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[0:00] All right. Is that on? Good. Okay, great. Let's go to First Chronicles 28. I'm a big fan of the new evangelism and outreach methods at this church. Jeff wants us to go eat at Five Guys with Five Girls or something like that. You're praying for Five Guys and Sam brings jelly donuts. Huge fan of this church's outreach. Anytime we eat Five Guys and jelly donuts. Well, I don't like jelly donuts, but every other kind of donut. All right. Second Chronicles, whatever Chronicles. First Chronicles. I told you Second Chronicles. It's First Chronicles. All right.

[0:28] First Chronicles 28, 1 to 10. It says, And David assembled all the princes of Israel, the princes of the tribes, and the captains of the companies that ministered to the king by course, and the captain over the thousands and hundreds, and the stewards over all the substance and possessions, blah, blah, blah. Verse 2.

[0:42] Then David the king stood up upon his feet and said, Hear me, my brethren, my people. As for me, and this is towards the end of David's reign, as you'll see, he's getting ready to pass off the scene and turn things over to Solomon. He says, As for me, I had it in my heart to build a house for the ark of the covenant of the Lord and for the footstool of our God and have made ready for the building. But God said unto me, Thou shalt not build an altar for my name, because thou hast been a man of war and shed blood. Howbeit the Lord God of Israel chose me before all the houses of my father to be king over Israel forever, for he hath chosen Judah to be the ruler, and of the house of Judah, the house of my father, and among the sons of my father, he hath liked to make me king over Israel. So I'm not going to build a temple. I'm still the king. And he's given me my sons for the Lord, and of all my sons, the Lord has given me many sons. He hath chosen Solomon, my sons, who sit upon the throne of the kingdom of the Lord of Israel. And he said unto me, Solomon, thy son, he shall build my house and my courts, for I have chosen him to be my son. I will be his father. Moreover, I will establish his kingdom forever, if he be consistent or constant, to do my commandments and my judgments as at this day.

[1:47] Now here's the two, three verses we're really going to look at for the majority of this message. Now therefore, in the sight of all Israel, the congregation of the Lord and the audience of our God, keep and seek for all the commandments that your Lord God, of the Lord your God, that you may possess this good land and leave it to inheritance and your children after you forever.

[2:10] So that was to the congregation. Now he talks to Solomon and says, and now Solomon, my son, know thou the God of thy father and serve him with a perfect heart and with a willing mind. For the Lord searcheth all hearts and understandeth all the imaginations of the thoughts. If thou seek him, he will be found of thee. But if I forsake him, he will cast thee off forever. Take heed now, for the Lord hath chosen thee to build a house for the sanctuary.

[2:35] Be strong and do it. Let's pray. Lord, we love you. In the next few minutes, I just pray that you would help us to line our character up with our calling, Lord, to realize that the work is great, so we must be greater in terms of character and who we are in the B-level and in our hearts, Lord.

[2:51] Help us to be great workers for a great work, Lord. And we love you and thank you. In Jesus' name, amen. All right, before we really get rolling, 14 years doing announcements, five-minute messages. I can't think of one time I've ever gone over on my time limit. And I am recouping 14 years of cutting it short tonight. So I hope you are very comfortable. All right, but does anybody remember, they were very popular when I was in high school, mid to late 2000s. Those yellow Livestrong bracelets. Did you guys ever see those? You know what I'm talking about? They were super popular for a while, and then they weren't. Because you probably know about Lance Armstrong. Now, the great, I mean, his story is ridiculous. In 96, he's diagnosed with potentially fatal stage 3 cancer, which is pretty far advanced.

[3:34] By the time he goes to the doctor, it's in his lymph nodes, his lungs, his brain, it's in his abdomen. Later, they asked his doctor what they thought his chances of survival were, and they said none. Almost absolutely no chance of survival. He said, we told him 20 to 50 percent just to kind of make him feel good. But with the kind of cancer he had, there was next to no hope. He overcomes all this, and then from 1999 to 2005, he wins seven straight Tour de France's, which even if you don't care about bicycling, biking around France, the fastest guy in the world to do it, is pretty impressive, seven times in a row after having all that cancer. And we should think about this guy like, man, he is an athletic hero. But no one wears his yellow bracelets anymore. No one really cares about Lance Armstrong. He's kind of the butt end of a lot of jokes. Why? Because it had come to find out that he was doping. He admitted it. He was on illegal drugs. He was taking steroids. He was doing everything that you could do to break the rules. They were making rules just so he could break more rules. I mean, it was ridiculous how much he was cheating. And I'm not saying that I don't understand, man, because if you had all that sickness and stuff that you physically had to overcome, and then, I mean, like, yeah, let the guy cheat a little bit. I mean, he had cancer all over his body. Let the guy cheat. But the rules are the rules. And nothing makes it okay to break the rules. So he admitted, and this isn't speculation, he's admitted that before all those seven titles, after that, for all these years, that he was on steroids, on illegal drugs. And what this illustrates so potently is that our character is always more important than our success. Our character is always more important than our ambitions, more important than our dreams, more important, maybe than our calling, anything that we want to do. In other words, it's this. Who the worker is matters so much more than what the worker does. Right? So think of Jonah, man. He preaches the biggest revival in history. Nobody wants to be like Jonah. Hard-headed, possibly racist, doesn't want people to get saved. Not anybody would want to be like, but he's the guy who preached and saw a whole city get saved. So in this passage, David's giving Israel and Solomon a charge. They're getting ready to build the temple. This is a big work. This is maybe the crowning work of the Old Testament. But he spends very little time talking about the temple and a lot of time talking about the workers. A great work requires greater workers. We have a great work to do for the Lord, and we need to line and live up with that calling in our personal lives and hearts. So number one, the cause. What is this work? Well, it's to build the temple. So the whole thing we're talking about is them building Solomon's temple with all the gold and all the wonderful things. A couple things about this work. Number one, it's a magnifying work.

[5:54] It's a work of worship. For years and for years, you remember Israel, they're wandering around in the desert. They're 40 years in the wilderness. They're walking. They're setting up the tabernacle. They're taking it down. God gives painstaking details in several Old Testament books and says, your family's carrying this, and your family's going to carry this, and your family's going to carry this. I mean, people, this group, they carry the forks, and these people, they carry the curds. Everything, there was just so much detail. But finally, we're going to get to see a true temple. A true, planted, stationary center point for the worship of God. Now, we do know that God is, he's everywhere. He's, how can one building contain God? It can't. It even says in 2 Chronicles 6, 18, but will God in very deed dwell with man on the earth? Behold, heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain thee, how much less this house which I have built. But what it does serve as is a central point for man to see and worship God.

[6:44] It says in 2 Chronicles 7, 1, 2, and 3, it says, now, and Solomon had made an end of praying. The fire came down from heaven and consumed the burnt offering and the sacrifices, and the glory of the Lord filled the house. It says, the priest could not enter into the house of the Lord because the glory of the Lord had filled his house. And when all the children of Israel saw the fire that came down and the glory of the Lord upon his house, it says, they bowed themselves with their faces to the ground and pavement and worshiped. This is a worshiping work. I mean, think of the thousands and tens and probably hundreds of thousands of sacrifices and burnt offerings and all the things that would be given at this temple. This was the central point for God's worship and for the magnification of the true Lord Jehovah. It's where the Ark of the Covenant was. It was a showbread, the golden candlesticks. I mean, this was the middle of the world for the Jewish people. So it's a work that was a magnifying work, a worship work, but it's also a missional work because Israel is God's chosen nation. Always, since pretty much Genesis 12, they've always been his chosen nation.

[7:43] They always will be, right? That hasn't changed. But the temple and God was not specifically just for the Jews. Maybe it's a mistake that we make in the Old Testament. We think that God only really cares about the Jews. He cares about everybody. Now, I kind of maybe took a shot at Jonah earlier, but consider that God, he's one of the two or three prophets that God sends to preach to another nation in the Old Testament. I mean, that's a pretty big deal that God does care about all the nations of the world. Israel will be a light on a hill to other nations.

[8:08] As they were obedient and blessed, God would prosper them, which, right, they're like, think of a light in the dark. You open a light at night. It's dark. All the bugs come into your house because light attracts. And so their blessing would lead to more light, would spread God's word. So even before the temple, we see that this works, right? This, maybe not how we evangelize today, but this is God's plan for the nation of Israel. And if you go to Joshua 2, 9 to 11, they meet Rahab, who is not Jewish.

[8:32] She's a Gentile, so it's not like she grew up going to Sabbath school or whatever, vacation Sabbath school that they had. But it says, even before the temple, Joshua 2, 9 to 11, and she said unto the men, I know that the Lord has given you the land and that your terror is fallen upon us and all the inhabitants of the land faint because of you. Why? Verse 10, for we've heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea for you. And when you came out of Egypt, let's pause real quick.

[8:58] They drove up, the Red Sea was dried up when they were getting out of where? Egypt. Now how long before, between Egypt and going into this promised land, how long has it been? 40 years, 40 plus years, right?

[9:10] I'm only 32, so I was, I'm not even, this is like longer than me. This is a long time. This is stuff that happened back 82, right? Am I good at math? 1982, 1983. That's how long it's been. And they're still talking. In a place that these people haven't been, ever been yet, they're still talking about what God did. So God's name was getting out into all the earth. And he goes on, he says that you were the other side of Jordan, Sihon, Og, these other kings you destroyed. As soon as we heard these things, our hearts did melt, neither did there remain any more courage in you because of you.

[9:37] For the Lord your God, he is God. And so they heard what God did, right? It went before them. And so that was before there was a temple. That was before there was all this wonderful things.

[9:49] But then they get to, Solomon comes into power at 1 Kings 10, 1, 6 through 10. It says, When the queen of Sheba heard of the fame of Solomon concerning the name of the Lord, she came to prove him with hard questions. In verse 6, it says that she comes to the king and she says, It was a true report I heard in my own land of thy acts. So she asked him all these hard questions.

[10:07] She hears it. She's in her country. She hears about him. She comes and asks all these questions. At the very end, she says, Blessed be the Lord thy God, which delighteth in me to set thee on the throne forever because the Lord loved Israel. And you say, he's God. You're right. What you have is awesome.

[10:19] Now, the Bible doesn't tell us where Ethiopia is. Some people think it's where Sheba is. Some people think it's Ethiopia. Some people think it's Yemen. We don't really know. But the point is, it's very far away. Jesus says in Matthew 12, 42, The queen of the south shall rise up in the judgment for this generation shall condemn it. For she came from the uttermost parts of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon. So this plan was working so well that even in the farthest reaches of the known world at that time, people were hearing about how good God was and what was going on in Israel. So African, whether she was Arabian in Yemen, it doesn't matter. She was far away. In 1 Kings 10, 24, I love this verse. This is one of the biggest missions verse in the Old Testament that all the earth sought to Solomon to hear his wisdom, which God had put in his heart. So this temple was going to be built for the Jews. And Jews would go in and they would offer their sacrifices and they would do all the things and all the worship and everything that they were commanded in the Old Testament, the law to do. But it was also for Gentiles. And sure, we maybe not, we couldn't go in and do all the special offerings and everything.

[11:21] And we were foreigners and all the things that the Bible says that we were. And that's true. But man, God still wanted to see us saved. He still wanted to worship from those other nations too, right? And so this is a, it's a, it's a magnifying work, but it's a missional work. And it was working as you see that all the earth was, was coming to hear about it. But it's also multi-generational work.

[11:40] David wanted to build this. It always cracks me up. It's Solomon's temple. He didn't do much. David does all the work. David kills everybody who would be a problem, which is the real hard work.

[11:52] Then he gets all the stuff together. And Solomon just shows up on the scene. He's like, this is my temple. I built this. I did this all by myself. I am so great, right? David, but David couldn't build it. He had it in his heart. God wouldn't let him. And God says that his son, verse number six, first Chronicles 20 at six, Solomon, thy son, he shall build my work. But David gathers everything.

[12:11] In verses 11 and 12, it says that David gave to Solomon, his son, the pattern of the porch. So the blueprints, the houses, the treasuries, the upper chambers, all this stuff and the patterns, everything that he has, the treasuries and all the chambers round about, the treasuries, the house of God, and the treasuries dedicated. I mean, he does everything. He gets the blueprints. He gets the government to approve it, everything, all the permits and everything that you need. He takes care of all of it. He does everything that he can for the work to go on in the next generation. I realize this. Christianity won't be accomplished in one generation. It's like we're ever going to get to a point where we can say, it's all done. Everybody just go home. All the boxes are checked. Everybody's reached.

[12:49] We got all the churches, all the Bible reading, all the prayer, all the mission. It's all done. We're done. Just go home. Job's over. I mean, when you clean your room, you wash your car, you decorate your house for Christmas, there's a point that you can start and you can say, we're done. There's nothing else to do. But Christianity is going to continue on until we die or he takes us home.

[13:05] And so it's going to pass on from our generation to our children's generation. My kids aren't old enough to be saved yet, but we're praying for them and we're hoping that whatever God has for them, they're involved in God's work some way. And we read with the little Bible book we got with them every night. We pray with them. We try to talk to them about God. Today, Isabella told me that I was like God and that she was like God. So maybe we need to tighten the theology up just a small little bit. But I mean, we're trying, right? Like I love, I mean, well, I can say this because we're part of Awana, right? We're the happy sheep or whatever we are, grumpy goats, whatever. But I think Awana's one of the most exciting ministries in this church because my little girl comes home and she knows stuff about Jesus that I didn't teach her. And I'm all for that. I'm trying to teach her, but I can't do this myself. Probably for their good, I can't. But it's a big deal. It's a multi-generational work. And there's going to be a work that God has for our children that we won't be either, they'll go somewhere else or we'll die and they'll carry the work on before us. We're never going to finish Christianity. So whether it is training your children or if you don't have children yet or you,

[14:08] I can't have children or maybe your children are gone and moves on, but there's still another next generation. There's still more young people. There's somebody younger than you, unless you're the oldest person in the church. And then, no, unless you're the youngest person in the church.

[14:19] Sorry, the oldest. Everybody's younger than you. Just invest in anybody. The baby in the nursery will work on it. But so questions to ask before we move on. How is your worship? This is what we're talking about. Worship, how is it? Is it more than just, we sing a song, get emotional, and I like that.

[14:33] I'm from the north. I don't know if you know Sean Bateman. You know Sean Bateman. He's from the south. And if you ever hear him say the word furniture, you definitely know he's from the south. But we were talking at camp one day and he was like, man, woo! And he's like, what's wrong with you, man? This is great service. I'm like, all the stuff that you feel outside, I feel it on the inside.

[14:52] And I just go, I'm from the north. I talk fast and I don't get super hyped up in service. That's the two things that kind of turn you off the fact I'm not from the south. But I mean, worship is more than that. Worship is everything about our lives. You're never not worshiping Jesus. Everything we do is part of worship. So do we worship God? Are we telling others about him? I mean, the whole purpose of this temple, which is very expensive, was for God to be worshiped by everybody.

[15:17] Living a life of worship is great, but we need to do more than simply exist next to unbelievers. They're not going to look at you and think, man, you have a Christian haircut. Right? They're not just going to look at how you just parked so perfectly between those lines.

[15:32] Jesus has done something. You have to go after them. They're not just going to, no one ever walks up to you and says, will you please tell me how I can be born again through faith in Jesus Christ? You've got to go after them. You've got to go after them. He said it. Somebody else said it. This is a great time of the year. I mean, you almost have to try to not witness to somebody this time of the year.

[15:52] I mean, even lost people are kind of like, yeah, Jesus and Santa Claus and it's Christmas. I mean, like lost people's antennas are kind of tuned to more spiritual stuff this time of the year. A life of worship is not complete unless it involves you personally evangelizing.

[16:04] Did you ever see somebody who goes to the gym and they only do arms and chest and their legs look like little ostrich legs and you wonder how they're structurally stable enough to stand up and support all that weight? It's kind of funny, but I don't want that to be my life of worship. I don't want to be incomplete in the way that I worship the Lord. I want to worship him fully. And that means, yes, coming to church and raising hands and singing songs. I do like doing that.

[16:25] The other day I saw, I counted, five different people had their hands up. We're singing. It was a five-hand alarm. It's the most I've ever seen up at Vision. I love it. I think it's great. But it's more than just that. It's everything we do is worship. Am I preparing my life? Am I preparing my family to carry on the work after me? The most important disciples we have are our children.

[16:43] I don't know who actually said it. It's been quoted to a lot of people, but someone said that children are not a distraction from more important work. Children are the more important work. Too many preachers, too many Christians have won the world to Christ and lost their family to the devil.

[16:56] And if I had to pick between starting 100 churches and losing my kids and having a good family, maybe one or two churches, I'm going to take my family every time. Maybe that's selfish. I don't know, but God seemed really important on us taking care of our kids. So that's the work.

[17:09] So the character, who will do the work? Well, God put certain requirements on his children's character. Not to be saved, obviously, but once you're saved, you are supposed to live a certain way. 2 Chronicles 16.9 is a verse that's been preached at this church and preached and preached and preached. And I have preached it as well, but I misquoted it. I took it out of context.

[17:30] In the last two years, I realized that I was goofing up. It says, For the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth to show himself strong. And I would stop right there. But there's no period. There's no exclamation point. There's nothing that indicates that's where the sentence stops. And yes, God is looking, wondering if he will let, if you will let you, if you will let him use your life. A lot of pronouns, right? But God's looking to see if you'll let him use you. He wants to. But that's not where the verse ends, because look, he doesn't say I'll just use anybody. He says, who's he going to use? Them whose heart is perfect towards him. Willingness is only half of the equation.

[18:04] There's a certain character that God expects. Well, let's look at what God expects of the congregation. Verse number eight. Now, therefore, in the sight of all Israel, the congregation of the Lord, and the audience of God, keep and seek the commandments of the Lord, your God. Well, the first thing he says is to keep the commandments. Mere knowledge of the Bible, while necessary, is not all that is required. Let me remind you, Adam and Eve knew every Bible verse there was.

[18:30] They knew all the commandments of God. Don't eat that tree. Everything else is totally fine. Don't eat that tree. And they even know, but when they eat it, they say, hey, we shouldn't be eating this tree, and they eat it anyway. It's not just knowing factually, like an answer on jeopardy.

[18:43] The commandments, it's more than that. It's obedience. It's keeping the key. I think that's why we put that verse on the back of our sign, right? When you go out the door. But be doers of the word and not hearers only. We are Christian practitioners. We're not theorists. We don't talk about what living the Christian life would be like. We're not scholars. We don't sit up in a tower and never interact with the world and study, maybe in a scientist kind of control environment. We live Christianity. It's our life. Good preaching, good Bible reading, good Sunday school teaching, good discipleship. They do more than impart fact to us. They tell us how to live. And then we go and we do it. That's what it means to keep the commandments. It says, so to keep the commandments, we need to be doing, living these things out. But then he says to seek the commandments. Look at Proverbs 2, verse 1 through 5. It says, my son, thou will receive my words, hide my commandments with thee, so that I incline thy ear in understanding and apply thy heart to understanding. Verse 3 is the one, yea, if thou criest after knowledge and liftest up thy voice for understanding, if thou seekest her after silver and searchest for her as for hid treasures, then shall thou understand the fear of the Lord and the knowledge of God. So unless I'm bad at Google, one pound of silver is worth over $300. So I told you, here's a 10 pound brick of silver somewhere in this church. Even like the rich people are kind of going to be like keeping the old eye out for it. I would at least. I mean,

[20:06] I'd be very curious as to where this thing was hidden because it's important. But do we really seek for the Bible like it was worth that much? I've wanted so long to tell this story in a sermon.

[20:18] I've never had the opportunity to, and here we go. We were on vacation. My parents have a, they have a timeshare. So they, they got one little apartment in this timeshare and they put us in the other apartment. And so they're like, we're going to go to the store over here right by the outlet mall and everything's on sale. So we're going to take the grandkids and we're going to go and shop. I'm like, man, this is great. We'll go with y'all. And so we get the kids dressed.

[20:36] Everybody's ready. And I'm like, all right, where's the keys, Hannah? She said, no, they were on the counter. I was like, no, come on. Now where's the keys? We got to go. My mom and dad are waiting. So we looked and we looked under the couch cushions. We looked under the bed. I mean, this, this apartment had never been this clean before. We were looking everywhere that we could look. I mean, there was literally, we looked everywhere you could, in the toilet, in the trash cans, in the nothing. And so Hannah goes, well, the only place it might could be is maybe Isaiah threw them out.

[21:01] Well, I could, I could look in the trash can, but if we back up one hour previous to the story, I'd take the trash out. And it just happens that if all, there's literally thousands of rooms at this place we're staying, the cleaning guy is going right by my room. And I'm like, hey man, I'm so glad to see you. Here's a bag of trash. This is for you. Thank you so much. He's like, hey man, great. And so there goes my trash. So now I'm running around this complex, trying to find the cleaning guy. I'm like listening for the sound of his like trash trolley going around and I hear it. And so I'm like running for this guy. I'm like, man, where do you put the trash? And he's looking at me like, what's wrong with you?

[21:31] And he shows me where the dumpster is. And I'm literally ripping bags of people's vacation trash bags open, trying to find my car keys. And I found them. Like 25, 20 bags later, I rip open our bag and I find our keys. I was so happy. Isaiah's grounded until he's 40. I had to go take a shower, but I found them. I was like, I'm not leaving. I was, cause I knew that they're like, hey, the midday trash pickup is coming. And I'm like, I can't leave these keys. We're six, seven hours away from home. I can't afford to buy new keys. Like this is an issue. Do we look for the Bible that way? If you're getting ready to go to bed and you're like, I have it in my Bible.

[22:04] Like I'll just double up tomorrow. I'd do it more than I'd like to admit. But if we really valued the Bible like silver, if we, if we sought the word of God, like it tells us to, we'd be seeking. So that's the congregation. What does he tell the chief? What does he tell the king? He tells him this. Look at verse number nine. And thou, Solomon, my son, know, know thou the God of thy father. It's more than a head knowledge. In knowing God, he did not mean head knowledge for Solomon already possessed that. This is the smartest guy that ever lived. Of course, he, like statistically knows God. But that experimental acquaintance, which God is only to be, of God, which is only to be obtained by loving and serving him. I think Adam said it, right? Or one of his unsaved disciples said it, that even the devils believe that God's real.

[22:48] In fact, by James 2.19, thou believest just one God, thou dost well. The devils also believe and tremble. Don't just believe. They're like, they're scared of God because they knew who God is. Factual, textual knowledge of God may be dangerous for you because knowledge, right? According to 1 Corinthians chapter 8, 1 and 2, it puffs up. And if all you have is knowledge, is factual knowledge, it kind of becomes a little dangerous. It needs to be mixed with experience and with love and with the true Christian faith. It's like I used to work at this little market and we would clean the coffee pots at the end of the day. We'd fill them like 95% with water, 5% with bleach. And I don't know if that's actually HOA approved or whatever, or if that's safe to drink. But I mean, if I pour poor bleach in there, that'd be an issue. Like you have to dilute bleach. Knowledge needs to be diluted with living the Christian life. Knowledge is not just enough. Even lost people can memorize facts.

[23:37] Philippians 3, 7 to 10, Paul says, everything that I have, I'll get rid of it. Ministerial success. This guy wrote half the Bible and he's like, I'd rather know Jesus than do that. Rather than start all these churches and see all these people saved, do all these wonderful things and all these miracles, I'd rather know Jesus. I'd rather know God. That, the knowledge of Christ was so valuable to Paul, he would give it up, everything in his life for it. This would seemingly include ministerial, vocational, and any other type of worldly metric used to measure success. And by the way, when he writes Philippians, he's 30 years into this thing. 30 years into his Christianity, he's still trying to know Jesus better. I think we sing this song here. I'm definitely not going to sing it. Me and Sam can do a duet of not singing. But it says, now my heart's desire is to know you more, to be found in you and be known as yours, to possess by faith what I could not own, all surpassing gift of righteousness.

[24:24] Knowing you, Jesus, knowing you, there is no greater thing. You're my all, you're the king, you're my joy, my everything, and I love you, Lord. That really is the chief commandment of a Christian's life. So it's to know God, but it's to serve God. And sometimes we think that serving God is a bad thing, but Revelation 22.3 says that his servants will serve him in heaven. So when we're in heaven, you want a little bit of heaven on earth? Serve Jesus, right? We already saw serving with a perfect heart. I mean, that's the most important thing, is your inward, who you are, right? Jesus tells us, the Pharisees and the scribes in Matthew 23, 27, 8 says, you're like whited sepulchers. Outside, you look great. Inside, you're full of dead man's bones. Not healthy. Our heart is the most important thing. A willing mind, we know this. Yes, it's important. God loves a cheerful giver, but guess what else? God loves a cheerful everything. It's not like you can give with a smile and be a grump when you greet people, or be a grump when you disciple, or teach Sunday school. Just be cheerful all the time.

[25:18] Now, the emphasis on this is how we do things, not how much of a thing that we give. God searches this. God sees this. I mean, maybe you fool everybody else. It's like when you look in the mirror after Thanksgiving. You're like, I've done too bad. I'm doing all right. And you try to put your pants on, you're like, okay, maybe we're struggling here a little bit. You can fool some people, but you can't fool God. He sees what's going on on the inside. Please note that all the qualities God gives to his people in building this temple are all internal things. Then there's the covenant, what God promises about the work. He says, hey, if you seek me, you'll find me.

[25:50] James 4, 8, you draw nigh to God, he'll draw nigh to you. You take the first step, God takes a step. You are as close to God as you want to be. I just read this in my devotions, Ezra 8, 21, 23. It says, And I proclaim to fast at the river of Ahava, that we might afflict ourselves before our God, to seek of him a right way for us, and for our little ones, and for our substance.

[26:08] They're going through the desert. They get a little bit lost. For I was ashamed to require of the king a band of soldiers and horsemen to help us against the enemy in the way, because we'd spoken unto the king, saying, the hand of God is upon all them for good that seek him, but his power and his wrath is against them that forsake him. So he's kind of like, hey, we're in trouble. Well, we already said we have God. We don't need anybody else. Verse 23 says, So we fasted and besought our God for this, and he was entreated of us. They looked for God in a big way. And guess what? God found it, or that God let them find him. They found God, however you're supposed to say that. You will find God if you look for him. Seek and find, forget and get wrecked.

[26:41] God wants to do work more than you or I do. But we're going to do it his way. Saul goes to the witch of Endor, and whether that was Samuel or whether that wasn't Samuel, it doesn't matter, because he never should have been there in the first place. You think doing God, doing things the right way is not giving you the result you want? Well, doing it the wrong way ain't going to take you any better. If you're running and eating healthy and exercising, you're not losing weight, Bojangles ain't going to speed the process up. Okay? It's not. Do the right thing the right way. The church at Ephesus, they left their first love. That was their big problem. It wasn't going to have enough bus ministry, enough door knocking. They left their first love. They fell out of love with Jesus.

[27:14] God, we maybe can't see it on the outside, but it's very visible on the inside. So what's the application? What do we do? Two things. Number one, live right so you can serve right. Get your B-level right so everything else is right. Line your character up with your calling. Live worthy is how the Bible says it. Ephesians 4.1, I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech that you walk worthy of the vocation wherewith you are called. And again, 1 Colossians, the only Colossians.

[27:40] Colossians 1.9 and 10. For this cause, we also, since today we heard it, do not cease to pray for you and desire that you might be fulfilled knowledge of his will, that you might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing. There's a certain way that we're supposed to live as Christians. Great power comes with great responsibility. I don't know who said that. Andrew Jackson, Spider-Man, whoever. Doesn't matter. It's very true. We have a high calling. We're Christians. Highest, most important calling on earth. We need to live up to it. We're not working to be saved, but we live up to who we are in Jesus. So line up.

[28:06] This is a great work they have to do. They need to know God. They need to seek him. And we have a great work. We're not just building one building. We're going into all the world preaching the gospel, which takes us to the next application. Show God to yourself and show him to others.

[28:18] Worship God personally. You're always worshiping. You're never not worshiping. And yes, sometimes you feel the worship a little more, but it's not like it's the worship meters up here and when you're doing right and reading your Bible on Tuesday at work, you're still worshiping. Teach them to the next generation, especially your kids. David made Solomon the man he was. David prepared everything for Solomon. David made the past. He did everything. But Solomon was the one who scored the goal.

[28:43] Train your children. Train others now so they can accomplish what the Lord has for them. We all stand on the shoulders of previous generations. And you know this. I know this. But be involved in world evangelism and missions. Witness to others. Get a track. Look, they're right here. Put it on their door.

[28:58] Bake some caramel corn. I'll bake. I'll make my wife bake some for you so I can eat some of it. It's very good. That's why I can't lose weight because we're baking caramel corn for our neighbors. And it's delicious. But we're going to give them a track and try and see what happens. Maybe nothing. Maybe something. But we got to at least try. Jesus is for everyone. He's not just for you. And Sam said it.

[29:15] If you don't have anybody that you're witnessing to, start praying. Colossians 4, 3 and 4. With all praying also for us that God would open unto us a door of utterance to speak the mystery of Christ. Listen, you will meet lost people if you're determined to meet lost people. God will send them to you.

[29:29] Live up to your calling and show others Jesus. This is such a wonderful work that we get to do. Let's live up to it. Lord, we love you and thank you for this day. Lord, I just pray as the pianist makes your way up to the piano. Lord, I pray that you would help every single one of us. Lord, I know that there's areas in my life where I'm not seeking you like I should. I'm not keeping your commandments where I sometimes get a little nervous to witness, where I get a little hesitant. Lord, where I'm not training my children right. I'm not investing in others as much as I could. But Lord, I pray that you'd help all of us to line our lives up with our calling, to live worthy of the mission you've called us to, and to be introducing you to others on a daily basis with your hands.