The Habits of a Happy Man (05/28/2023)

Hello everyone. Good to see everyone, and good to have our guests with us today.

A few folks came from all over Texas to hear Brother Myron, and we want to welcome you.

We're so glad you're here at Park Meadows, and a lot of Brother Myron and Tony's family are here.

It's always wonderful to see you. You don't have to wait for them to be here to come see us, but you're always welcome.

I know you don't live in Course Canada, but neither do I, by the way. It's so good to have you.

It's good to have our home folks back. It's good to have Raymond and Sharon well and back in their places, and all of you.

It's so good to see you. Most everyone here, probably everyone here, knows

Brother Myron, so I don't have to say a lot about him other than he is my closest friend.

Other than my family, he's one of only two counselors that I would go to with Scripture or any questions

I might have in the whole world. I guess the other one is Brother Raj. I have a few others

I go to with just advice, like Brother Paul and all my family, but Brother Myron, if I need to go figure out what a

Scripture means, I'm going to go ask him. He usually won't tell me because he wants to be the dude that figures it out.

See, I give him all my secrets, and that's why you're here to hear him preach. That's how he does things.

Anyway, love you, Brother Myron and Tony and your whole family. It's so wonderful and so good to have you.

You think that thing's working? You can try this one first, and we'll be working on that one.

All right. Well, come on up. There might be an on switch on there.

Yeah, I think Dave turned it on. Is it working already? Sounds like it's working. Maybe, maybe not.

Okay, yeah, it's working. How are y 'all doing? Are y 'all happy? I'm happy.

Good. Good to see y 'all. Good to be in Texas again for the first time in quite some time. I am glad that God's Word has all the answers.

It has the answers to the questions we know we have. It has the answers to the questions we don't know we have.

And it's really amazing when I look at my life, how everything changed.

Everything changed. The trajectory of my life changed when I came to Christ, when Jesus found me.

And I know he found me because I wasn't looking for him. Can I get a witness? Yeah, I wasn't looking for him. He was looking for me.

There he is. I got him now. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. And it was really interesting.

I've got a good friend who lives in Dallas who we went to high school together, and he's the guy that led me to Christ when we were in high school. And I remember,

I remember we were both into martial arts, and we had a mutual friend who was also into martial arts.

The guy in Dallas, his name is Dr. Stan Harrison. The guy was our mutual friend, Pete Smith.

And we all went to high school together. And I knew Pete, and Pete knew Stan, and I didn't know

Stan. And Stan didn't know me, so we knew each other through Pete. And they lived down the road from each other, and one day

Pete invited me over to his house so we could practice some karate. And we're down in the basement practicing, and Stan comes over, and he wants to practice with us.

But I didn't know that Pete was in Stan's karate class. I didn't know any of that stuff. I'm just there doing my thing because I saw a couple of Bruce Lee movies.

I said, I think I'd like to be like that dude. And after we got done practicing,

Stan says, so I want to ask you a question. Yeah, man, ask me something. He said, if you died today, do you know for sure you'd go to heaven?

I said, nope, I'm pretty sure I'd go to that other place. And I'm going to go somewhere, but heaven ain't on the list, right?

And he said, do you mind if I show you some verses? And because my parents had the foresight to teach us to fear

God, they took us to Sunday school when we were knee -high to a grasshopper. I didn't understand why we were going.

I knew we got dressed up that day. We didn't get dressed up any other day. We had money to put in the offering plate.

On Christmas and Easter, we'd have to memorize a speech and stand up when we were little kids and either say the speech or start crying because we were nervous in front of people or start laughing because we were nervous in front of people.

But my parents taught us to fear God. And so he said he wants to show me some Bible verses. Well, I'm 16 years old, but I'm not about to disrespect a church dude.

Right? And that's how I saw it then. And so he showed me all these verses.

He said, so what do you think? Do you want to get saved? I said, I said, I can't, bro.

You don't understand. I got a temper so bad that I can't do it.

I'm not ready to do that because I knew what I was capable of in my sinful condition.

Can I get a witness? Well, every time I saw him, he would witness to me again and again and again and again.

But even when he wasn't with me, the spirit of God was already convicting me. And I was already like every night,

I was like, oh, man, I hope I don't die and go to hell today. Like literally every night when I went to bed, I thought that every day

I was thinking about I don't want to die and go to hell. I was thinking about that the whole time. And so, in fact,

Stan's kind of wild. Not in a necessarily bad way, but just in a wild way. And even when we were teenagers, like he had this jacket.

He had this jacket that it was like a khaki jacket.

And on the front, it said, it's down one side, it said Stan, the other side said

Harris. And on the back, big, bold, black letters. Without Jesus, you ain't living, right?

And that was Stan, right? And so I used to go somewhere with him. He used to drive this old

Gremlin, this old AMC Gremlin. And he'd be driving down Front Street. He'd take his hands off the wheel and start eating chicken nuggets.

Like, dude, put your hands on the wheel. He would, I'm not even exaggerating. He would say to me, oh,

I'm going to heaven when I die. I ain't worried. Well, I ain't going to heaven when I die. I ain't worried. Put your hands on the wheel, right?

And anyway, anyway, I thank God for him. He's one of my dearest friends. And I just kept going to church with him.

And then one night, I was just like, I can't resist this anymore. But I knew, like I knew when

I got saved, even before I got saved, I knew when I got saved, God expected my life to change. And I knew

I couldn't change it, right? And I was an angry child.

I grew up with some anger in our home. I had polio as an infant. I couldn't run.

Kids made fun of me. So I was like, and I would fight at the drop of a hat. Sometimes I dropped a hat myself.

And I'm just keeping it real. Okay, anyway, so I got saved

April 9th, I think it was 1978, on a Sunday night. And I knew

God saved me. Like, everything changed. How I talked changed.

Like, I used to cuss like a sailor. No, sailors couldn't cuss as bad as me. It was way worse to them. And, like,

I stopped cussing immediately. It just was gone. But the fight part, like, y 'all don't even understand.

And I was relatively armed and dangerous. I had a left arm and a right arm, and I was extremely dangerous. Wow. I was just talking.

That's so wild. Dr. Sand, I was just telling them the story about how I came to Christ. Well, I'm still in the middle of it.

So you missed the part about you already. This is the guy I was talking about. This guy right here. Okay?

And it was all the good stuff. I don't even know any other stuff. And come on now.

That's what I'm talking about. Come on now. And I appreciate you doing that. So when

I came to Christ, I got saved on Sunday night the next day. Like, the devil is real, y 'all.

The next day. There was this little skinny kid in my class. Wasn't big as a peanut. And we were in our shop class.

I'm going to get to the sermon in a minute. I'm relaxing me. I'm relaxing me. Y 'all can come along for the ride if you want to.

But this little skinny kid in my shop class named Stanley Johnson. Little kid.

I'm in the 10th grade. He sucker punched me in my jaw in front of everybody.

If he had done that on Friday before I got saved, he'd still be in the hospital today.

But you know what I did? Everybody's like, oh, Gordy, he just sucker punched you in your jaw.

And I didn't do anything. I didn't hit him back. Because somewhere along the line in Sunday school,

I heard this thing about turning the other cheek. Didn't know where it was in the Bible. I just knew that I wasn't supposed to put him in the hospital because I just got saved.

Right. And so everything in my life changed. And I remember, I remember,

I guess this is kind of the introduction to the sermon that I'm going to eventually get to.

But I remember, I remember, we went to William Penn High School. And I remember that,

I don't know, did you go to Victory your last year or just your last year? Okay.

So he didn't, like, the year I met him, he was going to William Penn the next year or the next year he went to Victory or something like that.

I don't know. I don't remember exactly all the chronology because it was a long time ago. But thank you.

Thank you for reminding me of that part. I don't feel old enough to remember anything from maybe that's why

I don't remember. Okay. So anyway, so the church that I got saved in had a

Christian school. It's called Victory Christian Academy. And so when I got saved, I just wanted to be in an environment where I could just learn the

Bible. And I didn't like so I'm just like went to my parents. Can I go to this

Christian school next year? And then my brother Mike got saved later that summer. Can we go to the Christian school? And my parents said, we can't afford to send you out of Christian school.

And I said, that's okay. We got I've got jobs. I'll pay for it. I'll pay for myself to go. And they said, well, you can't go to Christian school.

And we're not going to send you to Christian school and not let your brothers go. And so Mike and I both had jobs. And so we said, well, me and Mike can pay for it.

Right. Because it was an A .C .E. school. So all we had to pay for was the paces. There was no tuition. And I said, me and Michael pay for it.

And so they said, well, we'll think about it. And then they said, OK, you can go. And then after a month or whatever, it wasn't very long at all.

Then my parents started paying for our little brothers to go and probably started paying for me to go, too. I don't remember. I had jobs since I was 14.

So anyway, I remember I told you that whole story to get up to this part. I remember my first day in Christian school as a teenager.

I was 17 at this time. And every morning we had chapel.

And every morning when you had chapel, you had to pledge allegiance to the flag, pledge allegiance to the Christian flag, pledge allegiance to the

Bible. There was a lot of allegiances going on back there. And then we had to read a passage of Scripture.

And you read the same passage of Scripture every day for a month. I don't know if they still do that in A .C .E. schools or not, but that's what they did back then.

And so I was reading the passage, the first passage of Scripture, the first day in Christian school.

Oh, I forgot to tell you the other part. That summer, before I went to Christian school, we went to Youth for Christ for youth activities sometimes on Saturday.

And I saw Dr. Stan. Well, he wasn't Dr. Stan there then. He was just Stan then. He wasn't Dr. Stan then.

He's Dr. Stan now, but he was just Stan then. And he was on the quiz team. He was on the quiz team where you had to memorize these verses, and you'd have these competitions against these other youth groups.

And when I went to that thing, and I watched them compete, and he was like blowing them away.

He was like, oh, you stand up and finish the verse. The moderator would start a verse, and then one of the kids would stand up and finish it.

And he just almost single -handedly mopped up all the other schools. I'm like, okay, that was pretty cool. And so I said, can

I be a part of this whole thing y 'all are doing? He said, I don't know. You've got to ask the youth director. So I went to Tim and said, Tim, can

I be on the quiz team? And I thought he was going to say, well, you've got to fill out an application and submit your resume. I didn't know what to expect, right?

He's like, sure. I'm like, really? He's like, yeah. He said, so what do I have to do?

He said, you memorize a chapter of the Bible a week. I'm like, okay.

How do you do that? I didn't. So when I came to Christ, it was like a full immersion, right?

And so he said, you've got to memorize a chapter of the Bible a week. Now, you've got to understand, I didn't know that wasn't what all

Christians do. I just thought all Christians just memorize. That's one of the things about being a Christian, just memorize a chapter of the

Bible a week. Right? And so I remember the first, so the next week we had another, or maybe it was two weeks later, we had quiz.

No, it was the next week. And so that week, fortunately, it was Romans chapter 13. I think it was only like 13 verses or 16 verses, a really short chapter.

And I said, so how do you memorize a chapter of the Bible a week? They said, you write it down and then you read it out loud a whole bunch of times every day.

I'm like, okay. So I just wrote it down and read it out loud a whole bunch of times every day. And I mean, I'm like,

I don't want to mess this up. I don't want to be the one that causes our team to lose. Right? I'm like, this is my moment.

This is my jeopardy, wheel of fortune, price is right moment. That's what it felt like to me.

And it was, let every soul be subject unto the higher powers, for there's no power but of God. The powers that be are ordained of God and whosoever. All of that, right?

And I remember when I was so excited that I got up.

I mean, when we sat down, the dude read one word and I jumped up. He's like, okay, you. I was like, me?

And then I went up and I quoted the verse. He said, that's it. You got a point. I was like, this is the greatest thing ever.

And so I received a reward. Like, my motive wasn't the best motive, but I received a reward for memorizing scripture.

And so I kind of got hooked on memorizing scripture when I was a teenager. I didn't kind of get hooked on it. I really got hooked.

And then I learned about Jack Van Impey, who memorized the whole New Testament and Psalms and Proverbs. I was like, ooh, I want to memorize the whole

New Testament. We were just really weird kids. We were just really out there.

Anyway, we'd have all night prayer meetings and preach to each other on the steps of our school and just go street preaching and witnessing to people in front street and knocking on doors.

We were just like all in. And so my first day in the

Christian school, I remember the very first passage. The very first passage we had to memorize was Psalms chapter one.

And I am telling you, that was so providential in my life, that Psalms chapter one, that we read it every day for a month.

And at the end of the month, it was like etched into my cerebral cortex. I think that's part of your brain.

And I had it dialed and locked and loaded. And I'm telling you,

I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that every blessing in my life is a direct result of activating the word of God in my life.

And so today I want to talk to you on this subject, the habits of a happy man.

The habits of a happy man from Psalms chapter one. Here's what it says. It says, blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful, but his delight is in the law of the

Lord. And in his law, doth he meditate day and night. And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of waters that bring forth his fruit in his season.

His leaf also shall not wither and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. And I got,

I'm going to tell you, as a teenager, I got kind of locked in on that. Whatsoever he doeth?

That mean like everything? Everything he does is going to prosper?

I'm like, what if that's true? What if that's real? What if this is really the way forward?

What if this is really the secret to life? Whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. The ungodly are not so, but are like the chaff, which the wind driveth away.

Therefore, the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.

For the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous, but the way of the ungodly shall perish. Now it says, blessed is the man.

That word blessed there literally means, oh, how happy is the man? Father, we thank you for your word.

We know that none of us have enough giftedness or talent to do anything to change anybody's lives.

But your word, your word is the catalyst that created everything out of nothing.

We pray, Lord, that even if we feel like our life is not much, or if we feel like our life is not anything, we pray that you would make us see, help us to see that the integration of the powerful principles of the word of God into every fabric of our life, of our lives, will change us in ways that we cannot change ourselves.

We pray that you'd help us to yield to your word and receive the blessing that goes along with that.

In the name of Yeshua, amen. So it says, happy is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly.

I want you to notice that when the Bible is telling us about this happy man, before it tells us what he does to be happy, it tells us what he doesn't do to be happy.

And it's really interesting, I think a lot of times we forget that the things we don't do are often as important to the quality of our lives as the things we do do.

And it says, happy is the man that walketh not. In other words, he removes himself from pernicious environments.

What are the pernicious environments? Perdition is judgment. Perdition is destruction. Perdition is like devastation.

And a happy person removes themselves out of an environment that ends up in perdition.

If you are only looking at how it starts off, you are looking at the wrong side of the equation.

If you're only looking at how good it feels when you get started in it, you're looking at the wrong side of the equation.

What we have to learn to do as followers of God, we have to look at where does the road end.

And I have to decide whether or not to get on that road through the entrance ramp based on where it goes.

In fact, it's really interesting, you know, there's a difference between the way we name roads today and the way they name roads in Bible times.

Like I -45 is just I -45, right? You got Beaton Avenue, maybe it has that name because two guys got in a fight and one of them got a beating.

I don't know, right? I don't know why they named it Beaton, but they named it Beaton. But in the

Bible, roads were always named based on where they led to. See, if you got pine trees on the street, they'll call it

Pine Street, right? You got rocks on the road, they'll call it Rocky Road. But in the

Bible, it was called the road to Damascus because Damascus is where it ended up. Are y 'all tracking?

The road to Jerusalem was called the road to Jerusalem because that's where it ended. And see, a lot of us need to wake up and have enough awareness, enough alertness, enough perception to realize that when we get ready to get on a path, the first thing we should do is see where it ends up.

And if it doesn't end up where we want to end up, then maybe we should just stay off that road. See, he removes himself.

He looks far enough down the road. He sees where it's going and he says, no,

I don't think I want to get on that road because that road leads to destruction. It leads to perdition. It leads to pain.

It leads to loss. I think I want to stay off that road. He said, blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly.

So the counsel, that's the advice. So you want to make sure that you're not walking in a place.

I'm going to move this over so everybody can see it. But you want to make sure that the people you get advice from are godly people.

Why is it so important that we don't walk in the advice of ungodly people? Well, it's really a simple answer.

I think we can find the answer in Genesis chapter 1. And here's the answer. And God said, let us make man in our image and after our likeness.

And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and the fowl of the air and over every creeping thing that moveth upon the earth.

The reason we shouldn't take advice from ungodly people is because we are made in the image of God.

How can an ungodly person give you advice to help you become more of who you were created to be?

It's not possible. So I have to cease to hear the words that cause me to err from the words of righteousness.

See, we have to make sure we have intention in our lives. So most of y 'all know me as a preacher, right?

And I am one. I preach. That's one of the things I do. But I'm also, in the business world,

I'm a consultant. I'm a business coach. I teach people how to grow their businesses. And on that path, one of the things

I tell people is if you're going to pick somebody to coach you, look at where their life is.

And if that ain't where you want your life to go, you probably should find somebody else. Can I get a witness? Right?

And the same thing is true in every aspect of our lives. We want to find somebody who is living like we want to be living, who's doing the things we would like to be doing, who's having the things we'd like to be having, and then follow that pattern.

Blessed is the man. Oh, how happy is the man that does not walk in the advice of ungodly men, of ungodly women.

We got a lot of ungodly people in the world today with really big mouths. Beware of who you listen to.

It's fascinating to me that people think that because a person is famous, that you should listen to them.

Sometimes, some of these celebrities, it's like they're like four -year -old and a grown person's body.

Like they're the last person you want to follow. Blessed is the man that walks not in the counsel of the ungodly.

You know, I find it amazing. We look at the children of Israel in Scripture, and it was like, you kind of wonder, like, when are these dudes going to wake up?

When are these people going to wake up and figure out, like, God ain't playing? Right? And they tempted

God in the wilderness. Well, they ended up in the wilderness because they tempted God by not believing in the first place. An 11 -day journey took them 40 years.

40 years to go on an 11 -day journey because they did not yield to the word of God.

How many of us have been on the struggle bus for 40 years because we refused to yield to the principles of God at the beginning?

And we could have been there in 11 days, but here we are 40 years later on the struggle bus. Can I get a witness?

But as many problems as they had, I'm talking about the children of Israel now.

Here's one problem they didn't have. One of the things we never see in Scripture, I mean, they messed up a lot, but we never see them send their children to the

Philistines to get educated. They didn't do it. I am blown away.

I am blown away by how many young people's lives have been ruined, destroyed, because Christian parents wanted to make sure that they could fit in with all their other kids' parents.

And, well, everybody thinks I should send my child to college, so I'm going to send my child to college. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with college.

My children went to college. But when they said to me,

Dad, I want to go to a real college. I said, you can go to any college you want to as long as you pay for it. But I am not going to pay some heathen to unteach you what your mother and I have been teaching you for the last 18 years of your life.

We ain't doing it. So my children ended up going to Christian college.

Why? Because I'm not going to pay some heathen to unteach them. I got a friend who lives in Tampa. His daughter was in college for a semester, a semester, and came home as an agnostic.

You know why? Because parents today don't understand that these professors are on a mission to unprogram your children from all that faith stuff, all that Bible stuff.

Blessed is the man that walks not in the counsel of the ungodly. I'm going to be very intentional about who I get advice from.

I would recommend that we all be very intentional about who we get advice from. But not only that, he removes himself from prodigious environments.

Don't listen to the advice of ungodly people. Don't loiter in the avenue of sinners. I want you to notice the progression of this person who listens to the wrong people.

He starts off walking, slows down to a stand, and then ends up sitting.

Blessed is the man that walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of scorn. He started out,

I'm just going to walk down this road. Next thing you know, he's standing around. He's loitering with sinners. You know what happens when you hang around with sinners?

You start trying to fit in with them. You don't believe me? Ask Peter. Peter will show you. Peter who?

Apostle Peter. Not Dr. Peter, not Pastor Peter, not Reverend Peter, Apostle Peter. Remember him?

Jesus said, you're going to deny me thrice. Here's what happened. Peter started warming his hands at the same fire that the world who was crucifying

Christ warmed their hands at. And when they said, aren't you? You talk like one of them Christians.

He said, ah, blankety blank, blank, blank. I tell you, I ain't with him. They started to curse and swear. Wow. When you stand around sinners, you start to resemble them.

You start to want to fit in with them. You want to be like them. So I think it's probably a little easier for me than it is for a lot of people because I had polio as an infant, so I never really fit in that well anyway.

Right. So not fitting in. Oh, I know how to do that. I know how to not fit in.

Oh, I know how to not fit in. And so I am not. People say, Myron, you can't say that.

No, no, no. No, I can say that. Like I'll do seminars and I'll I got folks in my

I got folks in some of my coaching programs who are no more saved than the moons made out of green cheese.

And I'll stand up and teach them straight from the pages of Scripture. Man, you can't say that here. I pay for this room.

If they don't like what I teach in this room, they need to go pay for their own room. We need like as followers of Christ, we need to stop trying to go along to get along and sign a banana and be one of the bunch.

We just need to be who God called us to be. See, I if here's what Jesus told him,

Jesus told the people, he said, Look, if you are ashamed of me before man, I will be ashamed of you before my father, which is in heaven.

I don't want I don't even want to risk that. I want to take a stand for Christ.

If nobody's standing for him. I remember one time and I shouldn't have done this. I don't think but I probably I was a little

I was a lot younger. And it was when that whole moment of silence thing first came out. You know, because you don't want to say we're going to pray.

We have a moment of silence. I was just a conference. It was a it was a market America conference.

And J .R. Reidinger, the owner of the company said, he said, Let's have a moment of silence for so and so and so and so I said,

Dear Lord, I pray that you bless him. I pray, Lord, that you raise them up. And then

I got to the end. I said, Amen. And J .R., he didn't know what to say. He said, Amen. Do you understand?

Do you understand that everybody in this world, whether they know it or not, they're seeking truth, even if they don't like the truth.

Everybody has a truth shaped hole right smack dab in the middle of their soul. And even when they resist it, it's the thing they need the most.

Stop. Don't don't loiter with sinners. Don't listen to the advice of ungodly people. Don't loiter in the avenue of sinners and don't lounge around with scorners, scorners.

What's the score? Somebody's mocks somebody who makes fun. That's what the whole world's about. Now they just want to mock. Oh, yeah. You're one of those

Christians, aren't you? You know, you got these nut jobs on the view. I don't watch it, but I've seen clips on YouTube.

And it's like it's like it's like making fun of truth has become the order of the day.

Do you understand the enemy? It's fascinating. I don't know if any of you have ever read any of Dr. Jonathan.

I mean, Rabbi Jonathan Kahn's works. Anybody ever read his books? Mind blowing. But one of his most his most recent book is called

Return of the Gods. And if you haven't read it, you want to read it. So Return of the

Gods is it's a he's revealing an ancient prophecy. And he's talking about how all the false gods that Israel worshipped in the past.

Are now being worshipped in the West. And in the

United States of America and how how the gods of sexual immorality and homosexuality and transgender and all that stuff, that's not new stuff.

I mean, the whole book is based on the premise that that like when you cast out a demon, when you cast out a devil, you have to replace it with something, because if you don't, what happens is he'll come back and bring back seven more demons, even more powerful than himself.

That's the world we live in today. And he talked about how how like the enemy is on a tear right now.

And he's on a tear because America had kicked out the gods of.

Sexual immorality kicked out the gods of it still went on in the background, but it wasn't like they was in your face with like.

Like like and now it's like they're coming after your children. They're coming after our grandchildren.

Why they can't have children. The only thing they can do is recruit yours. Two men cannot have a baby.

Two women cannot have a baby. And they're coming after our children. And by the way, they have to do the thing they're working hardest at, and that is the silence, the voices that oppose them.

And we cannot be afraid or ashamed to speak up against this evil.

They're coming for us. We have to be like Abraham in Genesis chapter four.

When those five kings, those five nations rose up against Sodom and Gomorrah, and they took his nephew.

They took Abram's nephew. You know what Abram did? He armed three hundred and seven soldiers that were born.

I mean, servants that were born in his house. He went out and fought against five nations and one.

Where are the followers of God that are willing to go to war with the enemy at that level, regardless of how much it costs?

The world is mocking. Don't lounge around before you know it.

You spend too much time walking in the vice of ungodly people. You spend too much time standing around loitering on the avenue of sinners.

Eventually you're going to be lounging around with scorners and you're going to be laughing at your own people, mocking.

It's fascinating to me how preachers, there are some preachers in our world today who think that their celebrity status elevates them above the word of God.

Because I'm a celebrity, I'm going to say, well, we just need to make this work. We need to find a different way. No, what we need to do is get back to the word of God.

So at least if somebody in our family goes astray, they know they're astray. Happy is the man who removes himself from that environment.

What we take away contributes to our blessedness as much as what we add.

Sometimes more. I just I just finished a book. It's a business book, but the principle, like all principles are microcosms of each other.

They overlay. It's a pattern. Just keep repeating over and over and over again. I just finished a book called 10x is easier than 2x.

And one of the principles Dr. Benjamin Hardy teaches in that book is if you want a 10x result, it's going to be easier than producing a 2x result because everything you have to do to get a 2x result is hard.

But the most the heart, the thing that's hard that you have to do if you want a 10x result, you have to remove the 80 percent of the things you're doing right now that can't get you that result.

So it's taking away the stuff we're used to, taking away the stuff people know us for, taking away the stuff that we've always done, taking away the stuff we're familiar with.

That's what's going to produce that 10x result. And if you look at that, they call that the

Pareto principle or the Pareto distribution, depending on how you want to look at it like. 80 percent of our results come from 20 percent of the stuff we do.

And 20 percent of our results come from 80 percent of the stuff we do. So if we remove the 80 percent, we make room for something that will get us closer to the desired outcome.

Anyway, we have to remove ourselves from environments that do not allow us to walk on the path that God has us on, that don't allow us, that don't encourage us, that don't foster the relationship with God that he desires for us.

But it doesn't just talk about what he doesn't do. Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful, but his delight is in the law of the

Lord, and his law is that he meditate day and night. He shall be like a tree.

Now, I want you to notice that the first two verses or the first verse talks about stuff we do, talks about actions, activities that we do and don't do.

But this one doesn't talk about activities that we do and don't do. This talks about attributes that we are.

It says he shall be like a tree. It didn't say he shall do like a tree. It didn't say he's going to act like a tree. It didn't even say he's going to have, it says he's going to be like a tree.

Now, here's the interesting thing about a tree. Trees are very interesting. Trees are all through Scripture.

In fact, the word tree is mentioned in the book of Genesis more than any other book.

What's interesting, in the Garden of Eden, the garden, by the way, the word garden means enclosure.

The word Eden means pleasure, which shows us that God's ideal environment for his children is the protected place of pleasure.

That's why, as a father, it's my responsibility to create a protected place of pleasure for my family. Are y 'all tracking?

Okay, so what's really interesting is there were three different types of trees in the

Garden of Eden. There were the abundant trees that were for food, and the Lord God commanded the man saying of every tree of the garden, thou mayest freely eat.

But of the tree that's in the midst of the garden, thou shalt not eat of it for the day thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die. So there was the trees, there were the trees that were for food, the abundance of trees that were for food.

Then there was the forbidden tree of knowledge of good and evil. How many of y 'all ever wonder, why did

God put a tree in the garden if he's not supposed to eat it? Why is it there? Well, because if it's not there, then he has no opportunity to not eat it.

There's no opportunity to obey unless there's an opportunity to disobey. If there's no opportunity to disobey, then obedience has no value.

Are y 'all tracking? Okay. But then there's another tree. It's called the tree of life. And when you eat off that tree, you live forever.

So those are the trees in the garden. Here's an interesting thing about a tree. This is the ground.

Oh, I think I see green. This is the tree.

When we look at the tree, this is what we see. But this is not all there is to the tree.

This is just all that we can see. But before the tree ever grows up and does this, it grows down and does this.

The roots go down before the shoot shoots up. See, it's roots that produce shoots, and shoots produce fruits.

I just made that up. That's a good poem, Ian. That's a good poem. Y 'all know that's a good poem. So you've got to understand the nature of a tree.

The nature of a tree is that it is both gravitropic, I'm just going to put

G, it's gravitropic, and it's phototropic, I'm going to put P. So the nature of a tree is that it's gravitropic.

What does that mean? That means it grows towards gravity and away from light. It is the gravitropic nature of the tree that makes the phototropic nature of the tree possible.

If the tree has no gravitropic nature, it cannot have a long -lasting phototropic nature.

If you try to grow phototropically before you grow gravitropically, when the first storm comes, the wind is going to knock you down.

But when we see something that goes up, the higher it goes up, the deeper the roots must go down.

How many of y 'all track it? Oh, am I messing up the whole camera thing? You're good?

Okay, so people can see it. Okay, cool. That works. So understand the nature of a tree.

Because here's what the Scripture says. His delight is in the law of the Lord. There's the habit. Delight.

He delights in it. He takes pleasure in it. He looks forward to it. He enjoys it when he's doing it.

Yeah, what you doing? I'm about to get in this Word. Yes, I'm about to get up in this Word. Yes, I am.

Right? Oh, I know that sounds funny, but that is how God wants us to look at the

Word. God wants us to look at the Word like we look at a meal when we're hungry. Like we look at some water when we're thirsty.

Like we look at some rest when we're weary. That's how God wants us to look at His Word. Not like, oh man, I've got to read the

Bible. I've got to read. I guess I'd better go in here and read the Bible. I haven't got my chapters in today.

No, no, no, no, no. No. God takes pleasure in our pleasure in reading

His Word. He takes pleasure in our pleasure studying His Word. He takes pleasure in our pleasure meditating on His Word.

His delight is in the law of the Lord. It's His joy. It's His excitement. It's His enthusiasm. He gets worked up about it.

I'm about, what you so excited about? I'm about to go get in this Word. This is my life.

Hey, isn't that what the Bible says? The Bible says it's not a vain thing for you because it is your life.

And through this thing you will prolong your days in the land. Whether you go over Jordan to possess it. The Bible says I am telling you every blessing

I have in my life is a direct result of the Word of God applied to my life.

Not just in my hand, but in my hand and working its way all down in my heart. And then it makes its way out of my hands.

And next thing you know, I'm doing exactly what God told me to do. Why? Because I'm meditating on it day and night.

Do you want to watch this show? I can't right now. I'm meditating on the Word. Do you want to go to the show? I can't right now.

I'm meditating on the Word. I'm filling up my life with the thing that gives me life. This is a habit.

It's a habit. I'm glad I developed the habit of meditating on the Word of God when I was a teenager.

I didn't wait until I became an adult. But hey, I know some of you are thinking, well, man, I'm already an adult. Well, start now.

The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. Second best time is right now. Right now.

And by the way, it says he shall be like a tree planted. Don't you want to be planted like a tree?

See, I'm so planted, you can't shake me. But Myron, but Myron, what is a woman?

Oh, I know what a woman is. Now the world might be confused, but I know what a woman is.

A woman is a female human that God made. What is a man?

A male human that God made. I'm not confused about it. I see these preachers and they get on TV.

And they're so chicken to tell the truth. It's just the truth.

I remember I saw one famous preacher. I'm not going to name him because I'm not. It's not important. Here's what's important.

It's important that we as God's people have God's answers and not man's answers. And Larry King asked him, said, so do you believe homosexuality is wrong?

See, by the way, how many of you have been asked that question? Well, what's wrong with it? There's just two people who love each other. First of all, they don't love each other.

Let's start there. And by the way, I'm not talking about hating homosexuals because I don't really think you should hate them. It's like,

I hate people who smoke. I don't hate people who smoke. I just don't want to breathe it. I don't want to walk through it when I go in the store. Right.

I don't want to walk through it when I go in the hotel, but I don't hate them. Right. Okay. Y 'all tracking. And here's what he said.

Well, you know, I don't know. Yeah, I don't know. I just want him to show. I want to show God's love. Okay. Faithful are the wounds of a friend, but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful.

But if Larry King were to ask me that question, here's what I'd say. Let me ask you a question, Mr. King. Do you believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God and the only payment for man's sin?

You know what Larry King would say to that? Well, of course I don't believe that. Then I'd ask him this question. If I don't need you to believe what

I believe in order for me to believe it, why do you need me to believe what you believe in order for you to believe it? Is it possibly because in your heart of hearts, you don't believe it anyway.

And that's why you're trying to recruit other people because you don't believe it. If a thousand people agree that the sky is green, the sky is not green.

In fact, the sky is no less blue because one blind man cannot see it. See, I'm talking about,

I'm talking about like followers of God, getting our orders from headquarters and finding our principles in the word of God.

Here's what we need to do. See, a happy man has the habit of removing himself from pernicious environments, but he also has the habit of rooting himself in principled ecologies.

What's an ecology? An ecology is like this whole natural environment that just supports everything. It supports itself because it says he should be like a tree.

It'd be planted like a tree. Gravitropic phototropic. Somebody said,

I want to made a comment on one of my YouTube videos. Where have you been for the last 20 years? You know, I said, preparing myself for my assignment.

That's the gravitropic part of the work. Everybody will, when you dig your roots deep and plant them deep and water them with the word of God, you're going to do it when people aren't watching.

Nobody's going to watch you do that. I mean, you're going to get joy out of it, but they ain't going to watch you. Oh, you know what

I'm getting ready to do? I think I'm just getting ready to go watch Myron read the Bible. No, no, no, no. You probably ain't going to do that. Right.

But when they see the benefits of that, everybody wants that. Myron, why do you have, how do you have people that are not

Christians and people who are homosexuals and people who are Muslims and people who are Catholics and people who are

Buddhists and people, how do you have all, and people who are quote atheists? How do you have those people who want to come by your program when you like on the front page of everything?

Like, if you don't like the Bible, you're like, you ain't going to like this. How do

I have that? Because they want what I have. I don't want what they, they don't have anything I want.

But no, they pay you. I don't need the money. I'm not looking for anything.

I'm going to tell you something. Here's what happened. You know why the happy man is so happy? Because nothing's missing. Come on.

That's good. He's got nothing to gain. He's got nothing to lose. He's got nothing to hide.

He's got nothing to prove. He's just, he's just being the tree that's planted by the rivers of water. I want you to notice where he's planted.

He's not just planted. He's planted like a tree, but he's pliable like a tree. He's planted by the rivers of waters. Why is that so important?

Because when you're planted by the rivers of waters, you are supple and you can move and you are mobile. And like when the wind blows, you'll bend a little, but you ain't going to break.

Because, because not only are you planted, but because of where you're planted.

I find it interesting. This is a good time to talk about this. I love the fact that the

Bible is complete. And it shows us these pictures that are, that we see over and over. They just keep on repeating patterns, these repeating patterns, these repeating patterns.

And they keep on repeating over and over again. Isn't, do you find it interesting? People talk about, people talk about, um, the economic pie.

And the only problem with the economic pie is that it doesn't exist. Say, why, what do you mean it doesn't exist?

Well, the economic pie doesn't exist when God made man. He didn't put him in a bakery.

He put him in a garden. Say, what's that? Well, what's that, what's that mean? What it means is if you put him in the bakery and there's a pie, if I eat a piece, there's one less piece for y 'all to have.

When you eat a piece, there's one less piece for me to have. But guess what? Not in a garden. In a garden, a garden works like this.

Consumption creates production. I know I said that too fast. I go in a garden,

I take an apple off the tree. And I bite the apple. And guess what's in the apple?

Some seeds. And I eat the apple and I got six seeds left over because I ain't eating the seeds.

But I ate the apple. And I take those seeds and I plant them in the ground. In just a couple years, guess what? My consumption of that apple produces six more trees.

I release the seed when I consume the fruit. Because God created an ever -expanding economy where consumption creates production.

Oh, it's in the Bible. I know it's good. That's where I got it from. It's in the Bible. Hey, it's good.

Can I get a witness? It's good. But wait a minute. Or how do they say?

But wait, there's more. So God put the man in the garden. But when

God made man, see, God did two things. He made man. And then he formed man.

Y 'all remember that, right? Because he made man in Genesis chapter one. But he formed man in Genesis chapter two.

Verse seven. And the Lord God formed, that means squeezed, formed man out of the dust of the ground.

Where did he make man from? He made him from the dust of the ground. Huh. Where's the tree planted?

The tree is planted in the ground. God took the man from the ground. But guess what?

Here's the first thing

God ever said to man. I'm not talking about the Ten Commandments. I'm talking about thousands of years before the

Ten Commandments. God gave the first command. Here's what it says. It says, and God blessed them.

This is Genesis chapter one, verse 27, 28. God blessed them and said unto them, be fruitful, multiply, replenish the earth, and subdue it. He blessed them and said unto them.

What do I learn from that? God blessed them first before he gave the command.

God always gives the capacity before he gives the command. He gives the ability before he gives the assignment. So when he tells me to do something,

I know I can do it because he told me to do it. He never tells me to do something he didn't give me the ability to do.

And then he said, be fruitful. I love the fact that he didn't have to make me have to guess what it means to be fruitful.

Because Genesis tells me what a fruit is. A fruit is a living organism whose seed is in itself.

When God said, be fruitful and multiply, he's telling us, make sure you produce on the outside based on what

I put on the inside of you. And God put something on the inside of all of us that we can go and produce something on the outside that looks like him.

Hallelujah. I'm about to get worked up. Y 'all don't even know. Wait a minute.

God, what is the seed? What is the seed? God put, if you're writing down, this is a writer down.

God put an aspect of his creativity inside of all of us.

But he put a different aspect of his creativity inside of me than he put inside of you. He put a different aspect of his creativity inside of you than he put inside of me.

So the seed that is inside of me is the seed of creativity. So God put an aspect of his creativity inside me as a seed.

And I'm supposed to make it show up on the outside. And then people are going to look at my fruit that shows up on the outside.

What are they going to do? They're going to glorify my father, which is in heaven. Are y 'all tracking? So, this is so good.

This is so... God planted the seed of part of him inside the soil that is this garden called

Myron. Made from the dust of the ground. God planted God's seed in man's soil.

And said, go make something grow. It gets more better. Here's what it says.

My ways are not your ways, saith the Lord. Neither are my thoughts your thoughts. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways.

And my thoughts than your thoughts. For as the rain cometh down and the snow from heaven.

This is Isaiah chapter 55. I think it's like right around verse 9, 10, 11 and 12.

Here's what it says. As the rain cometh down and the snow from heaven. And it watereth the earth. And maketh it bring forth and bud.

It didn't suggest that it brings forth and bud. It didn't imply that it brings forth and bud.

It didn't nudge it to bring forth and bud. It makes it. Here's what that means. As the rain cometh down and the snow from heaven.

And it watereth the earth. And maketh it bring forth and bud. Here's what God said. So shall my word be that goes forth out of my mouth.

What? God's word is like the rain and the snow that comes down from heaven. The rain and the snow that comes down from heaven.

And watereth the earth. Maketh it bring forth and bud. Why? That it may give bread to the eater. That's consumption to the consumer.

And seed to the sower. That's production to the producer. So shall my word be that goes forth out of my mouth.

And it shall accomplish that which I please. And it shall prosper. Oh there's that word again.

And the thing whereunto I sent it. I sent my word to you. So that it can water the soil that is the garden of you.

So the seed of creativity that I put inside of you. Would produce on the outside. Something that looks like me.

That was so good.

Yes it is. Planting like a tree. Plantable like a tree. Productive like a tree.

He said he bringeth forth his fruit in his season. Here's the interesting thing.

When you see somebody who's honoring God with their life. And things are going good. You ain't going to look at them and say wow they're awesome.

You're going to say wow. God is working mightily. They're going to leave evidence all over the place. God did this.

There is no universe in which I could produce a life this blessed. It's God.

It's God. Yielding the soil that is this garden of mine. To the seed of creativity that God planted inside of me.

And then watering. See here's the thing. I'm the one that has to water the garden. God put man in the garden to dress it and to keep it.

It's my responsibility to cultivate the garden. So how am I going to do that? I'm going to water it with the water of the word of God.

Why? Because the word of God is the only thing that can make that seed of creativity that God put inside of me.

Bring forth fruit unto good works. And then it says his leaf also shall not wither.

You'll be pretty like a tree. Huh? You'll be protective because leaves are pretty.

But they look good. They're good to look at. But guess what? They're also protective. They'll protect you from the sun. But guess what? You'll also be prolonged like a tree.

His leaf also shall not wither. You're not going to be a flash in the pan when you're saturating your life with the word of God.

You're going to be long lasting. You're going to be blessed for a long, long time. How long? As long as you keep on saturating the soil that is the garden of you.

And here's what it says. He produces prosperous economies. This is the part that messed me up when

I read this as a teenager. It says he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers and waters, verse 3.

His leaf also shall not wither. Bring forth the fruit of the season. Leaf also shall not wither. And whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.

What? Everything? When you say whatsoever, does that mean like whatsoever, whatsoever? Is that a different kind of whatsoever?

And I found out, guess what kind of whatsoever it is? It's the whatsoever whatsoever. Whatsoever he does for God will prosper.

See, whether you know it or not, we are all his. The earth is the

Lord's and the fullness thereof. Here's what the scripture tells me about me. Jesus saved me when

I was 16 years old, which was how long ago? 47 years? Thank you for the math. Thank you for math that makes me feel old.

No, it doesn't really make me feel old. It just makes me feel like I'm blessed. I've been here for a long, I've been blessed for a mighty long time. And here's what's interesting.

The scripture says, the love of Christ constraineth us because we thus judge. That if one died for all, that's

Christ. They which live should not henceforth live unto themselves. I ain't supposed to live for my own, but unto him which died for them and rose again.

Whatever they do for God will prosper. Whatever they do for others will prosper. The work that I do out in the marketplace, it blesses people.

It changes their lives. It don't change their lives because I'm smart. I mean, I'm smart, but so are you.

I ain't smart enough to change nobody else's life. Not even sure I'm smart enough to change my own. But I'm smart enough to know there's somebody who knows more than I do.

People say, man, oh my goodness. Where do you get this content from? God has the best content. It's in the

Bible. I am not making any of this stuff up. It was in my Bible when I got up this morning. Whatever he does for others will prosper.

Whatever he does for himself will prosper. Here's what the scripture says. If thou be wise, thou shalt be wise for thyself.

But if thou scornest, thou alone shalt bear it. I'm going to end on this.

It told us all of the blessings of the habits of a happy man. And then it says, the ungodly are not so.

What's that? They're not planted. They're not pliable. They're not productive.

They're not pretty. They're not prolonged. They're not protective. The ungodly are not so, but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away.

I don't know if you noticed this or not, but in the beginning it says, blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly. At the end it says, the ungodly are not so, but they're like a chaff.

The wind that you are on, when we follow the advice of ungodly people, we start off walking down that road. We end up being blown down that road.

Like dried up weeds. Well, chaff is actually a shell.

They fan it. They throw the weed up in the air and they fan it. And then the chaff would blow because the chaff was lighter.

Like the chaff which the wind driveth away. But the ungodly are not so, but are like the chaff with the wind.

By the way, what's wind a picture of in scripture, y 'all? Well, it is the Holy Spirit, but it's also a picture of false doctrine.

Right? Be not tossed to and fro with every wind of doctrine. So in the context when we see that in the beginning it's telling us not to walk according to the advice of ungodly, the advice of ungodly is going to be the wind of false doctrine.

That's why when Jesus went up on the deck of the ship in Mark chapter four, it says, he rebuked the wind, but he said to the sea, peace be still.

He didn't rebuke the sea. Why? Because the winds are a picture of false doctrine. The waves are a picture of false doubt. God speaks to our doubts, but he rebukes false doctrine.

False doctrine has to be rebuked. Okay? The wind driveth away. Therefore, the ungodly shall not stand on the judgment.

Oh, wait a minute. He was standing in the way of sinners. Now he shall not stand on the judgment. Be careful where you stand because sometimes where you stand in the end, you won't be able to stand.

Stand in the way of, it says he shall not stand on the judgment nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.

And by the way, don't make the mistake of thinking that you're doing something and you're going to get away with it.

Because here's what it says. For the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous and the way of the ungodly shall perish.

I am telling you, I am standing before you as a representative of the blessings that come to somebody who has the habit of delighting in the law of the

Lord. And if you will do it, the blessings can't be measured.

They can't be counted. Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think according to the power that worketh where?

In us. I love the fact that the word of God is full.

I want to encourage you. If you are a follower of Christ, saturate the soil of the garden that is you with the word of God.

If you are not a follower of Christ, I urge you, I implore you, that you need to receive

Christ. Because that's the only hope any of us have. Father, I thank you for your word.

I thank you that it is truth. I pray that you'd let this water saturate our lives that we might bring forth fruit, fruit that remains.

I thank you that your word is truth. I thank you that you use me even though you don't need me.

I thank you that you're willing to use us even though you don't need us. Help us to have the habits of a happy man and delight ourselves in the law of the

Lord and meditate in it day and night. And I thank you for what you will do in the name of Yeshua.

Amen. Amen. God bless you. Brother Dave, I'm going to turn it over to you.

Thank you, sir. Thank you, brother. Well, guys, y 'all are invited to stay and eat a lovely meal with us.

We've got some food in the back. Thank you,

Myron, so much for that. Praise God, brother. Dave asked me to come up. I closed this out because he's not sure what to focus on.

Cool. Isn't God's word good? All the time.