Thank you to the ate C. M. Ward for his contributions to this message. To God be the glory and may His Word bring forth the results which He has sent if forth to do.
Job 32:6 ,7. "I am young in years and you are very old; therefore I was afraid, and dared not declare my opinion unto you. I said, age (days/years) should speak, and multitude of years should teach wisdom."
Your life is made up of inventory: some is of countless value; other is made up of wasted days and a fruitless period of time, yet it's there, written down, recorded, waiting to be once again brought to life to be used against you, or to be used in your favor.
Matthew 12:36 (NKJV)
36 But I say to you that for every idle word men may speak, they will give account of it in the day of judgment.
Your inventory is made up of your experiences. Good or bad, every experience, every word, every attempt, every success and every failure has been documented.
Experience is your best teacher ... We learn by the things we have done ... by the things we are going to do.
The question is; what has your experiences taught you?
What, if anything,t have you learned?
A. You have learned if you live in the city to get up early to avoid rush hour traffic
B. You have learned where the best restaurants are that serve the best food for the best prices.
C. You've learned to get the front seat of the bus and the back seat of the church.
D. You've learned to keep your friends close and your enemies closer.
These may seem like simple cliches' to some and experiences to others.
- but there is more ... Much more.
E. You've learned that God brings people into your life, some for a season but all for a reason, for each one teaches us something.
1. Experiences teach us that patience really is a virtue and that getting rattled and frazzled over a time delay serves only to make the wait much more miserable.
2. They teach us that using honey to catch flies is much better than using vinegar, or something like that.
And I can tell you that you can save both your honey and your vinegar because if you are talking about flies, attracting them really isn't difficult at all.
Your days speak ....
- your days call out your experiences ...
- you know now the stove is hot because that scar on your hand is a constant reminder.
You relish the days when you had certain experiences ... The day you met a certain friend
... The week you spent laying on the beach on that secluded island, but there is always another side to the coin.
... You cringe to think what might have happened had you married that high school sweetheart who turned out to be everything you didn't need in your life.
Experience has been our teacher.
- our days speak
- a multitude of years have hopefully taught us wisdom.
You think back to the individuals who have contributed to your life ...
- those who taught you a skill that became your livelihood and supported your family over the years.
- that person who encouraged to sing and to use your talents for the Lord.
If multitudes of years have taught us wisdom, then our future should be a little better than our past.
- we know from experience the many pitfalls we should avoid
- those mistakes to avoid again and to not do them over and over.
The late C.M. Ward says that our experiences are a reference library.
- if I find myself heading for a ledge that I have fallen off of more than once, all I have to do is go to my reference library and there it is, written down, recorded to be brought out again one day when I stand before the God of the Ages
- but I can draw from those experiences in the meantime to help me not repeat the same mistake over and over again.
- our experiences should teach us that there is peace and safety in God's house, among God's people, in God's Word.
- likewise, our experiences teach us spending our nights in some sleazy bar, drinking our paycheck away one bottle at a time, putting anything we may have left in those machines in the back room where only other gamblers can watch us - and many who relate to us as we walk out empty-handed wondering how we are going to explain to our spouse that we only intended to have one drink ... That we don't know what happened ... That we'll ask for an advance in next week's pay so the kids will have food for the week.
Our days speak .... If only we would listen.
Listen to Job cry out: Job 19:23-27 (NKJV)
23 “Oh, that my words were written! (They are Job, they are)
Oh, that they were inscribed in a book! (They are Job, they are)
24 That they were engraved on a rock
With an iron pen and lead, forever! (They are Job, they are)
25 For I know that my Redeemer lives, (Experience has been your teacher, Job)
And He shall stand at last on the earth;
26 And after my skin is destroyed, this I know, (what has experience taught you, Job?)
That in my flesh I shall see God,
27 Whom I shall see for myself,
And my eyes shall behold, and not another.
How my heart yearns within me!
C. M. Ward says, "experience is a trust ... That like any investment, experience should bear interest dividends."
Why do our youth act the way they do? Why does it seem like they stumble over their own feet a lot of the time.
- Because they lack experience
- They haven't lived long enough like you and I to teach them how to walk without falling into the same pit over and over again.
Why do our young people seem to make so many mistakes.
- they don't have the experiences to call on like we do.
The question is, why do we, with all of the experiences we have to draw from, continue to act the way we do?
-- Why do we continue to make so many mistakes when experience has been our teacher more than one time?
-- when our days speak to us
- fellas, why is there such a compulsion to look to some younger lady to make you feel alive again?
- experience tells you that ... That lovely wife that you sleep beside of every night is the best thing that has ever happened to you. (And I can call her a "thing" because the Bible does.
- - - Proverbs 18:22 "He who finds a wife finds a good thing."
Listen, she may not look exactly the way she did the day you said "I Do."
--- but just a little reminder .... Neither do you
A. Listen men, and women ... This goes both way; you look at that spouse and his or her clothes may be a little more snug than they used to be,
B. It's all in how you look at it .... Ladies, you can look at him and tell yourself that your husband has gotten fat since you married him and you didn't sign on for that ....
C. Or you can look at that stud muffin and tell yourself that he is twice the man today that he was when you married him.
IT'S ALL IN HOW YOU LOOK AT IT.
But listen, the devil will try to tell you that the grass is greener on the other side, but you can know by experience that the greenest grass usually grows right over top of a sewage tank.
You can know from experience that even the neighbors grass, no matter how is looks, still needs to be mowed. And if it's really that much nicer than your, chances are good it's going to take a lot more care and maintenance than the grass you have.
- come on fellas, experience tells you that no matter how good that pretty little thing looks, that lady that you wake up beside of every morning, has proven herself to be faithful and true to you, and you don't have to worry about her pulling up stakes and moving on to the next guy as soon as she sobers up and realizes that she didn't want to marry some father figure.
- experience may have failed you, (or you may have failed to learn from your own experiences) but experience will soon tell her that she didn't want to marry a tired, worn out homebody.
- she wants someone who can keep up with her (and spend money), someone who likes to travel (and spend money) ... someone who isn't satisfied being treated like a princess. She wants someone who will treat her like a queen (AND SPEND MONEY).
Our experiences aren't only serving as our teacher, they are, as I said early on, they are all being recorded for each of us to one day give an account of.... Not to our parents .... Not to our spouse ... Not even to ourselves, but to God.
- you see, we are stewards of what we have learned.
It is our place to make good use of what we have learned by our experiences.
-- it is important that we instruct and educate others based on our experiences.
-- we have opportunities to spare others from hardships and pitfalls by being able to pull from our experiences.
-- we can at least make our mistakes and blunders turn out for good by preventing others from making the same mistakes ...
But not so if we continue to make the same mistakes over and over.
-- the old saying ... How many times does an elephant have to step on your head before you realize the circus is in town?
-- our experiences should teach us compassion.
Hebrews 4:15. (NIV)
15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet he did not sin.
He understands our hardships, our infirmities, our temptations because of His own experiences.
Isaiah 53:4-6 New King James Version (NKJV)
4 Surely He has borne our griefs
And carried our sorrows;
Yet we esteemed Him stricken,
Smitten by God, and afflicted.
5 But He was wounded for our transgressions,
He was bruised for our iniquities;
The chastisement for our peace was upon Him,
And by His stripes we are healed.
6 All we like sheep have gone astray;
We have turned, every one, to his own way;
And the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.
He knows how you feel. He understands because He has been there.
Our experiences should make us sensitive to the needs of others.
--- It's so easy to be critical and judgmental toward others if we haven't experienced something similar in our own life.
But suddenly, when a similar lot falls our way, we begin to understand a little better what others go through.
--- Jesus taught in the Sermon on the Mount, "Blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy." (Matt. 5:7)
To borrow from some of the wiser ones who have left us with great sayings ... We learn from experience that
A). it's better to rule a temper than to rule a city.
B). We learn that it really is good to treat others the way we want to be treated.
C) that pride goes before destruction and a haughty spirit before we fall.
So our experiences teach us often times that we should err on the side of caution:
-- the old saying, once burned, twice careful
-- words spoken in anger have broken apart families and split churches
Most soldiers who go into battle don't usually come out the same way they were when they went in.
-- they come out more cautious, many always looking over their shoulders, wanting to duck under a table every time they hear a sudden, loud noise.
-- experience has taught them such.
The best trainers are those who have been thru the battle.
-- David used his experiences to draw from:
"Yea, tho' I walk through the valley of they shadow of death I will fear no evil for you are with me."
That wasn't some fly-by-night comment.
A) even as a young lad watching his father's sheep, he had to face down the lion and the bear
B) he drew from his experiences and testified to Goliath just before he killed him and took his head off.
-- the same God who was with me when I faced the lion and the bear is the same God who will be with me today as I face you in battle.
-- oh yeah, and by the way, He helped me kill them and guess what ..... Based on that, YOU'RE GOING DOWN.
C) Job drew from his experiences when he said, "Tho' He slay me, yet I will trust Him.
D) Jude in the N.T., "Now unto Him who is able to keep you from falling and present you faultless before God on that day."
-- that's experience talking. Not just for the here and now, but for the hereafter.
-- on that day when you stand before Him .... Your experiences then behind you, and you stand confidently before the Great and Awesome God knowing by experience that all is well
-- not because of who you are, but because of who Jesus is and you know by experience that He has stood with you all throughout life and He will stand with you in death because He has covered you with His blood and sealed you with His Spirit and he has stamped on your heart ....FORGIVEN
Experience is recorded history:
- Days do speak.
- years do tell many a story
- a multitude of years should teach wisdom, Job said.
John 19:17-22 New King James Version (NKJV)
The King on a Cross
17 And He, bearing His cross, went out to a place called the Place of a Skull, which is called in Hebrew, Golgotha, 18 where they crucified Him, and two others with Him, one on either side, and Jesus in the center. 19 Now Pilate wrote a title and put it on the cross. And the writing was:
JESUS OF NAZARETH, THE KING OF THE JEWS.
20 Then many of the Jews read this title, for the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city; and it was written in Hebrew, Greek, and Latin.
21 Therefore the chief priests of the Jews said to Pilate, “Do not write, ‘The King of the Jews,’ but, ‘He said, “I am the King of the Jews.”’”
22 Pilate answered, “What I have written, I have written.”
What I have written, I have written ...
A record is being kept .... Take it lightly if you want. ... Count it for naught if you so desire, but every deed is on file.
-- if you think it's amazing how much your government knows about you, you ain't seen nothin' yet.
-- God has documented every word spoken, every transaction done, every stab in the back.
-- in the book is recorded, every act of adultery or fornication, every unkind deed done behind someone's back will be spelled out in detail...
The verdict for each of us will be either, depart from me you worker of iniquity,
Or ...
Matthew 25:21 New King James Version (NKJV)
21 His lord said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant; you were faithful over a few things, I will make you ruler over many things. Enter into the joy of your lord.’
Which will it be for you, my friend?
What about all I have done pastor? I have experiences I'm not proud of, thing I wish I would have never done or said...
There is only one attorney who qualifies to step into the courtroom and to speak on your behalf...
