1 Corinthians chapter number 1.
The Word of God says, 1 Corinthians 1
and verse 1, Paul called to be an
apostle of Jesus Christ through the will of
God.
And here we know that he's being called,
set aside.
Verse 2, he's called unto the church at
Corinth.
The latter part of that verse, we not
only have Paul called and the church called,
but then we have called to be saints
with all that in every place call upon
the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, both
theirs and ours.
And then verse 3, grace unto you and
peace from God our Father.
Now go to chapter 3, 1 Corinthians chapter
3, verse 1.
And I, brethren, could not speak unto you
as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, even
unto babes in Christ.
I have fed you with milk, and not
with meat.
For hereto you were not able to bear
it, neither yet now are ye able.
For ye are yet carnal, for whereas there
is among you, what?
Envying, and strife, and divisions.
Are ye not carnal and walk as men?
Now, church, we're talking about having extended nights
here.
We're talking about having revival.
We're having God's people gather together.
Your family, your church, and your community will
never, ever experience revival until God's people lead
the way in spiritual maturity.
We don't, we can't expect the world to
lead the way in spiritual maturity.
God's people have to lead the way in
spiritual maturity.
And what holds us back, he listed it
here for us.
He said, there's envy among God's people.
You'll be surprised, the people in a local
church, that God will bless a family, and
they'll just do something simple like trade cars.
And people will get aggravated at them.
Pow!
I wonder who they robbed to get that.
I know where he works.
You know?
And it's just green-eyed jealousy.
We've got churches in the same town, and
one church will get jealous of another church.
Now, you think about how little that really
is when you think about it.
God's blessing another guy.
Well, bless God, he must be compromising.
He had 200 more than we did Sunday.
They wouldn't be going over there if he
was really preaching like I preach.
And then divisions.
Divisions.
We use little things to divide the body
of Christ.
Have you ever noticed that you never find
a prostitute turning in a drug dealer?
You know why?
Devil's crowd works together.
They take up for each other.
And here you are, the body of Christ,
and if we're not careful, we'll have divisions
in our own physical blood families.
Then we'll have divisions in the family, the
church, the house of God.
Then we'll have divisions in the community.
And then we'll wonder why God's not sending
revival to our neighborhood, to our church, and
to our family.
And all it is, is the devil has
just outsmarted.
He's got us looking right here instead of
looking out there at a lost and a
dying world.
So he deals with this divisions in the
strife.
And he says, when you do that, you're
carnal.
For while one sayeth I'm of Paul and
another, I am of Apollos.
Are you not carnal?
Now, preachers, we don't do that.
We just say, we're from Bob Jones University.
Or we're from Tennessee Temple.
Or we're from Pensacola.
Or we're from Crown College.
Or if we don't pick on a school,
then we'll pick on a group of preachers.
We'll get on this fellowship, or that fellowship,
or that fellowship.
Well, I'm not of Paul.
I'm of over this fellowship.
Now, what God's trying to help us with
is that it's little things.
We've lost our power.
We've lost our authority.
And, listen, when we're right with God, and
when the church is right with God, when
we're doing what we're supposed to do, they're
taking us out and stoning us and tying
us to the stake and burning us.
And right now, they're just ignoring us.
We're just the fodder for the comic on
Saturday Night Live.
They're just making fun of Christians and making
fun of church.
Because we've lost that power and that authority.
Now, I believe God's given us one last
try.
I believe that we've got a last opportunity.
One last attempt before the Lord comes.
You think about it.
If we don't have revival for this generation,
we're going to be the first generation in
2,000 years that's not experienced the life
-changing, quickening power of revival.
The greatest revivals that we've seen down through
the decades.
In my part of western North Carolina, the
last time you can document a move of
God that was bigger than the church, bigger
than a preacher, bigger than Baptists, bigger than
Methodists, that it was God moving the last
time was 1937.
Had another little breath of God in the
50s right after the war, but nothing like
in 37, 36 through there.
At that particular time up in Asheville, North
Carolina, who had a population at that time
of the city of Provo of about 12
,000 to 15,000 people, we had a
tent meeting going on with the Irish evangelist,
William McBurney in Asheville, and he had a
tent up in downtown Asheville, and they were
averaging over 5,000 people a night going
for weeks.
J.
Harold Smith was down at the tobacco warehouse
on the river at the same time, and
they were averaging over 5,000 people a
night.
Now you've got a town, city proper, not
counting the county, city proper, 12, 15,000,
and you're averaging 10,000 people a night
going to church.
Huh?
What if you had 10,000 going to
church tonight in Archdale, Trinity, and High Point?
Huh?
This community wouldn't be the same tomorrow.
And what God's doing, He's showing us, He's
trying to deal with us, that if we're
not careful, we'll be so proud that we're
spiritual, and we're saved, and we're going to
heaven, that we're walking around, well, I'm a
blessed God, I went to the tent meeting
them heathens over there at that church, they
didn't go, no heathens.
The problem is not them.
The problem is under the tent.
It's not my brother or my sister, it's
me, oh Lord.
I'm the one that needs the breath of
God.
I'm the one that needs the power of
God.
And God said, you know what, Archdale, Trinity,
I'm going to give you one opportunity, I'm
going to give you another try, could be
the last try, for you to come together
as a community and pray and seek my
face, just like He said in this precious
word, if we would humble ourselves and call
upon Him.
Now, go with me to one more verse.
I won't take time to go through all
these verse studies, but go with me to
chapter 9, still in 1 Corinthians.
1 Corinthians, chapter 9, and look at verse
24.
Here's what got a hold of me.
Know ye not that they which run in
a race run all, but one receiveth the
prize.
He said everybody that's in that race is
going to run the race.
Everybody's going to run, but only one's going
to get the prize.
But that doesn't keep everybody else from running
the race.
Now, what Paul was doing to try to
stir the church up and motivate the church,
was he was speaking to what they would
understand the Olympic Games of the day and
hour that they were there on planet Earth.
He took a very common event that they
would all understand, and on that isthmus of
land where Corinth is, he knew that everybody
would understand that, and the Ishmenean Games that
were almost as famous as the Olympic Games.
The Olympics were held every four years.
Many of the Ishmenean Games were just as
famous as the Olympics, but just not as
many contests in it.
And so Paul knew that every person at
Corinth would understand this.
So here's what he said in verse 25.
And every man that striveth for the mastery
is temperate in all things.
Now, they do it to obtain a corruptible
crown, but, he says, we're not trying to
obtain a corruptible crown, we're running for an
incorruptible crown.
Verse 26, I therefore so run, not as
uncertainty, so fight I, not as one that
beateth the air.
He said, I'm not shadow boxing, I'm not
just working out, I'm not just going and
fighting the air.
I've got a purpose here.
I'm trying because I want to please God.
But I keep, look at verse 27.
Now, here comes the scolding or the challenge
or the encouragement, depending on how you interpret
verse 27, for all of us.
But I keep under my body and bring
it into subjection, lest that by any means,
when I have preached to others, I myself
should be what?
A castaway.
Now, I want you to think about the
last race, the last trial, the last attempt,
the last time I enter the race and
I say, by the grace of God, I'm
going to try.
There's a lot of people under this tent.
You once walked with God, you once fellowshiped
with God, you once read your Bible, you
once witnessed, and now, something's happened to you
spiritually, you're sort of in a foxhole mentality.
You got on your body armor, you got
on your helmet, you dug your hole, you
got your sandbags up, and now, instead of
going out and doing something for God, with
a smile and joy, we're just sort of
delegating ourselves to get up, go to work,
come back to our foxhole, hunker down, and
say, I've got to hang on for the
rapture, and then I get up in the
morning, I go to work, and I'm just
as grumpy as everybody else at work.
They don't see any joy on me.
They don't see any victory on me.
You got unsaved, unchurched people looking at you
saying, my God, if that's a Christian, I
hope I don't catch it.
If that person's born again, boy, I pray
I don't get any of that, because look
at them.
They never smile, they never laugh, they never
have any joy.
They say they're going to live forever with
God.
And to look at them, they act like
God was born on the dark side of
the moon, that we're going to His funeral,
He's dead and it's all over, and we've
been raised on dill pickles and lemon juice.
And there's no joy, no victory, no authority,
and we're just foxhole in the nap.
And we're caught up going through the motions,
and we've lost our excitement, we've lost our
joy.
Who would want to go to the tent
meeting with us?
Who'd want to go with us?
A bunch of old grumpy guts?
Who'd want to go down there and hang
out with us?
You know why the world's attracted to God's
people?
Because they believe you've got something they don't
have.
That God's alive and well, and Jesus is
coming back for a bride that's been washed
in the blood of the Lamb, and your
sins are forgiven, and never be remembered against
you again, and you begin to know and
understand that your name's been recorded in the
Lamb's Book of Life, and that if He
were to come at that moment, you would
enjoy living with Him for all eternity.
It's not what we say on Sunday mornings,
going to win somebody the Lord.
It's not how we act in Sunday school
that's taking the toll out there in the
world.
Listen, it's what we take to work with
us on Monday, in the school on Tuesday,
in the university on Wednesday.
It's how we're acting in the grocery store.
It's how we go buy our groceries and
what we do when they pump our gasoline
up.
And God said, you know what I'm going
to do?
I'm going to give you a little breath
of revival, and I'm going to give you
one more opportunity.
I'm going to give you your last try
to do it right.
I was coming out of Kentucky a few
weeks ago preaching, and spent a lot of
time on the road at night by yourself.
And I was going through those radio stations
trying to stay awake.
And usually I try to find some of
those old liberals.
I'd get some mad listening to that boy.
They'd keep me awake, boy.
I'd just fuss at them and preach all
the way.
And they was interviewing this coach, and he
had been at a ball game, and his
team had a great big lead at the
half.
And they went in for the half and
came back out.
And a team that was rated way below
them came back and won the game.
And they asked the coach, said, how could
you lose that ball game?
They're not rated as high as you are
in the rankings.
Your team outplayed them the first half.
He said, what happened to you guys?
What's wrong with you?
And he said, I'll tell you what happened.
He said, we came out and we relaxed.
We had that big lead.
He said, the offense quit hustling.
He said, the defense quit playing.
And we were resting on what we had
done in the past.
And we didn't do anything in this half.
And he said, what happened is, it cost
us the ball game.
And buddy, when he said that, I reached
over and I just cut that radio off.
And I started praying.
And I said, God, You help me.
Because that's human nature.
I could be serving God 20 years and
30 years and think, I've been faithful.
I've gone to church.
I've taught Sunday school.
I went on visitation.
I've helped.
And now, I'm going to take these next
years, I'm going to sort of rest.
Somebody else's turn to teach a class.
I've taught all the classes I'm going to
teach.
Somebody else's turn to go on visitation.
Somebody else singing in the choir.
I know what Book Bearer and the choir
director does.
We've had 19 choir directors, and I ain't
singing in the choir no more.
I'm wore out.
Let somebody else finish the last half of
my game.
When we need to be in there with
the best we've ever been, if there's ever
a time we need mature Christians in the
Sunday school classes, in the visitation, in there
going behind the preacher, in there singing in
the choir, it's this day and hour that
we need people that have walked with God
with 10 years, 20 years, and 30 years
experience.
This is the day.
And God said, I'm going to give you
a last try.
And I prayed coming over that mountain.
I said, God, with Your help, I want
to finish the last half stronger than I
finished the first half.
I don't want to quit right before Jesus
comes.
I don't want to rest on what used
to happen.
I don't want to talk about how revivals
used to be.
I can think about what Dad's told me
about the revival there in 37 when he
got saved, how God called him to preach.
And then I got to thinking about my
grandchildren and my children.
And I thought, why should they not have
the privilege of seeing the power of God
and the demonstration of God?
I remember being in services where the power
of God was surreal.
That men and women were weeping because they
were afraid they would injure the Holy Spirit
of God.
I can remember people standing up in a
service and begin to moan and cry and
say, My God, I'm lost.
I'm going to hell.
And start to get to go out the
door and not ever get out the door.
And God's almighty power would hit them and
they'd fall down in the aisle and begin
to say, God, be merciful to me, a
sinner.
They never made it to the altar.
That wasn't the preacher.
That wasn't the church building.
That was the power of God.
But most of our churches now are reduced
to mechanics.
We've got programs.
We've got personalities.
We've got publicity advertisements.
And what we have tried to do at
the house of God is we've tried to
replace the Holy Ghost, what God's power used
to do, with the mechanics of man's hands.
Now, you listen to me right here.
I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings, but
I've got to tell you the truth.
The reason we're having such an epidemic across
America of changing the house of God, getting
rid of the cross in the church, getting
rid of the communion table, getting rid of
the altar, getting rid of the hymn book,
getting rid of the old songs that have
to do with the blood and the virgin
birth, the reason that's happening is because we're
now reduced to demographics and marketing at the
house of God instead of the power of
God.
And we're paying the horrible price.
Listen, church, we need to know there's a
danger of living half-hearted.
There's a danger of not trying.
How close to wrong can I go and
still be right?
And if we're not careful, we'll have people
in our churches on Sunday morning, and here's
the way they'll spend their whole week.
Here is the danger of sin, ungodliness, wickedness,
vileness, old rap music with filthy four-letter
words, television with nudity, profanity, movies, magazines, and
here's the church of the living God.
I want to go to heaven, but I
also want to see how close to that
I can get because I like that.
Oh boy, that was close.
I almost messed up there.
And we've got the church, the Lamb of
God.
Instead of seeing how close to Jesus we
can get, the church is now trying to
see how close to the world we can
get.
And we're living in that danger zone.
We've got people walking like the world, talking
like the world, dressing like the world.
We've got Christian mamas and daddies taking their
little girls to the mall and letting Britney
Spears pick their wardrobe, exposing their little bodies.
Hey, you say, you shouldn't preach on things.
I'm not.
I'm talking about holy living.
I'm talking about keeping your kids out of
trouble.
I'm talking about walking with God.
Why do we want to be pulled to
the world?
Why are we not pulled to the Lamb
of God?
Where's the love of the local church?
Where's the love of the mama and the
daddy that wants their child not to look
like the world or act like the world
or be like the world, but I want
my child to be like Jesus?
You see how quickly we've gotten away from
the things of God?
We're living half-hearted.
And our attitude is, everyone else is doing
it.
It's okay for me to do it.
I think what we're doing is okay.
We're not really out there in sin.
We're just right up here on the edge,
seeing how close to sin we can live.
And you think about what's happening to the
church.
And that's why the Apostle Paul wrote these
Scriptures down and said, church, think about the
sporting event.
Think about the Olympics.
Think about the Ishmael Games.
You think about what happened.
Now, those events, the Olympics, they all focused
on individual effort.
That's what they focused on.
And they competed on individual effort.
And when they got in those games, they
took a laurel limb like this and they
took and made a crown out of that
laurel, okay?
Now, that is not much.
That's just an old plant.
But they would take that and put it
on the victor of the race.
And that's not gold.
That's not diamonds.
That's not jewelry.
It's just a crown, a laurel crown.
And Paul said, they are running for a
corruptible crown.
He said that's what they're running for.
He said, but you need to remember you're
running for an incorruptible crown.
Now, listen to me close right here.
Don't let the devil distract you from understanding.
Right here, this is important.
The object of the race is to win.
And when you won the race, you would
receive a laurel crown.
Made a plant.
If you won, they would present to you
this winner's crown.
But ladies and gentlemen, the purpose of winning
the crown was not to have those few
plants around your head.
That wasn't the purpose of winning.
Here was the purpose.
Brother Greg, bring a folding chair out here
if you would.
I want you to bring a folding chair
and I want you to sit right here
if you would.
Just sit in that chair.
Now, the purpose of the crown, I win
the race, I get this crown.
I'm cheered.
Danny, the whole crowd's cheering for me.
I won the race.
And now I'm taken over and I'm given
this crown.
But the purpose in winning this race was
not this crown, Brother Jimmy.
That wasn't it.
It was that when I got the crown,
then I had a privilege that no one
else in the country had.
I had a privilege.
No one else.
I won this crown.
Now, I get to go before the king.
Before the ruler of the land.
The highest authority.
The one that's got the power of life
and the power of death.
The one that can forgive my debts.
The one, glory to God, that can take
my land that's been taken by a bill
collector and he can restore my family.
He can give me what the locust has
consumed in the past and he can give
it back to me.
He's got the power.
He's got the authority.
He's the potentate.
He's the ruling one.
And because I got the crown, then I
have the power and the privilege to approach
the throne.
The multitude can't come in.
The crowd can't come in.
The masses can't come to.
The guards will hold him out.
The rulers will hold him out.
The troops will hold him out.
The horsemen will hold him out.
The royal guards will hold him out.
But I won the race.
I won the race.
So I get to go in and they
seize my crown.
And the guards step aside.
And the limitations step aside.
And all of that.
And I'm permitted to go into His presence
and I can kneel down and I can
take my crown and I can lay it
at His feet and I can say, Thank
You!
Thank You for what You've done for me!
Thank You for loving me!
Thank You for providing for me!
Because I am permitted to put my crown
at Your feet.
The object of the race was to have
access.
Now you hold that crown for just a
moment.
Stay right there, King.
The designation of this awesome privilege.
That's why men died competing to run.
Because that's the only way you could ever
get to the King.
You're just a poor kid.
The wrong side of the tracks.
You've never had anything.
Nobody knows your name.
They made fun of you at school.
Who are you?
You're a nobody.
You don't have any friends.
You're an outcast all along.
But buddy, if you win the race and
you get the crown, then you are permitted
to come and put your crown at the
feet of the potentate.
This was such an awesome privilege.
This was such a sober responsibility that they
had to have a designation to keep anyone
from cheating.
You study these games, the Ishmaelian games and
the Olympic games, and you'll find out that
big land barons would try to rig the
games.
They would try to take their favorite son.
They'd try to bribe judges.
They'd try to take shortcuts on the marathon.
They'd try to limit the other competitors because
it meant so much to get that crown.
You got so many privileges and when you
went back home, many of the villages would
build you the best house in the whole
village.
Many times you got a mansion because you
were the hero from your community.
And they would honor you with giving you
a house and your family would be honored.
And so for that reason, many of the
wealthy families, many of the politically dialed in
people, they had tried to rig the race.
So guess what they had to do?
They had to put in a system to
prevent cheating and inconsistency and people not trying.
And the designation they gave to those people
was that a judge would come up to
that person and he would mark them a
castaway.
That was a fate worse than death because
if that person was a castaway, then they
could never compete again.
They were out of the game and they
were in shame and embarrassment and they never
would go to the feet of the king
and put their crown.
Now, what did they do to ensure that?
See, you read this Scripture a lot of
times and we don't understand what it means.
So the Olympic Games and the Ishmael Games,
they had an official and the official was
called a herald.
And the herald was actually from a group
of people in Greece that had a reputation
of unbelievable honesty and integrity.
A whole group of people had a reputation.
And so for decades, that village and those
families, their greatest honor in all of Greece
and all of the Grecian Empire was the
fact that they were known all over the
land as honest people.
You couldn't bribe them.
They wouldn't cheat.
They didn't care about the political favor.
They were going to referee those games.
And it didn't matter who you were.
If you were a cheater or if you
didn't compete properly, you broke the rules, they
would designate you a castaway.
They didn't care who you were.
And those people were called the heralds.
Two rules could get you the designation of
a castaway.
Two things.
Here are the two things.
You'll always remember these.
Number one, if you were caught cheating, breaking
the rules of the Olympics, then you could
be designated a castaway.
But here's the one that got a hold
of me.
I can understand the cheat.
I can understand that one not trying.
But here's the one that got a hold
of me.
If the herald thought you weren't trying, you
were half-hearted in your effort.
You thought, I don't have to really try.
I've got a big family name.
My family's got money.
My dad's going to rig this race.
If you just got tired, you just got
lazy, and it appeared that you weren't trying,
he could designate you a castaway because you
didn't try hard.
You were half-hearted in your effort.
Two things could keep me from kneeling in
front of the king.
Cheating and not trying.
Being half-hearted.
And when I got that designation of a
castaway, then I couldn't approach the king.
Now, here's what I want you to take
home with you.
What does the Holy Spirit of God do
for us in this world today?
This is God's Word.
This wasn't a lesson on the Olympics that
Paul put in the Bible.
He said you need to know that today
it's not a herald, it's the Holy Ghost
of God.
And that God's people, Christian people, saved people,
if we're caught cheating, if we're caught trying
to live in both worlds, God said the
Holy Ghost will mark you and make you
a castaway.
And if God catches you loafing, not trying,
not giving in at all, being half-hearted,
then the Holy Spirit will mark you a
castaway.
You say, well, what would that castaway be?
The presence of God draws off you.
Can you think of anything any worse than
the power of God pulls off of you?
Because when that happens, you're losing your crown
of faithfulness.
You're losing your crown of a soul winner.
You're losing the crown of joy.
All of those crowns.
You're losing them when you break fellowship with
God and you start trying to fellowship with
the world.
If you broke the world, the rules, you
were marked a castaway.
If you did not give the event 100%,
then you were marked a castaway.
You know why?
Because that herald was the observer of the
race.
And he would declare you a castaway and
you would be a disgrace in front of
the monarch.
No crown, no access to the king.
1 Corinthians chapter 9, God commands you, commands
me, to run and run to win.
You say, but look at all the people
here.
You're missing the point.
You're not running against another preacher.
You're not running against another Christian.
You're not running against your husband.
You're not running against your wife.
You're running to please the Lord God Almighty.
You're running for Him.
You're running for the king.
You're not running for the Baptist.
You're not running for the Methodist.
You're running for King Jesus.
And what He's trying to get you to
see is that we're not running against each
other.
We're running for access to the king.
That's what we're after.
And He commands us to run and win.
You race for God.
That's the most important thing that you can
do.
The Bible teaches we're more than conquerors through
Jesus Christ.
That heavenly herald is the Holy Spirit.
And He watches my race and your race
every single day.
Now, there's two or three things that have
to happen, and I don't have time to
go through them tonight, but let me just
give them to you for your notes.
Number one, it takes a decision to run.
Nobody can decide that for you.
We're talking about saved people.
You've got to decide, I'm going to serve
God.
I'm going to try.
This is my last try.
I'm going to try.
Why, God's given me light and understanding.
Dad, Mom, you've got to try.
Now, you listen to me right here.
If you don't hear anything else I say,
here's a statistic to me that is very
frightening.
Seventy-five percent of all children that grow
up in a fundamental Bible-believing church, seventy
-five percent of those boys and girls, seventy
-five percent of those teenagers and those young
adults that have grown up in an independent,
fundamental, premillennial, missionary, Baptist church, any name you
want to give it, for a fundamental Bible
-believing church, seventy-five percent of those teenagers,
those young adults, those boys and girls today
as adults are not in church.
Seventy-five percent.
Why are they not in church?
Why are they not serving God?
You know why?
Because Mom and Dad, they need to see
in us that we've made a decision.
I'm going to run the race.
Whether I feel like it, whether it's popular,
whether anyone understands, because what we do is
we almost hunt an excuse to get out
of church.
We hunt an excuse to get mad.
We hunt an excuse to go, they didn't
treat me right over there.
And your little boy and girl, they hear
that.
That teenager hears you sitting around there having
fried chicken and barbecued preacher.
And they believe Mom and they believe Daddy,
so that when they get adults, they say,
Mom and Daddy, they never had a use
for preachers.
They never had a use for the house
of God.
Seventy-five percent.
We've got one last try here.
And we ought to get in this altar
tonight and say, you know God, I've made
some mistakes, but by your help, I'm going
to finish my race.
There's not a perfect church.
There's not a perfect pastor.
There's not a perfect deacon.
There's not a perfect Sunday school class.
There's not a perfect choir.
If that was the case, none of us
would go to church.
Every Sunday when I drive up at Trinity
and the parking lot's full and people are
going in, I get down in the parking
lot and say, I can't believe this.
They came back.
They're back.
I know the pastor here.
I know that guy.
And they're back.
You know why?
Because they're not there for me.
They're there for the Lord God Almighty.
They're going to go to church whether I
go to church or not.
They're going to go to church whether I
preach or not.
Well, what if you make a mistake?
If I do it backwards, two or three
of them will take me over to the
side saying, Pastor, bless God, we love you.
But buddy, you did that absolutely backwards.
And I said, I did?
Yeah, now bless God, let's turn that thing
around and let's go on for God.
But that's not going to make us quit.
That's not going to make us run up
the white flag.
That's not going to make us go to
Shoney's and talk about each other.
Hey!
We've got to try.
We're in the race for the Lamb of
God and we want to go put our
crown in front of the King.
Number two, not only does it take a
decision, but it takes motivation.
The Bible says that all of us can
get discouraged.
All of us can get down.
And many times we get to fussing at
people because someone didn't encourage us.
My worst time of my life and nobody
came to me.
Nobody encouraged me.
That's what they think.
I'm just not going back over there.
God said, you're not running for them.
You're running for me.
He said, I'll tell you what I told
David.
Stir yourself up.
Courage yourself.
Well, God, you don't understand.
I'm really down.
Stir yourself up.
Encourage yourself.
Get out of your playpen.
The world's dying and going to hell.
Get the praise of God upon your mouth.
Let the glory of the Lord God Almighty
wraith around you.
Walk around saying, yea, though He slay me,
yet will I serve Him.
I'm in love with the King.
I want to spend time with the King.
I want to have access to the King.
And I'm not going to let anything keep
me from my race.
I want to put a crown at His
feet.
You think about an old earthly corruptible crown,
a piece of tree.
And Paul said, your crown's incorruptible.
Our race is for eternity in the souls
of men.
What counts is when you can get to
the King and give Him a crown.
You say, but I'm tired.
You don't know what I've been through.
I don't.
And all of us have got unbelievable burdens
that we have to carry.
But I promise you, if you'll put your
eyes back on Jesus and get them off
of men and say, God be your help.
I'm going to love you.
I'm going to love my local church.
I'm going to pray for my pastor.
And I'm going to run my race.
I promise you, God will change your life.
He'll change your church.
And He'll preach your preacher.
Like you've never heard Him preach before.
Because His people are running the race.
Where's your crown tonight?
What are we running for?