Messages today will be from 1
Corinthians 7, so you want to mark that. 1 Corinthians chapter
7. Let's begin reading in verse
25. He says, Now concerning virgins,
that is, unmarried, believing women, and it can apply to unbelieving
married men. Now concerning virgins, I have
no commandment of the Lord, yet I give my judgment as one that
has obtained mercy of the Lord to be faithful. I suppose, therefore,
that this is good for the present distress. I say that it is good
for a man so to be. The Apostle Paul's writing, everything
we've been studying in chapter 7 throughout this Corinthian
letter. He's writing this during a very
distressing time for the church. The church was being persecuted
and afflicted. They were being killed for preaching
Christ and believing Christ. They were being driven from one
place to another. It was just a time that was very
distressing. It was very hard for believers
at this time. And so Paul's judgment to believers,
being one that God had called and blessed and made faithful,
his judgment. Now this is the inspired word
of God, but again you remember when he says, this is my judgment,
he's saying I don't have a direct command from the Lord, this is
not a commandment from our Lord, this is a matter of conscience.
This is a matter left up to the believer. And he says, now my
judgment on this is, is that the unmarried believer would
be better off remaining single. Same for widows. And we saw before
he said it goes, that goes also for Those that have been lawfully
freed from their spouse, they can marry again if they want
to in the Lord. But he says, in my judgment,
they'd be better off because of this distressing time. He
said there in that next verse, verse 27, he says, Are thou bound
unto a wife? He says, Seek not to be loosed.
Are thou loosed from a wife? Seek not a wife. But, and if
thou marry, thou hast not sinned, and if a virgin marry, she hath
not sinned. Nevertheless, such shall have
trouble in the flesh, but I spare you." Paul desired to spare them
this trouble they're going to have because of this distressing
time, this trouble that's going to come from being married. They're
going to have a lot more responsibility. They got another person to look
out for. They're going to have children. More than likely, they'll
have children they'll have to look out for. It's going to cause
them much trouble in the flesh. And this is what he would like
to spare them from. And he also spares them from
being under any heavy burden when it comes to this. He says,
you cannot sin if you marry. You are not sinned if you marry.
This is not a law. This is not something that is
a heavy burden to be under. This is just my judgment, Paul
said. Now, he says verse 29, and this
is what we are going to focus on, verse 29. He says, But this
I say, the time is short. You see, even though Paul is
dealing with these questions they had, In Paul's mind, it's
such a distressing time, and it's so needful that Christ be
preached, and it's so needful that God's lost sheep be called
out, that these questions about marrying and not marrying and
all that are almost trifling questions to Paul. They're almost
just trivial things when there's so much more pressing matters
at hand. And he says, now, that's my judgment
on that. You know, he spoke pretty briefly
on it. That's my judgment on that. But this I will say. This
I will say. The time is short. The time is
short. And he says there, it remaineth
that both they that have wives be as though they had none. And
they that weep as though they wept not. And they that rejoice
as though they rejoiced not. And they that buy as though they
possessed not. Now, I want us to deal with this
statement here, the time is short. The time is short. First of all,
brethren, the time of our life on this earth is short. The time
we spend, have on this earth, from the moment our birth is
appointed by God to the moment our death is appointed by God,
that's a short time. That's a short time. Turn to
Psalm 39. Look in verse 5. You might want
to mark Psalms. I'm going to refer to it several
times today. Psalm 39. Look in verse 4. He says, Lord, make me to know
mine end and the measure of my days and what it is. He says that I may know how frail
I am what time I have here, how short my time is here. Behold,
thou hast made my days as a handbreadth." As the breadth of a hand. A handbreadth. And he says, and
mine age is as nothing before thee. You think of eternal God. Think of eternity. My age is
nothing before you. A man that goes through this
life has this time to prepare for eternity. This brief time,
this short time to prepare for eternity. It would be like if
a man was walking across a beach. I mean from the parking lot to
the water. From the boardwalk to the water.
And in that short amount of time, He's preparing now to launch
out into that Atlantic Ocean and sail across that sea. Our
life would be like that walk from the boardwalk to the water,
facing that eternity, that sea of eternity. He says here, My
age is nothing before thee. It's nothing before thee. Verily,
every man at his best state is altogether vanity. When I was young, time seemed
to drag by. It just seemed to drag by. You're
always looking forward to something. You know, you wanted to get out
of school. You wanted to graduate. It took forever for it to get
there. You wanted to get old enough to get a driver's license.
It took forever. You wanted to get old enough
to where you could move out and be out on your own. It took forever.
Time just dragged by. Now I'm 46, and time flies by. Time flies by. In 10 years, I've
been here for 10 years, and in 10 years, our young people have
grown up overnight. I've got pictures of y'all when
I first came here, and just little, and y'all grown up now. Now to
you, that probably seemed like 10 years just dragged by. To
me, it went by in the blink of an eye. It was just a blink. And now I look at spaces of time
in my life, and ten years just seems like it's nothing. In ten
years, I'll be 56 years old. Ten more years, I'll be the same
age as my daddy. You know what I'm saying? Ten
more years, I'll be 56. Ten more to that, I'll be 66. It goes by like that. It goes
by like that. And none of us knows when our
time is over, when it's appointed that we'll die. James 4.14 says,
You know not what shall be on the morrow. You have no idea
what shall be tomorrow. For what is your life? It's even
a vapor that appeareth for a little time and then vanisheth away. Our Baltimore Ravens, Trey Walker.
He's 24 years old. He was young. He was strong.
He was healthy. If you'd looked at him, you'd
have thought, this man is going to live forever. He's going to
live a long time. He's got a long time to go. He
had a lucrative career. He didn't have anything to worry
about career-wise. And last Thursday night, while
we were sitting right here at church, he had no idea, but it
was the time God appointed for his life to end. Had a dirt bike
accident. 24 years old. Died. Died. Time is short that we have on
this earth. And then secondly, within our
short time, within this short time that we have, our time to
worship and serve the Lord is even shorter. The time we have is short, but
within this short period of our life, the time we have to worship
and serve the Lord is even shorter. Psalm 90. Look there just a minute.
Psalm 90. This is what the Scripture says
concerning the length of a man's life. Psalm 90, verse 10. It says, The days of our years
or threescore years and ten. That's sixty years plus ten.
That's seventy years. Seventy years. And if by reason
of strength they be fourscore years, eighty years, yet is there
strength, labor, and sorrow, for it soon is cut off and we
fly away. Now you notice there he doesn't
say an if. He says an if. He doesn't say
it shall be seventy years or eighty years. might be cut off tomorrow. But
he says, if we live a long life and God has appointed it to be
so, at 70 to 80 years, we're going to die. We're going to
die. Now, you think about a man in
public worship, engaging in public worship in that span of time.
I did some figuring yesterday on this. If God saved a man when
he was 20 years old, And he engaged in public worship three hours
a week until he died at age 75. This man was consistent. God saved him at 20 years old
and he faithfully came to the Lord's house to worship God and
he did so publicly three hours every week. Every week. The total
hours that that man engaged in public worship adds up to 357
days. Not even one year out of 75 years. A man that lived 75 years has
lived 657,000 hours. And he spent 8,500 hours in public worship. 8,580 in public
worship. If he was saved at 20, engaged
in public worship 3 hours every week. 657,000 hours, and out of that
8,580 hours in public worship. Now, that's just engaging in
public worship. That's not actually worshipping
the Lord. There's a lot of times we come
that you don't actually worship the Lord. You go through the
motions, but you don't actually worship Him. See what I'm saying? The time that we actually worship
the Lord within this space of time that we have is short. Now, seeing that's the case,
then think of this. The time that we have to actually
minister to our children and our brethren and our loved ones
and Christ's lost sheep, it's even shorter than that. I look
at my children right now and I think, my children or some
of your children have already moved out and moved away. And I think, I've got a few short
years at best to minister to my children before they're old
enough to move out and be on their own. And then I look at
our young people here and I think, I've got even less for some Because
the time may come when they decide they can move away and never
come hear the gospel again. You see, the time is short, brethren.
The time of our life is short, and the time we have to minister,
to worship and serve Christ is short. Very short. And then thirdly,
the time is short before the Lord returns, and the world ends,
and we all stand in judgment. The time is short. The saints
The saints believe, you can tell they believe this, they believe
that whenever Christ was coming to
destroy Jerusalem, that that was going to be the end of this
whole world. Not just the Jewish world, but the whole world. And
I'm convinced that the Lord let them believe that. and inspired
them to write the scriptures they wrote, so that me and you
right now, where we are, and believers in every age, wherever
they are, will read those scriptures with that same urgency, that
this is the end. We're living in the end. And
brethren, it's so with our Lord, because with Him a thousand years
is one day, and one day is a thousand years. We could be right here,
these last days since Christ has come, have been a very brief
time compared to eternity. Just like our age is brief. 2
Corinthians 6, verse 10. Look there with me. 2 Corinthians 6, verse 10. I'm sorry, verse 5, 2 Corinthians
5, verse 10. He says, We must all appear before
the judgment seat of Christ, that every one may receive the
things done in his body according to that he hath done, whether
it be good or evil, good or bad. Knowing therefore the terror
of the Lord, we persuade men, What do we persuade men of? Look
down at verse 20. Now then, we as ambassadors for
Christ, as though God did beseech you by us, we pray you in Christ's
stead, be ye reconciled to God. You see, God has sent forth Christ,
and God was in Christ reconciling the world of His elect unto Himself.
He's accomplished that work, and now He's sending forth this
gospel to say to everybody in this general call, now you be
reconciled to God. And by God's grace, He makes
that effectual in the hearts of His people. But you be reconciled
to God. Now's the day of salvation. This
is the day of grace. This is the accepted time. But
the time's short, brethren. Our Lord will come soon as a
thief in the night. Unexpected. He will come. And when He comes, that's the
end. There's no time then to say,
well, I meant to call on Him. I meant to read His Word. I meant
to lay down my life. I meant to repent. I meant to
be found only in Christ's righteousness, not have my own. It'd be too
late for that then. Now's the day of grace. Now's
the accepted time. Be reconciled to God. And then,
believer, you and I look over Romans 13. Look at verse 11.
Romans 13, verse 11. Romans 13, 11. Knowing the time. Knowing the time. We know the time is short, don't
we? So what we're looking at, knowing the time, brethren, that
now it is high time to awake out of sleep. For now is our
salvation nearer than when we believed. The night is far spent, the day
is at hand. Let us therefore cast off the
works of darkness, and let us put on the armor of light. Let
us walk honestly as in the day, not in rioting and drunkenness
in the party life, not in chambering and wantonness, not in strife
and envying, not in vain religion, but put ye on the Lord Jesus
Christ, and make not provision for the flesh to fulfill the
lust thereof. That's what the provision of
this flesh really is, brethren. Most everything that we make
provision for this flesh is just fulfilling the lust of our flesh.
The first time the Lord Jesus came, He came to this earth to
prepare His people for that final day of judgment. For this day
of judgment we're talking about. That's why Christ came the first
time, to prepare His people for it. to redeem us, to justify
us from our sins, to make us righteous in Him. That's why
He came. He came that through the washing of water by the Word,
He might sanctify us and present us to Himself, not having spot
or wrinkle or any such thing, but that His church might be
holy. That's why He came. Did Christ waste time when He
came? Did Christ make provision for
the flesh when He came? Would you put much confidence
in our Savior if we came across passages of Scripture where it
said, Christ, knowing He must work the works of God, said,
I'm going to take a month off. He said, I must work the works
of Him that sent me while it's day. The night cometh when no
man can work. I must work these works, He said.
I must work these works. He said in another place, my
meat, my life, my bread, my whole purpose for being here is to
do the will of Him that sent me and finish His work. That's why I'm here, He said.
That's my meat, He said. Christ had a bride. He says there
in our text about husbands, if you have a bride, be not as though
you had a bride. Christ had a bride. He had a
bride. Did He care for His bride? Did
He love His bride? You know how He cared for her?
You know how He loved her? He didn't do it by just coming
and just giving His church the fleshly provisions that we want
and we lust after. and spoil us rotten with all
these things. That's not how he made provision
for her, is it? The way that he made provision
for his bride is he let nothing turn him from this work of redeeming
each elect child of God to himself. Nothing could turn him from that
work. Satan attempted to turn him, but he couldn't tempt him. He couldn't turn him. He would
not be turned by Satan. He offered him all the kingdoms
of the world in an instant, but he couldn't be turned by Satan.
He couldn't be turned by vain religion's constant attacks.
So many men are just so easily turned by vain religion. Well,
we all got to be a little right. No, we can all be all wrong. God's people are going to be
right, and God's going to be right, but we have to bow to
God. And vain religion came trying
to trip him up and trip him up and entangle him in his words.
He couldn't be turned from the work at hand. Just like Paul
here. He's getting all these questions
about things that really aren't the important thing. And Paul
can't be turned from what's really important. In the middle of it,
he says to his brethren, time is short. Time is short. These aren't the important matters.
Here's the important matter, Christ and Him crucified. Christ couldn't be turned by
this world's joys. Our Lord on one occasion said,
let us go across the sea that we may find rest. He did say
that. He took His disciples over there.
He did it probably more for His disciples than He did for Himself.
But He didn't let the joys of this world turn Him from what
His purpose was in life. That was to redeem His people.
to provide for that bride by saving her from her sin. And
he didn't even allow his own sufferings to stop him and turn
him. You know, if you go the way of
this world, it's easy. Now, sin's always present and
there's always going to be some kind of trouble wherever there's
sin, but the path of least of resistance is an easy path to
follow. But whatever you do for the glory
of God and the honor of God and the service of God and for God's
people, it's going to involve suffering. It's going to be a
lot harder to do than that path of just going with the flow.
It's going to be a lot harder. Well, think of how much more
difficult it presented, the most difficulty it presented to Christ.
Our Lord knew no sin. Our Lord is the perfect Lamb
of God. Every word He spoke exposed our sin. Every word He spoke
exposed the sins of vain religious men. And men hated Him for that. And yet, when He went to that
garden of Gethsemane, He even knew there, brethren, that He
is fixing to take the shame that He hated, that He despised. and
be made sin for His people, and stand before God the Father who
He loved, with the sin of His people laid on Him. And He's
going to be hung up on this cross and stripped naked, not just
physically and before men, that would be bad enough, but He's
going to be stripped before the God He loved, bearing the sin
of His people, becoming guilty before God. as He stood there
in the room instead of His people, so that God might be just to
pour out judgment upon Him in our room instead. He went to
that cross sweating drops of blood. It was such a suffering
to Him to be laid down His life like that, and bear that shame
and that judgment, and be forsaken of God as He did that. To hang
there with none of His people, them having forsaken Him and
having God forsaken him. Alone. We don't even know what
that... We don't even have any idea how
alone our Savior was there. None to help. Not God and not
His brethren. None to help. I tread the winepress
of the fury of the wrath of God alone. And He did. He treaded alone, brethren. He's
facing that and He knows everything. If you speak of us having to
bear sin, that would be nothing to us. We've borne sin since
the moment we were conceived in our mother's womb. Christ
knew no sin. Christ had no sin. He's not guilty. He would never sin against the
Father. And He's going to go and bear
our shame and our punishment He knew what that was. He knew
the great extreme it was to go from having the riches of glory
to be made utterly poor for our sakes. He knew what that was. He knew exactly what that was.
But it didn't stop him. Knowing the time is short, he
said, I must be about my father's business. And he didn't sit down
until he finished it. He finished the transgression
and made an end of sins. He made reconciliation for iniquity. He brought in everlasting righteousness. He fulfilled the law and the
prophets. He is our new and living way into God's presence, our
high priest over the house of God. Therefore, there is therefore
now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus. Did He provide
for His bride? There is therefore now no condemnation
to them that are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh
but after the Spirit. And you who receive this abundance
of grace, you are complete in Him, which is the head of all
principality and power. Complete in Him. There can't
be one more thing added. to make you more perfect and
more holy and more righteous and more complete than you are
in Christ by what Christ has done. Just as He is the fullness
of the Godhead bodily, that's how complete you are in Christ. That word fullness and complete
are the same word. That's what He did because He
loved His bride and knew the time is short. I must work the
works. So lastly, brethren, how does
the Apostle, through the Spirit of God, apply this to you and
me now? Lastly, he tells us, for the sake of our own souls,
for the sake of those in our household, for the sake of other
lost sheep who he yet shall call through this Gospel. Verse 29,
he says, it remaineth that both they that have wives be as though
they had none. and they that weep as though
they wept not, and they that rejoice as though they rejoiced
not, and they that buy as though they possessed not. The time
is short and our business, our purpose for being on this earth
is urgent. It's urgent. There's nothing
more urgent than this. You know how How beside ourselves
and how anxious and how urgent we take things that are just
not even resemble any urgency. You know how we get all, the
world is going to stop if we don't get this accomplished,
you know. This is the urgent business. This is the urgent
business. The time is short. We... Christ was about his father.
Now he said, we must be about our father's business. We must
be about our father's business. Love and provide for your wives
and for your families. But do so by worshipping and
honoring Christ above all. Love them, provide for them.
But do it by worshiping Christ above them. And do it by making
sure that your wife and your children or your spouse, your
husband and your children, make sure they're under the sound
of the gospel. Under the sound of the gospel.
And love them by providing for the preaching of the gospel and
Love Christ's bride the same way. Love Christ's bride scattered
in all the earth by seeing that this gospel goes forth to them
in all the earth. That's our purpose, brother.
Believe Christ and love one another. Believe on Christ, rest in Him,
and all righteousness is fulfilled. All the laws are fulfilled because
Christ has fulfilled it all for us. God just brings us to believe
on Him and rest in Him. And the second commandment is
love one another. And the chief way we love one
another, right here in our midst, the chief way we provide for
one another, brethren, is making sure we have this gospel for
one another. You couldn't love me better than
making sure this gospel continues to be preached in this place
for my children, for my wife and my children. You couldn't
do anything I would more appreciate than that. Can't you say the
same? That's the number one way we
forgive one another, we look over one another's faults, we
cover the sins of our brethren. We don't excuse it, but we don't
bring it up and run each other down and all that stuff because
we don't want to divide and split and splinter and break off into
factions because we need each other to have this gospel for
each other. And that's how we love each other. Weep and rejoice, brethren. There's
no problem with weeping. Jesus wept. Weep and rejoice. But make sure Christ and His
gospel is our chief joy. Make sure Christ and His gospel
is our chief joy. And make sure our chief reason
for weeping is how badly we fail in honoring and serving Him in
this life. You could weep over things that's
sinful. We could weep over not getting our way and getting the
lust of our flesh and getting all our idols heaped upon us.
That's sinful. But to weep because we haven't
served Christ like we want to in our heart, that's an honorable
thing. So rejoice and weep, but make Christ the preeminent reason
for your joy and your weeping. And buy. There's no problem with
buying. You can buy. He's put us here
to buy. You can have possessions. There's
no sin against that. But glorify Christ who is the
possessor and the provider of everything you have. He possesses
you. He purchased you. And He's providing
everything for you. And everything we have is of
His hand. We don't have one thing that's of us. The air we breathe
is not ours. The space we take up on this
earth is not ours. When they lay these bodies in
a grave, in a six foot by three foot plot of ground, we are going
to be borrowing that from Christ. It's not our own either. Everything
in between is His. He provides it. So buy, buy. It's fine to buy. But do so knowing
Christ is the provider. Christ is the one. He's our chief
possession, and we're His chief possession. Brethren, now, knowing
the time is short, He's saying, make your focus one thing. Make
it Christ and His kingdom. He said, seek ye first the kingdom
of God and His righteousness, and He said, I will take care
of everything else you need in this life. Don't get twisted
and over here thinking, well, I've got to do this for my family
and that for my family. If I don't have all this, we're
not going to make it. We're not going to make it. Satan would
love for you to be right there. Why? Because now you're ignoring
Christ. Now you're not having Christ
for your family. Now you leave off the gospel. Now you'll be
so mad when you come to the church house that you'll get mad at
your brethren. The next thing you know, you're split off completely
from your brethren. If he can get enough people to
do that, the whole church will break up. Oh, he'd love for you
to be, I've got to provide for my family, I've got to do this,
and I'm going to ignore the gospel to do this. He'd love for you
to do that. One time I had the best intention in my heart. I
thought I had a job, I was working, I was making really good money,
and in my heart it was a job that was, I was having to rebuild
an entire sales office from the ground up, even the whole entire
branch. I was the only manager there
for a long time and I was working day and night. I would spend
the night there sometimes just so I wouldn't have to make the
commute back and forth. And so I'd miss Wednesday night services,
midweek services. But in my heart, I thought it's
okay because I'm doing this sincerely. I'm doing this because I want
to support the church. I want to support the gospel.
What does Christ say? First give yourselves and then
give your stuff. First give yourselves. My pastor
called me and he said, you would be more faithful to Christ if
you're here. I'd rather have you here than
have your money here. And then the other. But you need to be here. And
he's right. Where would that have ended up
if it had kept going? How good is it going to do my
soul or my children's soul if we never come to the house of
God ever, but we send our money there and support it? See? You've got to go first. You'd be there first. And Christ
will provide for you to do the other. You see what I'm saying?
So make him seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness,
and he'll take care of everything else. Turn over to Romans 12,
and we'll end with this. The time is short. I've gone
too long. Romans 12. And look here in verse 1. Here's
what he's telling us, brethren. Romans 12, verse 1. I beseech
you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, constrained by
His mercy, strengthened by His mercy, by the mercies of God,
saved by His mercy, that you present your bodies a living
sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable
service. And be not conformed to this
world, but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind,
that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect
will of God. All right, brethren, let's stand
together. Our great God and Father, we
thank you for this word. Lord, make us to know this of
a certainty. Make us to know how short our
time is and make us see the urgency of focusing all our time and
attention on Christ and the urgency of spreading his gospel both
for our families, ourselves, and our loved ones and those
that you're yet to call out. Lord, make us truly a living
sacrifice to Christ for all the great things you've done for
us by your mercy. Forgive us, Lord. Forgive us,
forgive us, forgive us. We ask it in Christ's name. Amen.