Seeking for the help of the Lord,
I direct your prayerful attention to the Lamentations of Jeremiah
chapter 3 and verse 25. The Lord is good unto them that
wait for him, to the soul that seeketh him. Lamentations 3 and
verse 25. Jeremiah lived to see that which
he had prophesied of God's judgment coming upon Israel for their
sins. Over many generations, they had
refused to hear the faithful and true prophets of the Lord,
and the Lord had said that He would judge them, that their
temple would be destroyed, they would be brought away into captivity
into Babylon, and this then had come to pass, and Jeremiah had
seen that destruction 586 years before our Lord. One of those
markers in Matthew, the 14 generations before our Lord came, was marked
by the carrying away into Babylon. And so this is a lamentation,
it is a bitter cry, say, weeping for the destruction and what
God was bringing and doing. But even so, in the midst of
acknowledging what they were going through, they are able
to hold, and Jeremiah is able to hold upon the mercies of the
Lord and hope in the Lord. This event with the children
of Israel is always to be a real encouragement for the people
of God under chastening, when they know they have sinned, they
have provoked the Lord to anger, and there is to be a period of
chastening, that it will not be forever. It is not to be cast
fully away, but the Lord will bring back, and the Lord gave
many signs, many tokens of it, that He would do so. And we think
of how Jeremiah says here in the 21st versus the change, it
changes from lamenting as to how the Lord was dealing with
them. He says, this I recall to my mind, therefore have I
hope, it is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed, because
his compassions fail not. Now to emphasize the things that
are in this lamentations, it's done in a similar way to Several
of the other Psalms, Psalm 119 especially, is based upon the
22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet. In the first two chapters, the
last two lamentations, you'll find there's 22 verses there. Each verse begins with a letter
of the Hebrew alphabet. In this one we have 66, which
is 3 times 22, So the first three verses are
based upon the first letter, the second three, the second
letter, and so on through the chapter. And it's done in this
way to make it easier for them to have remembered the word. Of course, in translation, we
lose that. We don't have that pattern that
is through. And of course, if you were to
read the Hebrew, you can see it written down, It doesn't go
from the left to the right as our Bibles does, it goes from
the right to the left as well. So it would look very, very different
to us even if we couldn't, can't understand the language. But
it's a great blessing for us to have it in our own language. But it's good for us to remember
as well that the Lord has used in His Word those means, and
we spoke a little of that this morning, the methods of remembering. and the importance of not forgetting
the Word of God, especially in times of trouble and times of
need. Well, in this, our verse, the
first part of it really is, can be looked upon as a statement,
the Lord is good. But then when we look further,
we read of those to whom he is good, the Lord is good unto them
that wait for him to the soul that seeketh him. And so I want
to look with the Lord's help this evening. Firstly, that this
first three, four words, that is a statement, the Lord is good. Statement of fact about God himself. And then secondly, to whom the
Lord is good as set forth in this verse. Unto them that wait
for him, to the soul that seeketh him. And then thirdly, how. How the Lord is good unto them. But firstly, the statement that
the Lord is good. Who is good? The Lord Jehovah,
God, the eternal God, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, not picking
out one in the Trinity, but all are good. We must not have the
thought that the Father is an angry God and the Son is mediating
between the angry God and between His people. Our Lord is very
clear, the Father Himself loveth you, and all are concerned in
salvation. When we read of the resurrection
of the Lord Jesus Christ in the different accounts, every one
in the Trinity is attributed to the rising of our Lord from
the dead. And so we would think of who
is set forth as good, our God, the eternal God, the ever-living
God, before whom we stand and before whom we must stand at
the Last Judgment Day. He is not a tyrant. He is not
unfair. He is not unjust. He is not unholy. He is not unclean. He is good
in every way. Our Lord, when He was on earth,
He had a rich young man come to Him and say to Him, Good Master,
what shall I do that I should inherit eternal life? And the
Lord asked him a question. He says, why callest thou me
good? That there is none good but God. And in that statement, he is
setting forth this truth here. And of course, our Lord Jesus
Christ was God. He is God. And yet the man coming
to him, is no indication that he knew or believed that that
was the case. So the Lord stated that. We may
have people that are good and good one to another, and we may
call them good, but in God's all-seeing eye, there is none
that doeth good, no, not one. All have turned to their own
way, and all our own righteousnesses are as filthy rags. But with
the Lord, He is inherently good. That is what belongs to Him,
His love, His compassion, His faithfulness. He is a good God. Now again, think of the context
where this statement is. It is when the Lord is judging
them, destroying their temple, bringing them into captivity,
and Jeremiah is still inspired to write, the Lord is good. We think of Job after all what
happened to him, and he says, the Lord gave, and the Lord hath
taken away, blessed be the name of the Lord. There's something
which the world as soon as disasters come, bad things happen, then
they immediately say, well, the Lord is not good. There's one
thing for God's people to really put a stake in the ground and
to hold fast in whatever they go into, that they have a good
God. They might not be able to understand
it, they might not even feel it, but to know that it is true,
that the Lord is good. In the Word of God, apart from
this, our text, there is actually another six occasions where we
have the same words as the first part of our text. In Psalm 34,
we read in verse 8, O taste and see that the Lord is good, blessed,
is the man that trusteth in him. And in Psalm 100, the psalm part
of which is outside on the notice board in the chapel here, for
the Lord is good, his mercy is everlasting, and his truth endureth
to all generations. And I always like that because
the word will say, well, Religion's outdated. That's something from
years ago. It doesn't apply to this generation. But Psalm 100 says no to all
generations, right through to the end of the world. He is good
and his mercy is everlasting. Then there's Psalm 135, verse
3, which excites to praise the Lord. Praise the Lord for the
Lord is good. And the goodness of the Lord
is a reason to praise Him. Sing praises unto His name, for
it is pleasant. There is 145, we spoke from that
this morning, but not from this verse, it's verse 9. The Lord
is good to all, and His tender mercies are over all his works. So, though we have in our text
those description of who he is especially good to, and they
need to know that, yet we are told that he is good to all. He opens his hand, he satisfies
the desire of every living thing. He feeds the birds, the fowls,
the beasts of the earth, He sends His rain upon the just and unjust,
Him that serveth Him and Him that serveth Him not. He gives
all these same benefits to them. And then we have in Jeremiah
33, Praise the Lord of hosts, for the Lord is good. This is
verse 11. For His mercy endureth forever. And so again we get a little
insight into the goodness of the Lord, of a mercy that endures
forever. And then we have in Nahum, in
the first chapter in verse seven, the Lord is good, a stronghold
in the day of trouble, and he knoweth them that trust in him. And then the words of our text. So it's not just an isolated,
word but it runs right through the scriptures and if we were
to extend it into different words or different ways of pointing
out the goodness of the Lord, it would run through many generations,
many inspired penmen and have that same witness that the Lord
is good. So may it be something that we
remember and especially in times of adversity, in times of need,
times when the devil may tempt us that he is something other
than good, may we remember this word, the Lord is good. Then secondly, we are told in
this verse, to whom the Lord is good, The Lord is good unto
them that wait for Him, to the soul that seeketh Him. And I believe it is very important
that such a soul should know that the Lord is good, and know
it from the Word of God itself. Why are they waiting? Why are
they seeking Him? I mean, there are those of you
here that are waiting and seeking. And before the Lord, how would
you answer? Why are you doing so? What has been shown you? What
are you seeking for? What are you waiting for? Maybe
that you can't really even put into words what it is. Maybe
it's like the hemorrhoid, an aching void that the world cannot
fill. Or the sense and burden of your
sin. The longing after God Himself. Seeking after God. Man by nature
is without God and happy to be without God. But an awakened
soul is not happy. to be separate and banished and
to not know God, and his desire is to come before God. It may be waiting for the blessing
of the Lord that maketh rich and hath no sorrow within, to
know sin's forgiven, to know your interest in the Saviour's
precious blood, to know that you are a child of God, to be
set at liberty, to be able to speak of the blessings that the
Lord has given you. There's many things that would
cause a soul to wait and make it a hard thing to wait. You know, if one is saying they're
waiting, but is just in a fatalistic spirit, it's like, If the Lord
blesses me, He blesses me. If I'm one of His, I'm one of
His. If I'm not, well, there's nothing I can do about it. That's
not the ones that the Lord is good to hear, because that's
just a fatalistic spirit, and it doesn't show that the one
that is waiting or seeking has any idea of what it is to stand
before a holy God. to be outside of Christ. The hymn writer sums it up, but
can I bear the piercing thought, what if my name should be left
out, when thou for them shalt call? And so there's these two
things. On the one side, there's a waiting. On the other side, there's a
seeking, a balance of these two. I mean, they're very, very important,
the waiting It sets forth our real belief in the sovereignty
of God, and that this is a blessing that we cannot just help ourselves
to, we cannot just give an assent to. We need the Lord to bless
us, and it be that blessing that comes from the Lord to our souls,
that it be sent from heaven and it be applied to our souls, not
just a duty faith acting upon the word of God and giving a
natural ascent and blessing ourselves. In one sense, whenever you hear,
if you hear a minister, he may preach a wonderful gospel sermon,
but if at the end, he is saying that you have power to accept
Christ, to be blessed before you walk out this chapel, And
to determine the time and manner of your blessing is undermining
the whole gospel and everything message is said. Because virtually
saying you do not need to be blessed from heaven, you can
take the blessing, you can determine the time. Our Lord said that
your time is always ready, but my time is not yet. There is
a set time to favor Zion. And it is the Lord that brings,
begins a good work. He which hath begun a good work
will perform it unto the day of Jesus Christ. And it is that
same God that then blesses a soul, brings them into gospel liberty,
brings them to a heart belief and a mouth confession. And it
makes a difference between really one that is just believing in
free will and one that believes in the blessing of the Lord that
comes from the Lord. And so there's many encouragements
in the Word of God to those that wait and if If it wasn't the Lord's people
that needed to wait, why would there be those encouragements
to wait for the Lord? In Isaiah 64, we read in verse
4, For since the beginning of the world, men have not heard
nor perceived by the ear, neither hath the eye seen, O God, beside
thee, what he hath prepared for him. that waiteth for him. The Apostle Paul quotes this
word, and he pictures the Old Testament church looking for
Christ to come, looking for the Lord's blessing, and waiting
for that time. The Old Testament church, they
couldn't picture what we have today. Our churches in every
nation or through the nations of the Gentile world, they couldn't
have pictured that. But he puts it looking forward. The New Testament church now
waiting for his son from heaven. The Thessalonian church, that's
what they were called to do. And so a people will be a people
that wait on the Lord. And there are many passages in
Isaiah that speak of the same, but just perhaps just to mention
another one in chapter 30. And verse 18, and therefore will
the Lord wait that he may be gracious unto you. What does
the Lord wait for? The Lord often does things for
a sinner to prepare the ground, to wait until they are humbled
and in a right place and right frame before he blesses them.
You think of with the children of Israel, in the time that they
turned away to bail in Elijah's time. The Lord waited for three
and a half years of famine before he then told Elijah to go back
and to make those two altars and to test. Why did he wait?
Why did not they just have six months of famine? Because the
people needed to be brought down low enough to be willing to put
their God veil on test. And the Lord knows how to prepare
our hearts and make us in a right frame before he blesses. And so it is, the Lord will wait
that he may be gracious unto you, and therefore will he be
exalted that he may have mercy upon you. For the Lord is a God
of judgment, blessed are all they that wait for him, that
wait for him. You think of the children of
Israel in Egypt, getting out of Egypt, being released from
their bondage. Could they do it themselves?
No. When the Lord began to appear, they rejoiced and gave thanks. The Lord was on his way. Could
they immediately get out? Could they hasten their time?
No. They had to wait until the nine signs. They had to wait
until the Passover. And the Lord brought them out.
And the praise is to the Lord and what He has done in bringing
them out. So it's a blessed thing to be
one that is waiting upon the Lord. Our eyes are upon Him. We're looking for Him. We're
waiting for Him to come. Picture perhaps a simple illustration
with someone waiting at a bus stop. They want the bus to come. Maybe it's a very important meeting
that they're going to. They don't want to miss it. How
anxious they are, looking up and down the road. Will it come? They look again on the timetable.
The timetable says it should come at this time. Can they make
it come quicker? No, they can't. They have to
wait their time. And as they wait there, they're
waiting at the right place, and hopefully it comes. A simple
illustration. But we're used to things in a
natural way, where we wait for something to happen, that we
don't have power to bring it to pass. So it's in someone else's
hand. And salvation is of the Lord.
Why didn't Jonah get out of the whale before he did? Why was
it three days? Why did the Lord wait three days? The Lord is a Sovereign. When
Jonah is brought down and able to say, salvation is of the Lord,
when he acknowledges his position and cast out of thy sight, yet
will I look again toward thy holy temple. He prays unto the
Lord, and the Lord speaks unto the fish, and it vomits him out.
And this is the gospel. It's not a gospel to a people
who want to have power themselves and want to have things in their
own hand and want to just of their own selves except of a
word, but for those who really want to be saved, but feel their
unbelief, feel their burden of sin, to be told in the gospel,
the Lord who has begun, the Lord who has bid you to wait and to
seek and to give you a concern, he won't bid you to wait and
not come, or to seek and you won't find, he has said. that
ye are to ask, and it shall be given you. Seek, and ye shall
find not, and it shall be opened unto you. And the gospel is,
the Lord will come. He won't forsake the work of
his own hands. He won't bring one to have a
concern, a burden, and then not relieve it. You think of Bunyan
and his pilgrim's progress, and when Christian had the burden
and realized he was in the city of destruction. It caused him
to flee out of it, but that didn't bring him relief. He still had
his burden of sin. It didn't bring him to assurance.
It didn't bring him to feel that he was truly saved until he was
brought through the wicked gate or brought through into Christ's
way, the narrow way, and even then, He still had his burden
of sin. Even then there were those who
were saying, well, you go to the law and that will, well,
the wise man, you'll get relief there. That didn't work. And
it wasn't until he came to the cross and then his burden was
removed. They shall look upon me whom
they have pierced. And it is the Lord's blessing
that maketh rich and addeth no sorrow with him. So there'll
be a waiting. But there will also be a seeking. It's not a careless and indifferent
waiting. We are probably waiting. Then
we will be in His Word, seeking the Lord in His Word. The eunuch
that Philip was directed to, what was he doing? He was reading
the Word of God. The Bereans that were saved,
why were they saved? Because they heard the preaching
on the Lord's Day and then for the rest of the week they searched
the Scriptures daily whether these things were so, therefore
many of them believed. And so they were seeking, they
were reading for a purpose. The eunuch who speaketh the prophet
this of himself or some other man. Philip began at the same
Scripture and preached unto him Jesus. That is the He aimed for
the people like the Greeks, so as we would see Jesus. Where
is He? There was born King of the Jews,
even at His birth they were seeking Him. When He was risen from the
dead, but Him they saw not. All the time there's that desire
after the Lord Jesus Christ. And it's not that to be expected. The Lord has said, none can come
unto Me except the Father which sent Me draw him. And the first
part of that drawing is a desiring after Him, a seeking after Him,
a wanting that salvation, understanding it is through Christ and it must
be through Him and Him alone. And so you're seeking that way
and looking that way. So you also come to His house
and you come in a different way than you did without a concern. You come prayerfully, you come
expecting, you come looking, and hungry and wanting the Word,
wanting to be fed, wanting to be directed, the Lord's house
then means a difference to you than it once did before, because
now you are seeking and now you're waiting, and you have that expectation. It'll please God through the
foolishness of preaching to save them that belief. And so you
come looking for that. You come in prayer. Asking the
Lord, I will yet for this be inquired of by the house of Israel
to do it for them. Again, we think of this idea
of waiting and our own helplessness to help ourselves and bless ourselves. The Lord says, I'll be inquired
of by the house of Israel, by his own people to do it for them,
that he will do it. And you read that chapter, Ezekiel
36, And it speaks of giving a new heart, a new spirit, cleansing
from all your filthiness, all the work of grace, what the Lord
does upon the heart. We need to ask ourselves then,
and we don't confine it really to just those at the beginning,
seeking really the Lord's people all the way along the way. We
don't cease to be those that wait for Him and seek for Him.
As many times we might be waiting for the Lord to appear in Providence
or seeking Him for a fresh blessing and revelation to our souls,
for the Lord to appear in trials, in difficulties, in troubles,
But we learn it right from the very beginning. The Lord brings
a people that are looking unto Him, that they're waiting upon
Him. And this is where the Lord is
said in our text, to be good unto them that wait for Him,
the soul that seeketh Him. It says something as well, doesn't
it? The Lord knows those that are
waiting for Him, and He knows those that are seeking for Him. It can't be hid from Him. He knows those. The Lord has said, there is joy
in heaven over one sinner that repented. The Lord knows where
one has turned from the ways of the world and turned unto
the Lord. Those that are Ephesus, Zionwood,
those who are going through that straight gain through Christ. They're looking for salvation
through Him and Him alone. No wonder the Apostle determined
to know nothing among men save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. It is only the Lord Jesus Christ
that can do poor sinners good. So are we? Are we in the text? Are we one that waits for Him
that seeks Him. Sometimes we're poor judges of
our state and condition, and very often we feel that our waiting
is not really good, sin is mixed with it all, and that our seeking
is very poor, and we would that it be much better. But I think
it would be a mark against us if we said, well, I'm a good
waiter. and I'm seeking exactly right,
and, Lord, why aren't you coming and blessing me? Because I'm
doing exactly what you've asked me to do, and I'm doing it perfectly. But where the Lord makes us feel
our sinnership and our poorness, it brings us humble and low,
not worthy. And yet, I have proved through
the years how many times the Lord has answered My poor prayers,
prayers that I've felt so ashamed of, and I know I have not been
worthy of the Lord appearing and coming, but it's a blessed
thing. And it's good also, if we're
constant in prayer, to be mindful of our spirit, that there are
some times that prayer is really hard work, and really an effort,
and other times, then, If you're constant in that, you find just
a little softening. And it's good when you feel that
to really press the case, really keep at the Lord in prayer. And
often that little softening, the Lord suddenly appears and
blesses the soul. And then there are times as well,
you might be, if you're on your own, maybe out in the field,
or working or in your home on your own and feel that inclining
to go and pray, do so, don't put it off to another time if
you can. Short breaths and those times
to going back again and again and then the Lord comes and blesses
the soul, softens the heart, draws our affections after Him
looses our burden from off us. Those are blessed times and I
can truly bear witness to this word, that the Lord is good,
the Lord has been good, good to my soul. And I've waited for
Him and sought after Him and it is a wonderful encouragement
to those who can, even in a little way, Say before the Lord, I humbly
believe that I do wait for thee, and I do seek thee. Well, this
word is for you. The Lord is good unto them that
wait for him, to the soul that seeketh him. Unto them, look
at how the Lord is good unto them. He already is good because they
wait and seek. With Peter, we read that, if
so be thou'st tasted that the Lord is gracious. We may have
tasted in providence, we may have tasted it in answers to
prayer and providential things, but a soul here that is waiting
and seeking has tasted that the Lord is gracious. There are countless
millions on this world that never wait for the Lord, that never
seek him. The hymn writer says, why was
I made to hear his voice and enter while his room, while millions
make a wretched choice and rather starve than come? Well, that
is not to be said only at the time of blessing, Right at the
very beginning, why was I turned? Why was I given an interest?
Why was I brought to see? Why was I brought to wait? They're
already blessed. We have things that we may bring.
You say, I can't bring anything of my own. It's all stained and
dyed with sin. Bring something that the Lord
has done. Bring in prayer, say, Lord, thou
has made me a seeker. Thou has done this. is not me,
thou hast done it. And use that as a plea, that
he come and bless your soul. Another way that the Lord is
good unto them is that he gives grace through the time of waiting
and seeking to do so, to continue. How often Satan would seek to
discourage, and you might have many times you might hear from
the pulpit, that encouragement to follow the Lord, to walk in
his ways, but you might be sitting there and feeling perhaps in
a spiritual way, shackles on, heavy laden, unable, and it's
like, given this is what I want to do, but I can't, and I feel
so weighed down. And it's the Lord that then gives
grace to continue. To hope thou in God. You think of the psalmist. Why
art thou cast down, O my soul? Why art thou disquieted within
me? Hope thou in God, for I shall
yet praise him. Why didn't he just help himself
to a blessing and praise the Lord straight away? He couldn't. I will yet praise him, who is
the health of my countenance. and my God. Salvation, it comes
from the Lord and the grace that first is given will be given
to keep that soul waiting. Sometimes it might seem that
it ebbs and flows, often encouraged like this with Samson, you know,
it was said of Samson that the Spirit of the Lord began to move
him at times in the camp of Dan. And you might think, well, if
the Lord's begun a good work, then that interest and concern
will get more and more and more. But the way I've found it, it's
sometimes very intense, and other times as if you've got no concern
at all, and it seems you're gone. And then it's revived again,
maybe through something that's happened in their lives or their
families or through a word preached again. And you know what that
is an answer to, because sometimes the devil will say, that's not
the Lord's work, that's just you doing it. You've just made
yourself a seeker and brought you into concern. If that was
the case, why isn't it constant? If it's in my power, why is it
constant? The Lord says, no, I withdraw
my influence, I withdraw my grace, my drawing for a little while,
and that's all It just returns to its sad face. And then the
Lord gives it again, and they rise again, and they seek again.
They that have no changes fear not God. God's people do have
changes, sometimes hot, sometimes cold, sometimes earnest, sometimes
not so. And yet, think of that with Samson,
moved him at times, and again, is something I have proved as
well. And the people of God prove this.
My heart will move at thy command. And those are blessed times when
it does. But the Lord is good in coming
and blessing them. Paul says the Ephesians are spiritual
blessings in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Those blessing
with peace, with pardon, unto you which believe he is precious,
making the Lord precious, giving faith that... And one of the
dear ministers now in glory in New Zealand, when I asked him
of assurance, he said, you've got assurance, don't look for
it 10 minutes later. I knew what he meant. It doesn't mean that one minute
we're a Christian, one minute we're not, when we believe and
trust in the word of God. But in the actual feelings and
enjoyment of that assurance, it is only sometimes for a short
time. There's been times when I felt
so blessed, I felt so certain and sure, if the Lord had taken
me then, I would have gone to heaven. I don't remain in that
feeling at all. And then it is a work of faith,
the belief and trust in the Word, that though my feelings change,
God does not change. His promises are the same and
he will deliver and he'll bring me safely through. But those
are blessed times when the Lord does bless us and when he removes
the burden of sin, when he favours us with the visits of his face.
I remember a time of going three days with so beset with all manner
of evil thoughts and suggestions in my head I just couldn't get
them out. And then walking along the corridor
of the home, I suddenly realised they'd all gone. There was just
a peace, there was just a quietness, a void, they were gone. And I
suddenly prayed, Lord, what is this? What's happened? And immediately
the words of Scripture dropped in, if the Son shall make you
free, you shall be free indeed. And it's been several times the
Lord has given me the the blessing, and then told me what it was,
the time when I lost that secular employment from Australia and
felt such peace sitting at my desk. Lord, I've lost my means
of income to feed my family. Why have I got such peace and
quietness? Immediately the Lord dropped
in. Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace. His mind is stayed on
thee, because he trusteth in thee. That was on the first day. Friday, I answered a job advert. Monday, I went for... No, Tuesday,
I went for the interview. Wednesday, I started a new job.
Within a week, the Lord had provided. But He gave me that peace. And
those are blessed times, when you know that blessing comes
from above, and the Lord has appeared. The Lord has spoken
to us and given that fruit and effect. You know, if we've got
imagined faith, then we'll have to support it. If the Lord gives
us true faith, that will support us. I've often thought of this,
sometimes when I've gone to Bethesda, one of the dear old residents
walks down the corridor and they're holding their walking frame up
high, off the ground, and I think he'd be better off not even having
it at all. That's just a weight to you.
Then if you see another one and they've got one walking frame
and it's pushed hard on the ground and they're leaning upon it with
all their weight, then that walking frame is really doing that person
good. They need it, they're leaning
upon it. It's not a burden to them. When
the Lord gives us faith, that lifts us up, that strengthens
us. The blessing of the Lord, it
maketh rich, it addeth no sorrow within. And really, you will
say the words of our text. The Lord is good. The Lord has
been good. You'll know the blessing of the
Lord when he gives it. You won't have to imagine it.
You won't have to wonder whether it's there or not. You'll know
that the Lord has been good, and you'll be able to rehearse
this to all around, come and hear, or neither fear God nor
tell what he has done for my soul. He is good in drawing. to the Lord Jesus, drawing to
the house of God, drawing to walk in obedience, drawing to
his people. We know that we have passed from
death unto life because we love the brethren. And he is good
in preparing a place for us. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place
for you, I'll come again and receive you unto myself where
I am. There ye will be also a prepared
people for a prepared place. Those in our text are people
being prepared. Think of that. Preparation doesn't
happen in a moment. The people of God are being prepared. It is in grace. It is with the
call to the ministry, 13 years. I had the exercise and burden
of the ministry before brought forth. I could not hasten that
time, sooner than what the Lord brought me into it. No amount
of prayer meetings and the friends knew I was exercised, I told
them clearly, but I could not go until the Lord gave me liberty
to do so. And it is in that way, with those
who are brought to gospel liberty as well, Our times are in His
hand. My heart will move at Thy command. I've proved that many times. Those are blessed times. In our
hard hearts, we think, what will move it? And the Lord knows exactly
what to do to soften our hearts and draw us out after Him. That blessing of the Lord, often
it centres in Calvary, brings that soul to view their crucified
Lord, to view him by faith as suffering in their place. Perhaps
one word blessed to them through the word of God or through the
ministry of the word, and they see the Lord as they've never
seen him before, and they're brought to love him and drawn
to him and to worship him, to say with dear Thomas, my Lord
and my God. The Lord is good. unto them that wait for him,
to the soul that seeketh him. Dear friends, may the Lord appear
for those of you that wait and that seek, and that you might
be able to testify of this in the Lord's time and way, to your
comfort and to the joy of your soul, and to the joy of the Church
of God. as well. The Lord is good unto
them that wait for him, to the soul that seeketh him. Amen.