1996 Boast Not Thyself of Tomorrow

Introduction and Prayer for God's Presence

0:04 The following sermon was delivered on Sunday morning, December 31st, 1995, at the Trinity Baptist Church of Montville, New Jersey.

0:15 Now, before we turn to the Word of God, let us again unite our hearts in prayer, giving thanks especially for God's faithfulness to us through another calendar year in which we have never been bereft of the sense of God's presence with us in our gathering. And let us plead that God would grant a crowning measure of that very blessing in the ministry of the Word this morning. Let us unite in prayer.

0:49 Holy Father, we come into your presence again to thank and praise your holy name for your faithfulness to us, your people.

1:02 With the prophet, we too can exclaim it is of your mercies that we have not been consumed. Because your compassions fail not, they are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness. And we thank you that you have sustained us as a congregation through another calendar year.

1:26 We thank you that Lord's Day by Lord's Day we have known your presence as we have sought to worship you according to the precepts and principles of your word. As we have sought to bring our minds, subject to your written word in the holy scriptures. And we plead that on this, the last Lord's Day of this calendar year, you would grant us that blessing which we desire above all else, even your own blessed presence. Gracious God, come in saving presence and power to those whom you have spared through another year and yet who have not been saved.

2:10 You have squandered their opportunities to close with the offers of your mercy. Oh Lord, on this final Lord's Day, will you not so work that they may look upon this day as the day of days in their earthly pilgrimage. We pray that you will speak to us, your people, take your holy word and inscribe it upon the fleshy tables of our hearts, that we may know its constant, complete, companionship throughout the coming days. Hear our cry and meet with us, we plead, through Jesus Christ our Lord.

The Text: Proverbs 27:1 - Prohibition and Fact

2:50 Amen. Now I doubt that there is anyone here this morning, within the sound of my voice, young and old alike, who is not aware that this particular Lord's Day, December 31st, is the last day of the calendar year, 1990. And since we are all creatures of time, and since few things are a more powerful reminder of the passing of time than the coming in of a new calendar year, I want us to consider a text from the word of God

3:33 which is most suitable to the realities and the circumstances within which we meet on this, the last Lord's Day of 1990. And that text is found coming to us from the pen of the wisest man who ever lived, who was only man, namely Solomon. And they are found in chapter 27 of the book of Proverbs and verse 1. Here in a section of the Proverbs compiled according to 25 and verse 1 by the men of Hezekiah, king of Judah,

4:14 in this collection of Proverbs, Solomon writes in chapter 27 and verse 1, Boast not yourself of tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring forth. Or as the New King James Version renders it, and two or three other modern translations which I consulted in my preparation, I found that the New King James Version renders it, and two or three other modern translations which I consulted in my preparation, which I consulted in my preparation, Boast not about tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring forth.

4:55 Now I trust you can all readily see in a very cursory examination of this text that there are two clear and dominant thoughts given to us by the Spirit of God through the mind and the pen of Solomon. There is first of all a strong, there is second of all a strong, a strong prohibition issued. Here is a strict prohibition issued to every one of us. Do not boast about tomorrow.

5:29 And that is followed by an obvious fact asserted, for you do not know what a day may bring forth. A strict prohibition issued. A strict prohibition issued. Do not boast about tomorrow.

5:44 A strict prohibition issued. And that is followed by an obvious fact asserted, about tomorrow, an obvious fact asserted, for you do not know what a day may bring forth. Now since the prohibition rests down upon the obvious fact and is logically connected to it, for you notice it begins with the word for, the prohibition rests down upon the logical connection with the obvious fact asserted, and therefore in expounding the text we shall first of all consider this obvious fact asserted, and then the strict prohibition issued.

The Obvious Fact: We Do Not Know What a Day May Bring Forth

6:25 The obvious fact asserted is that you and I do not know what a day may bring forth. Solomon here asserts with undiluted dogmatism that none of us knows what a single day may bring forth, let alone any combination of days into weeks, months, or years. And the word that he uses for bring forth is a much used Hebrew word, yalad, which in its several forms is found several hundred times in the Old Testament

7:10 to describe the day. And the word for bring forth is a much used Hebrew word, yalad, which in its several forms describes the birthing process or the act of birthing, both with respect to human beings and to animals. It is the most common word used when someone is said to give birth or to bring forth a person or animals even giving birth. Therefore Solomon is likening every day to an opaque womb.

7:40 In which God has placed all of the particulars that will come forth from that womb on a given day. And he says in this obvious fact that he asserts, you and I do not know for certain what will come forth and be birthed out of the womb of any given day. That's the image bound up in the language used. Each day which lies before us is to us an opaque womb, the

8:21 contents of which are utterly unknown to us until they are actually birthed in the events of our own days in the sovereign will and providence of God. Now this obvious fact asserted in this way is one that is not known to us. It is not known to us. It is not known to us. It is not known to us. It is not known to us. It is not known to us. It is not known

8:40 to us. There is one which is universal in its application. The man or woman with an IQ of 170 considered a genius. The poor man or woman with an IQ of 60 considered an idiot.

8:57 In this they have equal knowledge. Neither one knows what a day may bring forth. The filthy rich and the dirt poor. In this they stand still.

9:14 stand together, neither one knows what a day may bring forth. The famous, whose names are a household word throughout the earth, and those who live and die in utter obscurity known by the most narrow circle of only their most intimate acquaintances, in this they stand on equal turf, neither one knows what a day may bring forth. In the teeming cities such as Mexico City with its 10 or 12 million, soon to become 20 million souls, in the smallest

9:58 little rural village, in some obscure town with a population of 320, it is applicable universally. One knows what a day may bring forth. God has given to us some amazing and God-like faculties as creatures made in his image and after his likeness. He has given us the faculty of memory and reflection that enables us to look back, and looking back to remember events and circumstances, and to analyze and to interpret and to see the relationship between

10:40 and significance of those events, a marvelous faculty that God has given to us as creatures made in his image. To remember, to reflect, to look back. He has also given us the faculty of consciousness and awareness to look about us in the present, to have a sense of our consciousness. Each of us sitting here knows that we are in a present state of conscious existence.

11:10 We can turn our heads and look about us and see others of our kind who are also equally aware and conscious of their existence and of the circumstances that surround them in the present moment. Amazing faculties that God has given to us to look back in reflection, to look in in present understanding of our existence and of our circumstances, but God has not given to us. God cannot have any faculty to penetrate the unknown of what lies before us. Not even

11:55 for one day. Not for one day. For here the obvious fact asserted is you and I do not know with any certainty what one day will bring forth. Yes, I know there are some things written in the word of God, which are absolutely certain with respect to the future, as far as the general patterns of God's dealings, we know from Genesis chapter 9 that as long as the earth remains, there will never again be a universal flood that will inundate the

12:34 entire world and sweep it off into judgment. God made a promise in Genesis 9 that as long as the earth remains, there would be seed time and harvest, and never again would there be a flood. And we know that at the appointed moment, the Lord Jesus shall come with the voice of the archangel and the trump of God, for the scripture says, this same Jesus who is taken from you into heaven shall so come in like manner as you have seen him go into heaven. And that in the interim, we know that the Lord Jesus will infallibly and infallibly be the Lord Jesus. And that in the interim, we know that the Lord Jesus will

13:11 certainly gather his own to himself, for he said in John 10, 16, other sheep I have which are not of this fold, them also I must bring. And there shall be one fold, one shepherd. Yes, there are certain things we can know for certain with respect to the future, but this does not negate this very obvious fact asserted by Solomon. And that you and I, with respect to the hundreds and even thousands of the particular things

13:48 that make up any one of our days, you and I do not know what is locked up in the womb of any one day, and what that day will give birth to in our own experience.

14:07 Think with me of some of the startling reminders of this. This fact, the things that have captured the attention not only of our nation, some instances our congregation, but in most the entire world that no one would have predicted, who was seeking to be a seer and a prophet on the threshold of 1995, who would have known on that given day early in the morning that an entire federal building in Oklahoma,

14:43 the city would have been rocked as though struck with a whole plane load of bombs. We knew not what that day would bring forth. Who could have predicted that Superman would fall from a bolting horse, and the strong, virile Christopher Reed rendered a quadriplegic in a moment of time? Who would have ever thought that Sergei Grinkov, who made people who loved skating sit breathless with his artistry with his wife?

15:23 Would die, a man in his twenties die of a massive heart attack? No one, in that little village in the north of Scotland, would have ever thought when Little Emma kissed her mummy goodbye at age 15 and hopped on her bike that at age 24, she would be in another world. You see dear people, this is indisputable. When Solomon asserts, you know not what a day may bring forth, it is a very countenance.

16:02 clearly affirmed fact, and therefore he asserts it with undiluted dogmatism. Now only fools bent on self-destruction seek to live their lives ignoring the obvious facts of reality. Do you hear me? Live their lives seeking to ignore the obvious facts of reality. That's

16:36 why the young person who thinks he will beat the path from his first joint to his first tie on his coat to his first needle into his first pipe full of crack. I'm a junkie lying in an alley like a half-dead rat. Not me. He's a fool who will not face the reality of the facts. That the wicked should be held by the

17:14 cords of his own iniquity. And he that commits sin is the bond slave of sin. You see, this is an undeniable fact asserted by Solomon under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit that none of us knows what a day may bring forth. Is there anyone here, boy, girl, man, or woman, who would dare to dispute this? Who would dare to stand?

17:46 And say, I know for certain what tomorrow will bring forth for me. It will bring forth. You can't do that and make it stick. You may make some calculated guesses. You may make

18:01 some calculated judgments based on past patterns. But you do not know what a day may bring forth. That's reality. And only fools live their lives willfully ignoring reality. And that

The Strict Prohibition: Do Not Boast About Tomorrow

18:18 brings us to what is the real burden then of the text. It is the strict prohibition issued based upon that undeniable reality. And the strict prohibition issued is this. Do not boast about tomorrow. Now what does

18:38 it mean to boast about tomorrow? Well, it means to think, to speak, and to act confidently concerning what our purposes are, what our plans are, and what we will do and experience in the future. It is to do this with no realistic recognition that we don't control the future. It is to think, to speak, as though we have the power to fill up the womb of tomorrow based on our desires.

19:21 And having filled up the womb of tomorrow based on our desires, we have the power to bring forth everything that we've put in that womb. That is to boast about tomorrow. But two biblical pictures will be worth...

19:39 hundreds of my attempts to define it. Turn to Luke chapter 12. Here is a man who is boasting about tomorrow. He is framing purposes in his mind which find expression in the language of his lips and in the actions of his life.

20:02 And all of them have written over the sum total boasting about tomorrow. Tomorrow, Luke chapter 12 and verse 16. And Jesus spoke a parable unto them, saying, The ground of a certain rich man brought forth plentifully. Now notice where this boasting begins.

20:27 And he reasoned within himself, saying. It all began in the internal cogitations of his own mind. He reasoned within himself, saying, And what does he say? What shall I do?

20:46 Because I have not where to bestow my fruits. And he said, This will I do. I will pull down my barns and build greater. And there I will bestow all my grain and my goods.

20:59 And I will say to my soul, Soul, you have much goods laid up for many years. Not just many days. Many weeks. Many months.

21:12 You have much goods laid up for many years. Take thine ease. Those are his plans. This is his projected lifestyle.

21:23 Eat, drink, be merry. Here was a man boasting about tomorrow. A man who, as he looked back and saw the patterns of his productivity and his, quote, success, could reason from the past and his present circumstances into the future, and he thinks that he will place into the womb of his future only those things that he desires to factor in. And you know what God calls him?

22:00 That God said unto him, Thou fool. Why was he a fool? Astute businessman. A keen trader in the market.

22:15 He knew when to hold back his grain for the highest price and when to sell off how many bushels and how to get optimum return. He was no fool in his business enterprises. He was a fool in that he failed to reckon on this inescapable fact that he did not know what a day would bring forth. There's the man who is boasting about tomorrow.

22:46 And the Lord Jesus describes him. Then in James chapter 4, we have a second description of what it means to boast about tomorrow. James chapter 4. James calls to account people that are boasting about tomorrow.

23:06 James 4 and verse 13. Come now, you that say. Here it breaks out in their speech. Their speech frames the thinking of their minds.

23:18 Come now, you that say. Today or tomorrow, we will go into this city, and spend a year there. Here they've got their plans for a year. The fool of Luke 12 was thinking of many years.

23:35 These fools speak of a year. And trade, and get gain. They think they can absolutely predict the market. Whereas you know not what shall be on the morrow.

23:48 For what is your life? You are a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away. For that you ought to say, if the Lord will, we shall both live, and do this or that. In other words, he says you are not factoring in this reality.

24:04 The will of God fills up the womb of your tomorrows. Not your high pollutant plans. It is the will of God that fills up the wombs of your tomorrows. And what will come forth is not what you place there by your own wishful thinking.

24:23 But what is placed there by the sovereign will of God. But now you glory in your vauntings. All such glorying is evil. Rendered into more contemporary English.

24:36 You boast in your pretentious arrogant words. Is a little rendering of the Greek. You are boasting in your pretentious arrogant words. And what were they boasting about?

24:52 They were boasting about tomorrow. So what is clearly prohibited in this strict prohibition issued by Solomon? It is anything that approaches and involves the mentality that I can in my own independent judgment bore up what I propose to do tomorrow. Not in the humble spirit of the child of God who prayerfully assesses where the tracks of scripture will most likely find his feet

25:36 should God sustain him and prepare him for tomorrow and the next week and month and year. And who prudently seeks to frame his future by the precepts and principles of the word all the while knowing that the will of God is what determines the unfolding of each day. No, no. What is condemned in this prohibition is that disposition that thinks that we can put infallibly into the womb of tomorrow that which we desire to put there even the most noble of things when in reality all God has given us

26:20 is today in which to do the will of God. And so on the threshold of this new year we need to lay to heart these words of Solomon based on this obvious fact that we know not what a day may bring forth to take to ourselves this solemn strict prohibition that we must not boast about tomorrow. Now in the application I wish first of all to make an application to the people of Israel the people of God and then an application to you

Application to Believers: Dealing with Unconfessed Sin

27:04 who sit here unconverted this morning. God willing tonight it's my purpose to bring a seven-fold string of pearls of comfort and consolation to the people of God as they face the new year but without embarrassment and I trust with genuine pastoral love and concern I want to go after the consciences of not a few of you this morning. First of all to you who are the people of God you who are united to Christ not only by profession but in reality you have known what it is by the Spirit of God to be driven out of yourself to rest solely in Christ for your acceptance before God.

27:47 You have been united to Christ in the virtue of His death and resurrection and in the virtue of that union you have died to the dominion of sin and you have risen to walk in newness of life. You have a heart that is suffused with evangelical motives of desiring to please Christ and to honor Christ and to serve Christ and to you the true people of God I say first of all do not boast of tomorrow with reference to dealing with unconfessed sin that is right now in your life. Do not boast of tomorrow

28:31 with respect to unconfessed sins in your life today. See if you are a true child of God you are obeying Hebrews 12.14 which says follow after peace with all men and the holiness without which no man shall see the Lord. If you are a true child of God 1 John 1.7

28:58 is indeed the pattern of your life if we walk in the light as He is in the light we have fellowship one with another and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son goes on cleansing us from all sin. So that the basic pattern of your life is one of an ongoing honest dealing with sin and when sin is discovered you go to the fountain open for sin and uncleanness and with the assurance of God's promise in 1 John 1.9 if we confess our sins faithful and just to forgive us and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness and if any man sinned 2.2 of that same book we have an advocate with the Father

29:42 as a real Christian this is the meat and drink of your life however, however, however sitting here this morning on this last day of 1995 you know that you have one or more specific sins that you have not owned from the heart brought to the living God with fresh application to the blood and mediation of Christ and because you are a true Christian you know you are going to have to deal with that sin or those sins but you know what you are doing you are saying

30:26 come on I'll deal with that sin you know that you could not maintain your level of assurance were you to say I have no intention of ever dealing with that sin you know that to take that posture would be to relinquish a major element of a well-grounded Biblical assurance that you are even in a state of grace and so your posture is not one of justifying the sin not one of deliberately intending to try to bury it in some self-made sea of forgetfulness oh yes you have intention of confessing it

31:10 tomorrow do not boast for you do not know what a day may bring forth as long as that sin lies unclenched and unconfessed as a festering sore in your soul and as a burr in your conscience Proverbs 28 13 this stands on your forehead he that covers his sin shall

31:49 and if God were to allow you to prosper while you knowingly cover that sin he'd have to come out of heaven and scrub that peck from his own holy word what is the sin you say if I confess that to God I know I know I'll have to confess it to my wife and I don't know how she'd react if I tell her this or that she might turn against me she might threaten to divorce me I know eventually I must confess it and I fully intend to some tomorrow

32:33 child of God get out of your dream world harden your heart one more day about that sin and the likelihood that you'll ever confess it is much less in the orbit of reality ah but if I confess that sin I know I'll have to make it right at other levels it may mean going to the IRS and acknowledging that I shaved the facts in order to favor myself and I didn't render to Caesar what belonged to Caesar I might be taken to court I might lose my home my whole family might be ashamed and you're covering that sin that you know was committed

33:17 when you filled out your tax forms last April you know it yet you're boasting of tomorrow oh I don't intend to die with that sin undealt with I don't intend to meet the Lord Jesus with that sin undealt with but I'll deal with it tomorrow in God's name in the name of the God who's redeemed you child of God confess that sin today for whoso confesses and forsakes them

34:00 shall obtain mercy not only will you know the blessedness of a cleansed conscience you have the promise of God's mercy which is pity joined to action and though the confession of that sin may bring you into dire conditions in terms of your relationship to mom and dad wife or husband the government your boss sorrow faith a thousand obstacles with a clean conscience in the knowledge of open-faced communion with God is far better than to sneak into 1996

34:42 with a bloodied conscience knowing that God has a controversy sin you know even as I preach conscience is active boast yourself of tomorrow don't do another con job on yourself saying yes Lord you know I've acknowledged that I'm not trying to hide it and Lord I hope and plan and propose that I will boast not thyself of tomorrow but thou knowest not what a day may bring forth

Application to Believers: Ruthless Mortification of Sin Patterns

35:28 and a second word of exhortation to you the people of God do not boast of tomorrow with reference to the ruthless principled mortification of patterns of sin in your life see the difference between the two it is one thing to have a specific or specific unconfessed sins matters that have not been dealt with biblically time does not heal them time does not write them from David's adultery and murder to almost a year later all time did was bring him into such wretched spiritual declension

36:10 that he wondered if God was about to abandon him time rectifies no moral issue only dealing with it biblically rectifies it but now I'm talking about the matter of patterns of sin where there is not the ruthless principled mortification now because you're a Christian you are mortifying sin Romans 8.13 says if you by the Spirit do keep on mortifying the deeds of the flesh you shall live you are in a fundamental pattern of mortifying sin you are doing what Jesus said in Matthew 5.29 and 30 plucking out the right eyes

36:54 and cutting off and casting away the right hands that cause offense in your life you are by the grace of God in the overall pattern of your life seeking to implement 2 Corinthians 7.1 having therefore these promises dearly beloved let us cleanse ourselves of all defilement of the flesh and of the spirit perfecting holiness in the fear of God but there are some areas where you know that the ordinary spiritual energy directed to the mortification of those specific patterns of sin has found you coming into 1995 with those patterns entrenched

37:39 and sitting here this morning you're going out of 1995 with them just as deeply entrenched though in some areas there has been progress in mortification these particular patterns alas not only have they not been excised to any degree you have declined into even greater crippling falls before those particular patterns and what's the issue the issue is you know you know you know that those particular patterns are not going to go with the ordinary measure

38:23 of spiritual means and spiritual energy directed against them this kind goes not out but by prayer there's going to have to be a more determined ruthless concentration of spiritual weaponry upon those areas of your life and you know it and you have every intention of marshalling up those energies in dependence upon the spirit of God and starting to hack and whack away in holy mortification but it's tomorrow it's tomorrow it's tomorrow

39:03 tomorrow and God's word to you is don't boast about tomorrow you don't know what a day may bring forth leave those patterns of sin still entrenched as they are and they may be the very seedlings that will sprout into the full blown tree of apostasy what's the area conscience at work you came into 95 knowing you had an obsessive

39:45 inordinate attachment to your TV you're coming out of 1995 with that inordinate attachment increased and intensified and you know it you came into 95 knowing that you were not exercising the disciplines necessary to cut off the right hand that reached for the VCR and the rented movie that fed your flesh and put words and images in your mind that had nothing to do with enabling you to be a more holy man or woman and you have to determine I got to stop all of that but here you come to the end of 1995 and you're renting more movies a month

40:28 than you did in January of 1995 you've not mortified your inordinate insatiable appetite for that which you're getting from the blockbuster store and there are more in this assembly than I think any one of us would want to know who are in that category you can't remember when you took an evening out for three hours and opened the bible in Christ that he would help you mortify that in you which had an affinity for the unclean and the impure and the brutal

41:11 gratuitous sex and gratuitous violence and you've not spent one evening of three hours before God asking him by the power of the Holy Ghost whatever it is that has an appetite for that that you spent many an evening feeding it with what you rented at the video store get honest my friend stop trying to con yourself that's where you're at and you're boasting tomorrow tomorrow I'll deal with that tomorrow boast not thyself of tomorrow I know this may mean some negative votes on my reconfirmation in January frankly I don't give a hoot

41:54 because I'm going to stand before God and maybe on my tombstone we'll have etched the date 1996 I don't care how you may be angry at my honesty I say this now I say this not to hurt you my Bible says unless you start hacking and hewing you're going to go to hell I want to see you go to heaven and Jesus said if the offending eye is not plucked out and cast away and the offending hand come off and cast away you'll burn in hell

42:33 you boast of tomorrow because you know as a Christian you can't sign a peace treaty with any sin and you've not but you've been deceived into thinking somehow the resolution will be greater tomorrow somehow the next time I go into the video store the resolution will be greater to bypass everything I ought to or perhaps to resolve never to go into it again as some of us have made resolutions never to go into them at all

Application to Believers: Wholehearted Commitment to Biblical Duties

43:08 you child of God don't boast about tomorrow don't boast of tomorrow with reference to dealing with unconfessed sin in your life secondly don't boast of tomorrow with reference to the ruthless mortification of the patterns of your sin and do not boast yourself of tomorrow with reference to a whole hearted commitment to the full scope of your biblical duties do not boast yourself of tomorrow with reference to a whole hearted commitment

43:52 to the full scope or spectrum of your biblical duties as a child of God you are committed to doing all the will of God Jesus describes you in Matthew 7 21 not everyone who says to me Lord Lord shall enter the kingdom but he that is doing not half two thirds three quarters or the convenient aspects of but he that is doing the will of God if you are a true Christian you know that your heart with the Psalmist says I esteem all thy precepts concerning all things to be right and therefore I hate every false way if you are a true sheep of Christ in John 10 27 my sheep are hearing my voice and I know them and they are following me

44:37 not just following me selectively but following me in principle universally they hear they follow Hebrews 5 9 being made perfect speaking of Christ he became the author of eternal salvation unto all that are obeying him if indeed you are a true child of God you know that is the fundamental disposition of your heart commitment in the strength of Christ out of gratitude to Christ to fulfill all of your known duties as defined and delineated by the word of Christ but if you come to this last day of the new year and watch your problem you lack a wholehearted

45:21 commitment to certain aspects of that full spectrum of your duty for some of you the area of chronic lack of whole soul the basics of your own personal walk with God you came into 1995 with a sloppy devotional life you come to this last day of 1995 and you still have a sloppy devotional life I didn't say throughout the year some of us have had periods where our devotional life has been shriveled where it has been skipped where it has been more intense and more fruitful I'm not talking about the normal

46:05 ebb and flow the basic pattern of your life is you had no established framework of personal devotional exercises when you came into 1995 and you come to the last day and there's been no fundamental change and yet if I ask you does God's word warrant that you meditate in his law as a part of your daily experience does the Lord's prayer clearly establish that every disciple of Christ has a daily give us this daily bread you say yes but you're not doing it daily why not you say well I I have a

46:50 sure purpose to tomorrow tomorrow out there something's going to happen in me and in my circumstances that are going to make it more acceptable and more welcoming to an established devotional life you're boasting of tomorrow you're living the life of a fool in that area Christian in the domestic area what more can be said to you men about assuming the burden of loving assertive sensitive Christ like headship over your

47:34 wives and over your families what more can be said to you from the scriptures that has been said and you came into 95 knowing that you are not in your best interest spiritually physically emotionally psychologically but you know if you were to address them she might pull her special pout that you know and can recognize three blocks away she might push the buttons that you know she's pushed before her

48:18 and she's going to be willing to tolerate a tearing cherishing loving thing and be willing to tolerate her frown for a while and her frigidity emotionally and even physically for a while that you might nobly look up into the adults now and can negotiate what's going to go on in the family. And you don't have the moral courage to get in the face of those kids and say, look, as long as you're under this roof, God's appointed me, his vice-regent, to implement his rule, and you get too big

49:01 for your britches to obey that rule, there's the door. So you discuss things with your kids, and you negotiate with your kids. Shame on you. Any man rule not well his own household.

49:15 How shall he take care of the church of God? We are to rule our households, not like tyrants imposing our will, but as vice-regents appointed by the king of kings and lord of lords to graciously implement his will in the domain assigned to us. And you know it. And you purpose, oh yes, you're not sitting here today saying, I have no intention to be a loving, sensitive, caring, assertive head in my home. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

49:47 no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. No, but it's tomorrow I'm going to start. So tomorrow, tomorrow, boast not the self of tomorrow with respect to a wholeheart commitment to the full spectrum of your biblical duties as an individual believer, in your domestic roles and responsibilities, in your church commitments. You made some commitments when you came into this membership. You made them before God and before

50:17 men. That only providential hindrances would keep you from making your way to this place when the church gathers. I wouldn't want to be in your place and try to prove to God that all the times you've absented yourself from prayer meeting was because God's providence made it necessary. You think you could persuade God? If not, then don't con your own conscience. You made solemn commitments that

50:49 you would give proportionately out of principle, not out of convenience. And you know you've been waffling and robbing God in his tithes and his offerings. In the workplace, you know what the will of God is. Whatever your hand finds to do, do with all your might is unto the Lord and not as unto men. In the workplace, do all things without murmuring and disputing,

51:10 that you may be blameless and harmless. You know that. You've heard it preached. And you have every intention of being that kind of workman. Tomorrow, dear child of God, hear the scriptures. Boast not

51:23 your self of tomorrow with respect to a wholeheart commitment to the full spectrum of your biblical duties as an individual believer, in your domestic roles and responsibilities. You made solemn commitments with respect to a wholeheart commitment that you would give proportionately out of principle, not out of convenience. need……to work exterminate transgressions and transgressions. You've heard it preached. You

51:25 have all thesa confrayed.

51:35 That sin must be confessed They say anything subversive must be confessed That sinful Things must be confessed The waifu is your child. The euphoric xaom Memory Wandering out of Wisdom You've lied. The looking to Christ for fresh grace to mortify those chronic 16 19 Patterns Eldritch oppurtunity Unidirriable opportunity Undo ** nd for wholehearted commitment to the full scope and spectrum of your biblical duties. Don't enter the new year a partial fool saying, tomorrow, tomorrow.

52:15 The ability to even rationally think about the unconfessed sin, the patterns of unmortified pockets of sin in your life, the areas of sloppiness with respect to your biblical duties. How do you know you're even going to have the rational faculties to think of those things tomorrow? One little blood vessel bursting in the brain, it could be rendered an idiot.

52:52 One visit to the doctor and the discovery that there's been working in you silently and unfelt a deadly, life-destroying tumor, and your whole life will be absorbed in one thing. How am I going to get over the heaves for the next treatment of the chemotherapy? He won't be thinking about you. You won't be thinking about your family headship.

53:16 You'll just be thinking about how am I going to survive the next chemo treatment.

Application to the Unconverted: Do Not Boast of Tomorrow for Salvation

53:22 Now, these scare tactics? No, my folks, that's reality. We don't know what we may bring forth. Don't boast concerning tomorrow.

53:35 And then I make this application to you who are unconverted. You say, Pastor, who do you mean by the unconverted? I mean those of you, boys, girls, teenagers, men and women, you make no profession of faith in Christ. I would have come down where you're sitting in the pew and say to you, by name, do you profess here and now to be trusting only in Jesus Christ as your hope of life and salvation?

54:00 Do you profess to have given yourself to Christ to be saved by him and to be his willing bond slave for the rest of your days? You say, no way, man, that's not me. I make no such profession. Others of you are unconverted.

54:14 You make the profession, but you're a hypocrite. Hypocrite is a man. A man who knowingly wears a mask. The very biblical word hypocrite is the word that etymologically means the wearing of a mask.

54:26 When a man was on the stage playing the role of the mask he had on his face, he knew his own true identity as well as the identity he was projecting with his mask, with his voice and with his part. And there are some of you in that category. You profess and others have accepted your profession, but you know in your heart of hearts you're as phony, as a seven dollar bill. You know it.

54:54 You haven't got an ounce of reality in you. You know it, God knows it, you've fooled everyone else. And then there's a third category of the unconverted among us. Those of you that profess to be saved and you don't know that you aren't because you're a formalist.

55:10 You're convinced that if you say the right words and if you're in the right place at the right time and lives a reasonably decent life, then surely you've got reality. Of personal communion with God, you know nothing. Of tenderness of conscience, maintain that you might maintain that fellowship and communion with God, you know nothing. Of hunger and thirst after God, you know nothing.

55:36 You're a formalist, but you think you're converted. Now I'm addressing all three categories of the unconverted here this morning with this text. Do not boast yourself of tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring forth. If I were to gather all of you who fit that category of the unconverted and ask you, do you purpose to go on in this way until your allotted days are used up and in God's appointment book the angel of death comes or Jesus Christ returns in power and glory?

56:14 Do you intend to go on unconverted in any of those categories only to sink into hell forever? I doubt there's a one who would. Either way, throw his or her head back and say, yeah, what of it? I trust there's no one so heartened as to almost dare God to strike you dead in your arrogance.

56:39 I believe every unconverted man, woman, boy or girl here would say, yes, I do want to know that I'm saved. Those of you who make no profession, yes, I read my Bible and I listen to family worship and I hope someday that Christ will be mine and I'll be his. And I trust that some of you are his. Some of you are hypocrites, are feeling the wretched taste of the hypocrisy in your mouth, beginning to soberly realize, what does it matter if I fool the whole world?

57:09 I'm on my way to be stripped naked before God in the last day. And I hope you'd say, I don't want to be a hypocrite anymore. And if you're a formalist, that you'd at least admit the possibility and say, oh, God, if that's what I am, I'm a formalist who says the right things and is in the right place at the right time doing what's expected. But I don't know anything of communion with God.

57:36 I don't know anything of true fellowship with Christ. I would hope that anyone in any of those categories of the unconverted would say, no, I want to do something about it. I want to get serious about obtaining divine forgiveness, receiving a new heart, turning from my sin, laying hold of Christ. But I ask you.

57:55 I ask you, when? When you say tomorrow. In other words, I'm serious about this and I want to do something about it any time but right now. Well, I want you to look in the Bible at a man who took that posture.

58:16 Turn to Acts chapter 24, where God has given us the picture of such a man. Unconverted. Conscious he was unconverted. Concerned that he was unconverted.

58:31 He listened to a preacher the likes of which you and I have never heard. But he boasted of tomorrow. Acts 24 and verse 24. But after certain days Felix came.

58:43 Felix, I'm sorry, came with Drusilla, his wife, who was a Jewish. And sent for Paul. Now listen. And heard him concerning the faith in Christ Jesus.

58:55 This man Felix sent for this preacher of preachers, the great Apostle Paul, next to our Lord Jesus Christ. Probably did more for the kingdom of God than any other person that walked the face of the earth in human history. He sends for Paul and he listens to him. Didn't fall asleep.

59:19 Didn't nod off. He listened to him concerning the faith, the body of truth surrounding Christ Jesus. And as he, that is Paul, reasoned of righteousness. He went after the conscience of this man.

59:32 That there is an absolute standard of right and wrong. Epitomized in the law of God. And he went after this man's conscience concerning righteousness and self-control. The control of one's appetites and passions in relationship to God's standards.

59:48 And the fact that all of that would come out in the day of judgment and of the judgment to come when every area of lack of self-control that led a man into disobeying God's holy law and His standard of righteousness. What happened to Felix? Did he write it all off and say, well that was interesting to hear the babblings of this religious nut? Well that was a very interesting philosophical dissertation on his views of religious reality.

60:12 No, no, look what the text says. And as Paul reasoned, Felix was terrified. Felix was terrified. He became terrified.

60:29 He became terrified. These realities pressed in upon him. God, the law, righteousness, self-judgment. But what did he do?

60:44 Look at the text. He answered, go your way for this time and when I have a convenient season I will call you unto me. See what he's doing? He's boasting of tomorrow.

61:05 Look what he's assuming. He's assuming he would be alive for another season. He was assuming he would have his rational faculties for a more convenient season. He was assuming the man of God would be alive.

61:20 That the man of God would be accessible. And that the man of God would be willing to come and speak to him. And that he would still be cons...

61:27 The things he's putting into the womb of... So that he has no power to put into the womb of tomorrow.

61:34 He puts them in and says they'll come out at my will. Oh, hot shot Felix, now you control all these things, do you? It's a tragic thing. You read the story and meditate on it.

61:46 There's every indication that he never again was terrified. All he had was dollar signs in his eyeballs. And he hoped by having Paul in again and again he could eventually get Paul to Greece's palm. That's what the text says.

62:02 He hoped with all that money would be given him of Paul. Therefore he sent for him the more often and communed with him. But he never trembled again. You want something to scare you out of your indifference.

The Divine Antidote: Now is the Day of Salvation

62:17 This passage ought to make some of you grab the pew in front of you and say, God have mercy on me, lest I drop into hell. You think this is fooling business? That man, he had this great servant of God...

62:36 ...with passion and the unction of the Holy Ghost until the hairs on the back of his neck.

62:45 But he boasted of tomorrow. Tomorrow, manana, I'll call you again. Isn't that where some of you are? You have no intention to go to hell.

62:57 You have no intention to go on rejecting Christ until you die and sink into hell. You have no intention going on being the hypocrite you've been. You're getting weary of it. You're getting tired of always looking over your shoulder to make sure you pick your mask up at the right time and in the right place and in the right circumstances.

63:17 And you're beginning to have a yearning to live with no mask. Oh, the blessedness of having no mask to wear. So that what men see is what is. Warts and moles and all, but no mask.

63:36 Haven't you begun to wonder that maybe you're just a formalist? When others speak so naturally of communion with Christ and the Lord's presence and blessing. Isn't there a yearning in your heart to have something more than a formal religion? Oh, dear unconverted man or woman.

63:56 Don't boast of tomorrow. The scriptures tell us here is the divine antidote. Look at it in 2 Corinthians 6 and verse 2. 2 Corinthians 6 and verse 2.

64:11 And in my own devotional reading in the New Testament this week I came again to this passage. And found my own heart drawn out with earnest pleadings with God. That I would know something of what Paul felt and knew when he says in verse 20 of the preceding chapter. That's the beginning of the paragraph.

64:33 We are ambassadors therefore on the behalf of Christ. As though God were entreating by us. Think of this. As though God himself were entreating, exhorting.

64:48 They have a use of parakaleo, drawing alongside and calling and speaking. As though God were entreating by us. We, oh my, we beg you. On the behalf of Christ.

65:04 Think of it. Paul said as an ambassador we not only draw alongside and entreat you. In the very stead of Christ we beg you. With all the pathos and the passion and the yearning of the incarnate God.

65:23 Who said, oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem. How oft would I have gathered you as a hen gathers her chicks. And you would not. Who stood and cried in the temple of any man third.

65:38 Come unto me and drink. As the scripture saith. He that believeth on me out of his innermost being shall flow rivers of living water. Think what it means to stand in Christ's stead.

65:55 And his appeal was be reconciled to God. Throw down your arms. Going on in the posture of enmity against God. Living your own life.

66:09 Trusting yourself. Hiding under your mask. And on what grounds can we entreat and beg. Because God has done something objectively in space time history.

66:20 In the person of his son. Him who knew no sin. He made to be sin in our behalf. That we might become the righteousness of God in him.

66:28 It's on the basis of what Christ has done. That we entreat. We beg. And we working together with him.

66:36 Entreat also that you receive not the grace of God in vain. For he saith. At an acceptable time I hearkened unto you. And in a day of salvation did I succor you.

66:48 Behold now. Now is the acceptable time. Behold now is the day of salvation. You see the conjunction of those words.

67:04 Now. The time. Now. The day.

67:09 My unconverted friend. Now. The time. For you know not.

67:15 What a morrow. May bring forth. Hebrews 3 7 and following. Today.

67:30 If you hear his voice. Harden not your heart. And again he repeats it. In verse 15.

67:38 As he saith before. Today. If you hear. His voice.

67:42 All the Bible says. Behold. Now. The time.

67:46 Now. The day. My unconverted friend. Now.

67:50 The time. His voice. All the Bible. Says to you as far as tomorrow is concerned.

67:56 Hear me carefully as I close. Listen. All the Bible says to you are unconverted. As far as tomorrow is concerned is this.

68:07 That you may find God. To be a totally different God to you tomorrow. Than he is today. You got that.

68:19 You may find God. To be a totally different God tomorrow. than he is to you today. That's what you're talking about.

68:32 You go home and read Proverbs chapter 1, starting in verse 23, where God says, I have stretched out my hands. I have called. I have entreated. You have refused.

68:46 He said, the day is coming when you will call.

68:51 And I almost trembled to quote these words. And God says, I will laugh and I will mock at your calamity. You will cry and I will not hear.

69:08 My spirit shall not always strive with men.

69:16 You see why Solomon said, don't boast about tomorrow. You don't know what tomorrow may bring forth this morning in the gospel and in the word. And God taking a natively foul-mouthed, dirty mind, self-centered, hell-deserving sinner, and so working on his, part that he honestly, sincerely, has at least an infinitesimal touch of the yearning of God for your salvation. And I've tried to get inside your head and inside your skin to entreat and to beg and to plead.

69:54 You stand and tell me you have absolute certainty you'll have one more time for somebody so to beg and to plead.

70:06 God has told you today in the gospel, with an inviting face. God is toward you today in the gospel, may I say it reverently, with oversized ears, ready to pick up the faintest whisper of the sigh of a penitent cry.

70:26 God, be merciful to me, a sinner. And for the sake of Jesus, your son, save me. God has oversized ears. And God has outstretched hands.

70:41 But all God says, about tomorrow is that he may be a different God to you if your cry does not go up into his ears today. And if your heart does not reach out to his outstretched hands today, now is the day of salvation.

71:04 Now is the acceptable.

Final Plea and Warning of Judgment

71:10 May God grant that even this day,

71:15 this hour, you will say, God, no longer will I play the fool. No, I will close with Christ. I will cry out for mercy till I know that mercy is mine. Someone who felt the pressure of these things penned these words.

71:40 I dreamed that the great judgment morning had come. The trumpet had blown. Man is speaking, thinking of the coming day of judgment. I dreamed that the nations had gathered to judgment before the white throne.

71:56 From that throne came a bright shining angel, and he stood on the land and the sea, and he swore with his hand raised to heaven that time was no longer to be. The moral man came to the judgment that his self-righteous rags would not do, for the men who had crucified Jesus had passed off as moral men too. Now listen carefully. The man that had put off salvation.

72:27 Not today. I'll get saved. Not today. No time to think of repentance.

72:39 At last he had found time to die. And oh, what a weeping and wailing when the lost were told of their fate. They cried for the rocks and the mountains, but their prayer. What can we say before you?

73:19 The very thought that another Lord's Day morning would come and go, and that you would draw near in the worship and ministry of your word, and that sinners laid in with their guilt and bondage would go on increasing that guilt and bondage when liberty, forgiveness, pardon, acceptance all stand available in Christ. Oh God, have mercy. Have mercy, Lord. Don't let people destroy themselves forever.

73:54 Stretch forth your hand. Have deep, saving dealings with many today. And for your children, oh Lord, whose area of arrested growth has been identified, and your word has found them out, may they also have dealings with you today that we may be able, should you spare us for days to come into the new year, that we may look back and have occasion to bless you for this last day of the old year, because it was to us in a unique way, a day of your salvation. Hear us and seal your word to our hearts, we pray.

74:39 In Jesus' name, amen.