This morning we learned that the righteous shall flourish as the palm tree. Tonight we will learn that we flourish in the house of the Lord.

To flourish is to thrive, prosper, produce, and reach a height of development.  The palm tree is a perfect illustration of the righteous flourishing because it grows upright and tall.  It lives 100 years, it’s uninfluenced by seasons, and withstands the winds.  It is also very fruitful bearing coconuts, açaí berries, and dates, and is used to make wine, jelly, and palm oil.  We saw that the fruit of the righteous is the fruit of the righteousness of Jesus Christ in us and not our own production. To flourish, therefore, we must be righteous. The righteous flourish through chastening, witnessing, giving, and making peace.

Tonight, we’re going to continue with Ps 92:13-14.  In this passage we see that to flourish, not only must we be righteous, but we must also be planted in the house of the Lord.  We flourish in the house of the Lord.  We flourish in the courts of our God.

People in church flourish; people out there don’t.  You don’t see much fruit, if any, from their righteousness.  They look and talk just like those who are unrighteous.

Look at Eph 4:13 and notice why we flourish in the house of the Lord.

• We ALL come in the unity of the faith.  This is hard to do when you are not in communion with those with whom you are supposed to be in unity.  We flourish when we work together, pray for each other, support each other, and fellowship together.
• And of the knowledge of the Son of God.  You know Christ when you are with a congregation under the preaching and teaching of the word of God in a way that you can’t know him out of here.  We are his people and we are his body and we function together as a body.  You must be here to do this.
• Unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ.  Through the ministry of a local church, the Lord conforms us to the image of his Son “to reach our height of development”.

When we flourish through righteousness and faithfulness in church, we shall still bring forth fruit in old age.  This implies that we start bringing forth fruit in our young age through the righteousness of Jesus Christ.  Therefore, when we are older, we continue to flourish because his righteousness yields lasting fruit and it is his lasting “method” to bear fruit.

People who began to bear fruit in their youth who are no longer in church are no longer fruitful.  The ones who were involved in fruitful activities who were working on their own rather than through Jesus’ righteousness in them are no longer fruitful.

Start growing on Jesus’s righteousness today.  If you wait till you’re older to start bringing forth fruit, you might never get to it.  Better to be a late bloomer in righteousness than to not bloom at all.

To see the first part of this sermon, see The Righteous Shall Flourish.