Jeff Durbin | Dreamers Vs Workers

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Proverbs chapter 14, Proverbs 14 in verse 23.

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We have to go a little faster today because we have a special time of fellowship afterwards together, but I would love, absolutely love to just talk through a series of lessons on this particular principle.

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And it's amazing because as you get there, as I said a moment ago, this is such a simple, easy to understand principle.

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But if we're honest, there are a few things that keep us from actually pursuing this as a core principle of our lives in terms of building wealth or profit in any area of life, not just money, relationship, business, skills, whatever the case may be.

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This is truly an important proverb. So wisdom from above, amen, this is from God.

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God is telling us, here's how to have skill in living. This is how you live. It's not just filling your head with knowledge.

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The whole purpose of this series is so we stop being knowledgeable fools, people who know a lot of things about God.

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We can articulate the truths of the gospel, but we don't know how to live. And this one in particular,

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I love. Proverbs 14, 23, hear now the word of the living and the true

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God. In all toil there is profit, but mere talk tends only to poverty.

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Thus far as the reading of God's holy and inspired word, let's pray. Lord, bless today. Lord, bless the proclamation of your word, your truth to your people.

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I pray that you would allow this word from you, this wisdom from you to transform us as a people in every area of our lives,

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God. This is such a beautiful truth and such an inspiring truth, such an encouraging truth, but Lord, we all need work here.

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So I just pray that you'd bless us, God. Help us to understand this truth and actually bury it deep within us and get that profit that you promise.

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In Jesus' name, amen. Again, in all toil there is profit, but mere talk tends only to poverty.

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Simple, easy, right? Doesn't take long to digest the meaning of this principle, but it does take a lot for it to kick us in the teeth or in the behind so I actually get moving and grow in whatever area we need profit, in whatever area we're poor in.

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It could deal with personal relationships, it could deal with business, dreams and hopes and goals, skills, our marriages, building wealth for our children, for our grandchildren, whatever the case may be, this particular principle is easy to digest.

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Got it, understand. If you want profit, if you wanna gain, you have to work for it.

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If it's all talk, then it leads to poverty. You could spin this a number of different ways.

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I mean, there are highly successful, unbelieving secularists, real estate moguls, day traders, stock traders, you know, people who are wealthy, they build, they're successful.

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They could spin it a lot of different way. They could say, stop talking trash and get to work. You talk a lot of trash, but there's no actual work, right?

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You talk a big game, but I don't see anything, that sort of thing, right? That's essentially what this proverb is.

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It's amazing, as successful as these guys are, and at the New York Times bestseller books of like entrepreneurship or growth or success or whatever, they're just copying off of God.

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God said it first. He said it a long time ago first. In all toil, there is profit, but mere talk tends only to poverty.

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Is that you? So here's what I want you to do right now. Okay, simpler, quicker message today because of our fellowship, but I want you to do something.

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If you have a pen and paper, get ready to write something down with me. And if you don't, if you have a phone, maybe take some notes in your phone or whatever you have to do.

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Send yourself a message, whatever. Okay, so in thinking about this beyond the principle,

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I want it to hit us all square in the face. I want this to be a benefit to us as a church where we actually transform because of the wisdom.

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That's the goal of this series, not just to do a series, get through it, but we become a wise people. We actually grow, we thrive.

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There are some promises in Proverbs that actually make a lot of reformed people uncomfortable in terms of wealth and stuff and treasure.

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And it's like, we don't wanna go the way of like a Benny Hinn or a Kenneth Copeland. And so we actually ignore the passages that promise like a lot in terms of like wealth and things like that.

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We can't do that, it's God's word. So let's let it impact us. So take out your phone or write this down. I want you to write down, if you would, two or three goals or dreams or hopes that you have or have had for a very long time.

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Could have to do with a number of different things. Money, could have to do with a business, a dream you've always had.

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I'd rather be doing this. This is my passion. This is my passion. As long as I can remember, my passion has been this.

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This is what I want for my life. This is what I wanna pursue. I don't wanna feel like I'm working for the rest of my life. I wanna feel like I'm not working because this is my passion.

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This is what I love. This is what I've always wanted for myself. This is my dream. Write down a dream that you have, a concept you have, an idea that you have.

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You've had it, you know this would bless the world. It would bless other people, it would bless ministry. Whatever the case may be, it could be a number of different things.

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You could think about it in terms of like within the church, the walls of the church, or outside, work that's still glorifying to God as glorifying to God.

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Or maybe it's a hope or dream or goal that you have in terms of a relationship, maybe with your wife, your husband, your children, or maybe it's that desire to have a spouse.

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Maybe that's the dream, maybe that's the goal. Write that down. Now, think deeply about it. Maybe it's something that's been gnawing at you for the longest time.

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Maybe you're getting a little later in years and you feel like you've always been missing something as a believer.

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You're passionate about something. You've always wanted to do this thing. It's always been your hope. It's always been your dream and it eats you alive.

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Sometimes you wake up in the middle of the night and you're thinking about it. This is what I really ought to be doing. I feel like this is kind of my calling, my gifting, and this is what

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I should be doing. Write that down, write it down. Now, again, this is so obvious to me, it's an old toil.

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There is profit, but mere talk tends only to poverty. Dreamers versus workers.

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That's the key issue here, the dreamer versus the worker. The person who's constantly dreaming, what if, and I could, and I wish, and this is what

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I could do. It's there, the structure's there in their mind. They have the whole thing planned out. They've had it planned out for a decade, but there's nothing in front of them, so they figure, well, it's not appearing, so maybe

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I'm not supposed to do it. Well, I don't think that's actually the case. The plans are here within us.

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We hope, we dream, we desire, we've got the passion for this thing. We feel like God's calling us to this, and so oftentimes, we're so trusting in the sovereignty of God that it just kind of hangs there between our ears, or it's just within us, it's in our spirit, and we're thinking, well,

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God hasn't just dropped this out of the sky yet, and so I guess maybe that's not God's will for my life. That's not how the

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Bible works with God's sovereignty. God actually is sovereignly in control over, and decrees the ends as well as the what?

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The means. That in -between part is us. That's us. It's our responsibility. We're walking in time and in space.

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God, of course, is eternal and timeless. He's got a decree. We don't know what it is in every case. We know what he's told us his decree is.

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We know what the end of history is, by the way, or what God has done in Christ, but there are certain things in terms of the decree of God we don't know, we can't get access to, and so we walk by faith, and so we trust

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God, but we have to look inside and say, well, like, what is it? How come this thing I feel like I'm called to,

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I want to do, this business I wanna build, this dream I have, how come it hasn't come into fruition?

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And I think, if we're honest, it's the first part of this principle. That's the truth.

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It's the first part of the principle. In all toil, there is profit. You wanna get the wealth?

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You wanna get the gain? You wanna actually have the thing in front of you, hold on to it? Well, you have to work for it, you have to toil, you have to labor, that's how you actually get it.

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If you're just a big talker, if you're just a dreamer, then it's just poverty.

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You find yourself empty -handed, and that's the principle. Simple enough, we're done today, let's pray. No, that's, right?

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It seems easy enough, we can digest it, but what's the problem? First, before we get to in terms of like, well, what does the

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Proverbs say is the problem? How come it doesn't come into fruition? What does Scripture say? I wanna actually lay down at least two principles, two things to talk about, two things to think about.

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How come we should be thinking about this in a different way? I'll start with a sort of banner over this.

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One of the things that we have to overcome is, well, there's a lot of things we have to overcome, but in terms of thinking about out there, building something, doing a business, whatever the case may be, we have this very strange view within the

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Western church today. You've got like a secular -sacred divide. So you've got the sacred over here, right now in church, we're doing the sacred.

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This is the sacred, hallelujah, amen. This is the holy stuff. This is the God -pleasing stuff.

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This is the worship stuff. This is the stuff that has to do with Jesus specifically. It's the sacred versus the secular.

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And right now, people walk in, they go, well, now we're doing our duty, Sunday, it's the Lord's day, we're gonna do the sacred today, and I'm gonna go to bed tonight, and then tomorrow morning, and I'm gonna dabble in some of that secular stuff, and sort of just go through the mundane secular stuff that really is not as meaningful to God and the world as this.

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That sacred -secular divide is antithetical to what the Bible says about work, about your calling, your vocation.

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We need to see the world and what we do in it, our gifts, our calling, our work, our labor, our businesses.

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We need to see it the way the Bible talks about it. It is whatever you do, in word or in deed, do all what?

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To the glory of God. That means that you need to be a basketball star and play basketball better than anybody for the glory of God.

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That is worship. Do you see it that way? Do you see that kind of work as worship?

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You ought to. The Bible sees it as that. Do you see, when you're going to work tomorrow at your, quote, secular job, do you see it as worship?

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Maybe that's why it's so awful. Maybe that's why you feel, at the end of the day, just so depleted and not satisfied, is you're not seeing your work as something that is worship.

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Work is worship. What I do with my hands, what I do with my life and my calling is worship, and it is as valuable as everything you're doing right now in the, quote, unquote, sacred.

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All of life is worship. Do you agree with that? Yes? Now we can understand.

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There's a banner over it all. All of life is worship. Every detail, every bit of labor, every calling, every vocation, it is worship or it is not.

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So we need to get away from the sacred versus secular divide that is not a biblical perspective.

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All of life is worship, and get this, all of life is sacred, every bit of it.

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And so all of life is worship, so we need to think in terms of, okay, if I'm making plans, if I'm plotting a future, if I'm dreaming a dream, if I'm setting a goal,

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I need to have something underneath me. And the first thing I think we need to think about as believers, as we're looking forward and we're dreaming and we're saying, all right,

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Lord, I'll put this before you and I'm gonna toil for it so there's profit. We need to think about the character of God and what is

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God like? What is God like? So have this underneath you when you think about this verse. What is

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God like? The Bible opens telling us what our God is like. And he creates us in his image to mirror him into the world, to let the world see what

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God is like, the perfect image of God. He makes his creatures like him and says, now you shine that forth into the world, so you imitate me, you be like me.

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So in the beginning of the story in Genesis, we see God as somebody who works, he labors.

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And we know the formula, right? The formula is six days of work and a seventh day for what?

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So that's what he builds at the beginning of creation. He shows us what he's like and what God is like is a worker.

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God is not lazy, God is busy. And so God works and so he creates you as his image bearer.

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And that's why laziness, being a sluggard, is such a terrible sin. Why? Because you're sitting around doing nothing.

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That's not what God is like. God is busy, God works. And so we lay that underneath us to think about, okay, in toil, it's worship, there's gonna be a profit.

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Now, how do I turn this into something as an understanding of obedience? Well, the obedience part is

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I wanna be like God. What is God not? God is not lazy, God works.

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But beyond that, in the beginning of the creation story, in terms of God is creating something amazing, he's laboring, he's working, what else is there?

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What do you see? A couple of things at least. You see that when God is, in the beginning of the story, working, he is creative.

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That part's obvious, right? He's creative because he's creating. In the beginning, God spoke and everything leaps into existence.

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God is creative. He's making things. He's not being lazy, but he's also innovative, right?

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So he's creative, but he's innovative. He's making all new things and creative things and amazing things.

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But God is also good at what he's doing. So when he finishes creating, what does he say?

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He says, it is what? Good. So God, we know, works, God is creative,

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God is innovative, and God is good at what God does. And so God says, you're my image bearer, so here's your vocation, be like me.

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Be like me in your life, in your vocation, in your calling, in your pursuits.

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You work, you be creative, you be innovative, you be good at what you do.

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Christians ought to be good at what they do, but that gets back to toil. So there's profit, so we actually are good at what we do.

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Now, I wanna just put this also underneath you as you think about the toil and the profit and the mere talk and the poverty.

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We were there a year and a half, two years ago, as you finished Matthew up. I just wanna make sure you have a place in your heart and your life where you know where to go.

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And I believe this needs to be within us because it's something that has convicted me and challenged me many times over the years.

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It's what Jesus says in Matthew chapter 24, go there, or 25,

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Matthew 25, very convicting word from the

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Lord Jesus here. Matthew 25, starting in verse 14.

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This is the famous parable of the talents, parable of the talents. Now, I don't have time to go through the whole sermon.

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Again, I'm not gonna do that. I'm resisting all the temptation to do so. I just wanna mostly read this to us so we understand the consequence, right?

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We know the character of God. We know what he calls us to. We know what the principle is, toil, profit, trash talk, poverty, all talk, poverty, all dreams, poverty.

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We know what God is like, but we also have to understand there is a consequence to be handed a bag of gold by God and doing nothing about it.

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All right, so there's, ready? In this, the principle, toil, profit, all talk, poverty.

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There's also a moral consequence. When we think about all the things that God has given to you as a gift, all the passions and all the dreams that you have, the hopes that you have, the desires you have.

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I'm gonna serve God in this way. I'm gonna build this thing for the glory of God and my family and set up a thing for generations.

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Whatever it may be, there's a bag of gold. Every glorious thing that's been erected in the world, buildings, businesses, ministries, started as an idea.

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Started as just a seed in somebody's mind. There was that little token, that little piece of gold.

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There it was. And it just got invested and circulated and grown. Here it is, Proverbs, sorry,

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Matthew 25, 14. For it will be like a man going on a journey who called his servants and entrusted to them his property.

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To one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability.

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Then he went away. He would receive the five talents, went at once and traded with them and he made five talents more.

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So also he who had the two talents made two talents more, but he who had received the one talent went and dug in the ground and hid his master's money.

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Now after a long time, the master of those servants came and settled accounts with them. And he who had received the five talents came forward bringing five talents more saying, master, you delivered to me five talents here.

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I have made five talents more. His master said to him, well done, good and faithful servant.

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You've been faithful over a little. I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.

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And he also who had the two talents came forward saying, master, you delivered to me two talents. Here I have made two talents more.

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His master said to him, well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little. I will set you over much.

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Enter into the joy of your master. He also who had received the one talent came forward saying, master,

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I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not sow and gathering where you scattered no seed.

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So I was afraid. Mark that down. Mark that down. So I was afraid.

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So I was afraid. And I went and hid your talent in the ground.

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Here, you have what's yours. But his master answered him, you wicked and slothful servant.

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What's that mean, slothful? What's that mean? Lazy. You wicked. There's a moral component to this.

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There's an obligation before God. I gave you something. I expected a return off of what

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I gave you. And the response to the guy who buries it, right? Here's the gift. Here's the bag of gold.

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Here's the talent I gave you. Here's the gold. The guy says, I'm afraid. So I'm driven by fear here.

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And so what I'll do is nothing. Because I'm afraid. And so I'm not gonna do anything.

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And so he buries it and says, well, at least you've got back the thing that you presented to me. And the answer is you wicked, you evil and lazy servants.

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He says, you knew that I reap where I have not sown and gather where I scattered no seed.

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Then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers. And at my coming, I should have received what was my own with interest.

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So take the talent from him and give it to him who has the 10 talents. For to everyone who has will more be given and he will have an abundance.

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But from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away and cast the worthless servant into the outer darkness.

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In that place, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Well, there you go. It's not all ponies and rainbows here in Matthew 25, right?

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I mean, this is a moral component. God says this, here I am the master, you're the servants and I'm gonna give gold.

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I'm gonna give bags of gold. I'm gonna give a pot of gold to each person according to what their ability is.

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And if you bring a return on what my investment is in you, if you bring a return, I will, because you're faithful over a little, give you even more.

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I'm gonna give you even more to govern, to manage, to do. I'll give you more because you can be trusted.

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If you are given this thing by God, you return it to God as an investment that doubles in size.

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And the wicked and lazy servant is so afraid and so lazy, they bury it and there's a moral failure there.

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God's saying, I will confront that. I'm gonna confront the one that I've given this gold to and there's no return.

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Well, Lord, you don't understand. I was afraid, I was so afraid. It was more comfortable staying where I was.

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It was comfortable staying in that job that I hated. It was comfortable staying in that vocation that I hated.

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It was safe there and just much easier. You see, that's not an answer that God's gonna accept, obviously.

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There's a moral component here. We're to be like God and God says, if I give you gold, I expect a return and I wanna bless you.

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So there's the blessing initially, but then there's more blessing to come if you're faithful over the little. So as you think about toil and profit and just mere talk that leads to poverty, just think about the character of God.

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Think about all of life is worship and think about the parable of the talents God requires of us to get a return on his investments in us.

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And so again, think about it. What are your hopes? What are your dreams? What do you plan for?

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What have you been dreaming of for five years or 10 years or 20 years or 30 years?

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Just been there and it wakes you up at night thinking about it. I wish that I would actually finally just do this.

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This is what I feel God's made me for. This is what I'm passionate about. If I could do this thing, I would just feel like I'm worshiping

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God every moment of every day. What is it? Now, I think there's a couple of things because the principle is easy enough to understand, right?

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There's toil, profit. If you labor, there's profit. You're gonna gain something. And if it's all mere talk, if it's just trash talk, it's just ending in poverty.

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I think there's a couple of things you see in the book of Proverbs that indicate exactly the problem. You saw it in Jesus in the parable.

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He calls him lazy and wicked and the guy was clearly driven by fear.

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Well, laziness, I think is probably the primary culprit behind us not toiling with profit.

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So, just a couple of things. You've already seen some of these before. Go to Proverbs 13, four. Proverbs 13, four.

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Text says, the soul of the sluggard craves and gets nothing while the soul of the diligent is richly supplied.

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Don't you love the book of Proverbs? It's saying the same thing with a different spin and it hits you a different way.

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It adds more weight and more layers to the same principle. But actually here, it gives you a little bit of a taste of what's actually going on inside of the lazy person.

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It says, the soul of the lazy, the soul of the sluggard craves and gets nothing.

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Is that my problem? Is that your problem? Is that we're all about dreaming and thinking and wishing and hoping.

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And the problem is, is we never actually step forward to labor and plod and plant and start to work.

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We dream, we crave it, it's within us, but we're so lazy, we do nothing to actually see it come to fruition.

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There's the proverb there. So what's one of the primary things that gets in the way of us profiting or gaining?

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Well, one of the most important things is to overcome laziness in our lives. Next, Proverbs 6.

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Proverbs 6, six through 11. This is one of my favorite sermons

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I got to preach actually. I don't know why, just I loved it. Verse six of chapter six. Go to the aunt,

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O sluggard, consider her ways and be wise. Without having any chief officer or ruler, she prepares her bread in the summer and gathers her food and harvest.

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How long will you lie there, O sluggard? When will you rise from your sleep?

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A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest and poverty will come upon you like a robber and want like an armed man.

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Obvious enough. Look, big human being, if you don't understand what I'm saying, stop being lazy and pay attention to that little aunt.

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Look at what they gain, look at how they work. They are planning, plotting, they are working and God's dissing the person that's like,

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I just wanna rest a little bit. Can we just stop and rest for a bit? Can, you know, I've worked really hard. I wanna just rest a little bit and fold the hands and just take a breath.

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And they're doing that a lot. Like every day is, can we just take a rest? Can we just take a break? And God is indicting that as a problem.

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That's laziness, being a sluggard only ends in poverty. Proverbs 24, you have to forgive me everyone for going so fast today.

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I wanna do my best to do a shorter sermon. Proverbs 24, starting in verse 30.

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I passed by the field of a sluggard, by the vineyard of a man lacking sense. And behold, it was all overgrown with thorns.

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The ground was covered with nettles and its stone wall was broken down. Then I saw and considered it. I looked and received instruction.

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A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest and poverty will come upon you like a robber and want like an armed man.

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Again, Proverbs 21, 25.

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Finally, what causes us to stop working for our dreams, our hopes, our goals? How come we don't get the profit that we hope for?

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The desire of the sluggard kills him for his hands refuse to labor.

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There it is. Seeing the theme? Like the scriptures are identifying it. Here's the principle, here's the promise.

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Principle and the promise. Toil, profit, mere talk, poverty. And now we see the indications from God and here's what is the problem behind no profit.

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This is why there is no gain in our lives. Simple enough, simple enough.

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Scripture's clear. That's the problem. Our laziness will stop us from the gain.

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And so next I believe is fear. You saw it in the worthless servant, in the one who was lazy and wicked.

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There was that component of fear in Proverbs 26. Proverbs 26, verse 13.

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I love this one. The sluggard says, there's a lion in the road. There's a lion in the streets.

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There's a lion in the road. There's a lion in the streets. What does that mean? The lazy person is driven by fear of what may happen, what could be the consequences.

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And in this case, it's kind of cartoonish. By the way, the people that say things like you should never smile or joke as a

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Christian, or I even saw someone recently that said like, if somebody is telling a joke in a sermon, now we have to be careful how we do that,

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I understand. But if someone's telling a joke in a sermon, they're sinning against God. It's like, we're gonna have a real problem with that because as you're reading the

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Bible, it's telling jokes. God has a sense of humor. And this is the part that's supposed to laugh.

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It's kind of cartoonish. You've got the lazy person, they're doing nothing, and their excuse is there's a lion in the road.

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Sorry, I can't do any work today because there's danger out there. That's the problem.

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And there's more. It says, as a door turns on its hinges, so does a sluggard on his bed. Just constantly back and forth.

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That's your pattern of life. You don't do anything. You don't accomplish anything. You're just rolling over back and forth.

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And when someone says, why don't you get up and do something? The answer is, I just wanna rest a little bit longer.

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I wanna take a little bit more of a break and think things through. I wanna do a little more dreaming, right? And the problem is, there's a lot of danger out there.

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If I do what I feel like I'm called to do, there's a lot of risk involved, a lot of consequences. I may face some difficulties.

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I might have two years of a lot of pain trying to build this business that I hope for and I dream for.

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And so that's just a lot of danger. It's kind of like a lion in the street. Then it goes on.

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After flipping over and over and over like a door on the hinges, it says in verse 15, the sluggard buries his hand in the dish and wears them out to bring it to his mouth.

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Sorry, I just had to finish that. We're talking about the fear component here. But it's a person, I just love that it is cartoonish.

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It's a person that goes, like they're really hungry. They need to eat. Like they're starving. They haven't eaten for days maybe, right?

33:16

And they're just like, oh, oh, I can't get my hand in my mouth. Like there's, he just buries the hand in the dish and it's supposed to make the person look stupid, right?

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Just pick up your hand, you lazy bum and put the hand to the mouth. They just can't get all the way.

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It's like, oh, I work too hard. I can't, I've already expended enough energy. That's as far as I'm going, right?

33:38

Like that's the extent of the sluggard's work is his work ethic is like, I'll at least get halfway and like act like I accomplished something.

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I can't get it to my mouth. Well, that's more on the laziness portion, but we can at least see from scripture that there is something that drives the sluggard and it is fear.

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We saw it in the parable. He was driven by fear and God calls him a lazy and worthless servant.

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So fear is probably a component of why am I stopping? Why don't

34:10

I pursue this? Now watch, they can actually go beyond the lion in the street.

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That's supposed to be cartoonish for a reason. It's supposed to wake you up. It's supposed to startle you. But sometimes it may not be a lion in the streets.

34:23

Not that cartoonish. It's not that kind of danger. What can stop us from actually laboring for a profit, plotting and working for the profit and not just being trash talkers and hopeful dreamers.

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So maybe one day, hopefully someday, back to the drawing board. What can stop us is the fear of danger.

34:46

Like, well, my job now is super comfortable. Like I make a promised amount of money, not doing what

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I feel like I'm called to do. I'm super good at something else. I can glorify God in a big way if I could just do this thing.

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But you know, this job is safe. The danger out on the other side of this is if I actually pursue what

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I think God is calling me to do if I actually use the gift that God has given to me and I don't just squander it and bury it in the ground but actually allow it to produce a major return for God.

35:21

Like if I actually do that, there's a danger of now I'm not safe. Like at least my employer guarantees me a paycheck every

35:28

Friday or every two weeks. So there's safety there. I really like the safety. Is it a lot of money? No.

35:34

Is it like good for my long -term future as a husband, as a father? Is it great for like the future of my family?

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No, but you know what? It isn't. It isn't dangerous. Like at least my job that I kind of secretly hate is safe.

35:53

It's safe. There's no danger there. I know for sure, unless Biden's elected, that job's gonna be there.

36:04

Well, sorry, Kamala, sorry. It's safe, at least reasonably safe.

36:15

So we don't have to say like there's an actual physical danger, but there is a danger to my comfort. There's a danger to maybe the safety and security that I'm just so accustomed to knowing that that direct deposit's gonna hit on Friday.

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And at least I know this job is safe. Do I wanna do this forever? No. Has God given me an incredible gift?

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Yes. Do I have an amazing dream and calling and vocation I want to do?

36:41

Yes, but at least this is safe. Next, we don't toil for the profit because,

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Proverbs says in chapter 20, verse four, the slugger does not plow in the autumn.

37:01

He will seek at harvest and have nothing. Easy to understand, simple enough.

37:07

How come we're not toiling for profit? How come it's all talk with no gain? How come we have all talk and leads to poverty?

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The answer is we do not plan. We're not thinking ahead. We're not planning ahead.

37:19

So there's nothing to toil for because we have no idea where we're going. We've got the dream, we've got the goal, we've got the hope, we've got the calling, but we actually put nothing down to say, and now here's my toil on Monday to get to that goal, to get that calling, to get to that vocation, to get to using that gift and giving

37:36

God an amazing return to that worshipful life I wanna have, doing a vocation God's called me to.

37:43

The problem is we don't plan, which is why at the beginning of this, I wanted you to write that down. I wanted you to write it down.

37:50

Not just have it sort of out there somewhere suspended on nothing, but what is it?

37:56

What is it? You may have even gone to school for this thing. You're passionate about it. You love it. You've got an amazing skill in this area, but you're not actually doing it.

38:07

Maybe it's because you're lazy. Maybe it's because you're fearful. Maybe it's because you're both. Or maybe it's because you've never actually sat down before God and say,

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I'm gonna give you glory God in doing this. Here's the goal, here's the dream, and on Monday, this is the plan.

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Here's how I start this dream and goal. Here's the toil that turns into profit, where it's not just talk.

38:27

It's not just a big game. It's actual planning. The slugger doesn't plan.

38:34

And so when that time gets right in front of him that he needed a plan for, now he has no return.

38:40

There was no planning involved. And the last thing, and we could spend a lot on this, is confidence and trust in God, amen?

38:48

I'll just say this very simply for today. We can go through a number of verses. Pick your favorite. Pick your favorite in terms of trust in our

38:55

God and the kind of God that he is, the kind of faithful father that he is. What kind of faithful God is he?

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What's he like as a father? Jesus makes a point. If you're earthly fathers, are they like this, where you ask him for bread, they give you a stone?

39:11

Kind of a thing. Is that the kind of father you think you have in heaven? Do you have enough confidence in your father in heaven that he loves you, that you're his child?

39:18

And that he actually says, I love to give these bags of gold. I'm giving it to you, and I wanna see a return.

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I want to see you do something with this gift, this gold, this thing that I've given to you.

39:29

I want you to not bury it and do nothing with it because you're afraid or you're lazy.

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I want you to take risks. I want you to increase it. I want you to do something to my glory with that bag of gold that I've given to you.

39:45

So brothers and sisters, listen, we have permission to dream big and glorify

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God with our hands, with our minds, with what we create, what we build. You're like, does

39:55

God really want me to do that, to be that kind of person that creates and builds and does all these things? Well, I don't know.

40:01

That's kind of what he's like. I mean, he's like that. Amen? Next, the challenge.

40:09

The principle's easy enough, right? In all toil, there's profit. In mere talk, there is only poverty.

40:15

Let's think about it in a number of categories. How about this? Here's the challenge. Building a business.

40:23

So I want you to be thinking through this with me as I'm talking to you as your pastor. Very practical message today, right? Very practical.

40:29

Challenging you at your heart and mind level, okay? Is it building a business that you've dreamed of? It's what you wanted to do.

40:34

You've always had this plan. I can do this thing. I don't know what it is. What is it? I don't know. Coffee shop? Like Starbucks coffee now stinks.

40:40

Remember like back, like 1996, Starbucks coffee was the bomb. Wasn't it awesome?

40:46

Like they had to have like skills at Starbucks. I mean, that's, it was like an amazing thing. Like, and it was also shocking.

40:52

They're charging $1 .75 for a cup of coffee. Are they out of their minds? And then you would drink it and go, okay,

40:57

I get it. It's amazing. This coffee has like 10 different layers of flavor to it.

41:02

You had to work there. You had to have skills as a barista. You had to know how to dial in the espresso. You had to like, you know, like know like the humidity in the air that day and all kinds of weird other things.

41:13

And now it's just all just, you know, automated. And it's just, and monkey can walk to the machine and it just knocks out the really bad, highly sugared coffee, right?

41:23

It's terrible. So someone says, okay, I want to start a coffee shop that gets back to like, it's an art form and it's amazing.

41:31

And someone drinks it and goes, oh, praise God. Like I want atheists to praise Jesus when they drink my coffee, right?

41:40

That's, you know what I'm saying? Like it's a worshipful experience. Like I believe in God now. That espresso.

41:48

Maybe it could bring, yeah, that's right, Hebrews. Don't you love it when Christians do start coffee shops? It's so corny. It's like Hebrews.

41:55

That's the name of my coffee shop. It's like, can you do anything less obvious? Like, okay, but think about it.

42:02

You've got all these dreams. Like I can build a business. I make amazing stuff. You might have like a wife who makes the most amazing, amazing sourdough.

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She's passionate about it. She loves it. It's like everyone is like worshiping God, giving it to him at the altar. It's amazing.

42:16

And you're like, you know what? There's not a lot of in this town, a lot of places that make them. It's like amazing bakeries, you know, old school, amazing artisan bakeries kind of thing.

42:23

We'd always love to do such a thing. And it's just like, wouldn't that be great? We love that at night. We talk about it a lot. We dream about it.

42:28

And then there's nothing. Why? No toil, no planning, all fear and laziness. Well, you gotta think, plan.

42:36

Don't be like the slugger. Be like the ant. Plan for the future. Think, okay, this is my goal. This is my dream.

42:41

Toil, profit, mere talk, poverty. So you want the business? Guess what? Poor, business, poverty, nothing, no substance.

42:51

It'll never happen. If it's all talk, if it's all talk, no planning, no actual toil towards it.

42:59

So here's the thing. Why don't you kickstart yourself into starting this business as you've always dreamed of.

43:05

How about tomorrow you go online, you start an LLC or a corporation. You go online, get your

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EIN number. That's calling the government and asking permission to pay them.

43:19

Get a trade name, cost you 10 bucks. This is your doing business as name.

43:24

You've got your business, your LLC, your trade name, the name of your business. Get yourself a bank account under that corporation or that LLC and you know how long that will take?

43:37

All the steps I just told you in terms of the LLC, the trade name, the EIN, that will take you probably an hour, probably one hour.

43:47

And it'll cost you, what are they charging now for an LLC? What is it you're maybe gonna pay? Maybe you're probably gonna pay 100 bucks or something like that total.

43:56

And guess what you will have by Tuesday? You will have your own company. You will have a trade name.

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You will have an EIN number. And maybe on Tuesday you go and get the bank account.

44:07

Now what are you? Now you are committed. Now you are committed.

44:13

Why? Because you are a business owner. You have an LLC or S Corp or whatever you want.

44:19

And you have a trade name. You've got a business. You're ready to go. You've got the bank account. Now you gotta start the next part, right?

44:25

What's my brand? What's it gonna look like? What's it gonna smell like? What's it gonna taste like? All those things, but it has to be toil and plotting.

44:33

How come you don't have the business? Let's be honest. Because you're lazy. Because you're afraid.

44:40

Work your way towards it. And someone says, I don't even know. It's just a little bit. It's a little bit of profit a lot of times becomes what?

44:48

A lot of profits. Think about the story. And this is just, I'm not gonna spend a lot of time on this. But think about the story of like Elon Musk.

44:57

Elon Musk, did you know that in three decades, in three decades, he became one of the very richest men in the world in earth's history.

45:09

It took a man, a single man from South Africa who came from a very bad home, not a rich home who had to move to America.

45:17

It took him three decades to become the richest man in the world. When he was a kid, you know what he was doing?

45:24

When he was a kid, he wanted to learn about computers and programming. And so what he did was as a little, he says nerdy kid, is he loved computers and he started a programming course as a child that would take normally six months to do.

45:39

He did it in three days because he stayed up with no sleep for three days straight to learn this programming thing.

45:45

And that set him on his way. So he gets his first business, he sells that, he gets over $20 million for the sale of that business.

45:53

Then he moves on to the next business, sells that, gets over $180 million for that business.

45:59

And then he was off and running. Now he has Tesla, now he has SpaceX, now he owns

46:06

X. I hate that name, okay? Twitter or whatever. Isn't it funny though, by the way?

46:11

Isn't it cool? The Babylon Bee guys are friends of ours. I've done a podcast with them. Isn't it amazing that the reason

46:18

Elon Musk bought Twitter is because he loved the Babylon Bee and when Twitter kicked Babylon Bee off, he was like, well then

46:25

I'll buy it. That's wild. That's actually kind of crazy that that happened.

46:33

My point is, is what if I told you that in three decades, if you work hard and labor and stay up late and sleep in an office that's actually your house at the same time, that's what he did.

46:46

He didn't have enough money for an office and an apartment and so it was cheaper to have the office so all he did was live at his office.

46:56

And would you, listen, if I told you, look, here's what you gotta do. You gotta go some nights with no sleep and you gotta learn something new.

47:03

It's gonna be kind of painful. You're gonna be tired for like three days. And you gotta maybe sleep in an office and be uncomfortable for a couple, maybe a couple months or maybe two years.

47:14

But at the end of that, you're gonna have $15 billion. Would you do it?

47:21

Would you do it? Some of you are answering, you're out of your mind. Yes, yeah, you'd do it.

47:27

And what if I said you could be the richest person in the world on planet Earth in three decades.

47:35

I promise you can do it in three decades. Would you work for it? Now listen,

47:40

Christians get weird here because now you're talking about money and everyone goes, I thought as Christians we're supposed to love being poor.

47:47

What? That is not the Christian worldview. We're supposed to love the poor, care for the poor and be content with whatever

47:53

God has for us. But let me just say, if you thought that like actually wanting to build wealth for your family is somehow a sinful thing or wrong or we shouldn't be focused on that, let me point you to another proverb that says a righteous man leaves an inheritance for his grandchildren.

48:09

How do you leave an inheritance for your grandchildren if you're poor? Now there's other principles that can come from that and inheritance can also be a spiritual inheritance that we give to our descendants.

48:23

Of course that's there, but the primary part of that inheritance, what's being talked about is money.

48:31

Now we don't have to go all Benny Hinn here and we're not. But the point is, is that we should care about these things and think about them biblically in all toil there is what?

48:43

Let's say it together. In all toil there is what? In mere talk there is what? Poverty.

48:48

This is what the proverb is about. It's about profit, gain and poverty.

48:55

So for those of you guys that have been dreaming for years about this dream business, always wanted to do it, we know we're gonna do it.

49:00

Husbands and wives, you've been planning this forever. You just never actually gave it teeth or put your hands on it.

49:06

Tomorrow, go online, start your LLC, get your trade name, get your

49:11

EIN, get that bank accounts and then move to the next step. Sound good? That's toil, that's plodding, working through it.

49:21

How about building wealth for your family? All toil, profit. Mere talk, mere talk, poverty.

49:29

You talk a big game. How about building wealth for your family? You could talk about this a number of different ways, but someone says,

49:35

I'd love to get into real estate. I'd love to get into real estate, maybe start buying homes, flipping homes, or buying duplexes and renting them out, starting an

49:44

Airbnb business. You ever seen those clips online, the reels that come up where the guy will walk up to a person in a fancy car, says, excuse me, is this your car?

49:54

What do you do for a living? And the guy's like, well, I'm a business owner. Hey, can I talk to you, ask you a few questions about how you did this?

49:59

And you have this person that's like, yeah, I own like 85 properties, duplexes or whatever. Have you always been wealthy?

50:06

No, I was broke two years ago, completely broke, living in my car.

50:12

And you're like, now you're driving a Lamborghini in two years? What's the difference between that guy and the person who doesn't build wealth or isn't successful?

50:21

It's not always the brains or the intellect. It's the work ethic. It's the toil.

50:27

It's the person who's saying, I wanna build wealth, so I'm gonna start a real estate business, but I can't take 50 of them at once, so how about I just start with one?

50:37

How about I start with one? I do one duplex, start there, get money, get a profit, do the next one.

50:44

One, two, three, four, next thing you know, you're the one driving the Cadillac with 85 houses, and you're actually able to use your wealth to benefit the kingdom.

50:56

Do you know, listen, do you know that this church and all the main ministries of Apologia Church were able to be started?

51:06

End abortion now, Apologia Church, Apologia Studios, every single one of those ministries was started because a wealthy

51:15

Christian stepped in and funded it to start it. Did you know that? We didn't even know them when we started all these things.

51:24

All we were doing is living by faith. End abortion now? End abortion now, we knew we had to do this, we knew we didn't have the means, the money, nothing, and so we said,

51:33

Lord, if you want us to save these babies and do this big ministry, you've gotta have somebody show up and deliver us all of this money to do this and get it off the ground, and guess what happened?

51:42

Within like a week of praying, all of a sudden, random people that I've never met in my life start calling me, saying, hey,

51:51

I'm a successful business owner, I own a number of businesses, the Lord laid it on my heart to call you, what are you doing right now that you need help with?

51:58

Oh, that's amazing that you're calling right now because we were asking God for you to call us, and what we need is $200 ,000 to start this ministry to save these babies.

52:07

Done. So someone could say, really, should you invest your life in building wealth and doing those sorts of things?

52:13

I don't know, these ministries wouldn't exist without it. How's that? Is it worth it?

52:19

In all toil, there is profit, in mere talk, there is poverty. How about building a ministry?

52:25

Someone says, oh, I have this passion for this particular people group or this thing, I wanna pursue this,

52:30

I wanna do this for the glory of God, I wanna speak and teach about these things, but it just seems daunting and huge, and I just don't know if I can do it.

52:38

Just some encouragement. My story, our story's not the ultimate, it's not the main point, but Apologia Studios.

52:45

You look at it now, it's reached probably 150 to 200 million people in views, it's,

52:52

God is using it to transform people's lives. I run into people all over the world who will walk up to me.

52:59

I mean, I was in Australia for inter -abortion now. I think Luke was with me when we did this, and we're walking down this random street in Australia.

53:08

I'm in Australia, a random street, and I turn a corner to go down this alley. It's like this dark, dirty alley.

53:15

I just wanted to cut through, and as I'm walking through, this person's walking towards me in an alley in Australia, and they were like,

53:21

Jeff Durbin? And then he proceeded to tell me how their life had completely been transformed, and they came to Christ as a result of watching this content, some random video that was up for who knows how long.

53:32

God's using it to save people's lives, to bring them out of addiction, to bring them out of the cults, to bring them to Christ.

53:37

God's using this ministry. How did it start? Wasn't big at all.

53:43

It started with, first, Redemption Radio. The hospital that I was working at said, hey, weird thing, we're paying for advertisement on this

53:51

Christian station for the drug rehab, and they said, because we pay for advertising, we can have one hour of airtime a week.

53:57

Did you want to have a radio show? And I said, sure.

54:03

By the way, if that hospital had heard even one of those episodes, fired immediately. They did not care.

54:10

They were a secular company that had a Christian track, and they were like, I guess this guy's a Christian. You want a Christian radio program?

54:15

I was like, sure, I'll take it. If they had heard one episode, fired, absolutely fired. But it started with the

54:21

Redemption Radio. And as I started to move on, it became clear, we can do more, so we started

54:26

Apologia Radio. And what I did was, we didn't know a lot of people, know a lot of things, we just had what we thought was valuable theological information that would bless the world, and so we'd get the episode, and I just went into different groups online, and I joined like a million groups, like Christians and Mormons discussion,

54:44

Christians and Jehovah's Witnesses discussion, The Reform Pub, or whatever it was, and all I would do is just copy and paste the episode into a million groups.

54:52

My fingers were hurting from all the clicking and copying and pasting. And I would just sort of just spread the thing, or if we did evangelism on the street,

54:58

I would find all the groups and just take the video and put it in the video, start the trouble, right, like dropping a bomb into like a

55:04

Mormon community. Like, you know, Mormon Wives of Utah, I would go, bam, here's the Mormon video, right?

55:11

And they're like, oh my goodness, but it caused righteous controversy. But that's how it started, and then it grew, and people started being blessed, and they started saying, praise

55:18

God for this content, and it grew into what it is now, Apologia Studios, blessing the world with the gospel and with solid teaching to the glory of God.

55:28

But it started small, so why don't you toil, labor, start it, start working, start being faithful.

55:35

You wanna see the profit, you wanna see the growth work. Don't just talk about it, you have to actually labor for it.

55:41

How about in learning a new skill? You've always wanted to, you've always wished you could.

55:47

You know, it could be anything. Guys could be like, you know what I always wanted to be? A black belt in Brazilian Jiu -Jitsu.

55:53

Maybe someday I'll start it. I don't know, how about starting it this week? How about you find a solid place, reputable teacher, the best of the best, and you just go, and you work, and you labor, and you start it.

56:07

If you just dream and don't do, it's poverty. In all your skills. How about growing in your knowledge of God?

56:15

What's getting in the way? Well, is it laziness? Is it not planning?

56:21

Is it your phone? Someone's like, you know, I wish I could just know a lot more about my faith.

56:27

I wish I could really grow in my knowledge of God. Okay, how much time do you spend a day on your phone?

56:37

This is where everyone starts to go, I don't know. Think about how many, if you take that thing where you actually, it's always scary to do when you decide to actually hit the thing that tells you to monitor how many hours you spent that day on the phone.

56:51

Everyone's afraid to turn that on, right? Because you don't want to feel so convicted and horrible at the end of the day.

56:58

Turn it on, this week, turn it on. See what happens. Don't say that you don't have enough time to grow in your faith and to read some solid books or listen to solid sermons about God and your knowledge of God.

57:09

Don't say you don't have time, because I'll just say, let's see your phone and track how much time you spend on your phone this week alone.

57:16

Do you have time? Do you have time? I think one of the things we're gonna have to most give an answer for as Christians before God, not in judgment, but in terms of reward or lack of reward, is all of the idle time, the time we just threw away, we did not invest, it was just nothing invested.

57:35

It was burying it, it was squandering it. How about growing in your walk with God? Is it just laziness?

57:42

Is it a lack of discipline? Is it no work and toil? Is your phone actually the primary culprit in terms of no prayer time, no time in God's word, no time meditating in his truth, no time serving

57:57

God in some ministry with your gifts? How come I'm not growing in my relationship with God and I walk with God?

58:03

Is it that I'm not toiling? I'm not actually working for it? And I don't mean working for salvation.

58:10

Everyone understands I'm not saying that, amen, yes? Please don't think that. I mean in terms of I'm saved,

58:15

I know God, I wanna walk with him. I wanna have a relationship of pleasure with God and a deep prayer life with God.

58:22

What's in the way? No toil, no profit. All talk, no gains.

58:28

See that? I just did it in a modern vernacular, okay? But all talk, mere talk is only poverty.

58:34

What's in the way of you and I growing in our intimacy and walk with God? How about this?

58:41

In all toil there is what? Profit. Mere talk there is what?

58:47

How about your marriage? How about your marriage? All the complaining.

58:54

I wish, I hope, I wish I had a better relationship with my wife,

59:00

I wish we had more passion together, more romance. I wish we had a deeper connection.

59:06

I wish there was just so much more happiness between us. I wish it was, you know, that kind of love we had when we were, you know, dating each other and maybe even newlyweds.

59:17

Like I wanna get back to that, but now, you know, sometimes there's some things between us. We've had some conflicts, we've got some wounds.

59:23

I get all that. First thing, what do we say? Forgive and put away all bitterness. That's the starting point.

59:29

Next is where's the toil? Don't tell me that you want your wife to start being a certain way or you want your husband to start being a certain way if you're not actually laboring in the marriage to do it.

59:44

No toil, no profit. All talk, poverty. So in your marriage, what's in the way?

59:54

Let me ask it again, because it's probably one of the most obvious things. Is it your phone? Think about the culture that we're in now in terms of the laziness, the sluggard.

01:00:07

You could write a proverb today and it would have something to do with scrolling with the finger, right? Like the sluggards like the hinge going back and forth.

01:00:14

The sluggards like they're just in that like doom scrolling, right?

01:00:21

Just constant. So what's getting in the way of intimacy in your marriage? Is it your phone?

01:00:28

Where's your toil? Where's your labor to actually start benefiting your marriage? Don't say you want profits. Don't say, oh, my marriage is poor.

01:00:35

It's poverty right now. Okay, so if you want it to not be poor, if you wanna get out of the poverty, then the scripture principle is in all toil there is profit.

01:00:46

So you should be toiling for your marriage. Men, you should be asking yourself the question, what does she like?

01:00:53

What does she love? What does she need? What does she want? Wives, you should be asking the same questions.

01:01:01

What does he want? What does he need? What does he love? And you should be toiling to pursue that.

01:01:06

And you might say standard fair conflict in marriage, whatever they may be, you might say, well, I don't want to.

01:01:13

Well, my answer to that is very simple. It's you shouldn't have married them. Is that easy enough?

01:01:20

I don't want to love, cherish and honor them anymore. Then you shouldn't have promised you would.

01:01:27

And if you met the promise, love, honor, cherish, if you meant it, then you should be laboring and toiling to make sure they know that's true, that I love you,

01:01:39

I cherish you, I honor you. Oh, you don't understand. We've just had some conflicts. Well, then repent, both of you, repent of your sins, put away the bitterness, forgive one another and start laboring.

01:01:51

You're the one that made the promise. Amen? You stood there. Hopefully no one had a gun to your back.

01:01:58

If that's the case, it's not a real marriage. But if no one had a gun to your back and you made that vow before God and people, then you should keep your promise.

01:02:08

And so if you want a marriage that's not in poverty and in shambles, then guess what? The principle is this, work, work, work, and then there will be profit.

01:02:17

Maybe on Monday, men, you put some work into your marriage. And maybe on Monday, there's just a little cash flow.

01:02:25

And on Tuesday, a little more. And then on Wednesday, a little more. And then in two months, you're sitting on a pile of cash in your marriage.

01:02:35

You want it to look like that? Toil and you get rich in whatever category.

01:02:41

How about one more? Let's just do one. We can do this for days. I'm gonna finish this one because we do have to stop next, okay? How about, oh,

01:02:48

I wanna get healthy. What's the principle? What's the principle? In all toil, there is what? Profit.

01:02:54

In the mere talk, there is what? Poverty. Everyone's like, oh, you know, I wanna get in shape.

01:03:00

I wanna get healthy. I wanna get in shape. What's the real answer as to why you are not healthy and you are not in shape?

01:03:06

I'm gonna get in so much trouble. What's the real answer as to why you are not healthy and why you are not in shape?

01:03:12

The genuine, real reason. Now, I understand, forgive me, don't attack me and send me nasty emails. I understand we have physical issues.

01:03:20

Many of us are dealing with chronic diseases. I get that. But let's be honest, the lion's share, the lion's share as to why

01:03:29

I'm not healthy and why I am not in shape and I am not getting to my physical goals is because why?

01:03:35

What's the real reason why? I'm lazy. The truth is, and we all know, we've been there before.

01:03:42

You're like, I'm gonna get in shape. I'm gonna eat healthy. Here's my supplements, all methylated vitamins. I'm gonna do all of this.

01:03:48

I'm gonna do with these oils. I'm gonna do NAD, do all this stuff. And you get like three weeks in, you're like, I'm doing great, feel good, feel 100 % better, like I'm 18 years old again.

01:03:56

And all of a sudden, life comes back again. Things get difficult. Kids get in the way. I've got obligations. And what happens is the day that you're supposed to be training, the day that you're supposed to be working out, you go,

01:04:07

I'm just really tired. Or the kids have been very challenging today. And because they've been very challenging,

01:04:14

I'm gonna skip out on actually taking care of my body and being consistent in setting my goals. And then that day turns into the next day.

01:04:21

Why? Because you're rehearsing quitting. You rehearse quitting. That's the truth.

01:04:27

Isn't it right? We don't get physically fit. We don't get well. Why? Because something gets in the way and we go,

01:04:33

I have an excuse not to train today. Why? Because this minor thing got in the way.

01:04:39

What you should be doing is training yourself to toil for profit. Train yourself to never quit.

01:04:45

No matter what the obstacle was that day, you set a goal and you do it. Amen? Toil, profit, mere talk, poverty.

01:04:55

You wanna get healthy? You wanna get in shape? Stop talking a big game and start laboring, which means the next six months to 12 months might kind of stink, right?

01:05:08

Because you're gonna have to train yourself out of the quitter you made yourself to be. Oh boy, I'm in trouble. That's the truth though, right?

01:05:15

The real answer is that every time you give up, you are rehearsing quitting. And so just toil, because the principle is profit.

01:05:25

So just toil, just toil, even if it's just a little bit of toil. Little bit of toil, little bit of profit.

01:05:31

No toil, all poverty. Sound good? That's a pretty good return, right? If I don't do anything, it's just talk,

01:05:38

I just get poverty. If I just toil, there's some profit. So if you wanna get healthy, you wanna get in shape, quit talking about it, merely talking about it, and start toiling and laboring for it, because that is the biblical principle, amen?

01:05:56

And here's the final word. Banner over the whole thing is all life is worship. Everyone got that? All of life is worship, including what we just talked about.

01:06:04

You getting healthy, you getting in shape, you caring about being well for your children 20 years from now, that is worship.

01:06:14

Do you think about that? Man, you should be riding that peloton with power and passion right now, right?

01:06:19

Sing your favorite worship songs, crazy, peloton. Worship God through the burn. No, that's true, because what if I'm saying

01:06:27

I need to get healthy for the glory of God and the good of my children? Like, for example, me, starting my new family now at Durban 2 .0

01:06:35

at 46 years old, I'm looking at right now one -year -olds in my home going, I'm 46, and when they're 18, they're gonna have a dad in his 60s, that's crazy to me.

01:06:49

So I wanna make sure that I'm healthy and well for their good. I wanna be here for them so I can care for them, provide for them, guide them as their father.

01:06:58

So isn't it a God -glorifying thing to worship God by getting well for my daughters?

01:07:04

Do you see it? Do you see it? It's not selfish, brothers and sisters. In toil, there is profit.

01:07:10

In mere talk, there is only poverty. And in the end, the banner over the whole message is this. Whatever you do, in word or in deed, do all to the glory of God, amen?

01:07:19

Let's pray. Father, thank you for your word. Thank you for this truth. I pray that it changes us and grows us for your glory and kingdom in Jesus' name, amen.