Children—Stephen Hall
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I'll say that again. Good morning, kids.
My name is Steve Hall and I'm going to spend a few minutes with you. Who has a song that they like to sing, preferably on the Backpage.
Go ahead.
#47.
Umm, like the size of the morning?
It is bright on your head. They shall try it.
If you need right and forehead now.
He will come out there, he will look down everywhere. I get out of our heads and he came down.
On the plane on on one right once in the bottom of the ground here alone.
Like the Skype of all the mornings, it is crying around the Lord and so sky.
Excuse me, right, It can't. Go ahead and come.
But don't get a little bright and Red Cross ground.
To come on the prayer and bring me a turn on the new flesh of jewels.
Yeah.
1 morning.
And it frightened round adorned days they come shine.
With your day right now.
For his crown.
All righty, who else has one? Go ahead.
#40 and then #24.
40 #40.
Umm, yeah. Did you try 1? Three. Yeah, Skinny didn't die with me.
Yeah, it's right. So I'm doing.
Come on. Come on. Please. No, no.
Geez, I love you.
And why?
It will watch out in mind and let's talk again. Frozen child cannot come in.
Yeah, yeah.
Three 953.
Yeah, speaking to crying flooding so.
Do you guys don't love me? Don't want that and you were waiting to make me quiet?
00:05:01
Way to hold me in his heart.
Keep me safe from everyone.
Yes, let's see, because but sleeping.
Yeah, let's see 953.
Yeah, she's not slightly, not a pineapple tells me so.
She doesn't like me. Like me? Step away when you come down.
Run, hit and shine and all my life they will watch me where I can watch it.
Yeah, he's right. Last night.
That's been my name. Yeah, he's not like sweet love my ankles. Help me. Umm.
Please don't find me anywhere else may falling by the way.
In my heart and.
In the face, peeking on my thighs.
Yeah, let's see if I love things. You're not happy. You're interested in your eyes and stuff. Maybe.
Yeah, I don't know if I'm slightly.
Thus I will tell me so.
That was number 2444. Very good #44.
News on salvation with everything.
Nobody.
Has heard and sold it to me.
That way I can tell it again.
Well, thank you, son. Don't worry.
No one can say I'm in the children of heaven.
It doesn't play. Yeah, I'm very hungry for.
Yeah, it's not all the time we are supposed to go over anything. 935 July.
Not ever in thy hands with me alone.
Nobody ever in the story had a snow.
And light rain and I'm at night again.
No vacation, no more than anything.
One can say about the time your friends are asking me, and they're all funny as well and have told me before.
98.5.
John strategy and turn the valley outstanding out there. No, I'll send you a slang in the weather that we need than I am sure that I can be sent him forward and he's all right. I can't say I can't say I can't.
Dial donation store. Everything alright?
My pen stay out of the chills running out of bed. And you know nobody ever has told me before.
00:10:05
Let's bow our heads and we'll ask the Lord for His help with our little time together.
I'm going to go ahead and let's say our memory versus.
And then I have a little talk. When I was your age, I grew up in assembly called Tacoma. It's way out on the West Coast. And I always really, really was excited when the Sunday school teacher or speaker had a brown bag because I knew there was something special in that brown bag. So I've brought a brown bag. It's right over here and.
We'll get to that in a couple minutes, OK.
So there's a memory verse this week. I believe it's found in John chapter 3 and verse 36. I'm going to read it and then I was wondering if any of you children want to say it.
So the verse is John 336. He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life, and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him.
Who would like to say the verse?
Any of you brave enough?
Anybody at all?
Shall we all say it at once?
You guys all stand up. Everybody that knows the verse, go ahead and stand up. We'll say it all together, OK?
He that believeth on the son.
Hath everlasting life.
And he that believeth not the son.
Shall not see life.
But the wrath of God.
Abideth on him.
John, 336.
Very good. I know it's hard. It's hard to stand up and say a verse at a conference.
I'm wondering how many of you children were listening?
As we've had in the meetings yesterday and today.
Does anybody, can anybody tell me where we had the reading meetings? What book?
Very good. Do you know what, bud?
No.
Peter, very, very good. Good job.
I want to touch on a verse that we actually had in the reading meeting, so I'm going to open to.
First, Peter.
Chapter 2.
And the verse I want to talk about this morning is.
Is verse 3.
I'm gonna read it if so be ye have tasted.
That the Lord is gracious or that the Lord is good?
So I have some questions for you children this morning about tasting.
Do you guys know what it means to taste?
Yeah, how do you taste something?
With your tongue, what do you have to do to taste something?
Yeah, you got to take it right and you got to put it in your mouth and then you can taste it.
And this verse tells us that we should taste and see that the Lord is good.
I want to turn back to Ecclesiastes for a couple of verses. That's way back in the Old Testament.
I want to make a little bit of a contrast. You guys know what a contrast is?
That's the opposite, OK.
So this world.
Sets before us some things that this world wants us to taste.
OK, and I'm going to read it just a couple verses here in chapter 2. This was Solomon, and Solomon was a very wealthy man. He was the king of Israel and God had blessed Solomon and immensely it says that there was nobody that was richer than Solomon before him or after him.
00:15:24
And he was also a very wise man.
So I'm going to just read a couple verses. This is Solomon saying, I said in my heart, go now, and I will prove thee with mirth.
And therefore enjoy pleasure. And behold, this also is vanity.
We'll skip over a few verses down to verse 11. Then I looked on the works of my hands that had wrought, and on the labor that I had done I had to do, and behold, all was vanity and vexation of spirit.
There was no profit under the sun, children, this morning, this world.
Holds out all kinds of things that we can taste. And Solomon tasted pretty much all of the things that this world had to offer. And he said that they were vanity and vexation of spirit. And I know that you guys probably don't understand.
What vanity and vexation of spirit is. And so I brought an illustration.
Vanity is something that is empty, doesn't have any substance to it, and so I'm going to give us a couple things to taste here.
I hope your parents don't get upset.
I had to go search around a little bit. Does anybody know what this is?
It's cotton candy. Do you know what the ingredients list is for cotton candy?
Sugar and a little bit of garbage.
Right. So I'm going to ask you how much substance is in this container. This is a fairly good sized container. Probably in the US we'd call this about a quart. Do you know how much substance is in this container?
Almost nothing. You know what? There's mostly air in this container. So I went out to the store and I bought a container of air with a little bit of sugar in it.
I like to use cotton candy as an illustration of vanity because it's almost nothing. So I'm gonna get, I'm gonna let all of you children taste this cotton candy and what it tastes like, is it sweet? Right. If you put a little chunk on your mouth, on your tongue, you're gonna taste some sweetness for about 1/2 a second and then it's gone.
And that is a really good illustration, I think, for what vanity is, what this world has to offer. It's we read in another place about Moses that he was willing to suffer reproach with the children of God rather than to taste the pleasures of sin for a season. And what this world has to offer is is definitely pleasure, but it's only for.
Short season so you guys can take just a teeny little pinch. I don't want to get you guys sick. Go ahead.
So what would happen children, if you, if I let you have this whole container and you, you were able to eat the whole container by yourself? What?
Yeah, you would get sick. So usually there's consequences associated with the pleasure that this world offers us.
You got that. There you go. Good job.
PD you want to come up and get a pinch?
Anybody else in the back there that wants one?
That's right, you got 2.
Stop.
Anybody else?
00:20:00
You want a pinch.
If you didn't, if you didn't get a pinch, come up and see me afterward, go ahead.
So cotton candy.
It's a.
It's a whole lot like vanity, right? So all you guys have had a taste and it it's sweet, right? Tastes pretty good for how long?
For about a half second, right? Really, really short. And if I gave you the whole container, you would probably be sick by lunchtime.
The other thing it does is, is, umm, sometimes we go backpacking and we have to walk a long ways with a pretty heavy pack. And if you were to eat some cotton candy, what would happen to you if you were going backpacking?
You might get sick, but you would have a lot of energy for maybe a couple minutes, and then you wouldn't have any energy at all. It would leave you worse off than before. And you know what, children? That's what this world has to offer. It looks really pretty. There's bright colors in this container. We only got through part of the blue, but there's pink.
It's pretty, but it doesn't satisfy, It doesn't fill our hearts. So I want to contrast that. I want to make that opposite of what the Lord has to offer us. So let's look at a few verses and then we'll have another treat.
That has a little more substance to it.
Psalms 34.
As we had in the reading meeting to taste.
Lord Jesus and to find out that He's good. And I hope that by the time we're done talking here, you will have tasted a little bit of the Lord Jesus and I want to encourage you to taste of Him more and more.
You know, as we had in the Reading meeting, the more we taste of the Lord Jesus, the more our appetite.
For the Lord Jesus grows.
Psalms 34, verse 8.
O taste.
And see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man that trusteth in him.
Their children. The first thing, the very first thing that you need to do.
To be able to taste the Lord Jesus, to find out that he's good.
Is to receive Him in your heart, to trust in Him. And it's really simple. We had it in the gospel meeting last night. I know you all know.
The gospel yourselves, but Simply put, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.
And just like the memory verse that we had this morning.
It ends in everlasting life if we trust in the Lord Jesus.
Were saved for eternity, but if we don't, if we put it off.
If we delay, like the Sunday school verse, there's judgment, there's judgment coming. And so it's very, very important for us to believe on the Lord Jesus.
I want to turn to a verse in Jeremiah chapter 15.
Jeremiah chapter 15 and verse 16. Thy words were found, and I did eat them, and thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of my heart.
For I am called by thy name, O Lord of hosts, dear children.
The pleasures that this world offers, the what this world has to offer is just a fleeting happiness. Not even really happiness. It's pleasure just for a very short season.
But if we are willing to taste the Lord, if we open His precious word, and we eat of it, it says here that thy words were found, and I did eat them, and thy word was unto me the joy.
And rejoicing of my heart, dear children, if you want to find joy, if you want to find happiness.
Here in this world, it is found in this blessed book that we hold.
00:25:01
And I want to encourage you, even from a small child, you can open the Word of God and read it. You can listen when your parents.
Open the word of God and you can drink it in, it says of Timothy.
That he had known the Holy Scriptures from a child. And I hope, I pray that.
You are willing to listen to the word of God and that's how we that's one way that we can taste of the Lord is to listen to his precious word is to take in his precious word for ourselves.
But just as as I had that container of cotton candy for you guys to taste it right, you had to take a little bit of it. You had to reach out and take it and put it in your mouth and make it your own.
And dear children, the same thing is true for you. You have to take it.
And make it your own.
I want to speak just briefly to the young people, to those who are a little bit older.
Dear ones, make sure that you're reading this precious book every single day.
And that you take it in and you digest it and make it your own.
You can look at this container up here and not know what it tastes like. In fact, we had one child here that passed it by, and that's probably a good idea. There's a whole lot of food coloring and other bad stuff in that.
And it could make you really sick.
But it doesn't do any good. Dear young people, dear children, if you don't take it in and make it your own, I want to tell you a little bit of a story.
You know, I grew up in Tacoma and I'm very careful not to tell who this was, but I grew up, uh, along with a lot of friends that were my age and one other young man, he went to pretty much all the same conferences. I don't know that he came up here very often. We came up here a couple of times, Umm, but he went to most of the same conferences. He sat through the same Sunday school classes as I did.
And by the time.
That we were roughly 20 years old. I had opportunity to live with this young man for a short period of time and what I found is that 20 years of age.
The word of God had passed in one ear and out the other for him.
And we sat down and at 20 years of age, he had experienced a lot of sorrow in his life.
And that sorrow had brought him back to the Lord.
The goodness of God leadeth us to repentance, and so he was.
Seeking the Lord and we would sit around our little kitchen table for the wee hours of the morning and we would talk about the word of God.
And sadly, very little had seeped into his heart.
And it was a stark contrast for me because we would talk about this scripture or that scripture and I would share this or that with him.
And I wouldn't consider myself to be extremely well thought, especially at 20 years of age.
But he kept on asking me, where did you learn that?
And my response was, why didn't you learn it?
Dear children, you have to make it your own. You have to receive it and digest it and make it in as part of you if you're going to have the blessing from it. Just a couple more verses here that I want to talk about.
Turn with me to Luke chapter 5 if you have your Bibles.
I want to have a little illustration here of someone who tasted.
And found out that the Lord was good. We all know the story, but I'm going to read it really quickly. Luke chapter 5. I'm starting with verse one.
Then it came to pass, as the people pressed upon him to hear the word of God, he stood by the late Knesset and sought 2 ships standing by the lake. But the fishermen were gone out of them and were washing their Nets. And he entered into one of the ships which was Simon's, and prayed him that he would thrust out from him from the land. And he sat down and taught the people out of the ship.
00:30:01
Now when he had left speaking, he said unto Simon, Launch out into the deep.
And let your Nets let down your Nets for a draw. And Simon answered and said unto him, Master, we have toiled all night, and have taken nothing.
Nevertheless, at thy word I will let down the net. And when thee had done this, they enclosed a great multitude of fishes in their net break, and they beckoned into their partners, which were in the other ship, that they should come and help them.
And they came and filled both ships so that they began to sink.
Their children. Here's a beautiful example of someone who tasted and found out that the Lord is good. And I want to encourage you as you go through your lives.
It may be that you're going back into school and in a little over a month, plus or minus.
Peter here he found out that the Lord was good because he was being.
Was willing to listen to the word of God and go back out and let his net down.
And he found that the net enclosed a great number of fishes, so much that both the boats couldn't hold the the catch.
Dear children, I think another way that you can taste and see that the Lord is good is by asking for the Lord to help you.
And by proving His faithfulness in our lives.
Every single day, I want to encourage you, especially you young people as well, to get up and ask the Lord for His help, for your life. Ask Him for His help for the day that you're going through, and you will find out. I guarantee you will find out that the Lord is good.
And you will also find out, my dear children, that if you forget to ask the Lord for his help, you're going to find out that it's a hard Rd. without the Lord helping us.
Haste and see that the Lord is good. One more verse.
Palms, Chapter 22.
Psalms chapter 22 and verse 26. And the meek shall eat, and.
And be satisfied, they shall praise the Lord that seek him. Their hearts shall live forever. Dear children, the other illustration I want to give to you this morning is what this world has to offer will not satisfy, but what the Lord has to offer will satisfy your heart. And that is so very, very important. If you eat of the Lord, if you drink of the Lord.
If you taste of the Lord, you're going to find a satisfaction.
That nothing, nothing else that this world has to offer will provide. It's just like that cotton candy. You can eat that cotton candy all day long and you're never going to be satisfied. It's emptiness. There's no substance to it.
And so, without belaboring the point, I have the other.
Park here.
And you'll excuse me for the reference, but I believe that Snickers says it satisfies. This doesn't really satisfy children, but it's as close as I could get. So there's a there's some candy bars in here. Please take one and pass it down.
Dear children.
Taste and see that the Lord is good.
And you're going to find that he satisfies the heart.
And there's so many other verses that we could.
Take, but there's not enough time.
Toby, you want to come up and help me out here?
Go ahead.
Can you pass this around? Make sure everybody in the back gets one too. Thank you.
So we just have a couple more minutes here.
Do any of you children have another song that you'd like to sing?
00:35:13
What number 3141 #41?
And thank you.
Lombardi glory faces.
What brings them to that? Well, I love that. And so bright and clear.
When I come out of it, it's like joy and about how it came. I don't get all done. They're taking any bloody.
Because I take your genius what you want to tell me everything?
No one should have won't crash that from the beholden wise and clean singing glory.
Right.
I believe we have time for one more.
Go ahead #3.
The thus last and fell Friday, but grandpa's bloody bloody fell.
I think they're not from the French by holding on to his last name.
I write thy father let me go back to my grandfather's house and then thinking that.
Oh my turn, foundation shaking and.
Good. Our United States and the family space-time to change his team. Time change his grace.
And every time, so I mean again, I'll say praying for a home train in my family.
1517 rocks rise down the water and every time I'm missing them.
All the very crying on there, same things and.
All right, now it's ready again from the same.
Name is Grace and my name is Hands and.
00:40:05
Uh, sleeping things back.
All the better grounds in the same thing and.
Let's pray.