Life's Most Important Issues

LIFE’S MOST IMPORTANT ISSUES

INTRO.- ILL.- A certain boss was talking to his employee about selling their products and he said, “The main thing to remember is that repetition is the key. Repetition. Repetition. Repetition. If you have a product to sell, keeping harping on it in every possible way and at every possible chance. Cram it down people’s throats if you have to...make yourself sickening, if need be...but don’t forget to repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat. It’s the only way to get results.”

The employee said, “Yes, sir!”

Boss: “And now, what was it that you came in to see me about?” The employee replied, “A raise in salary! A raise! A raise! A raise! A raise!”

What is your priority in life? Or what are your priorities in life? A salary raise. More money. For

most people it’s money, money, money, money.

ILL.- In Deadwood, South Dakota, there is a museum which has the following inscription written by an old prospector. He said, “I lost my gun. I lost my horse. I am out of food. The Indians are after me. BUT I’VE GOT ALL THE GOLD I CAN CARRY!”

ILL.- According to one Roper Organization survey, the number ! daydream that most have is to be rich. “Who wants to be a Millionaire?” And many people want to be a millionaire.

ILL.- Ragged clothes....never enough food to eat.... virtually no medical attention....poor sleeping

quarters....little or no time for recreation or rest .... no time for family....SOUND LIKE A POOR PERSON IN TERRIBLE SHAPE?

Not so. Her name is Hetty Green who at one time was the richest and most detested woman in America!

At one time Hetty Green had $100,000,000 in the bank and yet she ate crackers and cold oatmeal because she was too cheap to buy good food. She lived the last 20 years of her life with a painful hernia because she would not spend the money, which was $150 at that time, for an operation. She tried to relieve the pain by placing a stick over the hernia and binding it to her body with rags.

You will be angered to find out that her own son’s leg had to be amputated because she was too cheap to take him to a doctor. She tried for several days to get free medical attention but each doctor she went to for help recognized her as a millionaire and refused to treat the boy for free.

When she was at last reconciled to paying a doctor she went to her neighborhood doctor and was told the boy’s leg would have to be amputated above the knee.

With millions of dollars in the bank, Hetty Green spent half the night searching for a lost $.2 cent

postage stamp. Another time, she attempted to forge the signature of her deceased Aunt in a vain attempt to get another million dollars!

Hetty Green’s father was Edward “Blackhawk” Robinson who sat her on his knee and read to her the business news and stock market reports when she was only 5 years old. Hetty Green claimed to have read them by herself when she was six years old. She was brainwashed as a baby with the mercenary philosophy of her father. She grew into a ruthless financial tyrant who found it easier to make a million dollars than to take a bath. When she died the fortune that enslaved her continued to plague her playboy son and screwball daughter.

The story of Hetty Green is the story of a slave, a slave to money. Her priorities were all messed up!

Matt. 16:26 “What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul?”

Brothers and sisters, what are your priorities in life? I hope they are not the priorities of Hetty Green. Anyone who is on her track is on the wrong track!

ILL.- The founder of McDonald’s fast-food restaurants, Ray Krock, was once asked what he believed in. He said, “I believe in God, my family and McDonald’s, but when I get to the office, I reverse the order.”

Whenever Ray Krock got to work his priorities changed. It was then McDonald’s first, his family and

God last. And he was, of course, another person who had wrong priorities.

Brethren, the vast majority of the people of the world have mixed up or wrong priorities.

II Tim. 3:1-2, 4 “There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money...and lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God.”

Most people’s priorities are: they love self, money and pleasure. AND THEY ARE WRONG! In God’s eyes they are wrong!

Again, what are your priorities? What do you believe in most of all? What do you value most of all? What does your life say? How does it read? What do other people see as your priorities? And more importantly, what does God see?