The Cost and Call of Discipleship
Pastor John Seay
John Seay is the pastor at Frederick Baptist Church in Frederick, Maryland.
“And Jacob sod pottage: and Esau came from the field, and he was faint: And Esau said to Jacob, Feed me, I pray thee, with that same red pottage; for I am faint: therefore was his name called Edom. And Jacob said, Sell me this day thy birthright. And Esau said, Behold, I am at the point to die: and what profit shall this birthright do to me? And Jacob said, Swear to me this day; and he sware unto him: and he sold his birthright unto Jacob. Then Jacob gave Esau bread and pottage of lentiles; and he did eat and drink, and rose up, and went his way: thus Esau despised his birthright.” (Genesis 25:29-34)
In Genesis 25 we have an interesting story of Esau selling his birth right. “Sell me this day thy birthright.” Jacob said. A few words later: “and rose up, and went his way: thus Esau despised his birthright.” Christians often throw away their spiritual birthright for the temporal, the eternal for the temporary. No one can take it from you, but you can give it up. That is so true.
I want to speak on the subject Trading Treasures for Trash. A man left his godly wife and wonderful children for a Jezebel that seduced him into sin. The process went through the court system. As they began to go through the divorce procedures, they ended up in court. His new woman sat there popping her gum, dressed like a street walker, and the judge looked over to see this well-dressed Christian woman with her beautifully behaved children, and he just shook his head in disbelief. As they finished the proceedings of the divorce, that judge looked at the man and said, “You have traded treasure for trash.” That is pretty stunning, but that is what this country needs, some truth.
I have for these many years witnessed the same unbelievable events. Oh, it may not have been trading a spouse, but other decisions that some Christians foolishly make where they have traded treasure for trash. You say, “What are they?” Let me give you a few examples, just very simple.
Number one, when you decide that the King James Bible is not an issue and other versions are just as good, you have traded treasure for trash! I want to say this very plainly. If you are here and you have never learned this, you can educate yourself in two minutes concerning your King James Bible if you want truth. We think we are so smart about everything else except God’s Holy Word. I want to say this very plainly, we have an Antioch Bible. It came from Antioch where they were first-called Christians. We don’t have a Douay version. We don’t have a corrupt version that came from Egypt.
We have a Bible that is perfect. It has no mistakes. All of it is right straight down the road. Nobody in this room, and nobody I have ever met can ever prove that there are any mistakes in that Book. I heard a man stand up in a church and say, “There are 22,000 mistakes in the King James Bible.” As he began to mess with that Book, God began to mess with his mind, and he began to preach heresy and crazy doctrine that nobody has ever heard of. That man now is spending many years in the state penitentiary because when you start messing with that Book, God will start messing with your mind.
The reason some of these rock n’ roll churches don’t have a pure good Christian fellowship and good Christian testimony is because they are not preaching out of the right Bible. One more time, I am going to say it, we don’t have a copyright in this Book right here. If you have a King James Bible and there is a copyright in the front of it, it is because of somebody’s notes, not because of its scripture. It is the only Bible in the world where there is not a copyright, which means that anybody can print it, because God wants His word to be spread. Every other Bible has a copyright, because somebody found out how they can make some money. Now isn’t that amazing? That alone would settle it for me, but as I slaved through this book for 40 something years, I cannot find any discrepancy, in any shape or fashion.
Listen to me carefully. You are trading treasure for trash when you get away from that Book and go another direction with some other so-called Bible. I found Christians that have sin in their life, and they have no problem changing churches or Bible version because a corrupt lifestyle matches a corrupt Bible.
Number two, you are trading treasure for trash when you start missing church for making money. I have seen this over the period of time, the 37 years I have pastored here. Other preachers that I have talked to have said, “Preacher, what is going on with Christians today?” We are absolutely going crazy in our churches where people are chasing the buck instead of chasing God. There was a day when they wanted to be spiritual and stay in that Book, they stayed in church, they stayed right, they won souls, they did the right thing, they built Sunday School classes and bus routes, but now they are chasing dollar bills. Now they are missing on Wednesdays, missing on Sunday nights, and they are trading treasures for trash.
You are killing yourself spiritually. The reason some of you feel disenfranchised is because you have lost it spiritually. When you become disconnected, my friend, it is exactly what happens in marriages when you get to hanging around the opposite sex too much and you lose your love for your wife or for your husband, and pretty soon you end up in an adulterous situation. The same is true spiritually, and this is why the Bible talks about spiritual adultery.
You end up killing yourself spiritually. I am simply saying that the fire has gone out. The Spirit of God is quenched and grieved in your life because you have traded treasure for trash, and you begin to think that money is the answer to all things and all needs and desires. My Bible says that if you are not careful, it is going to pierce you through with many sorrows. God is not against you having money. God is not against you having things. God is not against you having a nice car and a nice home, but bless God, when you are robbing God and you are robbing yourself spiritually, you are damning yourself, and you will mess up spiritually as sure as I stand here.
I have been doing this for many years, and I have watched it over a period of time. When that stuff starts happening friend, you are DRIFTING, and when you drift you will soon be gone! How sad it is when I have seen this happen over and over again. Your soul is in a dark hole. You have lost your excitement. You have lost the wonder of it all. Having things has now replaced serving God and being faithful to Him and His church. I made my mind up when I first got saved, by the grace of God, out of a life of sin, bless God, I don’t care whatever happens in our lives, we are going to be faithful to the house of God because that is where we heard the truth, and that is where we are going to get the truth, and that is where we are going to learn the Bible, and that is how we are going to stay right with God. You’ve got to bend an ear toward truth, and as long as that preacher is preaching truth, I am listening.
I am simply saying that we have lost the wonder of it all. There was a day in your life when, if you walked into a church like this you were sitting on the edge of your seat and you couldn’t believe the excitement of seeing souls saved and baptisms, the old time songs that are doctrinally rich are being sung. You were so stinking excited, and now all of a sudden, now, you just sit there in boredom and apathy. You know why you are sitting there bored? You’ve got sin in your life. It is time to look up here and get down and pray. You have got sin in your life, you have messed around and you are seeing stuff on the internet that you shouldn’t see, you are watching movies that you shouldn’t see. You are into sin, and that is why you can’t listen to the preaching right now. That is why you have become disenfranchised in the things of God because you have lost your spirituality. You have traded treasures for trash is what you have done.
How sad it is. The souls of men are not important to you anymore. It no longer matters that souls are dropping into hell unwarned. Bless God, you can’t wait to get out during the invitation. We’ve got to tackle you on the parking lot just to shake your hand. There was a day when you would sit there and tears would come down your face when folks would come to get saved, but now you are just headed out the door. You know why? Because we have lost it. I have said before, and I will say it one more time, and I will say it until the day that I die, “Something bad happened in our independent Baptist churches when we started going on social media.” Some of you folks are absolutely connected to everybody in the world, and when you became so connected to that you became disconnected to Him. Now instead of poring over your Bible, you are just tapping away on that phone, posting selfies and everything else.
There is something about what is going on that we still don’t have a whole picture of yet, and you can nail me any stinking way you want to nail me. Who cares? We have not got the end result of cell phones and social media yet, but we will see it one day for sure! What really puzzles me a great deal is those that have invented all this trash don’t want to have anything to do with it and they refuse to let their children and their wives have anything to do with it. They said, “We have created a monster that has taken this country.”
The FBI, the CIA, and all of them say it is the greatest thing that ever happened for us. We now know everything about everybody. Has that ever spooked you out that you sit around talking with your cell phone nearby, and all of a sudden stuff starts popping up on your cell phone that you are talking about? Have you ever thought through that thing? Have you got any stinking sense? It is getting quiet in here now. They even know what you are talking about just because it is sitting there. They know everything about you.
See, there was a day when we had problems in our lives, we went to the prayer closet and told God about it. Now what we do is so ignorant. We put it on Facebook for the whole world to see, and that is why people are losing respect for you because you haven’t got any sense. Every disagreement and stupid action of everybody, we advertise it to the whole world. We are supposed to go to God with our problems, not to the world. How sad it is! That is why we are losing this matter.
You know, the souls of men, women, boys and girls used to be important to you, and now hell is not real to you and Heaven is seldom even mentioned, with short-sighted and misplaced priorities today in the majority of Christians in the United States of America.
How sad it is! We’ve got women thinking it is more important to make money than to raise their children at home. I read this, The Parable of the Prodigal Mother. “A certain man had a wife and three children. The wife became dissatisfied with housekeeping and coveting the money being earned by her neighbor. She said to her husband, ‘Husband, secure me a social security number that falleth to me and divide me my portion.’ With a reluctant heart, the husband granted her desires and divided his wealth. Not many days later, the wife put on slacks, and with a toolbox under her arm waved goodbye to the children and took her journey into a far country, and there secured a man’s job in a factory. She made big wages, but she associated with the wicked and listened to the vulgar stories that they told. There was a mighty spiritual famine in that land, and she grew lean in her soul. The children were turned loose at the mercy at the neighbors and soon forgot that they even had a mother. But the husband remembered the duties of the wife and wished that his wife would return to her home. The husband dined on cold lunch meat while the wife tried in vain to fill her stomach with the husks of the cheese crackers that fell from the canteen vending machine, and no man gave unto her the respect due to a lady.”
“One day at rest period, she sat engulfed in cigarette smoke and smutty stories and she came to herself and said to herself with remorse, ‘Here I sit surrounded with vulgarity and sacrificing the respect due to a lady. At home is a deserted husband, while my children roam the streets unrestrained. The money I have made seems small compared to the peace of mind and soul that I crave.’ In vain, she tried to smother her conscience with the thought that she is contributing to the family’s economic welfare; so, she said to herself, ‘I will rise and go to my husband, and I will say unto him, ‘I am no more worthy to be called thy wife nor the mother of my children, make me as a hired housekeeper.’ So she gathered her tools together and started home. When she was yet a long way off, the husband saw her and ran to meet her and clasped her in his arms. The wife said, ‘Husband, I am no more worthy to be called thy wife nor the mother of my children.’ The father said to the children, ‘Run, and bring hither a dress and the best apron, put shoes on her feet, and rush to the meat market and get a steak from the fatted calf, and let us have warm meal once again. For this, your mother, was lost and is found.’ So they rejoiced and made merry.”
This is happening all across our country. We chain our dogs up in the back yard but we’re letting our children run loose on the streets. We wonder why there are gangland shootings, we wonder why there are drugs, we wonder why there is illicit sex, we wonder why all these girls are not only getting pregnant but killing their babies by the millions. It is because momma is making the choice that we are going to make a buck, trading treasures for trash.
Esau sold his birthright for a bowl of red pottage. Got to get a hold of it. That is not black words on a white piece of paper. That is not going to happen. You think that story is in there just because God was bored? No, maybe He put it in there for us to see it and maybe learn from it. Esau was lustful. He had more concern with his stomach than he did his birthright. If you don’t understand the birthright, let me explain it to you. That meant the firstborn gets a double portion of the inheritance. As the firstborn, he had some responsibility in the family. If you understand this whole story, he had a lot to lose and he traded all that treasure for a bowl of trashy pottage. That is exactly what I see being done.
Folks, I am preaching revival this week, and I have preached around this country almost every week of my life for many years. Do you hear me? I have watched this over, and over, and over again! I deal with preachers every week of my life. We tell stories, they asked to be counseled and helped. At Football Camp, that is all that I did. I am there to counsel preachers, and I did it all week long. Every story that I heard, it is almost always treasures being traded for trash.
Isn’t it amazing that there are so many Christians that have traded treasures for lustful trash? Not only that, but when you leave a Bible believing soulwinning separated church with standards to a attend a substandard we-don’t-stand-for-anything get-together, you are trading treasures for trash. How sad it is for some people to think that you could leave a soulwinning separated church like this that preaches from the King James Bible, and you are going to level up, but in most cases you level down. All of a sudden, your children know the difference, and before long they are headed down a long sad road of no return. These Rock-and-Roll gatherings are no more than Chuck E. Cheese churches. They are entertainment enterprises counting nickels and noses with no personal contact or responsibility. These Six Flags over doctrinal free zones are fun places, but they are not spiritual lighthouses to the lost and dying world. I wouldn’t be a part of any of that trash if they don’t have an absolute zeal to see people saved by the grace of God through knocking on doors, and getting the Gospel out. I wouldn’t have nothing to do with it.
Most of you in this room would have nothing to do with a non-soulwinning church, yet you won’t do anything to win souls to Jesus Christ while you’re here with us. You know why? Because you traded treasure for trash. You used to go out, but now you are shining your car on Saturday. You used to go out and knock doors and see people saved, but now you have got other interests because you have misplaced your heart. You are trading treasures for trash because there is nothing, NOTHING to take the place of you taking your Bible and sitting down with a sinner boy and showing them how to be saved.
Yesterday I knocked on a door, and this girl came out and was led to Christ, but she was so extremely excited to be saved. I got to thinking, you know everybody was that way when they truly got saved, and those who truly got saved were absolutely pumped because they understood the changed life that happened when the Holy Ghost of God comes into you. Are you all listening to me? When the third person of the God-head moves in, something is going to change boy!
When this wicked, vile sinner received Christ, I got up off my knees and I knew that something had transpired in me that was hard to understand and explain, because I didn’t know any doctrine yet, but I knew that something real happened to me. I knew it wasn’t some little emotional thing just because somebody told some tear-jerking illustration. The Holy Ghost of God pinned my sin down and told me that I could be converted if I would come to the blood of Jesus Christ and what he did on Calvary. I did that day, and God changed my life forever.
These churches are loose and fragile and can dissolve in a moment. Some years ago I took Dr. Lee Roberson over here to this Willow Creek thing because he asked me to take him. He said, “I’ve heard preachers talk about that, but I just want to go see it.” He is like Moses. Dr. Roberson had one of the largest Bible-preaching churches in the world for many years. I took him over there, and he got so shook I had to grab him. I said, “Dr. Roberson, we need to leave.” I mean, he was so irate, he just couldn’t believe what he was seeing and hearing, and he couldn’t believe what he was reading. We walked into the auditorium and there were like 20 or 30 people on the platform and they had lavaliere mics and they were rocking it out.
He said, “What is that?”
I said, “They’re practicing for Sunday Worship Service.” You say, “Well I don’t like what you are saying.” Lump it anyway you can Jack, that is not a worship service, that is just worldly entertainment! They do that in Hollywood. They don’t do it in the house of God. If you believe that, something is wrong with you spiritually. This is not Hollywood. This is not television. It is worship time and preaching time! You don’t worship God like that. You don’t worship rock. I used to be a rocker man! I know what Rock and Roll is. I used to play it, so when I hear it, I know what I am hearing. You want spiritual results from unspiritual means? It is not going to happen ever! You are trading treasures for trash is what you are doing. How sad it is.
When you stop walking down the aisle and spending time at this altar making sure and keeping your heart tender. The thing about walking an aisle, brother, is that you come down to keep your heart tender. The Spirit of God spoke to you. The same Spirit of God wrote that Book. You are supposed to be saved. The Spirit of God lives in you. I am supposed to be filled with the Spirit when I preach, and those three ought to be a witness. God is supposed to speak to you, and if He isn’t speaking to you, there is something wrong. There are only two things that could be wrong as far as I am concerned. 1. You have never been converted, which means that you don’t have the Holy Ghost in you, which means He is not speaking unless it’s conviction. 2. You grieved Him and quenched Him to the point where He is not even speaking to you anymore. That is a bad place to be. That is a bad place to be.
That is why, all of these years later when I hear preaching, I make my way from my pew to this altar. The problem with some people is that you are so proud you think that maybe somebody is going to think that you are guilty with whatever the preacher preached on. So, what! Why would you care what people think? Why don’t you care what God thinks? Everything I have ever heard, good preaching and bad preaching, God always speaks to me about something, and I always bow my head and make some adjustments in my life. I make some vows to God. You are trading treasure for prideful trash when you are not coming down to the altar. You know what our altar is built for? I have said it before. An altar all down through the Word of God as I study and teach it and understand it, an altar is a place to die, and that is what this altar is for. When you hear preaching and God speaks to your heart, you ought to come and die to whatever God is speaking to your heart about. If He wants you to change your life, part with some sin in your life, come die to that thing.
You need to remember this. When you say no to making decisions for Christ, it becomes easier every time you say no until you are totally cold and hardhearted to the point where God will stop speaking to you. Y’all know, I have preached this before and you just need to hear it again. When I got saved, I was a hell raiser. I used to fight like a stinking animal. We used to just go up on the levy and just fight. Y’all got cage fighting now and think that is so good. We would do it without cages. I am talking about friends, not enemies. We would just be on the levy and beat the stinking tar out of one another. We would play ball. When I came to that Independent Fundamental Bible Believing Baptist Church, and that preacher nailed my hide to the back of the pew, I was man enough to understand that I was a wicked sinner on my way to Hell, and I wasn’t going to squirm out of that one. I wasn’t going to excuse myself. I was man enough to take it on the chin and said, “The man is right about it, I am going to Hell.” I came and got saved.
The preacher started preaching on stuff that I had never heard of before. There were some things that I didn’t know about, and by the time that the preacher got through with me over weeks and weeks of preaching, I just didn’t know half the stuff I was doing was wrong. But I started changing things immediately, and that is why God kept speaking to me. Are y’all listening to me? When you harden your heart to that, you say no, God will stop speaking to you, and I never ever want God to stop speaking to me. This is why, I always respond to the preaching and come to the altar.
Dr. Don Green gave me this big wonderful sheep skin like Sheffey had. He signed it, we talked about it, and every Sunday morning on my face I pray for you and I pray for the services here. All week long, I pray for you and pray for these ministries. While I am alone, I ask God to forgive me and clean my life up. I ask God to do something through me. The truth of matter is that if you want to help people, you tell them the truth. If you want to help yourself, you tell them what they want to hear. I never tell people what they want to hear. I am trying to tell you the truth because that is going to change your life. If you don’t want to hear it, I can’t help you. If you grieve the Holy Spirit to the point where He stops speaking to you, you are in deep trouble.
My preacher started preaching. I started dropping stuff like crazy. Are you all with me now? There are some sins that I had, and then there are some sins that had me. I smoked, and I just couldn’t stop. I tried everything. Isn’t it amazing folks that you can’t sue for a lot of things, but you can sue a tobacco company? Could you tell me why? You are the one that picked it up and put it in your mouth, sir. You are the one that sucked on it. How can you sue a company for your own actions? I am going to tell you how. It is because they deceived you. They said there was nothing to it, and they lied to you. Not only that, but they infused the tobacco with stuff that makes you addicted, which now they say it is as addictive as cocaine. Think about that for a minute. No wonder I was having such a hard time. No wonder it is such a hard thing for some of you in this room, but if you think I am going to stop preaching against it, you’re wrong. Any more than I am going to stop preaching against any other sin.
Buddy, that smoking had me so bad it was crazy. I didn’t know what to do. I was still winning souls and bringing my football team to Christ. I was doing everything I could do, but I just couldn’t conquer this thing. Brother Smith preached on tithing, I came and knelt like this, “Dear God I pray that You...”, and my cigarettes fell out of my pocket. He said, “Look here at Keith. I didn’t even preach on smoking, but Keith is quitting smoking.” I wasn’t quitting smoking.
Let me tell you why I quit. God stopped speaking to me about it. No conviction anymore. Can you imagine that we have Christians that have the mentality to say, “Well, God hasn’t convicted me of that.” That might be telling you something. When God is not convicting you of your sin, it might be telling you a great story. You say, “Well I never repent because God hasn’t talked to me about it.” God help you! When He stopped convicting me, I knew I was in trouble. If I am not careful, I am going to end up in the old life that I had before, because He had stopped speaking to me and my heart was not tender anymore.
If you are not careful, you are going to trade your treasure for trash. I am certainly glad that I repented and got rid of that thing and became a deacon of the church. Then God kept dealing with me and I kept winning souls to Christ, kept getting them down the aisle. I kept getting my football team saved and all the people I came in contact with and all the old cronies. All of a sudden God began to deal in my life about preaching the Gospel and God called me to preach. Here I am after all of these years. If you are not careful, when God stops speaking to you and you lose that tender heart, it is not about anybody else anymore. You could care less about anybody else or anything else. Everything is all about you now, and you have to be careful of that. If you trade your treasures for trash, you’ll regret it. You need to trade your trash for treasure. That is what you need to do.
Listen, I did that many years ago. I traded my trash for treasure. Can two walk together except they be agreed? I understood very clearly that there is no way I could walk hand in hand with Jesus Christ and do these things that I was doing, and then I began to trade my trash for treasures. Are you all with me now? When you play Rock n’ Roll and you have gone to all the big concerts and now you are hearing “At the Cross, At the Cross”. Good Godly doctrinal songs that a Christian should be singing, but I had never sung this, and I had never heard those in my life. I was a Roman Catholic. I was a little altar boy and never heard those types of songs.
Now, I am in a Bible preaching, Bible believing church, got saved by the grace of God, and I am hearing doctrinal hymns, and I didn’t know. I thought you was supposed to rock it out. No wonder people go to the rock n’ roll churches. It is because they are not changing at all. I thought it was so different. When I began to get the song book and started reading the words and singing those old hymns, I thought, “That is what I did right there “I saw the light when I saw the cross.” When I started to sing the songs that they were singing in that church that actually described what I had experienced, I understood very clearly that I traded my trash for treasure.
I traded my booze for a Bible. I traded my pot for prayer. I traded my football for faith. I traded my worldly friends for spiritual friends. I stopped running the roads and started running to church. I stopped fighting and started faithfully winning souls. Instead of busting people’s heads, I started taking the Bible and showing them how to be saved. It was a wonderful thing. I had a big Bible in my hand, and I didn’t know you are suppose to use a little New Testament. I talked to grown men on the street and told them how I got saved. I would say, “Let’s get on our knees.” I thought you had to get on your knees for God to hear you. We would get down on our knees on concrete in front of everybody and they’d get saved. Man, it is good when you trade trash for treasure, and that is what I did. Thank God I did.
When preachers are for compromising, they are trading treasure for trash. When I came here I was still in Bible college, and I wanted to go around and meet some of the preachers in the area. I met an older preacher in the area and we became friends. They were running somewhere around 1,500 at the time. We had about 31 at the time after all the smoke cleared. I remember him telling me, “Son, you can’t build a church where you are over there.” I said, “Well thanks for the encouragement, Doc.” Time went on, and he became my friend. That place began to spiral out of control after the old man died. The person who took it messed up, then another guy took it and they ended up preaching from the ESV and then changed to NIV, they stopped winning souls and just wanted the entertainment. Are you all with me? I am not being ugly. I am trying to show you that I don’t care who you are or what teacher you had, when you begin to compromise you are out the door, and you are trading treasure for trash.
I am not trying to keep anybody here for entertainment purposes. You either love Jesus Christ and gravitate to His Word, or I guess you would have to go down to a cappuccino church. I still think that our cappuccino is better. Are you all listening to me now? Last Sunday, 364 on the AM service, 151 on the PM service, and 67 on Wednesday night at that church that used to run 1,500. That is a shame. It grieves my heart that those people traded treasure for trash. I am warning you Northwest. This man isn’t going to be here forever, and we’ve got a co-pastor now, and he needs to hold it straight just like it is. Bless God, I tell you what, if you have somebody in your pulpit that is going to compromise, it is going to take a left and go down every time. How sad it is. Treasure for trash!
I read a story about Garbage Mary. Garbage Mary would go around in trash cans and get garbage and \collect different stuff. You know we had a member do that. He was a single guy. He would drive all the way from the North Shore. He owned a lot of stock in the company that he worked for. When I preached his funeral, they called me from the hospital and said, “Can get you here quickly?” It is etched in my mind that when I walked in there, he was on a stainless steel gurney. His stomach had swollen up like this. They either left a tool in him or something. He had a staph infection. I’d never seen anything like it. His stomach was swollen very big. I remember him looking up and seeing me and saying, “Help me.” His eyes rolled back in his head. They rushed him off to another emergency surgery. He was only suppose to be getting his gallbladder out. No biggie, right? All of a sudden, he died. I did his funeral and some of the executives from his company came to me and said, “Do you know what he was worth?”
I said, “I have no idea. Money doesn’t speak to me. God speaks to me.” Let me say it again one more time. “Money doesn’t speak to me. God speaks to me.” I don’t care how much money you have got. Why do you think you are better than anybody else? I have respect for all people. Why would you think because you got a few pieces of papers in your pocket with the President’s picture on it that you are supposed to be better than anybody else? You have got to think through that a little bit. When people think money, it changes them to actually think they are better than somebody else. Anyhow, he didn’t think that at all. The guy owned, I forget how much stock in that company. When his mother died, he was left a lot of money.
In his car, there was just trash all the way up to his ceiling. I am just telling you that is how he lived. A couple went out to the house. He had trash piled up everywhere. They said, “Preacher, at lunchtime he would go in all the trash cans and get all the aluminum cans out and sell it.” He didn’t have to do any of that. The guy was quite wealthy. There was a kin folk next in sucession to inherit what he had, a pretty young woman. She cussed him like I have never heard cussing in my life. Called him everything in the book. She is getting everything that he ever worked for and all the things that were given to him, and she is cussing him every breath. I got to thinking how sad that this man had all these treasures, but he traded his treasures for trash. Now, a piece of trash got all his treasures, and God got none of it.
Garbage Mary would go around, and in fact the police picked her up and said she is dumpster diving. They tried to arrest her, and they asked where she lived. They began to fumble through some of her stuff, and she had $400,000 in cash, and then she had stock in all these oil companies. She had five major bank accounts full. Her refrigerator was full of trash. Her oven was full of trash. Her sink was full of trash. Her bathtub was full of trash. Garbage Mary, she traded trash for treasure.
There are some of you doing the same thing spiritually. How sad it is. You can find anything you want now, have it your way. You can go to any cappuccino church or a Chuck E. Cheese church, and feel comfortable instead of feeling convicted. Everybody needs to understand that when this Book is preached, you ought to feel convicted about something. Every time I read it, it either comforts my heart or it convicts me deeply. That is the type of church that you need to be a part of. If you are not careful, you will trade treasures for trash. If you are not careful, you are not going to keep your relationship right with your spouse either, and you will end up in a mess one day, and end up trading treasure for trash. You just think you have got it bad now. You really don’t. The problem is spiritual. All failure in life is a spiritual failure. Don’t trade. Please don’t folks. I am begging you, never trade your treasures for trash.
Some of these guys coming to Providence Baptist College. They won’t finish because they get their little nose out of joint about something and mommy will try to talk them into coming home or whatever. They are not becoming men, growing up. I went to school when I was married. It was a hard thing. A lot of those married men dropped out, and some are divorced and some are not in the ministry today.
“Thus Esau despised his birthright.” (Genesis 25:34) He traded. A double portion of inheritance was a lot back in those days for a bowl of lentils and red pottage. That doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, does it? How sad is that? I have seen that happen over and over again. Don’t do it people. I am begging you, don’t do it! Don’t trade your treasures for this world’s trash.
