Sermon Notes| Sermon Video

2024-12-06 | II-Peter-1:2-11 | The Infinite Imperishable JackpotWhat’s are your highest aspirations? For what are you working so hard to achieve? What are your ultimate goals? What final destination will bring you the greatest satisfaction? What are you running toward with such fervency? On what are you most passionately focused? If you were asked to describe your heart’s desires, what would be your most cherished prize? Seven excellent questions, but for most people unfortunately, as the train pulls into their dream station, they discover something utterly disturbing about their destination. It was all a mirage, a total illusion. Tragically, everything they believed would bring them a feeling of completion and a sense of meaningful accomplishment was an utter delusion— a thorough deception!

God’s word has much to say on this topic. If you understood His perspective and applied His knowledge beforehand, that kind of wisdom would help you avoid the guaranteed regret, misfotrune, and frustration that is assured anyone who chases rotting carcasses and evaporating vapors. But, God’s precious and exceedingly great promises will never disappoint you; they are infinite and imperishable, while all other treasures that you might chase, even if attained, will be dreadfully temporary.

It’s an epidemic of human achievement, but not because there is anything inherently wrong with human advancements and accomplishments. It’s just that the intense desires for such success transform from God honoring stewardship to a disease of human achievement in a particular environment. At this moment, you should be begging to recognize that type of environment. It’s a pathological setting that can be easily diagnosed with one test question, as long as you are willing to be honest with yourself: “What satisfies your soul?” When your self-talk sounds like this… “Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years; you are a true success,” the disease process has set in. The Great Physician has life-saving advice for this patient… “You foolish one, tonight is your last and your soul is being recalled. The things which you worked so hard to accumulate—whose will they be when you are gone? Since you can’t keep what you’ve accumulated after death—your wealth, achievements, and accomplishments, don’t bother laying up those perishable treasures for yourselves on earth. Instead, lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven that are permanent.”

Here is the true measure of your success—godly stewardship of your advancements and accomplishments. “Delight yourself in Yahweh, and He will give you the desires of your heart.” If you accumulate treasures for yourself here on earth, but you are not rich towards God, those treasures actually expose the disease of your heart. For you, there will only ever be a temporary and corruptible crown. But, if your heart is one that chases the riches of God, His precious and exceedingly great promises, your rewards will be infinite and incorruptible.