Pleasure Isn't The Problem — Heretic — Rich Wilkerson Jr

If you have a Bible today, reach for it. Ecclesiastes chapter 2 is where I want you to turn. Ecclesiastes chapter 2. Grateful that you are in church, welcoming everybody, all of our friends, all of our family, everybody online. Online right now. Put, he's always on time. He's always on time. I just believe that's a word for someone today. We are continuing, really concluding a collection of talks that we have been in. That's our custom as a church, that we take a theme, we take a topic, and then we go to God's Word and we discover it. And the topic that we have been in has been called Heretic. The lies we love to believe, but the truth that sets us free. How many sense that freedom has been taking place here at VU Church the last four weeks? I really believe it. Whom the Son sets free is free indeed. And much of this collection has been based upon a quote by an old preacher by the name of Charles Spurgeon. He said, discernment is not the ability to know the difference between right and wrong. Discernment is the ability to know the difference between right and almost right. Almost right. And so today we're going to continue and conclude the fourth part of this collection. I want to read, if I can, 11 verses from the book of Ecclesiastes. Ecclesiastes chapter 2. You can handle all of these scriptures. If you can, somebody said Amen. Solomon said, I said to myself, come now, I will test you with pleasure to find out what is good. But that also proved to be meaningless. Laughter, I said, is madness. And what does pleasure accomplish? I tried cheering myself with wine and embracing folly. My mind still guiding me with wisdom. I wanted to see what was good for people to do under the heavens during the few days of their lives. I undertook great projects. I built houses for myself and planted vineyards. I made gardens and parks and planted all kinds of fruit trees in them. I made reservoirs to water groves of flourishing trees. I bought male and female slaves and had other slaves who were born in my house. I also own more herds and flocks than anyone in Jerusalem before me. I amassed silver and gold for myself and the treasure of kings and provinces. I acquired male and female singers and a harem as well. The delights of a man's heart. I became greater by far than anyone in Jerusalem before me. In all this, my wisdom stayed with me. I denied myself nothing my eyes desired. I refused my heart no pleasure. My heart took delight in all my labor and this was the reward for all my toil. Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done and what I had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless. A chasing after the wind. Nothing was gained under the sun. Today, I'm excited about this message

because I really believe the Lord has spoken something into my heart that I want to get into your heart today. And part four, as we come to a conclusion, I want to preach in our collection, Heretic. I've titled today's message, Pleasure Isn't the Problem. Pleasure isn't the problem. Let's pray. Let's ask God to speak to us. Lord, we thank you for your word. God, we thank you that it's more relevant today than it's ever been. God, would you speak to us with a now word? Let us leave better than how we came in. Whether we're here in person, watching online, listening by way of podcast, years later, may this message go forth and not return void. We thank you. And it's in Jesus's name, everybody said. Come on, everybody said. Every location, make as much noise as you possibly can. All right, I want to start today, if you're taking notes, and you can even put this at the top of your notes. I want to ask you a simple question. Here's the question. I'll be happy when, fill in the blank. In fact, right now online, just fill in that blank. Because we all have a blank to fill in. I'll be happy when I get out of debt. I'll be happy when I get a job. I'll be happy when I'm not single. I'll be happy when I'm married. I'll be happy when I'm not married. I'll be happy when I have kids. I'll be happy when the kids leave. I'll be happy when I lose the weight. I'll be happy when things pick up. be happy when things slow down. The list goes on and on and on. In fact, some of us, even in this room right now, we have said that before and then we got to that place, we got to that moment, and now, before we even know it, there is a new when in front of us. Why? It's because when always becomes then. This is what I want to try to get into your heart today, is that if you're not careful, it's not that God is not for your happiness. I believe God is for your happiness. I just do not believe that happiness should be your pursuit. I do not believe that happiness should drive you, because if you always live your life saying, I'll be happy when, it's just a matter of time before when becomes

then. I'll be happy when I get married. Then you get married, and then becomes when, because when becomes then, and now you're saying, I'm married, but I'll be happy when we have kids. I'll be happy when I get an apartment. Then you get an apartment. And now you're saying, I'll be happy when I get a house. And then you get a house. And now you're saying, I'll be happy when we can upgrade the house. The list goes on and on, because happiness just continues to move the goalposts further and further down the line. And many of us never take time to actually consider this and recognize that some of us right now are living in the things that we prayed for, but you're still waiting to be happy. Come on, all the way from Miami Gardens down to South Miami, why don't you just clap your hands right now? Because if your happiness is based upon when, it's always gonna die when you get to then. A lot of us, this is where we're at today, that we are pursuing, we are chasing happiness. And let me just tell you, it's a poor pursuit. It's really a terrible God, because when you're chasing happiness, happiness is based upon happenings. Happiness is based upon feelings. Happiness is like the weather. You can't build your life on weather. And we should know this, more than anybody on the planet living right here in Miami, Florida. How many of y'all know Miami's weather is confused? Miami's weather does not know what it's trying to do. You can wake up, not a cloud in the sky, blue skies, sunshine, 90 degrees,

and then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, clouds, thunder, lightning, floods, hurricane wind warnings, all before noon. When I first moved to Miami in 1998, I'll never forget walking down the street. It was sunny on one side, and it was raining on the other. I said, what is this bipolar weather? I said, God, you gotta pick a lane. This weather is neurotic. This weather is psychotic. Yet some of us, we look like Miami weather. We start up in the morning, down by afternoon, feel like winning at breakfast, wanting to give up at dinner. One text message, one moment, and before you know it, we become unstable. It's because we're being led by our feelings. And when you're led by your feelings, it's like being led by the forecast. You never know what you're going to get. And many of us, we find ourselves in a moment in life that we go from one thing to the next thing. It's sunshine on one side, it's raining on the other. Why? It's because feelings are not something to be governed by. In fact, I would say it this way. Feelings are great passengers, but they make terrible pilots. You're not called to live by the forecast. You are called to live by faith. Is there anybody in this room who wants to walk out their faith? I want to walk out faith, not the forecast. I'm not trying to throw shade on anybody, but some of us, man, we check our emotions more than we check our convictions. And when you're led by the forecast, do not be surprised when life feels flooded. Maybe you feel flooded today because at the core of it, it's a feeling that's governing your life. At the core of it, you're being driven by the weather. At the core of it,

you can't get out of it. Keep telling yourself, I'm chasing happiness, but happiness is not a destination, because when you get there, the line moves again. Many of us, we're living life looking and waiting for when, and we're forsaking now. And with this, we don't realize it, but we're buying into an ancient philosophy, the philosophy that when I'm living and pursuing happiness by all means, I'm actually buying into an ancient philosophy called a hedonism. Try to teach a little bit today. Hedonism, it comes from the Greek word hedon, which really, it's a philosophical paradigm, and this is what it means. Hedonism is the philosophical position that pleasure is the highest good and the chief aim of human life. Now, most people today in 2026 don't walk around and say, I'm a hedonist. Instead, we say things like this. If it feels good, do it. If it makes you happy, it must be right. If it's hard, if it's painful, avoid that. This is the philosophy of the day all over the West, and it's not a new idea, it's an ancient idea. In fact, the Greek philosopher Epicurus, he was on the earth about 300 years before Jesus. He had an entire school, and the whole school,

the thought that he was sharing was, it's maximum pleasure and minimum pain. This is what he propelled. In fact, last year, we were preaching out of the book of Acts, and remember, as Paul comes into Athens, he's dealing with Epicureans, people that are living their whole life governed by being happy and what brings them pleasure. Now, the Romans took this philosophy, and I mean, they went with it. They said things like eat, drink, and be merry. If you've been on the collection with us, last week in Luke chapter 12, that's what the rich fool did. He built a big barn, and he said, let me build it bigger, let me get more so that I can store all my stuff, and then I can eat, drink, and be merry. Carpe diem. Seize the day. Right here, right now, pleasure is what's driving me. Oh, but Rich, that doesn't make sense. That's not really what's happening today. Are you kidding me? YOLO. Boom. YOLO is Latin with better graphic design. You only live once, and at the heart of it is do whatever makes you happy, and if it brings pleasure, it's gotta be good

because when you get there, you'll be happy. It's a lie, and what's amazing is that when this philosophy creeps into the church, heresy is right around the corner. One of the most early foundational church heresies, we've been giving some church history throughout this, is the heresy known as antinomianism, anti meaning against, nomos meaning law, against the law. So what took place is is right away as people started living for pleasure and happiness, they also started saying, wait a minute, okay, if God's grace has come to us, that removes moral obligation. I can do whatever I want to do. If God has saved me and forgiven me, then I have no moral obligation. Now I ought to do whatever I feel like doing. I mean, the early church, the ink wasn't even dry in the New Testament, and this was already the debate taking place. We know the debate because look at Romans chapter six. This is the Apostle Paul. He says, what shall we say then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means. Exclamation mark. I should shout it. No, I won't, I won't. By no means.

We are those who have died to sin. How can we live any longer? See, antinomianism starts sounding not like rebellion, it sounds like relief. Let me remove the pressure. Jesus did all the work. You ain't gotta do nothing, voo church. Why don't you just live like the Epicureans? Eat, drink, and be merry, for one day you will be with Jesus. You don't have to do anything whatsoever. We better be careful because this is a lie that creeps in, and as we live in the lie, we find ourselves walking bound. We find ourselves walking shackled. We find ourselves having strongholds. Sometimes I think in church, we're not very good at discerning between the natural mind and the supernatural mind. And sometimes what we do is we put these things in conflict or contradiction. There is no doubt that some things, you actually have to say, let me turn off my brain for a moment. Now faith is being sure of what I hope for, certain of what I cannot see. But other times, these things work and they coexist together. I always. believe that everything that happens in the supernatural has a physical correlation. For everything spiritual, there's also something natural taking place.

I'm going somewhere with this because it's really important that you understand that when it comes to grace, sometimes we forget our natural mind and we say, ah, I don't know. I think I can do whatever I want to do because Jesus has done all the work. I would tell you that's heresy. In fact, that's exactly what Jude said in his letter. He said certain false teachers have slipped in among you and they have taken our grace and they have used it as a license for immorality. In fact, we have been teaching different what I would call slip-isms. That's what the last four weeks have been, that things slip in. You know a slip and slide? Where you start is not where you end. Things slip in, little lies slip in. Week one was universalism. Week two was individualism. Week three was consumerism. Today is hedonism. Whatever makes me happy, I'm going to do it. But in your natural mind, you already know that's not true. Yesterday was really special because it was a big day in our church family. One of our early, early founders who was a part of their beginning days, Cat Rouse, got married yesterday. Cat Rouse is a pastor in our community. We love Cat. Cat is the best. Ain't nobody like Cat. Cat is different though. Cat marches to her own drumbeat. She got married yesterday for a 7 a.m. wedding. When I heard that, I said, seven what, seven, seven, excuse me? It's one thing, you know, to get up early.

It's another thing to put a full suit on. Go to the beach. You haven't lived until you've been to a 7 a.m. wedding. I love Cat's story because Cat helped us really in the early days of our church. But Cat met her now husband at VU Church, serving at VU Church. Shout out to growth track step number one. They started dating after soul care classes. Shameless plug for VU crew and VU care. You never know who you might meet. It's funny. Strangers become friends. Strangers become spouses. Cat and Henry got married yesterday. It was beautiful. I love going to weddings. And most of us, we've been to weddings. You know weddings. The best part about the wedding is when they exchange vows. We're all there as witnesses to say, we watched you make those vows. We say things like, for richer or poor? Hopefully for richer. In sickness and in health. Till death do us part. We hear those vows. Nobody with a rational mind. I'm not talking about supernatural stuff, spiritual stuff. I'm talking about logical, practical things. Nobody with a rational mind would say it's okay to make those vows simultaneously saying, in reality, I'm going to do whatever I feel like doing. No, that wouldn't be a covenant.

That would be a contradiction. You cannot use the vow to justify breaking the vows. And this is what happens oftentimes with antinomianism. That you begin to bleed into hedonism saying, whatever makes me happy, I'm going to do it and God will just cover it. So I'll live however I want to live. But listen to me. Grace becomes dangerous the moment you use it as a permission slip. It's not a permission slip to sin. Come on somebody. It's empowerment to walk faithfully to God. Anybody grateful that today, in Christ Jesus, you can walk in fullness of relationship? Today we want to dismantle this lie that I should live life for whatever my heart desires. For whatever brings me pleasure. And I'm grateful because today our guide is not some monk. He's not some, you know, I guess rabbi. He's not like, no, no, no. He is a dude who's got some experience in this category. I want to talk for a moment about Solomon. Who is Solomon? If you're new to church or new to the Bible, the writing we're looking at today comes from Solomon. Solomon is the son of King David. Now maybe you're new to church, but most of us have heard about David. David was the shepherd boy who took down Goliath. David was the one who wrote beautiful poetry and beautiful songs, but he was also good with a slingshot. He was dynamic, the warrior poet, the shepherd king. And David actually is the father of Solomon. If you know that story, Solomon is birthed out of David's greatest mistake. David saw a woman named Bathsheba taking a bath, there's your sign, and he said I want

her. It's kind of wild, right? Her name's Bathsheba, she's taking a bath. Sometimes the devil's crafty, sometimes he's like, it's pretty blatant, man, you know? No. He says, I want her, and he takes her for himself, and with it, he devises a plan to have her husband killed. It is a great grievance to God, and God sends a prophet, but as the prophet comes, David responds with repentance. Here's what I love about the story, is that even in the Old Testament, we see the mercy and the grace of our God, because God doesn't just let Solomon live, he blesses Solomon immensely. Anybody thankful for a God who is rich in mercy? Your greatest mistake doesn't have to become your legacy. As you repent, God can restore, God can redeem. And Solomon is interesting, because Solomon is known as the wisest man to ever live. Now that's not just like Christian talk. Many philosophers and many scholars would agree with that. He wrote the book of Proverbs. By the way, if you're an entrepreneur or a business person, whether you're a Christian or not, yes, take your creatine, yes, take your vitamin D, but you ought to wash it down with a proverb a day, because it's ancient wisdom about how to bless your life God's way. Solomon's story is really cool, though, because before Solomon becomes king, God shows up to him in a dream, and he says, Solomon, ask anything in my name, and I'll give it to you. Now, can you imagine this moment? This is like straight out of Aladdin. Ask anything in my name, and I'll give it to you. What would you ask for? Because many times, the things that we ask God for would only change our life.

But I wonder, would you ask for something that would change other people's lives? Some of us, our prayer life is far too small. We're only praying prayers that are going to change our path, our pattern, our trajectory. I want to be a person who prays big prayers. God use me and my life to change other people, to change the world. Come on, somebody, clap your hands. So watch what happens. This is important. This is 1 Kings chapter 3, verse 7, now, Lord my God, you have made your servant king in a place of my father David, but I am only a little child and do not know how to carry out my duties. Your servant is here among the people you have chosen, a great people, too numerous to count or number. So give your servant a discerning heart to govern your people and to distinguish between right and wrong. For who is able to govern this great people of yours? I want you to catch this because many people know the story of Solomon, but they don't tell the story of Solomon properly. Many people tell the story that when God showed up and said, what do you want? They say Solomon asked for wisdom. That's almost right. He did not merely ask for wisdom. He asked for wisdom so he could govern God's people. I want to encourage you that when you begin to connect your ask to God's heart, what is God's heart? It's always his people. When you start praying for things that's going to affect his people, that's the prayer God loves to answer. Pray a bigger prayer. This is why when it comes to our leadership at VU Church, I've just never ever wanted

to employ someone or really trust someone on our team or our staff who isn't faithful in their generosity financially. Why would you be so hard on that? How on earth are we going to empower you to lead and help shepherd God's people if you can't shepherd and steward money? Money is small compared to God's people. Here's what I love about God. God hears the request. He's like, oh, I'm going to give you wisdom, but I'm also going to make your name great. I'm going to bless you, make you wealthy, make you awesome. We're going to come from everywhere just to sit at the feet of Solomon. Why is it? It's because when you seek first his kingdom, God has a habit of adding everything else. I wish I could get a witness here today that would say, when you put God first, it just so happens, everything else that you ever dreamed of, wanted, and dreamed of, it just or desired, it falls into place. Come on, somebody give God some praise in this house. He's got a habit of making all of the additions. Solomon becomes great. He writes Proverbs, he builds the temple, he's doing big stuff everywhere that he goes. Solomon is the man. Here we are reading Ecclesiastes. Ecclesiastes in Hebrew means the teacher or the preacher. And this book is written after Proverbs, after he's written his success principles. Solomon has become great. Solomon is living large. Yet somewhere in Solomon's journey, as he begins to survey all the things that he's done,

he began to drift, he let something slip in. First Kings chapter 11 lets us know that Solomon had 700 wives and 300 concubines. Now, I just wanna make an announcement. I think you know this, but I have one wife. I can only handle one wife. 700 wives. This does not sound like pleasure. This sounds like chaos. 700 birthdays, 700 anniversaries, 700 opinions about where we're gonna eat tonight. This is not a household. This is a scheduling conflict, okay? But it's an interesting moment in Solomon's life because God had blessed him as he started strong. He rebuilt the temple. I mean, foreign leaders, the Queen of Sheba, she came and she said, man, when I'm seeing it in person, they didn't tell me the half of how great you are. Yet as he started to marry these women, they came with their foreign gods, their heresies, and their lies, and it slipped in. And like a slip and slide, where you start is not where you end. And if Solomon, who's the wisest man to ever live, could slip, something tells me that you and I, we too, we could slip. This is amazing because Solomon right here in Ecclesiastes chapter two, verse 10, notice what he says.

This is what he says. He says, I denied myself nothing my eyes desired. I refused my heart no pleasure. My heart took delight in all my labor, and this was the reward for all my toil. So the teacher, the preacher is surveying all this stuff. I mean, he said, anything I saw, anything that I desired, if I found pleasure in it, I mean, listen, I went for it. I mean, I really, really went for it. This is not like, you know, a bit of moderation. This is total immersion. This dude went for it. He built gardens, he had harems, all the silver, all the gold. He took wine, any pleasure you can think of, he partook in it. And then here comes his verdict. He says, I did all this stuff, and here's the verdict, verse 11. Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done and what I had toiled to achieve, everything. Someone say everything. Someone put everything in the comments right there. Everything was meaningless. A chasing after the wind. Nothing was gained under the sun. Have you ever tried to catch wind? What you doing, bro? This is what some of us look like. This is what your job looks like.

You can feel wind. Wind is real. Like it's a moment, but the moment you try to grasp it, you're getting hold of nothing. This is what it looks like to make your aim in life, to chase pleasure, to chase happiness. You're reaching out, getting nothing. In fact, this word he says, the word he likes to use is the word meaningless. And the Hebrew word has other words attached to it. The other words are vapor, mist, breath, smoke. Smoke, just try to settle in this for a moment. Let this hit your heart. The chasing of pleasure, the pursuing of happiness as a destination is like when you get out of the shower and the shower has filled the mirrors with steam. How many of y'all know, before you even finish getting dressed, that mist is gone. You ever sat by a bonfire? No, Rich, we live in Miami. Okay, chill out. But billows of smoke start to go up and the smoke is beautiful, it takes shape. But the moment you get fixated on that shape, it changes shape. He is trying to tell you that the chasing of pleasure, the indulgence, the believing that whenever I get there, I'll be happy. He's saying it's like smoke that changes shape.

In fact, this word meaningless, my man says it 38 times. When you say something 38 times, you're not being poetic. You're trying to wake people up. He's trying to say to you, pleasure makes a promise, it just can't keep it. Come on, anybody feel like waking up today that we're gonna find truth? Why is it meaningless? I mean, there's lots of things we could teach about, but let's just make sure we write a couple of these things down, because you gotta carry this into the week. Pleasure has diminishing returns. The very thing that's thrilling you today will not thrill you next year. This is the basis of addiction, by the way. This is the basis of a drug addict, that they got high one time, and now they spend the rest of their life trying to reach that high again. This is what takes place, that we go for something, but it's meaningless because it's the law of diminishing returns, that every time I get it, I just need more of it. I'm indulging myself, I'm trying to be happy, I'm trying to reach for it, but my happiness keeps getting further and further away. We all have that pair of shoes that we always wanted. You know, ladies, you get those heel heels, those high heels?

And they make you feel good for a moment, but it's still the same old you standing in those stilettos. And some of you, if you go into your closet, the shoes that you got two years ago, they don't make you feel nothing anymore. It's because pleasure is a diminishing return, and here's the man who had more pleasure than anyone, and he's shouting at you, it is a vapor. I have had the privilege of standing and sitting up close with some of the most famous celebrities in the world that have got and reached heights that most people dream about. You know what I've discovered? They're not any happier than you. If I go even further, some of them are miserable because they got the stuff, they had the experience, they had the moment, but it was smoke. It was a vapor. It's a diminishing return. Also this, pleasure, it makes you fragile. I could spend a long time with this, that when you live your life for comfort in what feels good, you don't develop a backbone. You don't get any kind of resilience. You don't learn any form of self-reliance. And so if you always avoid the fire, you're not getting better, you're not getting stronger, you're getting weaker. This is why James, he's really clear. He's like, consider it, this is the good word, pure joy.

The message of verse says, consider it a sheer gift. What'd you get me? I'll tell you what I got you. I got you a trial. A trial, yeah, yeah, consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know, someone say I know, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Come on, somebody. You don't wanna be fragile, you wanna grow strong. You want some conviction, you want some gumption, you want some fortitude, you want the type of courage that you don't back down every time something gets hard. As believers, we're not afraid of difficulty. Our biggest aim in life is not merely to be happy. And that is to say, and I think it's really important because my whole message is my title. It's not that God doesn't want you to be happy. Like I wanna really try to help us today. Like I actually believe God totally cares about your happiness. I just don't think it's his chief priority. Like I've always wanted us to build a church here in Miami. I don't want you to come to VU to endure it. Oh man, he's gonna shout at me today. I want you to enjoy it. Please understand, God is not against pleasure. My title is my point.

Pleasure isn't the problem. God gave you taste buds. That's why you like tasting things. He gave you that gift. God gave you the ability to see in color. Aren't you grateful God didn't just give you black and white vision? It was like the 1940s right here in my eyes. No, God said I want you to see color. I want it to be vibrant. I want you to live life in color. He gave you food. He gave us sex. He gave us relationship. He gave us pleasures. Nothing wrong with pleasure. That's not the problem. The problem is what happens when a good thing takes the place of the God thing. Pleasure isn't the problem. A good thing in the right place is what you call a gift. It's a gift. All these things are gifts from God. Every good thing came from our Heavenly Father as a gift. You don't earn it. You don't achieve it. It's a free gift. The gift is meant to make you look up and say, Wow! I really love ribeye steak. You are good. Man, I don't need 700 wives. I got one. There is a God somewhere. A good thing in the wrong place becomes an idol. And this is where we get mistaken and this is where we get confused because most of us are like, I don't deal with idolatry. I don't have any statues in the corner of my house. Oh friends, we've got statues all around us. Anything that we bow down to before Jesus Christ is a small God. See, pleasure is meant to point to God, not replace God. Pleasure isn't the problem. Replacement is. And many of us, we go chasing pleasure. We go chasing happiness instead of seeking first God. And when we

do, we buy into the lie. I want to be clear. A lot of times, idolatry can be like really good things. Let me try to illustrate it. Like even like God things, not God, but God things can become idols. Like even things like ministry can become an idol. Today, I'm preaching live right now at our Miami Gardens location. There's other locations. Join us by live link and also online. But this room that I'm preaching in always has like a really, really sentimental place in my heart because this is where my personal ministry began. I started preaching Tuesday nights and we had a young adult movement called the rendezvous. Maybe you've wondered, where'd you get the name VU Church? It came from rendezvous. Rendezvous means the meeting place. Meeting with God and connecting with others. And the reason we didn't name the church rendezvous is because if you Google rendezvous, really bad websites come up. And I have vivid memories of being in this room a year and a half into it. I don't know, 85 people showing up. Didn't matter how good the weather was, people still didn't come. And I remember going, God, God, when you give us 200 people, God, when there's 200 people at the rendezvous, then I'll be satisfied. Then I'll be fulfilled. Then I'll be happy. Well friends, look around. When became then? Today there's much more than 200 people that have shown up and I want to say I'm grateful for that. Anybody thankful to a God who continues to multiply right here in Miami, Florida? This is all glory to God. What I want to get at is that I'm so thankful for what God has done. But if I'm honest with you, I'm grateful. But there's also a temptation to creep right back in. That that old man that used to actually talk to God and say, when you bring 200 people, then I'll be satisfied. Sometimes that same thinking can creep in. It's not 200 people or 400 people, it's a lot more people than that. But anytime I start to make that the destination, it's a good thing to want the church to be full of people. It's a good thing to want the gospel to go forth and not return void and see people get saved. But the good thing becomes the bad thing when it replaces God himself. My ministry is not my identity. What I do for God is not my value or my worth, but rather what he says about me. And I'm trying to encourage some people today

because some of us we keep buying into this lie, and we're waiting to be happy. We're waiting to walk in the fullness of what God has for us. But if you keep living that way, keep believing that way, you can be doing good things for God, but still find yourself trapped. Well, Rich, what do I do, man? Because we've been here for four weeks, and you've given four heresies, four things I haven't even thought about. Universalism, and individualism, and consumerism, and now hedonism. I never even thought about this. We got to go four more weeks. I need to know about more lies. Well, friends, we could be here every Sunday till Jesus returns and continue to teach you about lies, because that's all the devil speaks, are lies. He's crafty. That's his native language. Every new day there is a new lie. But in the banks, when they're trying to spot counterfeits, did you know that they don't study counterfeits? They don't study the false currency. They don't get acquainted with the lie. No, instead what they do is they study the real thing. They get thorough with it. They study it. They enjoy it. They know everything about it. So when the lie comes through, they can spot it and say, wait a minute, I know the truth, and that's a counterfeit. And so it is with the lies of the enemy that you don't need to know every bit of church history, and you don't need to know every heresy that has gone forth. What you need to know is you got to get intimately acquainted with the real thing, author, perfecter, and finisher of your faith. His name is Jesus Christ. And the more I get to know Jesus, the more I can say, that's a lie. Because Jesus does care about your happiness. Just he has a better word for it. You see, there's a big difference between happiness and what Jesus came to give you. Happiness based upon feelings. Happiness like the weather. Jesus wants to give you something that's stable. John chapter 15 verse 11. Jesus said, I have told you this so that my joy, someone say my joy, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete. God wants to give you his joy. That as you get his joy, your joy becomes complete. And God's joy is different than the world's happiness. I'm not just trying to use semantics. I'm trying to give you a framework to look at this differently, because when you study the joy of the

Lord, you'll see that Jesus, he had joy even in Gethsemane. The scripture says in Philippians, or in Hebrews, for the joy set before him, he endured the cross. He had joy in enduring the cross. And three days later, after he resurrected, his joy is still standing. I want to encourage you. There's a difference, right? Because happiness, you can find happiness on any mountaintop. Happiness is there on the ground. Yay, we made it to the top. But joy has to be learned in the valley. Happiness and pleasure has diminishing returns, but joy can be learned. Happiness is a feeling, but, but joy is a choice. Happiness, it's fleeting. It's like weather. It comes and it goes, and it's here one minute, it's gone the next. But is a state in which you can stay in. Joy carries its own weather. Joy doesn't wait on a forecast. Joy is the forecast. I don't know what it looks like outside there. Thunder clouds, lightning, can't steal my joy. Why? Because biblically speaking, what you discover about joy is joy is most, is most discovered in suffering. Zach came with a word for somebody, that you are in a low moment. You're in a difficult moment. Joy is not discovered after. It's not discovered around. Listen, it's discovered in the suffering. The deeper the valley, the higher the mountain. The deeper the valley, the deeper the joy. How do you know, Rich? Because I have this book. I have the truth. See the Apostle Paul in a prison in Philippi, they have beaten him, they have spit on him, he's awaiting a death sentence, yet somehow late in the midnight hour with one other dude next to him he says, you know what I feel like doing? I feel like singing, I feel like praising God, I feel like worshiping him. Why? Because devil you can't steal my joy even in a prison cell. I'm not denying my feelings, I'm just declaring and confessing joy. Because Nehemiah he said it this way, he said the joy of the Lord is your strength. I don't think you heard that. Not the joy of your accomplishments, not the joy of your bank account, not the joy of your accolades, not the joy of your new job, not the joy of your spouse, not the joy of your kids. I didn't come preaching that today, I came preaching the truth. The joy of the Lord is your strength. Anybody strong at VU Church today? Circumstances can't steal the joy of the Lord.

You see the answer to hedonism is by no means the the heresy of antinomianism. It's not like we're going to go, hey let's just do whatever we want. That's not the answer here. And it's also not a religious life. The answer is not also let me live small, let me have nothing, let me deprive myself of everything. That's not the answer. The answer is not less. Listen, the answer is deeper. Deeper. Pleasure cannot be your God. It's wind. You were built for something deeper. You were built for the very presence of God. Psalm 16 verse 11. You, God, will show me the path of life. Did you hear that? The path of life in your presence is fullness of. In your right hand there are pleasures forevermore. Forevermore. Pleasure isn't your problem. Replacement is. And many of us are replacing God's presence with man's pleasures. But it's God's presence that you're craving. It's God's presence that you're thirsty for. It's God's presence that's got you acting that way. It's God's presence that has you out there in these streets acting a fool. You want God's presence, but you keep replacing it with pleasure. And I'm telling you, it will not deliver. Listen to the wisest man who ever lived. He said, you're aiming too low. You got to go deeper. There's something deeper. You were designed. The path of life is the fullness of joy. And that's only discovered in relationship with Jesus. It's only discovered when I get to know the real thing, not the counterfeit, not the false currency. I want the real thing. John Piper, the great pastor and theologian, his entire ministry was a theme and he called it Christian hedonism. He didn't like the difference between happiness or joy. He said, it's all the same thing. He said that if you're in Christ Jesus, you are blessed. It's amazing because if you go to Jesus's very first sermon, it's the sermon on the mount. It's called the Beatitudes. The last word in the Old Testament is curse. The first words out of Jesus's mouth is blessed. And what he blesses are not circumstances that most of us would wish. He says, blessed are you when you mourn, for you will be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. That word blessing is oftentimes also the same word as happy, joyful. He's trying to say, you can have my joy in all circumstances. And John Piper says, don't be a hedonist, be a Christian hedonist. What's a Christian hedonist? It's this. It's that God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied, most satisfied in him.

I'm not waiting for when. I'm choosing right here, right now. I have everything I've ever needed in the person of God. of Jesus. I'm satisfied in Him, therefore my life brings Him glory. Come on, somebody clap your hands. Bring God some glory today. Pleasure isn't the problem. Replacement is. Replacement is. Quit trading God's presence for pleasure. Pleasure runs out, but His presence never runs dry. Pleasure is fleeting, but His presence is long lasting. He's here with us in every moment. Tap into the presence of God. Solomon, the wisest man who asked for wisdom, he started right, but he drifted. He let something slip in. The wisest man ever found himself on a slip and slide that where he started is not where he ended. I don't know the conclusion of Solomon's story. Many ask me, will Solomon be in heaven? I'm not, I'm not God. I'm not a judge. I don't know. What I find comforting is the very last chapter of Ecclesiastes, after he said 38 times that all of this is like a vapor, all of it's like meanness. This is what he says. This is comforting to me. Ecclesiastes chapter 12, verse 13. Now, all has been heard, and here is the conclusion. Today we're concluding this collection, so here's the conclusion. All these lies. Here's the conclusion of the matter. Fear God, and keep His commandments, for this is the duty of all mankind. His last thing that he wrote was where he started and where he began. I always had the answer. I always had the truth. Everything is meaningless except. Everything is a breath. Everything is a vapor. Everything is steam on a mirror, smoke up in the air, except God. So revere Him and fear Him, because fearing Him is the beginning of all wisdom. Keep His commands because when He speaks truth to you, it's not to limit you. It is merely to liberate you. He wants you to walk in freedom, and His commandments are for your betterment and for your life. He came to set us free. And today as I turn my eyes to Jesus, as I fix my eyes on Him, I discover the truth. The truth that will not fade. The grass withers, the flower falls, but the Word of God, it stands forever. Come on, if you believe today, clap your hands at all of our locations.