-Transcript-
00:27 Amen. Glory to God. Welcome to the program.
00:30 Welcome to the Cafe. Pastor Clark Covington here with another episode of KJV Cafe. So glad that you’re joining me here today.
00:37 I thank God for you taking the time out of your day to listen to this wherever you are. God bless you for listening to it. You’re one of a few, an elite group, a small remnant.
00:49 Amen. No, I don’t, I don’t, we don’t get the ratings here, but most of our channels are AM. So I know you’re going to the AM dial.
00:58 You’re dedicated. And I thank you so much for listening. And look, if you want to reach out kjvcafe.com, go to the website, send me an email, like us on Facebook, anything you need, be happy to talk with you.
01:12 All right. So today we have a wonderful message. This is a multi-part series.
01:15 I can’t say three part or four part. It could go five. I don’t know, but it’s a wonderful message on the rich privilege of serving the Lord, the rich privilege of serving the Lord.
01:27 And really I should say with the Lord, because we aren’t serving on our own. We are serving hand in hand with him. We are his hands and feet, but he’s right there besides us.
01:38 As I was once taught from a radio preacher, actually many years ago, Adrian Rogers taught the idea that God doesn’t want to use you as in your, like who you are, you just doing things.
01:53 God wants to work through you by the working of the Holy Spirit. So it’s God through you, not like you doing something for God.
02:00 I think that’s very important. And it’s a privilege to serve God. And this is so ironic, isn’t it? You know, here we are in the Thanksgiving season.
02:11 Maybe by the time you hear this, you’ve wrapped up Thanksgiving. You’re getting ready for Christmas. You’re seeing those red kettles out there.
02:20 You’re seeing opportunities to give left, right, and center. And you’re, you know, thinking of being grateful, and it’s just that time of year, right? And at the same time, think about how serving God is looked upon.
02:32 I mean, outsiders look at those enlisted in Christian service as poor.
02:38 Do they not? That they are missing all the fun. No, I can’t go out to your party. I’m going to the soup kitchen to feed the needy.
02:46 Well, that’s admirable, but poor you, you know? No, I can’t go on this trip to Disney World or to the Bahamas or wherever it is.
02:56 I’m going to go on a mission trip instead, and I’m going to help build a church with concrete block. I’m going to work with my hands with mortar.
03:05 You know, outsiders look at Christians that serve as poor, as missing all the fun in life. You know, if we’re honest, Christians, actual God-fearing, Bible-believing Christians look on others that serve as sacrificial,
03:22 and it is, you know, as missing out, and maybe you do miss out on some things. But even Christians look on others, oftentimes, that are serving God as a, oh, man, well, I respect them because I couldn’t do what they do.
03:36 Oh, man, they’re teaching Bible study every morning. Oh, I couldn’t do that, or once a week or once a month, that’d be too hard for me.
03:45 You’re looking at it as a negative, as a drain, as something that’s being taken away from someone.
03:49 Even inwardly, in service, Christians can look at themselves as trodden down and defeated. Anyone that’s been in the ministry for more than a little bit of a season knows that it can get that way, where you can say, oh, I’m tired, Lord, oh, this is difficult.
04:02 But guess what? Today, we should rejoice in knowing that it is a rich privilege to serve the living God, a rich privilege.
04:10 Think of a privilege, right? I grew up with my grandma. I live with my grandma and my mom, and my mom was sick most of the time I was growing up, and grandma had built a house with her husband before she was divorced. So we grew up in a privileged neighborhood.
04:29 Now, we weren’t exactly the privileged family. We were a broken family. Grandma’s pension was from like 50 years ago.
04:36 We got by, but it wasn’t exactly like we were privileged. But we lived in a privileged area, and that word privilege, I know what that looks like. That looks like advantage, right?
04:46 That looks like abundant, right? The things that privilege brings, you know, when I went to school, it wasn’t if you go to college.
04:57 It was where you go to college. Everybody, literally, if we had 80, 90 kids in our graduating class, all of them went to school somewhere pretty much. Again, it was a privileged area.
05:05 Most of our teachers had PhDs. It was a very good education. There wasn’t a lot of crime.
05:11 In fact, the police officers really didn’t have a whole lot to do. And you go on and on. It was a privileged area.
05:17 Well, when I say it’s a privilege to serve God, people may have trouble reconciling that, amen? But truly, it is. And let’s get into the text verse here, Proverbs 16:8-9. Proverbs 16:8-9 better is little with righteousness than great revenues without right.
05:35 A man’s heart deviseth his way, but the Lord directeth his steps. Wow, that is a powerful verse and very interesting. Firstly, here, better is a little with righteousness than great revenues without right.
05:51 Serving God is about righteousness and not revenues, right? Realizing our need for him. And Lord willing, we’re going to get into it a little bit here, what it looks like, what a servant of God looks like,
06:00 where they are in their life and so forth. But I can tell you right here up front, it has nothing to do with your social status, with your income, whether you are in a privileged area or not.
06:13 I read a bio of someone yesterday and they said they lived in, I think it was Carrboro or something, and they said it’s the Paris of the Piedmont or something, and I guess it’s a nice area.
06:21 You know, I think of Davidson, you know, sometimes we’ll go to Davidson by Lake Norman if we’re up in that area, and that seems such a nice area.
06:27 Whether you’re there or whether you’re in the slums or whether you’re anywhere in between, it doesn’t matter about your revenues, doesn’t matter about where you live, doesn’t matter about how much money you have in the bank or who you know.
06:40 Serving God is about righteousness and not revenues. Better is little with righteousness than great revenues without right. Secondly, God’s ultimately in control of our destiny and path, and that’s for better or worse.
06:53 Verse nine, a man’s heart deviseth his way, but the Lord directeth his steps. So our heart says, oh, we’re going to do this or that. You know, I read about a man that was very, his heart was for a certain kind of currency, cryptocurrency, and he’s making all of this money, and guess what?
07:11 It was all a hocus-pocus thing, and it all came crashing down recently, and so his heart was saying, I’m going to be rich and famous and all-powerful and do what I want to do, and yet the Lord allowed him to fall into great despair.
07:25 And you don’t think that’s God? You don’t think that God’s hand is involved in all these things? I mean, the Bible clearly tells us, I’m studying the book of Jeremiah now, and in the book of Jeremiah, the Bible tells us that all things are from God and for God, and they’re there for a reason. Even judgment, even failure, even hurt, even problems, that’s all God, amen.
07:45 And so we see that in our heart, you know, maybe we love the Lord, and he’s going to direct our steps towards a way that’s going to allow us to love him more and be closer to him, even though we don’t understand it.
07:54 Or maybe in our heart, we think evil all the time, and this morning, I was teaching the kids from Psalm chapter 9 about how David is writing here, you know, the wicked person should be caught in their own net, trapped in their own snare, and the idea that even my children, five and six years old, can understand, my younger ones,
08:13 that God is going to be the one that directs their steps to be caught into that net and to be trapped into that own snare, amen.
08:19 And so we see here that there’s a privilege in serving God, because God’s ultimately in control of our destiny and path, and so if he has aligned it so that he knows that we desire to serve him, and he knows that we are repentant before him, and he puts us in a place where we can serve him, even in the smallest way, that is a blessing.
08:40 And the rich privilege of serving the Lord starts with here on earth. What’s too hard for God, amen. You don’t have a lot of revenue, you don’t have a lot of, let’s say, material things or money, okay, God can still use you.
08:54 Let’s say you don’t have a lot of theological experience, maybe you don’t have a ministry degree, maybe you’ve never served before, God can still use you.
09:04 Look at the Bible, it is full of characters that God used to do his will in the most unique way. It was characters that you would not expect. Look at the disciples, amen.
09:11 You had fishermen, you had tax collectors, and tax collectors were really hated back then.
09:18 You had a doctor, amen. You had all different types of people within the disciples, but oftentimes it really surprised people I bet. You look at God using Gideon and the 300, and Gideon was not the most powerful in his family.
09:34 You look at David, who was the youngest and had a ruddy complexion, he had a ruddy look to him, he was a little kid, amen.
09:40 You look at the people that God uses, and you know what? Righteousness was the key, not revenues.
09:47 Righteousness is nothing we can do, in the book of Isaiah it tells us, the Bible tells us that our righteousness is as filthy rags, as I understand that translation, like dirty gauze pads.
09:57 So it’s not what we can do, but it’s that we believe in a righteous God, and that we seek a righteous God, and that we love God, we fear God, and then that righteousness is applied to us, and God can do something with us, amen.
10:07 That’s when God can do something with us. So what does that look like? What does it look like to serve the Lord? You may be wondering, who is eligible to serve God?Matthew 5: 3-12 gives us an idea.
10:23 These are called the Beatitudes, this is Jesus speaking. Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted.
10:33 Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Now think about that. Why would you be blessed if you’re poor in spirit? Why would you be blessed if you mourn? Well you’re blessed because you realize your need for God.
10:43 You’re poor in spirit because you realize you can’t do it on your own. You’re meek because you realize that even though you have strength, that strength will not get you to where you want to go.
10:51 And so what do you do? You turn to God, and that is a blessing.
10:56 See when we are weak, we are made strong through God, amen? The idea is that the meek, that the humble, that those that realize their spiritual need for God are the ones that God will use, amen.
11:06 God cannot use a proud person. God in fact hates a proud look, amen? God cannot use a sinful person. The Bible talks about how a bad tree cannot bear good fruit.
11:17 Again from the book of Jeremiah, I was just reading, there’s two baskets of figs. One basket of figs, they’re good, and God’s gonna deliver them and help them and be with them.
11:26 The other basket of figs, they’re bad, and they’re gonna be destroyed, amen. God is very clear.
11:33 For all the complexity in the world, he is extremely clear about who he can use in this life. Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.
11:44 Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God.
11:55 Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
11:55 Blessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute you and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely for my sake, for Christ’s sake. Rejoice and be exceeding glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you.
12:09 And so we see in Matthew 5: 3-12, and not having a lot of time to dive into it, but we see clearly the individual that God can use.
12:18 They’re a peacemaker, they’re pure in heart, they are merciful, they hunger and thirst after righteousness, they are persecuted because they stand up for the ways of God.
12:32 They love the Lord so much that others will say bad things about them and have evil against them. And God’s saying, be glad, because you’re just like the prophets who were God’s mouthpiece at that time.
12:41 They were speaking on behalf of God. And so that’s who God can use. And so just understand that if you were in this state, or you were working toward this state in terms of getting right with God, repenting before God, seeking the Lord, of you were in this state, then you’re in the perfect state to serve God, amen. And maybe you’re not.
12:59 Maybe there’s some proud thoughts in your mind, maybe you’re coveting, maybe you’re dealing with some kind of sin. It’s not too late. Oh, it’s not too late to get right with God.
13:09 All the characters that I’ve mentioned in the Bible, true real-life characters, they had great sin in their life.
13:19 Abraham, he lied, amen, multiple times badly. David had committed adultery and had his good friend killed, and there are so many others that all of a sudden get right with God, realize their need for God.
13:29 Read about David in the Psalms when he’s talking about his bones shaking and how he can’t even bear it to be away from God. He realizes his need from God. God forgives his sin, and then God uses that man greatly for his kingdom.
13:44 And so we too, no matter where we are in life, can be used by God. When we start getting into the Word, we start understanding our need for Him, we start realizing that little is much when God is in it, and that He will direct our paths. And so if our heart is for God, He will direct our heart towards Him.
13:59 If our heart is against God, He will give us what we desire. And so we should really turn to God today, understand that He has all power, all knowledge, and is able to use us. And this is the first message here in the rich privilege of serving the Lord.
14:14 And I can’t wait to get to the latter part here, because we’re not just serving Him here on earth, we’re serving Him in heaven too. And that’s just an incredible thing as well. But I thank you for joining me today.
14:24 Again, if you haven’t already, visit us online, kjvcafe.com. Thank you so much. Take care. God bless and amen.