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THE GOOD NEWS BULLETIN
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Gen. Smedley Butler: War is a Racket Independent jury's secret power
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God Vs. the Wicked
By Bill Gibbons
I am
going to begin this message with a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon
that we feel you will profit from. This message shows how the curse of
sin has been removed by the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ. THE CURSE REMOVE
By Charles H. Spurgeon
“Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the laws, being made a curse
for us; for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree.”
GA. 3:13.
The
law of God is a divine law, holy, heavenly, perfect. Those who find
fault with the law, or in the least degree depreciate it, do not
understand its design, and have no right idea of the law itself. Paul
says, “The law is holy, but I am carnal; sold under sin.” In all we ever
say concerning the law justification by faith, we never intend to lower
opinion which, our hearers have of the law, for the law is one of the
most sublime of God’s works. There is not a commandment too many; there
is not one too few; but it is so incomparable, that its perfection is a
proof of its divinity. No human lawgiver could have given forth such a
law as that which we find in the Decalogue. It is a perfect law; for all
human laws that are right are to be found in that brief compendium and
epitome of all that is good and excellent towards God, or between man
and man. But while the law is glorious, it is never more misapplied than
when it is used as a means of salvation. God never intended men to be
saved by the law. When He proclaimed it in Sinai. It was with thunder,
fire, and smoke; as if He was to say, “O man, hear my law; but thou
shalt tremble while thou hearest it.” Hear it! It is a law which hath
the blast of a terrible trumpet, even like the day of destruction, of
which it is but the herald, if thou offendest it, and findest none to
bear the doom for thee. It was written on stone; as if to reach us that
it was a hard, cold, stony law—one which would have no mercy upon us,
but which, if we break it, would fall upon us, and dash us into a
thousand pieces. O ye who trust in the law for your salvation! Ye have
erred from the faith; ye do not understand God’s design; ye are ignorant
of every one of God’s truths. The law was given by Moses to make men
feel themselves condemned, but never to save them; its very Intention
was to “conclude us all in unbelief, and to condemn us all, that He
might have mercy upon all.” It was intended by its thunders to crush
every hope of self-righteousness, by its lightnings to scathe and
demolish every tower of our own works, that we might be brought humbly
and simply to accept a finished salvation through the one mighty
Mediator who has “finished the law, and made it honourable, and brought
us everlasting righteousness,” whereby we stand, stand complete before
our Maker at last, if we be in Christ. All that the law doth, you will
observe, is to curse; it can not bless. In all the pages of revelation
you will find no blessings that the law ever gave to one that offended
it. There were blessings, and those were comparatively small, which
might be gained by those who kept it thoroughly; but no blessing is ever
written for one offender .Blessings we find in the Gospel; cursing we
find in the law.
This
afternoon we shall briefly consider,
first, the curse of the law;
secondly, the curse removed;
thirdly, the great Substitute who
removed it—“He was made a curse for us.” And then we shall come to
the last place, solemnly to ask
each other, whether we are in the mighty number for whom Christ shall
bear iniquities, and for whom “He was made a curse.”
First,
then, THE CURSE OF THE LAW. All who sin against the law are cursed by
the law; all who rebel against its commands are cursed—cursed instantly,
cursed terribly.
We shall
first regard that curse, first, as being
a universal curse, resting
upon every one of the seed of Adam. Perhaps some here will be inclined
to say, “Of course the law of God will curse all those who are loose in
their lives, or profane in their conversation. We can all of us imagine
that the answer is a cursed man, cursed by God. We can suppose that the
wrath of God rested upon the head of the man who is filthy in his life,
and whose conversation is not upright, or who is a degraded man, under
the ban of society,” But ah! My friend, it is not quite so easy to get
at the real truth, which is this that the curse of God rests upon every
one of us, as by nature we stand before Him. Thou mayest be the most
moral in the world, but yet the curse of God is upon thee; thou mayest
be lovely in thy life, modest in thy carriage, upright in thy behaviour,
almost Christlike in thy conduct, yet thou hast not been born again, and
regenerated by sovereign grace, the curse of God still rests upon thine
head. If thou hast but committed one sin in thy life, God’s justice is
so inexorable, that it condemns a man for one solitary offence; and
though thy life should henceforth be one continued career of holiness,
if thou hast sinned once, unless thou hast an interest in the blood of
Christ, the thunders of Sinai are launched at
thee, and the lightnings of
terrible vengeance flash on thee.
Ah! My hearers, how humbling is this doctrine to our pride, that the
curse of God is on every man of the seed of Adam; that every child born
in this world is born under the curse, since it is born under the law;
and that the moment I sin, though I transgress but once, I am from that
moment condemned already; for” cursed is every one that continueth in
all things which are written in the book of the law to do them”—cursed
with out a single hope of mercy, unless he finds that mercy in the
Substitute “who was made a curse for us.” It is an awful thought, that
the trail of the serpent is on the whole earth; that the poison is in
the fountain of every heart; that the stream of blood in all our veins
is corrupt; that we are all condemned; that each one of us, without a
single exception, whether he be philanthropist, senator, philosopher,
divine, prince, or monarch, is under the curse, unless we have come to
Christ, and have been absolved through Him.
The
curse, too, we must remark, while universal, is just. This is the great
difficulty. There are many persons who think that the curse of God upon
those who are undeniable wicked is, of course, right; but that the curse
of God upon these who for the most part appear to be excellent, and who
may have sinned but once, is an act of injustice. We answer, “Nay, when
God pronounces the curse, He doth it justly; He is a God of justice;
“just and right is He,’” And mark thee, man. If thou art condemned, it
shall be by the strictest justice; and if thou hast sinned but once, the
curse is righteous when it lights upon thy head. Dost thou ask me how
this is? I answer, Thou sayest thy sin is little; then, if the sin be
little, how littler trouble it might have taken thee to have avoided it!
If thy transgression be but small, at how small an expense thou mightest
have refrained from it! Some have said, “Surely the sin of Adam was but
little; he did but take an apple.” Ay, but in its littleness was its
greatness. If it was a little thing to take the fruit, with how little
trouble might it have been avoided! And because it was so small an act,
there was couched within it the greater malignity of guilt. So, too,
thou mayest never have blasphemed thy God, thou mayest never have
desecrated His Sabbath; yet, insomuch as thou hast committed a little
sin, thou art justly condemned, for a little sin hath in it the essence
of all sin; and I know not but that what we call little sins may be
greater in God’s sight than those which the world universally condemns,
and against which the hiss of the execration of humanity continually
rises. I say, God is just, although from His lips should rush thunders
to blast the entire universe; God is just, although He curses all.
Tremble, man, and “kiss the Son, lest He be angry, and ye perish by the
way, when His wrath is kindled but a little.” The curse is universal, he
curse is just.
But let
us notice, next, the curse is fearful. Some there be who think it little
to be cursed of God; but O! if they knew the fearful consequences of
that curse, they would think it terrible indeed. It were enough to make
our knees knock together, to chill our blood, and start each individual
hair of our head upon its end, if we did but know what it is to be under
the curse of God. What does that curse include? It involves death, the
death of this body: that is by no means an insignificant portion of its
sentence. It included spiritual death, a death of that inner life which
Adam had—the life of the Spirit, which hath now fled, and can only be
restored by that Holy Spirit who “Quickeneth whom He will.” And it
includes, last of all, and worst of all, that death eternal, a dwelling
forever in the place. (Where solemn groans, and hollow moans, And
shrieks of tortured ghost,”) make up the only music. Death eternal
includes all that can be gathered in that terrible, that awful—we had
almost said unutterable—word “Hell.” This is a curse that rest on every
man by nature. We make no exception of rank or degree; for God has made
none. We offer no hope of exception of character or reputation; for God
has made none. The whole of us are shut up to this, that (so far as he
law is concerned) we must die—die here and die in the next world, and
die a death which never dies; feel a worm which shall gnaw forever, and
a fire which never can be extinguished, even by a flood of tears of
future penitence. There must be forever, O! Forever lost. Could we
estimate that curse, I say again, the torments that tyrants could
inflict we might well afford to ridicule, the injuries that this body
can sustain we might well afford to despise, compared with that awful
avalanche of threatening which rushed down with fearful force from the
mountain of God’s truth. Condemnation—that curse of God—abideth on us
all.
We hasten
from this point, beloved, for it is fearful work to speak upon it; but
yet we must not depart from it entirely, ill we have hinted at one
thought more; and that is, that the curse of God which comes upon
fearful men is a present curse.
O! my dear hearers, could I lay hold of your hands, if ye be not
converted, I would labour with ears and groans to get you to grasp the
thought. It is not so much condemnation in the future that you have to
dread as damnation now. Yes,
sitting where thou art, my hearer, if thou art out of Christ, thou art
condemned now; thy condemnation is scaled; thy death-warrant has been
stamped by the great seal of the Majesty of Heaven; the angel’s sword of
vengeance is already unsheathed, and over thy head this afternoon.
Whosoever thou mayest be, if thou art out of Christ, there hangeth a
sword over thee, a sword suspended by a hair, which death shall cut: and
then that sword shall descend, dividing thy soul from thy body, and
sending both of them to pains eternal. O! Ye might start up from your
seats with fear, if ye did but know this, some of you. Ye are reputable,
ye are respectable, ye are honourable, perhaps right honourable, and yet
condemned men, condemned women. On the wall of Heaven ye are proscribed,
written up here as deicides, who have slain the Saviour—as rebels
against God’s government, who have committed high treason against Him;
and perhaps even now the dark-winged angel of death is spreading his
pinions upon the blast, hastening to hurry you down to destruction. Say
not, O sinner, that I would affright thee; say, rather, that I would
bring thee to the Saviour; for whether thou hearest this or not, or
believest it or not, thou canst not alter the truth thereof—that thou
art now, if thou hast not given thyself to Christ, “condemned already;”
and wherever thou sittest, thou art but still in thy condemned cell; for
this whole earth is but one huge prison-house, wherein he condemned one
doth drag along a chain of condemnation, till death takes him to the
scaffold, where the fearful execution of terrible woe must take place
upon him. Now condemned and forever condemned: hear that word. “The
curse of the law!”
But now I
must speak, in the second place, THE REMOVAL OF THE CURSE. This is a
sweet and pleasant duty. Some of you dear friends will be able to follow
me in your experience, while I just remind you how it was, that in your
salvation Christ removed the curse.
First,
you we will agree with me when I say, that the removal of the curse from
us is done in a moment. It is an
instantaneous thing. I may stand here one moment under the curse;
and if the Spirit look upon me, and I breathe a prayer to Heaven—if by
faith I cast myself on Jesus—in one solitary second, ere the clock hath
ticked, my\y sins may be all forgiven. Hart sung truly, when he
said—(“The moment a sinner believes, and trusts in His crucified god,
His pardon at once he receives, Salvation in full, through His blood.”
You will remember in Christ life, that most of the cures He wrought—yea,
I believe all—were instantaneous cures. See! There lies a man stretched
on his couch, from which he hath not risen for years. “Take up thy bed,
and walk,” said Christ in majesty. The man takes up his bed, and without
the intervention of weeks of convalescence at once carries it, leaping
like a hart. There is another. From his closed lips a sound hath
scarcely ever escaped; he is dumb; Christ touchest his lips, “Ephphatha,
be opened;” and he sings at once. He does not barely speak, but he
speaks plain; the tongue of the dumb sings. Ay, and even in the cases
where Christ healed death itself, He did instantaneously. When that
beautiful creature lay asleep in death upon the bed, Jesus went to her;
and though her dark ringlets covered up her eyes, which were now glazed
in death, Jesus did but take her clay-cold hand in his, and say,
“Talitha cumi! Damsel, I say unto thee, Arise;” and no sooner had He
said it, than she set up, and opened her eyes; and to show that she was
not merely half alive, or half restored, she rose up, and ministered to
Him. We do not say that the great work of conversion is instantaneous;
that may take some time; for Christ commences in the heart a work, which
is to be carried on through life in sanctification; but
the justification, the taking
away the curse, is done in a single moment. “Un-write the curse,” says
God, It is done. The acquittal is signed and sealed; it taketh not long.
(“Fully discharged by Christ I am, from sin’s tremendous curse and
blame.”) I may stand here at this moment, and I may have believed in
Christ but five minutes ago; still, if I have believed in Christ but
that short space of time, I am as justified, in God’s sight, as I would
be should I live until these hairs are whitened by the sunlight of
Heaven, or as I shall be when I walk among the golden lamps of the city
of palaces. God justifieth His people at once; the curse is removed in a
single moment. Sinner, hear that! Thou mayest now be under condemnation;
but ere they can say “now” again, thou mayest be able to say—“There is,
therefore, now no condemnation to me, for I am in Christ Jesus.” We may
be fully absolved in a moment.
Mark,
beloved, in the next place, that this removal of the curse from us, when
it does take place, is an entire
removal. It is not a part of the curse which is taken away Christ
doth not stand at the foot of Sinai, and say, “Thunders! Diminish your
force;” he doth not catch here and there a lightning, and bind its
wings; nay, but when He cometh He bloweth away all the smoke, he putteth
aside all the thunder, He quencheth all the lightning; He removeth it
all. When Christ pardoneth, He pardoneth all sin; the sins of twice ten
thousand years He pardons in an hour. Thou mayest be old and
grey-headed, and hitherto unpardoned; but though thy sins exceed in
number the stars spread in the sky, one moment takes them all away. Mark
that “all!” That sin of midnight; that black sin which, like a ghost, has
haunted thee all thy life; that hideous crime; that unknown act of
blackness which hath darkened thy character; that awful stain upon thy
conscience—they shall be all taken away. And though thou hast stain upon
they hand—a stain which thou hast often sought to wash out by all the
mixtures that Moses can give thee—thou shalt find, when thou art bathed
in Jesus’ blood, that thou shalt be able to say, “All clean, my Lord,
all clean; not a spot now; all is gone; I am completely washed from head
to foot; the stains are all removed.” It is the glory of this removal of
the curse that it is all taken away; there is not a single atom left.
Hushed now is the law’s loud thunder; the sentence is entirely removed,
and there is no fear left.
We must
say again upon this point, that when Christ removes the curse, it is
an irreversible removal. Once
let me be acquitted, who is he that condemns me? There be some in these
modern times who teach that God justifieth, and yet after that, condemns
the same person whom He has justified. We have heard it asserted pretty
loudly, that a man may be a child of God today—hear it, ye heavens, and
be astonished and be a child of the devil to-morrow; we have heard it
said, but we know it is untrue, for we find nothing in Scripture to
warrant it. We have often asked ourselves, Can men really believe that,
after having been “begotten again to a lively hope,” that birth of God,
through Christ, and by this Spirit, can yet fail? We ask ourselves, can
men imagine that, after God hath once broken our chins, and set us free,
He will call us back and bind us once again, like Prometheus, to the
great rocks of despair? Will He once blot out the handwriting that is
against us, and then record the charge again? Once pardoned, then
condemned? We trow, that had Paul been in the way of such men, he would
have said, “Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died; yea,
rather, that is risen again. Who shall lay anything to the charge of
God’s elect?” There be no condemnation to us, being in Christ Jesus; we
“walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.” It is a sweet thought,
that Satan himself can never rob me of my pardon. I may lose my joy of
it, and lose my comfort; but the original pardon is filed in Heaven. It
may be that gloomy doubts arise, and I may fear to think myself
forgiven; but
“Did Jesus upon me shine?
Then Jesus is forever mine.
“O! My distrustful heart!
How small thy faith
appears?
Far greater, Lord, thou art,
Than all my doubts and fears.
‘Midst all my sins, and
fear, and woe,
Thy Spirit will not let
me go.”
I love, at times to go back to the hour when I hope I was forgiven
through a Saviour’s blood. There is much comfort in it to remember that
blessed hour when first we knew the Lord. (“Dost mind the piece, the
spot of ground, Where Jesus did thee meet?”) Perhaps thou dost; perhaps
thou canst look back to the very place where Jesus whispered thou wast
His. Canst thou do so? O! How much comfort it will give thee! For,
remember, once acquitted, acquitted forever. So with God’s word. Once
pardoned, thou art clear; once set at liberty, thou shalt never be a
slave again; once hath Sinai been appeased, it shall never roar twice.
Blessed be God’s name! We are brought to
And now
we are brought, in the third place, to observe THE GREAT SUBSTITUTE by
whom the curse is removed. The curse of God is not easily taken away; in
fact, there was but one method whereby it could be removed. The
lightnings were in God’s hand; they must be launched; He said they must.
The sword was unsheathed; it must be satisfied; God, vowed it must.
Vengeance was ready; vengeance must fall; God had said it must. How,
then, was the sinner to be saved? The only answer was this. The Son of
God appears; and He says, “Father! Launch thy thunderbolts at me; here
is my breast—plunge that sword in here; here are my shoulders—let the
lash of vengeance fall on them;” and Christ, the Substitute, came forth
and stood for us, “the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to
God.” It is our delight to preach the doctrine of the substitute,
because we are fully persuaded that no Gospel is preached where
substitution is omitted. Unless men are told positively and plainly that
Christ did stand in their room and stead, to bear their guilt and carry
heir sorrows, they never can see how God is to be “just, and yet the
justifier of the ungodly.” We have heard some preach a Gospel, something
after this order—that though God is angry with men, yet out of His great
mercy, for the sake of something that Christ has done, He does not
punish them, but remits the penalty. Now we hold that this is not of
God’s Gospel; for it is neither just to God, nor safe to man. We believe
that God never remitted the penalty, that He did not forgive the sin
without punishing it, but that there was blood for blood, and stroke for
stroke, and death for death, and punishment for punishment, without the
abatement of a solitary jot or tittle; that Jesus Christ, the Saviour,
did drink the veritable cup of our redemption to its very dregs; that He
did suffer death the awful crushing wheels of divine vengeance, the
self-same pains and sufferings which we ought to have endured. When it
is preached fully and rightly, what a charm and what a power it hath. O!
How sweet to tell sinners, that though God hath said, “Thou must die,”
their Maker stoops His head to die for them, and Christ incarnate
breathes His last upon a tree, that God might execute His vengeance, and
yet might pardon the ungodly.
Should
there be one here who does no understand substitution, let me repeat
what I have said. Sinner, the only way thou canst be saved is this. God
must punish sin; if He did not, He would undeify Himself; but if He has
punished sin in the person of Christ for thee, thou art fully absolved,
thou art quite clear; Christ hath suffered what thou oughtest to have
suffered, and thou mayest rejoice in that. “Well,” sayest thou, “I ought
to have died.” Christ hath died!
“I ought to have been sent to
Hell.” Christ did not go there to endure that torment forever; but
He suffered an equivalent for it,
something which satisfied God. The whole of hell was distilled into His
cup of sorrows; He drank it. The cup which His Father gave Him to drink,
He drank to its dregs. (“At one tremendous draught of love, He drank
destruction dry.”) All the punishment, all the curse, on him was laid.
Vengeance now was satisfied; all was gone, and gone for ever; but not
gone without having been taken away by the Saviour.
The thunders have not been reserved, they have been launched at Him, and
vengeance is satisfied, because Christ had endured the penalty.
Now we
come to answer that last question:
How many among us can say, that “Christ hath redeemed us from the curse
of the law, having been made a curse for us?”
the first part of our discourse
has been entirely doctrinal: some of you have not cared for it, because
you did not feel you were interested in it. It was natural it should be
so. At the reading of a will, doth the servant stay to listen? Nay,
there is nothing for her; but if a man be a son, how doth he open his
ear to catch the sound, to know if here be an estate for him; and
however ill the lawyer may read that will, how anxious he is to catch
every word, and know if here is a portion for him among the children!
Now, beloved, let us read the will again, to see if you belong to those
for whom Christ made a satisfaction. The usual way for most of our
congregation is this—they write themselves down for Christ’s long before
God has done it. You make a profession of religion, you wear a Christian
cloak, you behave like a Christian, you take a seat in a Christian
church or chapel, and you think you are Christianized at once; whereas
one half of our congregation who fancy themselves to be Christians have
made a mistake; never were they more apart from any character than from
being true Christians. Let me beg you not to suppose yourself to be
believers, because your parents were so, or because you belong to an
orthodox church. Religion is a thing we must have for ourselves; and it
is a question which we all ought to ask, whether we are all interested
in the atonement of Christ, and have a portion in the merits of His
agonies? Come, then, I will put a question to thee. First, let me ask
thee this, my friend: Wast thou
ever condemned by the law in thine own conscience? “Nay,” sayest
thou, “I know not what thou meanest.” Of course thou dost not: and thou
hast no hope, then, that thou art safe. But I will ask thee yet again:
Hast thou been condemned by the law in thy conscience? Hast thou ever
heard the Word of God saying in thy own soul, “cursed is every one that
continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to
do them?” And hast thou felt
that thou wast cursed? Didst thou ever stand before God’s bar, like a
poor condemned criminal before the judge, ready for execution? Hast
thou, as John Bunion would have said it, ever had the rope upon thy
neck? Hast thou ever seen the black cap put upon he face of thy Judge?
Hast thou ever thought thyself about to be turned off from the gallows?
Hast thou ever walked the earth, as if at every step the earth would
open beneath thee, and swallow thee up? Hast thou ever felt thyself to
be a worthless, ruined, sin-dominated, law-condemned, conscience
–condemned sinner? Hast thou ever fallen down before God, and said:
“Lord, thou art just; though thou slay me, I will say, Thou art just;
for I am sinful, and I deserve thy wrath?” As the Lord liveth, if thou
hast never felt that way, thou art a stranger to His grace; for the man
who acquits himself God condemneth; and if the law condemns thee, God
will acquit thee. So long as thou felt thyself condemned, thou mayest
know that Christ died for condemned ones, and shed His blood for
sinners; but and if thou foldest thine arms in self-security, if thou
sayest: “I am good, I am righteous, I am honourable,” be thou warned of
this—thine armor is the weaving of a spider; it shall be broken in
pieces; the garments of thy righteousness are light as the web of the
gossamer, and shall be blown away by the breath of the eternal, in that
day when he will unspin all that nature hath ever woven. Ay, I bid thee
now take heed; if thou hast never been condemned by the law, thou hast
never been acquitted by grace.
And now
another question I will ask thee:
Hath thee ever felt thyself to be acquitted by Christ? “No,” saith
one, “I never expected to feel that; I thought that we might know it
perhaps when we came to die—that a few eminent Christians might then
know themselves to be forgiven; but I think, sir, you are very
enthusiastic to ask me whether I have ever FELT myself to be forgiven.”
My dear friend, you mistake. Do you think, if a man had been a
galley-slave, chained o an oar for many a year, if he were once set free
he would not know whether he was free or not? Do you think that a slave
who had been toiling for years, when once he trod upon the land of
freedom, if you should say to him: “Do you know that you have been
emancipated?” Do you think he would not know it? Or a man that has been
dead ion his grave, if he were awakened to life, do you think he would
not know it? There may be times when he hath forgotten the season; but
he will know himself to be alive; he will feel and know himself to be
free. Tell me it is enthusiastic to ask you whether you have ever felt
your chains broken? Sirs, if you have never felt your chains fall off of
you, then be it known that your chains are on you; for when God breaketh
our chains from off us, we know ourselves to be free. The most of us,
when God did set us free from our prison-house, did leap for very joy;
and we remember the mountains and the hills did burst forth before us
into singing, and the trees of the field did clap their hands. We shall
never forget that gladsome moment; it is impressed upon our memory; we
shall remember it till life’s latest hour. I ask thee again, didst thou
ever feel thyself forgiven? And if thou sayest “No,” then thou hast no
right to think thou art. If Jesus hath never whispered in thine ear, “I,
even I, am he that blotteth out thy transgressions,” Thou hast no right
to think thyself pardoned.
O! I beseech thee, examine thyself, and
know whether thou hast been condemned by the law, and whether
thou hast been acquitted by Christ!
And,
lastly, my dear friends, I may have, and doubtless have, many present
here who have simply come to spend an hour, but who have no care, no
interest, no concern about their own souls—who are, perhaps, utterly and
entirely careless as to whether they are condemned or not. O! If I could
speak to you as I wish, I would speak, (“As though I ne’er might speak
again, A dying man to dying man.”) When I remember that I shall likely
never see the faces of many of you again, I feel there is a deep and an
awful responsibility lying on me to speak to each of you as are
careless. Here are some of you who are putting off the evil day; and
saying, “If I be condemned, I care not for it.” Ah! My friend, if I saw
thee carelessly asleep on thy bed, when the flames were raging in thy
chamber, I would shout in thine ear, or I would drag thee from thy couch
of slumber. If I knew that while thou had a bad disease within thee,
thou wouldest not take the medicine, and that if thou didst not take it
thou wouldst die, I would implore thee on my knees to take that medicine
that would save thee. But, alas! Here you are: you are in danger of
destruction, many of you, and you have a disease within you that must
soon destroy your lives; and ye are careless, hardened, thoughtless
creatures you are, just caring for the body, and not seeking for Christ!
As the angel put his hand upon
But to
close: have I one here who is saying, “What must I do to be saved, for I
feel myself condemned?” Hear thou Christ’s own words—“He that believeth
and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be
damned.” Dost thou ask me what it is to believe? Hear, then, the answer.
To believe is to look to Jesus. That little word “look” expresses
beautifully what a sinner is to do. There is little in its appearance,
but there is much in its meaning. Believing is letting the hands lie
still, and turning the eyes to Christ. We cannot be saved by our hands;
but we are saved through our eyes when we look to Jesus. Sinner! It is
no use for thee to try and save thyself; but to believe in Christ is the
only way of salvation; and that is, throwing self behind your back, and
putting Christ right before thee. I never can find a better figure than
the negro’s one: to believe is to fall flat down upon the promise, and
there to lie. To believe is as a man would do in a stream. It is said,
that if we were to fold our arms, and lie motionless, we could not sink.
To believe is to float upon the stream of grace. I grant you, you shall
do afterwards; but you must live before you can do. The Gospel is the
reverse of the law. The law says, “Do and live;” the Gospel says, “Live
first, then do.” The way to do, poor sinner, is to say, “Here, Jesus,
here I am; I give myself to thee.” I never had a better idea of
believing than I once had from a poor countryman. I may have mentioned
this before; but it struck me very forcibly at the time, and I cannot
help repeating it. Speaking about faith he said, “The old enemy has been
troubling me much lately; but I told him that he must not say anything
to me about my sins, he must go to my Master, for I had transferred the
whole concern to Him, bad debts and all.” That is believing. Believing
is giving up all to Christ, and taking all Christ has to ourselves. It
is changing houses with Christ, changing clothes with Christ, changing
our righteousness for his righteousness, changing our sins for His
merits. Execute the transfer, sinner; rather, may God’s grace execute
it, and give thee faith in it; and then the law will be no longer thy
condemnation, but it shall acquit thee. May Christ add His blessings!
May the Holy Spirit rest upon us! And may we meet at last in heaven!
Then will we “sing to the praise of the glory of His grace, wherein He
hath made us accepted in the beloved.”
Jewels from the Psalms
By Bill Gibbons
God judgeth the righteous, and God is angry with the wicked every day”
PS.
Yes God hates
wickedness in any person, no matter who that person might be. He
completely destroyed the old world, saving only eight people. He
destroyed the Sodomites for their wicked sin. He destroyed the
inhabitants of
We are taking
our subject today from Psalm Five: “For thou art not a God that hath
pleasure in wickedness: neither shall evil dwell with thee. The foolish
shall not stand in thy sight: thou hatest all workers of iniquity. Thou
shalt destroy them that speak leasing: the Lord will abhor the bloody
and deceitful man. But as for me, I will come into thy house in the
multitude of thy mercy: and in thy fear will I worship toward thy holy
temple” PS. 5:4-7.
I recently
received an email from a lady that has a talk show, and she was touting
this man who said, in a nut shell: that every time this nation did
something to hurt Israel, some natural disaster struck us, and she gave
as an example, Hurricane Katrina as a punishment for what we did to
Israel. Well now, dear friend that goes against all that the Bible
teaches us against sin. A careful
study of the Bible will show that
Even a casual
reading of the Bible, especially Romans chapter eleven will show you
that ISRAEL HAS BEEN CUT OFF FROM GOD, because of their gross sins
against God. Here is what the Maters said about what was soon to happen
to
Crucifying
Jesus Christ, the Son of God, and persecuting the Church, the Apple of
Gods Eye was the final insult to God. After they were responsible for
crucifying the Lord Jesus Christ, God gave them another 30 years to
repent, but they did not repent. In 70 A.D., God sent the Roman troops
into
Let us get to
our Psalm for today and hateful sin: “The Lord trieth the righteous; but
the wicked and him that loveth violence his soul his soul hateth. Upon
the wicked He shall rain snares, fire and brimstone, and an horrible
tempest: this shall be the portion of their cup” PS 11:5,6. So then, it
is easy to see why God pours out His wrath upon any sinful people. He
does so because of the wicked way in which they live. God uses so-called
natural disasters, like Hurricane Katrina to show His displeasure with
wicked people.
He also
uses diseases, which He controls as another way to punish a sinful
people; here is proof of that statement: “And said. If thou wilt
diligently hearken to the voice of the Lord thy God, and wilt do that
which is right in His sight, and wilt give ear to His commandments, and
keep all His statutes, I will put none of these diseases upon thee,
which I have brought upon the Egyptians: for I am the Lord that healeth
thee” EX. 15:26. You will please notice, that there were conditions
placed on the Jews for God’s blessings: OBEDIENCE TO HIS LAWS. By the
time Christ came on the scene, all diseases were rampant in
You know, of
course, that there was no AIDS disease as long as the perverts stayed in
the closet. But, as soon as they started to come out of the closet and
flaunt their wicked lifestyle before the public, God gave them their own
disease, AIDS, which has killed hundreds of perverts, including the
Actor, Rock Hudson. The average life of a pervert is 45 years, while the
average life of everyone else is 75 years. So ALL diseases are sent by
God and we must face that fact if we want to be honest.
The preacher
chips in with this jewel: “These six things doth the Lord hate; yea,
seven are an abomination unto Him: A proud look, a lying tongue, and
hands that shed innocent blood, An heart that deviseth wicked
imaginations, feet that be swift in running to mischief, A false witness
that speaketh lies, and he that soweth discord among brethren” PR.
6:16-19. That is certainly a condemnation that fits the
You can add
this to the above: “And let none of you imagine evil in your heart
against his neighbour; and love no false oath: for all these are things
that I hate saith the Lord: Zec. 8:17. I have ill will where evil public
officials are concerned and feel that they should be punished, and, I am
angry because they are seldom ever punished, but I would never take it
into my heart to punish them myself, I will gladly leave their
punishment to God Almighty.
We will take a
look at Divine displeasure: “And when the people complained, it
displeased the Lord: and the Lord heard it; and His anger was kindled;
and the fire of the Lord burnt among them, and consumed them that were
in the uttermost parts of the camp” NU. 11:1.
"He that
sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in
derision. Then shall He speak unto them in His wrath, and vex them in
His sore displeasure” PS. 2:4,5. I don’t know about, but. The Lord God
Almighty is the last person in the world that I want to get angry at me.
The Lord has many arrows in His quiver in which to punish people that it
makes my head spin. The difference between God and man is this: NO ONE
can prevent God from doing as He pleases. If God decides to punish a
nation, there is nothing that anyone can do about it. Keep that in mind
as you go through life. IT IS ALWAYS WISE NOT TO MAKE GOD ANGRY.
Here is
something that we might all considering praying to God for: “O God, thou
hast cast us off, thou hast scattered us, thou hast been displeased; O
turn thyself to us again” PS 60:1. Based on a casual reading of the Word
of God, we can be sure that God is angry with this nation and this
people; and we need to repent of our sins and turn His anger away form
us as a nation before it is too late
Sin separates
us from God, and this is not the way God would like for it to be, but He
has no choice, because He is a righteous God, He must punish us for our
sins. Here is one example for
Because one man
disobeyed the Lord, the battle was lost, because the Lord was not with
them in the battle. Don’t ever forget: that the battle is the Lord’s and
one can only win, if God allows him to win. We have been at war in
I have talked
about this before, but it does not hurt to bring it up again, because it
is so important for us to realize just how God operates: “If I regard
iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me” PS. 66:18. Every year,
the president has, what he calls, a prayer breakfast; and ALL faiths are
invited to attend and pray. But this is waste of time, because God will
not be there. He will not be there, because of ALL faiths being there
and being allowed to pray. President Bush, of course is a certified
liar, because he lied about the reason for going to war with
Sinful man
cannot stand approved before God: “O Lord God of
Just how does
the Lord feel about the wicked? “The face of the Lord is against them
that do evil, to cut off the remembrance of them from the earth” PS.
34:16. Who then we might ask, are the evil ones? the ones that
continually sin against God. God cuts them off from the earth, just as
He did
We will close
this message, because, by now you should fully understand how God feel
about sin and the sinners that commit such sins. Because God is a
righteous judge, He cannot allow sin to continually go unpunished. He
must, eventually. Do something about this situation AND HE ALWAYS GETS
THE LAST WORD.
May God richly
bless you in your service to Him. Reply to Bill at
gibb@gnrevival.com
A just and Righteous God
In the ninth Psalm, David prays for executive justice and exhorts others
to praise Him. We will be talking about the first part of the Psalm:
“But the Lord shall endure for ever: He hath prepared His throne for
judgment. And He shall judge the world in righteousness; He shall
minister judgment to the people in uprightness. The Lord also will be a
refuge for the oppressed, a refuge in times of trouble. And they that
know thy name will put their trust in thee: for thou, Lord hast not
forsaken them that seek thee” PS. 9:7-10. I urge you to let that sink
into your head and be blessed by such great promises.
Let us look
into these verses and get all the gold that God promises us here. The
first thing we will look at is the fact that God is eternal. God always
has been, God is now, and God will always be here sitting on His throne
and controlling the universe as He always has done. The world is in the
best of hands as far as spiritual matters are concerned, the redeemed
are assured of a brilliant future, while only death and misery awaits
the unredeemed. However, the world can be a disaster for the natural
man, which means most living men and women today. The natural man is the
man that has never been redeemed by the Blood of the Lamb, which reminds
me of the old song “REDEEMED BY THE BLOOD OF THE LAMB”.
In Deuteronomy
chapter 32, Moses exhorted the people to set their hearts upon God: “See
now that I, even I, am He, and there is no god with Me: I kill, and I
make alive; I wound, and I heal: neither is there any that can deliver
out of my hand. For I lift up my head to Heaven, and say, I live for
ever. If I wet My glittering sword, and mine hand take hold on judgment:
I will render vengeance to mine enemies, and will reward them that hate
Me. I will make mine arrows drunk with blood, and my sword shall devour
flesh; and that with the blood of the slain and of the captives, from
the beginning of revenges upon the enemy” DE.32:39-42. It amazes this
humble write: that people will reject such a wonderful, good, and
powerful God without ever giving Him a chance to do good for them. God
can snuff out your life any time it suits His purpose to do so. A few
months ago, the actress, Anna Nicole Smith, was snuffed out at the age
of 39. She was a woman that had ever thing to live for, but turned her
back on God and God, for reasons known only to Him, cut her life short.
He has done the same to many in the entertainment world, and one can
only wonder why. Sure most of the
The Assyrians
surrounded
God says He
lives forever, and this humble writer believes that with all my heart.
Readers of this column have read, in my own testimony, how God has
literally snatched me out of the jaws of death, on three different
occasions. I saw God do the same thing for my late wife in 1996. The
doctor called me up at two in the morning and told me, that she would
not live through the night. I rushed to the hospital to be with her when
she passed away. But she did live through the night and lived for
another eight years. God, when every one else had given up, stepped in
and healed her all by Himself.
God has always
had more enemies then He had friends and He always will have. Even the
Jews: that saw Him deliver them from starvation and thirst in the
wilderness for forty years, did not appreciate Him as they should have
and God destroyed all, over the age of twenty that left
“The eternal
God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms: and He shall
thrust out the enemy from before thee; and shall say, Destroy them” DE
33:27. Today, we are not under the rule of God as the Jews were for any
years, yet God does not change His ways. But we must let God be the one
that pays evil me for their crimes against Him and He is very good at
doing that. Today, God uses the elements to punish men for their crimes
against Him. He used diseases for that same purpose, so don’t think,
even today, that anyone is going to get away with anything. Nothing can
happen, disaster, no war, or any other calamity can happen without the
approval of God.
God has a long
range plan and the things that are happening today are all part of that
plan. God is allowing evil men to gather almost total power into their
hands. This is necessary, because when the Beats of Revelation thirteen
comes on the scene, all this power will be given unto the beats and this
poor world will suffer as it has never suffered before. But, praise God,
the redeemed will not be here to suffer along with the unredeemed and
all those that hate God.
Ever since
Satan was forced, by God, to crawl on his belly, he has been determined
to ruin all men. Ever since that fateful day, he has been the enemy of
man and does all that he can to see that man will suffer as much as
possible, while here on earth and go to Hell when he dies. Satan has
always had men ready and willing to do his bidding. Beginning with
Nimrod in Genesis eleven, evil men have desired to rule the entire world
and man have tried. Empires have come and gone, many wars have been
fought and many men, women, and children have suffered and died to
satisfy the lust of old Stan and he is still not satisfied. He still
wants to rule the entire world; and someday, God is going to allow him
to do that for a few short years. But, in the end Satan and all those
that follow him will be cast into the fires of Hell to suffer for all
eternity. Satan’s kingdom will only be temporary.
That is because
God is eternal: “Thy kingdom is an everlasting, and thy dominion
endureth throughout all generations” PS. 145:13. God is eternal and all
those that are redeemed by the Blood of Jesus Christ will also be
eternal and will live forever in the
I always like
it when a verse starts out with :THUS SAITH THE LORD”, but, this does
not make it any more truthful then anything else in the Bible, because,
the entire Bible is “Thus saith the Lord”, because the Bible is inspired
by God and written down by those chosen of God to do so. Even so, I
still like that way to start a verse, like this one: “For thus saith the
high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy; I dwell
in the high and holy place, with him also that is of a contrite and
humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the
heart of the contrite ones” IS 57:15.
Yes dear
friend, do not give up hope, because the Spirit God is still with us
here on this evil earth and will be until He takes us out of this world
and into a better one. Give God a chance and He will revive your spirit
and make your life more pleasant and joyful. Our family never had much,
but we always had all that we needed to survive. Our life did get much
better after we were redeemed and begin to work for the Lord.
Some times we
have done thing that we should not have done, and God has chastised us
to wake us up. Some times it takes us longer then it should to realize
that God has spoken to us in the manner that He did. God, of course,
knows what you are going to do, even before you do it and we can see
times when we should not have done what we did, because God had warned
us not to take that step, by the problems He caused us, but we took it
any way and had to pay the consequences of doing so, for this we are
ashamed.
But, after God chastises you, and you repent, He will restore you to
your rightful position in His heart and you will go on and be useful to
God. King David is a good example. David committed two capitol crimes,
adultery and murder, Yet God could say: that “David was a man after His
own heart”, which shows the great grace of God to those that repent and
turn from their wicked ways.
Time means
nothing to God. I once said that Cain had been in Hell longer then
anyone else and a man said, so what, he will be there forever, so what
does time mean? That is the way with God: He has been here forever and
that is hard for one to comprehend, but we know it is true, because God
said it, and we know that God lives and would never lie to us.
Here is how
Peter put it: “Buy beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one
day is with the lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one
day” 2 PE. 3:8.. Some people have tried to stretch this to mean that God
sometime means a thousand years, when He says one year, but we do not
see that in this passage. What we see, is God saying that time means
nothing to Him. He has always been here and always will be here, so a
year or a thousands years, what does time mean to God?
The glorified
Jesus Christ introduced Himself to John on the isle of
May God richly
bless you and yours. Reply to Bill at
gibb@gnrevival.com
The
Wicked In the Future
Let us bring
you another portion of Psalm nine: “The wicked shall be turned into
Hell, and all the nations that forget God. For the needy shall not
always be forgotten” the expectation of the poor shall not perish for
ever. Arise, O Lord let not man prevail: let the heathen be judged in
thy sight. Put them in fear, O Lord that the nations may know themselves
to be but men. Selah” PS.
We will begin
our study with the “end of the wicked”. I was stunned, the first time I
read the following verses: “Therefore my people are gone into captivity,
because they have no knowledge: and their honourable men are famished,
and their multitude dried up with thirst.
Therefore Hell hath enlarged herself, and opened her mouth
without measure: and their glory, and their multitude, and their pomp,
and he that rejoiceth, shall descend into it” IS. 5:13, 14. Before we
continue, let us make this point: God is talking about spiritual
knowledge in this instance, not human knowledge. I know, that we are
going into captivity because we do not under stand the political
situation in this country, but we cannot prove that by this passage of
the Bible. We will go into captivity for the same reason the Jews went
into captivity, we have deserted God for a lack of Knowledge about Him.
What amazed me
about this passage: was that “Hell hath enlarged herself”, I don’t
really understand that verse. God, who knows all things, created Hell
for the devil and his angels, but when He created man, He knew that many
men would also end up in that dreadful place, so why did He not make it
large enough in the beginning? It really doesn’t matter; Hell will be
big enough to hold all who will go there.
The psalmists
often contrasted the good with the evil and shows what will happen to
each: “Mark the perfect man, and behold the upright: for the end of that
man is peace. But the transgressors shall be destroyed together: the end
of the wicked shall be cut off” PS. 37:37, 38. Men who do not know God,
spends little time worrying about Hell. Some times, even the worst of
men try and make peace with God on their death bed, but this seldom
works. I read, at the time of his death: that Joseph Stalin, the Soviet
Union butcher, want to see a priest before he died, but we have no way
of knowing if this is true but I do know that some evil men try and get
right with God on their death bed. I an say this, because I knew a man
that tried that.
The Catholics,
most of who live like the devil, have the last rights performed over
them, if they are still alive when the priest comes. But, and this is
most important, NO MAN CAN FORGIVE YOU OF YOUR SINS, only God can do
that and you do not need the help of any man.
But Hell, the
final resting place of the unredeemed, will be in Hell. The Bible talks
more about Hell then it does about Heaven. Jesus Christ talked about
Hell, and He knew what He was talking about, because He created hell and
gave His life to see that you do not have to go there.
Jesus saw fit
to give us the testimony of one man that went to Hell, and we will give
you that passage of Scripture at this point, because it is so important
to see what that terrible place will be like. We will skip the
introduction and begin with the man speaking from Hell: “And in hell he
lifted up his eyes, being in torment, and seeth Abraham afar off, and
Lazarus in His bosom. And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy
on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water,
and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame” LU. 16: 24, 25. We
see that the man was so tormented in the FLAMES that he wanted just a
drop of water. Hell is a place of torment and the Bible tells us that in
other places. Men make light of Hell, because they do not now what the
place will be like. Old Satan keeps their minds on other things and away
from the thoughts about Hell place where they will spend eternity, but,
ALL the wicked unredeemed will go there at death.
“Until I went
into the sanctuary of God; then understood I their end. Surely thou dist
set them in slippery places: thou castedst them down into destruction.
How are they brought into desolation, as in a moment! They are utterly
consumed with terrors” PS. 73:17-19. Take the super rich men, like the
one we saw above, who dies, and is cast into Hades, which is where all
the unredeemed are today. No one is in Hell as yet, but will go there
after they are judged for their sins by Jesus Christ. The rich man has
all that he ever wanted, but was never satisfied, and most of them
always wanted more. He finds himself in Hell, where he has no money and
no one is bowing at his feet to kiss his rear end that will make Hell a
terrible place for them, they “are utterly consumed with terror”.
We have often
said; that Satan loves for a man to be religious, just as long as he
remains lost. For this reason, Satan has always furnished man with a god
of some kind. Men were amazed when the first missionaries came along and
said; there is only ONE God. If all those who profess to know God really
knew God, there would only be one religion. If two men don’t agree, one
of them must be wrong; they could both be wrong, but they cannot both be
right. Satan knows this, therefore he inspires men to disagree and start
another religion and lead millions of people to Hell.
One very famous
quote is found in PR. 14:12, and it certainly fits what we are saying at
this time: “There is a way which seemeth right unto man, but the end
thereof are the ways of death.” The Catholics think they are right, as
do the Mormons, the Jehovah Witness, the Muslims, the Hindus, the
Buddhist , and all the rest of the religions and denominations in the
world, but they cannot all believe as they do and be right. They think
they are right as the verse said, but most ways lead to death and
destruction.
Even those who
claim to be fundamentalists and believe the Bible from cover to cover,
cannot agree on what is right. That is why there are so many different
churches belonging to so many different fundamental churches. It is
amazing that so many people can be wrong and still think they are right.
It just goes to show you how easy it is for Satan to fool so many
people.
Paul said to
the Romans, in RO. 6:20-22: “For when ye were the servants of sin, ye
were free from righteousness. What fruit had ye then in those things
whereof ye are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death. But
now being made free from sin, and become servants to God, ye have your
fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life.” If all those who
profess to know God, would make a careful study of Romans six, you would
see a great change in the way they conduct themselves and they would
know the truth about how the work of God should be carried on.
Paul said “the
end of those things is death”, those things being all the sins that they
had committed prior to their conversion. He had just told them “ye were
the servants of sin” and nothing else mattered to them. He said, while
they were servants of sin, they were free from the restrains of God.
But, he said, those ways were the ways of death. But, he said, now they
were “made free from sin”, do you fully realize what the Spirit is
trying to tell you? He is
telling us what Matthew told us: “And she shall bring forth a son, and
thou shalt call his name Jesus: for He shall save His people from their
sins” MT.
In this next
passage we see Satan being blamed for all the confusion existing in the
churches today: “For such are false apostles, deceitful workers,
transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ. And no marvel; for
Stan himself is transformed into an angel of light. Therefore it is no
great thing if his ministers also be transformed as the ministers of
righteousness; whose end shall be according to their works” 2
The television
preachers in this country, ALL support
Abraham Foxman,
head of the Anti-defamation League, here in America, is one of the most
violent anti-Christ Jews in the country, but I have never heard one of
these so-called servants of Christ denounce him, or the league, or the
anti-Christ Jews, the Muslims, they have declared war on and beat up on
them all the time. Does that make any sense to you? If that makes any
sense to you, please explain it that to me.
Paul warned the
Philippians of these false preachers and teachers: “Brethren, be
followers together of me, and mark them which walk so as ye have us for
an example. (For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell
you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ:
Whose end is destruction, whose God is their belly, and whose glory is
in their shame, who mind earthly things” PH. 3:19. As you read through
the book of Acts, you will see that the worst prosecutors of Christ were
the Jews. Some actually followed Paul around and stirred up the people
against him and his message. Most people accepted any god and did not
care about Paul’s preaching, until the Jews came and stirred them us,
then they would attack Paul and the other missionaries. This is a Bible
fact that cannot be denied. Of course, as always the case, not all Jews
were guilty of these crimes against Christ; the fault was, primarily,
with the Jewish leaders. But, as you surely know, today, most all Jews
still teaching their children, that Jesus Christ is NOT GOD and all true
believers know that is a BALD-FACED LIE.
“For the earth
which drinketh in the rain that cometh oft upon it, and bringeth forth
herbs meet for them by whom it is dressed, receiveth blessing from God:
But that which bearteh thorns and briers is rejected, and is nigh unto
cursing; whose end is to be burned” HE. 6: 7, 8. The end, as you all
know of the wicked, is to be burned in the
“Yet if any man
suffer as a Christian, let him not be ashamed; but let him glory on His
behalf. For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of
God: ands if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that
obey not the gospel of God? And if the righteous scarcely be saved,
where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?” 1 PE. 4:16-18. The
wicked shall appear at the Great White Throne of God to be judged for
all their sins and cast into the
Look closely at
this group, that John says be cast into the
Let us look at
another acceptable sin that God condemns: ALL LIARS! Where, we may ask,
does this leave our “Christian” president? Any honest person knows that
George Bush is the “mother of all liars” as he has led us into two
undeclared wars and is trying to lead us into one more and he did this
based on lies that have proven to be lies. As a result of his lies, only
God knows how many people have suffered and died. That is why we say:
that George Bush is NO CHRISTIAN, and this verse proves where he will
spend eternity. It amazes this humble write, that so many professing
Christians still believe this bum is a Christian.
The conclusion
to the whole matter: all the unredeemed wicked will be cast into hell!
Reply to
Bill at gibb@gnrevival.com
Praising God For Deliverance
This message is
taken from the 18th Psalm, where David, the servant of God,
who spoke to the Lord the words of this song in the day that the Lord
delivered him from the hands of all his enemies and from the hand of
Saul. And he said: “I love thee, O Lord, my strength. The Lord is my
rock and my fortress and my deliverer, My God, my rock in whom I take
refuge; My shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold. I call
upon the Lord who is worthy to be praised, And I am saved from my
enemies” PS 18: 1-3.
The prudential
Insurance Company used the great Rock of Gibraltar as their logo,
because it represents strength. That is ok as far as it goes, but the
Rock of Gibraltar is nothing compared to the strength which resides in
God Almighty. God could sink that famous rock, merely by thinking it as
sunk. There is no power in the entire world that can be compared with
the strength of God.
I found this
verse, a very interesting verse, when I stopped to fully realize what
God was saying here and I am sure you will, if you stop and think about
it. Speaking of the Jesus Christ, the apostle said: “For by Him were all
things created, that are in Heaven and that are in earth, visible and
invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or
powers: all things were created by Him, and for Him: And He is before
all things and by Him all things consist” COL. 1: 16, 17. Think about
that now, before God there was nothing. Everything that exist, exist
because God created it; and, there are NO exceptions. There is no way
there could have been a big bang out in space, because there was nothing
to cause a big bang. God simply spoke, and all things cam into
existence. There was nothing to start with; therefore all things were
created by God. Now then,, you will please notice, that all things are
held together by God. God could simple speak and ALL things would
disappear from the universe and it would be like it was in the
beginning, there would be nothing once more. My friends, that is power;
and there is nothing in this world to compare with such power. As one
reads through the Word of God, one can see God’s power demonstrated
many, many times.
After the Lord
destroyed Pharaoh and his army in the Red Sea, the children of Israel
sag a song to the Lord: “Then sang Moses and the children of Israel this
song unto the Lord and spake, saying, I will sing unto the Lord, for He
hath triumphed gloriously: the horse and his rider hath He thrown into
the sea. The Lord is my strength and song, and He is become my
salvation: He is my God, and I will prepare Him an habitation; my
father’s God, and I will exalt Him” EX. 15:1, 2.
“The Lord
is my strength and song” and we owe all that we have to Him. The nation
of
Moses, Joshua,
and a few others realized that their power was with God and not in them
selves, but most of the Jews did not realize this fact. The same can be
said of men today, most men think they have what they have because they
did it on their own. But, no one has anything that is not given them by
God, and this includes the evil rich men, whom God has given power to do
as they please. No matter how much these evil men have, and no matter
how much power they have, God can take it all away from them any time He
wants to, and there is absolutely nothing they can do to stop God. God
is all powerful and can do anything He pleases to do. This is something
that man needs to learn about God and where he stands with God. The Lord
is the strength of the believer; and no one can harm a child of God
unless he is allowed to do so by God.
In Second
Samuel chapter twenty two, we read David’s Psalm of thanksgiving for
God’s powerful deliverance, and manifold blessings: “For who is God,
save the Lord? And who is a rock, save our God? God is my strength and
power: and He maketh my way perfect”, verses 32 & 33. David understood
that his strength was in the power of God. David had witnesses God’s
power many times, even as a young man, when God helped him kill wild
animals to protect his sheep. He certainly felt the strength of God,
when he slew the Giant Goliath.
“God is my
strength and power, he said; and he went on to say: “He maketh my way
perfect. There is that hated word PERFECT again in the Word of God.
Perfect is the Hebrew word TAMIYN, pronounced TAW-MEEM, and could be
translated integrity – truth – without blemish – complete – full –
perfect – sincerely – sound – without spot – undefiled – upright and
whole. Perfect seem to be the right translation for the way David is
talking. Most all preachers that I have ever heard, refuses to believe
that a man can live a perfect life. While it may be true, that no man
ever did live a perfect life, except the Master Himself, it does not
mean that God does not expect us to do so. Now, and this is most
important, God would never give you a command that was impossible for
you to obey.
The great
evangelists, Charles Finney, said: that he was not perfect, but that he
strived ever day to live a life pleasing to God AND WE KNOW HE DID, God
used him to win over one half million souls to Christ. That is what
David is saying, “He maketh my way perfect” and only God can do that,
for GOD IS OUR STRENGTH, and with God NOTHING is impossible.
David could
say: “The Lord is my strength and my shield; my heart trusted in Him,
and I am helped: therefore my heart greatly rejoiceth; and with my song
will I praise Him. The Lord is their strength, and He is the saving
strength of His anointed” PS. 28:7, 8.
The Lord does
for us what no other person can do: He saves the soul of His anointed
ones. There are some people, that believes only their church or
denomination can save them, such as the Catholic Church, because they
claim to be the ONLY church on earth. But salvation is in the power of
God and not in any man organization.
“God is our
refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble” Ps. 46:1. Take a
few minutes and think about the times when you were spared from being
hurt in an accident. How many times have you avoided a collision with
another car? How many times have you narrowly avoided an accident while
working around the house? How many times have you almost been injured
while at work? I am sure you, like me, can remember many such times. Did
it ever occur to you to thank God for that narrow escape from danger,
because it was God that helped you to avoid that danger? No, I am afraid
that we seldom ever thank God for helping us out of such danger and that
is a shame on us.
God helps the
unredeemed on many occasions. I once read a book by General Leon
Degrelle, a
The general
said Hitler was in WW I, where he served with distinction, winning two
Iron Crosses, which is
“My flesh and
my heart faileth: but God is the strength of my heart, and my portion
for ever” PS. 73:1. Here we see two hearts mentioned, but we are talking
about two different things. Man’s natural heart, the one that keeps him
alive often fails man when he can least afford it and there is not much
that he can do about that. I doubt if there is such a thing as a brave
man. Men sometimes do extraordinary things under stress, but, if they
stopped and had a chance to think about what they were doing, they
probably would not do it.
The second time
heart is mention, we are looking at the new heart that God gave us at
the time of our redemption and that is the heart that God deals with.
The strength of this heart comes from God Almighty alone and has nothing
to do with a heart of flesh. You can easily see the difference. We see
this same thought in PS. 84:5: “Blessed is the man whose strength is in
thee; in whose heart are the ways of them.” The old revised Version and
The New American Standard Bible translates the verse this way: “How
blessed is the man whose
strength is in Thee; In whose heart are the highways to
Next let us
look at our love to God. Few men have ever loved God as He would have
them love Him, and I must confess that I fall into that category. What
does the lor require of ALL of His People? Well let us see what Moses
said to Israel and I believe this applies to all His people, since God
never, ever changes His mind: “And now Israel, what doth the Lord thy
God require of thee, but to fear the Lord thy God, to walk in all His
ways and to love Him, and to
serve the Lord thy God with ALL thy heart and with ALL thy soul, To keep
the commandments of the Lord, and His statutes, which I command thee
this day for thy good” DE. 10:12, 13.
First, let us
clear up the meaning of fear in this verse: Fear is the Hebrew word
YARE, pronounced, YAW-RAY, which means to REVERENCE God. If you were to
follow reverence through a good dictionary, you will find that it means
to love God and hate sin as God hates sin; and we know that God hates
ALL sin.
Let us look,
for one minute at one of the most maligned men in the Word of God and
see how he felt about sin: “And delivered just Lot, vexed with the
filthy conversation of the wicked: (For that righteous man dwelling
among them, in seeing and hearing, vexed his righteous soul from day to
day with their unlawful deeds:) The Lord knoweth how to deliver the
godly out of temptation, and to reserve the unjust unto the day of
judgment to be punished” 2 PE. 2:7-9. Now, if you are like most
preachers I have heard in my life time, you have never seen
In the letter
to the Hebrews, the evangelist praised them for their love to God: “For
God is not unrighteous to forget your work and labour of love, which ye
have shewed toward His name, in that ye have ministered to the saints,
and do minister” HE. 6:10. These Hebrews, that had turned their backs on
the old ways and had been redeemed, had demonstrated to the evangelist,
that they loved God by their works and that is one sure way to show ones
love to God.
“And we have
known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he
thaw dwelleth in love, dwelleth in God, and God in him. Herein is our
love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment:
because as He is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love; but
perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that
feareth is not made perfect in love. We love Him, because He first loved
us” 1 JN. 4:16-19.
The Master
tells us how we are to love God: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with
ALL they heart, and with ALL thy soul, and with ALL thy mind” MT.
In Deuteronomy
chapter 32, Moses song sets forth the perfections of God. Of course, you
must always remember that God inspired Moses to do the tings he did and
to write them down for us. “He is a Rock, His work is perfect: for all
His ways are judgment: a God of truth and without iniquity and right is
He” verse 4. God is compared to a rock, which is considered very strong.
An old son goes something like this “On the solid rock I stand, all
other are sinking sand”.
The Master
closes the Sermon on the Mount with this observation: Therefore
whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken
him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock: And the rains
descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that
house; and it fell not: for it was founded upon a ROCK” MT. 7:24, 25. He
goes on to say the foolish man built his house on sand and it fell, with
a great fall. You will notice Him using the rock as a solid example and
that solid Rock Is Jesus Christ.
In her prayer
to God for a son, Hanna, Samuel’s mother said: ‘There is none holy as
the Lord: for there is none beside thee: neither is there any ROCK like
our God” 1 S. 2:2. How true that is, because all other gods are dead and
have never been alive. Only Jehovah God lives and is able to serve His
people. All the other gods are powerless to help the people that worship
them.
We see, also,
that God is a fortress: “The Lord is my rock, and my fortress, and my
deliverer” 2 S. 22:2. Sen. Strom Thurmon was a segregationist, back when
the blacks did not have the right to vote. But this all changed as the
black vote became as issue. One black leader was complaining about
Thurmon, and the next black, said, “No one can deliver like Strom
Thurman. Now Thurman is willing to yield to pressure from the black
leaders to give them what they wanted. Well, not even Strom Thurman
could deliver like God can deliver. This is just another way of saying,
that God can deliver on every promise that He ever maid.
The Lord is
good, a strong hold in the day of trouble; and He knoweth them that
trust in Him” NA. 1:7. If all of God’s people would turn to God for help
and not to politicians, this country would be a lot better off. God has
our best interest at heart, and He can do far more for us then
politicians, because politicians have only their own best interest at
heart. But, in looking our for themselves, they are betraying the rest
of us and some day all will suffer for what the politicians have done to
this country.
God is the only
one that knows for sure, who the redeemed are, because “He knoweth them
that trust in Him” the rest of us can never be sure who has been
redeemed. I get mail from people that talk about millions of Christians,
while I fear that hundreds might be a better figure. If there were
millions of Christians, this country would be a much better place to
live in and we would never have a president like George Bush or Bill
Clinton, or the next moron to occupy that office. Reply
to Bill at gibb@gnrevival.com
David
Lives For the Lord
We will
continue with David’s prayer for deliverance and the things he said
about himself. We believe you will find this very interesting: “The Lord
rewarded me according to my righteousness; according to the cleanness of
my hands hath He recompensed me. For I have kept the ways of the Lord,
and have not wickedly departed from my God. For all His judgments were
before me, and I did not put away His statutes from me. I was also
upright before Him, and I kept myself from mine iniquities. Therefore
hath the Lord recompensed me according to my righteousness, according to
the cleanness of my hands in His eye sight” PS 18: 20-24. Read that
again slowly and see if you agree that David could say these things.
“I have not
wickedly departed from my God.”
“I did not put away
His statutes from me.”
“I was upright
before Him.”
“I kept myself
from mine iniquities.”
“The Lord hath
recompensed me according to my righteousness.”
“According to
the cleanness of my hands.” Think
about those things and see if you can say the same things.
“And Boaz
answered and said unto her (Ruth-ED) It hath fully been showed me, all
that thou hast done unto thy mother in law since the death of thy
husband: and how thou hast left thy father and thy mother, and the land
of thy nativity, and art come unto a people which thou knewest not
heretofore. The Lord recompense thy work, and a full reward be given
thee of the Lord God of Israel, under whose wings thou art come to
trust” Ruth 2:11, 12. I am one that hates to speculate about what might
have happened to cause Naomi and her family to leave
We know, from
reading history, that God plans things so far ahead of us, that it is
enough to boggle ones mind. Esther is a good example of God planning
ahead for a way to save the Jews from extension. God placed her in the
palace as queen, so she could have some influence on the king.
When the Jews needed an advocate with the king, Esther was there.
The Bible is full of such examples, if we will only for them with
spiritual eyes.
Please allow
this humble servant of the Lord to tell you how God did this in my own
life. I caution you to look closely or you will miss this vital point
that I am trying to make. I say this, because many other have failed to
see the way God works in the life of a believer.
When I
was redeemed by the power of Almighty God, our family was barely
scratching out a living. I had to work two jobs in order to make ends
meet and it was a struggle. With my regular salary, we were behind
$15.00 dollars a week. We knew that God expected us to support His work
with our tithes and offerings, so we decided that we would step out of
faith and give 10% of our salary to the Lord’s work. This meant that we
would not have to come up with $30.00 more a week to pay our bills. Well
on the following Sunday, we put out tithe in the offering plate. Let me
tell you, we were very nervous.
I was working
as a bread route salesman at that time, delivering bread to grocery
stores, restaurants and public institutions. I worked on commission, but
I was making all I could possible make on that job. But, the following
Thursday, my company came out with a new way to package bread and made
us the first company to package or bread in a plastic wrapping with a
tie string and nor sealed at each end. You older folks will remember
when bread was packages that way. The ends could come loose and the
bread could get stale before it was eaten, especially if you did not use
a lot of bread.
That very week,
my salary exploded and I was making $45.00 more each week. This meant
that I could pay my $15.00 tithe, the fifteen dollars I was making part
time, and still clear another $15.00 every week. Since that day we have
never been short of money. Some people will say, that my company was
going to come out with that bread anyway. You know, they were right, but
God knew 6000 years ago, that I would begin to tithe on that day and He
had all that time, to get ready to prove that He could bless us for
obeying His instructions. God looks ahead and plans thing that we never
even think about and that is a shame on us for being so spiritually
ignorant.
Think about
this for a minute: When man needed a new source of heat, God allowed us
to discover coal, and it turned out that there was tons of coal already
available. When we needed oil and natural gas, we discovered that God
had already prepared a giant supply for us to use. He has done this for
every thing we have ever needed as a people to make our life better.
In Second
Samuel, David thanks God for delivering him from the hand of King Saul
and all his enemies, and tells us why: “I was also upright before Him,
and have kept myself from mine iniquity. Therefore the Lord hath
recompensed me according to my righteousness: according to my clean ness
in His sight. With the merciful thou wilt shew thyself merciful, and
with the upright man thou wilt shew thyself upright” 2 S.
The next point
we see in David’s prayer is the Divine ways of God: “As for God, His way
is perfect: the word of the Lord is tried: He is a buckler to all those
that trust in Him” PS
Why are we
having war in the
“The Lord is
righteous in all His ways and holy in all His works” PS 145:17. Every
thing God does is the right thing to do. God NEVER does anything wrong.
Why did God destroy the old world and save only Noah and his family? God
tells us why: “And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the
earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only
evil continually: GE. 6:5. Every imagination of their thoughts were evil
continually. Well now, if God meant that ALL people were like that, we
have not quite reached that point yet.
Why did God
tell
Why did God
finally kick
We know that
Here is what
God says about the unredeemed Jews that teach their children that Jesus
is not the Christ: “Who is a liar but he that denieth that Jesus is the
Christ? He is antichrist that denieth the Father and the Son. Whosoever
denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father…..” The unredeemed Jew
says that Jesus is not the Christ, that makes them antichrist and a
liar, and all such liars go to Hell re. 21:8.
God’s ways are
mot our ways and He tells us so: “For as the heavens are higher than the
earth, so are my ways higher then your ways, and my thoughts than your
thoughts” IS. 55:9. God’s ways are Divine ways and we could never hope
to know all His ways as long as were are on this earth. We can know all
that He wants us to know, if we will just let the Spirit speak to us as
we study the Bible.
Nebuchadnezzar,
the powerful Babylonian king had an experience such as no man ever had.
After God rescued him form that exile and restored him to his throne,
the old king said: “Now I Nebuchadnezzar praise and extol and honour the
King of Heaven, all whose works are truth, and His ways judgment: and
those that walk in pride He is able to abase” DE. 4:37. the old king
learned something that most of today’s professing Christians have not
yet learned: that God’s ways are the right way and the best way for all
of us. He says the just shall walk in the ways of God and that certainly
is true. The problem is this: who are the just and how can you tell
them? “By their fruits she shall know them.” I have heard people talk
about millions of Christians in the world, but let me say, I doubt that
there are millions of real Christians in the world today. If that were
true, that would be enough SALT to preserve this world from destruction,
which is looming ever closer ever day. There are millions of professing
Christians, that is true, but professing to a Christian and being a
Christian is two different things. The just WILL walk in the ways of
God, while the professors of religion, ”walk in pride He is able to
abase”.
Hosea put it a
little different: “Who is wise, and he shall understand these things?
Prudent and he shall know them? For the ways of the Lord are right and
the just shall walk in them: but the transgressors shall fall therein”
HO.14:9. The redeemed man understands the ways of God, while the natural
man, that is: the unredeemed man does not understand the ways of God.
Because he does not understand the way of God, he will not walk in His
ways. The redeemed man will walk in the ways of God, because they are
the right ways. The unredeemed man does not believe that God’s ways are
best, and will not walk in His ways.
Let us continue
with a few thoughts on steadfastness and see how we stack up against
dome of the olden people. One of Judah’s kings that I admire most was
King Josiah, because God had some very flattering things to say about
this king: “And he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord and
walked in all the ways of David his father, and turned not aside to the
right hand or to the left” 1 K. 22:2. When Josiah became king, God had
already pronounce judgment against This
shows us, that we could delay what is about to befall, if we would
repent of our sins and turn to God like Josiah and
We see another
fine example of steadfastness in the tree Hebrew children as they faced
King Nebuchadnezzar and His fiery furnace: “But if not, be it known unto
thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden
image which thou hast set up” DA. 3:18. I tell you, I am not so sure I
could have been that brave.
Let us move on
to the Book of Acts and see what the attitude of Peter and John were,
when they faced the evil Sanhedrin: But Peter and John answered and said
unto them, Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken unto you
more than unto God, judge ye. Foe we cannot but speak the things which
we have seen and heard” AC. 4:19, 20. The two apostles would not be
silenced, because the work they were doing was too important to be left
alone. How many preachers do you know that would stand, like these two
apostles, did before that angry crowd? These very same men had just
crucified the Son of God, and would not hesitate to do the same to these
preachers.
Paul put it
this way: “But none of these things move me, neither count I my life
dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course with joy, and the
ministry, which I have received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the Gospel
of the grace of God” AC. 20:24. Paul had a lot of trouble, brought onto
him by the Jewish leaders he encountered in his travels with the Gospel
message, yet he remained steadfast.
God was angry
at the people for refusing to go up against the Canaanites after the
spies returned and told of the fierce people in that land. He said none
of the men over the age of twenty would ever see the Promised Land. But
he said of Caleb: “But my servant Caleb, because he had another spirit
with him, and hath followed me fully, him will I bring into the land
whereinto he went; and his seed shall possess it” NU. 14:24. Caleb and
Joshua were the only two men over the age of twenty that were allowed to
enter the
We have been
discussing faithfulness to God and we will close this subject with
Paul’s word to the Corinthians: “For this cause have I sent unto you
Timotheus, who is my beloved son, and faithful in the Lord, who shall
bring you into remembrance of my ways which be in Christ, as I teach
every where in every church” 1 CO. 4:17. Most professing Christians do
not seem to realize how important it is to be consistent in teaching the
ways of God. God only wrote one book, with one doctrine, and ALL true
believers will believe the same. So then, how did we get so many
different doctrines in so many different churches? If all believers do
not believe the same way, some body is definitely wrong. The Holy Spirit
is our teachers and He would never teach you one thing and teach me
something different, because God ALWAYS tells us the truth.
The next
subject in our Psalm is ordinances, rules, statutes, or commandments,
which we are supposed to obey: “And thou shalt teach them ordinances and
laws, and shalt shew them the way wherein they must walk, and the work
that they must do” EX.18:20. It has been my experience in the churches
that I attended: that most preachers do not stress obedience to God’s
laws as they should. But God feels different and we find Him demanding
obedience on almost every page of the Bible. I would hazard to say, that
obedience is taught more then all other subjects in the Bible, because
obedience is such an important issue with God.
During the
reign of King Hezekiah, the days of a free
David said, “I
was also upright before Him” and he must have been, because God said,
David was “a man after His own heart.” God loves the just and upright,
but is angry with the wicked every day and He says so: “Oh let the
wickedness of the wicked come to an end; but establish the just: for the
righteous God trieth the hearts and reins. My defence is of God, which
saveth the upright in heart. God judgeth the righteous, and God is angry
with the wicked every day” PS. 7:9-11. God saves the upright, but He is
ANGRY WITH THE WICKED EVERY DAY. I don’t know about you, but God is the
last person in the universe that I want mad at me. At the same time, He
is the only person in the universe that really matters in the long run,
because Good ALWAYS has the last word.
We can truly
relate to this next verse: “Be glad in the Lord, and rejoice, ye
righteous: and shout for joy all ye that are upright in heart” PS.
32:11. Why should we be so glad in our heart? Because we have been
redeemed AND freed from the power of sin. We have the word of God on
that subject: “And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call His
name JESUS: for HE SHALL SAVE HIS PEOPLE FROM THEIR SINS” MT.
David said, “I
kept myself from iniquity” and was rewarded for his righteousness.
The covenant
with
You should sit
down and study the book of Deuteronomy and see what Moses had to say to
the Jews just before he died, it would be well worth your time. “Only
take heed to thyself, and keep thy soul diligently, lest thou forget the
things which thine eyes have seen, and lest they depart from thy heart
all the days of thy life: but teach tem thy sons and thy sons’ sons” DE.
4: 9. Needless the Jews did not follow Moses advice and today they have
no country. We are not following Moses advice and soon we will have a
country, but will all be slaves in our own country, God never changes. Man has
a physical heart and a spiritual heart. It is the spiritual heart that
must follow Jesus Christ if on ever expects to be blessed of God. The
spiritual heart is deceitful in all things wicked. The natural man’s
spiritual heart is at enmity with God and has been ever since the fall
of Adam. The natural man’s spiritual wants to follow Satan, because
Satan puts no restrictions on man heart like God does. The natural man,
that is the unredeemed man, will die and spend eternity in the The
next thing we see in our Psalm is JUDGMENT: “Also unto thee O Lord,
belongeth mercy: for unto thou renderest to every man according to his
work: PS. 62:12. We have often said this: Most rich people are born with
a silver spoon in their mouth and we see noting wrong with that. While
they are here on earth, most of their desires are met, at least all that
matters. But most rich men want to lord it over others and this is not
right. But God takes note of how they use their riches and will judge
them accord to how they use their wealth. When they give to charity,
they must give from the heart, or God will not take note of what they
do. But,
sooner or later, the rich an dies and goes to Hell, where his riches
will do him no good. Here he is; one day he has the world at his feet
and he lacks for nothing. A few seconds after death, he finds himself in
Hell, where he has nothing. He is no longer cock-of-the-walk, but is
only a poor lost soul that must pay for ALL the sins he has committed
since he became of age, what a shock that must be. “I the
Lord search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according
to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings” JE. 17:10. At the
judgment seat, man will receive no more then he deserves, because God
keeps records and His records are flawless. The unredeemed man loves
darkness, so he must spend eternity in darkness. The redeemed man loves
the light and will spend eternity in the light of Jesus Christ in the
pearly Jesus
Christ says He will be the judge: “For the Son of man shall come in the
glory of His father with His angels; and then He shall reward every man
according to his works” MT. We will
close this Psalm with this one last thought, which is what we do in the
sight of God. We find this jewel in DE. Here we
see where a king did what was right with God, but made the same mistake
that most kings made when they tried to reform Judah: “And Jehoash did
that which was right in the sight of the Lord all his days wherein
Jehoiada the priest instructed him. BUT the highplaces were not taken
away: the people still sacrificed and burnt incense in the high places”
2 K. 12:2,3. This is something that God did not like. It is always best
to do exactly as the Lord commands us, whether you like it or not. Reply
to Bill at gibb@gnrevival.com The Law
of the Lord is Perfect Today
we are going to look at a part of the 19th Psalm. When you
read this Psalm you will see why we want to discuss this Psalm with you:
“The law of the
Lord is perfect, converting the soul: the testimony of the Lord is sure,
making wise the simple. The statutes of the Lord are right, rejoicing
the heart: the commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes.
The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring forever: the judgments of the
Lord are true and righteous altogether. More to be desired are they then
gold, than much fine gold: sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb.
Moreover by them is thy servant warmed: and in keeping of them there is
great reward” PS. 19: 7-11. The Psalmists tells us the “Law is perfect”,
but the Law of Moses was only given to the Jews. This does not meant
that we should not pay attention to these spiritual laws, but we need
not follow the ritual laws of sacrifice. All the commandments we are
required to follow are repeated in the New Testament. Jesus summed up
the Ten Commandments in only two; “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with
all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the
first and great commandment” (This covered our relationship to God).
“And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as
thyself. (This applies to our relationship to our fellow ma n). On these
two commandments hang all the law and the prophets” MT. 22:37-40. One
can only imagine what the world would be like, if men would only follow
this rule. It would satisfy God, if only the professing Christians would
follow this rule. We saw
that the Law was PERFECT, now we will see that the law is GOOD:
“Wherefore the law is holy and the commandment holy, and just, and good”
RO. We said
above, that we should obey the spiritual law and here is what Paul says:
“For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin”
RO. Here is
something to think about: “But we know the law is good, if a man use it
lawfully” 1 Ti. 1:8, That was the problem in the early days of the
Church. The Jews did not use the law properly when dealing with Christ
and His message. They did not use the law properly, when they followed
Paul around stirring up the people against him and his message. Many
people in our day do not use the law properly, but twist it to suit
their own purpose. When
the first missionaries started out to spread the Word of God to a sinful
world, all they had was the Old Testament with which to preach. But,
that was all they needed, because as we read above: “the law is perfect,
converting the soul”. The law was enough to convert the heathen to Jesus
Christ, because the Old Testament pointed the way to Christ. Peter used
the Old Testament on the day of Pentecost and 3000 souls were saved.
That was an impressive figure, but compared to all the people that were
in David,
in his Psalm of confession, had this to say about converting the lost:
“Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation; and uphold me with thy free
Spirit. THEN will I teach transgressors thy ways; and sinners shall be
converted unto thee” Ps. 51:12, 13. What does this tell us? It tells us
that a man must be in the will of God before he can win a soul to
Christ. We believe that David wrote this Psalm after his adultery with
Bathsheba and his murdering her husband. He was in no spiritual
condition to win a soul. So he confessed his sin, God forgave him and
then God could say, “He was a man after my own heart”. One
must be truly converted before he can go to Heaven: “…Verily I say unto
you, Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not
enter into the Jesus
makes a strong point here: “But I have prayed for thee, that thy faith
fail not: and when thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren” LU.
22:32. This is a little puzzling, because He said this at the first
Lord’s Supper, to His closest disciples. Does this mean that they were
not yet converted; it would seem to say that. This Greek word is used
four other times in the New Testament and each time it seems to indicate
that the ones being spoken to were not yet converted. I have never given
this much thought before, but we are faced with what the Bible says and
we must accept what it says and the Master said, they were not yet
converted. But this all changed, because Jes had been praying fo them
and when he was crucifies, they believed that He truly was the Son of
God and they were converted and the rest is history. In Acts
chapter three, Peter healed a man lame all his life. This drew a crowd
and Peter took the opportunity to preach Christ to them, saying, “Repent
ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, when
the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord” AC. Let us
move on to testimonies: “Ye shalt not tempt the Lord your God, as ye
tempted him in Massah. Ye shall diligently keep the commandments of the
Lord your God, and His testimonies, and his statutes, which He hath
commanded thee (WHY) And thou shalt do that which is right and good in
the sight of the Lord: that it may be well with thee, and that thou
mayest go in and possess the good land which the Lord sware unto thy
fathers” DE. 6:16-18. Does that sound like God does not demand obedience
from His people? If you expect to see things go well with you, your
family, and your country, then you must OBEY God in ALL things. When
King David was on his death bet, he said to Solomon: “I go the way of
all the earth: be thou strong therefore, and shew thyself a man; And
keep the charge of the Lord thy God, to walk in His ways, to keep His
statutes, and His commandments, and His judgments, and His testimonies,
as it is written in the law of Moses, (WHY) that thou mayest prosper in
all that thou doest, and whithersoever thou turnest thyself” 1 K. 2. If
there is one truth that stands out in the Word of God it is this: The
best way to be sure you will prosper in the sight of God, is to obey His
commands. I know, that people prosper who do not obey His commands, but
death and an eternity in Hell awaits them; and we cannot worry about
what God is doing for them. Let us make sure we are in the will of God
and let the rest take care of themselves. As we
go on, let us look at spiritual enlightenment: “The entrance of thy
words giveth light; it giveth understanding unto the simple” PS 119:
130. That is the reason why a simple minded fellow like this humble
writer can understand the Word of God, “it gives understanding to the
simple”. I never made it through the 9th grade, but I did not
need to be educated to understand the Word of God, because God is the
teachers and teaches what He would have us know to understand Him. In the
days of old, in this country, many a powerful preacher was called to
preach and never attended a day of When
the Lord Jesus Christ came, the nation of But
Satan grabbed control of the Church, and the Catholic priest and a
corrupt pope moved in and that light went out for one thousand years,
which is known as the dark ages. God gave them light, but the people let
it go out, so God withdrew and let them live in darkness for 1000 years
as punishment for their sins. Today, that light is going out, because,
once more, Satan is taking control of the church. The light is going out
once more and we do not know if the light will come back on until after
the tribulation. We doubt that it will, because God only gives us so
much room to see the light and when we refuse, He pours out His wrath
upon us. Here is how Isaiah put the time of Christ: “And in that day
shall the deaf hear the words of the book, and the eyes of the blind
shall see out of obscurity, ands out of darkness” IS.29:18. Isaiah
shed more light on the subject concerning the final age: “Thy sun shall
no more go down; neither shall thy moon withdraw itself: for the Lord
shall be thine everlasting light, and the days of thy mourning shall be
ended” IS. 60:20. This is, of course, talking about the time, when ALL
rebels have been put down and God will rule supreme for all eternity. When
God appeared to Saul on the road to For
God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in
our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in
the face of Jesus Christ” 2 CO. 4:6. Paul is saying, that God, who is
the Light of the worlds, commanded that light to shine in the hearts of
all true believers; and it is our responsibility to let that light shine
so others can see it. We have
already talked about testimonies and statutes, so we will move on to
God’s pure Word. As you well know, every verse of the 119th
Psalm talks about the Word of God and is well worth reading, because in
this Psalm alone, you will learn much about what God thinks of His Word.
Here is a good example: “Thy Word is very pure: therefore thy servant
loveth it” PS. 119:140. When you find someone that does not like the
Word of God the way it is and wants to change it; so as to water it
down, that is does not mean what it says, beware of that person. I have
heard dozens of change the Word PERFECT to mean less then what perfect
means. This is just one example, but there are many more. I have never
heard a preacher preach a subject about The
preacher put it this way: “Every Word of God is pure: He is a shield
unto them that put their trust in him” PR. 30:5. EVERY WORD OF GOD IS
PURE, so let us not change what God says. If every redeemed man believed
this, there would be only one religion and not hundreds that we see
today. God only wrote one Book and there is only ONE
interpretation of that Book; and we have Peter’s word on that:
“Knowing this first, that no prophesy of the Scripture is of any private
interpretation. For the prophesy came not in old time by the will of
man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Spirit” 2
PE. Let us
carry this though a little further and see more of what God says on the
subject: “But the anointing which ye have received of Him abideth in
you, and ye need not that any man teach you: but as the same anointing
teacheth you of all things, and is truth, and is
no lie, and even as it hath taught you, ye shall abide in Him” 1
JN. 2:27. So we can see that the Holy Spirit is the teacher, but one
must be redeemed and possess the Holy Spirit before he can be taught of
the Holy Spirit. That is why there are so many false doctrines in the
world today, even among fundamentalists. Paul
was not taught by the apostles at Here is
some good advise: “And these things, brethren, I have in a figure
transferred to myself and to Apollos for your sakes; that ye might learn
in us not to think of m en above that which is written, that no one of
you be puffed up for one against another” 1 CO.4:6. Many millions have
been deceived by men, because they did not listen to the written Word of
God. Men, who preach a false Gospel, will be severely punished for that
gross sin against God. The
King of Glory Today,
we are going to discuss a portion of Psalm 24 : “The earth is the Lord’s
and the fullness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein. For He
hath founded it upon the seas, and established it upon the floods. Who
shall ascend into the hill of the Lord? Or who shall stand in His holy
place? He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart; who hath not lifted
up his soul unto vanity, nor sworn deceitfully. He shall receive the
blessing from the Lord, and righteousness from the God of his salvation”
VERSES 1-5. We have discussed the subject of who owns the world before,
but it’s something that the world needs to understand. God’s claims that
the worlds is His: and He has ever right to do so, because He created
the world and all that is in the world. When a
man invents a product and puts a paten on the product it is his as long
as he keeps it. When a child is born into a family, the parents claim
that child as their own. When a man buys a house or a business, he says
it is his, because he bought it. That is the way God is with the world
that He created. The world is His and He has a right to do with the
world as He pleases, that is the right of ownership. The
Lord makes this claim in many places in His Word: “Now therefore, if ye
will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a
peculiar treasure unto Me above all people: for ALL the earth is mine”
EX. 19:5. Now is does not take a theological professor to understand
what God is saying. The
Canaanites had been possessing the Promised Land for many years, but God
says, I am going to give it to you and the people in the land can do
nothing about it. The Indians had been living in When
God gave the Promised Land to Moses
warned the Jews: that they must love for the Lord and not return to the
ways of the Canaanites before them, or he would take the land away from
them: ‘“See I have set
before thee this day, life and good, and death and evil; In that I
command thee this day to love the Lord thy God, to walk in His ways, and
to keep His commandments and His statutes and His judgments, that thou
mayest live and multiply: and the Lord thy God shall bless thee in the
land whither thou goest to possess it. But if in thine heart turn away,
so that thou wilt not hear, but shalt be drawn away, and worship other
gods, and serve them; I denounce unto you this day, that ye shall surely
perish, and that ye shall not prolong your days upon the land, whither
thou passeth over Jordan to go to possess it. I call Heaven and earth to
record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death,
blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed
may live” DE. 30:15-19. We know
that they did not follow God as they were supposed to, and God took the
land away from them in 70 A.D. The final insult, to God, was the
crucifixion of His Son and the persecution of His beloved Church. Now
then, it is plain that the Jews have not changed their mind about Jesus
Christ or His Church, so God has not changed His mind about the Jews
living in The
Lord not only claims the land as his, but ALL that is in the land as
His: “For every beast of the forest is mine and the cattle upon a
thousand hills” PS 50:10. You belong to God and He will do with you as
He pleases. If you repent and turn to Jesus Christ with all your heart,
He will send you to Heaven. If you refuse to repent, then He will send
you to Hell and there is noting you can do about it. The
Lord holds your soul in His nail-scarred hand: “Do ye thus requite the
Lord, O foolish people and unwise? Is not He thy Father that hath bought
thee? hath He not made thee, and established thee?” DE.32:6. The answer,
of course, is YES, you belong to Him and ALL that you possess belongs to
Him. He is only allowing you to use your possessions while you are here
on earth, but you just leave them here when you pass on. This
situation makes man a puny little piece of nothing: “For whether we
live, we live unto the Lord; and whether we die, we die unto the Lord:
whether we live therefore, or die, we are the Lord’s” RO. 14:8. That
should really make you feel a little small, to think that your belong to
God and He can do with you as He pleases. We are called “bond slaves” in
the Word of God, because we are not our own. The
Word of God begins with this simple statement: “In the beginning God
created the Heaven and the earth” GE. 1:1. But we have an even earlier
account of the world as we know it here; “In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the
beginning with God….And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us,
(and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the
Father), full of grace and truth.”JN.1: 1-3,14. So the Word of God,
which was Jesus Christ was in the beginning of time with God, but was
not made flesh for some time later. We are
talking about the creator and we read this in COL. 1: 17, 18 and it is
an amazing statement, once you give it a little thought:” And He is
before all things, and by Him all things consists. And He is the head of
the body, the church: who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead;
that in all things He might have the pre-eminence.” What I want to draw
your attention is in verse 1 :and by Him all things consists. This means
that Jesus Christ holds the world together by His mighty power. If He
should suspend His power, the worlds would just vanish without a trace.
Just as He called the worlds into existence by His power, he could make
it disappear by His power. That should give you something to think
about; when you think there is any limit to His power as creator. He is
the creator of every thing: if there was big bang out in earth and the
world came into being, It was God that caused the big bang. But as
believers, we know the big bang is a bunch of horse feathers, but there
are many people that actually believe that is how the worlds came into
being. That goes to show you
that P. T. Barnum was right, “there
are suckers born every minute.”
Nehemiah puts it this way: “Thou, even thou, art Lord alone; thou hast
made Heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their host. The earth and
all things that are therein, the seas, and all that is therein, and thou
preservest them all’ and the host of heaven worship thee” NE. 9:6. Every
thing was made by God and there was not anything made, that was not made
by God, because He alone is the creator. In the
movie, “The King and I”, the king’s son said everybody knows that the
earth is flat and sits on the back of a giant tortoise.” But we know
that is not so, because Job tells us how the earth hangs in space: “He
stretcheth out the north over the empty place, and hangeth the earth
upon nothing” Job. 26: 7. So, the earth just sits there on nothing and
whirls around like a ball, and is held there by the power of God
Almighty. There is so much that the evolutionists do not even think
about, in his desire to leave God out of the picture.
The unbelievers and sceptics
often ask: why do you believe that God is the creator? I always answer,
because He said He was the creator; and, to this humble writer that is
the only thing that makes any sense. We could cite this verse as proof
of what we believe: “Through faith we understand that the worlds were
farmed by the Word of God, so that things which are seen were not made
of things which do appear” HE. 11: 3. God started with nothing and
created the entire universe as we know it. Where did God come from? He
came from nowhere, He has always been. We have
admission into God’s presence, or we might say access: “Who shall ascend
into the hill of the Lord? Or who shall stand in his holy place? He that
hath clean hands, and a pure heart: who hath not lifted up his soul unto
vanity, nor sworn deceitfully” PS. 24:3, 4. Who has clean hands and a
pure heart? The man that has been redeemed, all other have an evil heart
and dirty hands and can never see God this side of the judgement seat. “Open
ye the gates that the righteous nation which keepeth the truth may enter
in” IS. 26: 2. And who, we might ask, can open the gate that the
righteous may enter in? How is
that door opened? “By whom we have access
by faith into the grace
wherein we stand and rejoice in hope of the glory of God” RO. 5: 2. What
then, is faith? Faith simply believes God. Believing God is believing
that His word is the truth. Faith
in God gives us boldness to approach God: “In whom we have boldness and
access with confidence by faith of him” EP. Heaven
is the most holy place in the world, but parts of the When
Jesus chased the money changers out of the temple, He called it “His
House”, but when He left the temple for the last time, He called it
“Your House: “Behold, your house is left unto you desolate” MT. Moses
told Israel that God would choose a place in the new land to put His
name, but He did not do this until Solomon was made king: “But unto the
place which Lord your God shall choose out of all the tribes tp put His
name there, even unto His habitation shall ye seek, and thither thou
shalt come” DE. 12:5. The
temple was the place where all religious activity was to take place and
nowhere else: “Then there shall be a place which the Lord your God shall
choose to cause His name to dwell there: thither shall ye bring all that
I command you; your burnt offerings, and your sacrifices, your tithes,
and the heave offering of our hand, and all your choice vows which ye
vow unto the Lord” DE. God
required certain things of I don’t
know if it proper to say that God is a hard nosed God or not, but I do
know that He is very set in His ways. I do know that He only wants what
is best for you, and I do know if you obey Him in ALL things, you will
be a lot happier then you are right now in your present state of mind.
That is what he said at the end of the verses quoted above, these things
are FOR YOUR GOOD. The
next point in the Psalm is righteousness; and righteousness importance
in the redeemed person’s life: “For I say unto you, That except your
righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and
Pharisees, ye shall in no way enter into the kingdom of Heaven” MT.
5:20:20. The scribes were the teachers and the Pharisees were one of the
denominations of that day, but Jesus, who knew all things, said, unless
you are better then these people, you can never enter into Heaven.
Membership in any religious organization does not mean that you will
ever see heaven. There
were no doubt some church members in Who has
a pure heart? That is easy to answer, the ones that have been redeemed.
Peter had this to say: “Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying
the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren, see
that ye love one another with a pure heart. Love of the brethren is a
very import thing for all believers to remember, because God thinks that
is important t; and if God thinks it is important, we should think so as
well. The
next thought in our Psalm is falsehood; and what a great world this
would be if people were only honest. We are now fighting two senseless
wars, spending money we have to borrow, and wasting thousands on
thousands of lives, because of the lies of those running our country.
How does the Lord feel about this situation: “Thou shalt destroy them
that speak leasing: the Lord will abhor the bloody and deceitful man”
PS. 5:6. Take heed you lying politicians, that the Lord has placed in
high office, because He is watching you and He Always has the last word.
You may get away with lying in this world, but not when you stand before
the Lord to be judged fore your sins. That: you had better believe while
you still have a chance to repent. Next we
see what God thinks about truthfulness: “The lip of the truth shall be
established forever: but a lying tongue is but for a moment” PR. 12:19.
Ever since God spoke the truth to man: man has been trying to destroy
the truth. But the truth still stands out to accuse the liars of their
lies. God will never forget all the lying politicians and false
prophets, because He has reserved a place for all of them: “But the
fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murders, and
whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and ALL LIARS, shall have
their part in the lake of fire which burneth with fire and brimstone:
which is the second death” RE. 21:8. God does not take liars lightly. David’s
Confidence in Prayer
Today we are
going to talk about a portion of Psalm 25: 4-8: “Shew me thy ways, O
Lord; teach me thy paths. Lead me in the truth, and teach me: for thou
art the God of my salvation; on thee do I wait all day. Remember, O
Lord, thy tender mercies and thy lovingkindnesses; for they have been
ever of old. Remember not the sins of my youth, nor my transgressions:
according to thy mercy remember thou me for thy goodness’ sake, O Lord.
Good and upright is the Lord: therefore will He teach sinners in the
way.” There is much here for us to thank about and we will try, in our
humble way, to bring to you some of the things that will bless you, if
you will only take to heart what God is saying to you.
The first thing
we will look at is God’s
For instance:
how many of you can truthfully say amen to the following passage: “And
now, Israel, what doth the Lord thy God require of thee, but to fear the
Lords thy God, to walk in all His ways, and to love Him, and to serve
the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul, To keep the
commandments of the Lord, and His statutes, which I command thee this
day for thy good?” DE. 10: 12,13. You will find all these requirements
repeated in the New Testament.
Next we are
going to come up against that little word that so many professing
Christina hate, the word is perfect; “As for God, his way is perfect:
the Word of the Lord is tried: He is a buckler to all those that trust
in Him. For who is God save the Lord? Or who is a rock save our God? It
is God that girdeth me with strength, and maketh my way perfect”
PS. 18:30-32. Now we know that God is perfect and the same Hebrew
word is used of man that is used of God. Therefore, we are stuck with
the Bible fact, that it is God living in the redeemed man that can make
his way perfect, just as God is perfect in His ways. One has to pervert
the Word of God in order to make it mean anything else. John deals with
this subject in 1 JN. 3: 9: “Whosoever is born of God doth not commit
sin; for His seed remaineth in him and he cannot sin, because he is born
of God.” I have heard preachers tell there congregation that the word
commit should be practice, but this will not wash, because of the last
part of the verse, “And he cannot sin, BECCAUSE HE IS BORN OF GOD.” The
NEW MAN, that is Christ residing in you cannot sin; and the old nature
is dead as we see in Romans six. But we still live in a body of flesh
and the flesh can never be satisfied, but can be controlled by the NEW
MAN: think on that if you will with spiritual eyes and you will see what
we are talking about.
No matter what
man might say about God, God says that He is righteous in all His ways:
“The Lord is righteous in all His ways. And holy in all His works”
PS.145: 17. We have all heard people say, “Why would God allow that to
happen?” In the case of a redeemed person, there can be one of two
reasons: He could be spanking that person for not behaving as he should,
or He could be allowing this to happen, that others might be blessed by
His actions. All glory belongs to God, but many people get more glory
then God does. But the redeemed man can rest in the knowledge, that what
ever God does, he is righteous in what He does, because His way is
RIGHT.
Isaiah puts it
so plain, that every one, but an absolute moron could understand what he
said: “For as the heavens are higher then the earth, so are my ways
higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts” IS. 55: 9.
While the unredeemed man can not conceive of such a God, the redeemed
man can, because he has God with Him. God speaks through His Word to the
redeemed man, but He cannot do the same to the unredeemed man.
The Bible
refers to the unredeemed man as the natural man and says: “But the
natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are
foolishness unto him: neither can he know them. Because they are
spiritually discerned” 1 CO.2:14. The unredeemed man simply cannot
understand the Divine ways of God, no matter how hard he tries, because
God’s ways are foolishness to him.
Let us move on
to the next point that David makes: “Then
I proclaimed a fast there, at the river of Ahava, that we might
afflict ourselves before our God, to seek of Him a right way for us, and
our little ones, and for all our substance” EZR.8:21. Ezra was a priest
and a scribe, or teacher and he wanted time to, as we might say today,
deprogram the people, because they had been in
The
Maters tells us, that truthfulness is essential to entrance to God’s
kingdom and we know that is a fact: “And said, Verily I say unto you,
except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not
enter into the
Paul puts it
this way: “How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not
believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard?
And how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach
except they be sent: as it is written, How beautiful are the
feet of them that preach the Gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of
good things” RO.
The Ethiopian
Eunuch said it best: “And he said, How can I, except some man should
guide me? And he desired Philip that he would come up and sit with him”
AC.
In our
court system, a man is sworn to tell the truth in a court of law. If a
man lies under oath, that man can be convicted of perjury and sent to
the slammer for as long as the presiding judge thinks is best. God says:
“Thos shalt not bear false witness against another person. David
mentions perjury in our Psalm in verse four. We read this in LE.
This does
not seem to apply to politicians and bureaucrats. Many innocent men and
women have been sent to prison based on nothing but lies. This is what
happened to Martha Stewart. MS Stewart told the truth, but to convict
her, the FBI agents and witnesses committed perjury and the judge ignore
this and sent her to jail anyway. The same thing happened to Congressman
Jim Traficant of
God will
harshly judge those who commit perjury: “And I will come near to youto
judgment; and I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, and
against the adulterers, and against hales swearers, and against those
that oppress the hireling in his wages, the widow, and the fatherless,
and that turn aside the stranger from his right, and fear not me, saith
the Lord of hosts” MAL. 3:5. The Lord places the one who lies right
along side of some sins that demanded the death penalty in the Old
Testament and eternal fire in the Net Testament.
Satan has so
blinded the eye of sinful man that he has no idea of how God feels about
thins and the doom that waits sinful man in the eternity to come: WHAT A
SHAME.
Next
David talks about God’s blessing upon the redeemed: “Neither do they
which go by say, The blessing of the Lord be upon you: we bless you in
the name of the Lord” PS 129:8. And this from PR. 10:19-22, I have a
block around verse 19, “In the multitude of words there wanteth not sin:
but he that refraineth his lips is wise. The tongue of the just is as
choice silver: the heart of the wicked is little worth. The lips of the
righteous feed many: but fools die for want of wisdom. The BLESSINGS of
the Lord, it maketh rich, and he addeth no sorrow with it.” The
preacher, in writing the Proverbs, often shows both sides of any issue
as no one else does. The Proverbs are rich in excellent Bible doctrine.
“The blessing of the Lord maketh rich”, how true that is, “If God be for
us, who can be against us.” Sure the devil is against us, but God has a
rope around the devil and he can only do what God allow him to do; and
don’t ever forget that. Let us remind you: that all those who profess to
be believers are not believers, therefore: if a person is persecuted and
punished, he may only be a professor and not a possessor of Jesus
Christ.
David now
turns his attention to the KING OF KINGS IN VERSE 7 & 8. Paul, writing
to his young associate, Timothy, said: “I give thee charge in the sight
of God, who quickeneth all things, and before Christ Jesus, who before
Pontius Pilate witnessed a good confession; That thou keep this
commandment without spot, unrebukeable, until the appearing of our Lord
Jesus Christ: Which in His times He shall shew, who is the blessed and
only Potentate, the KING of kings, and the LORD of lords” 1 TIM.
6:13-15. Down through they years, there have been many potentates, but,
there is only one REAL POTENTATE, the Lord Jesus Christ and please don’t
ever forget that simple fact.
We will close
this section with the Sovereignty of God. God’s sovereignty in the
control Dos has over man: “Because thy rage against me and thy tumult is
come up into mine ears, therefore I will put my hook in thy nose, and my
bridle in thy lips, and I will turn thee back by the way which thou
camest” 2 K. 19:28. We must never forget that man is totally under the
control of God Almighty and God can do with man as He pleases. This is
just one more example of how God can give us the rulers that we deserve,
and God does this based on the way we live our lives before Him. If we
could only get people to realize this simple fact, this would be a much
better world to live in.
The worlds
rulers are in His hands: “The king’s heart is in hand of the Lord, as
the rivers of water: he turneth whithersoever He will” PR. 21: 1. As
evil as a ruler may be, he is only as evil as the Lord allows him to be.
We have said the same thing many times as you regular readers well know.
One final
thought: “That frustrates the tokens of the liars, and maketh diviners
mad: that turneth wise men backwards, and maketh their knowledge
foolish” IS. 44:25. How many times have we seen some brave soul leak
some lie that the government has been trying to hide from the public? It
is amusing to see the major media spin masters go into warp speed to try
and cover for the liars in government. But, nothing can be hid from God
and God can expose these liars when He so desires and He often does just
that. Psalm
25
In this
message, we are going to talk about a portion of the 25th
Psalm, where King David shows us his confidence in prayer: “Shew me thy
ways, O Lord; teach me thy paths. Lead me in thy truth, and teach me:
for thou art the God of my salvation; on thee do I wait all the day.
Remember, O Lord, thy tender mercies and thy lovingkindness; for they
have been ever of old. Remember not the sins of my youth, nor my
transgressions: according to thy mercy remember thou me for thy
goodness’ sake, O, Lord: 4-7. “Remember not the sins of my youth”, how
many of us can pray that prayer. Praise God, when one is redeemed by the
precious Blood of Christ Jesus, ones sins are ALL washed away and God
will remember them no more.
Let
us start with a few verses from Isaiah to show what God has done with
the sins of the redeemed. We will first show how God feels about the
nation of
With that
fact in mind we will look at some promises of God to the redeemed.
Hezekiah is thanking the Lord for delivering the nation the Assyrian
horde that had surrounded the city: “Behold, for peace I had great
bitterness: but thou hast in love to my soul delivered it from the pit
pf corruption: for thou hast cast all my sins behind thy back”
IS. 38: 17. This is symbolic, because God can see your sins no matter
where they are. But, in this case He is showing, in human terms, that
the sins of the redeemed are no longer visible to God. All sins
committed before you were redeemed are no longer a problem,; only the
sins you have committed since you were redeemed are a problem. But, and
this is very important , God will forgive and forget any sins you
commit,: if you truly repent of such sins and con fess them to God and
ask forgiveness. Here is proof of that statement: “If we sat that we
have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. Ifg we
confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to
cleanse us from all unrighteousness” 1 JN. 1:8,9. When you do that, God
will put all those confesses sins behind Hiss back.
It gets
better: “I, even I, am He that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine
own sake, and will not remember thy sins” IS. 43: 25. We said above,
that God will cast your confesses sins out of sight, but you must truly
repent of those sins for God to be able to do that.
God feels
altogether different about the wicked and those that refuse to repent
and confess their sins before God: “There is no peace, saith the Lord,
unto the wicked” IS. 48: 22. The sins of the unredeemed are always
before the Lord God, and He will never forget them.
This
writer can praise God for hiding my sins behind His back, for my sins
were many before I was redeemed by the precious blood of Jesus Christ.
God had His eye on me, even before I was redeemed and saved me from
certain death in WW II. In my youth, he saved me from death with a
terrible case of the flu; and from death in a very serious accident.
Let us go
to the beginning of our text and start with God’s Divine ways: “As for
God, His way is perfect: the Word of the Lord is tried: He is a buckler
to all those that trust in Him” PS.
You may
not like us saying that, but we are only repeating what the Bible tells
us: “The Lord is righteous in all His ways, and holy in all His works”
PS. 145: 17. If God does it, it must be the right thing to do. Since God
has total control on every thing that goes on in this world, we must
believe that He can do anything He pleases; and we must believe he is
righteous in doing so. Can you find a flaw in such thinking?
The
King of Babylon, Nebuchadnezzar, saw the power of God up close as few of
the unredeemed were ever allowed to see; and he said: “Now I
Nebuchadnezzar praise and extol and honour the King of Heaven, all His
works are truth, and His
ways judgment: and those that walk in pride He is able to abase” DA.
Hosea had this
to say: “Who is wise, and he shall understand these things? Prudent and
He shall know them? for the ways of the Lord are right, and the just
shall walk in them: but the transgressors shall fall therein” HOS. 14:9.
W e know that all the redeemed will have no problem understanding these
ways of God, while the unredeemed may find fault with God’s Divine ways,
because they have not been redeemed: “O the depth of the riches both of
wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments, and His
ways past finding out” RO.
The ways
of God can be taught as we see in Ezra’s example: “Then I proclaimed a
fast there, at the
The
Master called a bunch of unlearned men to follow him in His walk through
David
sought the Lord’s guidance, which is always a wise thing to do: “Lead
me, O Lord, in thy righteousness because of mine enemies: make thy way
straight before my face” PS. 5: 8. David wanted his enemies to see David
as one of the redeemed as an example of what it means to follow the
Lord. This is a very good example for the rests of us to follow.
I believe
one of the biggest failings of the modern church: is their failure to
know the will of God in their lives. The disciples were led by the Lord
to seek a replacement for Judas, the one who betrayed Christ. First they
chose two that were qualified to take his place as one of the twelve,
then they prayed: “And they prayed, and said, Thou, Lord, which knowest
the hearts of all men, shew whether of these two men thou hast chosen.
That he may take part of this minister and apostleship, from which Judas
by transgression fell, that he might go to his own place. And they gave
forth their lots; and the lot fell upon Matthias; and he was numbered
with the eleven apostles: AC. 1: 24-26. You will notice the order in
which this action was taken in Acts chapter one. The Lord told them to
tarry in
The next
subject David brings up is the salvation of God, verse 5. The Psalmists
ask two good questions that we will look at now: “The Lord is my light
and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the strength; of whom
shall I be afraid/” PS. 27: 1. As long as we have put out trust in the
Lord, we need fear no one and we need not be afraid of man of beast. We
must not temp man of beast and say the lord will deliver me, this might
be tempting God and that we must never do.
We have
found over the years, that most of what passes for the work of the Lord
is done in man’s sown strength, and we have said that all such work, is
wood, hay, and stubble, because God is not in such work. For a work of
God to be successful, God must be in that work, leading and guiding such
work all the way. The Master, Himself, said this was so, and it is
imperative that we follow His leading in all such matters or we will
fail every time: “I am the vine, ye are the branches. He that abideth in
Me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without Me ye
can do nothing” JN. 15:5. Well now, one need not be a rocket scientists
to understand what the Master is saying. He is saying that all work must
be done by Him in the person of the Holy Spirit, as the Spirit leads and
guides us in all that we do, especially the work that we do for the
Lord. We must never forget: that we are only instruments that the Lord
uses in His work; and to succeed in the work of God, we must be
possessed and led all the way by the Holy Spirit of God. An instrument
is of no use unless such instrument is guided by someone and in the case
of the redeemed, that guide is the Holy Spirit. Unless the Spirit is the
guide, all work will fail; and that is a Bible fact as we saw above.
Isaiah
hit the nail on the head with the hammer, when he said: “Behold, God is
my salvation; I will trust and not be afraid: for the Lord Jehovah is my
strength and my song; He is become my salvation” IS. 22:2. yes indeed
god is all and all and we need His presence if we are to succeed in the
work of God. Just a casual reading of the Bible will point out this
simple truth to anyone.
David
said that he waited upon the Lord all day long, Verse 5. There are
advantages in waiting upon the Lord as we see here: “Wait on the Lord:
be of good courage, and He shall strength thine heart: wait, I say, on
the Lord” PS. 27: 14. I believe when the Psalmists says God will
strength your heart, he means your faith is made stronger by the Lord;
and the Lord does this when you meditate on His Word. Spending time in
the Word of God is the only way that one can grow stronger in ones
faith. We find this to be the fact in RO. 10: 17: “So then faith cometh
by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God”. So we see that God is
consistent in His teaching in both the Old Testament and in the New
Testament.
During
the time that Isaiah prophesied to Judah, the nation was often out of
the favour of God, as Isaiah says here: And I will wait upon the Lord,
that hideth His face from the house of Jacob, and I will look for Him”
IS. 8: 17. Jacob was hidden from God because of their sins, because that
is the only reason that will cause God to hide from His people. The
prophet was going to look for God and we can be sure that he would find
God, because he was one called of God.
The next
verse has a block that I placed around it, because it meant so much to
me an d I am sure it will to you as well: “But they that wait upon the
Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as
eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; an d they shall walk, and not
faint” IS. 40: 31. The redeemed will be able to run and not be weary,
walk and not faint. Because
God is with them every day of their lives; because of this, we
must say GOD IS GOOD!
Hosea
gives us some good advise: “Therefore turn to thy God: keep mercy and
judgment, and wait on thy God CONTINUALLY” HO. 12:6. Look to God all the
time, praise Him to your friends and give Him all the glory that He so
richly deserves.
We will
now move on to the mercy of God, verse 6. We are, many times, encouraged
to repent, because God wants us to repent and turn to Him with all our
heart, body , and soul, and many thousands have taken God at His Word
and repented and have been redeemed by the blood of the lamb. Here is
how Joel puts it: “And rend your heart and not your garments, and turn
into the Lord your God: for He is gracious and merciful, slow to anger,
and of great kindness, and repenteth him of the evil” Joel 2: 13.
This evil world can rejoice in the fact, that God is slow to anger
and gives people space to repent before He pours out His wrath upon
them. As one reads through the Bible, one cannot fail to see that God
does finally get angry enough to slay hundreds of people at on time. We
saw Him do this with the Children of Israel in the wilderness journey.
We saw Him order every man woman and child in
We will
give you just one evil awful example that they did, and then you can see
why God ordered them all destroyed. Henry H. Halley, in his Halley’s
Hand Book of the Bible: said they would sacrifice one child to Moloch
the fire God, by throwing the child into a flaming pit of fire. Then
they would build a house, murder another child, and build the body into
the house to satisfy another God for what they did for moloch. I mean
how evil can a person get? As evil as people are in this country, we can
praise God that He is slow to anger: but He does finally get fed up with
sinful people, then He must act. How do you think He feels about the
forty million and counting abortions that have taken place in this
country? How long do you think He is going to remain silent?
God
delights in mercy, therefore He does not remain angry at His people
forever: “Who is a God like unto thee, that pardoneth iniquity, and
passeth by the transgression of the remnant of His heritage? He
retaineth not His anger for ever, because He delighteth in mercy” Mi.
7:18. It grieves God to have to punish people, because God loves His
creation, but our sins force Him to punish us as wayward children. If
God slaps you down, don’t blame God; blame yourself, because it is
usually your doing
that brought on your punishment.
It is God
alone that makes salvation possible and we must never forget that simple
fact. Left alone, no man would ever be redeemed, but God, because He is
a God of love, chases after some people until they repent and turn to
Christ for salvation. “Not by works of righteousness which we have done,
but according to His mercy He saved us, by washing of regeneration, and
renewing of the Holy Spirit” TIT. 3: 5. Salvation comes, not because of
anything we have done, but because of what God has done. And the washing
is not by water, but by the Holy Spirit.
Let us
move on to lovingkindness in verse 6; where God shows His love for all
men. “Shew thy marvellous lovingkindness, O thou that savest by thy
right hand them which put their trust in thee from those that rise up
against them” PS. 17:7. Who is spiritually saved and who will God save
from the clutches of their enemies? The chosen ones are saved from their
sins; and the redeemed ones are saved from their enemies.
I think
it is safe to say: that God showed more lovingkindness to
Paul said
the Jews were without excuse, because they were given the oracles of
God: “What advantage then hath the Jew? Or what profit is there in
circumcision? Much every way: chiefly, because that unto them were
committed the oracles of God. For what if some did not believe? Shall
their unbelief make the faith of God without effect? God forbid: yea,
let God be true, but every man a liar; as it is written, That thou
mightest be justified in thy sayings, and mightest overcome when thou
art judged” RO. 3:1-4. The ORACLES of course is the WORD of God. The
Jews were the only nation that possessed the Word of God. That was both
good and bad: good because the Word led men to Christ: bad, because it
left the Jews without excuse for rejecting God and His ways. In our day,
the entire world is without excuse for rejecting Christ, the only way to
salvation, because the Word of God is available to all men.
God has
always made it plain to all that would listen: that He was a God of love
and not a God of hate. God said, when He was forced to dish out
judgment, that it was His strange work: “For the Lord shall rise up as
in mount Perazim, He shall be wroth in the valley of Gibeon, that He may
do His work, His strange work; bring to pass his act, His strange act”
IS. 28: 21.
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