My text this morning is found
in the book of Ecclesiastes, the first chapter. Find Psalms
and Proverbs and then Ecclesiastes. Ecclesiastes chapter 1. In July of 2021, I preached a
message here from verse 1 that I titled, Vanity of Vanities,
All is Vanity. Solomon, the wisest man who ever
lived apart from the Lord Jesus Christ, concluded at the end
of his life that everything and everyone except one thing and
one person was vain, futile, and ineffective. That's what
vain means. Solomon's father, David, said
to the Lord, behold, thou hast made my days as a handbreadth,
and mine age is nothing before thee. Then he said, verily, every
man, every woman, everybody, at their best state is altogether
vanity. Psalm 39, five. Everything and
everyone at its best, vanity. In the end, just useless, pointless,
ineffective, except for one thing, just one, Jesus Christ. He's the one thing needful. There's only one thing needful,
and that's Jesus Christ, that's salvation in Him. Has God revealed
to you that you need Him? Are you like Martha, careful
and troubled about many things? Or are you more like Mary who
chose that good part which shall not be taken away from her? That's
something that can't ever be taken away from you. Salvation
in the Lord Jesus Christ. No man can pluck me from His
hand. He's greater than all. If I'm
His, I'm forever His. If He ever loved me, He loves
me still. What shall not be taken from
us? The knowledge of Christ. That's
what Mary chose, the good part. Salvation by Him. Faith in Him. She sat at Christ's feet and
heard of Him. And she heard from Him. You know, that's the only way
that we hear. He's the sum and the substance
of the Word that she heard. This is the one thing needful
and the one thing necessary. So, have you chosen the good
part? If you have, it shall never, never be taken away from you. Notice in verse 1 the emphasis
that Solomon put on preaching. And rightly so. You know, religion
today has made preaching the gospel the most important thing that
it is secondary. It kind of comes down the line
of the list of things. But here Solomon wrote the words
of the preacher, the son of David, King in Jerusalem. And notice
that the title preacher there is capitalized. The word king
is not. Solomon here is putting more
importance and significance on his calling as a preacher than
on his appointment as king. And he truly is. We think of the president, what
a high calling. There's no higher calling than
that of a preacher. And Solomon knew that. And at
the end of this earthly life in this flesh, the preaching
of the Gospel, dear friends, will prove to be the one and
the only thing that is needful. The hearing of the Gospel, the
truth of the Scriptures, the Bible, God's Word, will prove
to be the most important and crucial thing that we could ever
do for ourselves in order to have eternal life. The truly
needful thing in this life, in this world, is to attend the
preaching of the gospel. Not to attend church. A lot of
people attend church. A place where the gospel is not
preached is not a church. Well, I've been accused of that. Well, you think you're the only
ones. No. No, I don't. Now, there's others.
I know they are. I know. Our Lord said, upon this
rock, speaking of that confession of the Lord Jesus being the Christ,
the Son of the living God, upon this rock, that confession, The
church is built. It's the church that believes
the Lord Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God, that
the gates of hell shall not prevail against. Not a building. Those who believe and trust in
Christ. There is no church where there
is no Christ preached. There's no church where there's
no gospel preached. In Acts chapter 2 verse 47, we're
told that the Lord added to the church daily, such as should
be saved. Saul persecuted the church believers. He didn't go up to someone's
house where they met and just kick the side of the house. No,
he persecuted believers. He didn't persecute the unbelieving
Jews. He was an unbelieving Jew at
the time himself. Slaw made havoc of the church,
those who believed. He took them and drugged them
out of their houses and threw them into prison. He held the
coats of those who stoned Stephen. The church is made up of believers
in Christ. Not those who confess another
Jesus. Not those who trust in their
adding to what he did. Not those who have decided to
let him have his way in their life. Not those who have given
him his heart. The church of God is not founded
on what sinners do for God. but upon what Christ the Rock
has done for sinners. Only the church is gonna be saved.
Only those who are saved are called the church. And I mean
to be elementary here. I mean to be redundant. We need
to get this from here to here. That's a long 18, 19 inches,
isn't it? The gospel is the means that
God uses to save the church, them that believe. The world
calls it foolishness. They do so because they're perishing.
That's what Paul said. He said, for the preaching of
the cross is to them that perish, foolishness, but unto us, the
church, it's the power of God to be saved.
To those who are saved, it's the power of God. 1 Corinthians
1.18. Men and women perish because professing themselves to be wise,
they become fools. Romans 1.22. Paul continued on
there in 1 Corinthians 1, verse 19, and wrote, for it is written,
I, speaking of God, will destroy the wisdom of the wise and bring
to nothing the understanding of the prudent. Prudent means
the self-confessed wise, those who confess themselves to be
wise. And then he asked, where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where are those professional
transcribers of God's Word who thought they knew so much? Where
is the disputer of this world? Where is the debater, the argumentative
one who claims to know all? Hath God not made foolish the
wisdom of the world? People look at what we do here,
listen to what we say here, and they say, just foolishness. And
yet, they're the foolish ones. For after that, in the wisdom
of God, the world by wisdom, their wisdom, the world's wisdom,
knew not God. It pleased God by the foolishness,
what the world calls foolishness, of preaching to save them that
believe. And yet to the child of God,
preaching the gospel is the most important and crucial and needful
thing in all the world. That's why you're here this morning.
I hope it is. The preaching of the cross, the
preaching of the Christ of the cross, there's no effectual effectiveness
in the piece of wood that Christ hung upon. I heard Brother Henry
saying a message not long ago that if you could find the actual
piece of wood that the Lord was crucified upon, the best thing
you could do would be to burn it. Just burn it. Because sure
enough, men would start trusting in that piece of wood instead
of the one hung upon it. The preaching of Jesus Christ
and Him crucified. Who He is. What think ye of Christ? Whose Son is He? He's the Son
of God. He's God's Son. That's what He did. He was crucified
in the room instead of sinners. Sinners that He knew before the
foundation of the world and set His affection upon. And He's
going to bring every single one of them to the saving knowledge
of His blessed Son. All else, vanity. Vanity of vanities,
all is vanity. All else is empty, worthless,
valueless, useless. Solomon refers to himself as
the preacher, and this was his message as the preacher. Look
at verse two. Vanity of vanities, saith the
preacher, vanity of vanities, all is vanity. What profit hath
a man of all his labor which he taketh unto the sun? You work all your life, you work
hard, you save, you accumulate things. What profit is it in
the end? Huh? Are you going to take any
of it with you? No, Job said, naked you came into this world,
naked you're going to leave. And then he said, blessed be
the name of the Lord. That's the important thing. Verse 4,
one generation passeth away, and another generation cometh,
but the earth abideth forever. And it's all vanity. One generation
after the next. It's been that way since Adam's
fall into sin. And this is Solomon's word in
the beginning of the book of Ecclesiastes. What are his words
at the end of it? That's what I want us to look
at this morning. So turn with me to the 12th chapter of Ecclesiastes,
the last chapter of the book, and let's check it out. Had his opinion changed? Look at verse 6, and let me say
while you're turning that there are some of you here this morning
that are having some trials with your elderly parents. One thing
that I know for certain, if the Lord allows us to live, we too
one day very soon are going to be elderly. One day very soon every one of
us will experience physical death because it's appointed unto men
once to die, but after this the judgment. That's why this is
so crucial. That's why all these other things
don't amount to a hill of beans. One day we're going to go out
and stand before God. And how much money you got, or
what kind of status you had in this life, don't mean nothing.
It's all vain. It's vanity. The question is,
what think you of Christ? Our parents' death and our death
is appointed by God and every one of us is going to stand before
God. And now everything we do and everything we are is vanity
with the exception of one thing. What is it? What they give Christ. When you go out to meet God,
that's all that's going to matter. Solomon is talking here about
a man that has lived for a while and has now grown old. Look at
verse six. Wherever the silver cord be loosed,
or the golden bowl be broken, or the pitcher be broken at the
fountain, or the wheel broken at the cistern, then shall the
dust return to the earth as it was, and the Spirit shall return
unto God who gave it. Vanity of vanities. saith the preacher, all is vanity."
His mind hadn't changed. His opinion wasn't different. Now, when you grow old, your
strength as a young man won't matter. It's gone. You won't
have any. It'll be broken. That's what
he's talking about in verse 6. Your possessions, your accomplishments,
they won't matter. Your accomplishments are going
to be forgotten. Your possessions are going to
burn. The only thing that is going to matter is Jesus Christ
and Him crucified. What do you think of Him? Many believe that Solomon was
in his later years when he wrote this. He lived to be 80. Some
of you now are 80 years old or older. Many of us will be there
in no time. My, the last 10 years have flown
by so fast that in another 10 years, and I expect them to fly
by faster. They just get faster, don't they?
It's like a vapor here and it's gone. I'm gonna be nearly 80
if I live that long. We'll be there in no time. Solomon's
thoughts and opinions hadn't changed over the years. If anything,
he was more resolved. Vanity of vanities. It's all
vanity. All of it. Many men and women
alike in their golden years become feeble. That's what Solomon's
talking about in verses 2-5 here. He's describing the infirmities
of old age. Verse 2, he says, while the sun
or the light or the moon or the stars Be not darkened. Some choose to understand this
as the dimness of sight when we get old. By whom the sun,
moon, stars become dark and harder to see. A couple of years ago,
I had cataract surgery. I got to where I couldn't see
at all at night. And then after I had them, everything was so
bright. Some of you have experienced
that recently. And some choose to understand
this as the, speaking of the inferior faculties of the soul,
the brightness of understanding, the darkening of the mind, the
judgment, the will, and the affections being darkened. The stars referring
to those bright notions and ideas brought about the imagination
of a younger man that are lost in old age. For what it's worth,
I think it refers to both, somewhat. And then Solomon continues in
verse 2 and he says, Nor the clouds return after the rain. Some understand this language
to refer to the mucus and the tears that flow from the eyes,
nose and mouth that frequently attend the sorrow of afflictions
that come in our later years. I forget who I was talking to
the other day. He said, I don't feel any different than I did
when I was older other than I just heard everywhere. The clouds speaking of the perpetual
succession of evils and afflictions and disorders of old age. As
soon as one's over, another one follows. I see you shaking your
head. Me too. Me too. Gene and Judy, others of our
number, know something about this. Kind of like perpetual
storms of health issues, isn't it? One after another. Verse three, in the day when
the keepers of the house shall tremble. What's that talking
about? Well, The house here is meant
by the human body, which is a house of clay and an earthen house
in which the soul dwells and tabernacles. And in old age,
our bodies, they wrinkle and they contract and they shrink
and they get stiff. They're attended with numbness
and pain and tremors. And then Solomon continues and
says, and the strong men shall bow themselves. As we get older,
the thighs and the legs and the feet, which are the basis and
support of our bodies, they're weakened. They begin to bend
under the weight of the body and unable to sustain the weight.
And then Solomon says in verse 3, and the grinders ceased because
there are few. The grinders here refer to teeth, which in senior years are often
fewer in number and less effective. Those who look out the windows
be darkened. As we grow older, our eyes grow
dim. Eyes are compared to windows
because the eyelids open and close like a window does. And
as I said, cataracts cause things to become dim and our eyesight
is greatly hindered. It's talking about old age. Isaac
was old and his eyes were dim. And it's true that old age is
not for sissies. It's not, is it? Verse four,
and the doors shall be shut in the streets. The doors of our
body begin to shut. We don't see well through the
doors of our eyes. We don't hear well through the
doors of our ears. Our speech becomes difficult,
slower and lower throughout the doors of our mouth. And he continues
and he said, he shall rise up at the voice of a bird. What
does that mean? You ever have something, They'd
wake you up and you can't go back to sleep. Well, you can
hear a little something outside your window or something. You,
wait, what was that? Then you go. And you sit there
with your eyes open until you finally just get up. Because
you can't, you know, can't go back to sleep. The least noise
awakes the aged out of sleep. He rises early, he's not able
to go back to sleep. And then Solomon says, and the
daughters of music shall be brought low. The ears, the lungs, the
throat, the teeth, the mouth, and the lips, they begin to falter
and no longer able to be employed in the things of enjoying or
making music. These things express the weakness
which are generally attributed to our senior years. Aren't you encouraged? Verse 5, also when they shall
be afraid of that which is high. Now that's not speaking of God,
the Most High God, but that's speaking rather of high places,
high hills, mountains, towers. Most aged folks don't care for
heights. You know why? Well, because of feebleness and
weakness of the limbs, difficulty in breathing. When you ever been
to a higher elevation and you go, why am I having so much trouble
breathing? Well, atmosphere is thinner and it's harder to breathe,
or thicker, whichever one it is. Difficulty. Fears shall be
in the way. Fears of what? Falling over this,
tripping over that. Stumbling over something else.
Falling is a real fear for those that are older. Men and women
fall, they break their hip, and it's soon the end of them. There's
a fear of these things. It says, the almond tree shall
flourish. That refers to the gray hairs
that have appeared. The flourishing of gray hair
is a sign of old age. And the grasshopper shall be
a burden. You know, my mother, bless her heart, she had such
thin skin and older age that if you just touched her, she
would bruise. And this is saying if we live long enough, Our bodies
grow so frail that should a grasshopper jump on us, something that's
very light, should leap on an aged person, it'd cause them
pain and bruising. It doesn't take much. Just a
grasshopper can burden one who's aged. And it says, and desire
shall fall, the desire of appetite, food, pleasure, activity, whatever. I'm 68 and I have to make myself
get up and go most of the time. Get up. You know, you ever talk
to yourself like that? Get up. Get with it. You need to do something. How
many times have you heard an older person say, I don't feel
like doing anything? They don't. They don't. Their desire has failed. It's
common for all who live this long. Because man goeth to his
long home. That's speaking of the grave.
And that's where we're all going. And the mourners go about the
streets. We die, and those left behind come, and they pay their
respects, and they mourn, and then they're soon forgotten. Why is that? Because in the end,
all that we have, all that we've done, all that we've accomplished,
all we've accumulated in this life is vanity of vanities. All is vanity. It don't amount
to anything. And you might say to yourself,
there has to be more to life than that. I've got good news
for you. There is. There is. but you'll never see what God
doesn't reveal to you. May God be pleased to reveal
it to you this morning if He has it. God causes some to seek
Him for the things that really, really matter. And that's why we need the one
thing needful. Look at verse nine. And moreover,
well, what does that mean? It means besides what has been
said or what remains to be said, how much more excellent is it
to hear something of what the Lord has prepared for them that
love Him. And the means that God provided
this is the gospel through preaching. Beautiful are the feet of them
that preach the gospel. I remember when Brother Maurice
died, and I talked to Sue and them about
this before I ever wrote an article, but I wrote an article back then.
I went up to see Brother Montgomery, and his foot had come out from
underneath the cover, and he had a big toe that got cut off
in a lawnmower. And he was never embarrassed
about it. He joked about it. He said, look
at my big toe there. And I'm like, you don't have
a big toe. And he just laughed, and that's all with that. But
I'm going to tell you something. When I saw that foot, when he
was on his deathbed there, and that toe was missing, those were
the most beautiful feet I ever saw in my life. as they brought
the gospel, they preached the gospel of good news. And beautiful
are the feet of them that do. Verse nine, because the preacher
was wise, he still taught the people knowledge. Yea, he gave
good heed and sought out and set in order many proverbs. In
other words, the true preacher hasn't held back anything. Inhale
back anything, we don't hold back anything. God's servants
don't preach what they think is true. They preach what God
says is true. Everything that God says is true.
In Jeremiah 42 verse 4, the prophet Jeremiah said to Johanan, I will
pray unto the Lord your God according to your words, and it shall come
to pass that whatsoever thing the Lord shall answer you, I
will declare it unto you. I'll keep nothing back from you. In Acts chapter 20, the Apostle
Paul speaks to the church and he says, I served the Lord with
all humility of mind and with many tears and temptations, which
fell me by the lying weight of the Jews, how I kept back nothing
that was profitable, but have showed you and taught you publicly,
testifying both to the Jews and also to the Greeks, repentance
toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. A true
preacher of God is going to declare what this book preaches if it
angers everyone, because it's the truth. And we tell the truth about God
and about ourselves and about his gospel. Paul went on to say,
Wherefore I take you to record this day, that I am pure from
the blood of all men, for I have not shunned to declare unto you
all the counsel of God. Well, I like this preaching here,
but this predestination stuff, I don't like it. It's the counsel
of God. Well, I like to hear about the
love of God, but I don't like to hear about the judgment of
God, the wrath of God. It's all the counsel of God.
I take to record this day, I'm
pure from the blood of all men. For I have not shunned to declare
unto you all the counsel of God. Solomon, the wise preacher he
was, did just that. That's what every faithful minister
of the gospel does. And though Solomon himself turned
to folly in his old age, he recovered from that and he gained more
wisdom through his fall. Through the follies and vanities
of life being recovered and restored, Solomon was lifted more to teach
and instruct others. You know what qualifies me to
be a preacher? And someone asked me that time, well, where did
you attend seminary? Where did you go to college? I didn't. I'm glad I didn't. What qualifies me to preach this
glorious gospel of God's great and sovereign grace is I'm a
great sinner. who's experienced the need of
God's wonderful and great grace personally. I need it. The only
other qualification that I have is that I sit under a faithful
man who preached it for almost 20 years. Like Paul, I'm the
worst of the worst. Like Paul, I'm less than the
least. Like Paul, I'm a wretched man in need. How about you? Solomon said, I still teach the
people knowledge. We teach man that he's altogether
vanity in and of himself. We teach man that the world's
riches, the world's glory, the world's honor, excellencies are
the vanity of vanities, all of it's vanity. We teach that God will only accept
the perfect righteousness that the perfect Savior, the Lord
Jesus Christ, charges to our account by taking His sin upon
Himself. We, like Solomon the preacher,
encourage the sinner to take heed to what God says in this
book. Isn't that what it says here?
Take heed therefore unto yourselves and to all the flock, over the
which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed the church
of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood." Take heed,
take heed. This is one thing needful. Take
heed unto thyself and unto thy doctrine, continuing then, for
in doing this thou shalt both save thyself and them that hear
thee. Take heed, take heed, brethren,
lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing
from the living God. Better take heed. We have a more sure word of prophecy,
whereunto you do well that you take heed, as unto a light that
shineth in a dark place. A preacher seeks out, and sets
in order many proverbs from God's Word. That's what preaching is.
Telling sinners what God has done for them. Not bragging on
them for what they've done for God. We haven't done anything
for God that's worthy of bragging. What maketh thee to differ from
another? What do you have you didn't receive? And if you received
it, why do you glory in it as though you deserved it? Servant of God is diligent in
investigating the truth. We search the sacred writings
of God's Word. There are some coal miners in
this town, but I'm a word miner. That's right. I'm digging for
the gold and silver of Christ and Him crucified. I dig for
it. To show you, teach you, and encourage
you to take heed to these things. All else is vanity. It don't
amount to nothing. Verse 10, the preacher sought
to find out acceptable words. And that which was written was
upright, even words of truth. Every week God called men, seek
from this book God's word, acceptable words. You know what that word
acceptable there means? You're going to like this. It
means delightful. We seek delightful words. Aren't
these words delightful? They are to you if you're a sinner. We seek delightful words. That's
always accomplished when we preach Jesus Christ and Him crucified. I can remember early on in preaching,
There'd be times, most of the time, you feel like a failure,
and I still do. But every once in a while, you
step down and you think, hey, I did okay on that. I'll never
forget one such occasion. I asked Teresa, I said, what
did you think of that message? She said, well, there wasn't
no gospel in it. And there wasn't! There wasn't any delightful words.
No encouraging words. God forbid that I should glory
except in the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ and Him crucified. Isn't that delightful to know
that God Almighty became a man and came to this earth and died
in my room instead? How delightful that is! He's the delight and pleasure
of God's people. He's the delight and pleasure
of God Himself. Christ is. And no wonder Paul
wrote, but unto them which are called both Jews and Greeks,
Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God. No wonder
Paul said, for I determined not to know anything among you except
or say Jesus Christ and Him crucified. Why? Because that's all that
matters. All else is vanity, it's vain. What could be more pleasurable
and comfortable to God's people than Him sending Christ to be
our propitiation, our covering for sin? For your sin and mine. All your sin. Every sin. Every sin you've committed, every
sin you're committing now, and every sin you will commit. All
of them. What could be more thrilling
to a wretched sinner than the pardoning of their sin by the
shedding of Christ's blood? Oh, friends, these are acceptable. These are delightful words, are
they not? Peace, pardon, righteousness,
salvation. More delightful and desirable
than silver and gold. More pleasant and sweet than
the taste of honey and the honeycomb. So much so that God's preachers
seek them out. Woe unto me if I preach, if I
don't preach the gospel. Not if I don't preach. There's
a lot of people preaching and not saying anything. But woe
unto me if I preach not the gospel, the delightful, the acceptable
words of God. They're upright words, he said.
They're words of truth upright because they're the works of
an upright God. Words inspired by the upright,
righteous Savior, written according to the mind and the will of God.
Sincere, unmixed, unadulterated with the inventions and the doctrines
of men and devils. They are the means that God causes
men to walk uprightly, to live soberly, to live righteously
and godly in this world. Delightful words. Acceptable
words. And they're even the words of
truth. The truth of God who is the God of truth. The words of
God who cannot lie. The truth of Christ and what
He's done for sinners. The Lord said, sanctify them
through thy truth. Thy word is truth. Verse 11,
and I'll hurry. The words of the wise are his
goads. That's talking about an ox goad.
It's talking about a probe. That's what that is. It's a stick
with a big sharp nail or something on the end of it that prods and
pricks the oxen. And that's what the word of God
is. It's the means of pricking sinners
in their heart, laying open their boundness and their sinfulness. The Word of God is an ox gold
that God uses to stir the slothful and awake the sleepy, and it
corrects and it reproves and it rebukes. Thank God for these acceptable
words. Again, verse 11, as nails fastened
by the masters of assemblies. Christ is that nail in a sure
place. We preach Christ. He's the mighty
Redeemer. He's the able Savior that cannot
be moved. He's the unshakable and immovable. He's a nail in a sure place. He's the everlasting Head, Husband,
and Savior of His people. In Christ we shall not be moved. I shall, I shall, I shall not
be moved. In Christ I won't be. Now in
and of myself, you can blow me over. Now look at verse 12. And further by these, my son,
be admonished, be encouraged, of making many books there is
no end, and much study is a weariness of the flesh. There are many
books in this world. Oh, you can get online or go
to a bookstore, and you can get any kind of book you want on
self-help, motivational books, even commentaries on the Scripture.
Everybody's written one. How sad is it that men and women
are ever learning, but never ever coming to the knowledge
of the truth. There's no understanding, friends, apart from divine revelation. That's what I want us to understand.
Much study is weariness of the flesh, Solomon said. You know,
I can sit at a desk for eight hours and study, and there's
nothing physical about it. and become as weary as if I had
split lumber all day long. The wise man Solomon confirmed
this. Much study is weariness of the
flesh. Only God can reveal the salvation
of Christ. None can see it apart from His
divine revelation. There are many, many, many books,
but there's only one book that's effectual. It's the one you're
holding right now. You need to pick it up and read
it. You need to dig into it. Holy Bible, the book of truth.
We search the Scriptures, they testify of Christ. Jesus Christ
is the beginning and the end. He's everything in between. He's
that crimson thread that binds this book together. He's the
sum and substance of God's Word. Salvation is found only in Him. And by nature, we will not come
to Christ. that we might have life apart
from God making us willing in the day of His power. He must
give us life. He must make us willing. He must
save us if we're to be saved. All else, vanity! Vanity of vanities. And in verse 13, Solomon says,
let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter. Here it is.
There's only one thing that matters. There's only one thing that's
not vain and vanity. There's only one thing that's
needful. It's the conclusion of the whole matter. Christ did
for us what we could not do for ourselves. That's it. That's
it. We fear, we reverence God, we
keep His commandments. For this is the whole duty of
man, Solomon said. How do we who are nothing but
sin and can do nothing but sin keep the commandments of God?
Only one way. Only in Christ who kept the law
of God perfectly for us. Only in Christ who fulfills the
law and satisfied God's justice for us. He's the one thing needful. All else is vanity. It's our
duty to strive to do so. It's our reasonable service to
the one who loved us and died for us. In verse 14, for God
shall bring every work into judgment and every single thing, whether
it be good or whether it be evil. Now in the day of judgment, when
all of us stand before God, whatever's been done by men and women from
the beginning of the world will be observed by the omniscient
God. He knows everything. We're not
hiding anything from God. It's all been registered in the
book of His remembrance. The sovereign judge will bring
all things into account on that awful day. Whether they're good
or evil, the things done in the body. And that's why men should
fear God and keep His commandments, because it's a fearful thing
to fall into the hands of the living God. And with every secret
thing, things that are committed in secret, well, they're naked
and open unto the God with whom we have to do. We're not getting
anything over on Him. All we are, all we have, all
we've done will be useless, pointless, futile, and vain. It's all vanity,
except for one thing. What do you and I think of the
one who took our sin, our guilt, our sorrow, paid our debt in
full, and provided for us a perfect righteousness, and conformed
us to His perfect image? Jesus Christ has made to me all
I need. Everything I need is in Him.
He's the good part. He's the one thing needful. So
let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter. Christ is all.
Isn't that it? Three words. Christ is all. Knowing Him is eternal life. He that hath the Son hath life.