Proverbs 30 (08/05/2018)

Park Meadows Church

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I'm really glad to be here. It's good to see all of you. And I love my brother Dave so much.

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I was sitting back there just thinking about all, sitting back there, and Finn, David's grandson, was staring me down, intimidating me to no end.

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I got a picture of it, so I can prove it. I can prove it. He was really giving me the eye, like, right?

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And I was thinking, when I met brother David, or the first time I came to Texas, Ginny was that old.

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That was mind -blowing. It's like eons ago. Not that you're eons old.

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That came out so wrong. That came out so wrong. How do you,

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Ginny? Oh, I'm a couple eons, according to Myron, right? A wise man once said, when you find yourself in a hole, put the shovel down.

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So, I'm gonna put the shovel down and start reading some Bible verses. Tried to get sentimental, and it didn't work.

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Lots of, yeah, lots of Bible verses. All right, we're gonna look at Proverbs chapter 30 today.

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I believe that the Bible is the most practical book in the world. If you are looking for religion in the

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Bible, you're looking in the wrong place. What? If you're looking for religion in the

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Bible, you're looking in the wrong place. And when I say religion, I mean this idea that somehow you're gonna find what you're supposed to do to appease an angry

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God. There's nothing you can do to appease God. God can only be appeased by God, and so God never established a religion.

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And that's what all religions tell you you gotta do. Some religions will say you gotta do this to appease God. Other religions say you gotta do that to appease

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God. The Bible says only God can appease God. So the Bible's not a religious book. The Bible's a very practical book.

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There are things that God intends for us to do based on what we read in Scripture. A lot of people think that the

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Bible is a book that's supposed to make us feel good on Sunday, right? It's not that either. It's like, it's practical instructions for living on Monday and Tuesday and Wednesday and Thursday and Friday and Saturday and Sunday.

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And so when I read the Bible, I oftentimes find, or I all the time find, things that I'm supposed to do.

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Unfortunately, sometimes I'm not doing them, so I've gotta make a shift. How many of y 'all have ever had to make that shift, amen? Y 'all know what I'm talking about?

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And so I came across a passage a long time ago, and I couldn't really wrap my mind around what it meant.

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It was just, I was like, I wonder what that means. And it wasn't like I was wondering what it meant for a couple of weeks or a couple of months.

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It was like years, I'm thinking, what could this, why is this in here? And I think it's really gonna help you today if you ever feel like the job that you have to do is bigger than you are.

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The job as a parent, the job as a grandparent, the job as a business owner, the job as a pastor, the job as a teacher, the job as a husband, the job as a wife.

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If you feel like the work that you have to do is greater than you are, then I believe that this will help.

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I don't know if anybody else ever feels that way, but sometimes I feel like, I'm just me, how can

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I do that? Anybody ever feel that way? Okay, just a couple of us. All right, praise the Lord. So we're gonna be blessed by that, and the rest of y 'all, y 'all can just watch us be blessed.

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Amen. All right, Proverbs chapter 30, and we're gonna begin with verse number 24, and we are gonna read down to verse number 28.

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And it's just a few simple verses, but I wondered why it was in there. And here's what it says in Proverbs chapter number 30, beginning with verse 24.

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It says, there be four things which are little upon the earth, but they are exceeding wise.

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The ants are a people not strong, yet they prepare their meat in the summer. The conies are a feeble folk, yet they make their houses in the rocks.

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The locusts have no king, yet they go forth all of them by bands. The spider taketh hold with her hands and is in the king's palaces.

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Now, I don't know. I know you probably understood that the first time you read it, but for me, it made me scratch my head.

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What in the world is King Solomon talking about?

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He starts talking about ants and conies, and a conie's a rock badger. Ants and conies, and he's talking about locusts, and he's talking about spiders.

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What? Well, I believe that, I almost said the apostle

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Paul. I believe that King Solomon wrote this to encourage other people who feel like he once felt that the job that you have to do is beyond you.

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And so this morning, I want to talk to you about the subject, how to be wise beyond your size.

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Shall we pray? Father, thank you for your word. We thank you that it is not just true, but we thank you that your word is truth, and we pray that you would just open our eyes, and that we would behold your beautiful truth from your word, and that your spirit would open our ears, that we would hear what you have to say to us in this church this morning, and we bless you for it.

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In the name of Yeshua, our Savior, amen. All right, well, I believe that,

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I can't prove this, but I think there's a very good likelihood that when King Solomon wrote this proverb, that one of the 3 ,000 proverbs that he wrote,

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I believe that he was probably thinking back to when he first was anointed to be

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King of Israel. And what we're gonna do this morning is we're gonna look at that story in 1

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Kings chapter number three, and we're gonna see why I believe that King Solomon was probably thinking about that.

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And it says in 1 Kings chapter three, verse three, and Solomon loved the

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Lord, walking in the statutes of David his father, and burnt incense in the high places.

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And the king went to Gibeon to sacrifice, therefore that was the great high place, and he burnt offerings, I'm sorry, and 1 ,000 burnt offerings did

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Solomon offer upon the altar. And in Gibeon, the Lord appeared unto Solomon in a dream by night, and God asked, what shall

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I give thee? What do you want, Solomon? Hey, Solomon's sleeping.

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Hey, Solomon, wake up. I got something, what would you like?

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Got something for you. I'm gonna give you whatever, hey, hey, hey, wait.

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I got something for you, what do you have, Lord? How do y 'all like to have that dream?

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Can I get with this? Well, Lord, you know, if I could have three of these, two of those, four of those, one in green and two in blue,

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I mean, I think I'd be all set. How many of y 'all know what I'm talking about? That's not what Solomon said. He woke

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Solomon up, or he spoke to Solomon in a dream. He didn't wake Solomon up. He spoke to Solomon in a dream, and he said, ask what

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I shall give thee. You ask me for something, I'm gonna give it to you. Now, it's one thing if somebody who doesn't have much comes and says, hey,

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I'm gonna give you whatever you want. But when the one who owns everything in the universe comes to you and says,

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I'm gonna give you whatever you want, that is a good dream. And here's what

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Solomon says. Verse number six, and Solomon said, thou hast showed unto

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David, my father, great mercy, according as he walked before thee in truth and in righteousness and in uprightness of heart with thee, that thou hast kept for him this great kindness, that thou hast given him a son to sit on his throne as it is this day.

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And now, O Lord my God, thou hast made thy servant king instead of my father

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David. Lord, you made me king to replace my father David the great King David who killed

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Goliath. Now, I'm supposed to take his place. I've never killed a giant. I've never led mighty men.

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I don't know how to be a king. He said, I am but a little child.

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I know not how to go out or to come in. He was saying, I don't know how to do a royal procession.

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I don't know how to be, like, you've made me a king, but I don't know how to be a king. I don't know if you'd be stressing about that.

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I'd be stressing about that pretty big time. And then he said, and my servant is in the midst of thy people, which thou has chosen a great people that cannot be numbered nor counted for multitude.

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Give therefore, he said, he's about to ask him now, give therefore thy servant an understanding heart to judge thy people that I may discern between good and bad.

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For who is able to judge this thy great people? And the speech pleased the Lord, that Solomon asked this thing.

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And God said unto him, because thou hast asked this thing, because you've asked for a wise and an understanding heart, because you've asked for a wise heart to judge righteously, here's what

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God said. He said, I have given thee a wise and understanding heart, so there's none like thee before thee, neither after thee shall any arise like unto thee.

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And I have also given thee that which thou has not asked. In other words, I've given you that which other people would have asked for.

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Here's what it says. I've given you that which thou has not asked, both riches and honor, that there shall not be any among the kings like unto thee all thy days.

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I am gonna make you the greatest king in world history. I'm gonna give you riches, not just riches, you're gonna be the wealthiest king in world history.

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Not, there won't be any before you like you, there won't be any like you after. The Bible tells us that when Solomon was king, that gold and silver were like stones in Israel.

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Solomon was so prosperous that the whole country was blessed. Pretty amazing.

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And he says in verse 14, and if thou wilt walk in my ways and keep my statutes and my commandments as thy father

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David did walk then while I lengthened my days and Solomon awoke, behold, it was a dream. Now, Solomon prayed an amazing prayer.

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And the thing that caused him to pray this amazing prayer was the fact that he ran.

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You know what we do? You know what we do in 2018? We hide our inabilities. We cover up our inabilities.

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We make excuses for our inabilities. But Solomon didn't do that. Solomon said, Lord, hey, now I'm gonna tell you something.

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I don't got this. We're like, oh, I got this. Solomon said,

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I don't, I know that's very good grammar. And I probably shouldn't say that in front of the children. I don't have this. I know I don't have these children.

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But I'm, poor grammar I'm using for emphasis. I don't got this. And he said,

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I don't know how to be a king. The prayer that Solomon prayed was a kingdom prayer. When you understand that the whole

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Bible is a book, oh, you're recording, aren't you? Will it still pick me up from down here?

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Okay, so when you understand that the whole Bible is a book about a king, about what?

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Talk to me, everybody in church, talk to me about what? A king, it's a book about a king. It's a book about a kingdom, a what?

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Kingdom, it's a book about a royal family, a what? Royal family, and the colonization of a foreign land.

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Of a what? Of a foreign land, what's that foreign land? It's hard to remember. The whole Bible is about a king, and a kingdom, and a royal family, and the colonization of a foreign land.

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That's what it was about from the beginning. The very first thing God ever said to a human being.

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Be fruitful, multiply, replenish the earth, subdue it, and have what?

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Dominion. The word kingdom is a compound word that means the king's dominion.

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Hey Adam, I want you to rule over the earth with my heart. So the book is about a king.

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When Jesus came, he came preaching the gospel of the kingdom, because the whole thing is about the kingdom.

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See, you have to understand that the Bible is a tale of two kingdoms. Tale of two kingdoms, we know.

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So there's a good king, his name's God. He's got a kingdom objective for you.

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For who, everybody say, for me. Talk to me church, everybody say, God. Y 'all get it, y 'all. Some of y 'all don't know me,

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I can keep us here until four o 'clock this afternoon. For who, everybody say, me.

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Me. I knew that four o 'clock this afternoon thing would wake you up, okay. So God has a kingdom objective for all of us.

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And you have to understand that God's kingdom objective is this, God's a king who wants to make you a king.

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If you're a woman, God's a king who wants to make you a queen. That sounds like, you know, that's pretty awesome.

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Like, sign me up for that program, not that I know how to be a king, but I'll take it. God's a king who wants to make you a king.

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There's another king. He's the king of this earth, we talked about it earlier, the God of this earth.

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Say, he's got a kingdom objective for you, what's that? He is a king who wants to make you a slave. So, so,

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I want you to wrap your mind around this. God says, hey, hey, I want to make you a king over an assignment,

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I want to make you a queen over an assignment. I created you to rule over an assignment that I have placed under your authority as long as you remain under my authority.

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King who wants to make you a king. King who wants to make you a slave. King who wants to give you life.

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King who wants to bring you death. A king who wants to provide promise for you. A king who wants to provide life. A king who wants to provide freedom for you.

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Promise for you, wages, abundance, lack, life, death.

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That's what the whole book is about. And Solomon, we know that the story about Solomon, even though it's about Solomon, it's not for Solomon.

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Who's it for? It's for us. How do I know it's for us? Because Romans chapter 14 tells us what? The things that were written before time were written for our learning, that we, through patience and comfort of the scripture, might have hope.

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So the reason the stories are in the Bible is for our benefit. Amen. Amen. So he put

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Solomon's story in there so Myron could learn something from Solomon. And so Solomon prayed a prayer, and his prayer was a kingdom prayer.

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When Solomon prayed, Solomon didn't pray for Solomon. He asked for wisdom. He said, Lord, give me wisdom.

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But he didn't say give me wisdom, so I can be wise. He didn't say, Lord, give me wisdom, so I can get an A on my report card. He didn't say,

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Lord, give me wisdom, so people will think I'm smart. He said, you've given me a job to do that I don't know how to do.

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Wow, that's some brutal honesty, isn't it? The job you've given me to do is bigger than I am, and because it's bigger than I am,

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Lord, give me the wisdom to do the thing you put me on this earth to do in a way that pleases you and serves the people you put me here to serve.

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The Bible says in, Jesus said in Matthew 6, verse 33, and this is one of the most misunderstood verses in the

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Bible. There are a lot of them in there like that, that people don't understand what they mean. It says, but seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you.

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And people love quoting that out of context, right?

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Jesus said, don't worry about how you're gonna make it. Don't worry about what you're gonna eat. Don't worry about what you're gonna drink.

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Don't worry about what you're gonna wear. In other words, don't worry about making sure you can take care of yourself. Seek ye first the kingdom of God and all these things shall be added unto you.

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So, I haven't done this yet. I'm gonna go ahead and do it. I'm gonna define the kingdom of God. I told you about the kingdom of God, the expansion of the kingdom of God to a foreign land called

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Earth, but what is the kingdom of God? See, my question is this. If the Bible says, seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you, if I don't know what the kingdom of God is, when

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I find it, how will I even know I found it? Right? So, I'm gonna tell you the best biblical definition of the kingdom of God that I've been able to discern, if you'd like to hear that.

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Is it okay if I share that with somebody? The kingdom of God is, I yield to God's authority as king of my life.

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I've already come to Christ, so that part's done, right? I am in Christ. But now, am

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I gonna be an obedient, am I gonna be obedient in Christ or disobedient? I'm gonna yield to his will. Not my will, but thine be done.

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So, I'm gonna yield to God as king of my life. Now, once I yield to God as king of my life, guess what happens? My assignment has to yield to me.

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It has no choice. When I am yielded to God, the things that are supposed to be under me are gonna be under me.

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Why? Because what's supposed to be under me won't be under me until I'm under who I'm supposed to be under. Your assignment is an alignment issue.

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Did you pick up what I just said? Assignment is always about alignment. If God is here, and I'm here, and my assignment's here, when

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I say, well, God, I know that you think that's a good idea, but I'm gonna do this thing over here, because I like that, I like the way it feels, I like the way it's living, and it's over here, well, guess what?

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I am not only out from under God's assignment and from under his authority, I've removed myself from being over my authority.

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You can only be over my authority. You're supposed to be over when you place yourself under who you're supposed to be under.

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Amen. It's an assignment. Assignment is all about alignment.

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Are y 'all picking up what I'm putting down? So, the kingdom of God is, I yield myself to God as he's the king of my life.

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By the way, see, that's a hard concept for Americans. I know, because I am one.

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I was preaching over in Great Britain, I know I've told this story here many times, but some of y 'all have never seen it before, so I'm gonna tell the story again, besides, I like the way it sounds.

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So, I was preaching over in Great Britain for my good friend, Bishop Wayne Malcolm, and I got done, and Bishop, he can burn a book, man, this guy, he really gets it.

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And he comes to me after the church, after the service, he says, Brother Myron, we used to, and we were in this, he was in this old, run -down church building, plaster on the walls, important painting, concrete floors, old oak pews,

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I mean, it was just really a pretty dilapidated building. He came to me, he said, Brother Myron, you know how the Brits are so proud of you, and don't tell

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Bishop I was making fun of him. Okay, he says, Brother Myron, we used to have a much nicer building, but the Queen took it. What?

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She took it? He said, yeah, she took it. I said, what do you mean she took it?

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I'm an American, right? You don't just take people's stuff, but you're the Queen, right? He said, here's what he said,

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I mean, just as, like, you'd say, well, you know, it's sunshining. He said, well, she needed it for something, so she took it.

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Now I'm really confused. And I said, something? She needed your church for something, and she took it?

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I'm mad. He's as calm as just, just as cool as a cucumber. And I looked at him, he's confused, and I said, and you're okay with that?

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You know what he said to me? I like your style. He said, he looked at me like I had four heads, and he said, well, it doesn't matter, she's the

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Queen. And then he said, you do know why the Queen's picture is on all our money, don't you?

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And I realized in that moment that I had no concept of kingdom.

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Because when you grow up in a kingdom, and you live in a kingdom, and you're trained in a kingdom, one thing you realize is that you're not a king.

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One thing you realize is that everything, and everyone in the kingdom belongs to the royal family already.

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So if they wanna do something with it, it doesn't matter. She's the Queen. So if God says, hey,

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Myron, I want you to go over here and do this, it doesn't matter, he's the king. I used to read

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Ezekiel, and I felt so bad for that dude. Every time I read Ezekiel, I just feel so bad for that dude. I don't know if y 'all ever feel bad for Ezekiel or not, but I'm like, man, this dude had it so tough, right?

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Hosea, I mean, these guys had assignments that I just would not choose, right? God tells

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Ezekiel, hey, I want you to go lay on your side for 370 days, don't get up to eat, don't get up to go to the bathroom, don't get up for nothing for 370 days.

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I want you to do that as a sermon illustration. Oh, and by the way, nobody's gonna repent.

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What? A 370 -day sermon, and nobody's gonna, like a sermon illustration, and nobody's gonna repent?

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And guess what Ezekiel did? He did it. Why? Because it doesn't matter, he's the king.

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God said, hey, Ezekiel, you know that wife you love? He said, yes, sir. He said, she's gonna die tonight, and tomorrow when you get up,

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I don't want you to mourn for her. It's a sermon illustration. Oh, by the way, nobody's gonna repent.

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And here's what the Bible says. It says, in the next morning, Ezekiel arose and his wife died, and he did in the morning as he was commanded.

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Why? It doesn't matter, he's the king. Is God the king of our lives like that?

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Like God can say, this is what I have for you to do, and we say, yes, your majesty.

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See, when the Bible says, seek ye first the kingdom of God, the word seek there is not seek like you're looking for it with a magnifying glass, like you're a specter detector or something.

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That's not what it's talking about. The word seek there is the word worship, which literally means, and the word worship, we say praise and worship, praise and worship, praise and worship, praise and worship, but the word worship and the word praise aren't really even remotely connected.

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Praise is an outward expression, but worship is when you bow down before a king.

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That's what worship is, it means to bow down. And in fact, it actually has the idea of bowing down before someone like a dog, bowing to lick its master's hand.

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That's worship. Worship, this is not a worshipful position.

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I mean, this is what we think is a worshipful, praise God, that's not worship. That's not a worshipful position. A worshipful position is bow down.

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What am I saying? I'm just, I want you to wrap your mind around this whole idea, why

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Solomon prayed this prayer the way he did. Here's what Solomon said. Dear Lord, you've given me a job to do that's bigger than I am.

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By the way, there's not a single person in this room who could not pray the same prayer.

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There's not a parent in this room who can't say, Lord, you've given me this job to be a parent. And Lord, I don't wanna make this thing up as I go along, give me the wisdom.

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There's not a husband in this room who could honestly say, well, I know how to be a good husband.

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There's not a wife in this room who could say, well, you know what? I just know how to be a good wife. It doesn't work that way.

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So we have to pray a prayer like Solomon. Here's what Solomon prayed. He said, Lord, you've given me a job to do that's bigger than I am right now.

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Give me the wisdom to do the thing you put me on this earth to do, because you made me to be king, help me to be king.

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And the king was supposed to judge the people righteously. He would hear cases and people would bring hard cases to him.

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He didn't wanna make the wrong judgment. He said, Lord, I don't wanna give the wrong judgment because you've given me these great people to serve and I don't know how to serve them the way that would please you.

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So I'm gonna go back to the definition of the king of God. I yield my life to God as king. I rule over my assignment as king of my assignment.

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And then I use the assignment that I rule over to serve the people I've come in contact with. That is the kingdom of God.

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Like I know when I come in contact with somebody, the reason God brought me into their presence is to serve them, not to get them to serve me.

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You would say, what do you mean serving? I don't know. Maybe, maybe they're just having a bad day and God sent me by to encourage them.

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Maybe, maybe when I went through the line and the cashier was grumpy, maybe it had nothing to do with me.

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Maybe God sent me by to encourage that cashier who went through something that morning that she needed encouraging words.

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But we're so self -absorbed. We're so self -consumed. And we're always looking out for number one.

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And we come across somebody's path, we think it's about us.

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Solomon said, Lord said, what do you want? He said, I know it ain't about me. That's what this prayer means.

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I know it ain't about me. You've given, you made me king over your people. These aren't my people, these are your people.

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You made me king over this thy great people. Give me the wisdom to do the thing you put me here to do in a way that pleases you and serves these people you put me here to serve.

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Do you realize that as a parent, here's the prayer that we should pray over, dear Lord, you've given me these children, that you've given me these children of parents,

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I don't know how to be a parent. Give me the wisdom to parent these children in a way that pleases you and serves these children you gave me here.

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Husband, Lord you've given me this life. Lord, give me the wisdom to husband this wife in a way that pleases you and serves this wife.

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Wife should pray the prayer. Dear Lord, give me the wisdom to be the wife you've made me to be, be the husband you've given me to wife and helped me to live a life that serves him in a way that pleases you.

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Do we seek to serve people in a way that pleases

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God or are we seeking to get people to serve us in a way that pleases us? Can I get a witness, is that a good question?

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Do you understand the only fulfillment you will ever find in life is that the yielding to the king of kings and the service of his people.

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You will never find fulfillment anywhere else. You can live in the nicest house and drive the nicest car and there's nothing wrong with that.

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I like nice houses and nice cars better, I like ones that ain't nice. But that's not where the fulfillment comes from.

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The fulfillment comes from yielding to the king and being in his majesty's service.

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And then serving the people we come in contact with. But here's the caveat, none of us know how to do it.

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Solomon wasn't the first person on earth who didn't know how to do his job, he wasn't the last person. So he wrote in the

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Bible telling his story to encourage us that we don't have to come into this thing being good at it.

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That's so freeing that I don't have to start out great to end up great.

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All I have to do is start out yielding and willing to serve. The Bible is so awesome.

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So Solomon prayed this prayer and God granted his prayer.

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How did he grant it? Well, if we go to the next chapter, 1 Kings chapter 4, here's what we see. 1

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Kings chapter 4, here's what it says. And verse number 30, it says,

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And his name was in all nations round about. And he spake 3 ,000 proverbs, and his songs were 1 ,005.

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And he spake of trees, from the cedar tree that is in Lebanon, even unto the hyssop that springeth out of the wall.

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And he spake also of the beast, and of fowl, and of creeping thing, and of fishes.

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And there came of all people to hear the wisdom of Solomon from all the kings of the earth which had heard of his wisdom.

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I'm going to say that backwards. Wow. I think I got that from Ron. Did y 'all hear what it said?

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He spake also of beast, and of fowl, and of creeping thing, and of fishes.

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And what did we find over in Proverbs? Didn't we find Solomon in Proverbs chapter 30 talking about some beasts and some creeping things?

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So let's go back and look at those beasts and creeping things and see what it has to do with our lesson this morning.

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Before I even get into that, let me say this. Stop going through life thinking woe is me because I'm not good.

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Do you realize that your weakness is your greatest opportunity for strength?

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Your inability is the perfect side hole for God to show up with his mighty army.

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So here's what it says. There be four things. How many things?

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Church, wake up. How many things? Four. There be four things which are little upon the earth.

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It says they're little, but guess what? They are exceeding wise. Which means their wisdom is bigger than they are.

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Which means you don't have to be naturally good if you're connected to a supernatural

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God. Did you hear what

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I just said? Hey, hey, he said you don't have to be naturally good if you're connected to a supernatural

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God. Your inability can become your greatest ability.

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Your insufficiency can become your greatest sufficiency. Your weakness can become your greatest strength.

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The apostle Paul besought the Lord three times. Lord, remove this thorn in my flesh, this weakness in my flesh.

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And God said, my grace, my gift is sufficient for thee. My strength is made perfect in your weakness.

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Thank God for my weakness. There's a place in my life where God can show up. And when he shows up, he shows out.

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Proverbs chapter 30, verse 24. There be four things which are little upon the earth, but they are exceeding wise. He starts out with the ant.

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The ants are a people not strong, yet they prepare their meat in the summer. By the way, I want you to understand that this is not just Solomon sitting around making stuff up.

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God gave him God's perspective on these things. Now, Paul, do you have any wisdom before I start breaking this down?

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So, before you can have wisdom, there are some prerequisites.

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Prerequisites means you're required to have these things before you can have that thing. Wisdom has prerequisites.

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And I want to congratulate everybody in here because we were all born with the first prerequisite of wisdom. Would you like to know what it is?

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The first prerequisite of wisdom is ignorance. We were all born with that.

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We were born knowing nothing. We didn't know mom from dad, brother from sister, hand from foot, left from right, up from down, up from below.

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We didn't know anything. So, ignorance is the absence of truth.

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What's ignorance? The absence of truth. What's ignorance? The absence of truth.

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And then we begin to grow and all of a sudden we're doing this one day. And our mom says, hand, that's your hand, honey.

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We go, hand, hand, hand. That's right, baby, that's your hand. That's right, baby, that's your hand.

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Hand, hand, hand, hand, hand. And we get so much joy out of that. I don't know why. Right?

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We're so easily fascinated as infants. Okay, so, we learned our hand.

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I want you to think about that. When we were born, we didn't know what our hand was. But we learned what our hand is. We learned what our fingers were.

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We learned our right hand from our left hand. And we learned what our forearm is, and our arm, and our shoulders.

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Thousands of things we've learned. By the time we're three, we've learned thousands of things. By the time we're four, many, many more thousands.

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By the time we're five, man, we know so many thousands of things. But we all started out ignorant. Ignorance is the absence of truth.

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The next thing we do, we go from ignorance, we go to what? Knowledge. That's the next prerequisite.

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What's knowledge? Knowledge is the accumulation of truth. I go, hand, hand, hand. Okay, now I know that's my hand. Hand, hand, hand.

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I thought this was my hand. No, that's my hand. Oh, I have two hands. Wow, I have two hands. Imagine that.

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Right? And so I go from having ignorance to having knowledge.

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Knowledge is pretty cool. But knowledge can fake you out. People can make the mistake of thinking they are wise just because they have knowledge.

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Knowledge is a prerequisite of knowledge. Knowledge is a prerequisite of wisdom, but knowledge is not equal to wisdom.

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Y 'all picking up what I'm putting down? So you can know something without being wise about that thing.

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So, knowledge is the accumulation of truth. Ignorance is what?

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The absence of truth. Knowledge is the, what? Accumulation of truth. And then we go to the next one, which is understanding is the assimilation of truth.

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Now I don't just collect the truth like I do with the accumulation, but now

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I comprehend the truth. I don't just know what it is, I know what it means. How many of y 'all picking up what

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I'm putting down? So, before I can have wisdom, I've got to have ignorance.

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Well, I had that, so I was in good shape. Then I've got to collect some knowledge. And once I do that, now

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I've got the accumulation of some truth, but I don't know what it all means. And then I begin to understand what it means.

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Now I've got to understand, I've got the assimilation of truth. And then I can finally step into wisdom. And wisdom is the application of truth.

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In fact, the Old Testament word wisdom would be our modern -day word, not smart, not intelligent, not high

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IQ, not Mensa. But the modern -day word for wise would be the word skill.

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The word for wisdom would be the word skillful, which means you are applying what you know and understand.

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So we have ignorance, absence of truth.

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We have knowledge, the accumulation of truth. We have understanding, the assimilation of truth.

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We have wisdom, the application of truth. And then we have foolishness. What's that? That's when you abandon the truth. Well, I know it's true, but I'm just not going to do it because I'm a fool.

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I know it's true, but I'm a man. I don't know what I'm going to do. That's when you abandon the truth.

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Maybe you think you're smarter than the truth. Maybe you think you're bigger than the truth. Maybe you think you don't require the truth. But I'm telling you, that's a fool.

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So now that we've defined what wisdom is, the scripture says there are four things that are belittle upon the earth, but they're exceeding wise.

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In other words, these things know how to apply the things that they know. And it starts with an and.

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It says the ants are a people not strong, yet they prepare their meat in the summer. What does that tell us? It tells us that we can learn the wisdom of contemplation from the ant, because the ant knows how to prepare.

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What does contemplate mean? Contemplate means I'm thinking about tomorrow, today, and I'm getting ready for tomorrow, today.

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I'm not waiting for tomorrow, and then the stuff that happens tomorrow, I didn't know that could happen.

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I make some plans for tomorrow. It's called a contingency. What does the Bible tell us? It says the wise man foresees evil.

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What does foresee mean? He sees it before it gets to him. Foresees evil. What does he do? He hides himself.

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But what does the fool do? The foolish pass on and are punished. We learn the wisdom of contemplation from the ant and that they know how to prepare.

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Here's what that means. Family, here's what that means. If you don't have any money, get some life insurance.

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What does that mean? If you don't have money, get some life insurance. Because life insurance is kind of a misnomer.

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It's kind of a bad label. Like if you have car insurance, you break your car, you get a new car.

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If you have house insurance, your house burned down, you get a new house. If you have life insurance, you get a new house. So life insurance is not really life insurance.

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Are y 'all picking up what I'm putting down? Life insurance is income replacement insurance. Why should you have life insurance if you don't have money?

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So that your family can eat if you die. See, my family is not just my responsibility while I'm alive.

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My family is also my responsibility if I die. What do you mean your family's responsibility if I die?

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Well, that's what the Bible says. A good man leaveth an inheritance to his children's children.

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So if I don't have an inheritance to leave to my children's children yet, I've got to have some life insurance until I've got enough money to leave it in here.

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Wow, that's amazing. See, I'm blown away. People have – people and their family die, and the next thing you know, there's a

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GoFundMe. I'm not judging this. I'm just saying, like, life insurance is easy. And it's really easy when you're young.

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Right? Life insurance is easy. It costs less than a dollar a day. You can have $100 ,000. You say, I'm not sure.

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Guys say this. I want to just grab them. So you wonder or have to go find somebody.

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Oh, a wise man foreseeth evil and hideth himself.

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Like, hey, hey, guess what? Here's what we found out about cars. They break down. So what does that mean? Some of your money that you make every week, you should save some money for when your car breaks down, for when the refrigerator breaks down.

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All I'm saying is we learn the wisdom of contemplation from the ant. What do they do? They know how to prepare. They prepare for contingencies in the future.

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This is just like – it's Bible. Okay. One more quick thing about the ant I've got to show you.

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Proverbs chapter 6. I'm going to do this really, really quickly, and then we're going to get to the other three, and then we're going to be done, and then y 'all can go home and meditate on the

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Scripture. Bless God. Proverbs chapter 6, Solomon talks about the ant again.

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Here's what he said. Go to the ant, thou sluggard, consider her ways and be wise. What's he saying? He's saying ants are industrious.

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We can learn to work hard from ants. All we've got to do is watch them. I've seen ants doing a lot of stuff.

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One thing I've never seen an ant doing, never saw an ant standing still. They are always moving and doing something.

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They're either doing something or looking for something to do. Go to the ant, thou sluggard, consider her ways and be wise.

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Watch this. What's having no guide? What's that mean? The ant is self -taught. If you don't know how to do something, there's this amazing building in town.

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They've got one right here in Corsicana. It's called a library. It's amazing. They will let you read their books for free.

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They won't even charge you for it. Now, here's the caveat. They won't come by and read them to you.

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You've got to take an initiative. But you know what? Even though they let people read books for free to learn how to do all kinds of stuff, 3 % of the

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American population has a library card. Okay, I'm going to keep going.

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No guide, no overseer. See, an ant is self -taught, but also, not only is an ant self -taught, but it says they have no overseer.

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What does that mean? Well, that means an ant is self -disciplined. They do what they're supposed to do, when they're supposed to do it, because they're supposed to do it.

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And guess what? They do it that way every time they do it. They don't have to have somebody watching over them. They're going to do it.

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This is what I'm supposed to do. I'm doing it. I'm supposed to do it. The Bible says, King Solomon said, go watch the ant. Do what you're supposed to do, when you're supposed to do it, the way you're supposed to do it.

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Do it that way every time you do it. And it says, no ruler. What does that mean? That means they're self -motivated. They don't need somebody to come by and crack the whip.

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But you didn't wake me up. Well, guess what? You didn't wake me up either, but I'm up.

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Provide with her meat in the summer, gather her food in the harvest. How long without sleep, O sluggard, when will thou rise out of thy sleep?

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A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding in the hands to sleep. So shall thy poverty come as one that traveleth, and thy want as an armed man.

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What is that saying? It's saying that laziness will steal everything from you that you've ever hoped for.

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Okay. Let's go back to Proverbs chapter 30. We got three more creeping things to talk about here, and then we're going to be done.

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It says in Proverbs chapter 30 and verse number 26, the

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Cones are a feeble folk, yet they make their houses in the rocks. A Cone is a rock badger.

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So it says the Cones are feeble folk. What does that mean? They can't protect themselves. So we learn the wisdom of compensation from the

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Cone, because they know how to protect themselves with things that are stronger than they are.

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See, a Cone does not have a false image of its own ability to protect itself.

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So what does it do? It makes its house in the rock. So the predator that's seeking the Cone can't get to the Cone because it can't get through the rock.

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We, as human beings, we need to learn how to protect ourselves. Like coming to church, this is not a religious exercise we do.

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This is something we do to protect ourselves. It says the name of the

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Lord is a strong tower. The righteous, what? Run up into it and it's safe. See, the

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Bible tells us, it's not my word like a hammer that breaks a rock in pieces. The Bible tells us that the word of God, Jesus said to Peter, he said,

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Thou art Peter, small stone, and on this rock, boulder,

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I will build my church. The reason we come here is to learn the truth about that big boulder, the truth, the boulder he was talking about was the truth of the fact that he is the

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Christ, the Son of the living God. Okay. We need to learn to protect ourselves with things that are stronger than we are.

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And that's why we go to church. I don't go to church so I can do a religious exercise. I go to church so that I can get infused with the word of God and so I can hide in the rock of God's word.

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I've trusted Christ as my Savior and my soul is hidden in the cleft of the rock of the name of Jesus Christ.

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Okay. I'm going to go to the next one. So we learn the wisdom of, we learn the wisdom of contemplation from the ant, they know how to prepare.

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We learn the wisdom of compensation from the colony, they know how to protect themselves with things that are stronger than they are. And then it says, the next one is, it says the locusts have no king yet they go forth all of them by bands.

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We learn the wisdom of cooperation from the locusts. It's not good.

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Yes, that's true about it. God made us independent but interdependent.

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See, whether I like it or not, I need you. Whether you like it or not, you need me. It's how God set it up.

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So we might as well just go ahead and deal with it. We learn the wisdom of cooperation.

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God didn't give any of us all the answers but he gave all of us some of the answers so when we come together we can support each other.

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So amazing. One of the things, when I go around the country and around the world and do seminars, one of the things

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I teach is I teach a concept called the history and mystery of wealth. And you can't solve the mystery of wealth until you understand the history of wealth.

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And I talk about the different economic eras. Money moves like wealth changes into different economic arenas in different economic eras.

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I'm going to do this really, really fast. So from the beginning of time to the mid -1700s, the whole economic infrastructure of the world was built on agriculture.

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Land equaled wealth and the people who owned the land owned the wealth. From the mid -1700s to the mid -1900s, a couple hundred years, wealth was in machines.

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We were in the industrial age. Machines equaled wealth. The people who owned the machines owned the wealth. And what's really amazing is most of us grew up as children of the industrial age or some of us grew up in the industrial age.

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Like I was born after the industrial age. I was born in 1961. The industrial age, the wealth shifted from the industrial age into the new economic era in the early 1950s, like around 1954, 1952, somewhere in there.

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So we're going to just say 1955 around to the nearest five, right? So 1955. So from the mid -1750s to the mid -1950s, the economic infrastructure of the world was in machines, and the people who owned the machines owned the wealth.

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If you wanted to do something, if you wanted to earn some money, you had to go to someone who owned some machines, and they had to give you a job.

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If you thought you could write a book, you had to go to people who owned the machines who owned the printing presses, and they had to think that your writing was good enough to deserve a book.

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If you thought you could sing, you had to go to the people who owned the record labels, and they had to think that you were good enough to make an album.

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So during the industrial age, so many things that were created that didn't exist before. Like the whole idea of retirement was created during the industrial age.

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There was no such thing as retirement until the industrial age. People just worked until they died. There was no such thing as – in the

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United States, people think it's your patriotic duty to pay more in taxes. Here's the reality. There was no such thing as federal income tax until 1913.

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It didn't exist. There was no such thing as – I know this is going to shock you, but high school was not invented until the

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Great Depression. People graduated from the eighth grade. And the average high school graduate today could pass an eighth grade equivalency test from the 1930s.

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It's amazing. There's so much about history you don't know, so that's why it's best to repeat yourself. So 1950s, from the mid -1950s to 1978, we went into the distribution age.

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And in the distribution age, outlets equaled wealth. And then Sam Walton and Sears and Roebuck and Kmart and infomercials and multilevel marketing and all this stuff that did distribution was created between 1955 and 1978.

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A little 28 -year time period. And more wealth was created then than during the industrial age. More wealth was created in the industrial –

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I mean in the industrial age than in the agricultural age. Guess what happened? 1978. What was invented in 1978?

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Personal computer. And from 1978 to 1974, we went into the technology age.

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And in the early 1980s, everybody who went to college wanted to go to college for what? Computer programming. Why? We saw

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Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, billionaire babies on the front of Time Magazine, Man of the Year. But we didn't know that Bill Gates started programming computers in 1967.

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So we were too late. Like our first day studying that, if that's what you went to school for, you were already too late.

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What happened in 1994? Well, the Internet became prolific. And we went into the information age from 1994 to 2003.

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Are you noticing something about these economic areas? What happened? What happened, Joe? Say it again. Because every economic – and so the time to prepare gets shorter and shorter.

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So you began to learn how to make a living. And by the time you graduated from whatever you went to school to learn for, it was already too late.

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We had already shifted into another economic era. You prepared yourself to make a living in the past. How are you all picking up what

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I'm putting there? And guess what happened? In 2003, we went into what I call the techno -info -entertainment age, where people who knew how to use technology to create information to educate people in an entertaining way, those were the people who became mad – crazy wealthy.

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Like there was a guy who was a comedian named Jeff Foxworthy who literally became a multimillionaire selling cassette tapes at truck stops.

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You might have never heard of him. That's amazing. It was so easy for him.

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He could have made the mistake of thinking it was because he was good, right? And he might be good. But that's not why it worked. It worked because he created – he was wiser in his generation.

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Are you all picking up what I'm putting there? Now, something happened that was amazing in 2008.

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This is the first time this has ever happened in human history. Margaret Downey, you've heard it here first. Heart of Meadows Church, of course,

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Kansas. And that is, in 2008, we went into the first economic era in world history that's ever lasted for a longer period.

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First time it ever happened in world history, 2008. There was something that was created in 2007. Does anybody remember what was invented in 2007?

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Yeah, that's right. Say it again, Jenny. iPhone, 2007. Woo -hoo! What happened in 2008?

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The next thing that they created was what? It was big. They paid out over $2 .3

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billion in commissions in two and a half years. What was the next thing that Apple invented in 2008?

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The App Store. And in 2008, we entered into – watch this now – the partnership era.

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For the first time in the world, they would pay you 70 % of the money for your product you created that they sold to their customer base.

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And guess what? We are still in the partnership age ten years later. Like, the person who can make their life happen the best in 2008 and beyond so far are the people who are the best at creating strategic partnerships with other people and other businesses.

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It's amazing. Anyway, why did I say all that? Because we learned the wisdom of cooperation from the

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Locust in that they all participate. One of the things, if you went back and read King Solomon's story,

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Solomon had this wisdom way back when. Solomon, the Bible tells us that he made a pact with this king and he made a league with that king and he entered an affinity with this king.

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Solomon was doing partnerships way back in his age. Solomon was doing seminars back in – it says everybody on the earth came to hear

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Solomon. He didn't have time to talk to all those people individually. He was doing seminars way back then. He was writing songs. He was writing proverbs.

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Anyway, I'm just showing you that all this stuff is in the Bible. It's practical. The Locust go forth, who are you participating with?

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Well, I'm just going to do my own thing. I just want to move out in the woods and just be by myself. Well, that's fine. It's just not how

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God set it up. It's not good for man to be alone. I'm on the last one. Here we are. It says, The spider taketh hold with her hands and is in the king's palaces.

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What does that mean? We can learn the wisdom of – that's so amazing.

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That means I don't have to be the person who creates everything. I can take what somebody else has done and catalyze it.

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Hey, you look at this church. You look at this school. You don't have to start this school, but you can catalyze all the fact that it's here.

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You don't have to start this church, but you can catalyze all the fact that it's here. We don't have to create the internet, but we can catalyze all the fact that it's here.

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But we have to be wise enough to be like a spider and go to bed before we do that.

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After we pray the same prayer that King Solomon prayed, Dear Lord, give me the wisdom to do the thing you put me here to do in a way that pleases you and serves the people you put me here to do.

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And I begin to apply these principles, how to be wise beyond my size, to what the word of God or to what

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God has created me for. I'll be blown away that maybe when I look in the rearview mirror of my life,

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I'll notice that God did for me what he did for Solomon, and he made me one of the best of the best in my assignment who's ever lived on the earth.

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James confirmed it in James chapter 1. Here's what he said, and I'm done. He said, If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, who giveth to all men liberally, and it braideth not, and here's what it says next, and it shall be given him.

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Father, thank you for your word. I pray that you would let your word sink down deep into every cell of our being, and may we live a life that is yielded to the

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King of Kings. May we rule over our assignment with great authority, and may we use the assignment we rule over to serve the people whose paths we cross, and we thank you for it in the name of Jesus our