Transcript

Grab your Bibles and let’s go to Psalm 1. Actually, this is one of the first texts I have ever studied or rather I did ever study after God saved me and called me to preach. I’ve redone two or three times but it’s a rich rich passage and has a lot of applications to what you and I are seeing in our world today. By the way, brothers and sisters, what happened in Orlando was a vile and vicious wickedness. Certainly we don’t approve of the kind of things that were going on in that nightclub or any nightclub, but what happened to those people was wrong and every Christian should stand up and denounce that as the evil that it is. You know, and this…I’m not going to go there.

Psalm 1, beginning in verse 1 . The Psalmist writes,

1 How blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, Nor stand in the path of sinners, Nor sit in the seat of scoffers! 2 But his delight is in the law of the LORD, And in His law he meditates day and night. 3 He will be like a tree firmly planted by streams of water, Which yields its fruit in its season And its leaf does not wither; And in whatever he does, he prospers. 4 The wicked are not so, But they are like chaff which the wind drives away. 5 Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment, Nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous. 6 For the LORD knows the way of the righteous, But the way of the wicked will perish.

Throughout the Scriptures or numerous times in the Scriptures, God compares people to trees. He’ll just have a little metaphor if you’re a godly man, then you’re like a certain tree. Well, this is a man here who is planted like a tree planted by the streams of water, but through the years I’ve meditated on that a little bit and thought about some of the trees that you might think you’re like or maybe you know some people like these trees: maybe a wild apple tree, or maybe a mighty oak, and I suppose all of us know a weeping willow, or maybe a scaly bark, have you ever known a scaly bark? You don’t get over it when you run into one of those. Or maybe you just want to be a poplar tree. So I think when the Scripture often uses a plant or a tree as a metaphor there’s a lot of truth to that as you look out at the world and see the trees that God has given us and God has made us.

But the Psalmist said in Psalm 52:8, “But as for me, I am like a green olive tree in the house of God;I trust in the lovingkindness of God forever and ever.” And I think what he wants us to see there, the green olive tree would have been a tree of prosperity and beauty and even a tree of hope in that day because olive were something that was coveted and needful for food, for the oil, and so if you had an olive orchard, you were doing pretty good. So he said, “I am a vigorous, flourishing, green olive tree but there’s a superlative there, “in the household of the Lord.” Not just doing well, but doing well under God and for God and the Bible says here, “Here are some things that you need to know about the truly blessed man who is doing well.” You may have used the phrase many times, “Boy, he’s a blessed man. Or she’s a blessed woman.” Well, the Bible here tells us, “Here is what a blessed man looks like.”

First of all, let’s talk about some negatives the blessed man of God or woman avoids. Some negatives they avoid. He begins in verse 1 and says, “How blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked.” Now, there is going to be a digression here but he begins by saying in your walk, in your lifestyle pattern, you’re a blessed person if you know how to turn the right advice away. Turn on your television or turn on your radio and I’m telling you, you will be inundated with the counsel of the wicked. I mean, such twisted, warped viewpoints and logic that is in the world today; such perverse, ungodly and unnatural stuff that they want to parade as normal. But if you want to be blessed of God, you have to have the capacity, the discernment to say, “No. I’m turning that off. I will push that away. I will not take that into my heart or into my mind. As far as my daily life, my lifestyle, my habits, my activities, I’m not going to walk in the counsel of the wicked.”

Now, again, talking about the nightclub in Orlando and asserting again how totally evil and horrendously bad that episode was but, you know, three times in the New Testament the Bible tells us to do not be found in carousings and in drinking parties. It’s amazing how if we’ll just follow what the Scripture says, we’ll keep ourselves out of environments where very bad things are likely to happen. Three different times the New Testament says the child of God just doesn’t need to be around carousings and drinking parties. Now, that doesn’t mean anybody that’s in a honky-tonk in Texas or a homosexual bar in Orlando deserves to be gunned down. That’s still wrong. It always will be, always has been. But we need to stay out of places where the wicked dwell if you want to be a blessed man. Now folks, look, we sin enough not purposing to without making a pattern and a purpose to do those.

So the blessed man does not pattern his life after the follies of the flesh and all the wooings of this world and the doctrines of demons. I used to talk a lot about how we ought to develop a scriptural strategy to avoid those environments where we are most vulnerable. How blessed is the man who knows his weaknesses and guards himself in those areas. Often when I was a young man and a single man, there were things I tried to stay away from and things that I didn’t do and places I didn’t go and sometimes some of the guys, sometimes Christian guys, “Well, that’s not really wrong to do that. It’s not really wrong to go there.” And I would say, “Look, it’s not about me being strong, it’s about me being weak. I’m weak and that’s why I can’t do this or go there. I’m not strong.” Wisdom is knowing you’re weak and knowing how to guard yourself in those particular areas because I want to be a man blessed of God and blessed are you when you do not walk in the counsel of the wicked.

Now, there is no greater fool on all the earth than the man who thinks he can identify and depart from sin apart from a complete dependence upon God so we have to constantly cast ourselves, and that should be an ever abiding prayer in our hearts, “O God, if you don’t save me, I’m sunk. O Lord, be my help at this time. You’ve got to keep me or I won’t be kept.” So we want to be that kind of a person and God wants us to be totally dependent upon him to avoid sin, to find sin, and to overcome sin.

So that’s the first step in this degradation, if you will, that the Psalmist is going to talk about. First a man finds himself walking in the counsel of the wicked. It’s not really maybe who he is yet but he’s beginning to be influenced; he’s beginning to be brought down by the counsel of the wicked.

Now there’s a second one, we’re digressing here. He said also that man in verse 1, he does not “stand in the path of sinners.” “Stand” means “to take one’s stand.” It’s more like your place in life. The word “sinner” here, now we’re all sinners but that’s not really what this verse means, it means one who has sort of settled in a course and settled lifestyle of sin and I believe that’s what the New Testament says when it talks about fornicators and adulterers and effeminate and others will not inherit the kingdom of heaven. He doesn’t mean a man who has failed there or a man who struggles there from time to time, he means a man who just opens his heart and life and embraces those wicked things and says, “This is now what I am.” A course and settled place. That’s standing in the path of the sinner. That person is no longer experimenting or investigating sin, he’s now openly accepting it. It’s become what he is.

Now, it’s never too late for anybody that’s still breathing, though. God can still save them and God can still apprehend them, but the further you go in the degradation, the harder it is to come back out, but thanks be to God. You remember the old story, I’ve said it many times. It’s amazing how certain things stay in your mind through the years. Of all things, Jerry Clower said this. Do you know who Jerry Clower is? A fertilizer salesman from Mississippi who was a comedian. He said he had an aunt that he’d stay over her house sometimes as a little boy. He’d say my aunt would be in there ironing and I’d be walking through the den and she’d set that iron down and say, “Jerry!” I’d stop, “Yes, ma’am.” “Jerry, Satan is mighty but God is Almighty.” He said, “I’ve never gotten over that.” Well, friend, even if you may have slidden to the place where you’re even in a course settled place of sin in your life, I’m going to tell you, there is an Almighty God who has grace sufficient for everyone.

But if you want to be a blessed man, you stay away from the counsel of the wicked. You stay away from the path of sinners. Now, there is a third level here and that is a seat, it’s what he uses, the word “seat,” the last part of verse 1, “Nor sit in the seat of scoffers!” Now, that’s a third progression. I never dreamed you and I would live in a country where you could turn on the television for the nightly news or whatever it is, and almost every night see one, two, three episodes of out-and-out scoffers just reviling, railings, scoffing against everything that’s right and decent and moral and good. Just boisterous about it. Unapologetic. We’ve lost every ability we ever had to blush in this country. Just a hardened, coarse reviling against everything that’s right and that’s part of the reason, maybe one of the main reasons we need each other as a church family. We need to come back and cleanse that back out and get our sensitivities to wickedness back up and never let ourselves drift to the place where we’ve begun listening to the counsel of the wicked and settling our lives in the path of sinners and even attempting to take our place in life as a scorner against God and the things of God.

So this man has digressed to that place of being totally satisfied and comfortable in his unholy state. He’s in the seat of the scoffer. It’s like the seat of David or the seat of Paul. At the university they’d say he has the chair of theology of a certain graduate school. Well, that’s a settled place, an established place. He mocks. He ridicules. He sneers. He makes that which is holy, divine and true the object of his scorn and his ridicule. This is the man who is no longer able to be reproved. He does not want a reproof. He does not want a rebuke. He does not want a correction. He just wants to be affirmed in his wickedness. It might be gambling. It might be drunkenness. It might be whore mongering. It might be 1,001 things but he’s settled in what he is. Have you ever witnessed to somebody like that? I have. I witnessed to a lot of people like that. They’ve just given in completely. That is the man that is radically opposite of a man that is blessed of God.

A man that is blessed of God does not listen to the counsel of the wicked. He does not stand in the path of sinners. He does not sit in the seat of the scoffer. The scoffer is the one who deep in his heart is miserable and he is bound. I just looked up several things the Bible says about a scoffer in the Bible. The Bible says the scoffer is odious to all men. The Bible says the scoffer must be avoided by all who wish to live godly. The Bible says the scoffer is one who is worthy of being punished by hitting. The scoffer is one who is to be rejected from the assembly. The scoffer is one who has a prepared judgment awaiting him. The Bible says his trademark is scoffing. The Bible says the scoffer will be brought to nothing and consumed. Some of the famous scoffers the Bible talks about are wine, the proud, the king of Samaria’s henchmen, and Job’s friends.

The Psalmist writes, “How blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, who does not stand in the path of sinners, who does not ever find himself sitting in the seat of scoffers!” Child of God, let’s pray for our children, let’s pray for our grandchildren, let’s pray for ourselves, that when the word of God is read or remembered or preached we would say, “O God, that’s me and I repent. I humble myself. I don’t want to become a hardened scoffer. Thank you, God.” The godly man, the Bible says, loves reproof. Did you hear that? He loves reproof.

Dr. John MacArthur said some time ago talking about churches that practice church discipline, I can’t imagine a church that doesn’t. As a matter of fact, the church that doesn’t practice church discipline ceases to be a church before long. But he said if you are a church that deals with sin, then you’ll have people come to your church that want their sin dealt with. That means they love being reproved. They understand. We have within us the germ that will destroy all of us. We’re all totally depraved. We’re all naturally wicked. We’re all bent toward rebellion and we need the clean, pure preaching and teaching of the word of God. Well, the scoffer is right the opposite of that.

Those are the negatives the blessed man of God must avoid. Let’s look at the positives that he adores. In other words, he’s not going to do those first three, walk in the counsel of the wicked, the path of sinners, and the seat of scoffers, but verse 2, “But his delight is in the law of the LORD.” That means he firmly adheres to. He wishes strongly to learn the word, wants to understand how it applies to his life, wants to live it out in his life. He doesn’t open the Bible with human wisdom or human ingenuity, he opens the Bible trusting the Holy Spirit to give the understanding. Now folks, everything about this passage is dependent upon the Spirit’s power. You will never be able to truly avoid the counsel of the wicked and the path of sinners and the seat of scoffers if the Spirit doesn’t enable you. The Spirit of God has to be alive and so much so under the word of God. When our delight is in revelation, it’s because the word of God is becoming alive through Holy Spirit illumination. Holy Spirit illumination, and you need to pray for that. “O God, help me. Spirit of God, help me to see what I need to see as I look at the word of God.” I mean, if it wasn’t necessary to have the Spirit of God, I guess I’ll just turn on a computer, find some Bible scholar and just get the facts, but it just doesn’t work that way. God has ordained means by which the word of God comes to us and the Spirit illumines it so that we might grasp it and joy in it.

I can honestly say with all of my heart there is no pleasure on earth greater than the times I have in my study preparing to preach for you. There are times when God shows me things and blesses me from the word that is absolutely beyond comprehension and is beyond description. It’s just blessed. I’m not special, that’s the Holy Spirit. That’s the Holy Spirit of God. Now, it is true that God has to make us hunger for the word. The Spirit’s got to give us an illumination for the word, but there is a man-ward responsibility here. Have you ever found that if you’ll study in the word, you might start reading or start your devotion cold but you often end warm? You might start it just because I’m supposed to do it but as you read, the Spirit of God warms your heart.

So understand, you remember when Paul was telling Timothy what it was going to be like pastoring? He said, “Timothy, preach the word. Be instant in season and out of season. Reprove, rebuke, exhort with great patience and instruction for the time will come when they will not,” here’s the word, “endure sound doctrine.” That means there is some effort and some work to you raising your children and your grandchildren and your wives or whoever it may be, so that we all learn together to enjoy the word of God. It doesn’t just…it’s not like ice cream at home and Dairy Queen over here. You don’t have to work at that, it just happens. Your fallen nature loves ice cream. I’m not saying ice cream is evil, by the way. Some of you are going to go now and get you some when we get through here and that’s okay, that’s good. Give them some business. They don’t have any. Have y’all noticed? It’s the busiest place in town. You might be a redneck when they put a Dairy Queen and it’s the busiest place in town. But I don’t need to get off on Dairy Queen tonight but we have things we naturally enjoy and when the Spirit of God comes into us, he begins to enable us to have an enjoyment in the things of God, primarily the word of God, but you do have to work at it. There are some spiritual disciplines.

When I was a little boy, I wasn’t a good eater as a little boy. Do you know what my mother raised me on? She raised me on oatmeal because I wouldn’t eat anything else and she just figured it was good for me so she gave me oatmeal all the time. I don’t know how many cartons of Quaker oatmeal I ate growing up but it was a bunch of them. But she slowly would put corn and peas and okra and squash and turnip greens…I come from country stock, by the way. My mother was one of 12 children. Twelve. Poor people. Country rural people. And you know, as the years went by, don’t ever say, “Brother Jeff, I’ve got corn and peas and okra and turnip greens and cornbread, would you like to come eat?” because I’m coming.

I learned to love it and that’s the way it is with the word of God. You discipline yourself to learn to have a delight in the word of God. The Bible says if you want to be blessed of God, you’re a man who learns to delight in the word of God and I’ve got to say this because it’s so foundational and a corner stone of this. That means you’ve got to be in a church that’s anchored in truth. You’ve got to be in a congregation that’s sold out on whatever else we do, we’re going to preach and teach this word as it is written for the glory of God. There’s nothing more important you can do for your family than that.

Well, he says not only is his delight in it, he goes a step further in some practical aspects of this, “And in His law he meditates day and night.” You may remember that the word “meditate” comes from a word of agriculture; it means “to chew the cud.” It’s like a cow chewing the cud. You know the cow swallows it down and then she’ll go find a big shade tree and she’ll lay down under that tree and she’ll bring it back up and she’ll chew that cud and get it to a certain moisture or status or texture and then she’ll swallow it back down again, and then she can digest it and get the proteins she needs to survive. If a cow doesn’t chew the cud, she doesn’t get protein and she dies. Do you know what happens? If you don’t let the word of God dwell on you, you’re not going to get spiritual proteins that you need to survive.

So you learn to just…it’s a great joy of mine to take the text I’m preaching that week and I’ve told you before, on Monday, I put it on like a cloak and I wear it all week and I try to just let it work on me and I think on it. I do that a lot when I’m falling asleep. I do it when I’m bush hogging at the farm. I just try to let that word work on me and then when Sunday comes, I’m ready for it to bust out. I’m just ready for it to bust out. Now, you’re not called to preach. There’s a difference in what you have to do. You may not can meditate like I do but there ought to be some of that in your life. I would challenge you to get your small group lesson or to get my next text that I’m going to be preaching on Sunday and find you a verse or two and memorize it that week and just kind of maybe put it by your bedside and just think on it as the week goes by. You will be overwhelmed at the power that will give you in your life.

The Psalmist said, “You’re blessed if your delight is in the word of God and if you meditate on it day and night.” David said, “I meditate on you in the night watches.” And as you keep flushing the word through your heart and mind, it’s kind of like the family that lived out in the desert and the desert soil had a lot of salt in it and they couldn’t get anything to grow. But momma every evening would throw out the dishwater out the back door, it’s what people used to do back before they had all the plumbing and things we have today. She just kept throwing it out and throwing it out and every now and then there was a tomato seed or cantaloupe seed or something in that water. She threw so much water out as the years went by, she finally washed the salt out of that sand and she started noticing some things were growing out there that would have never grown before.

And that’s what God wants to do with us, keep washing, keep washing. By the way, we are unapologetically in the brainwashing business because 100% of life is brainwashing. You either washing your mind with the filth and the wickedness of the world, or the pure truth of the word of God. I mean, everything that comes into you is having an effect. David said, “Blessed are you if you’re learning to delight in the word of God; if you’re learning to meditate on the word of God.” The word given by the Father is implanted into our souls by the Holy Spirit and produces into our lives the character of the Son, Jesus Christ.

This man is blessed. His life will be like, or out from him will be like rivers of living water, water whose quality is incomparable and whose quantity is incomprehensible. You know, I sometimes think about our church and think about the difficulties we’ve been through and the wars that we’ve been through and the difficult seasons, and I think about the sweetness that God has given us and the genuineness and the humility and the love. You know, I’ve been here 36 years counting the time I was here before I came on staff, 36 years and how has God sustained all of that? It’s nothing but the word of God changing our hearts and rebuking us and humbling us and causing us to love him and love each other more and more and more.

Well, he says if you want to be a man blessed of God, you’re going to have to make sure you avoid the counsel of the wicked, the path of the sinners, and the seat of scoffers. You don’t even want to get close to that kind of level. On the positive side, verse 2, “delight in the law of the LORD, meditate in that law day and night.” Then he says there are going to be some blessings. Look at verse 3, “He will be like a tree firmly planted by streams of water.” Planted by the streams of water. You see, at one time you were planted in this world growing among the thorns and the thistles of this world, but when you’re saved, you’re reborn but listen, you’re replanted. I might even say transplanted. You’re planted now in the garden of God and the word of God begins to bless your life. You will be like a tree planted, he says.

He goes on and says, “by streams of water.” He uses “streams” there because he wants to emphasize an abundant supply; a stream that never runs dry. In other words, when your mainstay for living is God and his word, you will never, ever, ever be without enough nourishment. Now listen to me: if you satisfy your soul’s palate on the wickedness of this world, you will just grind and lust and long and never ever have enough. The stream of God is always enough. It’s always more than enough. It’s always more than satisfying. It’s always more than sufficient. One scholar said this word “stream” can actually be translated “canal” and they would have canals in this day just like they do in agriculture today; for the dry season they have a canal to make sure the plant always gets its water.

I just thought about this and built on this a little bit. When David said in Psalm 52 that he wanted to be like a green olive tree in the house of God, one characteristic of a green olive tree was they had deep, long roots. So an olive tree could make it in that harsh and arid Palestine climate that they had there because of the long and deep roots. So that’s a picture there of the man who is anchored in something deeper than himself and when the storm comes and the storm would rush down that stream and you’re that green olive tree planted by that stream, after the storm subsides, very often rich and fertile new soil settles in around those roots that came from upstream. So the storms that wipe other men away only bring us new nourishments and that is so true. I’m telling you, every storm I have ever faced as a child of God, after we got through, brought new blessings and new spiritual nourishments when it was all said and done. It’s an amazing thing that God does for us. We don’t need a dam or a dike or a levy for our nourishment, sandbags, we just have long roots enabled by God to grab the immovable rock of Jesus Christ and we’re always secure there.

He said not only is he like a tree planted by streams of water, never ending, abundant supply, he said it “yields its fruit in season.” Now, all that means is this: that means that tree does what it’s supposed to do. You know, that’s what revival is when you do what you’re supposed to do. What is revival? It’s when you do what you’re supposed to do; when you do what a child of God is supposed to do. Do you know what revival is? When you’re back faithful in church because that’s what you’re supposed to do. Revival is when you faithfully give your tithes and offerings. That’s what you’re supposed to do. Revival is when you live clean and holy and strive to walk with God because that’s what you’re supposed to do.

He said this kind of man, now he’s not talking about perfection here and he’s not talking about an instantaneous position of sanctification. What he means is as he walks in his life, he has his struggles, he has his trials, he does fall down but as he nears his old age, you just see in that man he has in his life and he does in his life what he’s supposed to have and what he’s supposed to do. Do you know what that means? It means you can depend on him. Do you know what I have as your pastor? I have a lot of men and ladies in the church I can depend on them. I don’t worry about you. I know you’re going to do what you’re supposed to do. I don’t have to stroke you. I don’t have to pet you. I don’t have to feed your ego. You’re just mature. You’ve been by the streams of water. You’ve walked with God. You love the things of God and you’re dependable. That’s a great attribute to have. By the way, you want to raise children and children’s children and children’s children’s children who love the Lord, then grow old and let them see you’re a faithful dependable saint of God. They’re watching, by the way. They’re watching.

His “lead does not wither.” That’s a third thing. He’s planted by streams of water, yields its fruit in season and then, thirdly, his leaf does not wither. “Wither” means “dried up; still attached but it’s worthless.” In other words, this guy is always full of sap and foliage. He’s like an evergreen. Even when he’s old, he has some freshness about him.

I remember when I was first converted, my pastor at First Baptist Church of Lawrenceburg was Charles Owen Dinkens. Dr. Dinkens just died, oh goodness, in the last year. He was a friend for the rest of my life. I guess Dr. Dinkens had to be 60ish when he came to First Baptist of Lawrenceburg. He was in the final years of, you know, of his pastoring, but he had a freshness and a sweetness and a vitality. His body wasn’t everything it used to be, by the way, mine isn’t either and I’m looking around and I don’t think yours is either. But it does sag, bag and drag, doesn’t it, as the years go by. But, folks, look, there is a freshness, a holiness, a vitality in your eyes, in your countenance, in your life when you’re a man blessed of God, or a lady blessed of God. I’ve said this many times and I have a bunch of them but for those of us who are getting into maybe the edge of the senior adult realm, pray that you’ll grow old sweet in Jesus. Sweet in Jesus. Let some of these little 18, 25 year old girls look at you and say, “When I get to be 75, I want to be sweet and in love with Jesus like she is.”

That’s what happens, leaf does not wither. Yeah, this old body withers, this old frame withers and our minds may begin to grow dim and a lot of other things but I’m telling you, there could be a spiritual vitality. Look, you don’t have to turn it on and be a phony either, just be real. Boy, I want to grow old that way and I know you do too and many of you are growing old that way. We don’t want to be like so many of our former great churches. Do you know where Baptist work began in America? Providence, Rhode Island. You know, do you remember Roger Williams, the story of Roger Williams, one of my heroes? Roger Williams was a Puritan who came over with the, I don’t know what ship. I’m going to say Mayflower but he’s one of the first Puritans to come over and establish the Massachusetts Bay Colony, but they were staunch Puritans and they required every citizen of the town to be a member of their church. Now, their motives were pure and we owe, I think, almost everything in America to that great godly foundation the Puritans founded this country with, but Roger Williams was troubled that they were forcing people into membership. Roger Williams believed you preach the Gospel and then they experience the new birth and then you baptize them. Not as babies. They were baptizing babies. Roger Williams said, “No, the Bible teaches you preach the Gospel and the Gospel changes them and then you baptize them, then they’ll join your church.” They said, “No, that’s not what we’re going to do here.” So they ran Roger Williams out and he went through the wilderness and some Indians helped him and he settled in a place up in what became later Rhode Island and he called that place Providence because he said, “The Providence of God put me here.” He started the first Baptist church in America where they preached the Gospel and led people to Jesus and then baptized them, which is what the Bible teaches, and made them members of the church.

The great Bible believing, soul winning, evangelistic churches of America started in the Northeast. Go up there today. Go up there today. They’ve withered. They have withered almost completely away. Why? They got smart in the world. They learned the wisdom of the world. They tried to synchronize worldly wisdom and worldly values and worldly acceptance in what the world would call compassion and equality and inclusion, all this nonsense, and they left this right here out. A man wrote that he visited one of those churches that was once a great Bible preaching church in New York City. There used to be some great Bible preaching evangelistic churches, there are a few still scattered but not many. In one of those churches, they have over the door, “The gates of heaven.” What they meant was you can come in here and hear the Gospel. What they meant was you can come in here and hear about Jesus to be saved and know you’re going to heaven. But that was long long ago. Do you know what it says now? “The gates of heaven. Closed June, July and August.” Because nobody comes. Nobody is interested. In the summer months, they get so low they just close the church down. I don’t guess you can go to heaven from New York in June, July and August.

Well, we don’t want to be like that. We don’t want to be where our leaf withers and that’s one of the great burdens of my heart after being here 35+ years is, “O God, when it’s 55 and 65 and 75, will this place still be anchored in truth? Passionate in the things of God and the glory of God?” And it’s really hard for the next generations to carry on. Do you know why it’s hard? Because God formed us in the fire and the next generation doesn’t have to have that many fires because a lot of them have been, the battle’s been won. But we’re going to pray and work that the next generations are even stronger and even better for the Lord.

Last thing, real quickly, whatever he does, he’ll prosper, he says there in the last part of verse 3, “And whatever he does, he prospers.” He knows God. He’s indwelt by God. He’s controlled by God. And by the way, God must prosper so he doesn’t grow old and become a weeping willow. He doesn’t grow old and become a scaly bark hickory. He’s a green olive tree in the house of the Lord.

Let’s keep fighting the good fight, saying, “No! No! No!” to the counsel of the wicked, to the path of sinners and to the seat of the scoffers. I’ve just resolved in my mind we’re going to be lied about, they’re going to twist everything we say, we’re going to be the off- scouring of the world but that’s fine. I’m prepared for it. I am not changing my doctrine. I’m not going to hug up to that bunch. I want to be a green olive tree in the house of the Lord whose leaf does not wither and whatever he does prospers.

Let’s pray together, alright? Ushers, would you come?