Appreciation and Perspective

Einstein, but he was a remarkable man. But there was one famous quote from him explaining relativity. You know, people find it hard to sort of wrap their minds around this theory of relativity that he was able to come up with. But this is what Albert Einstein said, as a way of explaining what relativity really is. He said, put your hand on a hot stove for a minute, and it seems like an hour.

Sit with a pretty girl for an hour, and it seems like a minute. And he said, that's relativity.

And you know, in this life, we must constantly be putting things into proper perspective so that we can reflect the right attitude in life. And coming to see perspective means that we see things relative to what, in fact, that we may be personally experiencing in our own lives. You know, as Mr. Velicci was talking about David, I thought about the fact of how David, you know, came to understand another perspective as a result of his experience with Bathsheba. You know, he came to see a perspective that he had never seen before. And you go and you look at other examples throughout the Bible, and I'm not going to go through a whole list, but you think about Job. You know, old Job came to see another perspective. He saw things relative in the past that changed his perspective when he went through certain experiences in his own life, one of which was, again, being sick as long as he was. And then another individual in the Bible, I think, that stands out is the prodigal son. He got a new perspective. He was probably like a young teenager, a lot of young teenagers are. They think that their parents are hard, they're harsh, and they're cruel. And he thought, well, I'm going to ask my dad for my part of the inheritance, and I'm going to take off because I think I'm going to find better things out there. You know, the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence. And he got to the point where he was feeding hogs, and he was even tempted to eat some of the food that the hogs were eating. And he thought, well, you know, my father has servants in his house that don't have to go through this kind of thing. And so, in other words, the prodigal son went through a perspective change, and he came to himself. It's like Job came to himself, and David came to himself. Well, brethren, in life, we must constantly be putting things into its proper perspective so that we reflect the right attitudes in life. And I have to say, going to Zambia has been quite an enlightening thing for me.

I'm like many of you. I grew up in America. You know, I grew up in Oklahoma, and, you know, our life was not, you know, I would say on the wealthy side at all. And on the other hand, it wasn't on the super poor side. And I don't even think ours was on the middle-class side. It was below that in how we had to grow up. But, you know, going to Zambia enlightens you in a way that cannot happen any other way. You know, we take a lot of things for granted in the United States. And the good things God has given to us in this wealthy country, I mean, this super wealthy country that you and I live in. And the youth chorus group spent two weeks roughing it in Africa. And we came home to the greater comfort most of our brethren will never know in this lifetime. I thought about that, you know, as we left Zambia, that here we're going to go back, and we're going to get back to the business as usual about how we live back in the United States of America. But these people can't escape this. This is the way they live. This is where they are, and this is where they're going to remain until Jesus Christ returns. They're going to live in this kind of environment until that happens, until that change comes, and that opportunity.

You know, even so, though, the Zambian brethren seem to be so appreciative of everything that was made available to them. You know, they were just so appreciative to that. And maybe for some, what they had, you know, during the course of the two weeks that we were there, you know, what they had to eat and where they slept was better than where they came from, you know, the places that they lived. And, you know, so the people there were so appreciative in every way. It was a remarkable experience, again, to see that in their eyes as they enjoyed the meals with one another, as they went through the day and the activities that we had, you know, over there for the leadership training and the English classes and also the camp the next week. Let's go to Ephesians 5, Ephesians chapter 5. Down in verse 19, let's know this here, it says here that we ought to, as God's people, in verse 19, it says, Be speaking to one another in Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, seeing and making melody in your heart to the Lord. You know, we ought to have our focus, in other words, on the spiritual. This is what Paul was talking about here. And in verse 20, it says, Giving thanks always for all things to God, the Father, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. I had to ask myself the question, by the way, do I give thanks always? Am I that way? Always. That word thankful means that we're grateful, that we're appreciative. It is a state of being with us, in other words, not just something we do capriciously when somebody does something nice for us, but it's something that we are as God's people. Are we thankful, brethren, always? Does this make up our character? Is this the way that we are? You know, do you and I, brethren, have the right perspective, and are we appreciative? Are we appreciative? Do you show that appreciation in all that you do in your life? You know, we arrived, as I told you, on Monday evening there in Chang'e.

And the leadership classes and the English computer classes began on Tuesday.

And the four with the youth corps were sitting there, myself, Lena, Lewis, and Mark, and we were sitting on these couches in front of the guest house, where the dining hall was as well. And the church bus arrived, by the way. That was a very special thing that they could have in Zambia. They have a church bus that says on it, United Church of God, publishers of the Good News magazine. And by the way, this is a very good advertising thing for them. Every community they drive through, everybody's basically gawking at this bus. And some people come up and ask for a Good News magazine. And they actually have magazines they hand out to people, you know, along the way. But anyway, we're sitting again on these couches in front of the guest house dining hall, and the brethren from the Copper Belt and Lusaka had traveled by the bus, and they came down for this program. And you know what was so striking to me, as those as the brethren stepped off of the bus, every one of them, brethren, walked over to the four of us. They had never seen me before in their entire lives. They didn't know any of the people were there with the exception of Lena. She had been there one year before. And it was so striking to me that they all came out, one by one, out of that bus, and they came over and shook hands with every one of us and said, welcome. You know, I thought when I saw this, that this would never happen in the United States.

No one would ever be that way, you know, in the United States. And you know, I thought a good deal about this since it happened. What is the difference between the African brethren and us?

What's the difference between us? You know, Americans tend to never be satisfied. That seems to be the way we are. We're never satisfied with what we have, even though we have so much. I mean, we've got so much. I mean, not just do we have some things, but we have so much, and we're never satisfied. We always want more. Most Americans don't see the right perspective. Many people in the United States probably think that they're deprived. Our brethren in Zambia don't seem to carry that same kind of thinking, even though they are deprived. I mean, if I looked at somebody and said, you know, these people lack, you know, I would say to the brethren there in Zambia that they lack, but they don't carry that way of thinking. You know, it was so amazing, though, when I would talk to some of the brethren, it's like every time they would have an appreciative attitude, they would say, thank you very much, and if they made a mistake, they would always say, sorry. Sorry.

And they said sorry a lot, even though they didn't make any mistakes. I think they said sorry in case they did make mistakes. But it was quite an education, seeing that in the way that the brethren were, they were, again, so appreciative, so thankful. All the way through, they were that way. 1 Thessalonians 5. Let's go to 1 Thessalonians 5 in verse 16.

Here the Apostle Paul, you know, is admonishing the brethren at Thessalonica, chapter 5 in verse 16 through 18. It says here, rejoice always, just in the way that we ought to be thankful always, but we ought to rejoice always. In verse 17, pray without ceasing, pray without stopping, keep praying in your life. And in verse 18, in everything give thanks, for this is the will of God and Christ Jesus for you. And so it's God's will that we learn to be a thankful, appreciative people. You know, give thanks to God in all circumstances.

You know, in case we ever think things are bad for us, you know, when you have a right perspective, it helps us realize that it could be worse. It could be worse. You probably heard that expression, you know, people talk about, well, this is bad. You know, what we're going through, and sometimes someone will say, well, it could be worse. Well, it really could be. And we need to have that perspective, brethren. You know, we might, in fact, if it did get worse, trade the current situation we have for the bad situation that was going to come or was going to happen to us, because it can get quite a bit worse. You know, it can develop that way. You know, there's one young lady who wrote a mother at home from college. This young lady was at college, and this is how the letter goes to her mother. She said, dear mom, sorry I haven't written sooner. My arm, it says, really has been broken. I broke it, and my left leg, when I jumped from the second floor of my dormitory. You hear this mother reading this letter here, you know, you broke your arm, you broke your leg, you jumped from the dorm. It says, when we had a fire. So it gets worse. We were lucky. A young service station attendant saw the blaze and called the fire department. They were there in minutes, I was in the hospital for a few days. Paul, the service station attendant, came to see me every day, and because it was taking so long to get our dormitory livable again, I moved in with him.

I mean, this gets worse than the mothers say, what in the world is this girl doing?

And he's been so nice, but I must admit that I am now pregnant. Paul and I plan to get married just as soon as we can when he gets his divorce.

I hope things are fine at home. I'm doing fine, and will write more when I get the chance. Love your daughter, Susie. P.S. none of the above is true, but I did get a C in sociology and flunk chemistry. I just wanted you to receive the news in its proper perspective. So you see, brethren, things could get worse, couldn't they?

And you would gladly accept the C, you know. I hope we never get a letter like that, boy. To be thankful in all circumstances, we need a proper perspective of our circumstances and our God as well. And only then, brethren, will we be appreciative always as Christians in the way that we should be. What is it, brethren, that robs us of the ability to be appreciative? What is it that robs us of that? Like I say, Americans, it seems like we're never satisfied, you know, and who was it who wrote the book, The Ugly Americans, that was very popular many, many years ago, because, you know, America, of course, was walking in high cotton from the standpoint of international economic wealth, and Americans were not very good tourists when they would travel abroad. But, you know, what is it that robs us of the ability to be appreciative? Let me give you three points with regard to this, and let's write these down and let's think about this, brethren, a great deal.

Number one thing that robs us of our ability to be thankful, to be appreciative, brethren, is pride. Our pride.

You know, people can act like nobody ever did anything for them.

And they believe their success is because of all their hard work. You know, I worked hard, I went to school, I went to college, I, you know, became a professional, or whatever it is that people do to, you know, be successful in this life. But some people can act like nobody did anything for them. And we can think that there's no one to thank but ourselves for where we are in our lives. The question is, I would have, is unless something has changed dramatically, who gave birth to us? Well, mom and dad, you know, were responsible for that, weren't they? Who diapertors and fed us? You know, when we're born, we don't come out full adults.

I remember they had an advertisement many, many years ago how this one young fellow was about six years old and anyway had this voice that was very mature. And he said, hello, my name is Chester Hollyhock and I am seven and a half years old. You know, we don't come out that way, do we? You know, being fully in charge of our ability to command ourselves, you know, in this life, in the director pathway. So all of us have somebody to thank. Every one of us do.

So pride, get rid of the pride. Pride is such a horrible thing in our lives and I know we all have it. We all have it. But, brethren, we've got to get rid of it. We've got to get rid of the pride and the vanity. Number two, number two, a murmuring spirit. A murmuring spirit.

You know, we can constantly carp about everything. You know, we can gripe about everything. Instead of being appreciative, you know, we are never satisfied. We're never satisfied with what we have. You know, Paul said he was content, you know, no matter what, whether he was up or whether he was down. Well, brethren, we need to be content. And certainly, if we work harder, God will bless us. Maybe we will have more, but be content with where we are. And not what we expect to accomplish. If there's anything I could tell our young people as they're thinking about going on to higher education, is learn to do that. To be content at whatever, you know, station you are in your life. You know, appreciate what you have. And don't have this murmuring, complaining spirit. It seems when you look in the Bible that God hates murmuring. He despises it. You know, here you had children of Israel on their tents, you know, they were murmur, murmur, murmur. You know, God's hearing this grumbling, this murmuring all the time.

There was a lady, by the way, known as an incurable grumbler, and she constantly complained about everything. And at last, her preacher thought he had found something about which he could be happy, because her farm crop was the finest that had ever been for miles around. And when he met her, he said with a big smile, a beaming smile on his face, you must be very happy, Mary. Everybody is saying how healthy your potatoes look this year. And she said, true, they're pretty good, but why am I going to do when I need bad ones to feed my pigs?

You know, some people can be that way. The blessings are coming out of heaven and falling down upon those and complaining about something like that and murmuring. And of course, this has been in a humorous fashion, but we know it's a reality the way people are. They got the yell butts.

Oh, look at all the blessings that God has given to you, the wonderful family that you have. Look at the good job that you have. Look at your children. Look at how God has really blessed you. Yeah, but. And then, of course, the murmuring about something. So, number two, the murmuring spirit, brethren, causes us not to be appreciative. Number three, not being careful to notice things causes us to be unappreciative. You know, it seems that some people are oblivious to the blessings that they have, and they simply just don't see the good things that God has allowed them to have. They just don't see it. You know, they have that perspective about them, and they need a perspective change. They need to think about what God has given to them and to be noticed things, notice things. I know a lot of wives would probably like their husbands to notice how well they take care of the home. Maybe how they got, in the case of our family, by the way, I'm really very thankful my wife organized all of our feast stuff into a notebook. I appreciate that. Frankly, I haven't had the time to organize things. I had paper all over the place, but she's always been good at that.

You know, and it seems like she comes to the rescue with those things. But, you know, men need to notice things that their wives do. And wives, you need to notice some things that your husband does, because it might be hard for him to do some things. So if you see any evidence, ladies, you better let him know. I mean, it might be as good as it gets until he's a spirit being. You know, it might be advisable to learn to be notice things and be careful to notice. You know, there was a man who was greatly proud of his golden retriever, and he was talking about how wonderful his dog was when hunting. He had an old salty partner who was constantly complaining and carping. But this man was so proud of his golden retriever bird dog, and how that this dog was just so good at what he did. You know, he would point right at the bird. You know, he would readily do this for his owner. Well, one time the man had shot a bird, and the bird fell in the pond, and as usual, the dog headed toward the water to retrieve the bird. His bird was so good, brethren, it just walked on top of the water. Out of where the bird was floating, he picked it up with his mouth, turned around, and headed back to his master with a prize in his mouth. And the old complaining salty man said, now look at that dog of yours. He's not such a good dog after all. Look, he can't even swim.

Some people. You know, it's like some people say some people's kids. Well, some people again just don't notice things. They don't seem to notice things. It's like God performed a miracle and gave Israel manna from heaven. And it wasn't long that they were complaining that they had the same thing every day. There wasn't enough for God to perform a miracle and providing manna for 40 years. In the middle of nowhere, by the way. They had manna falling out of heaven, and all they had to do was go out and gather it. And they were complaining. You know, they had a miracle straight from God every day, but were no longer satisfied because of the pride. And they were careless. They didn't notice what God had done for them. And you see that, in fact, in the writings of the prophets. You know, it's like they didn't notice what God did. All these times that he delivered them. You know, sometimes, brethren, we can be that way, too. We can not notice what God does for us, what others do for us, as well. And, you know, we can become people that are not satisfied easily because of pride, because of carelessness, and because of a murmuring spirit, brethren, that we could show ourselves not to be thankful to God for what he's done for us. So we can be the same way. You know, Rudyard Kipling was a great writer. I know most all of you have heard of Rudyard Kipling, but he was a writer and a poet whose writings many people have enjoyed through the years. And unlike a lot of old writers, Kipling was one of the few who had the opportunity to enjoy his success while he lived. And he made a great deal of money writing. He was successful, very successful in that way. You know, one time a newspaper reporter came up to him and said, Mr. Kipling, I just read that somebody calculated the money you make from your writing amounts to over a hundred dollars a word. And Mr. Kipling raised his eyebrows and said, really, I certainly wasn't aware of that. And the reporter cynically reached down into his pocket and pulled out a hundred dollar bill and gave it to Mr. Kipling and said, here's a hundred dollar bill, Mr. Kipling. Now you give me one of those hundred dollar words. And Mr. Kipling looked at the hundred dollar bill for a moment, took it and folded it up and put it in his pocket and said, thanks.

We know, brethren, God would like to hear us use that hundred dollar word a lot more. Thanks, God, for what you do for us. And, you know, if we're more appreciative, it would change us. It really would. If we can learn to be more appreciative as God's people, it would cause us to think about what God has done for us so we can reach out to others. It would cause us to worship God more, to appreciate Him more than we do, and to extend, brethren, our love to others and try to connect people with God. We would live each day with appreciation for what we've been given. Let's go to 1 Corinthians 11. Like I said, God does not like complaining, murmuring, Spirit. He didn't like it in Israel. In 1 Corinthians 10, down in verse 9 here, we're admonished over here in verse 9 on down to verse 11, it says, "'Nor let us tempt Christ, as some of them also tempted, and were destroyed by serpents.' And verse 11, "'Nor complain, as some of them also complained, and were destroyed by the destroyer.' And it says, "'Now all these things happen to them as examples that they were written for our admonition upon whom the ends of the ages have come.'" So God doesn't want us to be a bunch of complainers. Sometimes little kids can be irritating that way. They can be finicky.

One of the things a parent would do is to try to teach a child not to be that way. Not to be that way. "'Oh, Mommy, I don't like this! I don't like it!' You know, how many of us like that? It's like, isn't it fingernails on a chalkboard? You hate that? Many years ago, there was a sitcom that was talking about a family called the Weiner family. And everybody whined in the family. Father was, "'I don't like this, Mom! I don't like this!' You know, and all of them were that they called the Weiner family. Hopefully, brethren, we're not in that club. We're not a part of the Weiner family." In the King James, by the way, the word complain here is translated murmur.

It's murmur. Again, God does not like murmuring. The buzz of murmuring in the camp of Israel made him sick to hear. And, you know, we can be like ancient Israel as God's people. And, brethren, God has indeed blessed this country. Just think about, brethren, we can drink in of these mighty blessings that God has given to us. And traveling in Africa over the villages and in the Bush country and seeing how people live there. And mud hut shows me what God has given us is more profound than we realize what God has blessed Israel with. In Mapoco, by the way, I met a young couple who lived in a hut. And it was a mud hut, you know, with the grass on the top. The way that these huts are constructed, you've got, you know, they use, you know, the grasses that are around to do the roof of it. It takes quite a skill to do it. They make their own bricks, by the way, themselves. And this little hut that they lived in was a round hut. It looked like it had been made many, many, many years ago. But what was unique about this young couple that Mr. Onkomo wanted me to meet, he wanted me to go in and to meet them, is they live in this mud hut. They have five children and they just had a newborn. In fact, what was unique about seeing this young couple is they'd had the newborn about four or five hours before. So she had had this baby, you know, she was sitting up in the room and people were attending to her. Anyway, it was such a wonderful thing, is they asked me to pray for their daughter, their newborn daughter. And so anyway, I asked God's blessing over her. I said, what is her name? They said, we don't have a name yet. And so it was such a touching thing. I think we got a picture of that little baby, just as cute as a bug's ear, you know. But what I was trying to say, though, about where they live is the room where they live, I don't know what to compare it to, but I would say the room where she was sleeping was probably about seven feet by six feet, something like that. So what is that? 42 square feet. And there was another room on the other side, but that was their house. And that's where they lived with five kids. Now, sometimes we think we're crowded. I'm thinking to myself, how in the world do you live here in this small mud hut with five kids? And yet both of them were very happy. The mother seemed very happy and very healthy, by the way, as well. One thing is, I will never again complain about bad health care in America. Never. You know why? Because that young couple had none that I was aware of. They had no medicines. They had nothing whatsoever. These are people in the church who live there in Zambia, back in the Bush country. After I saw that, I thought, you know, we have an absolutely wonderful health care system in the United States. And my perspective changed. I realized, brethren, that our perspective changes. We become more thankful with what we have, what God has given to us. You know, if you have any health care at all, brethren, be thankful for what you have. Be content. You know, we, again, we as Christians need to express our gratitude more as the time goes on, brethren, and we ought to be thankful. Let's go to Psalm 100. Psalm 100.

Psalm 100. And verse 4. Psalm 100, verse 4. Notice here, we're told in verse 4, enter into my, into his gates with thanksgiving. You know, when you came into the door here, brethren, for this service here today, did you come up with that attitude of thanksgiving, of appreciation, of being able to be here? And into his courts with praise. You know, when you came, did you come with the idea, boy, I can't wait to get into the singing, so I can praise God. And with, you know, my ability to sing with God's people. You know, sometimes we make a joyful noise. I realize that. But I remember people through the years that put their heart into what they were singing, and they were really praising God. In some cases, people can't carry a tune in the bucket. But that's okay with God. That's okay with God, because it comes from the heart. In verse 4, Be thankful to him and bless his name, for the Lord the Eternal is good. His mercy is everlasting, and his truth endures to all generation. Psalm 107. Let's notice this. Psalm 107 in verse 1. Here it says, very short verse, brethren. It says, O give thanks to the Eternal, for he is good. His mercy endures forever.

And so we ought to be thankful to God for what God does for us. Now, there was a time when Jesus was passing through the middle of Samaria and Galilee. You remember the story about how that ten leprous men cried out for Jesus to have mercy on them? And Christ told them, remember, he told them, he said, you go show yourself to the priests. And so they went to show themselves to the priests, and on the way, all ten of them were cleansed of their leprosy. Now, that was a very big miracle that took place. And only one returned to express appreciation to Christ. And to show again that God cares about whether or not we show thankfulness, whether or not we are appreciative of what he does for us, brethren, Jesus Christ said to the man who would come back to thank him, where are the other nine? Where are they? You know, is it possible that in heaven, God says that? Of people he heals? Maybe he heals more than one on occasion. Where are the others?

Where are those who have been healed miraculously? And I'm not going to go to it, but you might want to write it down. It's in Luke 17 verses 15 through 19, if you want to read the account. But you remember what the leper was told by Jesus Christ after that?

Christ told the one leper who came back, thankful, he said, your faith has made you whole. I've wondered by that statement on the part, you know, of Christ. He told him, your faith has made you whole. But weren't all ten of the lepers healed? What did Christ mean here? Well, the word whole is more—and again, this is speculation on my part—but the word whole here means more than physical healing. Because Christ implies here that it meant more for him. Perhaps he received more than the others. Perhaps because of what he did and the attitude that this man had, he could be called, he could be brought into the church. And not only would he be healed physically speaking as he was there by that miracle that took place, but he was healed spiritually in a way that the nine were not. In other words, for the nine, it was just a healing, physical healing. For this thankful leper, it was a healing that affected his spirit and his heart.

You know, we need to realize, brethren, that God wants us to be thankful. It's his will that we'd be thankful is his people. And you know, being positive and thankful in life has its physical benefits to us. Studies have shown that having a positive, happy, and a calm demeanor, people are nearly three times less likely to develop a cold after being exposed to the virus than those that tend to be negative-minded. These were volunteers, by the way, and they found that this was true. And psychologists will tell us the impact this can have on us health-wise as well.

It is healthy, brethren, for us and good for us to be thankful. And you know what is good? And it's healthy for us to hear somebody who is thankful, too. You know, when I saw the brethren in Zambia and the reaction to things, it made me feel good about them. It made me realize that, you know, they've got things that I need. I need to be this way. I need to have a perspective change. I need to see things differently. You know, God will give that perspective to us, that's perspective of hope which this world cannot have. And the reason why the world can't have it, brethren, is because they refuse to believe God. In Romans 1, Romans chapter 1 over here, let's notice in Romans chapter 1, Romans 1 and verse 20, notice it says, For since the creation of the world, his invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made. In other words, it's obvious by looking at God's great creation, even as power, eternal power in Godhead, so that they are without excuse. But in verse 21, because although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts and their foolish hearts were darkened.

And so here we see God looks at mankind because He's not thankful, that He's not appreciative.

God appreciates our gratefulness to Him, and the reason why is because it glorifies Him. It glorifies Him. It lifts Him up to the level that He ought to be in our way of thinking.

An attitude of appreciation toward God, brethren, also endears us to Him.

When we're appreciative to God, He's endeared to us. He's drawn to us for what we say to Him, what we express to Him. Now, I want to give you some quick points here and maybe some scriptures to give you some points on how we can express appreciation more in our lives as Christians, to have an appreciative attitude in our lives. And we'll go through these fairly quickly. Number one, brethren, if we're going to have an appreciative attitude, is we have to draw near to God in our lives. You know, the Apostle James in James 4, 8 says, Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Again, God appreciates it if we are thankful to Him. He draws near to us. He has an affinity for those who appreciate what He does for them.

You know, that we don't use God as a hip pocket God. You know, every time we need something, okay, God, now let me take you out of my pocket here. I need you. Need a Lamborghini. You know, I need whatever it is. You know, it's a selfish attitude usually. So draw near to God in your life. Number two, number two, have forgiveness for others. Have forgiveness for others.

You know, we need more tolerance. We need more patience for each other. You know, in a couple of weeks, we're going to have, hopefully, new people that are going to be come and be with us in our midst for the kingdom of God seminars. Brethren, we need to be patient. Let's not receive people with doubtful disputations, but let's receive them and realize that God is apparently effectuated to work in their lives, or they wouldn't be here when they come.

And let's be tolerant and patient of people and have an attitude of forgiveness. That's what happens when we forgive other people and have that attitude of forgiveness, is we become more tolerant. We're patient of other people. I'm not going to go to Matthew 6 in verse 14 through 15, but it says, For if you forgive men their trespasses, Jesus said, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. I would suspect Jesus Christ could say, look, if you're not patient with other people, guess what? I'm not going to be patient with you.

If you're not tolerant of other people, I will have no tolerance for you.

So again, it reflects the ability for us to see a perspective here. Our forgiveness of others should be an expression of our perspective of how much we have been forgiven. How do we view our own selves in comparison to our sins? You know, have we been forgiven much in our lives? You know, just ask yourself right now, have you been forgiven a lot in your life? Or have you just been forgiven a little?

Because he who perceives how much he has been forgiven loves much.

Number three, brethren, to show appreciation.

Express your appreciation when you serve in the church. Express your appreciation when you serve in the church. Once again, brethren, this has to do with perception. And our perspective as to what we comprehend and what God has done for us. Remember, Jesus Christ, we're told in the book of Philippians 2, emptied himself and came in the form of a man, a slave, as it were, and died for us so that we could have eternal life. Is that enough? Is that enough for you and me, brethren?

Romans 12, verse 1, we're told over there that we ought to be a living sacrifice, which is our reasonable service. And that word reasonable, by the way, in the Greek is logikos, or logikos, and it means logical. It's logical that we would be a living sacrifice.

Young's literal translation translates it intelligent. It's the only intelligent thing to be a living sacrifice to God. So, express your appreciation when you serve in his church. And I think it goes without saying that we all should be serving in some way or capacity within the church. Number four, we show appreciation and perspective when we want to help preach the gospel to the world. Do you have that burning desire, brethren, inside of you to help get the work done?

You know, Mr. Armstrong said there were two reasons God had called all of us. And I love to remember this and remind myself of this, even as I mention it in church services. Number one, to train to be teachers, and number two, to help get the work done. So, the number one thing that God called us for was not to be saved, because if that were the case, then God's being unfair to the rest of the world.

But he's called us, brethren, to help to preach the gospel to the world. Do you remember the woman who was at the well in Samaria? Jesus asked her for a drink of water, which was not something typically a Jew would ask a Gentile woman.

And let's go over to John 4 here. John 4. And notice this story over here, but in John chapter 4, in verse 9, you know, Jesus asked her for some water, and in verse 9 down here, said, How is it that you being a Jew ask a drink from me, a Samaritan woman? For Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans. And Jesus answered and said to her, If you knew the gift of God and who it is that says to you, Give me drink, you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.

Christ could have said here, Look, if your perception were to change a little bit, you'd know who you were talking to, and I would give you living water. And so Jesus Christ begins to talk to this woman who has a narrow perception and perspective. You know, she couldn't perceive godly concept. Most people are like this in the world. This woman, of course, was like every other natural person to hear upon the face of the earth.

Verse 11, it says, And the woman said to him, Sir, you have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where it says, Then do you get the living water? And so, you know, here in this case, she asked again the natural questions with regard to that. But as we go on down through here, let's notice Jesus Christ begins to talk to her.

He talks about with her about her husbands, and Christ tells her that the man she's living with is not her husband either, that she's had five husbands, and the man that she's living with is not her husband either. Let's go down to verse 19, And then the woman said to him, Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. In other words, her eyes start opening here. Her perception and perspective begins to change a little bit. Oh, I'm not just talking to a Jew who wants a glass of water here or a cup of water.

And then he gets into this discourse, further discourse with him. But let's note this down here in verse 25. It says, Then the woman said to him, I know the Messiah is coming, and who is called Christ? When he comes, he will tell us all things. Now here Jesus gets direct with her. And he said to her, I who speak to you am he. Now he was very direct with her.

I am he. I am the Christ. I am the Messiah. And so her mind by this time was really beginning to open up, as she's beginning to see things in a bigger way. And notice what she does then. Notice what she does down in verse 28. And then the woman, it says, left her water pot and went her way into the city and said to the men, Come see a man who told me all things that I ever did. Could this be the Christ? Could this be the Christ? And then I went out of the city, or they went out of the city and came to him.

You see, her perspective changed, and she changed her her thinking. And now her expression of appreciation is shown by how she wants to share what she's found out. In other words, if we have appreciation, brethren, and we have the right perspective, we want to help preach the gospel. This is what she did. And this is what others have done in the Bible. David, remember, when he repented of that dangerous sin with Bathsheba, where it almost cost him the Holy Spirit, what did he tell God?

If God would forgive me, he said, Restore unto me the joy of your salvation, uphold me with your free spirit. And then, well, I teach transgressors your ways, and sinners shall be converted unto you. In other words, a change of perspective here with David. Look, not only God, am I going to back you the help, but I'm going to go and do it myself as much as I can. Wherever I can talk about your mercy, God, wherever I can talk about your way of life, and obviously David was in a position quite different than many of us as a king.

People tend to probably listen to the king a whole lot more, but, you know, and we need to do so sometimes when we have the right circumstance, share with people as we can. Number five, when we reach out with compassion to people who suffer, we show appreciation. You know, when we are of this world, the part of this world, we were in constant consternation and trouble in our minds because we lacked understanding. I remember, brethren, how it was. I remember going down by the creek behind our house and wondering what this life was all about.

You know, when I heard about people starving in Africa, when I saw the suffering and all of that stuff that all of us see, brethren, in this world, I thought, well, how could there be a God, a loving God that would allow all that? I didn't have the answers. It blew my mind sometimes, and then God opened my mind.

I saw a different perspective. I understood. I began to change my life. There was still compassion, though, for other people. That compassion was mainly as I wanted people to be able to be a peace of mind, the way that I was able to do that, because of what God revealed to me.

We have compassion for one another. I'm not going to go to 2 Corinthians 1, but you might want to write it down in 2 Corinthians 1, verse 3 through 4. It shows there where God comforted us.

So, when God took away the consternation and the dismay in my mind when I was, you know, being called, and when He did it for you, brethren, He intends we comfort other people, that we have compassion with people who are suffering.

Number 6, brethren, number 6, we show appreciation and right perspective when we give God our best time. We give God our undivided attention on the weekly Sabbath and on the holy days. We give God our focus when we pray and when we meditate before Him, giving our best time, as it can, brethren, to offer Him the best sacrifice that we can before God. Remember, God was not pleased with Cain's offering because He did not give God the best offering. Now, Abel apparently did. He gave God the best.

Perception, brethren, means that we know who it is we worship. We know who He is.

Like Job grew in his perception. He thought he had heard of God. He said, I have heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you. I see you now.

And I repent, he said, in dust and ashes. And so, we give God our best time because we know who it is we worship. That God is not a man, but He is infinitely greater than a human being. You know, I was meditating on this yesterday, in fact, about God and how great God is. And I thought, God, wouldn't it be wonderful if you could show us how great you are?

How great you are? And He has. I do not mean to imply He has not. But, by that, I mean, humanly, if we could see how great God is. And then I came to the conclusion in my meditation, no, I couldn't even take it. I couldn't take how great God is. And the reason is, brethren, it probably scares half the deaf. It would literally scare the deaf. We understood how powerful and how great God is. But we see through it glass darkly, don't we?

And some day we'll see fully. But right now we're not quite ready for that fully, as it shall be in the future. And number seven, brother, every sermon should have the seven points. And we show appreciation for worshiping God with all of our heart and all of our soul and our mind. Christ said, the great commandment of the law is you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. So we need to give our whole heart to God. King David gave his whole heart to God. He said, he told God, he says, give me understanding, I will keep your law. Indeed, I will observe it with my whole heart. You know, one thing about David, he did sin mightily in his life, and the sin with Bathsheba was a terrible sin that had multiplicity of errors in it. But David also repented mightily. He repented of what he did wrong.

And he said, look, God, I will do things with my whole heart. Well, brethren, traveling to a country like Zambia has given me a new perspective. And how my appreciation for what God has done needs to grow. I need to grow in that appreciation for what God has done and to be an appreciative person, to be thankful before God. So, brethren, let us be appreciative to God. Let's gain a new perspective, a perception that we have not had before. And if we do not, brethren, I think we of all people upon the earth can be classified as selfish. And forgive me the word, pig-ish.

Very pig-ish. Because God has abundantly blessed us, brethren, and it's important for us to recognize this before our great God. So, brethren, I encourage you, grow in your perspective and grow in your appreciation so that you have the state of being a thankful and appreciative person.