. That will be glory, glory for me. Amen. This message has been brought to you by the Santa Rosa Bible Church. Our purpose is to lift up the Lord by living out the word, loving one another, and leading others to Christ. Be sure to visit us on the web at www.srbible.org or come visit us in person at 4575 Badger Road, Santa Rosa, California 95409. You can also give us a call at 707-538-2385.