Welcome to a firm foundation presented by Princeton Ministries with Dr. Ken Smith. This is Carol Smith, Ken’s wife. Please enjoy.

I remember several years ago, graduating from college and not certain as to what direction I’d be taking. There are many opportunities. Opportunities. One was to go into business, another was to go into the Air Force. And I came to that moment of trying to decide so many options, it seemed. And as the Lord is good, he brought someone across my path who gave a clarification for me. My father, who had spent his life as a fireman and had spent a great deal of time with a man who then became the chief of the fire department of Yonkers, was in a Corvette shopping center. And we began talking, and he said, what are you going to be doing? I said, well, I have several options. He said, what are said, business or the air force? And to be truthful, I can’t make up my mind.

And he asked me a question that cut through everything. He asked, well, where are you going? Because if you don’t know where you’re going, any road will get you there. Dave Mahoney spent the first 27 years of his life working in the back office as an ad man. And finally, by 27, he became the vice president of that ad agency. At the age of 33, he was given the presidency of the good humor ice cream company, 33 years old. And Dave Mahoney says, it’s not a question of where you’ve been, nor even where you are. It’s a question of where do you want to be. The birth of our first son, Nathan, went through the Lamaz training, and if you have been through that, you know that it’s quite an experience.

And one of the important points in that training is the knowledge that you receive and knowing almost as much as the doctors know, as long as everything goes well. And one of the things that we learned was that there is a period called transition. Transition is that time in the delivery where the mother wants to simply leave the room. She realizes that she has been brought here by false pretense, and there’s really no reason to be here, and it’s time for me to go home. And it’s very important during transition to remind the soon to be mother about why we’re in the hospital. And I remember with Carol as transition came and she wanted to leave, we had a pair of baby booties that were on the table in front of her.

And I simply pointed to the booties, and I said, in a few minutes, there will be a baby born who will be able to use those boots. Remember why we’re here. To have a child. And in so many areas, it is tremendously important for us to remember our goal. All long distance runners know about a thing called the wall. The first time I ever heard about it was over a cup of coffee with a friend of mine who used to enjoy running 26 miles marathons. And I asked him, what’s the most difficult part of long distance running? And Michael said, the greatest problem comes between the 15th and the 20th mile, and you hit the wall. The wall, he said, is an emotional thought that overpowers you.

And you are totally convinced that you cannot run the 26 miles, even though you know you can, even though you have run the 26 miles many times in the past. And the thing that prevents many runners. From becoming long distance marathon runners is the wall. And as they approach the 15th to the 20th mile, they slow down and forget their goal and say, I can’t make it. And it’s about goals that I’d like to speak to you this morning. In the christian life, is it important for you to have a goal? Do you have a goal? What is it? Moses was called out of being a herdsman by the Lord God. And after tending sheep, the Lord said to him, Moses, you are a special man that I am going to use for special purposes.

I want you to go to the pharaoh, and there you will tell him to let my people go. And Moses says, not me. I’m not the one. My tongue stutters. You should send my brother Aaron. He’s a very good talker. The Lord says, I’ll do that. But Aaron’s going to speak by way of you. Moses, I have a goal. The goal is not just that the people will be set free, but the goal is that they will be brought to a land that is filled with milk and honey, Canaan, the promised land. And Your goal is to lead them there. Now, you would imagine that the Jews would have thought, having seen all that they saw by the hand of the Lord, that it would have been an easy thing for them to accept the goal still in Egypt.

And Moses says, plagues are going to fall upon Egypt. Until God’s people are let go. And the Jews lived in a part of the country called Goshen. And in Goshen, after the plagues were announced, we find that when the flies descended upon the Egyptians, that the flies did not fall in the town of Goshen, where the Jews were. And when the locusts came and devoured all of the food, they fell on the land of the Egyptians. But Goshen was free of the locusts. And then The Lord said, your hearts are still hardened. I am going to take the firstborn son, and he will die. And the firstborn sons of the Egyptians died, but the children of the Jews did not die. And Moses gathers the people after Pharaoh has said, you may go, he says, we are now going to the promised land.

And they cross the red sea. And the Jews look behind them to see Pharaoh’s soldiers being drowned in the falling of the waters on the very ground where they had passed on dry ground. And afterwards, a celebration. Remember the goal. We have been set free, but we are now heading to the promised land. And no sooner are they in the wilderness than there is complaining. And from the people who have seen the hand of the Lord work so mightily, they become preoccupied on the fact that now the lord has given them manna, and they’ve been eating the manna until now. They are tired, and they are sick of manna. And in the place in the wilderness called kibosh, the people complain. And the lord hears their complaining.

He says, I will send you meat, but I will send you so much meat that in the consuming of that meat, you will eat it until it comes out of your nostrils. You have forgotten the goal. And after that day of feasting on the quail, exactly as the lord had predicted occurred. And no sooner does that occur when the Jews continue on. And there at Hazaroth, Miriam and Aaron, relatives of Moses, begin to complain again, because Moses has been wed to a Cushite woman. And they say, does the Lord only speak through Moses? Meaning what? That both Aaron and Miriam wanted to take upon themselves the priestly office, and that they wanted to give and receive the power that obviously Moses was executing. And at this point, the Lord’s anger is enraged.

And he calls down and he says, I want three of you, Moses, Miriam and Aaron, to come aside. He questions Miriam and Aaron. He says, to show you the authority that Moses has. And instantly, according to scripture, Miriam became a leper. And Moses prayed that she would be changed. And she was sent for seven days to the outskirts of the camp. And you’re a Jew, and you look out from the camp in the distance, and you see Miriam. Miriam, who had forgotten the goal. And then she’s brought back, having been cleansed after one week. And then we read, twelve spies were selected to go out into the land. And they were to scout out to see if it were possible to go into that land. Twelve spies, they enter the promised land, the land that the Lord had established.

As the goal, the lord who had promised that they would receive that inheritance. And so the twelve spies go, and they return with their report. Ten of them say, the land is filled with giants, the sons of Ana. The cities are mighty, the people are strong, and we are not able to take the land. That’s the majority report. And like so many majority reports, it was an error. And then the minority report, Joshua and Caleb, they saw the same land. They return and tell the people, yes, it is true there are giants in that land. Yes, it is true that the cities are strong. But with the Lord who has promised us this land, we will certainly be able to take it. And as is the case so often, the majority report was received.

And the people laid back and said, we shall not enter the land. And the Lord’s anger was so kindled that he then said, because of your unbelief, because of your distrusting in the very promise, and the fact that I have given you the goal and told you that you will succeed because you have denied the promise, none of you but two will enter the promised land. Joshua and Caleb. And so for 40 years the Jews wander in the wilderness. And no one other than those two enter the promised land. So often, as Christians, we forget what our goal is. So often we get caught up in the incidents of the day or the week that we forget that we are going to a goal, that our eyes should be fixed on that goal.

You might have read this week in the paper about a woman who was found in a park in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Her clothes were old and worn. She obviously had not eaten for several days and perhaps weeks. And the police found her, brought her to the station and asked, what is your name? She said, I don’t know. Well, where did you come from? I can’t remember. And unlike detective stories, the truth of the matter is that amnesia very seldom occurs over long periods of time. But for eight months, this woman has been totally unable to remember where she came from, the name of any relatives, or even any hobbies that she has. She is the same today as she was when she was found in the park. The police have named her Mary Doe because they don’t even know her name.

And in an interview this week, a reporter asked her, what is the hardest part about your amnesia? She delayed. She said, the hardest part is that I don’t know where I came from and I don’t know where I’m going. Where are you going? What is your goal? In Romans, chapter eight, verse 18, we read Paul, saying, for I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us now. If Paul were a man who lived out of convenience, and Paul simply enjoyed great comfort, these words would not have much meaning to us. But if you would turn with me to the book of two Corinthians, chapter eleven, verses 24 through 28, this is what Paul received. This is the comfort in which Paul lived.

Five times I received from the Jews 39 lashes. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked. A night and a day I spent in the deep. I have been on frequent journeys in dangers from rivers, dangers from robbers, dangers from my countrymen, dangers from the Gentiles, danger in the city, dangers in the wilderness, dangers on the sea, dangers among false brethren. I have been in labor and hardship through many sleepless nights, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure. Apart from external things, there is the daily pressure upon me of concern for all the churches. And Paul tells us that he considers the sufferings of this present time not to be worthy to the glory that is going to be revealed to him in Christ Jesus. How can he make such a statement?

How did Paul live, having been beaten, stoned, whipped, thrown overboard? How was he able to go and to continue? And to say that none of this is comparable to the glory that’s to be revealed to me in Christ is because Paul knew his goal within the christian church. Today, walk with me through any christian bookstore, and there you will find literally hundreds of titles, books that talk about 15 steps to a greater marriage, 30 steps to financial security, three easy lessons to maturity in Christ. And within the christian church, there are many today who are wandering from one seminar to the next, seeking to become preoccupied one aspect of the christian life, as though that were the only aspect of their life.

And when you talk to Christians, you’ll find that many of them are spending days, weeks, hundreds of dollars attending these seminars to improve their marriage, to receive financial security, to grow in Christ. And certainly in some cases, it has been helpful. But by and large, the average Christian who attends these seminars leaves them frustrated. Something didn’t snap that they were hoping would fall into place. And why is that? I believe that like the Jews wandering through the wilderness, there are many Christians today who have become preoccupied on small areas of their christian life, as though there were only the water in the wilderness that should concern us today. And we forget the goal. The goal is to go to the land of milk and honey. The goal is not to become preoccupied today on this seminar or that seminar.

The goal of wandering in the wilderness was not for the Jews to become preoccupied on the fact that they were getting tired of manna. It was not the fact that they didn’t seem to have enough water. And yet on that day, you would have thought that the only goal that the Jews had was water. The only goal that they had was meat. And within the christian church today, there are many who would think that the only goal that they have as Christians is one aspect or another of the christian life. And the reason for the frustration is that so many of us have forgotten our goal. And what is our goal? The goal of the Christian is to stand before Jesus Christ and for him to declare, well done, good and faithful servant. That is our goal.

Thank you for listening to a firm foundation presented by Princeton ministries. This programming is supported by you, the listener. You may go to our website, princetonministries.org, or send your donation to Princeton Ministries Post office Box 2171, Princeton, New Jersey 8543. That’s Princeton Ministries post office Box 2171, Princeton, New Jersey 8543. The Lord bless you and Dr. Smith looks forward to hearing from you. We would like to thank Rones web development company for making this webcast possible. You can find their link at the bottom of our website, princetonministries.org.