Fifteen or sixteen years ago,
maybe more, there was a movie on television that portrayed
two friends caught in a tense situation. They were both in
love with the same woman. That does make for a tense situation
and a quick ending of a friendship. In time, the two were competing
against one another in a parachute competition, and they jumped
out of the plane at the same time. But one of the fellows,
when he pulled his ripcord, the parachute failed to open properly
and his death seemed imminent. His friend, what used to be his
friend, now considered an enemy, saw what great danger he was
in and so he made an effort through free fall to catch him, and he
did. When he caught him, he tied himself
to his friend, opened his parachute, And they both came safely to
the ground. And then a shocking thing happened.
Something far more amazing than the feat itself. When they got
up, took off the gear, started to walk away, the fellow whose
life had been saved walked away from his former friend without
even a nod or a thank you. Just walked away. Just walked
away. Oh, how like us that is. That was a fictitious story,
just made up by a movie writer. But there is a real life situation
described in Luke 17, familiar to you all, I'm sure. There were
ten lepers on their way home after a meeting with the master.
And as they walked on their way, they realized that their leprosy
was gone. They were white as snow, cleansed,
healed from their deadly disease, healed from their corruption,
healed from that disease which would bring them at last to the
grave in the most ignominious manner possible. One of them
turned around and went back to give thanks. And the master said,
where are the nine? Ten were healed. Where are the
other nine fellows? Why was it that one came back
and gave thanks and the other nine did not? I think I can give
you the answer. I think I can give you the answer.
I'm sure I can. The one who was healed and went
back and gave thanks understood plainly that he had been saved
from death by the Son of God. The other nine did not really
think they were in such bad shape and they did not really attribute
to the Son of God their healing. Perhaps they waited to see if
the cure was real. Perhaps they wanted to see if
it would really last. Maybe they said, well, I'll go
back later. The Master will always be around.
He'll be happy for me to come anytime I want to. Perhaps One
decided that he really never had leprosy after all, it was
a mistake. Perhaps another thought, well, I would have gotten better
anyway. Another may have presumed it was really the priest who
had healed him. And maybe it was, well, the Lord
didn't really do anything. Any rabbi could have done this.
After all, I was already improving. Everything was going to be all
right. It's a sad, sad commentary on
our society that few people, few people, have the manners
and common decency just to say thank you when someone gives
them something, does something for them, or is even courteous
to them. Seldom do you even go into a place of business these
days and spend your hard-earned money in a man's business to
keep bread on his table and him say thank you. Seldom. Thank
you words seldom heard. People do things for you, give
gifts to you. You young people learn this.
Learn it well. Thank you are two of the easiest
one-syllable words in the human language to speak, and they ought
to be spoken and written often. That's a sad commentary on our
society, but it is an indescribably greater evil that you and I need
to be reminded to say thank you to God our Savior for his wondrous
grace in Christ. But we do need to be reminded,
don't we? This matter is of great importance
because the very heart of true worship, the very heart of true
worship is in this matter of thanksgiving. Only thankful hearts
worship God. Only thankful souls serve Him. Only the thankful turn to Him
with their soul. And in everything give thanks. Others may fear and tremble before
Him. Others may pay respect to Him
in one way or another. But only the thankful worship
and serve God. There's only ones who do. There's
only ones who do. In Leviticus chapter 2, verses
1 through 16, The Lord gave Moses some specific rules about meat
offerings. Now these are called meat offerings
because meat represents food. That's the word commonly used
for food. Even though they were meal offerings,
they are properly called meat offerings. God intended that
they be called meat offerings because these things represent
that by which life is sustained. These meat offerings There are
things that were done voluntarily. They were done freely. Now there
are other neat offerings described in the law, things that were
required by the law. But these offerings described
here in Leviticus 2 were all free will offerings. They were
offered without compulsion of the law. These were things which
represented a man voluntarily. freely, just from a grateful
heart, bringing a gift to God to say thank you. It is interesting,
they follow, not by accident, but deliberately, the burnt offering. In the burnt offering, we have
a picture of our Lord Jesus Christ making atonement for our sins.
Now, having sin put away, having sin dealt with, we have a picture,
a memorial of our Lord Jesus Christ by which we come and bring
to God an offering, but the meat offering we bring is still a
representation of Him. It sets forth the character and
conduct of our Savior in all His obedience to God as our substitute. It was the Father's will which
our Lord Jesus came to perform. He came here to bring in an everlasting
righteousness on our behalf. And he did so in two ways. First, the Lord Jesus, by his
obedience in life, worked out for us a spotless garment of
righteousness which we are clothed with by God's own hand. Righteousness
imputed to us by which we stand accepted before God. But this
righteousness could never be imputed to us until first sin
had been atoned. And so our Lord's atonement for
sin is represented first in the burnt offerings, and the righteousness
of his obedience to God as our representative is represented
second in the meat offerings that are given here in Leviticus
chapter 2. Now though our Lord's obedience is given in this manner,
and it is set before us in these offerings, it is set before us
to teach us to give thanks to God. Jesus Christ alone is our
redemption and our righteousness. All the atonement we have for
sin is the sacrifice He made. All the righteousness we have
before God is the righteousness of Christ imputed to us so that
we stand before God and look upon our Redeemer and say to
Him, the God-man, who lived on this earth in perfect obedience
to the Father's will as our representative, who then willingly gave His life
as an atonement for our sin, and we say to Him, behold, the
Lord Lord, my righteousness. That's all the righteousness
we have. And every believer understands that. Every believer recognizes
that the whole of our acceptance with God is in Jesus Christ and
in Him alone. And with that, we have every
reason in this world constantly to give thanks to God. Constantly. No matter what else we may experience. No matter what bitter cup we
may be compelled in providence to drink, no matter what pain
we may endure, no matter what may crush our hearts, we who
have been redeemed and made righteous by the obedience of Jesus Christ
have reason to say, oh, give thanks unto the Lord, for He
is good, because His mercy endures forever. Now the meat offering
was always presented along with and in conjunction with the burnt
offering. A burnt offering of some other
animal sacrifice. And thus it shows that consecration
and pardon are intimately connected. We cannot be consecrated to God. We cannot devote ourselves to
God. We cannot give ourselves to God. We cannot be accepted of God
except first our sins be put away. But once sin had been put
away and the Lord God comes to us in his grace and declares
that we are justified now, we come to God and give ourselves
to him. And the meat offering represents
that as well. Yet the meat offering like the bird sacrifice as I
said speaks of our Lord Jesus Christ by whom alone We are accepted
and by whom alone our worship is accepted by whom alone our
sacrifices are accepted Hold your hands in Leviticus 2 and
turn to Hebrews. Let me show you Hebrews chapter 13 If we would do something for
God We must do it by Christ If we would give something to God,
we must do it by Christ. If we would even say, thank God. I'm talking about really give
thanks to God. If God Almighty will bend his
ear and hear this sinner lift his heart and say, thank you. He will only accept it by Christ
Jesus the Lord. Let's see if that's so. Hebrews
chapter 13 verse 15. By him therefore, by Christ,
let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually. That is the fruit of our lips.
to giving of thanks to his name because you see our thanksgiving
at its best at its best needs to be repented of our thanksgiving
at its best must be washed in the blood of Christ and robed
in his righteousness because even our thanksgiving arises
from a heart of corruption So by Him we offer God the sacrifice
of praise. Look in 1 Peter 2, 5. Ye also
are as lively stones are built up a spiritual house and holy
priesthood to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God
by Christ. That's all. Now what we do may
be acceptable to one another on its own merit because we kindly
We kind of deserve each other. That's just about the way it
is. We sort of deserve what we get with each other. But not
God. I don't care if somebody wrote
a check this morning and put a million dollar offering in
that offering plate, or you put a two dollar offering in that
offering plate. Neither is acceptable to God,
no matter how costly. And the two dollars may cost
someone more than a million costs somebody else. no matter how
costly, is accepted of God but by Christ. I don't care how earnest
you are in prayer, how fervent you are in devotion, how zealous
you are in service, nothing we do is accepted of God but by
Christ Jesus. Remember Cain, when he came to
God, he brought a meat offering. He brought just the kind of offerings
described here in Leviticus 2, what we read about earlier. But
his offering was rejected. The Lord had no respect to Cain's
offering. Though he brought a meat offering,
though he brought it willingly, nobody said, Cain, come bring
an offering to God. But Cain brought the fruit of
the ground the best he had. Brought it to God. And God would
not even look toward it. How come? Because he didn't bring
a blood offering. He did not approach God on the
basis of blood atonement. He did not approach God acknowledging
sin and need of mercy to substitute Christ Jesus the Lord. But rather
he brought his good deeds to God Almighty and said here it
is Lord I give myself and what I have to you. And God said I
won't have you or what you have. And I'm telling you God, Rex
Bartley, will not have you or me or what we have apart from
Christ. Can't be done. Alright now, hold
your Bibles open here to Leviticus chapter 2. And let me show you
several things about these meat offerings. First, the meat offering
was a bloodless sacrifice. A bloodless sacrifice. Chapter
1, everything was a blood sacrifice. Here, a bloodless sacrifice.
Look at verse 1. And when any will offer a meat
offering unto the Lord, his offering shall be of fine flour, and he
shall pour oil upon it, and put frankincense thereon, but no
blood. No blood. How come? Because when
we bring a sacrifice to God in worship, when we come to God
with thanksgiving, when we come to God with praise, no matter
how we do so, we do not come to Him anticipating that in any
way we are making up for sin or atoning for our sins. But
rather, we come to Him on the grounds of sin atoned just to
satisfy sin put away and offer Him thanksgiving. offer him the
sacrifice of praise, even ourselves. You see in the meat offering
there's no suggestion, no mention, no word, nothing about sin. There's
no confession of sin, there's no laying of the hands on the
head of a sacrifice, there's no shedding of blood, there's
no atonement, no act of justice, no act of violence, no act of
wrath, no act of punishment. All that was done away by the
burnt offering, by Jesus Christ our Lord. We don't have to make
up to God for our sins, and Bob, we don't dare try. We don't dare
try. If we do, we've denied the blood
offering, we've denied what Christ did at Calvary, and He's made
of no effect to our souls. But rather, when we come to God
in worship, when we come to God giving ourselves to Him, when
we come to God believing Him, we come to God on the basis of
justice satisfied, and offer a freewill offering of thanksgiving
to Him. There's nothing in this meat
offering except that which speaks of the perfect holiness and righteousness
of our Savior. His perfect righteousness is
our representative and our perfect righteousness in Him. Now you'll
notice the meat offering was an offering of fine flour, fine
flour. Not bran. They didn't come off with bran
muffins. These weren't health food folks. These folks were worshiping
God. There's a reason why. Because the bran had much of
the earth in it. The bran implies roughness, coarseness. But the meat offering is made
of fine flour, bolted and thoroughly sifted. Because it represents
the obedience of Christ as a man in this world in whom is nothing
but evenness. No roughness, no coarseness,
just absolute perfection. Perfection. Look him over. Look him over thoroughly. From
the cradle to the grave, look him over. Everything about him
is in exact symmetry, in exact perfection, as a man before God. Our Lord Jesus Christ was not
more or less anything. He was perfectly everything.
He loved like no man ever loved, but with no compromise. He was
gracious as no man was ever gracious, and yet he was gracious and perfectly
holy. Our Lord Jesus Christ was merciful,
ever merciful, perfectly merciful, and yet never condoning of evil.
You understand that? He's perfect. He's perfect, even
in everything. No coarseness in Him. His devotion
to God never faltered. No circumstance hindered Him.
No company lowered Him. No praise elevated Him. He's always perfect in His determination
to obey and honor God the Father as a man, doing always those
things that please Him. I wish with all my heart, Bobby,
I could say that. But you see, there is no evenness
in any of our Master's disciples. No matter how greatly the world
or the church may consider his follower to be, there's no evenness
about any of us. None of us. Take the great, eminent
apostles of our Lord. John, I suppose he was the meekest,
most humble of them all, the beloved disciple, that one who
leaned his head on the master's breast to supper. John, that
one who spoke most of love, brotherly love and kindness, that one who
wrote most of the love of God and imitating the love of God.
John is the one who desired that the Lord Jesus would give him
the first place in the kingdom of heaven. Peter, that man who said though
all these forsake you, I'll not forsake you, I'll die with you,
and he did. That disciple who was willing
to die with the master showed his coarseness when he denied
him and abandoned him. Paul lifted up to the third heaven, caught up to the paradise of
God, saw things no man could see, heard things no man could
speak, witnessed things that words cannot describe. When he
walked on the earth the rest of his life he walked with a
thorn in his flesh because he was inclined to pride. You and
I in our best services, in our best performances, in the best
that we do, let alone the other things. There's a lot of braying,
a lot of coarseness, a lot of roughness. I try to preach. I want to be a good husband,
a good father, I want to be a good grandpa. But as far as occupation and
responsibilities in life are concerned, Oh, I want to honor
God in preaching. Here I most zealously, here in
the study of things I do as a preacher, I most zealously seek to serve
the interest of your soul. I most zealously seek to honor
our God. But so often, what I say, words
that come out needlessly offend. Needlessly, I say something that
just puts a black cloud over the light of God's glory. When we pray, I was thinking about this when
I prayed earlier, we often, I'm almost inclined to say we're
always, Pray for things we hope not to
pray for at all. We most often seek things according
to the lust of our hearts because it's what we want because it
has some relationship to me. And I don't know how to avoid
it. I'll be honest with you, I just don't know how to avoid
it. I wish, Celeste, I could love
your kids like I love mine. I ought to. I should. I ought
to pray for them just like I do mine. And pray for them I do,
but not like I do mine. That's because mine mine. Mine are mine. You understand
what I'm saying? We ask that we may consume things
on our lust. Thank God the Spirit makes intercession
for us with growlings which cannot be uttered. according to the
will of God. This meat offering of fine flour
speaks of Christ, the bread of life. You see, the Lord Jesus,
He is the bread, listen now, He's the bread that satisfies
God. And that's the only bread that
will ever satisfy your soul. Eat of him and you'll hunger
no more. Drink of him and you'll thirst no more. Find him and
you found everything. He's the staff of life. He's
the manna from heaven. Alright, now look at this. Verses
2 and 3. The meat offering was a baked offering. He shall bring
it to Aaron's sons, the priest. And he shall take there out his
handful of flour, and of the oil thereof, with the frankincense
thereof, and the priest shall burn the memorial of it upon
the altar, to be an offering made by fire of sweet savour
unto the Lord. The remnant of the meat offering
shall be Aaron's and his son's. It is the thing most holy of
the offering of the Lord made by fire. If the offering was offered up
to God, this meat offering, it could be offered as an offering
baked into nothing. Man got a nice whirlpool range,
self-cleaning oven, just man got every convenience. He brings
his offering baked into nothing. But a fellow who doesn't have
all that, he just brings a pan. The equivalent of what we call
a cookie sheet. And if it's a meat offering baked on a pan, that's
all right. And if a fellow didn't have any
of that, all he had was an earthen pot. That's what the frying pan
represents. You can see this in the following
verses. It's all right. You just take your earthen pot
with that old clay lid, stick it in the fire and bake the offering.
Bring it to God. You see, the offering must be
given according to what a man has, not what he has not. And the offering of the rich
is no more accepted of God than the offering of the poor. And
the offering of the poor is just as highly esteemed by God as
the offering of the rich. It is a thank offering to God. It's an offering made under God
just to give thanks to Him. But it's a baked offering. And
thus it represents our Lord Jesus Christ who suffered the wrath
of God as our substitute. Every particle of that which
was offered to God. Every bit that the priest took
out. and burned on the altar. Every
cake, a wafer that was burned on the altar, it was utterly
consumed by the fire of God on the altar. And so our Lord Jesus
Christ, when He bare our sins in His body on the tree, said,
I'm poured out like water. All my bones are out of joint. My heart, like wax, is melted
in the midst of my bowels. My strength is dried up like
the potion. My tongue cleaves to the roof
of my mouth. Thou hast brought me into the
dust of death. The fire consumed the sacrifice. When at last he cried, My God,
my God, why hast thou forsaken me? All right, look at verse
4. The meat offering was an offering
mingled with oil. Oil, you know, is constantly
used in the scripture as a representation, a picture of our Lord Jesus Christ.
I'm sorry, it's a representation and picture of the Holy Spirit.
Now, be sure you get this. The oil is offered as a meat
offering, but the acceptance of the sinner is altogether because
of the burnt offering. Now don't miss it, don't miss
it. Our acceptance with God, our acceptance with God does
not have anything whatsoever to do with the work of God's
Spirit within us. It is all together because of
the work of Christ outside of us. Now get that. Get that. The Holy Spirit doesn't
come and speak of himself and he doesn't direct your faith
to himself. The Holy Spirit speaks of Christ
and directs your faith to Christ. Our acceptance with God is in
the birth offering of our Lord's substitutionary atonement. But
we come to Him now in the Spirit and offer Him a fake offering,
mingled with oil and anointed with oil. with the oil of his
grace in us and the oil of his spirit upon us so that we are
accepted as the servants of God and priests of God in Jesus Christ
the Lord who had the spirit of God without measure given unto
him. Alright, here's something else.
The meat offering was an offering made with frankincense. Sweet,
sweet incense. You see it in verse 1? He shall
pour oil upon it and put frankincense there on. The meat offerer wasn't
just anointed with oil, but frankincense was put with it. Now this word
frankincense is an interesting word. My immediate thought is
this word has to do with our Lord's perpetual intercession.
As the incense goes up before the altar, the sweet savor to
the Lord. That's got to be the primary
thing, no question about that. But the word used here for frankincense
is an interesting word. It is a word which means to be
white or to be made white. It's the very word David used
in his verb form when he said, wash me and I shall be whiter
than snow. It's the same word that God used
when he said, though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be
as white as snow. This word rendered frankincense
is used 20 times in the Old Testament. And it's always connected with
the holy anointing oil and the Holy Ghost. It's placed upon
the 12 loaves of showbread. It has no connection at all with
sin, with corruption, with defilement. Yet it speaks of the relationship
that exists between Christ and His church. And what is said
of him is said of his church. We speak of him and speak of
the smell of aloe and cassia, frankincense and myrrh. And he
speaks of us, read the song of Solomon again. And he speaks
of us as having the smell of aloe and cassia, frankincense
and myrrh. We say, we say he's white and
lovely. He said, you're white and lovely.
In fact, he describes us as chaste virgins in the book of Revelation.
We are made totally perfect before God in Christ the substitute. And we offer to God this memorial. What we do when we come to God
and worship Him and offer our gifts to Him, offer our sacrifice
of praise to Him, we come to Him in faith. In faith and a
perfect substitute by whom we have perfect acceptance with
God. This offering, you'll notice,
was made without leaven and then a strange word. It seemed strange
to me until I looked at it closely. Without honey. Now leaven, you
know, represents evil. Almost all the time in the scriptures
represents evil. Not always, there may be some
exceptions, but most of the time it represents evil. Hypocrisy. The leaven of the Pharisees,
the leaven of the scribes, the leaven of the Sadducees. Our
Lord tells us to avoid it. Put out the leaven. Put out the
evil because leaven has a way of swelling and multiplying and
ruining. Honey, Honey, you'll remember,
the scripture says, is sweet to the taste, but bitter in the
belly. Eat too much honey, it'll ruin
you. Eat too much honey, you'll get
sick as a dog. Just have a taste of honey. Because honey has,
though it's sweet to the taste, it has a corrupting influence.
It speaks of sensual pleasure. We do not come to God We must
not come to God. We dare not come to God with
the leaven of carnal doctrine or with the honey of sensual
pleasure. Now Merle, there's a sermon in
that. Pick up your newspaper when you get home and read church
advertisements. And you're reading advertisements
of sensual pleasure. Things we look at with, oh that
looks good, that makes you feel good, that'll tickle you inside,
that'll send a chill up your spine. That's impressive, that's
so beautiful. Oh, men will surely like that.
Sensual pleasure. But turn to Deuteronomy chapter
12, I'll show you what I believe is the primary import of this. Leaven and honey were forbidden
because these things were commonly used in the sacrifices of the
pagan. The leaven swelled things up
and made them look bigger than they were. And the honey made
them taste real good. And so the pagans used these
sacrifices throughout all the Gentile world in their worship
of false gods. And we dare not, now listen to
me, we dare not learn the ways of the world. We dare not mix
the ways of this lost pagan world's religion with the worship of
our God. Look at Deuteronomy 12 verse
30. Take heed to thyself that thou be not snared by following
them, after that they be destroyed from before thee, that thou inquire
not after their gods, saying, How did these nations serve their
gods? Even so will we do likewise.
Let me tell you what you need to do. I get mail all the time. I get mail all the time. I just
throw it away. I don't even tell them not to send it. I think
they need to spend their money on something wasted. Folks, now this is what you need
to do to build your church. This is what you need to do to
get folks to come. This is what you need. Don't learn their ways. Don't learn their ways. Thou
shalt not do so unto the Lord thy God, for every abomination
to the Lord which he hates have they done unto their gods. For
even their sons and their daughters they have burnt in the fire to
their gods. What things whoever I command
you observe to do it, thou shalt not add thereto nor diminish
from it. Doesn't matter how popular it
is. Doesn't matter how much men approve of it, don't you bring
your offering to God with leaven or honey. And then the offering,
the meat offering is an offering seasoned with salt. Look at verse
13. Every oblation of thy meat offering shalt thou season with
salt. Neither shalt thou suffer the salt of the covenant of thy
God to be lacking from thy meat offering. With all thine offerings
thou shalt offer salt. Let me give you a few things
quickly here. We may come back to this. Salt preserves. Salt gives things that are normally
naturally bland a good taste. Take a little bread, these days
most everywhere you go and you buy bread somebody else has fixed,
it doesn't have any salt in it. I'll give you a little salt and
put a little butter. Mmm, that tastes good, tastes good. Salt
stops corruption. It doesn't just preserve, it
doesn't just give a good taste, it stops corruption. It is a
representation of our Lord's everlasting covenant of grace
by which alone we stand accepted with God, by which we are preserved
in the midst of a cursed race, by which we stand in God's good
favor without condition, unqualified forever. was not something the worshipper
brought to God. Nothing in here about that man
who brings his meat offering, bringing some salt. No, no, no,
no. He just brought some fine flour, mingled with oil, mingled
with frankincense, and he brings it to the priest. And there's
a place in the tabernacle and later a place in the temple provided
by the congregation where the priest constantly had salt because
every offering brought to God must be mixed with salt. Covenant
salt. Preserving salt. Tasty salt. And the salt is provided by God
himself. That's our acceptance. That's
our preservation. That's our being kept by the
power of his grace. And this meat offering, lastly,
is an offering to the Lord. I won't read them, but you read
the chapter again, particularly verses 2 and 3 and 9 and 10.
The meat offering, most of it, was consumed by Aaron and his
sons. They just took a little handful
out, burned it on the altar. The remnant in this case was
the bigger part. And it was consumed properly
by Aaron and his sons. Because Aaron and his sons must
also be maintained. And they were maintained by the
gifts of the people, by the sacrifices they made. But the offering was
made to the Lord. and accepted of the Lord. The
sacrifices were considered by God himself as being the most
holy of the sacrifices of the burnt offerings. You see, that
which we give to and do for others in the name of Christ, no matter,
Lindsay, how they respond to it, is a sacrifice sweet and
acceptable to God by Christ Jesus. Here, have a cup of cold water. How come? Because I belong to
Christ, in his name I give it. I don't want your stinking water. Throw it away. That's your problem. I've done it in the name of God.
And God says, for Christ's sake, I accept it. Here, Brother Cody,
take this and Take care of your family. Take this and give it
to Brother Roberto. Take this and give it to Brother
Jose. Take this and buy your kids some shoes. God says I'll take that. Most holy, acceptable to God.
But what's all this have to do with us? When Paul received that
gift which the Philippians sent to him, he said, I am full having
received of Epaphroditus the things which were sent from you,
an odor of a sweet smell, a sacrifice acceptable and well-pleasing
to God. For God is not unrighteous to
forget your work of faith and labor of love. The meat offering
was a thank offering, an act of dedication. an act of consecration,
by which a man came to God without compulsion of law, without threat,
without terror, being constrained by nothing but gratitude. And
he brought God according to what he had been given by God, and
said, Lord God, I'm not my own. I've been bought with a price,
and I'm yours. That's what we do when we worship
God. That's what we do when we bring our offerings to God, support
the cause of Christ. That's what we do when we sing
His praise. We come to the house of God, we proclaim the gospel
of His grace, we share His goodness and mercy and love with other
folks, and we do it because we're His! Just because the love of
Christ constrains us. Have you ever heard the story
or read the story of Eddie Rickenbacker? Back in the days before dope
heads, thugs, and rapists who made multi-million dollar salaries
playing football, baseball, were heroes. Our kids used to learn
about heroes. Eddie Rickenbacker was one of
them. He was an ace pilot. His plane was a flying fortress.
He was just top notch, very famous. His plane was shot down in 1942,
during the Second World War. He, with eight other survivors,
landed hundreds of miles from shore, out in the middle of the
ocean, on eight foot rafts. Four men to a raft, five, and
another. They were there for 30 days.
30 days. And the food ran out after just
eight days. Every day they sought to worship
God. He tried to lead the folks in
worshiping God. And about the end of the ninth
day, after they'd had their afternoon time trying to worship, trying to thank God, he laid
down, pulled his hat over his head, tried to get some sleep,
and about the time he got almost asleep, he felt something. on
his camp and immediately he realized it was a seagull and everybody
in the boat realized it was a seagull hundreds of miles from shore
hundreds of miles and they were all dead still because they knew
if they didn't get that seagull they were dead sure enough and
with a quick grasp he caught the seagull They cleaned its
feathers best they could and ate its raw flesh and then they
took its entrails and used them for bait and survived for 30
days in the middle of the ocean in the hot sun until they were
rescued. 30 days. If you were down around
Jacksonville, Florida, Eddie Rickenbacker lived there in a
place called Switzerland, real close to Jacksonville. Every
week, he'd make his way, till he was an old man, out to the
beach. And at the end of the day, when
most everybody would go home, just the sun setting like a great
big orange ball, you'd see him out going toward the pier with
a bucket in his hand. And he'd get out on the far end
of the dock, and he'd start throwing shrimp out on that dock. Did
it every week. Every week. Every week. And you'd
see dots in the sky just coming everywhere. And soon you'd see
that that dock was just covered with seagulls. They were on the
dock, they were on his shoulders, on his head, just covering the
place. They'd come to expect it. Every
week. Every week. And long after the
shrimp was all consumed, seagulls would still be there and that
old man in their midst. And so why on earth would he
do that? Because he never forgot. And this is his way of saying
to that dead bird by whom he now lived, thank you, thank you,
thank you, thank you. And that's what it is to worship
God. Amen. Alright, Lindsey. Number five in your handbook. Number five, begin my tongue
some heavenly theme.