<TITLE>17. Par 62-64</TITLE>L-62 But this rich young man... now here's something for you businessmen, and I have to close. Notice now, so you'll--you'll let this sink deep in your hearts. By rejecting Jesus it never stopped his increase of goods. He continued on. Let's follow him awhile down through the Bible. His flow of goods got greater. And because your business picks up a little bit, don't you never think that all the time that's God's blessings. The wicked prosper, you know.
This man, he got greater. And he got to a place till he was so great till all of his barns bursted almost. He had to build new ones.
Now, he thought he had done the right thing by turning down Jesus and not making an investment in Him. He thought he was--he'd done the right thing, because in the worldly possessions... (I'm going to say something now.) In worldly possessions he thought he'd done the right thing because he had prospered. And that's what our denominations think. Because they organize themselves, and their groups become millionaires and billionaires, they feel that they are it.

L-63 Didn't the Bible say, "Thou art rich and increased in goods (to this age), but don't know that you're naked, miserable, poor, wretched, blind, and don't even know it." What a miserable condition. Men and brethren, don't make an investment in something like that. It's bound to perish. Why not make an investment in something that's proved down through the Bible? And you know, with the--the texts that I got written here, we could be here tonight, still on these texts proving through the Bible those who made that and who turned it down.
I am showing you a real investment to make. Put your life, your time, your money, your talent, put everything you've got in Christ. God guaranteed it to us by raising Him up again. We'll rise in the last days. He promised it. What more could you look forward to? Tell me any investment you could make would pay off like that.
Tell me what you could invest in this morning and make ten million dollars, and tomorrow be a corpse? What good would it do you? What profit a man if he gained the whole world and lose his soul? What if you're popular, and called So-and-so, and Deacon, Presbyter Dr., Bishop, Elder, Pope, or whatever you might be called? That's praises of men.
I'd rather be called a holy-roller by the people, and had be a son of God in my heart, with the new birth and the Spirit of Christ dwelling in me, and Him proving it by the vindication of His Word and making me live. "The life that I once lived I don't live no more," Paul said. And yet he was a teacher and a scholar. But he changed his life, when he met Christ, and made his investment in Christ. He was a different man from then on.

L-64 Oh, increased in goods. Certainly this man did. You know what? Jesus told him, if you notice here, He said, "Go, sell what you have, and give it to the poor. And come follow Me. Take up your cross and follow Me, and you'll have riches in heaven." See? What an investment to make, but he chose not to do it.
Now, so has the Laodicea church age chose the same thing: not to do it. And remember, when he got so awful rich (as the church has today), the poor laid at his gate, and only got the crumbs that he swept off to the dogs: Lazarus, the poor in spirit.
Jesus said in Matthew 5, "Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs in the Kingdom of heaven." We don't want to take that place, that rutted place, that way away place of being poor in the spirit. We don't want that. We want somebody to praise us and be big somebody.
As some brother said awhile ago, sure sealed it good, when he said, "How can you have faith, when you have respect one to another, or desire the--the praises one of another?" Don't care what anybody says. You want the praises of God, the respect of God on you. He will only respect you as you keep His Word. All right.


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