Let's begin reading here in chapter
1 of 1 Corinthians, verse 26. Let's begin there. Verse 26 to
the end of the chapter. Paul says, for you see your calling
brethren, and everyone who has had their eyes opened by the
grace of God that's been given faith, they do see that. You
see your calling brethren, how that not many wise men after
the flesh Not many mighty, not many noble are called. But God,
I think Darwin mentioned the other night, don't you love those
words? But God has chosen, as they just sang, has chosen the
foolish things of the world to confound the wise. And God has
chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things
which are mighty. And base things of the world
and things which are despised hath God chosen, yea, and things
which are not, to bring to naught things that are. That no flesh
should glory in his presence. Of course not. What do they have
the glory in? But of him are you in Christ
Jesus, that is of God are you in Christ Jesus, who of God is
made unto us wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption,
that according as it is written, He that glorious, let him glory
in the Lord. Now, last night, Brother Darvin
preached from Philippians 3, verse 9, found in him. And he read this passage, he
read my text, verse 30, dealt with it a little bit. As I said,
his message was found in him. Mine is in Christ Jesus. In Christ Jesus. No better place,
no better place to be than in Christ Jesus. Several years ago, more than
that actually, longer than I can really remember the date, But
I was visiting a dear friend in the hospital, and I went in
about the time he was having lunch. And I said, brother, if
you don't mind, you just go ahead and eat your lunch, and I'll
sit, and I'll do the talking. He said, OK. And finally, after
a few minutes, he pushed his tray away, and he said, brother
Larry, I declare, the more I eat that piece of meat, the bigger
it gets. The longer I chew it, the bigger
it gets. So it is here. I think there's
enough room for my brother and myself that we're not going to
exhaust this subject of being in Christ Jesus and being found
in him. You remember the apostle Peter
wrote in his first epistle, chapter two, verses six and seven, these
words. Peter wrote, wherefore also it
is contained in the scripture. This is from Psalm 118. Behold,
I lay in Zion a chief cornerstone, elect, precious. This is what
God says concerning his son. And he that believeth on him
shall not be confounded, will never be put to shame. Unto you,
therefore, which believe, he is precious. No child of God
would fail to say amen to that. No child of God will ever argue
about that. He is precious, and oh, how precious
for every believer to be in Christ Jesus, God's precious Son. There was a fellow one day teaching
a Bible class of young children, and he read these verses from
1 Peter that I just read to you. And he asked the children, young,
What does precious mean? What does that mean, precious? And one little girl raised her
hand and said, my father told us this morning that mother was
precious, our mother, because where would we be without her? And I thought that's a pretty
good definition. How precious is the Lord Jesus Christ? Well,
ask yourself, where would we be? Where would we be? Without Him, we'd be without
hope. We'd be without God. We'd be
without grace. We'd be without any promise whatsoever
except that of eternal damnation. Yes, Christ is precious. Old
John Newton, his most famous hymn, although he wrote hundreds,
his most famous one is Amazing Grace. Remember this line he
wrote? It was grace that taught my heart
to fear. Now that sounds strange to this
religious generation, because the God they profess to believe
in is a God that doesn't deserve to be feared. Why fear Him? He's helpless. He's rather to
be pitied than feared. Oh, but when God is pleased by
His grace to do for that sinner what only He can to teach him
some things when a man has truly been learned and taught of the
Father. As our Lord said in John chapter
6, oh, first he learns something about who God is. God turns the
light on. And then at the same time, he
teaches that sinner something about himself, what a wretch
he is. And then he'll understand old
Newton's words when he says, oh, it was grace that taught
my heart the fear that got me lost. Man, I declare, we are
so by nature in darkness, so far fallen, until God Almighty
gets us lost, we'll never be aware of it. We'll never know
it. That's what Newton was talking
about. It was grace that taught my heart to fear. And I'll tell
you this, I'll confess this. If someone at the time that I
was passing through that experience of God's grace by teaching me
who He was and what I was, if someone had told me, this is
an act of God's grace, God's being gracious to you, I'd say,
man, are you kidding me? Are you kidding me? This is grace? I'm lost. I'm undone. I'm a wretch before a holy God
and I don't know how he can justify me. You say this is grace. Yes, it was. Yes, it was. Another hymn writer put it this
way. What comfort can a Savior bring to those who've never felt
her woe? A sinner is a sacred thing. The
Holy Ghost has made him so. That's what it is, the fear.
But old Newton didn't stop there, did he? He also wrote, yes, it
was grace that taught my heart to fear, and grace, grace my
fears relayed. You remember that, don't you?
You remember that, don't you, brothers and sisters? Oh, what
a relief that was. What a relief that was. When
Jesus Christ spoke peace to my heart, I was a hippie. I'd been running around saying,
peace, peace, wearing things, peace, peace, my soul. I didn't have anything but peace,
turmoil, frustration. Oh, but God in Christ spoke peace
to my heart. Oh, what a relief that was. Remember old Pilgrim? In Pilgrim's
Progress, Christian with that burden on his back. He said,
just as I came up to the cross, that burden fell from off my
back. And it began to tumble and tumble until it fell into
a sepulcher below, and I saw it again no more forever." Oh,
what a relief that was. Can you imagine what a relief
it must have been that that poor, helpless, outcast leper? I mentioned him the other night. I identify with him, Darvin,
like you said you did. I see myself there. And he came
to the Lord Jesus Christ and said, if you will, you can make
me clean. Oh, and the Lord reaching forth
to touch him said, I will. Oh, do you not hear the chime
of wedding bells there? Will you take this man? Will
you take this woman? And Jesus Christ says, I will.
I will to that leper be thou clean. Oh, what a relief. My soul, can you imagine the
relief it must have been that that dying thief When by God-given
faith, he looks over to Jesus Christ in his dying hour, ready
to stand before a holy and just God and says, Lord, remember
me. Oh Lord, please remember me when you come into thy kingdom. Really? He's got some nerve. I mean, he's lived the whole
of his life. an insult or dishonor to God
Almighty. And now in his last hour, he
says, Lord, remember me? Oh, amazing grace, how sweet
the sound, because the Lord said, I remember you. Oh, I remember
you. Today, you're going to be with
me in paradise. And in a few hours, that dying
thief entered glory. as a trophy of King Jesus' mighty,
sovereign grace. Oh, and Newton also said, how
precious did that grace appear the hour I first believed, because
it was then that I learned what I never knew before, that I was
in Christ Jesus. Been learning, trying to learn
about that ever since, darling. Oh, in Christ Jesus. And I've just scratched the surface,
oh, I doubt that I've done that. To be in Him. Who did that? God did that. We read of Him,
that is God. He put His people in Christ Jesus
before the world was. He chose Him. God saves people
on purpose. How about that? I hear these And I'm being nice,
I'm being nice as I can be, but I hear these idiots supposed
to be preaching, teaching for God, speaking for God, and they
talk about salvation as though it's an accident, as though it
was an afterthought. My soul, what kind of God has
a new idea? Anything God does today, since
He changes not, He must have determined to do it before today,
hence before the foundation of the world. I'm God, I change
not. Our God never has a new idea
or a new thought. He knows His works from the beginning
to the end because He's purposed that. It must come to pass. I find a lot of comfort in that,
don't you? God doesn't save people by accident, He saves them on
purpose. And he purposed to give a people
to Jesus Christ who agreed in that covenant of everlasting
grace to be their surety and promised his Father in the fullness
of time, when you send me, I'll go and do everything necessary
to bring them back to you one day, Father. And I'll present
you and say, Father, here they are. All that you have given
me, I lost none. Hallelujah. Hallelujah! What a Savior! If I could put
myself in Christ, I could take myself out. But God put His people
in Christ Jesus. Our being in Christ is altogether
God's work. Our conversion, our regeneration,
our saving union with Christ is not the result of something
we've done. It's something that God's done
for us and in us. You remember Brother Rupert Rivenbart? Before he became ill, he's not
ill anymore. He's plumb well. But he would
sing this song in Danville during the conferences there. In the
Beloved, in the Beloved, excepted am I, risen, ascended, and seated
on high, saved from all sin through His infinite grace, with the
redeemed ones accorded a place. In the Beloved, How safe my retreat. In the Beloved, accounted complete. Who can condemn me? In Him I
am free. Savior and Keeper forever is
He. Oh, what a marvelous place to
be. In the Beloved, God's marvelous grace calls me to dwell in this
wonderful place. And I love these words. God sees
my Savior and then He sees me. In the Beloved, accepted and
free. We'll be brief on these four
things. Of Him, are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto
us first? Wisdom. Wisdom. Oh, look at this
table before us. Here's a buffet of grates. And
the first we come to is wisdom. Christ is our wisdom. Meaning
that our highest wisdom is to know Him. to know Him. Christ is the head of His body,
the church, and all the wisdom of the body is derived from His
glorious head, the Lord Jesus Christ. Remember what Jeremiah
said? Thus saith the Lord, let not
the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory
in his might. Brother Henry said that just
one worm bragging on another worm. But let not the rich man
glory in his riches, but let him that glorieth glory in this."
Glory in this. You can't go too far with this.
"...that he understandeth and knoweth Me." Knoweth Me. Oh my soul! You mean a creature of the dust can know
God Almighty? Really? Wow! Wow! I sat in my
backyard one evening, and one of my brothers, one of my younger
brothers stopped by the desert. He was into astronomy. And we
sat there, and it was a clear summer night. Oh, the stars. It was just beautiful. And he
began to wax eloquent. Larry, did you know, and I didn't,
so he was going to enlighten me, did you know everything you
see there That's just one galaxy. That's our galaxy. And scientists,
they just don't know how many galaxies there are. And I let
him go on until he stopped to catch his breath. And I said,
Ernest, you're right. That is something. This creation
is something. But let me tell you a greater
marvel, Ernie. I know the one who did all that.
I know the One who just by His will created all that. I know
the great God that's behind all that. Now that's a wonder. That's
a wonder, is it not? Christ, the wisdom of God. Who
can answer this question? Who can solve this dilemma? How
can a man be just with God? Anybody got enough wisdom to
solve that? It's not easy. God won't accept
just any old thing. People think he will, but he
will not. How can a man be just with God? Moses, Moses, you're
the lawgiver. Can you tell us how can a man
be just with God? No, Moses would say, for by the
deeds of the law shall no flesh be justified in God's sight. I can't help you, Moses would
say. Solomon, what about Solomon,
Carol? He was the wisest of men. Can
you tell us how a man can be just with a holy God? How a holy
God that demands perfection can justify, declare not guilty a
sinner? How can it be? And Solomon would
confess, I know a lot, but I can't solve that. I can't answer that. Oh, but glory to God, there is
one. There is one that doesn't just
have the answer. He is the answer. Christ, the
wisdom of God. Listen to this. Being justified
freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ
Jesus, Darwin read this, whom God has set forth to be of propitiation
through faith in His blood, to declare God's righteousness for
the remission of sins that are passed through the forbearance
of God, to declare, I say at this time, his righteousness,
that he might be just, that is God, and justifier of him that
believeth on Jesus." Scott Richardson put it this way, as only Scott
could. He said, before God does anything for you, he's got to
do something for himself. He's not going to set aside his
holy law. It must be satisfied. And bless
God, his son, our substitute, did perfectly. Acts chapter 13,
Paul is preaching at Antioch and he says, Be it known unto
you therefore, men and brethren, that through this man, that is
the God-man, the Lord Jesus Christ, is preached unto you the forgiveness
of sins. And by him all that believe are
justified from all things from which they could not be justified
by the law of Moses. Isaiah chapter 53. Someone read
this the other night. Verse 11. He shall see of the
travail of his soul and shall be satisfied. By his knowledge,
this is God speaking of his Son, by his knowledge shall my righteous
servant justify many, the many that the Father gave him, he
shall justify many, for he shall bear their iniquities. It would be unjust, it would
be unjust of God Almighty not to justify every sinner that
Jesus Christ bore their sins away. And God's faithful and
just to forgive us of our sins because Jesus bore our sins in
His own body on the tree. Oh, He is the wisdom of God.
You remember, He turned to His disciples one time. after he
had rejoiced in spirit, saying, I thank thee, O Father, Lord
of heaven and earth, because you've hid these things from
the wise, the worldly wise and prudent, but you revealed them
to babes. Isn't that a marvel? That's what
we just read. He passed by the wise, the, we
call them celebrities, the rich, and he reveals his son and bestows
His grace on somebody like me. And you base things that are
not. And Jesus went on to say, all
things are delivered to me of my Father. And no man knoweth
who the Son is but the Father, and who the Father is but the
Son, and He to whom the Son will reveal Him. And He turned unto
His disciples and said privately, are you listening? Has He spoken
thus to you? Blessed are the eyes which see
the things that you see." Oh, my. God turned the light on as
we began. Taught my heart to fear. But
He that's begun a good work in you will perform it into the
day of Jesus Christ. He won't leave you there. Oh,
if He strips you, He's going to clothe you. If He brings you
down, He's going to lift you up. If He convicts you of sin,
He'll show you His Son who bore your sin away. He is the wisdom
of God. And on this buffet table of grace,
here's the second thing. And righteousness. God has made
Christ to be unto us righteousness. Righteousness refers to that
which is right before a holy God. Not our definition of right. Not what we call right. We'll
settle for about anything and say it's enough, but not God.
It must be right in His eyes, according to His standard, which
is perfection. And Christ didn't come to lower
God's standards. Isn't it amazing how many people
think that? Because we couldn't keep the
law because, as old Bunyan said, it was just a fence too high.
You know, we couldn't climb over that. We couldn't reach the pinnacle
of God's holy law and ever satisfy it. Therefore, Christ, people
think, somehow just lowered the standard so we can step over
it now. No, no, no. Christ didn't come
to destroy the law, He said. I've come to fulfill the law.
And bless His glorious name, He did that. In every jot and
tittle in His life, Also, as our representative, he kept God's
holy law perfectly. Perfectly! And it's put to our
account. You remember what Paul wrote
to Philemon concerning that runaway slave Onesimus? He said, if he
owes you anything, I, Paul, tell you, I promise you, I'll repay
you. If he owes you anything, Put
it on my account." And that's what Jesus Christ did. I was
talking with Bob last night, and he was telling me about some
lean years that he and Sandy experienced. And then he got
a business of his own and took out a loan and the payment and
so forth. And he said, finally, he said,
I paid it off. And I said, ooh, Bob, I bet it
was nice to see him stamp on there, paid employees. He said,
it sure was. It sure was. Brothers and sisters
in Christ, Jesus Christ, our righteousness, the righteousness
of God in him, he says that God's holy law, if they owe you anything,
put it on my account. I will pay it. And he did pay
it. Jesus paid it all. and all to Him we owe. Again, from Jeremiah 9, this
is, Paul refers to it in these verses that we read in 1 Corinthians
1. Thus saith the Lord, let not
the wise man glory in his wisdom, but let him glory in this, that
he understandeth and knoweth me. Christ is our wisdom and
He's our righteousness as well. I remember when I was a little
boy, have I mentioned living up that hollow Y'all know what
a holler is, don't you? I preached a couple of years
in the conference in Danville, and there was a brother sat next
to me after the service over lunch, and I mentioned the holler,
hollow holler. And he sat next to me, Darvin.
He was from California. He said, Larry, I appreciate
your message. And he was serious as he could
be. But could you tell me, what's a holler? I don't know what a
holler is. I said, man, where are you from?
He said, San Diego. But I lived for several years
as a child growing up, up the hollow. Last house in the hollow
is where I lived. And one winter, near Christmas,
the snow had gotten so deep that Mom couldn't get out to Murphy's
to get our gifts out. on the layaway plan. Y'all remember
that? You could lay stuff away, make
payments, and by Christmas get it out. So my uncle went and
got it, had an old pickup truck, and he came as far as he could
up that hollow, but he couldn't get no further. So me and my
father started out, had a sled. My father, man, I used to think
he's the biggest man in the world, especially when I'd done something
wrong, I'd be looking up. And he had a long stride, like
I do now, but I didn't then. My wife tells me sometimes, Larry,
would you slow down? It takes me four steps to keep
up with your one. So I'm following my father in
the snow. And man, he's just, you know,
taking his normal step. And it's all I can do. But I
put my shoe where He'd already made a place, a print, a print. And I followed Him that way.
Listen, listen to this verse of Scripture from Psalms 85 verse
13. Speaking of the Lord Jesus Christ,
righteousness shall go before Him and He shall set us in His
steps. How about that? You mean That
God Almighty reckons us as though we had walked those perfect steps
of absolute obedience to His holy law. As if we had ourself
fulfilled every jot and tittle. Yes, because He has placed us
in the steps of His Redeemer. And you know where those steps,
or our Redeemer rather, and you know where those steps are going
to lead. In Revelation chapter 4 we are told, these were redeemed
from among men, not with all men, because all men are not
redeemed. These were redeemed, those that sing the song before
the throne of the redeemed. These were redeemed from among
men. These are they which follow the
Lamb, whether so ever he goeth. Oh my, you mean grace is going
to bring me right up to the throne where I shall see the one who
loved me and gave himself for me? Yes, yes, because he is the
Lord our righteousness. Look at this next one. Sanctification. Sanctification. Don't folks have odd ideas about
sanctification? Oh, yes, we're justified by faith.
We're justified by grace. But we've got to run back to
the law. We've got to run back to Sinai for sanctification. You know, got to make the law
my rule of faith and practice. Oh, no. Oh, no. The same grace
that justifies sanctifies. You know what this word is? It's
the same word as holiness. Holiness. Who is our holiness? It's not what, it's who. The same one that justifies,
sanctifies in Christ Jesus. He is made unto us by God holiness. It doesn't depend on you or I. I was growing up for a while. My mom made us go to church with
her mother, my grandmother. Man, that was a sad, sad bunch
of folks. because they thought that sanctification
was this. Touch not, go not, wear not,
smile not, don't wear a dress where you can see the arm of
the woman, don't have a TV. No wonder they were miserable.
They looked like they were wearing tight shoes and their feet hurt
or something because they always looked so sad. It's no wonder. My soul, what did Paul say? Ye that desire to be under the
law, have ye not heard the law? Don't you remember? As ye have
received Christ Jesus, so walk in Him. I don't play some kind
of religious hopscotch over here. I mean Christ for justification,
but I'm going to jump over here for the law for sanctification. Oh no, Christ is all. All in Him. I'm complete in Him. Is that right? Is that right,
Pastor? Is that not what we read here and in many other places?
Oh, child of God, you see why I say there is no better place
to be than in Christ Jesus. When I was a kid, every now and
then, one of my buddies in the summer, they would say, hey,
Johnny has found a new swimming hole. He's discovered it, like
he was Christopher Columbus or somebody. He's found a new swimming
hole. Okay, so we'd get together and
we'd hike to where that thing was, I mean through woods or
walk down railroad tracks, and there it would be. But we weren't
plum ignorant, so someone would make their way down, because
this one I'm thinking of in particular I mean, it was a pretty good
drop down to it, 30 feet or so. So somebody made their way down,
swam out, dove down, and they pop up and say, I didn't touch
the bottom. Jump in. Jump in. It's safe. Brothers and sisters
in Christ, by God's grace, we've jumped in. Let me read this to
you. Here in 1 Corinthians 6, I think Dartmouth referred to
this again the other night. He says concerning what he has
named in verses 9 and 10, and you know this verse, it says,
such were some of you. We're ashamed of it, but we can't
deny it. Such were, past tense, such were
some of you. There is a fountain filled with
blood drawn from Immanuel's veins. And sinners plunge beneath that
flood, jump in, lose all their guilty stains. Jump in. Jump in. You know what happens? You know what happens if God
enables you by His grace to jump in? This. Look how you come up. You're washed. You're sanctified. You're justified in the name
of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God. Brothers and
sisters, jump in. You won't touch bottom. You won't
touch bottom. Hallelujah. What a Savior. What
a blessing to be found in Him. And the last one. Not only wisdom
and righteousness and sanctification and redemption, but rather redemption
or sanctification, we'll get it right. The last one is redemption.
Redemption. My soul, you'd be hard-pressed
to find a sweeter word, would you, other than the Redeemer
himself, redemption. You know what it means? It means
complete deliverance by a ransom. Isn't that what Jesus told his
disciples that night before he went to Gethsemane? Take this. This is my blood. This is a ransom
for many. He gave Himself a ransom for
many. Complete atonement thou hast
made, and to the utmost farthing paid, all that thy people owed. And God says concerning the ransom
price of Jesus Christ giving Himself, not a part of Himself
or a piece of Himself, He gave Himself for us. He gave all of
Himself. I hear people talk about redemption
and don't say anything about the Redeemer. There's something
bad wrong with that picture. Oh no, it wasn't a doctrine that
hung on that cross. It wasn't a doctrine that cried
out, my God, why has thou forsaken me? It was a loving, living,
breathing Savior. He's my, He loved me and gave
Himself. He didn't hold anything back.
He drank damnation dry, and now God Almighty, as a matter of
justice says, deliver his soul from going down to the pit. I
found a ransom, and the ransom was his son with which he was
completely satisfied. Oh, thank God for the blood of
the Lord Jesus Christ. We're redeemed. Redeemed. Oh, we'd love to proclaim it,
but redeemed by the blood of the Lamb. But there is a day
of redemption yet to come. You remember what Moses told
Pharaoh when he wanted to compromise? Moses said, no, no, no. We're
leaving. We're getting out of here, and there's not going to
be a hoof left behind in Egypt. Jesus Christ redeemed his people,
body, soul, and spirit. The whole man. And he'll have
what he paid for. Listen to this. that the whole
creation, Romans 8 and 22, groaneth and trebelleth in pain together
until now. And not only they, but ourselves
also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves
groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the
redemption of our body. And don't you love what Paul
wrote in 1 Corinthians 15 along that same line? He said, oh,
brothers and sisters, behold, I show you a mystery. We shall
not all sleep, but we shall all be changed. Oh, we shall all
be changed. I'm not always going to struggle
and cry out, oh, wretched man that I am, because one day I
shall be changed. We shall all be changed. and
be caught up to be with the Lord. Then Christ shall be made of
God unto us, redemption and complete deliverance of his elect from
all the consequences of sin." Sunday night, when Robin and
I checked into the hotel here, the fellow, I said, you have
a, I think a reservation was made in my name. He said, oh
yeah, yeah. And he handed it to me and I looked at it and
it said, I wrote it down here. It's never happened to me before.
It's an upgraded, on the little, where they put the key, little
envelope said, Upgraded. Enjoy your elite upgraded status. Did you do that? Did you? Thank you. I've been downgraded
a lot of times, but I've never been upgraded. I said, well,
how about that? But the young man at the desk
said to me, he said, welcome. and so forth. He said, now you
can't see it now, it's dark, but in the morning, you're on
the third floor, you're going to be able to look out your window
and see the beautiful mountains in the background. And sure enough,
I did. They're just beautiful. But I
couldn't help but be distracted. I couldn't focus entirely on
those mountains out there because of the highways and the cars
and the buildings. I couldn't stay focused. You've got that problem. I just
can't stay focused. I want to love God with all my
heart, but I'm so easily distracted. So many things clamor for my
attention. Larry, look here. Look there. Look there. Look what we found.
Look at this. New this. New doctor. New that.
New revelation. Oh, a constant, constant warfare. Oh, this flesh hinders me every
day, every moment. I want to love my redeemer. I want to honor him. I want to
worship him. But all my mind just drifts a
thousand different, so easily distracted. But that's not always
going to be the case. Beloved, now are we the sons
of God, and it does not yet appear where we shall be. But we know
that when He shall appear, we shall be like Him, for we shall
see Him as He is, Darwin, and I won't be distracted. I won't be distracted. I'm going
to have a perfect view in every sense of the word of the Lord
Jesus Christ. Nothing's going to distract me.
I think it was McShane that wrote, when I see thee as thou art,
and love thee with an unsinning heart, then, Lord, shall I fully
know, but not till then, how much I owe. Let me get done. If Christ is all this to us,
his people, and God has made him to be so, then in Christ
Jesus, how loved we must be. Isn't it beloved? Could we be
any more loved? In John 17, he said, Father,
you love them as you've loved me. How accepted must we be? Could we be any more accepted
as God's son? How secure we must be. What can
separate us from the love of God? That's in Christ Jesus. John Kent wrote, twixt Jesus
and the chosen race, subsist the bond of sovereign grace,
that hell with its infernal train shall never dissolve nor rent
in vain. Hail sacred union firm and strong,
how great the grace, how sweet the song, that worms of earth
should ever be one with incarnate deity. This sacred tie forbids
our fears, for all he is and has is ours. With Christ our
head we stand or fall, our life Our surety, our all. Can I tell you one more holler
story? Thank you. I may never have another opportunity.
My friends and I, we caddied at a local golf course. That
was about the only way to make any money. And after we'd caddy
all day, we'd walk out town to the theater. And, man, a lot
of times we wanted to see the Wolfman or Dracula or Frankenstein. I'm talking about not like this
stuff today, but way back. And then we'd walk home, four
or five of us, and we'd come to the holla. And they lived
down in the camp, the coal camp they called it. Our daddies all
worked in the mine. But I lived up that holla. And,
man, we'd park company. They said, hey Larry, don't let
the wolfman get you. I said, I'll give him one of
these. I'm not scared of no wolfman, but as soon as they were out
of sight and I started walking up there hollering by myself,
I was scared to death. He going to get me, Darvin. He
going to get me. He going to lose the wolfman.
And it was a long walk. I told you. It was our house.
The road ended at our house. You could go nowhere. Man, I'd
be walking along. A breeze would rustle a leaf
and I'm gone. I'm laying them down. I'm laying
them down. I mean, I'm not getting that.
That wolf man ain't going to catch me. I turn the last bend in the
road and there's my house. There's the light on, the porch
light. Mom's waiting for me. And I kind
of calm down and I go in. I'm a pretty young fella. And
Mom would come upstairs. And she tucked me in. And she,
I don't know how she did it, but she'd throw that old bedspread
up, and it would come floating down. And she tucked me in, and
I wasn't scared anymore. I was safe. I was secure. I was home. Brothers and sisters,
when he shall come with trumpet sound. O may I then in him be
found, dressed in his righteousness alone, faultless to stand before
the throne. And we will be in Christ Jesus. God bless you. Thank you for
your time.