Money, fame and belongings will never satisfy you. Billy Graham shares how to find lasting purpose and peace in this 1972 message from his hometown of Charlotte, North Carolina. Watch more #MondayNightClassics every Monday at 8 p.m. Eastern.
From our archives,
the Billy Graham Classics.
Now tonight I want you
to turn with me to
Deuteronomy the 32nd chapter
and the 31st verse, Deuteronomy.
That’s in the Old Testament
over toward the beginning of
the Old Testament
in what is called
the Pentateuch,
the first five books
of the Bible
and there’s a verse tucked away
in Moses’ farewell address
to ancient Israel
that says this
in the 31st verse.
It says this, “For their rock is
not our rock.”
For their rock is not our rock.
In the latter part of
the last century,
a man toured America
and Great Britain
and many times,
he used that text.
I’d never noticed that text
until I read one of his sermons
a few weeks ago.
D.L. Moody.
Their rock is not our Rock.
Moses is now an old man.
He has led
the children of Israel
for 40 years
in the desert.
He’s been a king,
a father, a president,
a leader all these years.
And now only Joshua
and Caleb are left.
All the other generation are
dead
and all the people standing out
before him are young people.
Young people just like you
with the same desires,
the same aspirations,
the same longings,
the same dreams,
the same problems,
the same sins,
the same temptations
that you have.
And Moses looking
upon this vast audience,
an entirely new generation,
with his long white beard,
preaching to them,
warning them,
warning them of other gods
and false gods
that are going come up
to take the place of
the true and the living God.
And he said, if you follow
these false gods,
that judgment of God will come
upon you.
And he referred to God as a Rock
and he referred to
these other gods as rocks,
spelled with a little “r”.
The rock God was spelled
with a capital “R”.
Now why did he use the term
rocks as an illustration?
The children of Israel had been
wandering around
among the rocks
for 40 years.
They knew what
a rock was.
They knew the hard rocks
and the soft rocks
and all kinds of rocks.
And he said,
“Their rock is not our Rock.”
What are some of the rocks
in America right now
that young people are
in danger?
You know, I talked to a man
just a few weeks ago
who claimed to be an atheist.
I don’t know whether
he was really an atheist,
but he said he was an atheist.
He said, “I’ve been an atheist
all my life”.
He said, “My father was
an atheist.”
He said, “I am now
71 years of age,” and
I said, “What do you have
to look forward to?”
He said, “Nothing.”
He said, “Life has been
miserable for me”.
“Well,” I said, “why don’t you
give up your atheism?”
“Why don’t you believe in God?”
He said,
“My pride won’t let me.”
Their rock is not our Rock.
Compared with Paul,
the apostle Paul said,
“I fought a good fight.
I finished my course.
“I have kept the faith.
“Henceforth there is laid up for
me a crown of righteousness,
“which the Lord,
the righteous judge,
“will give me in that day.”
What a contrast between
an atheist and a believer.
One man was facing death,
fearful, empty.
The other man was facing death
full of confidence.
Their rock is not our Rock.
Secondly, young people,
many young people are
going after materialism.
They fallen for
the materialistic god
that says things are
more important than
anything else.
I find across the country today,
a deep economic discontent
among people.
I find it in Europe.
I find it around the world
and people are wanting more
and more things
and we forget that
we have the highest standard of
living the world has ever known.
We still have poverty.
The government is trying to do
something about it.
The church is trying to do
something.
Hundreds of social agencies are
trying to do something about it,
but the people that
we call living in poverty
would be considered rich
if they lived in Bangladesh
or in many other
parts of the world.
We’re a rich nation,
but still with all of
our riches,
we’re dissatisfied.
We want more,
more, more, more.
The more we get,
the more we want.
Jesus said,
“You cannot serve God
and mammon.”
He said,
“A man’s life consists not
in the abundance of
the things that he possesses.
A famous man was quoted
in the paper the other day
as saying,
“I’m worth millions of dollars,
but I can tell you this,
“That’s not where it’s at.”
“I’m worth millions,
but that’s not where it’s at.”
Adolf Berle,
in his study of power,
points out riches make people
solitary, lonely,
and often afraid.
Many times a rich man has
a loneliness and a fear
because you see,
if you make riches your god,
if you make things your god,
if you make money your god,
it leaves you empty.
George Bernard Shaw said,
“There are two tragedies
in life.
“One is not to get
your heart’s desire
“and the other is to get it.”
You think if you had a lot of
money, you’d be happy.
Some of you have already got
a lot and you’re not happy.
Two tragedies, you didn’t get it
and you did get it.
You see, without God,
life loses its zest and
its purpose and its meaning,
even though
you may have money.
Young people in America today
are revolting against affluency
and yet today, many young people
are prisoners of a culture
which puts a premium on things
rather than moral values.
Their rock is not our Rock.
Don’t make money your god.
There’s nothing wrong with
having money
if you’ve got it legitimately
and honestly.
It’s what you do with it.
It’s your attitude toward it.
Do you love it?
Has it become your god?
Does it dominate you?
Does it have
such a hold on you
that you don’t have time
for God?
Their rock is not our Rock.
That’s not the rock we want.
And then thirdly, their aims and
objectives are not our Rock.
What are the objectives of
the average person
in America today?
Power, pleasure,
leisure, money.
What is the objective
of a Christian?
To glorify God,
to live for God,
to do the will of God,
to love your neighbor,
to help your neighbor,
to make an impact in society
for God
and to leave the world
a little better place
because you were here.
What is your objective?
Is your objective to get
all the leisure time you can,
to have all the pleasure
you can have,
to make all the money
you can make?
What is your objective?
What’s your goal in life?
Where are you headed?
Their rock is not our Rock.
And then fourthly,
there’s pleasure.
You know, in America today,
we’re searching for new thrills.
We’ve worn out
the old amusements.
You’re not to become
so absorbed.
The Bible says,
“Be temperate in all things.”
There are legitimate pleasures
that can take most of your time
and occupy most of your thinking
that are legitimate
in themselves,
but they soon become sin because
they’ve taken the place of God.
“In Thy presence is
fullness of joy;
“at Thy right hand there are
pleasures forevermore,”
said the Psalmist.
Do you have
that kind of pleasure?
The kind of pleasure that’s not
dependent on circumstances.
The kind of pleasure that’s not
dependent on how you feel.
The kind of pleasure that runs
deep that has been brought there
by the Spirit of God.
When the tide comes in,
the rock of pleasure will turn
into a sand.
The sweetness of pleasure
turns to
bitterness and disappointment.
Life becomes empty, sick,
and a tragic thing
when pleasure is put first
and becomes your god.
Their rock is not our Rock.
There’s the rock of revolution.
All over the country we hear
the word revolution
and many young people have fixed
their hopes and their dreams
on change in
the political system
and they believe that if
they can get this revolution,
it’ll fix everything.
I was with one of
these young leaders
whose name is known to
many of you in New York
some time ago;
and I looked out across
Manhattan.
He said, “We’re going
to burn it down.”
I said, “What are you going to
rebuild in its place?”
He said, “We haven’t gotten
that far.”
I said, “Well, before
you destroy the American ship,
“you better be sure that you can
know how to build a raft.”
Many people have an idea
that they, I think they,
it’s the excitement
of revolution
for revolution’s sake.
You know, every utopia has
turned out to be a pipe dream
in the history of
the human race.
Their rock is not our Rock.
Yes, we need change in America,
but let’s keep our freedom.
Let’s don’t have a revolution
just for revolution’ sake
or we will destroy
everything that’s been built
in the greatest nation in
the history of the world.
Seventhly,
religiosity can become a god.
You know, there’s
a great emphasis today
on the occult.
I was asked about it
on television today
in an interview.
Satan worship.
People today that are going
after all kinds of false spirits
across the country and in Europe
and in the far East as well.
It’s become a big thing
and a big business,
and many young people across
the country are being fooled by
all kinds of cults and spirits
and devils and demons.
Beware, you are dealing
with the dark powers
that are very real.
How did Jesus overcome
the devil?
By arguing?
No.
By debating?
No.
He quoted Scripture.
The Bible says that
He was filled with
the Holy Spirit.
He was walking according to
the will of God
and He quoted the Bible
and every time
He quoted the Bible;
the devil was defeated.
That’s the reason it’s important
to memorize Scripture.
Study the Bible.
I’m so anxious that young people
across America now
that are finding Christ
by the thousands,
will get into the Scriptures,
get into the Word of God.
Learn it.
“Desire the sincere milk of the
Word that ye may grow thereby,”
Because if you don’t,
we’re going to have a backlash
in the next generation
and young people who have had
an experience with Christ
and don’t become
taught in the Scriptures
are prime targets
for the devil.
Get into
the Scriptures.
Get to work
for Christ.
Their rock is not our Rock.
Eighthly,
their cure is not our Cure.
That’s one of the problems
of psychiatry.
I’m for psychiatrists
and psychologists.
I send many people to them,
but there’s a point beyond which
a psychiatrist who is not
a believer, there’s a point
beyond which he can’t help.
In many cases,
he has no cure.
And many of them have admitted
this to me privately
and some of them are
beginning to do it publicly
and they’re doing it
in books now.
You’ll see,
the cure of the world,
the Freudian cure is
one direction,
but the Christian cure is other.
The Christian cure is the cross
of our Lord Jesus Christ.
The cure for domestic problems.
There’s a father having problems
with a son.
What is the cure?
The son in rebellion,
the son going out on his own,
seeking his own identity, doing
things that appalls the father.
The father becomes angry.
The parents become upset.
There is a Christian cure.
The cure is Christ.
To go to our knees.
And you know,
I love the young people
of this generation.
I can see why a lot of them
have rebelled.
They have rebelled against
the hypocrisies
they’ve seen in us.
They’ve seen us tell lies.
They’ve heard us tell them
not to smoke their pot
and seen us drink our alcohol.
They’ve heard us use
those swear words.
They’ve seen father
and mother flirting with
the next-door neighbor.
They’ve seen
the sharp business deals
that they knew were not right.
They’ve seen the emphasis
has been on things
even while you went to church
on Sunday,
yet the whole emphasis
of your life is materialistic.
They’ve seen the hypocrisy
and they said,
“We don’t want it.”
But let me tell you this.
You young people.
If you had lived
a few years ago,
your life expectancy
wouldn’t have been very long
because, you see,
this generation was able to make
some breakthroughs
in medicine and in science
that has given you
all these marvelous drugs
so you don’t have to worry today
about small pox and polio
and all of these other things
that preoccupied people
a generation or two ago
and sent terror and fear
through this community of
Charlotte many times
through disease.
There are many wonderful things
this generation has brought.
Television, radio brought
the world into our living room.
And this generation of people,
my generation, worked hard.
We came through the Depression.
We didn’t want you to ever
have to go through
a depression again.
We came through World War II
and we determined that
we were going to do all we could
to keep out of another
great world war.
And you young people must
understand that
this generation has done
some good things
even though we’ve done
some bad things
and we want to help you
as we hand the torch to you.
We want to help you change it
and make it better,
but we’ve got to,
in all fairness,
say that the problem lies deeper
than we thought.
The problem lies
in the human heart.
We’ve found that
we cannot legislate morals.
We’ve found we cannot pass a law
and settle our race problem.
We can help, but
that doesn’t solve it all.
It’s got to come
from the human heart.
That’s why Jesus said,
“You must be born again.”
Their rock is not our Rock.
Their cure is not our Cure.
Our Cure says
you must be born again.
Now what is this Rock that is
ours with the big capital “R”?
The rock is God
and the Bible tells us that
the Rock in the Old Testament
was actually Jesus Christ.
He was the Rock, King of Kings
and Lord of Lords,
born of the Virgin Mary,
died on the cross for our sins,
rose again
for our justification.
He is the Rock that
we’re to put our confidence
and our faith in
and He’s called in the Bible,
the Rock of defense.
When we put our trust in Him,
He takes our side.
He takes out part.
He helps us carry the load
and when you come to
Jesus Christ as Savior,
you don’t have to,
you don’t have to live
a life by yourself.
You can’t live
the Christian life alone.
Christ will be there.
He is the Rock that will
help you to live the life.
If God is for us
who can be against us.
I’m glad that my defense
at the great judgment of God
is going to be in the hands of
the greatest lawyer
in the universe,
Jesus Christ,
our advocate.
And the devil is going to say,
“Look at Billy Graham, ha-ha.
“Look at the sins he committed.
“Look at the things he did
that are wrong.”
Jesus Christ is going to step,
step up and be my representative
and he’s never lost a case.
And then, He is a high rock,
the Bible says,
a watch tower.
Lead me to the Rock that is
higher than I.
Did you know that
the Christian has
a vantage point that
the world doesn’t have?
Everybody’s wringing their hands
and saying,
what’s happening in the world?
What’s wrong with the world?
Why is the world in such a mess?
I can tell you.
The simplest Christian
in this audience tonight
with no education at all
can tell you exactly
what’s wrong with the world
because the Christian has
an insight
that nobody else has.
Their Christian can tell you
what’s wrong with the world
and the Christian can tell you
what could put the world right
because you see we have a Rock,
a vantage point.
Then the Bible teaches that
our Rock is a refuge.
The Bible speaks of
the cleft in the rock,
a hiding place
from the storms of life.
A place where we can go
and pray and meditate and
think and worship God.
Rock is a foundation.
For other foundation can
no man lay than that
was laid in Christ Jesus.
Is Jesus Christ the foundation
of your life?
There were two men
that Jesus told about.
One built his house
on the sand,
one built it on the rock.
The storm came and the one that
was built on the sand crumbled
and the one that was built
on the rock lasted.
Where are you building
your life?
Is it on the Rock
or is it on a false rock?
A sandy rock that will crumble
and erode, a shaley rock.
Oh, there are some things that
are eternal in our Rock.
The Bible says God is eternal.
The eternal God is thy refuge.
The Bible says that
spiritual truth is eternal.
The Bible says that
God gives us eternal life.
The Bible tells us that
heaven is eternal.
The Bible says
God’s judgment is eternal.
He is an eternal rock.
The Bible says,
“Prepare to meet thy God”.
The Bible says, if in this life
only we have hope,
we are of all men
most miserable.
Even His enemies recognize that
their rock is not our Rock.
Paul says of
the Rock in the wilderness
in First Corinthians 10,
that Rock was Christ.
Other rocks crumble and slide
and erode and fall,
but not Christ.
Is He your rock?
Is He your Lord and your Master
and your Savior?
Have you surrendered everything
to Him without reservation?
You can tonight.
You say, what do I have to do?
You have to be willing
to turn from your sins.
You have to be willing
to receive Him as your Lord and
your Master
and your Savior.
And you have to be willing
to do it publicly.
Jesus said,
“If you’re not willing to
acknowledge Me openly
and publicly,
I’ll not acknowledge you before
My Father, which is in heaven.
There’s no such thing as
secret discipleship.
You come publicly.
That’s why I ask people
to come forward
to receive Christ openly.
That’s part of it.
It’s an open acknowledgement
that He is your Rock.
But I want to tell you what
I said across Japan and India
and across Africa.
When you come to Jesus Christ
and make Him your Rock
with a capital R,
you must turn from
the other rock.
And it will cost you something
because some of the rocks
in your life are wrong.
Will you make Jesus Christ
your Rock of Gibraltar
and stake your eternal destiny
on Him?
I am asking you
to do that tonight
and I’m asking
hundreds of young people to make
Him their Rock tonight
and go out of here saying,
from this hour on,
I’m going to follow Him
and serve Him
and I’m going to help
change the world for Christ.
That’s the revolution we need.
I’m going to ask you to do it
right now.
I’m going to ask hundreds of you
to get up out of your seat;
men, women, young people,
and come and stand
in front of the platform
and say, tonight,
I want Christ to be my Rock.
I want Him to be my Lord
and my Savior.
I want Him to forgive
my past sins.
I want to know that
I have eternal life.
Men, women, young people.
You may be a member
of the church.
You may not be
a member of any church.
I don’t know who you are,
what you are,
but you want Christ tonight.
You get up and come.
We’re going to wait.
As hundreds are responding to
Mr. Graham’s invitation
to make a public commitment
to Jesus Christ,
you can make
that same commitment
right where you are.
Just pick up the phone
and call the number
you see on your screen.
Special friends are waiting to
talk with you and pray with you
about this most
important decision.
♪ And that Thou bidst me
come to Thee ♪
♪ O Lamb of God,
I come, I come. ♪
To you that are watching
by television,
I’m sure that you can see
that hundreds of people are
coming here in
the great Charlotte Coliseum
to make their commitment to
Jesus Christ as
the Rock of ages,
the one that they’re going
to give allegiance to tonight
and surrender to as Lord
and Master and Savior.
To receive everlasting life.
Where you are in your home
or a bar or hotel lobby,
wherever you are,
you can receive Christ
into your heart.
I hope you’ll make
that commitment.
It’ll change your life.
God bless you.
If you just prayed that prayer
with my father,
or if you have any questions
about a relationship
with Jesus Christ,
why don’t you just call that
number that is on the screen.
There’ll be someone there
to talk with you, pray with you
and answer those questions.
And remember, God loves you.
If you would like to commit
your life to Jesus Christ,
please call us right now
toll free at 1-877-772-4559.
That’s 1-877-772-4559.
Or you can write to us at
Billy Graham,
1 Billy Graham Parkway,
Department C,
Charlotte, North Carolina 28201.
Or you can contact us on the web
24/7 at PeaceWithGod.tv.
We’ll get the same helps to you
that we give to everyone who
responds at the invitation.
On behalf of Franklin Graham and
the Billy Graham
Evangelistic Association,
thank you for watching and
thank you for your prayers.
(Billy Graham)
There’s only one way,
only one hope.
♪ Hear the sound of
a brand-new day. ♪
♪ Witness the story that
never fa-a-ades. ♪
♪ Come, come with me, ♪
♪ to the Billy Graham Library. ♪