Hey, welcome to One and All.

We're so glad that you made it.

I want to encourage you before we jump into the message to download the One and All app so that way you can follow along, take notes, and see where we're headed for week two of Marked for Life.

So let's jump into it.

Hey guys, this is Pastor Jeff.

Welcome this weekend.

You are in for such a treat.

Charles Delaney, my father-in-law, is going to be bringing the message.

And I think this is such a good thing.

I mentioned a few weeks ago how when I read a good book and I think, you know, I really like this author, I'll always turn to the back of the book to see who taught the author.

I want to know the original source.

Well, I know some of you have wondered, you know, who taught Jeff?

Who's had influence over his life?

Who's been his accountability partner?

Well, my father-in-law, God has gifted me with a very special man who's preached the gospel for basically going on 60 years now and who's done it all the way from Africa to Kentucky, now here in California, around the world.

And so I want you to know that what he has to say fits in so well with our series.

Here is a man who was marked for life at a very young age and who is here now to tell us how you and I can endure.

He knows we're going to face all kinds of tribulation and trouble throughout the Christian life, throughout the course of our lives.

But here is a man who has remained faithful, who has fought the good fight, whose years are now limited, and who can tell you and give you what you need to do to be a Christian.

A formula of success and endurance and how to remain faithful to Christ in the midst of so much turmoil.

So I want you to give a very warm welcome to a man who has served Christ well all of his life, Charles Delaney.

Usually, people clap like that when I'm finished because they're glad it's all over.

Hey, it's so good to be back in California.

My wife and I, Betty, we enjoy coming out here just every year.

And we enjoy coming here because we get to be with you folk here.

So thank you for that warm welcome.

You make me feel at home.

We enjoy coming here because we really like to spend time with Robin.

And...

When we come out, we're able to spend quality time with her.

And it is good from time to time to see Jeff.

But we really enjoy seeing Robin.

Now, speaking of Jeff, I've got to take just a moment and tell you what happened a couple of weeks ago.

Because I know at some time or another, Jeff is going to tell this story.

And it's not going to be accurate when he tells it.

So I want to tell you the accurate story of what happened.

We were playing golf a couple of weeks ago.

And I think it was on the 15th green.

And I hit my ball on the green.

And it rolled past the green.

And there was a lake there.

And it went into the lake.

But when I got up to where my ball was, Jeff was standing there looking at it.

So here's the bank.

The water was down about two feet.

My ball was out about six feet in the water.

So I went up there, and Jeff said, I think we can get your ball out.

And I said, well, good.

So he said, I'll tell you what.

He said, what you do, take hold of my hand and hold me back and let me reach out and get the ball.

Now, can you see something wrong with that logic?

Because you look at Jeff and his height and weight, and you look at me, and Jeff is always talking about, or lately, of older the generation mentoring the younger generation.

And I saw something wrong with that picture.

And I knew nothing good could come out of that.

But since he paid for the golf, I didn't say anything about it.

And so...

So what we did, I took hold of his hand.

He was reaching out.

And everything was good for a minute.

And then he went way over trying to get it, and the weight shifted.

Now, I knew if I held on to his hand, both of us were going to go into the water.

And so my older generation logic kind of took place, and I thought, now, if I hold on to his hand, I'm going to go into the water.

If I let him loose, it's just my son-in-law.

that goes in the water.

And so somehow, I can't tell you what happened for sure, his hand somehow slipped out of my hand.

And folks, I want to tell you, your pastor went straight in the water.

Rick is here tonight.

He can testify to that.

Now, I hated that that happened to Jeb, but I have never laughed so much.

And many a time.

So it's good to see that.

Now, I know when there's going to be a sermon, when he's going to talk about that.

But my story is the accurate story.

Now, Jeff talks about my age a lot.

And I will say, since the last time that I spoke here in person, my memory is not quite as good as it used to be.

And, in fact, I gave you an example back a few months ago.

I was getting ready for the day, and I went over to my chest of drawers and got out a pair of socks.

And I put them on the bed, and then I went in the bathroom to brush my teeth and comb my hair.

It took me longer to brush my teeth than it did to comb my hair.

But when I came back out to the bedroom and I looked on the bed, my socks were gone.

And Betty was in the kitchen, so I hollered out to her.

I said, did you do anything with my socks?

And she said, no.

And so I looked around quite a bit, and then I came back to her again with a little different tone.

And I said, are you sure you didn't do anything with my socks?

Well, she came back with a little different tone also, and she said, no, I didn't do anything with your socks.

So I didn't say it out loud.

I said it to myself, but this is what I said.

Well, there's only two of us in this house.

There's you and there's me, and I didn't do anything with my socks.

Well, I looked all over the bed, and finally it dawned on me that I had more than one pair of socks.

So I went to the chest of drawers, got out another pair of socks, went over to a chair and sat down to put my socks on.

And when I raised my left foot up, lo and behold, there was a sock already on that foot.

So I put my left foot down, brought my right foot up, and lo and behold, there was a sock on that foot also.

Sometime during the morning, when I wasn't looking, Betty sneaked in and put socks on both of my feet.

I want to tell you, I am honored.

I'm honored tonight to be asked to speak, and it's a humbling thing for me.

And the reason I know Jeff, a couple of weeks ago, he said when I asked Charlie to speak, he hesitated.

He felt like he couldn't do it.

And the reason I hesitated is because I don't know how much you really know you are blessed.

by the messages that you hear from Jeff and all of your other staff.

Every Lord stay here.

You guys are powerfully blessed.

You're blessed with such powerful messages and such quality of message.

And when I looked at that, that's the reason I hesitated.

because of what you're used to every week.

So let me say this in the beginning of this message before I get into it.

And I may have mentioned this one time before when I was here.

But in 1960, Betty and I were students at Cincinnati Bible College in Cincinnati, Ohio.

And there was a church, a little country church that sent word to the college that they needed a preacher.

And so I put my name in the list, and I didn't know it, but there were like three or four other guys that put their name in also.

And so back then, when you went out to try for a church, you'd preach, and they'd listen to you, and they'd listen to someone else, and then after a time, they would vote on you.

So I got contacted, and so one Sunday morning, Betty and I went out to this little church.

little white frame building right along a country road.

Had a bell tower there and would ring the bell every Sunday.

And the church entrance to the church building was only about eight feet from the road.

And it was just right on the road.

Back in the back, there was an outhouse.

It was a two-holder.

So two people could go there at one time.

Well, that Sunday morning, I was introduced and I got up to preach.

And when I went up to the podium, I looked down.

When I put my Bible down, there was a little bronze plaque on that podium.

It had an inscription on it.

And the scripture said, Sir, we would see Jesus.

I don't know who put that plaque there, but that's a passage over in John chapter 12, verse 20.

And it has to do when Jesus was beginning his ministry.

And the scripture says there was a feast, a celebration in the city of Jerusalem.

And there were some Greek people that came into Jerusalem to worship as other people were there.

And the scripture tells us that these Greek people.

Apparently, they'd heard about Jesus.

Maybe they'd heard of his ministry, his words that he spoke, or his miracles.

But they wanted to come to Jerusalem.

And the scripture says that they came and they found Philip, who was a disciple of Jesus.

And when they came to Philip, they just simply said, Sir, we would see Jesus.

Now, I don't know who put that plaque on that podium of that church building.

A godly woman, maybe an elder.

But there's no doubt about it.

The message was clear.

What they were saying is, whoever stands behind this podium, whenever and whoever it is, we've come to worship Jesus.

That's the one we want to see.

We want to see Jesus more than anyone else, not you.

Well, I preached, and then we went home, and about three weeks later, I got a message that they had voted on me, and they accepted me as their new pastor of that church.

Now, I'll tell you, I really felt good.

I'm pretty proud of myself.

And then I found out that the reason they voted me is because my wife, who's sitting right back there, she plays the piano, and they needed a piano player as bad as they needed a preacher.

And so Betty and I went to that little church.

And for two and a half years, we served and had a tremendous ministry there, a beautiful group of people.

But every Sunday...

for two and a half years, when I would go off to that pulpit and place my Bible there, I saw that plaque, and it said, sir, we would see Jesus.

And I made a decision very early in my ministry that whenever I preached, the one that I wanted people to see was Jesus, not me.

And when I looked at that plaque, that made an impact upon me.

So that's a decision I made.

And throughout my years of ministry, even coming to here at this place tonight, folks, the one I want you to see is Jesus.

And I hope you get a little glimpse of him tonight.

I hope when you leave here, you're a little closer to Jesus.

Jeff has been wanting me to speak, and it kind of goes along with the theme of what kind of people ought we to be.

And I'm going to preach tonight on our journey home.

And to begin with this message, we have to go all the way back to 1952.

Now, a lot of you were not even around at that time.

But in 1952, I was 13 years old.

And at a church service on a Sunday night in Kentucky, the preacher preached a message on Jesus being the Lord of salvation.

And that Sunday night, there was an invitation time, much like what you all have here at One and All.

And when that invitation time was given, I walked out from where I was seated.

I walked down the aisle.

And I confess with my mouth that I believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God.

And I want him to be the Lord of my life.

And folks, I want to tell you, that changed my life.

Because I took a step that has put me on the right road.

And it's a step that I've been walking on.

In fact, the step changed me so much that I realized I had to change my life.

And so I've been on this journey now for about 72 years with Jesus.

So what I want to do is just talk to you tonight.

And I don't mind telling you, I'm a little nervous tonight.

That's the reason why I went into the women's restroom.

I got caught just before I went in there.

But what I want to do is just talk about some scripture that's helped me and some events that took place in my life.

And maybe it will help you in your journey of faith.

So I want to talk about our journey home.

The first thing I want you to notice about our journey home is a journey of faith.

I like 2 Corinthians chapter 5.

It's a great passage of Scripture.

In that chapter 5, the Apostle Paul begins that chapter talking about heaven.

And he says, we know that if this earthly tent we now live in is destroyed, we are destroyed.

We have a home eternal in the heavens, not made with human hands.

Folks, I like the way the Apostle Paul said that.

He says, we know.

And when you look at some of the writers of the New Testament, especially the Apostle Paul so many times, he said, we know this to be fact.

And so what Paul was saying is simply this.

Tonight we live in a tent.

Calls this body a tent.

It's not meant to last very long.

It wears out.

It gets thin.

It gets wrinkled.

In fact, some of you can look in the mirror and you know that to be true.

But the Apostle Paul is simply saying this.

When this tent is destroyed, we don't have to worry about anything because we know there's a home eternal in the heavens, and that's where we want to go.

Now, Paul went on to say that while we're in this tent, He said there's sometimes that we are burdened and that we groan.

And that's a strange way to put things.

But the Apostle Paul, the reason he said we burden and we groan is because we want to be clothed in our heavenly dwelling.

He says we want to go to heaven.

And so from the very beginning of our journey with Christ, there's a longing for heaven.

And when you think about that, none of us have ever seen heaven.

But there's a longing for heaven.

So Paul talks about heaven, and he talks about the tent we live in, and it's so temporary.

And then out of the blue, the apostle Paul starts talking about faith.

And the scripture says, Paul talking, he says, we live by faith and not by sight.

Now, there are really two kinds of lives mentioned here in this passage.

There's a life of sight.

And sight would represent people who put a lot of trust in themselves.

Their lives are many times fashioned by what they see and what they hear.

And they put a lot of faith in the world that God created.

Where on the other hand, there's also the life of faith.

And the people of faith, we don't put so much trust in ourselves, but we trust in our Lord Jesus Christ.

And our lives are not fashioned and shaped just by what we see, but it's fashioned and shaped by what we don't see.

And we put more faith in the God that created the world than the world that God created, don't we?

Now, also, there are two kinds of kingdoms represented here.

There's a kingdom of God and the kingdom of this world.

And it might be good for us to realize tonight that when Jesus stood before Pilate, he was not just a king, but he was a king of the world.

when he was going to be judged whether he would live or whether he would die, he said to Pilate, my kingdom is not of this world.

Folks, we are a member of a kingdom, not of this world.

Paul went on to say one time that our citizenship is in heaven, and we eagerly await a savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ.

And he says, so since this is true, we need to fix our eyes not on what is seen, but what is unseen.

The things that are seen, Paul said, are temporary, but the things that are unseen are eternal.

Now, Paul, when he talked about heaven, talked about a tent.

Then all of a sudden he started talking about faith.

You'd think he almost changed subjects altogether, but I don't think he did.

I think what Paul was saying is simply this.

Folks, here we are tonight in a tent.

Over there, somewhere in the heavens, is our house eternal in the heavens, not made with human hands.

And I think what Paul is trying to say to us, that we want to get to that place.

That's what we long for.

Well, what he's saying is we get there not by a walk of sight, but we get there through a life of faith.

And that's why faith is so important in our journey.

I like Hebrews chapter 11.

It's a great chapter in the Bible.

And if you haven't read it for some period of time, go read it sometime this week.

In fact, Hebrews 11, I think it's verse 6, it says, Without faith, it's impossible to please God.

But one of the things you notice about Hebrews chapter 11, and what this is, is the author of the book of Hebrews takes people down through the ages that had great faith in God, and so their names are listed among the people of faith.

A lot of those people are just ordinary people like us, but they had a tremendous faith in God.

But one thing you notice about the people of faith in Hebrews chapter 11 is that so many of those people They died for their faith.

They were persecuted.

They were tormented.

They were killed.

In fact, the scripture says in Hebrews 11, 36 through 38, he said, Some faced jeers and flogging, while still others were chained and put into prison.

They were stoned.

They were sawed in two.

They were put to death by the sword.

They went about in sheepskins and goatskins.

They were destitute.

They were persecuted.

They were mistreated.

The world was not worthy of them, the people of faith.

When Betty and I were in Africa, in the country of Zambia, there was a country north of us, quite a few miles, called the country of Uganda.

a beautiful country.

In fact, it was called the warm heart of Africa.

And the people there were so gracious.

But in the latter part of 1979 and in the 80s, Idi Amin came into power in Uganda.

He became a ruthless dictator.

And one of the things that Idi Amin wanted to do when he became the dictator of Uganda was to destroy the church.

And there were hundreds of Christians that were persecuted and killed.

I read accounts where they would take Christians to crocodile-infested pools of water and just cast them in.

In fact, it says that Idi Amin was responsible for the death of something like 300,000 people.

But his main object was to destroy the church.

I had the opportunity to go to that country a little bit after Idi Amin was put out of power.

And I went into the area, which was his hometown.

And I had the opportunity to speak at a little village church in that area.

It's a memory that sits in me, I think, for the rest of my life, as long as I have memory.

The little church building had a grass roof on it, mud walls, a dirt floor.

And I preached that Sunday morning, and the people were so gracious.

They listened.

None of them went to sleep.

And after the message is over, they gathered around me.

And they wanted to talk some and tell what happened during the time of Idi Amin.

And one of them said, when Idi Amin was our dictator, he issued a decree one time.

And he said, in the laws of Uganda, it's against the laws of Uganda to worship God on Sunday.

And so the Idi Amin just simply said, you cannot worship God anymore.

And that little group of people gathered around me, I can still see them today.

They said, we feared Idi Amin, but we also wanted to worship our God.

So they said, we came together that Sunday, right in this building where I'm standing, where we're standing here.

And he said, we came to worship.

But he said, we prayed softly.

And we sang softly, which is hard for them to do.

And they said, about the time we were getting ready to leave, the soldiers of Idi Amin came into this building right where we are.

And they said, all of us were arrested.

We were put into prison that night.

And we were told the next day we would stand before the magistrate to determine what would happen to us.

And they, all of them, they said, we were afraid.

We knew our lives were in danger.

They said, we didn't sleep all night long.

We prayed and we sang to God all night long, pleading for mercy.

And then he said, the next morning, we were marched into the courtroom of that magistrate.

said he was on a kind of an elevated platform sitting behind the desk.

He looked down at us and they said, we looked up at him.

And then they said, this magistrate looked down at us and said, I find nowhere in the books of Uganda where it's against the law to worship God on Sunday.

And then he said, you are free to go.

And they said, we jumped up and down with joy.

They said, he's one of us.

He's a believer in Christ.

They just said, we jumped up and down.

We ran all around the courtroom.

But then all of a sudden, there's a quietness.

No one spoke.

And then one of the men said, in just a few short days, the soldiers of Idi Amin came into the office of that magistrate.

and shot him to death.

They said he died for his faith.

Folks, that's Uganda.

What about us here in America?

I do believe this.

In the days and years to come, right here in our own country, God's people are going to be persecuted.

We're going to be intimidated.

We're going to be ridiculed.

I don't know if we'll ever be called upon to die for our faith, but folks, we're called upon to live our faith.

We are God's people.

When we live our faith, we will say things and do things and go places.

that I think a lot of times people will say there's something wrong in your head.

There's something not quite right up here.

The people of sight will say that about the people of faith.

In fact, sometimes even our own family will say things about when God's people do certain things.

My father died when I was only eight years of age.

I don't remember hardly anything about him, but I grew up without a dad, and that was hard at times.

But I remember one time my mom told me that when I was little, I was putting my shoes on.

And you know how back, you don't notice that much anymore, but years ago when the tongue, when you'd start to put your shoe on, your tongue would go down into the shoe.

And my tongue had gone down into the shoe, and I was struggling to put my shoe on.

And my mom said, my dad looked at me and said, son, pull your tongue out.

And then mom said, when he said that, I stuck my tongue out and I brought both hands up and I started pulling on my tongue.

And then my mom said, my dad looked at her and said, do you ever wonder sometime if he's all right?

And folks, I want to tell you, if we really live our faith, there will be people sometime look at us and say, there's something wrong with you.

But let me just give you a word of encouragement.

Never let the people of sight hinder you in your journey of faith with God.

Because they can see with their eyes, they can see only as far as your physical eye can take them.

But to us, we can see that far, but we can see further than that through our eyes of faith.

We can see all the way to that home eternal in the heavens.

So never let people of sight in the world hinder you in your walk with God.

When we have a journey of faith, sometimes that journey is not easy.

In fact, Jesus said in John chapter 16, verse 33, he said, in this world, you will find trouble.

Have you found trouble in your life?

You know, I can talk about my life and I can tell you that there have been times in my journey with God that I've faced some real conflicts in life.

There's been times, folks, when I have been so full of sorrow that I didn't know which way to turn.

You remember the Apostle Paul said that we grieve and we groan and we are burdened down because we want to be clothed in our heavenly bodies.

I think also there's another time that we groan, and that's when we go through some difficult times in life.

And all of us here have a story to tell.

There are some here tonight can tell about the death of a loved one, the breakup of a home, an addiction, trouble with kids and grandkids.

We can all understand that.

And I want to tell you, and I don't want to talk about my life that much tonight, but there have been times that I've gone through those times, and there have been times that I've groaned.

Have you ever groaned?

There have been a few times in Africa and also here in the States when I would be burdened down with a problem.

And when we talk about burdened down, there's a heavy weight upon you.

And when we're burdened down that way, folks, it brings us to our knees before God.

And when we try to pray to God, words can't come out.

Tears can fill our eyes, but so many times there have been a few times in my life when I couldn't pray and the only thing I could do was just groan out to God.

Say, oh God, oh God.

And I would groan out to him.

We have a beautiful passage over in the book of Romans, chapter 8, verse 26.

And it says this, in the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness.

We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express.

I don't know for sure what all that means, but what I get out of that is that when we are so burdened down and we've grown out to God, that the Holy Spirit...

comes and intercedes with us and with God, and he even groans, but somehow he's able to take the groanings of our hearts, put them into words, and place them before God upon his throne.

So what that simply means is this.

Some of the greatest prayers that have ever been prayed, it's not in big, large cathedrals somewhere.

It's not in a big ceremony where a prayer has been written out before and it's read out.

But some of the greatest prayers that have ever been prayed is simply when God's people have been down on their knees groaning to God.

I don't know where you are right now in your journey of life.

Everything might be hunky-dory for you.

I don't know if you know that term.

That's a Kentucky term.

And it just simply means everything's okay.

Right now in my life, I don't have any real problems.

Everything's okay.

But you might be here tonight and you may be groaning.

You may be burdened down and you don't know what to do.

Let me just say how I've gotten through some of those times.

We have to realize that our journey of faith is a daily walk with God, a day in, day out walk with God.

We walk one day at a time.

And so if you get up some morning, in fact, we probably do this every morning.

We stand before the mirror and we say, God, I don't know what's going to happen to me today.

And Father, I don't know why I'm going through the things that I'm going through.

But Father, I want to tell you this.

I'm determined whatever comes my way today, I'm going to walk in faith with you.

And if we will do that, we will see that God will carry us through to the next day.

John 16, 33, I only quoted the first part of that verse where Jesus says, in this world, you will find trouble.

The last part of that verse, he said, take heart.

I have overcome the world.

So when we daily walk with God, just place our life in his hands, realize he's in control, God will carry us through.

God leads his dear children along.

Some through the water, some through the flood, some through the fire, but all through the blood, some through great sorrow, but God gives a song in the night seat and all the day long.

God will provide a way for us.

Well, when we look at this journey of faith, it's our journey home.

It's a journey of faith, but there's something else about this journey.

It's a journey where everything is new.

Folks, when we come and confess Christ as our Lord, everything changes in our life.

There's a passage in the book of Romans, chapter 1, and I know you've heard this many times.

I know Jeff has preached on it, but the scripture says, what shall we say then?

Shall we go on sinning that grace may increase?

And Paul says, by no means.

We died to sin.

How can we live in it any longer?

Or don't you know?

Now, notice here, he said, don't you know this?

He says, don't you know that we were all, when we were baptized into Christ, we were baptized into his death.

We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death.

In order that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we also will have new life.

So the scripture says, In Christ, we have new life.

And apparently there were some people that were kind of wanting to keep one foot in the kingdom of the world and one foot in the kingdom of God. They wanted to continue to sin the way they were always doing.

And they were saying, well, God is a God of mercy and grace, so therefore he will forgive us.

And Paul says, if you think that way, don't even begin to look at it that way.

He says, don't you know, down deep you know that you shouldn't live that way.

He says, when we were baptized into Christ, we were baptized into his death.

And we were buried with him and we were raised to new life.

He paints a beautiful picture here.

What he simply says is that Christ lived.

He died, he was buried, and he rose from the dead by the glory of the Father with new life.

We too died to sin.

We were buried and we resurrected unto a new life because of our commitment to Jesus Christ.

Paul said in 2 Corinthians 5, 17, If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature.

Old things have passed away.

Behold, all things are become new.

There's a passage also, he says, do not be conformed to this world, but be you transformed by the renewing of your mind.

Folks, I want to tell you, the walk with Christ is a mind thing.

It's a heart thing, but it's a mind thing.

You change your mind about sin.

You change your mind about the way of the world.

And one of the things that I've noticed sometime in my ministry, that you have some Christians that seem to have no joy in their Christian life.

I don't know if you say this here, but in Kentucky, we say if somebody's having a hard day, they'll say, what side of the bed did you get up on?

And sometimes you'll find Christians, they'll wake up in the morning, and they say, I have to live for Christ today.

I have to.

That's expected of me.

That's what people want me to do.

That's what I'm supposed to do.

Folks, if you have that kind of attitude, I encourage you to get back in bed, get on the other side of the bed, and when you get out of the bed, you put your feet on the ground and you say, This is the day the Lord has made, and I'm going to rejoice and be glad in it.

And you say, today, I don't have to live for Christ.

I get to.

That's about joy in the Lord.

And I'm going to do what the psalmist said in Psalm 100.

This is the day that the Lord has made, and I'm going to serve him with gladness, and I'm going to come into his presence with singing.

That's the attitude that we need to have with Christ.

There's a song we sing in Kentucky.

And by the way, if you're calling long distance in Kentucky, it's a local call.

You don't have to make a, that's not a local, that's not a long distance call.

But we sing sometimes, I'm resolved no longer to linger, charmed by the world's delight.

Things that are higher, things that are noble, these have allured my sight.

Jesus, greatest, highest, I come to you.

That's the way.

We need to look at living for Jesus.

Well, we also have new priorities.

Or let me say this.

We have a new direction in life.

I told you that my memory is not as good as it used to be.

But when we come to Christ, we have a new direction.

In 1 Thessalonians, the first chapter, the Apostle Paul wrote to that church, and he said, they tell us how you turn from idols to serve the true and living God and to wait for his Savior to come from heaven.

Folks, when we come to Christ, we change directions.

We're not serving an idol God in the world, but we're turning to the living God, and we're walking with him.

In fact, Paul said in Ephesians, you were dead in your trespasses and sins in which you used to live when you followed the ways of the world.

But God, who is rich in mercy, has made you alive unto Christ.

And he goes on to say you were dead in sin, but now you're alive unto Christ.

The Apostle Peter, one time, great passage in 2 Peter 3.

He said, there's going to come a time when the Lord comes back.

There's going to be a loud noise.

The earth and everything in it is going to be destroyed.

Everything's going to be laid bare.

And after he said that, then he asked the question, if things are going to happen in this way, what kind of people ought we to be?

That's a good question.

Now, the Apostle Peter didn't wait for us to say, well, I think we ought to do this and that.

The Apostle Peter said, I'll tell you what you need to do.

You need to live holy and godly lives.

You need to make every effort to be spotless and blameless and at peace with him when he comes.

That's the kind of people we need to be.

And also, Peter said these words, we need to live such good lives.

that though the people of the world, the pagans, live such good lives among the pagans, that though they may accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of his coming.

Here's what I want to say to you.

You remember when Jesus was on the earth in John 17, he had a long prayer to God, his father.

And he said, Father, I thank you for those people that you gave me out of the world.

He says, my followers are out of the world.

They've come out from sin.

They're still in the world, but they're not part of the world.

And a few moments ago, it said that the people of sight, their lives are fashioned and shaped by what they see.

This is what kind of people we need to be.

In fact, John says, if we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with the other, and the blood of Jesus Christ, his son, cleanses us from sin.

Here's what we need to do.

Today, we need to live such a good life.

When we go out to the world, the world will see our faith.

They'll see our love and our hope and our joy and our peace and our, all the things that make up our Christian life.

And it's our desire then that they will have the attitude that the Greeks had when they came to Philip, that they will come to us and just simply say, We want to see Jesus.

That's the kind of life we need to live to reach our family for Christ, to reach those that we love, to reach our workmates.

Well, also, we have a new priority.

Scripture says over in Colossians, when Christ, who is your life, appears, you will be like him.

Notice what it says, when Christ, who is your life.

Folks, when we give our life to Christ, he becomes our way.

We are to love him with all of our heart, soul, and mind, and love our neighbor as ourselves.

I like Proverbs 3.

Scripture says, Trust in the Lord with all of your heart.

Lean not on your own understanding, but in all of your ways acknowledge him, and he'll make your path straight.

Trust in the Lord with all of your heart.

The word heart here in the Eastern world means the center of intellect.

It means your emotion.

It means who you really are.

When you're all by yourself, your heart is really who you are.

That's who you are.

And the writer says to trust the Lord your God with all of who you are.

And it said that all of your ways acknowledge him.

In other words, the way you live your life, you acknowledge God.

Now, the word acknowledge in our English language means that we just kind of recognize someone.

If we're in a meeting somewhere, someone will say, by the way, we have so-and-so here and we recognize them and they stand up.

Sometimes you'll have a ball player, maybe they make a touchdown and after he's made the touchdown, he'll kind of point up to heaven.

Knowledge.

And by the way, I don't think the Lord is that concerned about the Super Bowl.

There are much greater things that we need to be concerned about.

But the word acknowledge in the Hebrew language is the word yadah.

And it's a much deeper meaning.

The word yadah means that, yeah, we can recognize someone, but it goes so much deeper.

It means that we revere them.

We worship them.

We praise them.

It kind of carries out the notion that when I acknowledge my God, that I kind of lay out my life and my hands are out before him and I say, God, I acknowledge you.

You are the Lord of my life.

And so we acknowledge him.

He's our priority in life.

I heard a story back some time ago of a man who wanted to be rich.

Above everything else, he wanted to be rich.

And so the story goes that he was given one wish, whatever that would be, that it would be granted to him.

So this man's wish was simply this.

I want to get the financial section of the Wall Street Journal a year in advance, all the time, a year in advance.

And his reasoning behind that was simply this.

If I can see the Wall Street Journal, the financial page, I can see what the markets are going to do.

I can see what everything's going to work a year in advance, and I will know where to invest my money.

And so that's what happened.

He was granted that wish.

And after a couple of years, he was a wealthy man.

In fact, everybody was coming to him.

How are you doing what you're doing?

And he was pretty proud of himself.

Every day he'd look at the Wall Street Journal.

Then one day he was looking at the Wall Street Journal.

And by this time he became wealthy.

But he read it and then down at the bottom of the Wall Street Journal on that page one day was the list of obituaries.

And he thought, well, I'll look and see who's died.

And he looked and he knew a couple of those people because they kind of were chums together.

And all of a sudden, he saw his name.

He knew within a year he was going to die.

And folks, he also knew the words of Jesus came through.

What is it profit a man if he gave the whole world and loses his own soul?

He had the wrong priority in life.

And so I would say to all of us here this evening, Make sure that your earthly priorities yield eternal values.

Make sure God is first.

Well, I'm going to close.

I've got one other thing I want to say.

And I know there's another preacher somewhere around here.

When he gets to a certain point, he said, now, you ought to have been so gracious.

You've been listening to me and said, you know, I've got one more thing to say.

But what I want to ask you, are you with me?

And this preacher said, you know, I've got to look at the clock.

I've got three more minutes.

And I knew Jeff never could tell time because he always goes over three more minutes.

But the last thing, it is important.

And Jeff does such a great job of bringing everything together right at the end.

And so I want to bring this together with you tonight.

the journey home is a journey of endurance.

We talked about the people in Hebrews chapter 11, what they went through.

But in Hebrews chapter 11, I think it's verse 13, that scripture talks about the people who had died and the verse says, and all of these people were still living in faith when they died.

Think about that.

They were still living in faith when they died.

Folks, if the Lord tarries all of us in this building tonight, we're going to die.

And there'll be some sort of celebration for us.

And the preacher will say a few things.

It's been my privilege to have a lot of funerals or to be asked to speak in funerals.

And I always talk to the family.

before I have a funeral, just say, what do you want me to say about your loved one?

And I remember there was one guy by the name of John, and I said, what do you want me to say about John?

And when I asked the family, they just sat there and looked at me like, I don't know what to say.

And one of them all of a sudden says, well, he liked to play softball.

And another one said, yeah, especially on third base.

And so when I had John's funeral, I said, well, I don't know what to say about John.

While I was talking, I said, well, one thing we know about John, he loved to play softball, especially on third base.

And some of the people there, they said, yeah, that's right.

Had another service for a man, and I said to the family, I said, what do you want me to say about Bill? They said, well, he loved to eat.

Said when he was eating breakfast, he was thinking about dinner.

When he was eating dinner, he was thinking about supper.

And so when I headed to his funeral, I said, one thing for sure about Bill, he loved to eat.

And they said, that's right.

The Apostle Paul, one of the great servants of the Lord, he went through so much in his life.

We don't have time to talk about it.

Went through so much.

But when he came to the end of his life, he says, the time of my departure is at hand.

He said, I fought a good fight and I finished the course and I've kept the faith.

Henceforth, there's laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge will give me at that day, not to me only, but to all who love his appearing.

Paul was faithful to the very end.

But when he came to the end of his life, he says, the time of my departure has come.

And this word departure.

It's an interesting word in the Greek.

It means to loosen, to loosen up something.

And by the way, it has reference a lot of times in that day and age to soldiers out on maneuvers or maybe fighting a battle.

They've got their tents all set.

And the word comes out, we're going to move to another place.

We're going to depart.

And the soldiers would unloosen the rope on their tents.

Take the tent pegs out and they would move.

Does that make sense to you?

And Paul says, this tent that we live in, if it's destroyed.

Paul was simply saying this.

He says, I've come to the place in my life where the tent pegs of my life, they're going to be loosened and I'm going to a better place.

Folks, I know as I stand before you tonight.

because of my age, I'm getting to the end of my journey in life.

And when I get to the end, I think about it a lot of times.

I think of the passage of Scripture that says that the eyes have not seen, the ears have not heard, neither has been conceived in the mind of man what God has prepared for those who love him.

And I think about that a lot.

I don't know how much longer.

My journey will be on this earth.

I know one thing.

It's not going to be as long as it has been.

There's going to come a time, I think, in the very near future or close.

I don't know how much longer I've got.

But there's going to be a time when I'm going to loosen or the ropes of my tent are going to be loosened.

And I'm going to be moving.

And my journey.

will bring me to the valley of the shadow of death.

And folks, when I get to that valley, I'm not going to fear because the shepherd that has walked along with me for so many years is going to walk with me through the valley.

His rod and his staff, they'll comfort me.

And I'm not going to tarry in that valley.

I'm going to walk all the way through.

And when I get to the other side, my faith will become sight.

Because I can see that home that I've longed for.

And then I will hear my Lord say, well done, good and faithful servant.

And when I hear that, I know my journey is over.

My faith has brought me home.

And surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life.

And I'll dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

What a day that will be.

When our Jesus we shall see.

When look upon his face, the one who saved us by his grace.

One last thing and then I'll close.

The Apostle Paul said, I've fought a good fight and I'm going to have a crown awaiting me.

But it's not just for me, but it's for all those who love his appearing.

I don't know where you are tonight in your walk with God.

I wish I had time to fellowship with so many.

If you've never yielded your life to Christ and got on the journey that leads home, I beseech you tonight, don't leave without making a decision.

Maybe you've been on this journey and you've kind of wandered away.

The old song says, I've wandered far away from God.

Now I'm coming home.

Maybe you need to do that tonight.

Rededicate your life.

You may be here and you may be groaning.

You may need someone to pray for you.

And I know we have prayer partners that can do that.

And folk, we may be here tonight and everything is hunky-dory.

We may just want to come and just say, I just want to praise the Lord.

where he's such a great God to me.

Whatever your decision, I encourage you to do that tonight.

Let's pray.

Father in heaven, thank you so much for being such a loving God.

And Father, we pray tonight that you would help us to walk with you in all that we do.

Help us to trust you with our lives, acknowledge you in all ways, and I pray for decisions tonight.

In Jesus'name I pray.

Amen.

Thank you.

What a powerful message.

We are so thankful for Charlie Delaney to come in this week and speak to us.

He has been such a huge influence, not only in Pastor Jeff's life, but for the church as a whole.

If you really want to find out what this faith journey really looks like, I want to encourage you to click the link below.

And there we're just going to help you find the right steps for you to follow Jesus.

Well, I hope you have a blessed day and a blessed week.

We'll end as we always do with one hope, one life in Christ.