“Let's Party!” – FBC Morning Light (7/17/2024)

Well, a good Wednesday morning to you, hope your week is going well, and again by way of reminder, this little banner on the lower left-hand side, you can go to that website, which is our church website, Baptist Church in Sterling, and click on the Give Online link, and it provides an opportunity for you who are benefiting from these Morning Light devotionals to give whatever you can just to help support this ministry.

It's been going on for four years now, ever since COVID, and our church has basically been funding whatever it's cost to carry on that work, all the equipment, the streaming service, paying for the sermon audio site, and whatever has been necessary.

Our church has just been funding it, and to think recently for stewardship purposes and for the benefit of all, both our church and for those who can't have the ability to give, that there can be great blessing to the giver, and you know this.

You've been walking with the Lord any length of time, you know the blessings that are yours when you give to something that you know is worthwhile and that's beneficial to you and enabling it to carry on.

So if you're so inclined, that link is there. I'm not going to be harping on this every day for the rest of my life or the rest of the life of these broadcasts. Just keep this banner up for a while, just as a reminder that the opportunity to give is there.

Well, today in our Bible reading, we're reading in Isaiah chapter 20, first six verses of Isaiah 20, and then chapters 22 and 23. I want to zero in on a couple of verses in chapter 22. Now, how would you describe the general mood of our culture, the general approach to life of our society, when you see venues like athletic stadiums or concerts of whatever kind, the latest Taylor Swift concert, or whoever, whatever, and you look at the throngs of people who go to these things.

It's like anything that can serve to entertain or be a party is embraced with open arms. It can be festivals in the community, various events, and so on and so forth. Our town nearby a couple of weeks ago, in celebration of Pride Month, had a Pride festival, and people turn out for that.

People who aren't of that lifestyle persuasion would go just for the fun of it, just for the fun of it. It seems that there's a great deal of priority placed on fun and party, as if life is a party, or it ought to be one, or we want to make a party anytime we can make a party.

But what are we ignoring in that spirit that says, let's eat and drink for tomorrow we die? What are we neglecting in that spirit? You know that spirit is an ancient spirit. It shows up here in Isaiah 22 verse 13.

They say, let us eat and drink for tomorrow we die. And what is the context in which they say that? Well, verse 12 says, in that day the Lord God of hosts called for weeping and for mourning, for baldness and for girding with sackcloth.

What that verse is referring to is that the state of affairs in Judah were so spiritually, in such spiritual decline and decay, that God was calling his people to repentance, to turning from their sin, their idolatry, and their forsaking of him, and express that repentance with mourning and weeping, with baldness and the girding with sackcloth.

But how did the people respond? Instead of responding with repentance, the Lord says, you responded with joy and gladness, with slaying oxen and killing sheep, eating meat and drinking wine, saying, let us eat and drink for tomorrow we die.

They threw a party. And this response is a typical response I suggest even in our culture. We don't want to think about the potential consequences to the lifestyle that we are pursuing, or even think about the eternal consequences of being a human being.

You know, where will I be when I die? Will I face my maker? What will I say to him? Where will I spend eternity? How should I be living my life? See, we don't really want to think about those things. So what do we do?

Throw a party. We do whatever we can to create some kind of pleasurable experience that gives us an escape from such thoughts. But it doesn't work. It just doesn't work. The Lord says in verse 14, surely for this iniquity there will be no atonement for you, even to your death, says the Lord God of hosts.

So long as man persists in this pursuit of pleasure and the throwing of a party when he should be repenting, there's no long-term hope for that individual. Let's not make that mistake. Let's realize that it is critical to have a right relationship with God.

And if that means I've got some repenting to do, then so be it. Then let's turn from our sin. Let's repent of that sin, and let's turn to the Lord. And there we will find true, lasting, eternal satisfaction.

Our Father and our God, I pray that you would deliver us from the spirit of the age, the spirit that says life is a party and we need to throw it. We pray in Jesus' name, amen. All right, well listen, have a good rest of your Wednesday.

May the Lord bless you and encourage you in it. Good day.