with me this evening to the second
book of Peter chapter three, second Peter chapter three. This third chapter of the book
of Peter, speech to his hearers in regard to the last days. There's, I think, a misconception
in the minds of many religious people of our day as to the last
days. They feel that in these latter
days that we live in now, in the last ten or fifteen years,
up into the present is what is referred to in the Bible as the
last days. But I think that the apostles
understood the last days to begin when they were on earth. And
this is what Peter is talking about, the last days. And I think
myself, that's my opinion, that the last days had its beginning
even during the life of the apostles. as unto the Lord is as a thousand
years, we're told. But anyhow, he says here in this
third chapter that in the first verse he said this letter, Beloved,
I now write unto you in both which I stir up your pure minds
by way of remembrance that you may be mindful of the words which
were spoken before by the holy prophets and of the commandments
of us the apostles of the Lord and Savior, knowing this first,
that there shall come in the last days scoffers walking after
their own lusts, saying, Where is the promise of his coming? For since the fathers fell asleep,
all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.
For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the
heavens were of old in the earth standing out of the water and
in the water, whereby the world that then was being overflowed
with water perished. But the heavens and the earth
which are now by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto
fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men. But, beloved, be not ignorant
of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand
years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slack
concerning his promise, as some men count slackness, but is longsuffering
to usward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should
come to repentance. But the day of the Lord will
come as a thief in the night. in which the heavens shall pass
away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with
fervent heat, the earth also, and the works that are therein
shall be burned up. Seeing, then, that all these
things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to
be, in all holy conversation and godliness?" That is, the
eleventh verse is to be understood in light of what is said previously,
that that one day when the Lord comes, it will be as what is
commonly referred to, the end of the world. That will be the
end of all things, the consummation of all things. It says, The heaven shall pass away
with a great noise. The elements shall melt with
fervent heat. The earth also and the works
that are therein shall be burned up. That's the end of the world. Do you remember when you were
a child and you thought about things of this nature? Sometimes
maybe you heard a Sunday school teacher mention that the end
of the world is coming. Or maybe someone in school or
some mother or father said something about the end of the world is
coming. And you thought about that. You had some foolish ideas
as to regard what they were talking about. But you did understand
that there was an end of all things. And that's right. There's an end of all things.
There's going to come a time when we're going to quit eating.
There's going to come a time when we quit laying down and
rest. There's going to come a time
when When we quit getting up in the morning, when we quit
going to work, when we quit looking at the clock, there's going to
come a time when time ceases to be. When time is dead and
buried and time shall be no more, the end of the world, everything
will be consumed. And that's so. And so he said,
seeing then that All these things shall be dissolved. Now, he said
in light of that, what manner? What kind of people ought ye
to be? He's writing here to Christian
people, people who are already in the grace of God. He said,
I write unto you in both which I stir up your pure minds. He's talking to Christian people.
What manner of people are ye to be in all holy conversation
and godliness, looking for the hasting unto the coming of the
day of God? Now, these dispensationalists
say there's a difference between the day of the Lord and the day
of God, and there's a difference between the last days and the
latter days and so forth, but I think they're making a play
on words, really. It says, "...looking for the
hastening unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens
shall be on fire, shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with
the fervent heat into the world." I think when the Lord Jesus Christ
comes back, eternity comes with Him. I think when He splits the
skies open and comes back as a King, I think eternity comes
with Him. I think that's the end of all
things, and I think that'll be the end of all flesh too. Nevertheless,
we, according to His promise, we, we, according to His promise,
only those that are in Christ are looking for Him. People outside
of Christ are not looking for the coming of the Son of God.
The majority of the world makes fun of the second coming of the
Lord Jesus. They don't believe He's coming back. They say, well,
they say just like they said here that the apostle wrote about. He said, well, he says, knowing
this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers
walking after their own lust and saying, where is the promise
of His coming? We've heard that for years, the
end of the world, the coming of the Messiah. We've heard that
since the fathers fell asleep. All things continue as they were
from the beginning of the creation. So, the we are those that are
in Christ. They're the ones looking. Nevertheless, we, according to
His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth
righteousness. Wherefore, beloved, seeing that
you look for such things, you look for such things. Do we look
for such things? Be diligent that ye may be found
in Him in peace without spot and blameless. If you are not
in Him without spot and in peace and blameless, you are in for
a hard time. If you are not in Christ, you
better get in Christ. And account that the longsuffering
of our Lord is salvation, even as our beloved brother Paul also
according to the wisdom given unto him hath written unto you.
as also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things,
in which are some things hard to be understood, which they
that are unlearned and unstable rest, as they do also the other
scriptures, under their own destruction." That is, they take the scripture
from their setting and they take the text out of the context and
make a pretext out of it and use various scriptures in order
to prove their own arguments and so forth. They rest. They rest the scriptures from
their settings and the end is their own destruction. Yet ye
therefore, beloved, seeing ye know these things before, beware
lest ye also, being led astray, with the air of the wicked, fall
from your own steadfastness. Remember I preached to you one
time, Lord, keep us from falling. Keep us from falling. All right,
the 18th verse is my text right here. This is the verse I want
to talk to you for just a few minutes here this evening. I'm
not going to keep you long. But grow in grace and in the knowledge
of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be glory both
now and forever. Amen. Well, first off, grow in
grace. Now, you can't grow in grace
unless you're in grace. He's not talking to people who
are alienated from the love of God in Christ Jesus. He's not
talking to those that are yet rebels, that are in their sins,
He's talking to those that have been translated from the kingdom
of darkness into the kingdom of God's dear Son. He's talking
to those that have been born anew. He's talking to those that
are new creatures in Christ Jesus. He's talking to those whose hearts
yearn and pant after the Lord Jesus. He's talking to those
that look for the coming of the Savior. He is talking to believers. He is talking to people who have
understood who they are, that they are sinners. They are lost. They are lost. They are like
sheep without a shepherd. They have went their own way.
They have gone astray from the God who made them. And they are
wandering out in the wilderness of this world. and content in
their lost condition, not even knowing that they're lost, trusting
in themselves that somehow everything will work out for them. Having
a vague concept of God, believing in a higher power, a supreme
power, and somehow feeling in their
hearts there is a God There is a day of reckoning. There is
a day of judgment. But somehow, some way, I don't
understand and don't have any feeling in the matter, but I
know it will work out. He's not talking to them kind
of people. They've got no hope. They've got no hope. They must
be brought to see their lostness. If they'll ever be brought by
the Spirit of God to see their waywardness, they've gone astray. and see that they're lost. And
then they'll cry out, Lord, save me, I'm lost. Lord, help me,
I'm lost. I'm lost from Thee. Not lost
from mother or father, brother or sister, or lost from the society
of this world. We're part of it, but we're lost
from Thee. Lord, I'm lost. I'm in the midst
of this world. and all the tensile and all the
glamour of this world, all the temporary. I'm in it, Lord, but
I'm lost. I'm lost from Thee. My heart
cries out. Lord, save me, else I perish.
They were brought to that place and brought under the feet of
Him who alone can save them from their sins. Well, they'll be
growing. And He's talking to people who've
been there. who has, by experience, experienced
their waywardness, experienced the fact that they are sinners
before God and despised Him in their hearts, and would say,
we'll not have this man to reign over us, but they've been stripped,
they've been broken, they've been brought to the end of themselves.
They've experienced this. The work, the Scriptures talks
about Spirit conviction. They've been
brought by the Spirit of God to have a conviction in their
hearts that they're helpless and hopeless and lost, that they're
sinners. They've embraced Him who's the
cure. Our Lord Jesus Christ, you know,
He came to God, but He must have a sacrifice. Remember I preached
to you from the book of Leviticus one time where it says, that
it must be perfect to be accepted. The sacrifice must be perfect
to be accepted. Our Lord Jesus Christ came to
God in our behalf, in our place, in our room. He came with a sacrifice. What was the sacrifice? Was it
a lamb? Was it a turtle dove? Was it
the firstling of the flock? Was it a goat? Was it a ram?
Was it an oxen? No, sir. It was Himself. He offered
Himself. That's the cure. For our condition
is our sacrifice. What sacrifice do you have? You
see what I'm talking about? He says, but grow in grace. You who have been brought to
the feet of the Lord Jesus Christ, He said, you grow. Grow. You came to Him as babies. Babies. You had to be dealt with with
the alphabet. We had to talk to you about the
A's and the B's and the C's. And he said you couldn't go any
farther than your A, B, C's. You're just babies. When you
was a baby, you had to have some toys. Had to have some toys. I took Ben the other day to the
folks' house, there's Catholics. And they had pictures all over
the house, pictures representing the Lord Jesus, crowns of thorns
upon his head, and hearts that was bleeding, and they had little
statues of various patron saints, and they had little pictures
and so forth hanging on the wall. And Ben said, You see, you want
to get them babies. You want to get them toys. So, what do you think of that? People
have to have little toys like that. Little toys. Well, your
babies. Babies. When you're babies, you
got to deal in ABCs, but you can't have any meat. You can't
digest it. Babies can't chew meat. You've got to give them condensed.
You've got to give them meat that's already chewed. Mothers
used to chew the meat up for the babies and chew it up and
give it to the babies. Some parts of the country still
do that. Babies can't take strong meat. But he said, grow, grow! If you don't grow, something
matters. If a baby doesn't grow, you get
alarmed and concerned about a baby that doesn't grow. It's a dwarf. It's stunted. It's the runt of
the litter if it doesn't grow. So He says for us, you and I,
to grow in grace and the knowledge of our Lord. Grow in grace. Grow
in God's love. Grow in the love of God which
is in Christ Jesus. Have some firmness of your faith
in His love. Don't be tossed about by every
wind of doctrine that comes along, but be anchored firm and deep
in the love of God in Christ. Grow in grace. What is grace?
Well, I don't know the best definition, but one definition is the unmerited
favor of God. Unmerited. That is, we didn't
deserve it. It's whatever we get. from God. That's grace. We didn't deserve
anything. We've gotten everything from
Him and we didn't deserve anything. You say, well, I thought I deserved
something. No, you didn't deserve anything. You see, He is unworthy
of the least of His gifts. No one God looked down upon the
children of men to see if there's any that do it good, and there
was not a single solitary soul upon the face of the earth among
the race of Adam that done good. He couldn't find any. They're
all going out of their way. They're all unprofitable. So
anything that you and I get this side of hell is what? It's the grace of God. Anything! Say, the Lord's been good to
me. I hear people say, the Lord's been good to me. You're mighty
right He's been good to you. He's been good to me. Any movement
of God towards us is the grace of God. Grow in this grace and
appreciation of it. And the knowledge of our Lord
and Savior Jesus Christ. I told you this morning. You
want to know anything? You want to learn anything? Come
unto Him. Come to the cross. Come to Christ. The best thing that any man can
do for you is to bring you to Jesus. That's the best possible
service that He can render unto you, is to bring you unto the
Lord Jesus, that you might see Him, you might know Him, and
you might learn of Him. Learn of Him! I don't care if
you can quote the whole Bible. That's nothing. I don't care
if you read the Bible every day and every day and every day and
you know everything that's in the Bible. If you do not come
to the cross, it's all there. Now it's good to read the Bible
and know the Bible and be able to quote every verse in the Bible.
That's good if your heart's in it. But just do it for self-recognition,
there's nothing to it. There's no love of God in it.
All this love, this knowledge, it all comes when we're brought
to the cross. You say, how come? I don't know,
that's just the way God fixed it. That's the way He planned
it and purposed it. Before the fall of man, before
there was ever one man to fall, that's the way God purposed it.
that everything would be in His Son, that His Son might receive
all the recognition, all the exaltation, all the honor, and
all the glory. Grow in the knowledge of our
Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Now this is what I want to talk
to you about. To Him, that's to Christ. To Him be glory both
now and forever. Amen. You know, right now, heaven
is full of the unending praises of the Lord Jesus. Right now
while we're gathered here, they that are in heaven are praising
Him, the Lord Jesus. They're singing, worthy is the
Lamb that was slain. Heaven is full of unending praises
unto the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Let me read something
to you over here in the last book of the Bible. Last book
of the Bible. Listen to what it says. It says
in this fourth chapter, it says that The four beasts, 8th verse
of the 4th chapter, says, And the four beasts had each of them
six wings about him. Now, I don't know if this is
literal or not. I don't know. But I'm certain
that it's descriptive and it signifies something. It's picturing
something. Four beasts had each of them
six wings about him, and they were full of eyes within. And
they rest not day and night. There's no rest for them night
and day. What is their labor? What is
their activity? These four beasts, six wings
about him and full of eyes within, and they rest neither night nor
day. What do they do? What do they do up there? John
had a revelation. He's seen some things. Jesus
Christ came to him and revealed some things to him. He said,
write this in a book, John. This is what it looks like in
heaven. What are these fellows doing? And they rest not day
and night. What do they do? They do this.
Say, Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty, which was and is and
is to come. That's what they say. Day and
night. Day and night. And when those
beasts gave glory and honor and thanks to Him, to the Lord Jesus,
that sat on the throne who liveth forever and forever. And the
four and twenty elders fell down before Him, the Lord Jesus, that
sat on the throne, and worshiped Him that liveth forever and ever. And this is what they did. They
cast their crowns before the throne, and they said this, Thou
worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power, for Thou
hast created all things, and for Thy pleasure they are and
were created. I'm telling you here this evening
that heaven right now is full of unending praise unto Him. Look in that fifth chapter of
the book of Revelation, the second verse. It says, And I saw a strong
angel. I wonder what is meant by that.
I thought all angels were strong. I don't know. Something significant
about that. I saw a strong angel proclaiming
with a loud voice. A fellow told me one time, come
to hear me preach here. I'd seen him on the street, and
I talked to him a little bit, and I said, well, I said, you
and I are friends and all, and I said, why don't you just come
up Sunday and hear me preach? I believe I'll do that. So he
came up, he heard me, And after it was over with, the only thing
he had to say to me was, he says, do you have to talk that loud? Do
you have to? Well, I said, I don't have to.
I just kind of get carried away. That bothered him. Well, you got something to say. You might get a little excited
about it. I sometimes get excited about this. I think this strong
angel, I think he is excited. He would proclaim with a loud
voice. Brother, you can't proclaim what
that strong angel proclaimed. You can't do it whispering. Oh
no, it takes a strong voice. Why? This is what he's saying.
Who is worthy? The Lord Jesus. He's talking
about who is worthy to open the books and to loose the seals.
And no man in heaven or earth or neither under the earth was
able to open the book, neither to look, And he said, I wept
much. John said, I wept much in this
revelation. I wept much. I cried. I cried
because no man was found worthy to open to read the book, neither
to look thereon. One of the elders saith unto
me, Weep not. Behold, the Lion, that's the
Lord Jesus of the tribe of Judah, the root of David, hath prevailed
to open the book, and to loose the seven seals thereof. And
I beheld, and lo, in the midst of the throne of the four beasts,
in the midst of the elders, stood a Lamb, that is the Lord Jesus,
as it had been slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which
are the seven spirits of God sent forth into all the earth.
And he came and took the book out of the right hand of him
that sat upon the throne. And when he had taken the book,
the four beasts and the four and twenty elders fell down before
the Lamb. They was occupied with something.
I'm telling you here tonight, heaven is full of the unending
praises unto Him, the Lord Jesus. And they fell down before the
Lamb, before the Lord Jesus, having every one of them harps.
Harps. Harps you play with the strings.
They had harps. Not mouth harps, not juice harps. String harps. Harps. makes music, soothes King David. One of them harks, and a golden
vial full of odors, which are the prayers of the saints. And
they sung a new song in heaven. The new song was, Thou art worthy
to take the book, and to open the seals thereof, for thou was
slain, speaking of the Lord Jesus. For thou hast redeemed us to
God by thy blood." You were slain and redeemed us to God. How did
you do it? By your blood! By offering yourself as a sacrifice
in our stead and place, satisfying the justice of God in order that
God might be just and justify him that believeth in Jesus.
Ah, by thy blood out of every kindred and tongue and people
and nation, they come there from all walks of life. There's black
ones, there's yellow ones, there's white ones, there's brown ones.
From every tribe, every tongue, every race of people on the topside
of God's green earth, they're going to come one day. The Lord
has redeemed them. All right, and He has made us,
and has made us, made His people unto our God-kings and priests,
and we shall reign on the earth. And I beheld, and I heard the
voice of many angels round about the throne, and the beasts and
the elders, and the number of them was ten thousand times ten
thousand, and thousands of thousands, an innumerable multitude of people,
as many as the sands of the sea. What were they doing? What were
they doing here? What occupied their minds and
their hearts? What were they occupied with?
I'll tell you. This is in heaven! I said to
you, heaven will be full of the unending praises of Him. All
right. Twelfth verse, this is what they
were occupied with. Saying with a loud voice, Worthy
is the Lamb that was slain to receive power, and riches, and
wisdom, and strength, and honor, and glory, and blessing. And
every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the
earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them,
heard I saying, blessing, and honor, and glory, and power be
unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb forever
and ever. And the four beasts said, Amen.
And the four and twenty elders fell down, and they worshipped
Him that liveth forever and ever. I read all that to say this,
that heaven is full of the unending praises of the Lord Jesus Christ. Remember now, I told you, to
Him be glory, both now and forever. Amen. You see, unnumbered years
shall speed on their everlasting course. That is, time shall grow
old and time shall die and be buried, but forever and ever
unto Him be glory, world without end. Listen, is He not a priest
after the order of Melchizedek? He certainly is. To Him be glory. Is He not a King forever? Is
He not King of kings, Lord of lords? He is. Never shall His praises cease
as long as immortal spirits live. There will be no quieting of
immortal spirits in praise unto the Lord Jesus Christ. as long
as the Father's throne endures, forever and forever and forever
unto Him shall be glory." The Apostle's word here is to Him
be glory now and forever! Now! To Him be glory now and
forever! Let us make that our prayer. Listen, now. You see, now are
we the sons of God. You know what the Scriptures
say somewhere over here? It says, Beloved... Listen, 3rd
chapter of the book of 1 John, 2nd verse says, Beloved now.
Same word, same word. To Him be glory both now. Beloved now are we the sons of
God. Now are we the sons of God. When
are we? Now are we the sons of God. It
doth not yet appear what we shall be. But we know that when He
shall appear, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as
He is. Now. We are the sons of God now. Now our sins are forgiven. Now
let us glorify Him. Let this be our prayer. Lord,
help me to glorify You. I'm poor. Lord, help me to glorify
You by contentment. Paul said, I have learned in
whatsoever state I am, wherewith, to be content. I'm poor. I haven't got any money. I haven't
got fine clothes. I haven't got this. I haven't
got that. You know my needs. You know my heart. Lord, help
me to glorify You by being content in the condition that I'm in.
Lord, I'm poor. Lord, I'm sick. Help me to give
honor and glory to Your name by being patient. Lord, I have
some talents. Help me to exalt you and give
honor and glory to your name by spending these talents in
your service. Lord, help me to do it. I have
time. Lord, help me to redeem it that
I may serve you, that I may in some way, with my time and through
my time, exalt you, give you the honor and the glory. For
He says to him, Be glory both now and... We know that there's
unending praises and glory to God in the heavens, but He says,
He's talking to us right now. He says, Now you know that this
end of the world is going to come upon you. You know that.
I've told you that. He said, What manner of people
ought you to be? Why, He said, you ought to give
Him glory. Ah, that's one reason why I haven't
got much to do with these fellas that are just running around
talking about salvation, that you've got some part in salvation.
God's got a part and you've got a part. You play your part and
cooperate with God. I don't have no use for that.
I wouldn't give those fellas the time of day. I'll tell you
why. Because their ambition. Their
ambition is this. dedicated their whole life and
the entirety of their soul is ambitious to one end, is to rob
God of His glory. Rob God of His glory in the salvation
of a sinner and saying that, well, you've got to You've got
to cooperate with God now. You do your part and God will
do His part. You take the first step and God
will meet you halfway. You've got to do this and you've
got to do that in order to be a Christian, in order to be saved,
robbing God of His glory, robbing the Lord Jesus Christ of the
sufficiency of His atonement. I'll tell you this, my beloved
brethren, tonight. The Lord Jesus Christ died on
that cross for somebody. I know that. And the somebody's
that he died for is going to be saved come hell or high water.
I know that. Whether I'm in the somebody's
or I'm not in the somebody's, I know that his purpose will
not be defeated and I know that he shall see the travail of his
soul and he shall be satisfied and say it's all worthwhile.
So, you see, my brethren, I have time. Lord, help me to exalt
you. Help me to glorify you by serving
you and telling the truth. whether people will listen to
me, whether people will come and hear me or not, whether people
avoid me or people crowd around me. It makes no mind to me. Lord,
I have time. Let me tell the truth. Let me
tell the truth. For what reason that you might
be exalted, that someone might ask you to give the invocation
somewhere to some public? No, sir. Tell the truth for the
glory of God, whether men hear you or not. I have time, Lord. I have a heart
to feel. Let that heart feel no love but
Yours. To Him be glory both now, right
now, and forevermore. I have a head to thank. Oh, Lord,
help me to thank only of thee and for thee in any religious
sense. Oh, my soul, you have put me
in the world, Father. You put me here for something. I'm not sure what, but you put
me here. I'm here. Lord, show me what
it is, why You've put me here, and help me to work out my purpose
in life for Your glory and for Your honor. Can we be like that
poor widow? You know, she put her two mites
into the treasury of the temple. And it indicated, or our Lord
said that she put in all she had. He watched them there. They
all came into the temple. Some put in a whole lot more
than she did. That is, as far as dollars and
cents goes, some rich people came in and they put their pounds
in. She came in and put her pints in. Our Lord said, well, she's
given more than all the rest of them. Why? Because she gave
all she had. Now that's what I'm talking about.
I'm saying, Lord, help me to cast my time and my eternity
in your treasury. Oh, that I might give all that
I have. Oh, Lord, enable me in my feebleness,
in my nothingness, that I might be useful and serve my generation
for your glory, for your honor. Oh, my soul, what can I do? People ask me this from time
to time. I go away and preach a good bit. I'm going away here.
I'll be gone for ten days here pretty soon. I'll be gone to
Kentucky, and then I'll go on from Kentucky into Louisiana
and preach. And I'll talk to a lot of people.
And invariably, when I go somewhere, I always say, What do you think
about this? What do you think I ought to
do? What they want to know is, how can I serve the Lord? Well,
what do you think I ought to do? Ah, there's a lot of things
for us to do to serve the Lord. What can I do? I can love Him. Oh, if we drink of that water,
that everlasting water, if we come to that spring, and drink
of that water, I'll tell you, it'll flow in us and out of our
bellies shall come rivers of living water. And it'll expand
and it'll explode and we'll serve the Lord with joy and we'll not
sit back on our haunches and stand on our hind feet and say,
well, I've got it. The Lord has saved me. The Lord
saved me by His grace. I'm waiting right now until I
die. Nothing for me to do. I'm just
going to sit right here. I'm just going to wait until
I die. What are you doing, brother?
Just waiting until I die. Oh, I'm serving the Lord. I'm just waiting until I die. Just waiting until I die. That's
all I'm doing. Just sitting down. You can line
up. And there are some people that
I know, there are some people that need to put their lives,
to put their lives, that's what a church is for. A church, people
say, well, it doesn't make any difference whether you go to
church, join the church, belong, it doesn't make any difference.
I think it does. If that's the case, why do we
have a church? Why do we have one? It doesn't
make any difference? I bet you wouldn't tell your
wife one woman the same as the other, would you? Would you tell
your wife, well, I married you. Well, you do have a pretty face,
but no prettier than the other woman that I've seen. You wouldn't
do that, would you? You sure wouldn't. You'd say,
well, there ain't no difference in the churches, though, are
there? Ain't no difference? You haven't been listening. There's
a difference. There's a difference. And men
ought to put their life where their mouth is. Put it there. Line up. Identify themselves. Serve the Lord. Unto Him be glory. Listen to me now. Listen to me.
Ephesians chapter 3 and almost the last verse. Unto Him be glory. Unto Him be glory through our
all ages, world without end in the church. You know what it
says? You know what it says, Ephesians 3, verse 21? It's what
it says, Unto him, unto the Lord. In his church. There's a difference. Well, what should I do? Serve
the Lord. Bless the Lord. Oh, my soul and
all that is within me, bless His holy name. Bless Him. Thank
Him. Praise Him. Conduct yourself
as becometh a Christian. You know how to do that. You
don't need me to instruct you there. You know what's right
and what's wrong. Huh? Lord, help me to cast into
your treasury all that I have, all that I am, all that I hope
to be. Let me cast myself into your
treasury and enable me to be useful, to serve my generation
for your honor and for your glory. Now one more word and then we'll
quit. Last word says, Amen. To Him be glory, both now and
forever. Amen. What does that Amen mean? Several different meanings. Four
that I know of, but I'll just deal with one. The meaning that I'm going to
give you, I think is the meaning that it has right here. the desire of your heart. Amen
means the desire of your heart. You know, we say amen at the
end of our prayers. Why? to signify, Lord, let it
be so. We say, we ask these things in
the dear name of the Lord Jesus Christ who died in our stead,
who was buried and who rose again, who is ever at the right hand
of God. We ask these things in the mighty
name of our Lord. Amen! We are saying, let it be
so. Let it be so. We're saying, this
is the desire of my heart. That's what we're saying. It's
all a heart matter. To Him be glory now and forever. Amen. Is that my heart's desire? Is that your heart's desire?
It was Peter's heart's desire. He said, to Him be glory both
now and forever. Amen. Let it be so. This is my
heart's desire. Father, I want the Lord Jesus
Christ to be honored and glorified. This is all I live for. That's what Peter said. It's
all I live for. Everything else just fades off
into insignificance in light of this great object of my life. The object of my life is that
God might be honored and exalted in the name of His Son, the Lord
Jesus. That should be, brethren, That should not be just an unusual
object and desire reserved only for those who are public preachers,
but that should be the object and desire of every man, every
woman, every boy, and every girl that has been castulated from
the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of God's dear Son.
The object of my life is that Jesus Christ might receive honor
and glory. I know I will forevermore. Now,
to Him be glory now and forever. Amen! That's what Peter said. Is that your heart's desire?
Is that my heart's desire? If you cannot say Amen to it,
you've got a problem. If you can't say Amen to this,
to Him be glory both now and forever. Amen. Does your heart
pant thirst, moan, groan, cry out after Christ? Do you cry
out in your heart, give me Christ or else I die, I must have Him? Huh? So that you can say every
time you bend your knee, Thy kingdom come, Thy will be
done on earth as it is in heaven. For thine is the kingdom, the
power, watch it, the glory forever and ever. Amen. In other words, hearts desire. Can you say, Lord, let thy kingdom
come? Amen. Do you long to see Him
magnified? Amen. That's what it means there.
To Him be glory both now and forever. May it be so. Let it be so. Let it be so. May it come to pass. You don't
pray, Lord, save my children. Save my children. I ask this
in Jesus' name, Amen. And the Amen means, well, I'm really not interested. Are
you interested? When you say, Amen, you're saying,
Lord, it's my heart's desire that my prayer might be answered,
that my petition might be heard, and my prayer might be answered.
It's my heart's desire. Let it be so. Amen. To him, Peter
says, let us grow in grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ,
our Savior, and unto Him be glory right now and forevermore. Amen. Lord bless you.