What's It Like Down Under? (Part 3)

We all have equal amounts of time everyone of us.

We are given each morning, 86,000 seconds 1440 minutes 24 hours in the day. Everyone of us has exactly the same amount of time.

Listen carefully you cannot carry forward your time that you did not use for the day before. You cannot take credit for the time from the date before in two days time tomorrow will be yesterday in 30 minutes the future will become the past what we do with these equal amount of hours and time that God gives us is of utmost importance. How we divvy up the hours that God has given us is of utmost importance.

How we dedicate the time that God has given us every single day is of outermost importance how to prioritize our time in our hours that God has given us as a gift is outermost importance. Sometimes I have to chuckle about the use of time I read not long ago about how this visitor to the United States and wrote a commentary he said you know, America is the only country I've ever been to where men literally jumped the traffic light. The safe seconds, but then they patiently wait to tee off at the golf course for hours. We are driven by the clock out about the elevator operator who really got tired of people soon as you walk into his elevator the site what time is it what time is it what time is at present I am fed up with that. So I brought a big clock and you put it right there in his elevator. Guess what, everybody walked in his elevator says is that clock right where all given exactly the same amount of time ritual for young and old, married or single student or teacher.

We all have the exactly the same amount of hours.

How many times we use the word time in our conversations in our discussion throughout the day.

I don't have time how much time will it take, don't waste my time. It's time to go timeout Sir Isaac Watts said time is like an ever rolling stream bears all its children away order. To him it out on this one. What makes time to be very important is the fact that it is irretrievable. That's why it is repeatable, easy instant replay is only on television. Now the life and it was that fact that time is it repeatable that time is irretrievable that caused King Solomon to focus on time and the importance of time in his life and the meaning of life and why he came to that conclusion about the meaninglessness of life. Knowledge extend with me please to Ecclesiastes chapter 3. There, he concludes, in the very beginning. There is a time for everything we have begun a series of messages entitled what is like down under and it is we saw how down under at least when the way Solomon use it is under the sun and under the sun is a euphemism it's a reference to living alive this life without God is living alive without reference to God without the relationship with God without the living under the authority of the word of God that is alive under where and at this time as Solomon experienced both living under the sun and then living above the sun.

He comes to certain conclusions and throughout this book he talks about what it is like under the sun and what is like above the sun is like under the sun. What is like above the sun when he experienced life under the sun.

He said life is meaningless alive is monotonous alive is purposeless. Life is empty. Life is unfulfilling. But when he began to be lifted up to live in relationship with God.

When you begin to see things from God's perspective when he began to see things from maternal perspective. He realized that life can be joy filled life. It can be purpose filled life.

It can be fulfilling life in one of the things that God taught me that when my life has a purpose and that purpose is articulated and when the purpose is written down not believe in writing so I write down what books I write things down when the goal in life is got me through time with God through discerning the will of the Holy Spirit in your life and when you have that articulated that purpose helps me will help you to eliminate the unnecessary to eliminate all the clutter life to eliminate all distractions in life, but that's not all window purpose is articulated in life. It will help you expand expand the important expand the lasting and expand the everlasting and today in my life just about everything that I do is governed by my last purpose, life was too short and I'm not gonna wasted running around chasing rabbits with the food you if you have never sat down and under the power and the authority and the guidance of God the Holy Spirit who dwells in you and say God I am going to take time and don't care how long it takes.

If it takes a day or 2304. It doesn't matter how long it takes. Stay with God until you discern your life's purpose and once you have that lives purpose articulate your prayer life will be change your effectiveness will be changed. Everything in life would be changed see many people think when you read this book of Ecclesiastes that many people read this book and think it's a morbid book. They say this is a doom and gloom and pessimistic book. It is the opposite for me. Why because I tried to live where above the sun. I don't try to live under the sun. I live where will you live above the sun. You see this book from different eyes altogether.

You will see the message of this book of Ecclesiastes that God wants us to have a joyful life. That's the message of the book that God wants us to have a fulfilled life that God wants us to have a purpose filled life that God wants us to be his and his forever. Even though sometimes in life we experience opposites as we see in the first eight verses of chapter 3. Lots of opposites for 2028 of we experience joy and reexperience sorrow. We experience life and receive death, and so on. We experience birth and reexperience that reexperience time of sowing and then we experience time of harvesting we experience a time for renewal doctors will tell you that all the cells in your body, except to your brain cells they are changing every seven years. What you are now not the same person that you were seven years ago for new cells to come in and grow in your body that the gold cells have to die this time to that time to live.

That's what the writer is saying here. There are times when destructive friendships when destructive relationships must be torn down and there are times when good and wholesome ungodly relationships need to be built and the rest goes on and on and on. He said for everything has a season in life. Listen carefully Nimrod on this one. You cannot appreciate and even comprehend these different seasons of life and will go through the but you will never appreciate them you will like someone had the other, but in order to appreciate all the things that God brings in life, in order to comprehend his purpose in these different seasons in life you must be living under the sovereign control of God for the believer who is living above the sun, even the tough times and will have them have purpose in them that purpose in them. Even the Arabs.

They have a saying that too much sunshine creates a Sahara. We need the rain and we need the sunshine couple of years ago when I was invited to go to Turkey to preach there and then I had an opportunity to go and see one of those manufacturing plants with makes his beautiful Oriental tapestries and I learned something. I'm always looking for some biblical thing some spiritual thing for everything and I realize that when you look at these people working from the back lot of threads and monitor jungle threads center looked EE doesn't make sense but you come right in front of it and there you see a beautiful piece of Oriental tapestry and they are all put together by different strands in different experience. There is the goal of success and there is the crimson of suffering, and there are those somber hues of sorrow all together make a beautiful tapestry and those who live under the sun can only see those threads. The jungle threads and that don't make sense but those who live above the sun can see the beautiful work of art that is being produced in your life and mine from the back and that tapestry is a life under the sun but from the front end. It's a life lived above the sun sickly exquisite piece of art.

No wonder the apostle Paul said in Romans eight. In a lot of Christians know that verse and in Alitalia if I have to translate the Bible. I would not have translated that verse. The weight is because a lot of people just grab that verse of God works everything together for and they glibly even when somebody suffer going through painful time instead of understanding what's going on now. God works all things together for good.

I just shut up. The first word ought to be. Now for those who love God, that's really should come first, not last. For those who love God. Those who live above the sun God works all things together to produce a beautiful tapestry, even the son of God, was not immune from suffering and the pain in life. He was a man of sorrow and acquainted with grief because he knew that the resurrection is going to follow the crucifixion and therefore he would joyful. He was contented he was finally surrendered to his father and there is a verse in verse eight that trips a lot of Christians and I want to take a moment just to dwell on it for a few seconds because it's important for me to explain. Some people really, Jemison rule was that mean there is a time to hate and time to love. Is there a time really to hate us, hate the sin that causes human degradation, hate the sin that causes confusion in the minds of people, especially the young, hate the sin of those who hurt young children hate the sin of those who pervert justice in our courts of law. Hate the sin that those who call good evil and evil good headache that said he said there is a time for everything, said the searcher and then he comes to great discovery. Verse 11. I want to look at it carefully. Verse 11. He said he has made everything beautiful in his time. Only those who live above the sun can truly say that only those who have surrendered their altar Jesus Christ can truly say that only those who trust God with all of their hearts in the tough times in the testing times in the disease times and the sorrowful times those who trust God with all of the heart can say that only those who know they are being redeemed and they are on their way to rain on rule with Christ in heaven can say that for those who live under the sun.

They live in darkness and they don't know what life looks like, and therefore they have no knowledge or experience of those who live above the sun have they curse their enemies because they Love them. They curse their jobs because they cannot see that the gift of God. They curse a lot in life because they don't know what the believer knows, but those who are living above the sun. No, what do they know.

Listen to me very carefully that God is buckling every tear of errors in heaven that God is treasuring every sorrow for the growth that God is using every difficult, and live for his glory and the good that God is molding every challenge that they face for very good and his glory that God is carrying every burden was them and for them that's what they know and that is why they live above the sun. Those who are living on the sun will never understand the power of living above the sun until they come and experience it firsthand and the invitation is for everyone to move from living under the sun. The living above the sun beloved many of you know this like like all of you have experience raw fear and have experienced ecstatic joy when I experienced sorrow of losing my mother at an early age. I truly thought my world has come to an end but it wasn't God was using that in the deep tapestry and I was lifted up by the power in the wings of her prayer for me. In fact of all the Valley's I've experienced in my earlier years have compelled me to write the book of God is in control and that has blessed thousands upon thousands of people. Some actually received the call to go to full-time ministry as a result of reading the book all around the world and then full leather years with my wife who experience the values that came our way there.

From that Valley can the book empowered by praise and that too has blessed thousands of people around the world. Why, because in the valleys of life we experience the presence of God in a way that you couldn't live or experience it any other way you grow closer to God in a way that you could never grow when you are on the mountaintop, it's in these valleys that you come to the realization that God makes all things beautiful in his time. It's in these valleys that you begin to learn to develop a confidence in the living God and the love of God and the care of God like no other place I don't misunderstand you. I like the mountaintop much better. I don't invite to cherish the valleys but when they do, I know that God has a purpose and that in that Valley. I'm going to meet him in a way that I have never seen them before. And every time I grow deeper with him in the valleys not on the mountaintops. The reason that Solomon got so depressed and got so despondent and even was despairing of life itself.

Just think about this the man who had everything, everything that nobody ever before or since. Probably ever had everything, like he did, and yet he despaired of life itself wanted to die. And the reason that happened is because at that time he was living where but then when he begins to be lifted up and begins to live above the sun.

He could say he makes all things in a Solomon begins to live above the sun starting to see things differently from where he was living under the sun like the whole book is contrasty and I was under the CC. He was on the sun and he got above the sun on the subject on the subject on the subject on the subject in this thing in and that thing and so in verse 10, he said life is a gift of God is because he was living above the sun. Then he said in verse 11 is alive is linked to eternity and without that you cannot understand it any other way. In verses 12 and 14 is that God can make a joyful life even here and now and in the midst of sorrow, you hear people always say well you know how to clean the media how can God be in control hard and be a loving God so much evil in the world. I'm going to talk more about that. Actually, in the next message but listen, the answer is really a lot simpler than you think. Those who ask this kind of question I living where a person is living above the son will not ask that question.

Solomon asked that same question when he was living under the sun even looked at the courts of justice.

Remember he was a wise man and give good judgment and so he went and observed the courts of his kingdom and he looked and saw what the judges are doing and what the lawyers are doing and people tell me today that the lawyers tell me it's so miserable now that they've seen people literally lie under oath. Without batting an eye and he went to the courts of justice, and he saw what was happening. There is a miscarriage of justice and the laws being perverted and he got sudden scarring. But then he comes out of his living under the sun to begin living above the sun, and he says only then he could see those two things.

Number one that God has a time for everything, and secondly, that God is working out his eternal purpose. How many of you believe that God will judge the world. Salmon that very few people actually know that God is judging the world right now even though you see injustice old even though you see perversion. Even you see all the persecution of the faithful and the righteous are suffering in schools in different parts of the world, but God is judging the world now but just because you have not seen the execution of that verdict. It doesn't mean that it had not been pronounced from the portals of heaven, it's already been pronounced. It's a matter of time, but is already been judged.

Those of us who live above the sun.

We live by the promises of God, not by explanations.

Everything from those who want explanations when you give them explanations and work, but we live by the promises of God, not by explanations. That is why the Lord Jesus Christ in Matthew chapter 5, after he gave the Beatitudes, blessed, blessed, blessed.

Then he concludes the beatitude by saying, rejoice and be glad.

Why, because great is your reward where hemorrhoid is a complement beyond physical life beyond death. There is a tenet. Solomon said after he compares the animals with humans and he gets discouraged and depressed. He has an awakening and he sees that humans are different from animals because he puts it in verse 11.

He said God has placed eternity where in man's heart human have eternity in their heart and that what makes a difference. Listen to me this is a quality about humans that can never, never, never, never, never be explained by evolution.

CS Lewis said the following listen very carefully every word is loaded.

He said our heavenly father has provided many different Indians for us along our journey but he takes great care to see that we don't mistake any of them for home neglect. There may be someone here who is living under the sun and beginning to feel life is meaningless life is empty. Life has no purpose today is your invitation to come and begin to live above the sun is a test. If you close your eyes and death this afternoon. Can you be absolutely certain that you will be in heaven with Jesus. If your answer is I'm not really sure hope so or have done some good in my life. I think that my get me there than the answer is no. But today you can fulfill your heart's ultimate longing your heart's ultimate long as you can, and rest on the promise of him who said, come unto me all who are Trevor on the heavy laden, and to me all the weary ones come to me and I will give you not only mental rest, not only emotional rest not on the spiritual rest, but I'll give your soul complete and permanent rest and then you can be sure that if you close your eyes and death. You will see Jesus face-to-face. Thanks for listening to this message from Dr. Michael. You sat recently featured on leading the way. If you'd like to know more about us, please visit LTW.org that's LTW.Ward