Tonight we're going to be in the book of Proverbs. I've been preaching out of the book of Proverbs here lately. If you haven't noticed, I've been reading a lot in Proverbs and studying a lot in it. I tell you what, it is a good wisdom book and it is able to help you to grow in wisdom. As we look here in the book of Proverbs, I want to take a look at Proverbs 25. And now we're gonna take a look at verse five, Proverbs 25 and verse five. I've entitled this message, The Power of Influence. The Power of Influence. Proverbs chapter 25, verse five. I'll read the verse here in a minute. We live in a world where we are influenced by things all around us. We woke up this morning, we were, I'm sure, probably influenced by some things. You know, sometimes, I mean, we're influenced by music, most definitely. We're influenced by what comes across the television, you know, the things that we listen to in our life, people that we listen to, people that we hang around, all different kinds of things. You know, the radio, you know, we go to school, we're influenced by You know, our classmates are influenced by people out on the job and all these different types of things. We're just influenced by things every single day. And as we face these influences, what we have to do is decide on whether or not we're going to allow a particular person or particular thing to have that impact on us that maybe perhaps it is seeking to do. So we live in a world of influence. Now I'll be honest, I never really looked up the word, because influence is really two words, it's in and influence. I'll be honest, I never really looked up the word fluence, I never did. So I actually did that whenever I was studying, as I looked up the word fluence, it actually meant this, it meant but it meant a mysterious, magical, or hypnotic power. And so, you put the words together, of course, it's a compound word, so you got in, you got fluent. So, fluent means a mysterical, magical, or hypnotic power, and then you have influence, and so the influence is something that has scores that is in them, and they are fluencing you with it. Does that make sense? It is in them, they are fluencing you with it, so they become an influence to you, and what they seek is to get what's in them in you. Does that make sense? To get what's in them in you, and so that is an influence. How many of you know, today, we have what they call influencers. That is what we have out on social media and all these different types of things and influencers. And these folks, they call them influencers because they have a following. They have a platform where they have a lot of people that follow them, listen to them, talk to them. And so because these people have these folks that they influence so much in their life, you know, a large crowd of people that they influence into people's lives. Companies like to use these influencers to hire them, to pay them, you know, to say, well, I'll tell you what, we'll get this influencer right here to, we'll pay them X and X amount of money to endorse our brand or whatever, whatever it is that that could be. Politicians do the same thing. They have folks that they'll come out and they'll say, well, you know what, these folks do this, this influencer does that. This influencer influences people to move in this direction. So we'll call them up, we'll pay them to use our name on their platform. And, you know, and so they can influence people to perhaps buy something from us, to vote for us. Influencer are used to Companies use them to influence people to go on certain vacations and stay in certain places and all the different kind of stuff. And so every single day, there is a lot of influence that's going on out in the world. And every single day, there's a lot of people that are called influencers and some on large scale degrees, and then some on smaller scale degrees. But listen, no matter what, we're all going to be an influence. Whether you have a crowd, whether you've got a following of 100 people, or it's just you, yourself and I, no matter what it is, you're gonna have an influence. on somebody, on somebody around you. It could just be your husband, it could be your wife, it could be your kids, whatever, you're gonna have an impact. You're gonna have some type of influence, good or bad, positive or negative, there's gonna be some type of influence there. Here in Proverbs chapter 25 and verse five, one of the things that we're gonna see is, is we're gonna see actually what influence has on a nation. And whenever we think about, when we think about this text, of course we can apply it of course, to a nation. We can apply it to our life. We can apply it to every area of our life, you know, and even personal lives and our churches and school job, whatever it could be. But we are an influence. And so we ask ourselves, what kind of influence am I? Am I being a positive influence on the people around me? Am I being a negative influence on the people that are around me? What type of influence am I on everybody else's life? And so let's take a look at the text here tonight, Proverbs chapter 25. here in verse five, and let's take a look at some things. I know in my life, one of the things I wanna do is if, you know, because we all make an implant, we all make an influence on something or somebody, and if I'm gonna make an impact, or if I'm gonna make an influence, I want it to be for something good. I want it to be for something righteous. I want it to be for something that's right, something that's holy, you know, something that's for God. And so let's take a look at our text here tonight. Let's take a look at it. Notice the Bible says, take away the wicked, watch this now, take away the wicked, from before the king and his throne shall be established in righteousness. Let's read it one more time. Take away the wicked from the king, and his throne shall be established in righteousness. What I want us to see here as we begin this text, I'm just gonna give you three things here tonight. What I want you to see here in this text is there's several things that's happening, and as I said, we're talking about the influence, and as it's in this text, we're talking about the influence that the wicked actually has on the nation, and what kind of impact that it has, what kind of influence that it has. that it has on the people, and also because of the influence it has on the people, how the society actually ends up living because of this impact, because of this influence. Now let's take a look at it, let's read it one more time, I'll give you the first truth. The Bible says, take away the wicked from before the king and his throne shall be established in righteousness. The very first truth I want you to see here is, we see the intervention. Notice there, one of the very first two words In this verse the Bible says take away Take away now we think about the words when we think about take away What comes to my mind is as I think of an intervention, we're gonna take away something that's bad because listen the Bible showing us list you take away that which is bad and you take away that which is bad that is seducing or influencing the people for wickedness you take that out of the way and and the end result, especially for positions of power, you take that influence out of the way, you take that seductiveness out of the way, and you have a place of righteousness. Does that make sense? So listen, we can apply that to our nation as well. You move out wickedness, and you can live in righteousness, you know? And so we take a look at this text, and he says, take away the wicked from before the king and his throne shall be established in righteous. So the first thing that we see that God shows us that needs to take place is that there must be an intervention. There must be a moment where somebody says, you know what, we're going to, things are not going well. And so we're going to intervene in this situation. The wicked are ruining, the nation, they're wicked, are moving people, directing people, seducing people into sin. That's what God used Jehu for. Whenever God called Jehu to be the king of Israel, God used him to be a powerful influence on the nation to rid the land of all the wickedness that was taking place and all the wickedness that was going on. especially the people that were in positions of power, because those positions of power, just like Ahab, and just like Jezebel, and that whole crowd right there, they had these positions of power, and they were able to seduce the masses into leading them further away from God. to leading them into idolatry. And so God says, listen, what you want to do with the problem is, he says, the problem is, is that the wicked are surrounding the king, the wicked are surrounding the throne. And he says, if you'll take away the wicked from around the throne, if you'll take away the wicked from around the king, then you'll be able to establish a righteousness in your land. And listen, not just in the nation, but we gotta do that in our homes, we gotta do that in our personal lives. Listen, we gotta do that in every aspect of our life. And so here in the text, the Bible shows us that you take away the wicked from before the king and his throne shall be established. Listen, it's often, what we see is these people, they gather themselves, the wicked, they in essence gathered themselves around a person with a lot of power. Notice he says, take away the wicked from before the king. Why did the wicked desire to be around the king? Because their desire is to, they have wicked ways, they have wicked thoughts, wicked things they wanna do. And so the wicked desire to be in control. They wanna be in power. And there is a power struggle between good and evil today in every aspect. You can see it all over the place. And so there is this power struggle between that which is good and that which is evil. And we see that their desire is to gain a position of power so they can influence those that are in power to do that which they want to do. Because listen, the one that has the king's ear is the one that can control the country. Does that make sense? If you can gain the king's ear and you can make the king, you can influence the king, with your thoughts, what you desire, wicked, wicked or evil, either way, but if you can influence the king, especially we're talking about the wicked here tonight, but if you can influence the wicked, if the wicked can influence the king, if the wicked can gain positions of power and influence the king's ear, then the land will dwell. and wickedness. And so there is this power struggle. We even see it today, I believe, in our own nation. I believe it's obvious that we are in a power struggle today between good and evil. I believe it's obvious we can see how wickedness and evilness is doing everything it can to gain positions of power so that they can gain the ear of the king. Now, I know that we don't have a king today, we have a president, I get that. But listen, but you understand I'm talking about positions of authority, positions of power, but listen, it's just not just in the nation though. Here we're talking about a nation, but listen, so goes the home, so goes the nation as we keep saying. Listen, the devil do everything he can to gain influence, to gain power to your husband or to your wife or try to get to your kids to influence your kids and vice versa, all these different things. that evil seeks to do. And the Bible shows us here that if you take away the wicked from before the king and his throne, then his throne shall be established in righteousness. And as I said, whoever is able to influence the king's heart, in essence has the ability to rule the kingdom. And as we talked about Jezebel, Ahab, all these guys and girls, they were the same way. And so what I see here is a warning for a nation that if they desire to live fruitfully, if they desire to live in the bountiful blessings of God, then one of the things they have to do is remove the wickedness from the positions that they hold around the king. Because the wicked want to influence the king for, of course, their own wicked purpose. The Bible says in Proverbs chapter 13 and verse 20, you say, why is it so important? Why is it so important? Well, Proverbs 13 verse 20 says this, he that walketh with wise men shall be wise. And I would dare say, listen, I think you yourself can, I think would honestly admit that if you walk with wise people in your life, what's it gonna do? As the Bible says, iron sharpens iron, does it not? And so if you walk with wise men, the Bible says, then you shall be wise. The wiseness will run off, the iron's gonna sharpen the iron. And so the people that you generally tend to hang around with, Linda, if they're good people that wanna serve God and live for God, more than likely, they're gonna help lead you closer to the Lord. They're gonna sharpen you in your Christian life. But the flip side of this very same verse is that it says this, and we quote it all the time. Proverbs 13, 20, he that walketh with wise men shall be wise, but a companion of fools shall be what? Destroyed and the Bible says here they're in chapter 25 of verse chapter 25 verse 5 Take away the wicked from before the king because we're the wicked want to do they want to be Companions to the king and if the wicked can be companions to the king then they can lead everything into destruction which is of course incited and energized by the devil himself and inside energized by the devil himself. And as I know, I've said it before, but we are, we, we, we are living in half and the world's been living for a long time under a satanic influence, under a blanket of darkness, a little God, the little God of this world, the devil himself is doing everything he can to satanically influence everything that is out here in our society. And the Bible says here that, listen, what we wanna do is keep the wicked away from the king, keep the wicked away from powerful positions, keep the wicked's ears away because if they have this impact on the king, the Bible says, just like it says here in Proverbs 13, 20, a companion of fools shall be distorted if the wicked are able to influence the king to make foolish, foolish decisions, then what's gonna happen is he's gonna lead everybody in a foolish direction. And so what we want to do is we want to understand the power of our influence tonight. And if I'm an influence, what kind of influence am I? Am I being a good influence? Am I being a bad influence? Is there anything in my life that's a bad influence or a good influence? I mean, when I do a self-check and I do a self-examination of myself and my life and my home and everything else I'm involved in, what is it that is good? What is it that is bad? What is it that I need to work on? I mean, we all got some stuff. And so what is it tonight? influence am I having? Am I impacting and influencing people to come closer to God? Or is there something in my life that's saying, you know what, that can maybe lead people away or even be a summon block? Not in front of them, we don't wanna do that. And so the intervention is the key and that's where the words take away is. Take away the wicked and intervention where somebody comes in and they say, you know what? We're not gonna keep going in this direction or this isn't right. We're gonna have to do something about this. And the Bible says, take away the wicked from before the king and his throne shall be established. And not only this, but we also see in Proverbs 14, 34, listen to this. The Bible says, righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people. Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people. Now, and so here in verse five, you take away the wicked from before the king, and then what do you have? Notice the Bible says, and his throne shall be established in what? Righteousness, righteousness, righteousness exalts the nation, lifts it up, builds it up and encourage it, gives it strength, gives it power, gives it stability, gives it a good foundation. But sin is a reproach to any people. Sin destroys and sin leads away and sin causes chaos and sin does all these things. And that's exactly what the devil desires to do, is to put people in powerful positions that'll get the king's ear so they can influence them to move them away from where they need to be with God. Because listen, the last thing the devil wants to happen is for a nation to exalt God and be blessed by God. The last thing the devil wants is for your home, for you to exalt God in your home, and your home be blessed by God. That's the last thing the devil wants to do, wants to see happen. So we as a people have to understand the power of the influences of things that come into our life, but not only that, the power of influence that we have Own others righteousness exalts a nation but since we're opposed to any people I'll read this last one Psalm 33 12 The Bible says blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord and the people who we may have chosen. I for his own inheritance. So getting wickedness out of the way, getting wickedness out of our lives, getting wickedness out of our communities, getting wickedness out of powerful positions that are influencing people to be led astray. Understand, when we think about that word, when we think about that word, fluence, it had the idea of a mysterious, magical, or hypnotic power. that comes from within. All right, let's take a look at the next thing. We're gonna go to the second truth, which is the installation. The installation, notice the Bible says, take away the wicked from before the king and his throne shall be established. Not only do we see the intervention when God says you need to take away, but we also see the installation because listen, when you take away something, you want to make sure you fill it back with something. Listen, anytime you take something away, it's gonna create a void. So if you don't put something there, the devil do everything he can. Uh, and listen, and this is a good thing too for those of you that are trying to break habits, different things like that. You say, well, I'm trying to cut this out. I'm trying to, you know, stop this or stop doing that. That's good. But understand this, if you take something out of your life, replace it with something good, because if not, what's going to happen is the devil is going to do everything he can to fill up with something bad. Does that make sense? Years ago, and I told you years ago, I was a smoker a long time ago, back in my, back in my early, early 20s. I stopped 20 some years ago, praise God. But back in my early, early 20s, and I was a smoker. You know what I meant? I threw, I smoked, man, I was smoking two packs a day. And I was trying to quit, trying to quit, trying to quit. I was throwing them out the window, throwing them out. I don't know how much money I threw out the window. And man, I was throwing them out and I did everything I could try. That was the worst stuff that I ever had in my entire life. I wouldn't recommend anybody have anything to do with it. And so but it was very, very difficult for me to lay down, but I finally got the victory over it. But one of the things I did was was I said, you know what, if I'm going to get this out of my life, I'm going to have to do something to help get me back on track. And so I started going to the gym and lifting weights. And that was what And so exercising and trying to take better care of myself was what actually filled that void of getting rid of the cigarettes. I know that's just illustration, but I'm trying to get you to see is that when something is removed, something needs to take its place. And if you don't put something there, the devil's got plenty of stuff to fill in the gap. He's got plenty of stuff to put in there. So make sure you fill it with something that's gonna be good. Make sure you fill it with something that's gonna be holy and righteous. And so the Bible shows us here, we take away the wicked from before the king and his throne shall be established. So you get the wicked out of the way, we get the wicked out of our life, and then once that is done, we can establish something that is great. We can establish something that is good. You know, it's kind of like a computer. Whatever you install in your life is what you're going to get. Does that make sense? Whatever you install in there, that word established has the idea of an installation, to literally install something. And so, like I said, just like a computer, when you install something on it because you want to get the program. Listen, whatever it is that you install in your life, whatever it is that you install in your mind, install in your heart, whatever that could be, that's exactly what you're gonna get. It's kind of the divine law of reaping and so on. You put it in, that's what you get out. Amen? You put it in, that's what you get out. And so the Bible shows us here that you take away the wicked from before the king and his throne shall be established. And so we get the wicked stuff out of our life. We get the wicked stuff out of our home. And listen, that's for the church, that's for the community, that's for the nation. Listen, that's for all of it in every aspect of life. You get wickedness out of the way and righteousness can reign and God can bless. And so we can see. Here are the installation. You know, it was said one time by a man a long time ago, and it's argued, I think, people argue over who said it, but I'll just quote it. You've heard it before, that the only thing necessary for evil to triumph, only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing. And so that's exactly what we see coming from take away. There is an intervention that says, you know what? We're not going to keep going down a path of evil. We're not going to keep going down a path of wickedness. And so we're going to do something about it, and we're going to lead our nation in a different direction. We're going to lead our lives in a different direction. So there must be an installation. An installation of what? An installation of righteousness. You get the wicked away. Verse five, take away the wicked where the wicked want to be. They want to be around the king. They want to be around the position of power. They want to get the king's ear. But once that's done, the Bible says his throne. Now his throne is a picture of the kingdom itself. And his throne shall be established. So we consider the installation. We think about wicked men over the years and the empires. been around, we think about, you know, guys like, I guess we go back to World War II and you come up with guys like Stalin, you come up with guys like Hitler and these popular guys that we know about in World War II and the atrocities and the wickedness and the evil that they committed amongst the people. And we see that because they were in these positions of power, the wickedness that they was able to exact upon mankind. Whenever we think about the wicked in power today, Proverbs 29 verse 2 comes to mind. The Bible says when the righteous are in authority, listen to this, when the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice, but when the wicked beareth rule, the people mourn. Think about that. In Proverbs 29 verse two, when the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice, but when the wicked bear through, the people mourn. And so that goes, the wicked wants to have power, wants to have control. The wicked wants the king's ear because they want to be an influence to the king to lead the nation away from God. Same thing happening in America today. The same thing happening, and really, if you break it down to it, just in smaller factions, in homes all across America, and in churches across America, and in communities all across America. No matter where you go, the evil influences in every aspect. and trying to creep in into every place. And so when wickedness gains control, it seeks to turn people away from God, turn people away from God's blessings. And the Bible shows us right here in Proverbs 29, two, that when the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice because God is blessing. Blessed is a nation whose God is the Lord. God is blessing and the people are rejoicing. However, when the wicked beareth rule, the people mourn. And so when wickedness is in control and wickedness is in power, there is chaos and there is ruin, there is destruction, and there is mourning and there is sorrow. And that's exactly, of course, what the devil seeks to exact on my life personally, your life, your family, this church, this nation, this community that we live in. The devil do everything he can to get into a place to where he can exact his wickedness in our life to produce ruin and mourning and sorrow. And so we as a people have to say, you know what? I'm not gonna allow this to take place in my life. Listen, when the devil tries to come into your life, what do you do? You say, I don't think so. We're gonna have an intervention today. Devil, you're not coming into my home today. You're not coming into my life today. Oh, you're trying to bring this in. No, I'm kicking that right back out. You're not bringing that in here. And no, I'm not gonna allow this to happen. We have to intervene in our own lives at times. Amen? Every single day. You know, you ever had a... Now, they used to have a TV show. I don't know if it comes on anymore, but they had this TV show a long time ago. It was called Intervention. And it was about people who were... It was about families who had someone in their family that was an alcoholic or drug addict or something, whatever. They were bound by something, and so the family would get together, and they would say, all right, we're gonna have an intervention for this person that we love. What was the whole purpose of the intervention? To get them to go in a better direction. To get them to stop living this way of ruin and mourning and sorrow, but to have an intervention to get them to go in a better direction, to live a better life, you know? Because why? Because they loved them, and they wanted to see them succeed. Because listen, the whole time, the devil's got his claws on them, evil's got his claws on them, trying to bring them down and trying to keep them in this place of ruin. and the Bible tells us in the text here in 29 Proverbs 29 2 when the righteous are in authority the people rejoice when the wicked beareth rule the people mourn and so the installation of wickedness in our lives and in our homes and in our nation is definitely going to cause mourning and it's going to cause a suffering people a suffering people we're going to suffer personally our families will suffer in our our nation everything will suffer and And Romans 14 verse 7, the Bible tells us that no man lives to himself and no man dies to himself. And listen, we can all think, and I've said it before, when I just live my life and I just do my own thing, I just live my own wicked way, I'm not gonna hurt nobody else, I'm not gonna bother. No, you don't live, nobody lives to themself. The Bible says no man lives to himself and no man dies to himself. You have an influence. You have an impact. It's not about you. The Bible says one sinner destroyeth much good. You have an impact. Whether it's gonna be for righteousness or whether it's gonna be for wickedness. Some sort of way, your life and your decisions are gonna have some sort of impact. and what kind of impact is that gonna be? Is my influence gonna be a godly influence that'll help to exalt a nation and build it up and lift it up or exalt my family, lift up my family? Is it gonna be something that God can use to exalt me and lift me up? Or is it gonna be something the devil's gonna use, something wicked and evil that'll destroy and cause suffering and cause hurt and pain? None of us live to himself, no man dies to himself, Romans 14, seven. And the third truth is this. The Bible says, it says here in the text, take away the wicked from before the king and his throne shall be established. We desire to have a righteousness in throne. We desire to have holiness in throne. But the first thing that has to happen is we gotta get the evil out of the way and then we can build and then we can establish a throne, a kingdom. The Bible says, take away the wicked from before the king and his throne shall be established in righteousness. You notice there in verse five, the idea isn't to get rid of the king, it's to get rid of the wickedness that's around the king. Does that make sense? The idea isn't to get rid of the king, it's to get rid of the wickedness around the king because the king's the one that's sitting in that seat of power. And the wickedness that's around the king is the one that's getting the king's ear. And so the idea is to get the wicked away from the king and establish a place of righteousness. So take the wicked away from the king and his throne shall be established. We look at the last thing and that's gonna be this and that's gonna be the inheritance. So if we take away the wicked from before the king and his throne shall be established in what the Bible says in righteousness. Now if we remove the wicked away from our personal lives and we remove the wicked away from our homes, whatever it is, could be sin, you know, sinful things, whatever it could be. We get these things out of our life and we get these things out of our home. You know what inheritance that you're leaving behind for your kids? You're teaching them how to live right. That's an inheritance to them. You say, well preacher, I ain't got much to give. Let me tell you what, if you can teach a kid to live a godly life and teach him to fear God, that's what he's gonna need. That's what he's gonna need. I know there's lots of other things, I get it. I can tell you this, the Bible says the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. If you teach a kid to fear God, you may not be able to give him all the bells and whistles, you may not be able to give him everything, maybe that they want, and even maybe that you want him to have, but if you can teach him to fear God, and be a godly person, then you've given them far more than this world's ever gonna give them. The world may give him money, and the world may give him homes, and the world may give him cars, and the world may give him a big bank account, and the world may give him fame, and all that kind of stuff, but it can't give him heaven. And what shall a prophet man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul? You teach a man to fear God, because fearing God is the beginning. You teach a man to fear God, and God will take that man that fears him and do something mighty through him, mighty through him. The Bible shows us right here what's gonna happen when you get the wicked out of the way, there is going to be a throne, there's gonna be a kingdom that is in essence established, and it's gonna be established in righteousness. So we get the sin out of the way, and we start over, we get the devil out of the way, we get all this wicked stuff out of our life, and we start over and we establish a throne inside of us, Jesus sitting on the throne, we establish this in our life, and we'll leave behind an inheritance of righteousness. An inheritance of righteousness, as I said, is one of the best things, if not the best, you can leave behind for your kids. You teach them what God said about the certain things of the world, what God believes about this, what the Bible says about this, and how God feels about that. And you teach them these things. You show them the Word of God. You give them the Word of God. You take them to church. You pray with them. And you show them what it's like to serve. You show them what it's like to give. And you show them what it's like to be by somebody's side. And you show them what it's like to recite scripture and memorize verses. And you show them what it's like not just to talk about the Word of God, but to live the Word of God. I mean, you show them these things, and it'll help them, and it'll be a blessing to them. You leave that inheritance to them, an inheritance of righteousness in their life. And so, as I said, there's a divine law of reaping and sowing, and so we can either sow righteousness in them, or we can sow evilness in them. But we understand, as we've talked about before, that evil pursues sinners. You live an evil, wicked life, and the results of that living will one day catch up to you. When we think of our kids and we think of our churches and our nation today and everything that's going on, what are we leaving them for in inheritance? Let me ask you this. And this is something we've really got to think about, not just gospel, but I mean every church. Every Bible-believing Christian across the world at some point needs to have this self-reflection and think about this. What kind of influence am I having on people's lives today? What kind of influence am I making on those that are close by, making on those across the world, making on the folks down the street? What kind of influence am I having in people's lives? There's a whole world of people out here. Tons of people that are dying and going to hell every single day. I'm talking just like this, and there's more people that are dying and going to hell today than there are going to heaven. Narrow is the way that leads to life, and few there be that find it, but broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many be that go in there at. There's many people dying and going to hell today, more than there are going to heaven, but if you know just like I do, you read the newspaper, everybody's on the way to heaven, everybody's there, everybody's got their angel wings, And everybody's having a good time and everybody's on the cloud playing harps and listen through all this kind of stuff But that is not the case That is not the case. Listen, what kind of an impact are we having? What kind of an inheritance are we leaving behind? Because we have to ask ourselves, what are we leaving behind for our kids and our grandkids and our great-grandkids down the road? Are we leaving them something? Are we installing a time of wickedness that they are going to have to deal with in a society that may be even more corrupt? in this nation than where we're at right now. And we think about, man, I wonder what it's gonna be like in 20 years. I can't believe how much the nation's changed in three. Three years! I have seen, just in my lifetime, as far as I can go back and remember, and I've paid that much attention to it, as far as I can remember, the last three years, to me, has probably been the most downward time that I have witnessed in my personal life that I remember seeing that the nation's ever gone. But you talk to people 20 years ago and before that, and they can bring you up something else. You talk to people 20 years before that, they can bring you up something else. But what's it gonna be like in another 20? What's it gonna be like in another 50? What's it gonna be like in another hundred if the Lord tarries and the Lord Jesus doesn't come back? What kind of society and what kind of generation are our grandkids and our great grandkids and our great great grandkids? What kind of society are they gonna be living in? Are they gonna be, is there gonna be somebody standing here at Gospel Like Madness Church, standing up here in this pulpit preaching the truth of the word of God? Who's gonna be doing that? Somebody will. Somebody will. At some point, at some point, whether it's in five years, at some point, somebody else is gonna be leading the music. Somebody else is gonna be playing the guitar. Somebody else is gonna be teaching all these Sunday school classes. Somebody else is gonna be cleaning the church and somebody else is gonna be in control of the soundboard. Somebody else is gonna be welcoming everybody into the church and parking people out in the parking lot. Somebody else is gonna be teaching the youth back there and all those kids on a Wednesday night. And these people who we have no idea who they are, are they gonna be a people that is ingrained in righteousness? Or are we gonna pass that torch So that even in 50 years in the corrupt society that is probably going to go, is a gospel light still going to be a church that is a gospel light in the community? Because you know just as well as I do, all it takes is one. One. One. That's all it takes. The wrong man standing right there will blow everything wide open. The wrong man standing right there will blow everything apart. And the devil will do everything he can to get his ear. The devil will do everything he can to come into your house and get your ear. To even try to get you to leave your kids away from what is true and right. Think about that. The wicked come to the king because they want the king's ear. God says you get this wickedness out of the way. Get it out of the way. Establish the throne of righteousness. And then you'll be able to pass something down for folks who can live in an inheritance of godliness. Here in our text we see a complete change taking place. Verse five, take away the wicked from before the king and his throne shall be established in righteousness. His throne shall be established, that means he'll have a firm footing, that means he'll have a good grip, that means it'll be something that is able to sustain, be strong and powerful. Something that is lasting, is that not what an establishment, something that is established is something that is lasting. that is able to persevere into something that is established. And when every single one of us are gone, every single one of us, the Lord tarries and we're all gone, is this church gonna be able to stand the test? Is this church still gonna be an establishment in a place of darkness and wickedness? And we pray so, every one of us. That's how important it is that we make sure that we keep wickedness out of our life, wickedness out of our home, wickedness out of our church. We fight to get wickedness out of our communities and we fight to get wickedness away from people in power that make important decisions for our nation. The Bible shows us here. Almost done. Take away the wicked from before the king and his throne shall be established in righteousness. Proverbs 24 verse six, the Bible says, for by wise counsel thou shalt make war and in the multitude of counselors there shall be safety. So it's the right thing to do is to surround the king in righteousness. with people that can give good advice, surround the king with good godly people. Listen, all of us live in our life, wanna surround ourselves by good godly people that can give us good advice. So that when we don't know what to do and we're having difficulty with decisions to make and we are praying to God, but man, it's always nice to have that person or those people that you can go to and say, hey, you know what? What do you think about this? And they just be able to give you through biblical knowledge and through experience in life, to be able to guide you in the right direction in a good, godly way, to be able to help. So we surround ourselves with good, godly people that can influence us for the better. The Bible also says, Proverbs 11, 4, where there is no counsel, the people fall, but in the multitude of counselors, there is safety. And so as we close out of here tonight and we think about what kind of influence we are, what are we leaving behind, too? What influence are we leaving behind? What's the Bible say? Good names rather to be had than riches, right? So, we leave out of here tonight, and we do think to ourselves, whenever I'm gone, what's the very first thought that somebody's going to think about me? Whenever The epitaph is being written on Pastor Brian's stone. Whenever people come to the funeral, and they're standing there, and they think about Pastor Brian, what is one of the first things they're gonna think about? I'm not perfect by no means, but what is one of the first things they're gonna think? I would like to think that people would say, at least to some degree, that that was a man that loved the Lord, and he served God the best that he could. And I dare say every single one of you wants somebody to think the same thing. What are people going to think? People say, I don't care what nobody thinks. I do. You know why? Because what they think about me is the influence that I had on them. I know I can't please everybody. Listen, you try to make everybody happy, but one person is not, and that's you. You can't make everybody happy. If there's one thing we can do, We can strive to be a good and godly influence on people. So we can leave something behind. We can teach our kids what is right. And when we're all gone, and everybody else is running this place, no matter how far down the rabbit's hole this world goes, there'll be a people like Jason that are standing up here on Sunday morning teaching Sunday school. There'll be people like every single one, all the other Sunday school teachers, and all the other people that are involved in everything that we do. Whatever preacher is up there, that he'll be preaching, just like what we do right here. Leading people to Christ. Teaching people about the word of God. And that's what we want to do. That's what we want to leave behind. What did Job say? You came into this world with nothing. And you're gonna go out the same way, right? Amen, let's pray tonight. Father, we thank you so much, Lord, for this day. And God, you've been so good. Lord, I just pray here tonight that you would help us, God, to be an honor and a blessing, God, to you and to everybody else we run across. God, to be a good, godly influence. Lord, help us to be a people that, Lord, that leads people, God, to you. And though we understand that we have our moments in life and we're not always what we want to be, God, you remember our frame, we are but dust. And God, we do pray and ask that you'd help us to leave something behind. To leave a good godly influence, a godly word, a godly testimony. Because for some people that come after us, that may be all that they have to build on. And God, there may be some people born one day when Pastor Brian's gone and my grandkids, great grandkids, who knows if they'll ever know me personally. But in the midst of the wicked world that they're living in, if they hear that their great granddaddy was a man that lived for God, then maybe that can be something that'll help them to turn to you. God, I pray that you'd help us all here tonight just to live like you need us to live. We love you and we thank you for it all, and this we pray in Jesus' name, amen.