In this sermon, the speaker emphasizes the importance of prioritizing our pursuit of Christ over material possessions and worldly achievements. He highlights the distractions and busyness of our culture that hinder us from focusing on the goal of knowing and seeking Jesus. The speaker also addresses the issue of teaching evolution in schools and the need for people to believe in the existence of God. He encourages a balanced approach to faith, combining the study of God's word with the power and worship of the Holy Spirit.

Now, we started Tuesday night in the 11th chapter of Hebrews. If this is your sort of thing that you care to think about. We're talking about faith. Now, faith is something we, all Christians, talk about at length. And I come up with my own definition of faith, which I will now give you. Faith is an enduring belief and trust in the goodness and faithfulness of God. An enduring trust and belief in the goodness and faithfulness of God. As far as I see, that fits the 11th chapter of Hebrews. Under the New Covenant, it works out in a daily interaction with the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ. A daily interaction. This enduring belief and trust in the goodness and faithfulness of God, under the New Covenant, works out in a daily interaction with the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ. And, in obedience to the Lord. The result being, growth into His image. Not to be on the tape. Faith is an enduring trust and belief in the goodness and faithfulness of God. And under the New Covenant, it works out in a daily interaction with the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ. Each day. And, in stern obedience to God, His written word and what He speaks to us personally. The result of the faith is faith being that we come into the image of God. So, I thought that you might be pleased with that. Now, in the 11th chapter of Hebrews, we talked last week about hope. What we hope for. When the NIV faith is being sure of what we hope for. Something we hope for. We see that, we believe that God made these things. Abel teaches us about what? Does anybody remember from Tuesday night? It's so important. Attitude. See, you can go through your religious thing. But, if your attitude is stinko. You know, I don't want to do this. And, I wish I was in Las Vegas. And, why do I have to do this and everything? Finally, God says go. I don't want any people whining around here. I've got a lot to give. You've got something better, go after it. That's God's attitude. He's not begging anybody to stay and do some religious thing. And, Abel's attitude was good. By faith, Abel pleased God. Cain's attitude was not right. How do we know that? Well, it's plain as anything can be. When God reproved him, what did he do? What should we do when God rebukes us? Repent. His attitude was lousy. Instead, he got angry and went after his brother. Envy came into him. And then, envy led to murder. Just like envy in the priest led to the murder of Christ. Envy. Don't ever get envious. One of the seven deadly sins, they say. And, see, this man's attitude was all wrong. It wasn't because he offered his farm products. That's what he was. He was a farmer. He offered up what he had. But, his attitude was terrible. Well, maybe God wanted blood offered with it. Because, in the grain offerings in the Old Testament, you also offered blood. Well, maybe God said that to him. You all have to order blood. I don't know. The Bible doesn't say that. It says he was a murderer. But, if God did, what should he have done? As many as I love, I rebuke and chase them. And, we have to repent. If we get sore about it, and if you get sore at God, you don't have the temerity to approach God, how's it going to work out? Against people. So, you can't go after the chief because you're afraid to do that. So, you go after people. And, that's exactly what he did. He had no call being angry at Abel. Why would he be angry at Abel? Abel didn't do anything. But, once sin gets going, boy, you'll get mad at people around you. That's one of the ways you can tell. When you're not living in faith, when you're not living in daily interaction with the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ, you may be coming to church and all that, and blah, blah, blah. But, if you find yourself getting angry at people, that's a great big red flag, and it says you're doing something wrong. Now, get back there, go back to your altar, and talk to God about it. Did you get this out of your heart? Isn't the Spirit of God in you that's making you angry at people? It's because you're getting cold. It's a warning. You're getting cold, and you're not praying and reading your Bible and serving God like you're supposed to be doing, and so it will work out, and angry toward people, and you get envious, and then murder. So, it didn't make any sense, getting angry at Abel. Abel didn't do anything to him. But, that's the way it works, when our attitude is wrong. You do all your religious work, but if your attitude is wrong, leave your gift at the altar. Don't mess around. Any question about that? Now, you say, what is that? Faith. See, we've got so many definitions of faith go around. Usually, it's people that don't want to work, so they live by faith. Meaning, they want people to give them money. And there's no instance in the Bible that I know of that living by faith has anything to do with money. But maybe there is, I'm just not aware of it. Or miracles. Miracles. Miracles. If you have faith, you can do that. Well, the 11th chapter of Hebrews is God's idea of what faith is. Isn't that neat? God's idea of what faith is. And the first thing is attitude. Attitude. That's faith, is when you have a right attitude toward God, and toward your brothers. That's faith. By faith, Abel offered a better sacrifice than Cain. Any problem with that? Anybody have any problem with that? And then we went, of course, the result was that he was commended as righteous. As a result of that faith, righteousness comes by faith, Paul told us. He didn't have to use Abraham. He could have used Noah. Could have used Abel. Righteousness has never come by anything but faith. And whenever righteousness came under people to the law, and there's a lot of verses in the Bible that speak of people who were righteous under the law. In fact, the book of Psalms is full of it, talking about the righteous. Righteous people who were righteous under the law. That isn't always taught, but it is what the Bible says. Many times. In fact, I think of the first Psalm. Doesn't it say, Sinners shall not stand where? What have you been reading? The congregation of the scornful. Yeah, well, what does it say? Does somebody have their... Tim, somebody, what does it say in the last... Psalms 1. Alright? Doesn't it say, Sinners will not stand in the assembly of the righteous? I mean, that's what it says to me. Huh? Well, there had to be righteous people. Right? Well, they're under the law. Right? Well, there was a lot of righteous people under the law. And if you read about it in the book of Psalms, you'll find out it's continually talking about the righteous. Hello? Is that strange to you? But those who were righteous under the law were not righteous because of the law. They were righteous because they had faith. Because nobody ever pleased God by the law. There was people that went through that sacrifices and did it in faith and touched God. And they were righteous. It says, Those who do these things shall live in them. And they're righteous. And when they didn't, then catastrophe came on them. But when they did, God blessed them. Well, I'm emphasizing that because we have an awful lot of teaching throughout the law. Do you know that one of the big things that Hitler came out with was to get rid of the Old Testament? Did you know that? One of those big things. I've been reading recently about Pope Pius XII and the Concordance and other things that went on there. And one of Hitler's main things, and there was a German Catholic priest that stood up against that and said, The Old Testament is the word of God. See, Hitler says, Well, that's all Jewish. The Old Testament is the word of God. And he got himself in trouble doing that. And let me tell you, the book from Genesis through Revelation is all food for us. All of it. We don't go back and keep the law. I'm not saying that. But all through the Old Testament, God can speak to you from the Old Testament. God can speak to you from the New Testament. Yes, He can. The whole book. What would we do without Psalms? You see, we get some crazy ideas. What would we do without the 23rd Psalm? What would we do without the 91st Psalm? God speaks to us through the 91st Psalm, the 23rd Psalm, the 34th Psalm, about many afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers them from the wall. Don't ever rule out the Old Testament. It's most of the Bible. And it's full of good stuff. And I'll tell you, a Psalm, if you want, a Psalm of the Psalms is the 119th Psalm. Every verse in it is about the word of God. It's the longest of the Psalms. And every verse in the 119th Psalm is about the word of God. Remember the one we all know, Thy word is a lamp unto my feet. That's the 119th Psalm. So, there was people that pleased God by conscience like Noah. There was people that pleased God under the law like the mother and father of John the Baptist as they walked in all ordinances of the law, blameless. But when we want to study faith, the Bible uses all the old timers. See? Ever think of that? Hebrews 11 is all about the patriarchs. And that's where... In Hebrews, the 10th chapter, the preceding chapter, in almost the last verse, it says, the righteous one will live by faith. That is, the just shall live by faith. Four times that's in the Bible, and this is the last one. And so, Hebrews 11 is a long definition of the just shall live by faith, which is the cry of the Reformation. The just shall live by faith. And it's all about people from the Old Testament. Isn't that a caution? So, the thing about faith is that it touches God. It has an enduring belief and trust in God. And that's how David pleased God, even though he was under the law. No one has ever pleased God by just going through the mechanics. Now, when we get up into the New Testament, we have doctrines that prevail in the evangelical churches that we can go through Romans 10, 9, and 10, that thou shalt believe in thine heart that God has raised Him from the dead, and so on, thou shalt be saved. And people do that with no faith. Somebody told them, just go through this, the formula, and you've got it. Well, come on. Boy, you're thinking, I can smell the rubber burning in here. Isn't it the truth? Can't you come and accept Christ without faith and just go through your doctrinal thing? Come on, you may never have thought about that. But it's true, and people do that. They slip up their patty in church, and then they drop a faith in it. They never touch the man. You've got to touch the man. That's why, as it grieves me, it touches me when I hear, like Jeremy said, the young people go and they feel a lack that they don't know God for themselves. And I didn't realize that, but I've heard that, John, several times lately that the young people have this. I didn't realize that. I did not realize that. So one thing we've got to teach the young people is you stay with it until you touch God. Don't be satisfied with some formula. Don't be satisfied with it. So you said the formula. Great. But you can do that without faith. See, you didn't have an enduring belief and trust in God. See, you said, well, how do I get to heaven? Well, just say these words and you get to heaven by grace. And that's not it. And we need to teach the young people and old people too, you stay with it. You know, the Bible says, Verily thou art a God that hideth thyself, O God of Israel, the Savior. And it says, In the day you seek me with all of your heart, I'll be found. And you don't get God. You know, one of the worst things that happened in Pentecost, we used to tarry for the baptism. And then someone got the bright idea that we didn't have to do that anymore. They sat them down in a chair and said, now speak in tongues. Well, because the Holy Spirit's been here for 2,000 years. Well, I think a lot of people were really helped by that that had been tied up in knots for years wanting to speak in tongues and couldn't. So Brother Stiles just sat them down in a chair and said speak in tongues and they spoke in tongues. And so, tarrying went out. And with it went the baby. Because that was when Pentecostal people used to seek God. And before them, the Nazarene people, seeking sanctification. They would get down on the altar and pray and pray and pray and pray until they got sanctified. Well, you can say from the Word, you're sanctified by Jesus. Tra-la-la-la-la. Go on your way. You don't need faith or anything else. Just do the formula. But they had this thing, which was really baptism without tongues because I saw the old Nazarenes in action. And they'd go down on the altar and they'd tarry. And the Methodists before them, they would wait until they had a heart warming. They would say, stay with it until you touch God. We used to call that in Pentecost praying through. You pray through. You just don't say the thing. Now, there's a place for standing on the Word. Make no mistake, there's a place for standing on the Word of God. But, you know, they used to say we're not saved by feeling, but by faith. That's a false dichotomy. The opposite of faith is not feeling. The opposite of faith is unbelief. And there's plenty of feelings. Praise the Lord. David said, don't take the joy of thy salvation from me. David, under the Old Covenant, says don't take the joy of salvation from me after he had sinned with Bathsheba, that psalm. Don't take the joy of my salvation from me. Talk about feeling. Did you ever see a backslider at the office that's lost the touch of God, knows it and can't get it back and is panicked? They'll go down there and scream and cry because they don't feel the honey in the rock anymore. There's plenty of feelings with faith. But the Bible is our guide. The Bible is never wrong. Never, never wrong. But we're not led by the Bible. How are we led? By the Spirit. That's what the Bible says. So, the balance. There's a balance there. And I think the charismatic moves, sometimes they get unbalanced. We need to go back more to the Baptist sword drills and things and all that we used to do in the youth of Christ where there's more of an emphasis on the Word. Learn the Word. Learn the Word. Then you mix into that the life and the power and the worship of Pentecost and you've got something going. You've got what it says in the 149th Psalm. See, you've got the high praises and you've got the two-edged sword. If you have just the high praises, the church will go into immorality every time because worship is sensuous and it leads into sloppy agape and the first thing you know, you've got adultery in your church going. If you just have the two-edged sword, things are dry. Like they said, the last place in the world, I've heard this said, that you'll ever find the supernatural is in your local church. So, that's what happens if you just have the sword. So, the order is important there as it is throughout God's Word. You have the high praises of God. That's the 149th Psalm. The high praises of God. Not just the little old praises of God, but the high praises of God and the two-edged sword. Then, according to that Psalm, you're ready to judge the nations. So, faith has plenty of feeling to it. So, you do what the Bible says and then you press into God until you know Him, until you touch Him. If it takes a month, if it takes a year, you don't quit until you have your experience with God. And let me tell you, it'd be pretty dry going if we never heard from God. Pretty dry going. And I know there's some that God leads that way. I realize that. He doesn't speak to us all in the same manner. But I do want to encourage you that faith is more than a subscription to Bible verses. The Bible verses are absolutely accurate and are an infallible guideline. But what they lead us to is the living Jesus. And that's why Jesus said to the Pharisees, search the Word, because in there you think you have eternal life. But they testify of what? Of Me. And you won't come to Me. You've got your nose stuck in the scroll, which is right, which is the revealed Word of God. But it brings you to Jesus. So, the Bible, true faith, is an enduring belief and trust in the goodness and faithfulness of God. And under the New Covenant, it works out in a daily interaction with the crucifixion and resurrection. Part of our life is knowing the sufferings being conformed to His death. Part of our life is knowing the power of His resurrection. Isn't that so? And we have to have them both in balance. They both do certain things in our life. The crucifixion gets the old out of the way. The resurrection lifts us up so that we have life. Death and life. Death and life. And if you think back today, because God is so practical and He didn't waste a day, there was something in your life that if you took it right, it caused a death to the natural man. If you took it right, it caused a death to the natural man. And if you took it right, it also brought to you a measure of resurrection life that you never had before. And this has to operate daily to bring you into the image of Christ which is that to which you've been called. Is there any question when I've said a lot of things? Talked a lot. I don't know if I said anything. Yes? If you don't believe what the Word says, if you don't believe what the Word says, you don't have faith. Because faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word. Once you see something in the Bible, you have to make a decision. Either I believe that or I don't. If you don't, you'll never get it. And that's true for salvation. That's true for healing. That's true for speaking in tongues. That's true for ministry. That's true for anything that you find in that Bible, you're brought right to a decision. And that's true of all the things the New Testament tells us about sin. You can ignore what it says. Like it says, don't let any foolish talk go out of your mouth. You can look at that and say, ha, ha, ha, ha. Who's doing that? You'll never get deliverance. When you go and say, God, that's what I want. If that's what You said, then that's what I want. That's faith. See? Faith is acting there. It's interacting with Christ in a living way. It's obeying Him. And it's bringing you into His image. How many see that? And it's been the same under the old as under the new. Under the old, God said, bring your sacrifice. But He didn't want you to come dragging a bull and say, oh, Lord, here goes a valuable part of my livestock. I could be getting all these offspring out of this bull. Oh, well, I guess if I have to, I have to. Well, you drag the thing by the neck. And of course, all the Israelis are looking at it and saying, what did He do? Yeah, I know what He did. I know what He did. I know what He did. You know why He's got that bull there? And you're thinking, they don't want to shut their mouth. I have to bring my bull here with all these people doing all this. You might as well leave your bull home. You got too much bull there and too little faith. You bring your bull cheerfully. Hallelujah! God gave me this animal and I can get fellowship with Him. And I get up there and I slay this bull in the fellowship offering. And oh, God will bless me in this wonderful. Instead of going through your herd you find some weak old, deformed bull with bad knees or something. Well, isn't that what we do? Give God the dregs of your life. How about getting up in the morning and giving God the best of your life? That's faith. That's an enduring belief and trust in the goodness and faithfulness. And there's a hope there that He's a rewarder of those who seek Him. That's faith. That's what faith is. It isn't necessarily miracles. And it certainly isn't living without working for most of us. There's some people, yes. God does call them to that and they have to exercise faith. But faith is what we're talking about here. This is what faith is. Attitude. And then Enoch. It mentions Enoch. Again, another old timer. And what did he do that was faith? He walked with God. I mean, he didn't save it for Sunday morning at 11 o'clock. He was with God all the time. As soon as he got up in the morning, God was in all his thoughts. How are you this morning, Lord? How is the weather up there? We're fine down here. Praise God for our blessing. Well, thank You, Lord. This is wonderful. Oh, God, what a day You gave us. It's raining. Well, Lord, it's raining dairy products and fruit and vegetables and nuts and meat. Oh, praise God. Oh, look at this wonderful meal my wife makes. This is wonderful. Oh, thank You, Lord. God was in all his thoughts. He walked with God. And what was the result? Guys, I can't hang down there anymore. This is ridiculous. Let this man up here. So, that's an example of faith. It's not some magic that you work. It's a walk with God. You're showing your faith. Here He is invisible. You can't even see Him. And yet you love Him and you believe in Him and you bring Him into everything that you do. Hardly anything that's more of faith than that. That's what faith is. The just shall live by faith. Means that's how they live. The just shall live by faith. This is how they live. In fact, the first time that appears is in the Old Bible. I think it's Habakkuk in the second chapter, but I wouldn't swear to that. But somewhere it's around in there. And you know what the opposite of living by faith is? It's all in one verse. It goes something like this. He whose soul is lifted up in Him. Something or other. But, what is it? Habakkuk 2.3? 2.4. Read it once for us. See, the opposite of living by faith is what? It's living in your own wisdom and talents and energy. See, that's the opposite of living by faith. It's by trusting yourself. And we have many decisions that we make each day. Most of them very minor. But every once in a while a major decision. But every one of those is to be taken to Jesus. Anyone that you just got through or feel... You know when we make a mistake when it's something that we're accustomed to. I remember the time Doug Bellamy told us about doing drywall. It was so interesting. He was going to show somebody how to do it or something. And Doug had been in this business for years and years and years and years. And he knows drywall. So he's going to show this guy. He couldn't do a thing with it. And God was just showing him. I don't want you doing the drywall. I don't care if you've done it for 20 years. Every time you get that blade out, the mud out, you look to Me. I had that same thing happen to me. I was at another church. After service, I was going to sit down and show off playing the piano. I liked it and couldn't find middle C. I thought, what in the world is wrong with me? I'd been playing since I was five years old. I couldn't do a thing. But see, the reason for that is God is jealous. And He doesn't want you able to do anything by yourself. Now it may cause bad news to some that are pretty confident. But God doesn't want you to do anything by yourself. You'll do a better job brushing your teeth if you'll ask the Lord. Or you can just stare at your face in the mirror. You've got a choice. Bring God into your life. That's what faith is. That's calling upon God that just shall live that way. We live by faith. Instead of by what? By our own ability. I can do it, you know. I don't need to bother God with this detail. Do you ever hear people say that? Oh, I don't want to bother God with that. Let me tell you something. God wants to be bothered. Okay? Whatever you can do that you don't need Jesus is loss. Didn't Paul say that in Philippians 3? The things that were gained to me are loss for Christ. Anything you can do without Jesus is a loss to the whole creation, God, Jesus, and everybody else because you're not going to do it like you could do it in Jesus. You could be throwing snowballs. I don't care what it is. Things go better with Jesus. Yes, they do. And He's jealous when you get out. And you know, the older you get... I'm older than anybody in here. I don't see anybody that comes close. This is what I've been learning more than when I accepted God when I was 19. But what I've been learning all the time is like Paul said, you keep pressing into Jesus. You keep pressing more of Jesus. Forget the past. Forget it. Forget it. It brought you here. Now, press into Jesus today. More of Jesus. Something today that you can do in Christ that yesterday you didn't think about it. That's the way my life is going. More of Jesus. By the time I get through, I won't be able to do anything. What a wonderful place to be. I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless, I live, but not I. Oh, hallelujah. You know, that's the end result of the New Covenant. That verse Paul used in Galatians 2.20 to sum up an argument that was going on in Galatia. And that argument was how can you just accept Christ and forget the law of Moses and circumcision and everything else? That was the argument that was going on. How can you do that and not be a sinner? And Paul gave the answer in Galatians 2.20. The answer is not that I just shucked the law of Moses and not obeying the Ten Commandments. That's not the answer. The answer is I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless, I live, but it's not I, but Christ who lives in me. That's the only resolution to the problem of how the law relates to grace. The only resolution is Galatians 2.20. Because otherwise, you're going to get yourself into a theological snarl trying to figure out how these two relate. You can't just say, well, we're not under the law anymore. Oh, you're not under the law anymore. Cool. What law are you under? Well, there's no law. People say there's no law. God will not have people without law. It's always law. So you're either under the law of Moses or you are crucified with Christ and living with Him. And there's nothing in between that God's going to accept. Hallelujah. Can you go for that? See that? Oh boy, are we under the law. You say, oh, the law of Moses was so strict, but now we're under grace. Hey, I've got news for you. Grace is far, far stricter than the law of Moses. Oh, wow. Because nobody under the law of Moses was ever commanded to offer his body a living sacrifice. No one under the law of Moses was ever said forsake your life, hate everything, turn from the world, deny yourself, and take up your cross and follow me. No one under the law of Moses was ever asked to do that. So don't talk about... We're freer in the sense that we're not bound to have to be worried about the Sabbath day and whether we're eating pork or snails or whatever it is, or whether we're keeping the laws of leprosy or the laws of servitude or whatever. No, we don't have to do that. We're free from that. Thank God that's gone. We've got another law working. And Romans 8 too calls that the law of the spirit of life. And that means that you have to be following the spirit in everything that you do. Hallelujah. So you're free from Moses only if you are crucified with Christ. Because the law is dominion over us as long as we're alive. Think of it. So God has no lawless children. God has no lawless children. God has no spiritual singles that are not married to Moses or Christ. Huh? Come on. Come on. God has no spiritual singles. You're either married to Moses or to Christ. And if you're married to Christ, then you're under His law, under His person, under His ruling, under His government, under everything He is, that you might bring forth fruit unto God. Hallelujah. Isn't that wonderful? What a covenant that is. Oh man. That's got the law of Moses beat come and gone. Alright. Now, Enoch walked with God and his reward was to be in God's presence. Abel's reward was to be accepted. And then we come to Noah. Noah did not. He was way before the law of Moses. But God said about him, he's the only righteous man on earth. Supposing God said to you, you're the only righteous person on earth. What would you do? I'll tell you what I'd do. I'd test the spirits. Right? Whoa. Who's talking to me around here? I mean, I'd test them a whole bunch of times. They kept coming back to me. But how did God judge his righteousness? He's the only righteous person on earth. But how did God judge that? Because there's written in man, and God's law is written in man. And unsaved people. I remember teaching school in Rochester, New York. And there was a little girl. She was in fourth grade maybe. And she had stolen a penny. A penny. Of course, a penny nowadays. In those days it meant more than it does now. But that wasn't the point. The point was she got found out. And the tears just ran down her face. Why? Because she knew in her heart. See, there's a law written in the conscience. It reflects God's eternal moral law. It gets seared sometimes so we can't hear it. But in its primitive form, it's a pretty good index of God's will. And that's what Noah was following. And other people weren't. They were evidently very angry people and murderers and rioters and whatever they were doing. And Noah knew that wasn't right. Everybody knows in his heart that it isn't right. You know, sinners know when things aren't right. Do you know that? They know that. Now, they'll persevere in something until their conscience is seared. But they know when they're doing wrong. That's one thing where the church has failed sinners. I believe the Christian church has failed sinners. That's why we're encouraging our young people so much to walk in righteousness. That's the testimony. Let your good works so shine before men. Let your light so shine before men they may see your good works. You see, if people have an innate sense of God until it's seared beyond redemption, they know. They know God is honest. They look at a television evangelist and they say, this clown is not honest. Anybody knows that. See, unsaved people. And we try to snow them with religious words. Don't look at me. Come to Sunday school and we'll teach you about grace. Well, see, I'm not interested in joining your religion. You know what they're looking for? Honesty. Integrity. And when we stress things and we don't stress what the New Testament stresses about righteousness, we don't have a testimony. We can talk about Jesus all we want to and as far as the world's concerned, see, they know. If you want to know how a Christian should live, you know who you should ask? An unsaved person. And they'll tell you. They know the difference. We get snowed with religion and pretty soon we don't know the difference between sin and righteousness. That's the truth. Well, you might as well say amen because you're going to hear it anyway. We don't... We're very confused about what is sin and what is righteousness, but the world is not confused. They do wrong because they're bound by the devil. But what they're looking for is a living epistle. They're looking for somebody that's living the life. And that means more than all the words. Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works. God wants in America a church that's showing forth the moral nature of Jesus Christ. Not just talking about it, blaming the Democrats or anything else, but are doing it. I mean, we can blame Clinton and blame the liberals and blame the homosexuals and blame the lesbians and everything else, but the fault is a lot closer to home. See, we're talking it, but we're not walking it. Well, we haven't known how. But God is restoring in our land a spirit of repentance, so we need to repent. And start living for God, doing what the New Testament says to do. Hallelujah. Well, I feel better about that. Alright, Noah. God. Noah was obeying his covenant. He didn't have the law of Moses long before the law of Moses. And he didn't have all these nice things of the law. What he did after the boat came back down, he got pie-eyed. Well, God didn't speak to him about that because that wasn't... where God was dealing with him. But he did what he felt was right. And God said, build an ark. So, part of faith is what? Obedience. And that obedience proceeded from fear. Fear. Noah was moved by fear. Because God said, it's going to rain, you're going to drown, so you better... So, let me tell you something. I don't think there's a better illustration of saving faith in the Bible than Noah and his ark. Because the result was he saved himself and his house, and God called him righteous. He became the heir of the righteous, which is by faith. Alright, now just stop to think about it. That's what God wants in a Christian. He doesn't want just talk. He wants us to build an ark. Now, it says in Ephesians, the sixth chapter, prepare yourself for what? What have you been reading? The evil day? Does that ring a bell? That you may stand in the evil day? That's the same thing with Noah. And he didn't go around saying, oh, God told me it's going to rain. What did he do? He built something. God wants you to build something. He wants you to build something that will stand when judgment comes. Don't tell me that God won't touch you with judgment. When judgment comes, you better be ready. Noah rode the waters of judgment. He wasn't carried up to heaven. He rode on the waters of judgment because his ark was pitched. That word pitch, I'll tell you something interesting, in the Hebrew is the same word for atonement. The Hebrew word for atonement literally means asphalt. It's something that is protective. Oh, yes, kapor. So, Noah's ark was pitched. Apparently there's oil fields around where he was. So, Noah pitched the ark, which made it waterproof. Now, we don't get all pitched just when we make an initial profession of Christ. That's the beginning of it. That's our orientation to it. Then we have to walk it out so that every day we're building. We used to say, I'm working on a building. We're building something that's going to stand on the day of judgment. And if you just make a profession and then you go about your way, forget what man or person you were, forget what you saw in the mirror, and just say, well, everybody says I'm saved by faith, whatever that means, you're not building an ark. And when judgment comes, you're not going to be protected. Now, you may say, I don't believe that. But that's all right. It's your salvation. But my advice is don't wait to find out. I've been around for a while. And some of these things I've experienced. And boy, I'm telling you, you can get lulled to sleep easily. You're not watching your business. And Satan's way is to just leave you alone. Just leave you alone. Just leave you alone. You're more careless. More careless. More careless. You figure, well, I still can say hallelujah and praise the Lord, and I still feel good, and I still feel the Lord, I can still talk in tongues, etc., and so on. And then all of a sudden, he turns on you. And you don't have the strength to resist it. How did that happen to me? I know what that's like. And boy, getting back on board. Whoa. So, the thing you do, you live every day wire tight for Jesus. Every day wire tight for Jesus. Whether you feel anything, you don't feel anything, you live wire tight for Jesus. Seeking His face. Like Paul says, I'm pressing on. Pressing on. Forgetting what's behind. I'm pressing on. I'm pressing toward the goal. And here's an old man at the end of his days. He wasn't trying to get to heaven. What was he after? He stated what his goal was. Paul, at the end of his days, in Philippians, the third chapter, Here he is in jail in Rome. Okay? He told what his goal was. Now remember, he'd been saved for many years. He'd been out in the desert. Heard from God. Learned about the transition from Moses to Christ. Established churches. Wrote epistles. He was after something. And he tells you what he was after, and you won't believe it. What was he after? I'll kill you. What do you think the old guy was after? This tough old Jew. What do you think he was after? Yes. Read the eighth verse. Do you have the eighth verse there, Philippians? There you are. That's what I'm after right there. Knowing Christ. Now you would think that when you first accepted Christ, that was all there was to it, wouldn't you? But if you're going to know Christ, you've got to go after that every day. See, Christ is our goal. He's our goal. Paul says, I pressed toward the mark. That mark was the knowledge of Christ. That I may gain Christ. That I may know Christ. What is your goal? What is your goal? Have you ever thought about it? What are you trying to do? Well, when you get into engineering and into systems, the first thing you do is define your goal. Find your goal. Because if you've got the wrong goal, you can't do anything. You can't have quality control. You can't have anything. First of all, you've got to decide on your goal. It's got to be explicit. It's got to be defined. I want to know where I'm going. What am I doing in this system? I think sometimes the reason Christians wobble around so much is they don't know what the goal is. They're like people trying to run a race. They don't know what the finish line is. Paul didn't say there wasn't any finish line. He said, I pressed toward the mark. A mark is a finish line. You know what? We're so busy in this culture of ours. And that's how Satan works. I think a lot of times... You know, we've got all this hassle in schools. I'm almost through here, so just fasten your seatbelt, your shoulder harness and the airbag and we'll be through in a minute. You know, we've got all this thing about teaching evolution in schools. If we could just get people to believe there is a God. Can you imagine in 21st century America? Is that what we're in? Trying to decide whether we believe there is a God or not. You know why that is? That's because we're too smart for our britches. We're just too smart. You go into primitive cultures. You don't have to teach them there's a God. They know there's a God. Half their life is spent in appeasing the gods. They know there's something more than the material realm. You come into America and we're so educated, far beyond our intelligence. If you get educated beyond your intelligence, you're in a bad way. You know, when the fella came over from Indonesia there, he came over to live in Escondido for a military, he expected he was going to work these miracles in the United States, work over there, all these marvelous miracles over there where he was. They won't work here. We're too educated. It's our problem. Sundar Singh came over here to see America and went back home to India in a hurry. That place is dead. We've killed ourselves with material things and we don't realize it. And we say, well now after I get my new computer and my software and get on the internet and get my automated refrigerator that automatically works and it tells me when it's run down and the ozone is missing and I've got my fax machine and my wristwatch and everything, then I'll be happy. Well, what is taking from us is time. Time. And we pursue money. The start-up. I get in a start-up. I can be a billionaire in six months. I can be a billionaire in six months. Well, how are you going to remember that you're supposed to be pursuing Christ? Somebody found out how to do this or that faster or smaller or bigger. How am I going to make Christ the goal? Do you see what I'm trying to tell you? God says, come out of this thing. Just get your beans on the table, be responsible and spend those prime energies of your life on seeking Jesus. That's the problem in America. We've got too much stuff. I taught in a Morris Sorello school. Each semester we had about 500 students from the third world countries. Well, they got over here. They got Disneyland. Disneyland. I guess half of them defected right there and never found them again. They all hid out in Anaheim. Brother Sorello had a terrible time with that. He got them over here but he couldn't find them to get them back. They all wanted to be in Disneyland in America. Whoa! What they didn't realize, they were a lot better off in the jungle. When it comes to seeking God, I had a fellow tell me, Asaph Lully from Uganda, said, why don't you come to Uganda? And I said, well, why? He said, well, you can just sit in your hut and look at the mountains and the moon and grow all the vegetables you need in your backyard. You don't have to do anything. Well, I'd give you time to seek Christ. Well, this was in the University of Rochester. I said, well, what are you doing here? He said, well, I was sent over here to learn English technical manuals. And I said, well, why? So we can have manufacturing in Uganda. And I said, why? And he said, so that we can have jobs and work. And I said, why? And he said, so we can retire. I said, well, you're already retired. Asaph Lully, you're going to pay my way over to Uganda. Oh, Lord. That's it. That's what God is saying to us tonight. I want you to have the faith that saves. The faith that has an attitude toward God. The faith that walks with God. The faith that obeys God. The salvation of yourselves and your families. Father, we look to you right now in the name of Jesus. Oh, God, here we are in America and we think that we're rich and full and everything. We know not that we're naked and blind and have need of so many things. God says, I counsel you to buy of me faith tried in the fire. I said that you may anoint your eyes. White raiment that the shame of your nakedness does not appear. I know that applies to us, Lord. I know it applies to us. God, we've made a start in this church toward iron righteousness, fiery holiness, and stern obedience to God. Now, Lord, inculcate it in us and in our children and in their children so that there's a testimony. There's a lighthouse. There's the presence of the fiery God of Israel in our midst. We covet you, Lord. We love you, Lord. And I pray, Lord, you'll give each one of us more faith. We need more faith, Lord. We need faith to take us out of this culture that we're in and we can walk like Enoch with God until we're no longer fit to be down here, but we're risen in heavenly places with Christ Jesus. Oh, God grant it for each one of us.