I want to thank you for the honor
of having me conduct this service today. I'll be brief and hopeful
that I will be comforting to you. I didn't have the privilege
meeting Vonda, but throughout time I have met her family, some
of her friends and loved ones, and I appreciate them greatly,
and I'm thankful to be here for you. I can't imagine the grief
that you must be bearing. I've never lost a child. I've
never lost a sibling. I've never had to mourn through
those things. I have lost a parent. And for
you children, I was only 18. So my heart goes out for you
because there's been more years of growing in love, more years
of growing in trust, more years of appreciating them. And that
makes it harder. My heart breaks for you. But
I pray I'll be able to show you some comfort today in the only
lasting place that comfort can be found. At our church, we often
look at trials. how to handle trials, how to
find comfort in trials. But why would I preach so much
on that? Humans have a lot of trouble, don't we? Job wrote,
man is born of woman, is a few days and full of trouble. He
cometh forth like a flower and is cut down. We know that. We each experience many troubles
in our lives. These are things that we know
to be true. King Solomon wrote, to everything there is a season,
a time to ever purpose under heaven, a time to be born, a
time to die, a time to plant, a time to pluck up that which
is planted, a time to weep, and a time to laugh, a time to mourn,
and a time to dance. We remember happy times, but
we also remember times of weeping like we have today. But King
Solomon wrote some other things too. He's known to be the wisest
man that was ever born of Adam. He wrote three books in the Bible.
There was Song of Solomon. Most people don't know that.
He wrote Proverbs. Most people have heard of a book
called Proverbs, but what I'm going to look at today in my
text will be out of Ecclesiastes. Here's the wisest man that ever
lived. He said, it is better to go to
the house of mourning than to go to the house of feasting.
For that is the end of all men and the living will lay it to
his heart. And you and I, all the natural
men and women walking on this earth, that doesn't make any
sense, does it? Why would it be better to be in this house
of mourning today than enjoying a wonderful feast and a time
of happiness? He said, for it is better to
be in the house of mourning than to go to the house of feasting,
for that is the end of all men, and the living will lay it to
his heart. Us who are physically alive need
to lay this to our heart that we have an end. The Hebrew writer
said, it is appointed on a man once to die, but after this,
the judgment, every man and woman on this earth knows in them that
we will not live forever. And the Lord puts in our hearts
to know that he is real and we will come to his throne of judgment
on our final day. And now we may suppress those
things. We may ignore them. We may fight against it, push
it down. But inside of each and every
one of us, we know that. So. When we are in the house
of feasting, we're in those houses of good times, there's not much
care given to the things of God. We're content with the things
we have, we're distracted by our material blessings, the good
times. God's not in all of our thoughts,
and our end is not in our thoughts. So many may give a little bit
of thanks, but then they quickly turn back to that joy that we
find here on earth. But for those that are in the
house of mourning, it is better. Because we are brought to consider
spiritual things. We are forced to face the reality
we have before us in our body. We're forced to acknowledge we
have an end. There will be a service like this for each of us. Each
and every one of us. No one here will live forever
on this earth. No one's going to live to 900
years old. And we know that. But what comes after this life?
Scriptures tell us it's the judgment. The Bible is so clear throughout
from Genesis to Revelation that we will either be judged on our
merit, our works, our righteousness, or we will be judged in the merit,
in the work, and in the righteousness of the substitute. We will either
be found in Christ, robed in His righteousness, His worth,
and His perfection, and we will enter into eternal bliss and
glory, being made in the likeness of Him. or will be judged in
comparison to Him, in comparison to His holiness, in comparison
to His perfection and His merit. And we will enter into eternal
condemnation, wrath, and judgment. So why do we need a substitute?
The Scriptures show throughout that man's at war with God. All
of mankind is evil continually. Our thoughts are enmity against
God day and night. We're sinners, each and every
one of us. We fell into sin when Adam fell
in the garden. And then on our own, we come
forth from the womb speaking lies. There's none good. No, not one. Those are all scriptures.
I just paraphrased it. As a teenager, my pastor told
me that. And I said, that can't be right. I'm not that bad. I'm
not one of those sinners." And he said, you stand up in front
of this church and you tell everybody what went through your mind today.
Tell them the thoughts that went through your mind just this morning. And suddenly I realized I didn't
want to do that. Suddenly I realized that what
God says is right. His Word is correct. We're all
sinners. We're lying to ourselves about
our true condition before a holy God. Preacher, I thought she
was going to comfort us today. I pray I can. I pray the Spirit
will give you ears to hear the truth. You can't appreciate the
good news if you don't know that there's bad news. It's better
for me to be in this house of mourning, knowing the truth of
my situation, than it is in the house of feasting, lying to myself,
walking in ignorance. So what's the good news? If my
soul was ruined by the fall in the garden, and throughout my
whole life all of my thoughts have been wicked and evil, what
hope is there? There's redemption in the blood
of Christ. Christ died for sinners. That's
our good news. That's the only comfort to those
that face judgment. Men, women, children, we all
die because we have a terminal illness called sin. But the effects
are only seen in our eyes in this body. We only see it on
the outside. But that disease in us is in
our souls and we perish for eternity if we don't have a cure. If we
are without a physician, Christ said in Luke 5 that they that
are whole need not a physician, but they that are sick. I came
not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. If we
stand firm that we are ready to be able to satisfy God's judgment
on our goodness, our righteousness, our spiritual health, we do not
need a great physician. If we do so, we will come up
short. We will be found lacking in that final day. I don't want
to be found lacking. So that raises the question,
what must I do to be saved? What must I do to see this position?
Some people asked the Apostle Peter this after he preached
at the Feast of Pentecost. And they said, therefore, let
all the house of Israel know assuredly that God hath made
that same Jesus whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ. Now when
they heard this, they were pricked in their hearts. They were in
that house of mourning. It pricked them. And they said
unto Peter and the rest of the apostles, Men and brethren, what
shall we do? And Peter said unto them, Repent. That word means turn. Turn from
what you think is right and believe what God says. Turn from your
works and your merit to Christ's work and Christ's merit. We turn
from ourselves and turn to the Lord. Paul and Silas were in
a jail, and an earthquake came. The Lord sent an earthquake,
and it tore down all the walls of that jail. They were free,
but they kept sitting there. And the warden came up and asked
them, the man that was responsible for taking care of them, and
he said, Sirs, what must I do to be saved? And they said, believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. Do I have
to get better in my life? Do I have to get my life in order
before I come begging for mercy to Christ? Do I have to do something
to be healed from my sin by this great position? The Romans were
told by Paul, for when we were yet without strength in due time,
Christ died for the ungodly. He came for those sick people,
not for the history, not for the will. Matthew 11, Christ
said, come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, those
that labor in their works, those that are laboring, trying to
please God on their own and their righteousness. Come unto me and
I will give you rest. You can rest from your labor.
Come to Christ. If the Lord does a work in your
heart and draws you to Him, you're His. Those that Christ died for,
those that believe on Him, those that declare, if I have any merit,
if I have any goodness, if I have any righteousness, it's His righteousness. It's His merit. He gave it to
me. Those people are born again.
Those people that profess Christ as all will not face the throne
of judgment. Because Christ faced that judgment,
that holy justice for us on the cross of Calvary. That debt has
already been paid. When Solomon wrote, it is better
to go to the house of mourning than it is to the house of feasting,
for that is the end of all men and the living will lay it to
his heart. I plead with you, come today,
right now in this house of mourning, come to Christ. Do not rest in
your feasting and in your happiness. See that you have an end and
I pray that God will give you life in your eternal soul and
that Christ's salvation is laid on your heart. Amen. Let's pray
together. Heavenly Father, we're thankful
for this time in your providence that you've given us to hear
your word. This house of mourning will come
to us all, Lord. Before that time, give us the
great hope in your son. We're sick and needy, Lord. Send
the great position to us and do a work in our heart. Give
us his righteousness. Give us his hope. It's in his
name that we pray. Amen.