A Reckoning is Coming

I got a flat tire today and I was trying to drive on it to a local tire store, and I had to pull out in traffic a little slower than usual, and while I got to the light, I waited for it to change. A car pulled up beside me and was honking its horn, motioning for me to roll down my window. I did so, assuming the person was going to point out my flat tire to warn me, but as I rolled down my window, this woman behind the wheel let loose on me with the most abusive language and cussed me and cussed God until she was red in the face.

Satisfied that she'd finished her tongue-lashing for me pulling out in front of her, she drove away with an obscene gesture. Here I am, an old man with a flat tire, who just needed some compassion, and instead I received judgment, and as I thought about that obscene and wicked woman driver, I wondered why God just didn't cut her off. Why is she taking up space in the world, breathing God's air, while cussing him out and cussing out his preacher? And a verse of scripture came to my mind.

It's in the book of Ecclesiastes. You can turn in your Bibles there now, friends. It's found in chapter 8, in verse 11, and this choice word of God applies to that devil of a woman, and it applies to everyone the wicked today, because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil.

I want us to look at this text this evening, friends, for it has much to say to us today about the world in which we live. For a Christian is to live differently in the world than the rest of the world, at least God expects us to. We're not supposed to look like the world, or act like the world, or talk like the world.

We are to be lights to this dark society in which we live, and not blend in with it so that our light is diminished. I believe Lot and Sodom didn't shine too well, he just tended to fit in, and it cost him his family, for he lost his wife on the way out, and he lost his daughters within the gates of Sodom a long time before they were dragged out by the angels. Parents can either be the spiritual means of great blessings to their children, or they can be spiritual hindrances to them.

It all boils down to how we live in the home. Is there such a reality of God in our personal lives that it impacts for good those that are dear to us, or are we just one thing at church and quite another at home? The kids are watching, especially the teenagers who are looking for reality. If that spiritual reality isn't present in mama or daddy, then to look for reality in other things out in the world.

Such was the case with Lot and Sodom, though he was a saved man, he was a silent man, a silent witness to those around him. That's my introduction, friends, to this message this evening from Ecclesiastes 8.11, which is entitled, A Reckoning is Coming. Allow me to read us our text again.

Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil. Speaking of Sodom, the men of Sodom waxed worse and worse as reprobate silver, because they were making hay in the sunshine as their hearts were fully set in them to do evil. But there came a reckoning day to those wicked Sodomites when the sun set on Sodom, reducing it to smoke and ashes.

And in the days of Noah, the antediluvians bought and sold and did wickedly and filled the earth with violence, and their hearts were fully set to do evil, as Genesis 6.5 declares. And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. But there came a reckoning day, when the flood drowned an entire world, save Noah and his family.

And although you, friend, may be a young man listening to me, or a young woman, and your heart is full board in the pleasure of this world, and you feel you have plenty of time to make your hay in the sunshine, and come to Christ when you're good and ready at a fun, a day reckoning will appear on your horizon sooner than you realize, and all that will be upon you then is a sentence of judgment from a holy God. People think they can live as they please in the world, and sin all they want to, and get by with it, because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily. Therefore, the hearts of the sons of man, both young and old, I may add, is fully set in them to do evil.

The older a sinner gets, the more corrupt they get. I was sitting on a bench by the ocean, watching the sunset, with my little dog in my lap, and an old woman asked if she could share the bench with me. It wasn't long.

She was telling me the dirtiest sex stories that I finally stood and walked away. Little did she know she was talking to a Baptist preacher. She just assumed I enjoy a dirty joke or story, because that's who she was.

Folks think they can mock God and get away with it, because the skies don't turn black all of a sudden. It reminds me of a story I heard when I was just a little child, and I remember it to this day, and I'll close my message today, friends, with it. It's a story from the mid-19th century, when America was still a Christian nation, and there was still a fear of God in the land, and the Sabbath day was still kept, kept holy back then, because society was a Christian society back then, and it was a time in America when this country was in the grip of revival and spiritual awakening, and there were many people getting saved, so many, you could practically throw a stick in a crowd and you'd hit a Christian.

Sundays were set apart for church and the family altar. It wasn't a day for sports and entertainment like it is today. Well, here's that story, friends, and I'll close my message with it.

A farmer who prided himself on being an atheist wrote to the editor of the town newspaper, Sir, I have been trying an experiment. I have a field of corn which I plowed on Sunday. I planted it on Sunday.

I did the cultivating on Sunday. I gathered the crop on Sunday, and on Sunday I hauled it into my barn, and I find I've got more corn per acre than any of my neighbors this October. The editor of the paper publishes God-defined farmer's letter with an editorial footnote at the bottom that read, God does not always settle his accounts in October.

Listen, friends, because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil, but a reckoning is coming, for it is appointed man wants to die, and after that the judgment. Let us pray.