Welcome to the Kerwin Baptist Church broadcast today. Our desire is for the Word of God to be spread throughout the world so that all may know Christ. Join us now for a portion of one of our services here at Kerwin Baptist Church, located in Kernersville, North Carolina. For that today, an attitude of apathy. We're not just talking about apathy here, literally in this passage.
Now listen to me tonight. We're talking about a person who has developed an attitude of apathy. Not just cold to the Lord. Every time we talk about apathy, we always do it in terms, which is true, that we're cold towards spiritual things.
Now, I am the first one to tell you one of the big problems in our churches is apathy. Apathy to the Word of God. Apathy to the moving of the Holy Spirit of God. yes but what I'm talking about goes even further than that because you can develop an attitude of apathy towards your life beyond just spiritual things you can get to the point in your life that you become so apathetic that you don't want to be around people you don't want to do the things you used to want to do, you don't feel like it, you don't want to socialize, and you can even begin to isolate. It gets to the point that there's just, you almost don't care, really care about anything in your life.
Everything's a drudgery. Everything seems to be, have a negative connotation. And if you and I are not careful, and I want you to hear me out, apathy is certainly dangerous spiritually. We're going to talk about this tonight. But I want you to know that sometimes you need to analyze and look at your life that maybe you've developed a bit of a spirit of apathy to a lot of things in your life.
It used to be that you look forward to accomplishing some things, and you had some goals in your life, but now it's not.
Now it's just trying to get through each day and getting to the point, I don't enjoy this, I don't want to really go and be around that, I don't want to go get involved in that. And I've, you know, talked so often with people in my office about this exact thing. And God began to lay on my heart that this can develop into an attitude, that it's almost a self-defense mechanism. It's that we get hurt by things, and some things frustrate us and hurt us so much that we don't even want to put ourselves out there. It's the way we defend ourselves.
No, I don't want to go socialize, because if I do, I might get to know somebody, and then they might end up saying something about me, and then they might start talking to people about me, or they might do negative, and then I'm going to be hurt by another person. No, I'm not going to go after this goal in my life because if I don't reach the goal, then I'm just going to get discouraged about that. You know, I'm not going to really put the metal down and try to excel in my job because, you know what, they're probably not going to promote me anyway. And then if they don't promote me, then it's going to hurt me. And you all understand that before long, you can begin to get that spirit with people and friendships and church and every area of your life.
I heard a story about a high school social studies teacher and he was frustrated with the apathy of his students and so he stormed into the classroom one day, didn't say anything, went to the chalkboard and he wrote A-P-A-T-H-Y, real big, and put it on the chalkboard. Two of the students who had been forced to sit on the front row because of so many other things, they looked at him with their normal disinterest. One of the students cocked his head to the side and looked at his classmate and said, what is A-P-A-T-H-Y? And the other student said, who cares? I have never seen in my life, and I've been around church since the very beginning, and I have never at times fought it even in my own life, just in the past 10 years, of how easy it is to develop an attitude of apathy.
And now it goes beyond just, I'm apathetic about reading my Bible.
Now I'm apathetic about coming. Listen, we have even a generation of young people that are apathetic. They don't care about anything but their phone. They don't care about anything but their video game. And they can sit in a family reunion.
They don't care about anybody in the family. They don't really want to have a conversation with anybody. They don't want to get out of the house. They don't want to learn to ride a bike. They don't even, listen, we have a generation of kids.
They don't even want to get a driver's license.
Now listen, I couldn't wait to get my driver's license. Why? Because I wanted to get away from my dad. I couldn't wait to get a driver's license. But listen, we just have this culture is shifting to where we just don't care.
So God gives us Ecclesiastes chapter 9, and I want to look at some factors of why this happens. And I believe it's in God's Word. I believe God's Word has the answer to everything, don't you? I do not believe man has the answer to everything. And I don't believe the preachers have the answer to everything, but I believe God does.
I want you to notice, number one tonight, what causes this? How do you get to this point?
Well, number one, it's not going to sound real spiritual, but I can back it up with Scripture. Number one is a lack of setting goals. But a lot of times you and I, if we can get to a point in our life where we have quit setting goals, we've quit trying to achieve. We've quit looking ahead and setting a goal for ourselves.
Now look at Ecclesiastes 9 verse 10. Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do. It means you're looking for something to do. It means you care enough that you want to do something. You want to accomplish something.
Notice what it says. Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, give it everything you've got. Do it with all thy might. It means this literally. set a goal, accomplish something, do something, get active.
But we have developed many times a spirit of apathy where our hand is not looking for anything to do. In fact, we're looking for how to stay out of doing something. We're looking for how we can isolate and withdraw ourselves from things and people and church and everything else. Notice what it says. Why is it that we ought to be looking for something to do.
And when we find it and we give it everything we have, why is it that we're supposed to do that? Because there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom in the grave. You get to the grave, you have no chance to go back and redo it. You get to that point, you can't go back and change it. You can't get to this end and say, boy, I wish I would have done a whole lot more.
I wish I would have tried harder. And I wish I wouldn't have gotten so discouraged. And I wish I wouldn't have gotten to the point that I didn't care because it just things built on me and I got to the point that I just didn't even want to try anymore.
Well dear friend it's dangerous when we get to this point. And that why God led me to preach on it Whatsoever thy hand find Are you looking for any are you looking to do are you are you looking to accomplish something Is there still an excitement in your life that you want to do something for God that you want to maybe reach a person or you, you want to do something in a ministry or remember how you used to be excited and you used to have that desire. And yet some of us would say today that desire is not there. What do you mean a lack of setting goals, preacher?
Well, number one, sometimes the problem is that there's no goals. You fall into apathy and your desires stop and you've got no target for your energy. You've got nothing to shoot for. What used to excite you doesn't excite you now. And let me ask you this, what stopped your interest in it?
If you used to enjoy coming to church and you were excited about it, if you're watching online, I'm glad you're watching online. A lot of people, they didn't really want to come to church, they're not going to listen online either. But I want to ask you something. if you happen to be listening and you've gotten your joys out with coming to church, what killed your interest in church? What stopped that?
Why do you not care about it now? I would ask you, is there a way to rekindle some of your desires? Is there a way to rekindle that energy? Is there a way to get those desires back in your life? Things that used to excite you.
Things that used to motivate you. There used to be something to look forward to. There used to be an energy or a motivation to do something with our life. Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, give it everything you've got because you don't know how much time you have. Let me encourage you.
Write something down that you could start pursuing now. Set a goal for yourself.
So, preacher, I don't even know where to start.
Well, I'm going to help you with that in just a little bit. Start setting a goal. Forget about the potential cost. Forget about the potential, you know, what could go wrong. And forget about, well, I don't know if I'll, just forget all that.
Write something down. Get a goal in your life.
Sometimes what happens is we've set no goals. Number two, sometimes the problem is that we've set the wrong goals. You say, preacher, what do you mean? Look at verse 11. I returned and saw under the sun that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong.
Do you understand what's going on here? Here's a person that has set a goal to be fast and they found out that's not the key to winning the race And then here's a person that has set the goal to gain strength and they found out that that's not what wins it It means that many times you and I have set the wrong goals in our life We think that if I set that goal, it's going to satisfy me and it doesn't satisfy And then before long we think why should I set any goals? Hey, if I make more money, I'm going to be more happy. You make more money and you're less happy hey if I could get this then that'll give me I'll feel great about that and that'll give some enjoyment in my life and then you get that and it brought enjoyment for about a week and then you're done with it now you're left with the bills and you start hanging clothes on that treadmill maybe sometimes it's the fact that you've set no goals sometimes it's the fact that we have set the wrong goals I think of Jonah before he was swallowed by that, I believe, whale, obviously something like that. Maybe you're going against the direction God wants you to go in life.
You've set a goal that's opposite of God, and it's been frustrating ever since. You've decided this is what I, you know, maybe this is what I want to do, but it's not that you're not setting a goal. It's the fact that you've set a wrong goal. Are you going in opposite direction of God? or maybe the fact is that, you know, maybe you've set a goal that somebody else imposed on you.
Maybe you're trying to please someone else with what you're doing in your life and you realize that can't please them and it's not pleasing you. And whatever the case might be, sometimes it's the fact that we don't set any goals and sometimes it's the fact that we set the wrong goals. Number three, sometimes the problem is we set impossible goals. And this is at times where you begin to expect more out of yourself than God even expects out of you. You want perfection.
You know why a whole lot of people set New Year's resolutions in January and they give up by March? You know why?
Well, number one, because they got hungry. Excuse me, number one, because we got hungry. Number two, let me tell you why. Because they set a goal so impossible that they couldn't keep up with it. And the moment they couldn't keep up with it, then they just quit.
whatsoever thy hand find it to do do it notice what the verse says do it with all thy might it doesn't say win it it doesn't say accomplishment it means just listen if you're going to do something give it everything you've got but don't set a goal that's impossible for you or anyone else to reach look at verse 11 neither yet bread to the wise nor yet riches to men of understanding nor yet favor to men of skill, but time and chance happeneth to them all. You understand God has a time and a chance for you. God has a purpose for you. And sometimes you and I can set goals apart from God's plan. And we've set an impossible goal and we get mad at people.
We get mad at ourselves. We get mad at God and everybody else because we set an impossible goal that we couldn't reach or we set a wrong goal for the wrong direction or we set no goal at all. And the answer is this, you've got to do something. Number one, a lack of setting goals. Number two, I want you to see how does this develop in your life where we get this apathy.
Number two is a lack of spiritual concern. Look at verse 11, but time and chance happen unto them all.
Now, what's the point of this? Look at verse 12. For man also knoweth not his time. This is the spiritual aspect of it. Notice first, it's like, hey, whatever thy hand finds to do, give it everything you've got.
Do something with your life. Motivate yourself. Get some energy about some things. Don't let yourself just drift into apathy because it'll happen if you allow it. But listen, not only that, find something to do.
Do it with all your might. But there is a spiritual principle behind all this. Look at verse 12. For man also knoweth not his time as fishes that are taken in an evil net. Notice that evil net.
And as birds that are caught in the snare. Snare is often used in the Bible in a spiritual application. Notice this.
So are the sons of men snared in an evil time when it falleth suddenly upon them. He says, listen, don't let yourself get apathetic. Because I'm going to tell you, if you're not careful, you're going to forget that life is short. That there's things to do. And you're going to regret this.
Listen, we have a generation of people that are withdrawing and so apathetic. They don't care about anything. Here's the problem. They're gonna regret it. They're gonna get to a point in their life they're gonna look back and realize, I have not cared about so many things that I missed out in life I here to challenge you tonight Listen you got to analyze your own life Maybe it's the fact that you are not motivated by time now.
You have a lack of spiritual concern. And the spiritual concern is this. Listen, I don't know how much time I have. Death can happen to you that fast. Death can happen to you that quickly.
and I need to make sure that I get out and I do something for God while I can. And when you and I lose that, we have a lack of spiritual concern. Let me remind you of Revelation chapter three. Remember the whole series we did on the churches. Let me look at verse 14.
Notice this.
And under the angel of the church of Laodiceans write, these things sayeth the amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God. I know thy works that thou art neither cold nor hot. I would that thou wert cold or hot.
So then because thou art lukewarm and neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mouth. Because you're not cold, you're not hot, you're just apathetic. I just don't care. There's no passion about serving God. There's no passion about life.
There's no passion about your marriage. There's no passion about your children. And I'm here to tell you, there's so many of us that have lost our motivation and our energy to do something for God. Do something in your marriage. Do something with your children.
Get out there and mentor them and love them and spend some time with them. Do something to help in your marriage. Take some time off work. Spend a little bit of money on your wife. Don't sit back and let everything die on you.
It's happening everywhere I look. I'm getting tired as a pastor of watching it. We just don't care. We've just gotten an apathetic attitude at life. Number three, it's a lack of social compassion.
Now I want you to look at Jude 20 and I want you to see these verses. There's a lack of setting goals. There's a lack of spiritual concern. This is how this apathy develops in our life. And let me tell you where it really develops is when we stop having compassion for people.
Having a lack of passion turns into having a lack of compassion. I get to the point that I just don't care about so many things that now I don't care about people. Look at Jude 20. But ye, beloved, building up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost. Notice this.
Keep yourselves. Keep yourselves in the love of God. Looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. and of some have compassion, making a difference. And others save with fear, pulling them out of the fire, hating even the garment spotted by the flesh.
May I say something? If your love for God has begun to fade, then I know your compassion for people has begun to fade. A lot of times, look at me, a lot of times when you begin to the point in your life where you have so much apathy about so many things, let me tell you what's going on. It's a spiritual issue between you and God. There's something lacking there.
And it's manifesting itself by an attitude of apathy. I can't change things, so I just won't care. loving and caring for your neighbor is one of God's top priorities in Luke chapter 10 what's interesting there Jesus is giving this parable and a man asked him a question Jesus says love thy neighbor as thyself and a man asked him a question well who is my neighbor and Jesus begins to tell this story about literally a man that was on his way to Jericho and he was a Jewish man and he was attacked by thieves and he was left half dead on the side of the road.
Now listen to me. While that man lay there, Jesus said, first a priest came by. A spiritual leader came by and saw this man, saw what happened, and guess what happened? He left. He went to the other side, crossed the road, walked on the other side, and did not help him.
Then the Bible says a Levite, which is literally a priest helper, comes by, and he saw the man's condition, and guess what? He just passed on by. But then third, a Samaritan came by. Samaritans and Jews did not get along. They didn't like each other.
But when that Samaritan came by, he showed a compassion that the priest and the priest helper didn't show. And Jesus says, listen, what you need to understand in your life, one of your greatest priorities should be to love your neighbor. You say, preacher, who is my neighbor? Anybody that needs you is your neighbor. How are you doing on that compassion level?
Let me tell you something about a pastor's life. I have to constantly monitor that. pastoring can turn into meetings and planning and budgets and everything else and pastoring can turn into sermon preparation and getting material ready and pastoring can turn into scheduling events and looking at a calendar and meeting and planning things but if you're not careful what pastoring can lack is compassion for people. Can I tell you something? All the board meetings and all the revival meetings and all the planning and all the finances and all that won't do one bit of good if you don't have compassion for people.
My predecessor was the greatest in the world at that. Brother Joe genuinely loved and cared about people. I can't tell you how many times when I I was working for him. Part of my job here, Miss Dorcas, was to make sure that Brother Joe got to where he needed to be. Because Brother Joe would get talking, and he'd be three hours late to a meeting.
I can't tell you how many times in my life I went, hey, Brother Joe, we need to get going. He goes, yeah, I know. And he just keeps talking to the person and talking to the person and talking to the person. You know why?
He cared about people. People were the priority. Brother Joe didn't have a college degree. Brother Joe never finished college or didn't have much of an education. But he sure built a great church here.
You know why?
Compassion makes a difference. You know why there's no difference in your life? Because there's not compassion. Oh, you might have done everything else right. You might have everything planned out.
You've got all the T's crossed and all the I's dotted and everything else. But dear friend as you look at your life and you look at your marriage and you look at your family you realize something missing and it just might be compassion Look at this verse 1 John 3 verse 17 But whoso hath this world good and seeth his brother have need and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him? I mean, how do you prove to me that they have the love of God in them if they don't even show compassion for their brother. My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue, but in deed and truth. How many of you can say that's a good verse?
Thank you for four of you that that's a good verse. Let's try that again. How many of you can say amen? That's a good verse. I'm not always doing my ear I'm trying to fix this thing by the way here's the admonition my little children let us not love in word neither in tongue but in deed here's the admonition God gives do something do something quit talking about it quit using all your words start doing something I believe in our churches that there needs to be a revival of compassion for other people listen we sit in this little enclosed building and we don't make one bit of difference outside of this building if we don't have compassion now look at me we can rip up a floor we can put carpet we put sound panels we put lights we've done everything we can do to make this building as acceptable as possible but can I tell you something this building isn't what's going to change Kernersville.
It's the people in it if we show compassion. But we can get such an attitude of apathy in life that now not only I don't care about that and I don't really feel like doing that and I'm not driven to do that anymore and I don't really want to the point now I don't even care about people. Oh, there's another person in need. Yeah, I know.
So number four, learning where to start. All right, preacher, so Mr. Know-it-all, let's just say, hypothetically, that maybe I have a little bit of an issue with this. Let me be the first to tell you I understand. I've been there, and I go there quite often.
You're looking at an individual that most of the time, if I had my way, I wouldn't be around anybody. And what's interesting is my wife, I, I love people. I enjoy people, but I get very hurt by people because it's just that. And so sometimes the self-defense mechanism is I'm just not going to get hurt if I just don't, I've told you before, and y'all laugh at me, but I have anxiety. And you know, on Sundays, Sunday mornings, I pray with the deacons before we come in here, and that's been a godsend of my life to get my heart and mind settled and ready to come in here and preach God's Word.
But a lot of times in services, listen, anxiety to me is music's playing, there's people sitting in different places, some people are coming in, and I come into the room. That is anxiety to Pastor Hotry. Why? Because I come in, I'm like, I need to start going and talking to people. I enjoy talking to people.
I enjoy you people. You're my favorite people. But if I go start talking to people, what if I run out of time, and there's a person over here I didn't talk to, and there's a guy over here I didn't shake his hand, and here's a person over there like, well, he never even came by and talked to me. And I'm already assuming and seeing how I can get people hurt and angry before I even start shaking hands.
Some of you are like, you have an issue. Yes, I do. I understand how you can get to the point that you can just just want to isolate you want to withdraw and listen we have people in our church and outside of this church and everywhere in the area that have gotten to the point that man they've just lost their passion they've lost their motive they've lost their energy they just just don't really care like they used to about things and I'm here to tell you if you're not careful that can often be a spirit that Satan has fought you with. And God says different in his word.
So where do I start, preacher?
Well, number one, you need to set a spiritual goal in your life.
Now look at 2 Peter 3, 17. Just want you to see it. Ye therefore, beloved, seeing ye know these things before, beware lest ye also, being led away with the error of the wicked, fall from your own steadfastness. You've got to beware because Satan's going to try to make you slow down, make you stop, make you quit, get you discouraged. He's going to try to keep you from your own steadfastness.
The greatest news that anyone can receive is the news of the free gift of salvation found in Jesus Christ. It is our desire for you to know Him personally. Would you take a moment to hear this today? Every man is born with a sin nature. Romans 3.23 says, For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.
No matter how hard we try, we're not good enough to obtain God's glory or to get to heaven. Because of that, sin carries the penalty of death. Romans 6.23 says, For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. The wages of our sin or the payment of our sin only equals death and separation from God. But it's only through God's gift of salvation through Jesus Christ that we can accept Him as our Savior.
Jesus Christ paid for your sin debt. The Bible says in Romans 5.8, But God commendeth His love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. All you have to do is receive Christ by faith as your Savior. Romans 10.9 says, That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. Verse 13 continues, For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.
It's as simple as admitting that you're a sinner, believing that Jesus is the only way and calling upon his name. The Bible says whosoever, that's anyone, can call upon the name of the Lord to be saved. Have you accepted Christ as your personal Savior? There is no greater day than today to take care of this. Would you accept Christ as your Savior?
If you have any questions, please give us a call at 336-993-5192 or visit our website at curwinbaptistchurch.com or visit that person at one of our three service times. We hope you have a great rest of your day. God bless you.
