[0:00] This morning I want to do something. I believe I'll take two Sundays with this. But a few Wednesdays ago we were studying the life of Rehoboam. And I recall making a comment that Rehoboam, the son of Solomon, the kingdom split.
[0:16] And he had an opportunity to just rule over two tribes. And he didn't have the whole kingdom that his father had and that David had. And he made some foolish mistakes and some decisions.
[0:29] But there was a time where he made some good choices. And things were going very, very well for him. And the Bible says he dealt wisely. And then his heart was lifted up and he forsook the law of the Lord.
[0:42] And the comment I made was that Rehoboam joins a long list of kings and men in this Bible. That have things going right for them.
[0:53] And are following the Lord and doing what the Lord would have them to do. And somewhere along the lines they'd get their heart or their eyes turned away from it and they fall.
[1:04] And there's so many different accounts of this. I started looking at a few and I have a total of six here that I put together. And I think I want to try to do three this week. And Lord willing do three next week.
[1:15] And I want to look at this and what I want to call this is some dangers of growing old. And I know that for some of you it's like, well, I'm not old. Well, you're growing old. Today you're older than you were yesterday.
[1:27] And whether it applies to the youngest in here or the very eldest in here, I think it's truth. And there's examples that we need to learn from.
[1:39] And so whether you feel yourself as an elderly person or a senior saint or someone who hits that category yet, maybe you think you're in the prime of your life. You better pay attention to some mistakes some men have made.
[1:51] And have your eyes wide open as you go through life. Because if it happened to them, it can surely happen to you. And this is something that I take personal.
[2:01] I've always, since just getting involved in the work of the Lord, I've always kind of had my eye and had my ears open to stories of men in the ministry that have fallen. And they're not doing it anymore.
[2:13] And I can tell you stories and there's a huge list, much bigger than the one we'll look at here in the next few weeks, a huge list of men that have stood behind pulpits and have built what we'd call great works.
[2:26] And there, some of them are in jail. Some of them are divorced. Some of them are on a list of, a certain list that you don't want to have your name on, if you know what I mean.
[2:37] They've got into some messes. And when I hear those things, I think, good night. That's not going to be me. Not if I can help it. But then I also get scared. I thought, well, they probably didn't think it would be them either.
[2:48] So I better be careful. And the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. And so anyway, let's look at some dangers of growing old. We're going to start here in Judges with a man that's named Gideon.
[3:00] In chapter 6, I just want you to see verse 12 to get a little introduction to what God says to Gideon through the angel of the Lord. Verse 12 says, And Gideon's like, who are you talking to?
[3:20] You're not talking to me. I'm not a mighty man of valor. Gideon, I've never done anything in my life. I'm hiding from the Midianites threshing wheat in a wine press, of all places, because they'll never look there.
[3:36] Gideon's not a mighty man. He's an intimidated fellow. He doesn't understand why angel would call him that and say that. He doesn't believe it, I'm sure. Yet Gideon gets inspired by what the angel of the Lord tells him and prophesies concerning him and kind of calls him to do.
[3:57] And he gets inspired by that and he takes strength from that, takes courage from that, and he goes and fulfills what he was told to do. He goes and throws down the altar of Baal. And that's a big, he cuts down a grove, a place of worship, and just wipes it flat and says, You're not worshiping those idols here anymore.
[4:14] I mean, what gall, what gumption of this man to just, out of nowhere, start making these big moves. They're moves that got the attention of others, and they were wanting to kill him.
[4:27] Gideon has a few men gather to him, and he has the men stand up against him, and he stands for what's right. He does what's right. He builds an altar, and he sacrifices unto the Lord here in chapter 6.
[4:40] Now, as you know, by the end of the chapter, if you've read your Bible, this is the situation with the dew on the ground and dry on the fleece. He puts out a fleece. We've taken this story here, and we've used that term to say, I put out a fleece to the Lord.
[4:54] And it's straight from Gideon's story. And what Gideon does is, he says, if there's dew on the fleece, but if it's dry on the earth, then I'll know that God's called me to do this thing. It was a great thing. It was something he was scared of.
[5:05] And it happened. And then he said, well, okay, I want to make sure it wasn't, I want to do it differently. Let's put dew on the ground and have it dry on the fleece. And of course, by the end of the chapter, God did so that night.
[5:15] So Gideon gets a calling of God to do something, something dangerous, to deliver Israel from the Midianites and from the Amalekites. And Gideon ends up just, in the next chapter, 22,000 men gathered to him to fight, and God says, that's too many.
[5:34] And he whittles it down to 10,000 men. What a pitiful army. And God says, no, Gideon, I'm not going to deliver with that many men. And he gets it all the way down to 300 men in chapter 7 that he's going to go.
[5:50] And God uses Gideon with those 300 to win an incredible victory and a strong showing of the hand of God. Another phrase that comes out of chapter 7 we're familiar with is in verse 18 where they say, the sword of the Lord and of Gideon.
[6:06] If you're familiar with that, just to bring it to mind. Now I want to move ahead to the end of all of what Gideon did, inspired by God, enabled by the Spirit of God to do this, and God wrought the victory.
[6:19] Gideon comes to the end of this. He defeats the enemies. He chases them down. He whips them. And look where he ends up in chapter 8 and verse number 22. 8, 22.
[6:32] Then the men of Israel said unto Gideon, Rule thou over us, both thou and thy son and thy son's son also, for thou hast delivered us from the hand of Midian.
[6:44] Now Gideon was a deliverer. And that's what these judges are. They're men that God raised up to deliver the people Israel from their enemies. And Gideon wants, or the people want him.
[6:56] They don't have kings yet established in Israel. That's not until Saul years later. So they want Gideon to be that judge and that ruler over Israel. That's the word. Rule thou over us.
[7:07] Not just you, Gideon. It's going to be your line, your seed, your son, your son's sons. We're going to start it with you. And Gideon's response, look at verse 23. And Gideon said unto them, I will not rule over you, neither shall my son rule over you.
[7:22] The Lord shall rule over you. Now, on the surface, that sounds noble, doesn't it? That sounds like, yeah, that's right. The Lord, you know, he's a positive figure, a valiant man.
[7:36] He went out and fought the battles of God, led Israel to this great victory. The Lord's with him. The Lord's using him. And when he stands and says, the Lord shall rule over you, we could really make this sound like he's in the right here.
[7:48] But I don't think he's in the right at all. I think Gideon's got a problem. He's afraid of something. And what follows here, what follows here is an intense blemish on his character, on his story.
[8:01] Look at chapter 8 and verse, look at verse 24. And Gideon said unto them, I would desire a request of you that you would give me every man the earrings of his prey.
[8:17] For they had golden earrings because they were Ishmaelites. So that sounds reasonable. I'm not going to rule over you, but you know, you do owe me for what I've done for you. So he says, of course they did.
[8:30] They said no problem. And they willingly, verse 25, they answered, we will willingly give them. And they spread a garment and did cast therein every man the earrings of his prey. And the weight of the gold earrings that he requested was a thousand and seven hundred shekels of gold.
[8:44] Besides ornaments and collars and purple raiment that was on the kings of Midian besides the chains that were about the camel's necks. Now that's incredible and quite a prey.
[8:56] Something Gideon takes away from this. But here's verse 27, which gets scary. And Gideon made an ephod thereof and put it in his city.
[9:07] He didn't take it home. He didn't invest it. He didn't put it in the bank. He fashioned something with it and put it in his city, even in Ophrah. And all Israel went thither, a whoring after it, which thing became a snare unto Gideon and to his house.
[9:26] When he tells them he's not going to rule over them, the Lord shall rule over you, sounds like he's saying, you know, God should be our king, not man. But Gideon shows something wrong with him, something that inside of him, he's not even seeking wealth, it doesn't appear.
[9:47] Taking this gold and fashioning something, the ephod is something that was in the high priest breastplate. I don't know, and I can't understand exactly, perhaps the application and why he fashioned this and put it in his city.
[10:01] I don't fully understand what it was. But I can tell you this, it wasn't good. And Gideon had an opportunity to lead these people and follow the ways of the Lord.
[10:13] And Gideon instead turned completely the opposite direction and caused them, with this snare to him and his house, caused Israel to go a whoring after this. This thing, this is a spiritual thing that's going on.
[10:27] Look a little later in verse 33. It came to pass as soon as Gideon was dead that the children of Israel turned again and went a whoring after Baal. So whatever Gideon is doing, he's turning them toward this instead of toward the Lord and the righteous ways of worshiping God and then it just opened the door for them to completely fall off.
[10:48] Now, what's here going here? What's the danger here as I'm talking about of Gideon and growing old? I want you to notice this first here, that Gideon rejected an opportunity to serve the Lord.
[11:02] He had an opportunity to go forward with what God had set him up and established him in and he could have taken a step but he said, no, that's not for me. The people wanted him to rule.
[11:13] The people needed somebody to rule over them and train them and Gideon said, I'm not interested. You know what? Let the Lord take care of it. The Lord will take care of it.
[11:25] The Lord will find somebody else. Let the Lord rule over you. I'm not doing it. But who else in this moment is the best choice? Who else do the people believe in?
[11:38] Who led them and defeated Midian? Who's the one that they're going to do? His son? No. Gideon's the man. Gideon was set up.
[11:48] Gideon was called of God to do something. A deliverer and leader. And he backed away. The whole nation's ready to follow him and he backs off and he says, it's not for me. And what does he do?
[11:59] He goes back to his city. He's at a fork in the road where he can take a step and serve God and lead God's people. Do you realize that Gideon experienced the Lord working through him?
[12:12] He experienced, what I'm saying is, a man that God uses and does that kind of thing, he has faith. When other people doubt and don't know, he knows what God can do.
[12:24] He's not afraid of the enemy. He's not afraid to do what's right because he's experienced it. So he's the guy that should be stepping up to the plate that the Lord set up in that moment. And he didn't want it.
[12:37] He had a fork in the road and he chose to go back to his city where he set up this ephod to be a snare unto him. God did use Gideon to do wonderful things, but in the end, he wasted these years of his life, wasted them instead of using them to serve God.
[12:56] As he grows old, he wasted years of his life because he rejected an opportunity to serve the Lord. I feel like it's true of believers in churches all over the place today.
[13:08] The older they get, the more they can look back and say, yeah, God called, God used, I've put out fleeces, little or big, years past, but today, they're back where they used to be.
[13:22] They went back to their city, wasting the latter years of their life, which is not the Christian life. The Christian life is you put the hand to the plow and you don't look back. You go forward until Jesus Christ calls you home.
[13:36] There's no, I'm finished in the Christian life. There's no, the Lord will figure it out. He'll take care of it. If God raises you up and gives you an opportunity, you say, yes.
[13:47] You say, speak, Lord. Thy servant heareth. You say, here am I. Send me. You know, in the book of Revelation in chapter 3, there's that Laodicean church that is being spewed out of the mouth of God for their lukewarmness.
[14:07] Revelation chapter 3, you've read it. You know what we do with somebody who's something that's stale? We spew it out of our mouths. And there's a danger, without a doubt, a danger, in growing old, is that you get stale.
[14:22] Is that you stop serving. Is that you stop looking for ways to minister and to work for God and you say, oh, somebody else will do it. The Lord will fix it. The Lord will find somebody.
[14:33] And you go back to your house. You go back to doing nothing. When you turn down an opportunity that God gives you to serve Him, God will probably just say, okay, and just walk on by.
[14:48] And maybe He'll look for somebody else or maybe it just won't get done at all. And somebody's going to give account of that in the judgment seat of Christ. But in the meantime, you don't have the joy of the Lord in your heart for the energy that you're expending on Jesus Christ.
[15:03] And God's not getting glory in your life. And your testimony is falling away while you can continue to prop it up as being I used to be. You can prop it up, but the truth is you can be a pitiful example of the love of Christ and the devotion to Jesus Christ and surrender to the ministry, especially to the youth.
[15:25] There's a danger in growing old and the danger is that you can tend to feel like you put your time in. I did what I was called to do. And you tend to feel like I can just coast this out the rest of the way and I think it's a bad place.
[15:39] It's a dangerous place. It's a slippery place. You can get out of fellowship with God and not even know it. And Gideon puts up this ephod like it's some religious thing and it became a snare to him.
[15:52] I don't know if he was fully looking for it to be a snare to him, but what he said was, no God. And maybe you say, well, I don't have the energy. I can't do what I could do in the past.
[16:02] Well, you know what? God wasn't calling Gideon to go fight another battle against Midian and the Amalekites. He was giving an opportunity to do something completely different. To serve him, to rule over the people of Israel.
[16:16] To make decisions, to lead them, to stand strong for God and his ways. That's totally different than picking a sword up and going out and swinging it.
[16:27] God gave him a different thing to do and he walked away from it. Now take a peek at 1 Kings now. 1 Kings chapter 3. There's another man I want us to consider. And another man that got dangerously or in a dangerous spot as he grew old.
[16:48] Gideon rejected an opportunity to do something for God. He felt like he put his time in and he did his job and now he's just going to coast.
[17:01] And it's a dangerous place. And you can see he slipped all the way to his death and did nothing. Now in 1 Kings chapter 3, here's another guy. This is King Solomon.
[17:13] I think we know well his story. But let's get a little background here and just build this up so we can fully grasp the circumstances. Look at chapter 3 verses 3 through 5.
[17:24] The Bible says that Solomon loved the Lord walking in the statutes of David of David his father. Only he sacrificed and burned incense in high places. And the king went to Gibeon to sacrifice there for that was the great high place.
[17:39] A thousand burnt offerings did Solomon offer upon that altar. In Gibeon the Lord appeared to Solomon and dreamed by night and God said ask what I shall give thee.
[17:52] Now well we'll see later here fast forward through this we'll kind of get from the Lord's response what Solomon asked. Verse 10 the speech pleased the Lord so that Solomon had asked this thing verse 11 and God said unto him because thou hast asked this thing and hast not asked for thyself long life neither hast thou asked riches for thyself neither hast asked the life of thine enemies but hast asked for thyself understanding to discern judgment behold I have done according to thy words lo I have given thee a wise and an understanding heart so that there was none like thee before thee neither after thee shall any arise like unto thee and I also have given thee that which thou hast not asked both riches and honor so that there shall not be any among the kings like unto thee all thy days this is quite a thing an amazing thing that God puts on Solomon move to the end of chapter 4 and look at a few statements here verse 29 a summary so God and God gave Solomon wisdom and understanding exceeding much and largeness of heart even as the sand that is on the seashore and Solomon's wisdom excelled the wisdom of all the children of the east country and all the wisdom of
[19:08] Egypt for he was wiser than all men there's some men that were famous on that day and even at the end of the verse his fame was in all nations round about so Solomon set up kings and queens come from all over the world look at chapter 10 to see him to hear him I mean it is all the nations region wide are jealous and envious of what God has done in this man's life and the way he is set up look at chapter 10 verses 6 and 7 here's the testimony of a royal woman herself in verse 6 she said to the king it was a true report that I heard in mine own land of thy acts and of thy wisdoms how be it I believed not the words until I came and mine eyes had seen it and behold the half was not told me thy wisdom and prosperity exceedeth the fame which I heard come to verse 23 so Solomon exceeded all the kings of the earth for riches and for wisdom in his writings he said whatsoever mine eyes desired
[20:20] I kept not back from them I withheld not my heart from any joy Solomon he just had it like that if he wanted it he did it there was nothing he was on top of the world nothing withheld from him he literally had everything he wanted if he was the guy the original cause I can guy why would you do that song cause I can that's him you don't even know these idiots get on a music video and shine and show their bling and their gold and their diamonds and their money and throw it around and they think there's something and they want to go through the ghettos and show them what we got oh please they want to say cause I can they're just children Solomon was the king and all the nations you don't even understand the wealth and the wisdom that he had you don't understand
[21:21] I don't understand now come to chapter 11 he was that high that set up and established but chapter 11 verse 1 but uh oh all of that leading up to this but king Solomon loved many strange women how many well in verse 3 he had 700 wives princesses and 300 concubines and his wives turned away his heart so they turned away his heart and what happens next is well he's worshipping other gods he's building in verses 5 6 7 he's building a high place for an abomination of a god these gods of the of the Ammonites and the Moabites he's he's establishing in his own kingdom a place to worship them and he did it for his strange wives they burnt incense and sacrificed unto their gods and Solomon just went with it and he knows better he definitely knows better but he disobeys the commandment of god the commandment there's several commandments actually that he disobeys here one about even in earlier in chapter 10 about horses from Egypt chapter 10 verse 28 he's not supposed to do that and getting wives outlandish women he's not supposed to do that and then serving and worshipping all of these things he's just going down all right so we see his ascension and then his descent is falling away and this is not good and the lord god remember the lord god showed up to him two different times as a matter of fact even actually verse 9 it says that 11 9 the lord was angry with solomon because his heart was turned from the lord god of israel which had appeared unto him twice he had a real life appearance of god to him and speaking to him and communion with him and solomon just drops it and walks away and disobeys and when does he do it's my question look at verse 4 it came to pass when solomon was old that his wives turned away his heart after other gods and his heart was not perfect when he was young he was serving god when he was young he was sacrificing in the thousands more than anybody before him or after him i mean good night his ascension was so elevated and high when he was young he loved the lord when he was young he built god an immaculate and exceeding magnifical temple where everything is overlaid in gold the entirety of the interior and the ornaments and the things of that temple is mind blowing the value and cost and gold alone fine gold pure gold solomon's heart desired to do this for god because he loved him because his heart was right with the lord in chapter 3 verse 3 it says solomon loved the lord but in chapter 11 verse 1 it says solomon loved many strange women and they turned away his heart so when solomon disobeyed god's commandments that he understood and knew just not about the women and other things he could have thought it was no big deal but then lord in this chapter in verse 11 says you're done with this kingdom i'm going to rend the kingdom from thee and give it to thy servant and then there's jeroboam and he wants to kill jeroboam and he flees to egypt and then his son rehoboam takes the throne eventually and jeroboam comes back and the thing blows up and it all started with solomon and when did it start when he was old when he was old i wonder how many people are like solomon here when you're young you obey you lean on the lord you need his wisdom you need him to
[25:21] guide you and to direct you in life you're raising a family you're trying to do what's right you don't know what you're doing so you call on god and you realize i need the word of god i need his direction or i'm going to make a mistake and it's going to be them that suffer and it's going to be me and so you cry unto god and you call on god like solomon did when you're young and now you're old and you've been there you've done that you raised the kids and they're gone and you don't need to be on your face anymore you don't need to be crying out to god for wisdom and raising your children and dealing with those things you've done that you don't need to be to be begging god to make ends meet you're financially you're probably a little better off things have worked their way out in life and now you're not there anymore now you're old and it's almost like you don't need god's help anymore now you're the wise one now your kids and others come to you for advice and instruction how should i handle this but back then you went to god and now you don't need to go to god and there's a danger right there in growing old because you can be quick to forget maybe not quick maybe it's incremental maybe it's over time but it happens nonetheless that you can forget god and end up disobeying him and just not think anything of it because it's you're just in a different place in life and it's not a big deal to you anymore what you were scared of before has just become not such a big deal i remember as when my kids were little and my wife's always been an early to bed kind of person and i'm more of a late nighter and there's times where she'd be already asleep and the kids are sometimes just putting them to bed i remember there's times even right beside the crib just getting down on my face beside a crib or beside their bed and just praying and just saying god i don't know what i'm doing these are souls and they need to know about you god i want them to be saved and i want you to use them and i want you to be pleased with me and with them and and just being on my face beside the crib begging god for help for wisdom i wonder when you get old and your kids aren't home anymore you still beg god for help you still need that wisdom you still call out to god like that or have you gotten to where you quit relying and needing him like you did it could be that your heart got turned away it's a dangerous place to be a little more established and you just don't need god anymore like you once did let's move forward again to one more man second chronicles chapter 24 one more this morning second chronicles 24 there's gideon who got to a place where he rejected an opportunity to serve god and just coasted back to the way it was and thought the lord can handle it somebody else will do it i've already done my part and that's dangerous ground then there's solomon who's been there and done that and he's gotten to the place where he doesn't need god anymore and he's not seeking the wisdom because he has it he's not seeking the wealth he hasn't and his heart's turned away and now in second chronicles 24 we're introduced to a young king named joash and in verses 1 and 2 joash was seven years old when he began to reign and he reigned 40 years in jerusalem his mother's name was zibiah of beersheba and joash did that which was right in the sight of the lord all the days of notice jehoiada the priest now joash goes and he gets in his heart that he
[29:21] wants to repair the temple because the generations before some bad kings had closed it up destroyed it there's no use for it because they weren't worshipping god and joash had a problem with that joash had actually some pretty ugly stuff with his i guess his mother things that went down before and he decides i need to get this thing back up and running i need to get the priest serving their god he's got influence from a very good man the high priest here jehoiada and jehoiada is called the chief in verse number six and he tells him he says you know what in verse four it says it came to pass after this that joash was minded to repair the house of the lord and so he gets these priests and levites together and he says go collect all this money and let's put this thing to use and let's fix the house of god let's get this right and they didn't do it in verse five says they hastened it not they didn't the matter they they didn't follow through and so the king doesn't take their heads off when he finds this out he actually says you know what all right it's going to get done and i'm going to do it and so he gets his hands to it and he makes something happen and in verse eight the king's commandment they made a chest and set it without the gate of the house of lord and they they ended up getting the money and they ended up raising it and putting it to work but the king had to be proactive to get his wishes done what a heart he had to make sure that god's house was back up to the way it should be and they could worship god and the priests and the sacrifices and the things could get back this is this is what revival is in this land and this economy is getting the house of god back in operation and the incense before the lord and the bread and the candles and all of that back running that wasn't happening and so he sees that as this is priority and he does it now look at verse 15 but jehoiada waxed old and was full of days when he died and 130 years old was he when he died and they buried him in the city of david among the kings because he had done good in israel both toward god and toward his house now after the death of jehoiada came the princes of judah and made obeisance to the king then the king hearkened unto them and they left the house of the lord god of their fathers and served groves and idols and wrath came upon judah and jerusalem for this their trespass god sends prophets in the next verse they end up stoning the prophet they don't want to listen to the truth anymore there's a danger here in joi or in joash and we see it because his his sin and his falling away seems directly correlated to jehoiada his mentor the man that was godly and that trained him up but when his mentor left and passed off the scene joash is just flip flopping and the princes show up and he's like yep he follows them and the danger here is when the generation that taught you to serve god starts dying off and falling off and leaving you alone when the change comes and it always comes that's the nature of life you're left to stand by yourself and with the old timers gone the ones that preached the word of god the ones that lived by example that were men and and women of faith and that have been through some things and stood through it all and when they're gone and what's left around is just a bunch of soft feminine lukewarm christianity what are you going to do the message has been changing year by year in christianity of prosperity of health of of of easy of love of just soft and not biblical truth what are you going to do when that generation is gone that trained you the danger you got to stand for jesus christ and
[33:23] what this does is reveals the importance of your personal relationship with jesus christ that you're not leading and following a man and leaning on his strength and on his example but that you've got yours and that when push comes to shove you're going to stand for jesus christ but there's a danger as you grow old those examples and and those leaders fall to the side some of them for bad some of them like i said they're in jail some of them make mistakes and fall like solomon others are just with the lord and there's a danger that you're not strong enough that you're not prepared that you were just following them as they serve jesus christ i was in a church for most of my life that was set up on service the pastor was a hard working man like grew up in the depression grew up just just rolling his sleeves up and from sun up to sundown and even after that just work all day in the factory come into the church and build a garage and work on buses and run the buses on sunday and just he built by the grace of god a ministry and quite a work and and he he had a way of pulling people in to working it was just his way he was kind of a tough and a hard guy in that way and nobody wanted to tell him no and it's not because they feared him necessarily but because he was doing it and and he needed their help and and they it was like they did it to serve him and and i know what i'm saying here i'm not getting out of balance with this in any way but when he passed away it showed up it showed up who was just serving him or following him or was just doing it because he was going to get on him or come and visit him or or say what's wrong because that when he passed away certain little by little just kind of dropped off certain men certain women dropped off and just quit doing what they were doing found an excuse and just backed off to the pew and like gideon said somebody else can do it i've done it long enough but the example of that man though is his son preached his funeral and he said my dad died with his boots strapped on he didn't quit and he didn't decide i'm too old for the ministry he did turn the church over and he did back away from certain things but he kept on doing what he could do to the day he died because his relationship with jesus christ was real he was serving him there's a danger as you won't have them around to help you like you've always had them you may not have the role model that you had you may lose some christian friends that held you up and helped you out kept you accountable you need to be prepared you need to be prepared there's a danger growing old that you might end up by yourself your spouse may leave you your spouse may may you may be at their funeral there was a man that this is sad but there's a man and a woman that my wife and i know from bible school that were close to us they were we were like almost like their kids and they were like our parents while we were away at bible school and we didn't know anybody and they didn't have anybody they left their kids and back home and so we just befriended them and we ran with them and did things with them and it was it was kind of funny because they were a whole generation older than us but we just had that bond together and we enjoyed them a lot and time just kind of went and the the woman got sick with something and she ended up passing away and it was pretty quick and it was just shortly after that that the husband who felt called to preach and was going to do this work and he had some idea of what he thought god wanted him to do we talk talk talk about it he just fell off and just disappeared and just he literally went right back to some of the wickedness that he was involved in in
[37:24] his past life before he got right with god some of the things he did it turns out as a time was that it was his wife she was the christian all those years while he was out in sin praying for him and then he got in and they went to bible school but when she disappeared there wasn't a whole lot there there was a danger there when he lost his spouse that she was the one that was holding him up she was the spiritual one that was keeping them in church i'm not saying she was leading the home and all of that but it came out that he wasn't able to handle it and it wasn't an easy thing to do i'm not belittling that but nevertheless the grace of god sufficient for him and he chose not to take it there's a danger in growing old because it may not be your pastor it may be your spouse it could be some leader some spiritual guider in your life that's gone and now you're left to stand by yourself and you don't have them to call and you don't have them to pray for you anymore or to keep you accountable or to show up at your door it's you and the question is is your relationship with jesus christ what it ought to be so that you can stand without your parents without your spouse without your pastor that you can stand for jesus christ on your own you better get prepared for it because those days are coming in one way or another so here's three men three men that get older and then fall and they these are all three guys that did some amazing things for god and leading god's people they were not just just random people in the middle of the mix these guys were leaders of the pack kings of israel and judges and deliverers and yet they fell and yet they disappointed and they weren't ready for what was sitting ahead for them later in life and so let the warning come out today there are dangers and growing old and next week we're going to see there's more we're going to try to look at three more i believe and show you in three different kind of situations and learn something to prepare us and to get our eyes wide open for those days coming ahead and if you're in those days today then take heed take this message and consider it you don't want to pretend and think that you're okay and that you don't need god you're deceiving yourself you don't want to pass up an opportunity to serve god he's not going to put more on you than you can handle or have the strength to do you can do it you can do all things through christ so don't let those opportunities pass and be prepared to stand all by yourself because it may be that you have to do that let's bow our heads will be dismissed here this morning you