They shall still bring forth fruit in old age—-Psalm 92:14   As we grow older we need all the encouragement we can get, and nothing cheers our heart better than the Word of God. Our text today is a good example. We can’t keep from getting older, but we can keep on being fruitful. I love the following story told by Charles Swindoll. Perhaps it will strike a note in your heart as well. He wrote:

Last fall one day at the church, I spotted a visiting gentleman who was shaking hands with a half-dozen folks he’d never met before. Then he looked at me, and with a grin and a twinkle, he whipped out his hand. It was a hand you could strike a match on, toughened by decades of rugged toil.

“You look like a man who enjoys life. What do you do for a living?” I asked.
“Me? Well, I’m a farmer from back in the Midwest.”
“Really? I guess I’m not surprised, since you’ve got hands like a tractor tire.”
He laughed . . . asked me a couple of insightful questions, then told me about his plans for traveling on his own.
“What did you do last week?” I asked.
His answer stunned me. “Last week I finished harvesting 90,000 bushels of corn,” he said with a smile.
I then blurted out, “Ninety thousand! How old are you, my friend?”
He didn’t seem at all hesitant or embarrassed by my question. “I’m just a couple months shy of 90.” He laughed again as I shook my head.

He had lived through four wars, the Great Depression, sixteen presidents, ninety Midwest winters, who knows how many personal hardships, and he was still taking life by the throat. I had to ask him the secret of his long and productive life. “Hard work and integrity” was his quick reply.

As we parted company, he looked back over his shoulder and added, “Don’t take it easy, young feller. Stay at it!”

The Bible is filled with folks who refused to take it easy. Remember our friend Caleb, who, at age 85, attacked the Anakim in the hill country and successfully drove them out (Josh. 14)? Or Abraham, who had a baby (well, actually Sarah did) when he was “in his old age” . . . he was 100, she was 90 (Gen. 21)? Or Noah or Moses or Samuel or Anna, the 84-year-old prophetess . . . significant people, all.

Age means zilch. Wrinkles, gray hair, and spots on your hands, less than zilch. If God chooses to leave you on this old earth, great. If He makes it possible for you to step aside from your work and move on to new vistas with fresh challenges, that’s also great.

And whatever else you do, don’t take it easy!

“No disease is more lethal than the boredom that follows retirement” (Norman Cousins).

Someone called Peter “the apostle of failure”. That seems a bit harsh, but the fact remains that that Peter was prone to fail. Aren’t we all? That’s why we ought to remember Proverbs 24:16 “For a just man falleth seven times, and riseth up again: but the wicked shall fall into mischief.”   Everyone fails from time to time and that’s bad, but that’s not all. Believe it or not, good can come from it. That’s right! Although it would be better if we never failed we need to realize that something positive can come out of it. We need to look for it. Generally we see only the bad in failure, but the truth is that God can use our failure for some good purpose. Let me give you just one example.   Failure can make us aware of our weakness, and that can lead to a greater dependence upon God. Let’s face it–we all tend to get a bit cocky at times. We suppose we are better, smarter, or stronger than we really are. Failure brings our feet back down to the ground! You don’t hear much boasting from a kid who just got the stuffings knocked out of him by a neighorhood bully, and failure often transforms our attitude in the same way. So the next time you fail, learn from it, and look for some good to come out of it. Sometimes it takes a failure to make us aware of our weakness and to rid us of pride. Failure doesn’t have to be final. It can be the very thing that leads to success. But you got to get up and get going. Confess your failure, do what you can to make it right, and look for the good that comes from it.

For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you an expected end. 
-Jeremiah 29:11

When it is all said and done, what God wants from us is not success as much as faithfulness. Results and fruit are His work. Faithfulness and obedience are ours.

God had a future for the apostle Paul, even when he had been arrested and thrown into prison in Jerusalem. Jesus reminded Paul that He knew what he was doing in Jerusalem and approved it. It had been controversial for Paul to go to Jerusalem to begin with. Agabus had warned him that he would be imprisoned, and sure enough, he was. One could even look at Paul’s circumstances and conclude that Paul blew it, that Paul was outside of the will of God and never should have gone.

But our job, if you will, is to obey the leading of the Holy Spirit. And you can always anticipate opposition when you do that. We gauge success as bigger and better. But time has a way of sorting things out. And what may be deemed as a success today may, in the future, be viewed as a failure. What may be looked upon today as a failure may be regarded as a success in the days to come.

As God is at work in our lives, we may see only a brushstroke here or a dash of color there and say, “Wait. What is this? I don’t know if I agree.” We need to step back and give God room. There will be an expected end. There will be a completion. And ultimately, it will be good. God had a future for Paul, and God has a future for you.

And in that final day, Jesus is not going to say, “Well done, good and successful servant.” He will say, “Well done, good and faithful servant.” So be faithful. (By Greg Laurie)

A woman said to me,”You can preach about gossip all you want, but you will never stop it.” Maybe she was right, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to remain silent. A lack of response doesn’t change my responsibility to denounce what the Bible condemns.   Gossip is to the church what cancer is to a body. It just keeps eating away until it destroys everything. The devil knows that, and so he just keeps feeding the rumor mill. And, he is smart. If he can’t get you directly involved in the gossip circle he will use another method. One of the most common is to have you put it in the form of a “prayer request”. Some holier-than thou person will say something like this–“I hate to mention it, but we need to pray for so-and-so. Did you know——-“.   The problem is that most folks don’t understand the nature of gossip. They think if what they say is true it is fair game. Here’s what you need to remember–some gossip is based on lies and some on facts, but in both cases it is destructive and should be avoided. Just because something is true, that doesn’t give you a licence to repeat it.   Here’s three reasons why we should refrain from gossip: 1. It is hurtful to others-(Proverbs 11:9)     It hurts those of whom you speak. Some people would have recovered from their sin had it not been for all the gossip about it.     It hurts those to whom you speak. Long after you are gone your words will remain in the mind of the person who heard them. Sometimes the gossip about a person’s sin does more damage than the sin itsefl.   2. It is hated by God (Proverbs 6:16-19)     God hates all sin. When you gossip about another person’s sin you are doing the same thing that person did–offending God! The nature of your sin might be different, but that doesn’t make it better. Putting it in the form of a “prayer request” doesn’t sancitify it.   3. It is harmful to you (Proverbs 26:20-28)     Don’t think for a moment that you can hurt others and offend God without suffering the consequences. The Bible teaches that such people should be excluded from the church (Rom. 16:17 ; 2 Thess. 3:6-14). Next time you are tempted to gossip about the gossipers you need to remember that!   A.B. Simpson wrote: ” I would rather play with forked lightning or take in my hands living wires than speak a reckless word against any servant of Christ, or idly repeat the slanderous darts which thousands of Christians are hurling on others, to the hurt of their own souls and bodies.”

“No God? No Problem!”–So reads the signs erected by “The American Humanist Association” in five major cities this Christmas. How foolish! Humanism is the belief that you can be good without a belief in God. It’s easy to criticize the folly of people like this, and we certainly ought to point out their errors, but they aren’t the only ones who play the part of a fool.   There are many professing Christians and other religious people who are just as foolish as the atheist. I’m talking about those who believe in God, yet think they can be reconcilied to Him by their “good works”. We seldom hear preachers denouncing them. In this “make me feel good “world, that would be bad for their business. Instead of declaring the truth concerning Christ, that salvation is by grace through faith in Christ alone, they cater to the whims of the crowd so they can add them to their flock and brag about their large attendance.   We need to make the truth known, not only to the atheist who thinks there is no God, but also to the religious people who think they can get to heaven by their good works. It’s not the popular thing to do, but if we truly care about people we will tell them what they need to hear rather than what they want to hear.   By the way–How is it with you? Do you truly know Christ as your Lord and Savior? If you are trusting anything other than the shed blood of Jesus Christ you are no better off than the folks who say, “No God?No Problem!” Fact is–you’ve got a big problem. You will spend eternity right along side of them in the lake of fire. If you’re really concerned about knowing the truth here it is, Jesus said, “–I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.”(John 14:6)   Instead of spending our time bashing a handful of deluded atheist this Christmas, let’s declare the truth of the gospel to everyone–including the millions who think they can be saved by self-effort. The devil doesn’t care if you go to hell from a bar stool or a church pew, and chances are he can get you there from the pew of a liberal church easier than from any place else.