Alright, now we're always talking
about how amazed we are at God's timeliness and the way He brings
passages to us, the next passage we come to and how it applies
to what's going on in our life. And that's the case here with
this psalm. We read here at the beginning
in the heading to the chief musician upon Shushan Eduth, victim of
David, to teach. To teach. Now this golden psalm
of David is to teach that God has given his saints a banner. It's to teach us that God has
given us a banner. A banner is a flag. It's an ensign,
a banner. and it's to be displayed. He
says there in verse 4, Thou hast given a banner to them that fear
Thee, that it may be displayed the cause of the truth. Now our banner is Jehovah Nissi,
the Lord our banner. Christ Jesus our Lord. He's to
be lifted up before us like a flag, like an ensign. He's to be lifted
up that we might look to Christ alone. look away from ourselves,
away from man, away from this world to Christ only. And here's
why. Look down at verse 11 and look
at the end there. It says, for vain is the help
of man. You remember Isaiah? We were in Isaiah and he said,
cease ye from man, whose breath is in his nostrils, for wherein
is he to be accounted of? Don't we trust man too much? Don't we trust ourselves too
much? And we don't even realize a lot
of the times how we are trusting ourselves by some of the things
we say and we do. We don't realize that's trusting
ourselves. But he says there, vain is the
help of man. Here's why this banner's to be
lifted up. Through God we shall do valiantly. through God, for he it is that
shall tread down our enemies. And now David wrote this psalm
back there in our heading, we see he wrote this in the midst
of war. It says there in verse 1, when David strove with Arinum
and with Aramzobah, when Joab, that he was fighting under David's
command, when Joab returned and smote of Edom in the Valley of
Salt 12,000. Now, David won that victory. He won it. He won the victory
in this battle. Saul It was the king before. Saul had no part in this. David won this victory. And that
typified Christ who wins the victory for us apart from our
flesh, apart from man. Christ wins the victory. So our
subject tonight is the banner displayed. The banner displayed. What we're learning here, what
this Psalm teaches, Christ our banner must be lifted up that
we might look to Him to win the victory for us. Christ is our
banner who must be lifted up that we might look to Him to
win the victory for us. I want to look at three points
here. First of all, it's vain to trust
in man. And then secondly, Christ is
our banner by whom we're saved. And then thirdly, when God makes
us look to Christ our banner, we triumph valiantly. Now let's look at these three
points. First of all, it's vain to trust in man. It's just vain
to trust in a sinner. Any sinner. Me, you, or anybody. It's vain to trust in man. Now, King Saul was the king prior
to David. And Saul was a sinner who looked
to himself. He didn't trust God. He trusted
himself. And he represents any sinner
who trusts in himself. Who trusts in man. Whether it
be himself or any other. rather than Christ, rather than
trusting Christ. Now in Saul, God teaches us that
it's vain to trust in man. We see it because while Saul
reigned as king, while he was reigning, God worked against
the children of Israel. The whole time, God made them
suffer defeat and division. when Saul was king. And what
we learn from that is, as long as our sinful sin nature is dominating,
as long as it rules, like King Saul, you see a picture of sinful
man, King Saul was ruling. As long as our sinful flesh rules
us and dominates us, it's gonna make us look to man, gonna make
us look to ourselves. It's going to make us look to
our will and our works and our wisdom rather than Christ. And
as long as we're doing that, God shall work against us. He'll work against us. We'll
suffer defeat. We'll suffer division. And unless
God has mercy on us, we'll meet God in judgment and suffer the
greatest defeat of all. And the greatest division of
all, when we're cast out of God's presence. Now under King Saul,
as they looked to man, and as Saul looked to man, and as the
children of Israel looked to man, God made the children of
Israel suffer defeat in war. It says there in verse 1, O God,
thou hast cast us off, thou hast scattered us, thou hast been
displeased. When God's people look to Christ,
when we're resting in Christ, the scripture says we win the
battle by Christ. Do you remember this from 2 Chronicles
20 in verse 15? They were about to go into a
battle with Jehoshaphat when he was the king, and the word
was sent and it said, hearken ye all Judah, and ye inhabitants
of Jerusalem, and thou King Jehoshaphat. Thus saith the Lord unto you,
be not afraid nor dismayed by reason of this great multitude. They were facing a far greater
multitude of, a far greater army than they had. God said, don't
fear that multitude, for the battle is not yours, but God's. And that's God's word to me and
you who believe. The battle's not ours, it's God's.
But when a man is trusting himself in this world and in salvation,
then he's God's enemy and God's going to fight against him. When
he goes into battle, whatever it is, it's a trial you're facing
or whatever it is, God's not going to go forth with you and
make you win that victory. He's going to show you that by
your strength you can't win. And so the result, when Israel
looked to themselves, was defeat in these battles, in these wars
they fought. Look down at verse 10, and he says there, he said,
Wilt thou, O God, which hast cast us off, and thou, O God,
which didst not go out with our armies? That's what he means
by casting them off. When they went into battle, God
didn't go with their armies. He didn't go with them to fight
the battle for them. Brethren, we can't even defeat
an earthly enemy except God fight the battle. We can't defeat a
carnal enemy unless God wins the victory for us. We can't
do it. So how would we ever think we could fight our great enemies?
Our great enemy is sin. Our great enemy is our sinful
flesh. Our great enemy is Satan. Our
great enemy is death and hell. How do we think we would ever
win a victory against those enemies when we can't win a victory in
this carnal warfare unless it be by God? And then God caused
Israel to suffer division amongst themselves. In their own kingdom
they suffered division. He speaks of it symbolically
here as an earthquake. He says in verse 2, thou hast
made the earth to tremble, thou hast broken it. You picture an
earthquake and the earth breaking open and the picture here is
of division. Sinners can't create unity between
us and God. Our sins have separated us from
God and we can't create unity between us and God. And if you
want to see how true that is, we can't even create spiritual
unity between ourselves and another sinner. So we certainly can't
create unity between us and God. We can't even hardly create unity
between just two sinners together. You put two sinners together
and unless God makes unity there, there's going to be division. So we certainly can't create
unity with God. You take two sinners and when
they're divided, there's one reason. I don't care what the
call or what the second cause is and all the back and forth
is, there's one reason that two sinners will be divided. One,
they're trusting in themselves. Mark it down. When a believer
trusts Christ to make his brother stand, when he trusts Christ
to teach him and correct him and make him submit to God and
follow after God, when he trusts Christ to do this, Christ will
promote, He'll produce unity between those two brethren. Why? Because you trust Christ to do
it. and he'll do it, but if one accuses another, and one condemns
another, and one forsakes another, it's the sure result of that
sinner trusting himself. That's right, it's him trusting
his own self-righteousness, trusting his own wisdom, trusting his,
it's all pride, it's sin, and God will not bless that. God
will not, he'll fight against that to make it cause division. So knowing that Christ alone
has to reconcile us to one another and make us to have unity with
one another, we know it's gonna be Christ alone who can reconcile
us to God. He alone can take an enemy of
God and reconcile us and make us friends between us and God. Christ is the only one that can
do that. Under Saul's dominion, God made
the children of Israel see hard things. Perplexing things. So that they walked about like
drunk men who couldn't figure out what to do about it. They
couldn't figure out how to fix their problems. They were so
perplexing to them. And God did it. God did that. Look here in verse 3. Thou hast
showed thy people hard things. Thou hast made us to drink the
wine of astonishment. You've made us drunk with astonishment. Now brethren, does that sound
familiar? Does any of this sound familiar
to you? Right now in our day, that's
exactly what God has done in sending this virus. God has shown
us some hard things. People are dying. You have the
economy failing. Unemployment higher than it's
ever been. God's made the earth tremble.
He made the earth... Nations and governments are divided
over this thing. Political parties are divided
more than ever over this thing. Not just in this country, in
other countries. The Middle East, you got multiple
religions just divided against each other. And God's made an
earthquake of division throughout this whole world right now. God's
made us drink the wine of astonishment. The political leaders have no
idea what to do. Economists have no idea what
to do. Everybody's walking about, physicians,
regular citizens, everybody, like drunk men, astonished and
we don't know what to do. There's one thing we need to
do. We need to all together be calling
on God. We need to be calling on God. You know, there's only one that
can heal us, and that's God. And here we are telling everybody,
telling churches, don't assemble. Don't assemble together. assembling
before God and asking God to heal us. It's the only way this
is going to be cured. And it's our not assembling and
not trusting God is the reason God gave it. It's the reason
God gave it. It's because we've been trusting
in man. That's why God sent this. It's
vain to trust man's strength rather than Christ our strength. And let me tell you something.
That's what we do if we look to government to save us from
this thing. That's looking to man's strength.
It's what we do if we start blaming this party or that party over
this. We're exalting man as if a man
in his strength could fix this. It's no different than trusting
our own works to save us from our sins. It's vain to trust
man's wisdom rather than Christ our wisdom. That's what we do
when we try to understand this pestilence apart from God's word. That's what we do if we start
chalking this up to some big conspiracy that's going on in
the world. Listen, this is God's judgment. This should be taken
seriously. This is God's judgment, his direct
hand upon us for not trusting God. Everything we see in this
psalm was God's judgment upon Israel for not trusting God,
for trusting man rather than God. And what's happening right
now in our world is because we've trusted man rather than God. and you would think it would
wake us up. It's a proof of our depravity in that rather than
it waking us up and turning us to God, we've just become more
divided, and more arrogant, and more proud, and look to our strength
more, and to our wisdom more, and to our flesh more. We've
done more and more of exactly what it is that caused God to
send it in the first place. That's depravity. That's depravity,
brethren. But how are we going to be saved
out of this mess? Christ is the banner by whom
God's people are saved. Now look here in verse 4. Thou
hast given a banner to them that fear thee, that it may be displayed
because of the truth. And God says, now you think on
that. This is a verily, verily. This is a behold. This is a see-la. Think long about this. God has
given a banner. God gave his only begotten son. He's the banner. Christ our Lord
is our king. God raised up David as their
king. He raised him up so that now
they're fighting under David's banner and not fighting under
Saul's banner anymore. That's the picture here. He replaced
Saul and he raised up David now as the king and now they're going
to fight under David's banner. In doing so, they prospered.
David prospered, and they prospered in David. And that typifies Christ
our King, who God has exalted, under whose banner, under whose
flag, we now fight this good fight of faith. Christ is our King. He's Jehovah
Nissi. He's the Lord, our banner. Now
look, God has given a banner. See that? God's given this banner.
How are we going to be saved? It's going to start with God.
God gave this banner. God gave this remedy. God gave
this salvation. He gave his only begotten son.
And God didn't give a banner to everybody. He only gave this
banner to his elect. He gave this banner, read it
there, to them that fear thee. Now understand what that means. God did not give us Christ because
we feared God. We fear God because God gave
us Christ. You get that? We're not them
that fear God. God didn't give us Christ because
we first feared God and so He gave us Christ. No, the reason
we fear Christ is because God gave Him to us. The first cause
is God. God gets the glory for bringing
us to fear Him. God has to give you the fear
of God. And God gave a banner for this reason that it may be
displayed. You see the problem we have right
now in this world is Christ hadn't been displayed. Christ hadn't
been preached in truth. Men have been trying to carve
off the offense out of the gospel and take the offense out of the
gospel just to get people to show up to a building and give
their money and make it look like they got a big church. That
won't save anybody. That's not displaying Christ.
To display Christ is to preach Christ in spirit and in truth.
Let the chips fall where they may. And the gospel is offensive. In Galatians it's called the
offense of the gospel. Why? It takes all the work out
of man's hand. It takes the choice out of man's
hand. It takes the reason for God's
saving out of man. And it gives it all to God. It
says God chose us by grace apart from anything in us. God sent
His Son to save and to work the works because we couldn't work
the works. God the Holy Spirit must regenerate us and give us
life because we're spiritually dead and trespassing in sins
and we can't believe on God unless He gives us faith to do so. You
see, it puts it all in God's hand, takes it out of our hands,
so it's offensive. But that's the only way you can
display this banner is preaching Christ in truth. It's to be displayed, raised
up like a flag is raised up. Raised up in the preaching of
the gospel. Displayed to one another. You
and I are to display this insulin to one another. To turn each
other from this world and from ourselves to Christ. I'll tell
you one thing that's been such a blessing to me in the midst
of this worldwide trial, in the midst of my own trials, you preach
and you preach and you preach and you admonish your brethren
to look to Christ and to look away from ourselves and our works
and our wisdom and look to Christ. And then you come into this trial
and a personal trial and your brethren do exactly what you've
been encouraging them to do. they start pointing you to Christ.
And in turning you from yourself, they display this banner to you,
Christ Jesus, and turn you to Him. That's, I'll tell you what,
that encourages a pastor. That encourages us as brethren
one to another. When our brethren turn us to
Christ, display this banner before us. And why? He says because of the truth.
Because of the truth. Because God only saves by the
truth. God only saved by the truth.
He does not save by lies. And because God defeats our enemies
only by the truth. And because Christ is the truth.
He is that truth. The old translations, some of
the oldest translations, they say that that last phrase there
is to flee from the boat. God has given us a banner to
be displayed. He's given a banner to them that
fear thee to be displayed to flee from the bow. I mean like
as in archery. The Philistines are mentioned
here as some of the greatest enemies of Israel and they were
experts in archery. They could shoot with the left
hand and with the right hand. That's good. If you can shoot
a bow with the right and the left hand, that's something.
And they could do that. What this is teaching us here
is that this banner was given so that the soldiers would see
this ensign when they're on the battlefield and they could flee
from the enemy to this banner. It typifies how Christ, exalted
in the preaching of the gospel, is our one weapon in this war
that we're in. Go to 2 Corinthians 10. Let me
read this to you. you know it, but let me read
it. 2 Corinthians 10.3. Here's what the, so that we flee
from the bow, we have one weapon. It's this banner. 2 Corinthians
10.3. It says here, though we walk
in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh. We walk in the flesh,
but we don't war after the flesh, for the weapons of our warfare
are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds,
casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalteth
itself against the knowledge of God, bringing into captivity
every thought to the obedience of Christ. That's what this banner
represents, our one weapon. Now let's think about how this
banner was used in days of old on the battlefield. We don't
use it the same now as they used it then, but it was very important
in warfare back then. First of all, in the confusion
of war, when you're on the battlefield, and bullets are flying, and smoke's
rising up, and you can't see, and everything's confusing, the
soldiers would look to that banner, that flag raised up on high,
and they would rally to it. They would rally to it. They
would unite beneath it. Christ is exalted in the preaching
of this gospel. so that God might draw his people
to Christ's feet out of this world and unite us with one another. That's what this banner's for.
We need Christ raised on high right now more than ever, brethren. We need to behold this banner
more than ever so we look away from this world and all this
craziness that's going on to Christ only. And then the banner
helps soldiers get their bearings. They could look at that banner
and they knew where they were on the battlefield and they knew
where they needed to go on the battlefield. When we hear Christ
exalted in the gospel, we get our bearings in this world. We
get our bearings. We hear Christ our guide. We hear Him teach us. We hear
Him in the midst of all the voices arguing in this world. And we
get so turned around by all the things we hear in this world,
we hear Christ speak, and we get our bearings, and He tells
us, cast all our care on Him, for He cares for you. The banner
strengthened the soldiers so that they could fight and they
could defeat the enemy. You remember when Moses held
up the rod, There, where he built that altar, Jehovah Nissi, the
Lord, our banner, is a picture of Christ being exalted in the
preaching of the gospel. When he would hold up that rod,
the Lord would fight for Israel, and they would prevail against
the Amalekites. And when he would let down that
rod, the Amalekites would prevail. As Christ is exalted in the gospel,
he fights for us, and he defeats our enemies. He's our strength. You get out in this world, you
get to watch the news. Oh, don't watch the news. You
gotta watch half a dozen different ones now and just try to figure
out some little semblance of truth in the midst of them all
to try to figure out what the truth is. It's just propaganda. One political party's got their
news, the other political party's got their news. Most all of them
is against anything that's right. Don't, don't. You get turned
around with all that. You get to listen to all that.
You start to doubt. You start to fear. And then you
come and you hear Christ preached. And He strengthens your heart.
He settles your heart on Christ. He settles you to know that He's
controlling everything. He's ruling everything. He's
doing it for the good of His people. And He's the strength
to remove those doubts and those fears. And you prevail against
the enemy. were more than conquerors through
him that loved us. And then the banner also intimidated
the enemy. When they saw that banner flying,
they knew Israel was still in the fight. Satan and all our
enemies are afraid of Christ. As long as you're still flying
this flag, they know you're still fighting under the banner of
Christ. That's why Peter said, whom resists steadfast in the
faith. He's saying flee to Christ. Resist
the devil by believing on Christ and looking to Christ alone.
And then this banner was raised as a declaration of victory.
And brethren, when we hear the gospel preached, the message
we hear declared is that our victory has already been won
by Christ. The Lord has He said, go and
comfort ye, comfort ye my people. Declare to them that the warfare
is accomplished. I've rewarded them double for
all their sins. Our Lord Jesus Christ, the captain
of our warfare, has won this victory already. And He has given
us free justification. He's given us perfect redemption.
He's given us eternal life. We can never be lost again because
of what He's done. So in the midst of all this confusion
right now, and we're on this battlefield, and in the midst
of all the confusion that's going on in this world right now, don't
look to your flesh. Don't be looking to your wisdom
and trying to chalk this up to just being some kind of conspiracy
and that there's something being overblown by one political party
or another. See, this is what it is. This
is God's judgment for not looking to Christ. So what's the remedy? Look to Him. Look to the banner. Look to Christ our banner. Flee
to Christ. Cast your care on Christ. Turn
from the carnal weapons and use this one weapon of our warfare.
This is the way our enemies are defeated. In our own heart, in
our own flesh is defeated and subdued and every other enemy.
How does God do this for us when we hear Christ exalted? Look
at verse 5. First of all, Christ intercedes
for each one of his redeemed with the Father. Verse 5. He
says, that thy beloved may be delivered, save with thy right
hand and hear me. Christ is God's beloved and all
his elect in him are beloved. Christ pleads God's own love
for Christ and for his people. And he pleads God's glory. He
says, save with thy right hand. You do the saving, Father. Save
with thy right hand. And do you know who God's right
hand is? It's Christ. Christ pleads His
own righteousness. He pleads His works. He pleads
what He's done in glorifying the Father. His blood by which
our sins are put away. And God always hears His Son
as He pleads for His people, makes intercession. And He delights
in Him. And in Christ, He's the mediator.
So not only does He go to the Father and plead for His people,
then He comes to us and gives us a word from the Father. Look
here at verse 6. God had spoken in His holiness.
I will rejoice. God promised David. And that's a type of God's promise
to Christ. Psalm 89, 35, Once I have sworn
by my holiness that I will not lie unto David. God said, I've
sworn by my holiness. He can swear by no greater than
himself. He said, I've sworn by my holiness.
I will not lie to David. God will not lie to Christ. This
is God's everlasting covenant promise to Christ because Christ
redeemed His people and fulfilled His everlasting covenant promise
to the Father. And God is sworn by Himself.
He's sworn by His holiness. He can swear by no greater. And
since God's covenant promise to Christ is sure and can't be
broken, God's promise to us who believe Him is sure and can't
be broken. And since this everlasting promise
is all of Christ's rejoicing, this is all our rejoicing. For
all the promises of God are in Him. Yea, and in Him, Amen. To the glory of God by us. And
here's what Christ declares to us. He comes to us and He says,
this is a sure promise from the Father. This is my rejoicing
and your rejoicing. And He comes and He tells us
this. He says to every believer what God the Father promises
Him. All His people are going to be
called out of this world and united as one in Christ. The Father promises Christ that.
Christ redeemed them. He justified them. And the Father
promises, you'll have them all. You'll have them all. And there'll
be one people. Look here in verse 6. I will
divide Shechem, and meet out the valley of Sukkoth, and Gilead
is mine, and Manasseh is mine, Ephraim also is the strength
of my head, and Judah is my lawgiver. Now these were all tribes in
Israel. But under King Saul, they were all divided. Nothing
but division in the kingdom. They were divided. That symbolical
earthquake caused by man looking to himself. And now Shechem on
the west and Succoth on the east of Jordan. Gilead and Manasseh
on the east and Ephraim and Judah on the west. He says they're
all united. They're all united. See, man's
way divides. But Christ and what he accomplished
for all his people, there's no separation, there's only unity.
There's only unity. Christ, he's gonna call all his
elect Jew and Gentile and make us all one. Next time you go
to the grocery store and you have to stand six feet apart
from the person in front of you, just remember this. Look into
man's way, divides us from one another. That's all it does.
Why do you have to stand six feet away from your person? Because
we look to our own way and God sent this virus. Our sin of looking
to ourselves rather than Christ always divides. But Christ, perfectly
serving the Father, unites us as one. And that's so of all
His elect. He's just talking about people
in Israel, but that's so of all His elect, Jew and Gentile, He
unites them. And then for the Gentiles here,
this stands for all his enemies. He speaks of Israel's three worst
enemies here. Verse 8, Moab's my wash pot,
over Edom will I cast out my shoe, Philistia triumph thou
because of me. He's speaking sarcastically.
Who will bring me into the strong city? Who will lead me into Edom?
Will not thou, O God, which had, cast us off? And thou, O God,
which didst not go out with our armies? Here's what he's saying.
As assuredly as God cast us off when we look to ourselves, as
assuredly as He cast men off when they look to themselves,
God shall save all who trust His Son just that certainly. You look to yourself, you can
be assured God's going to cast you off. You look to Christ,
you can be assured God's going to deliver. He's going to save.
The battle's not yours, it's God. Did God go with David? That's
David saying, who's going to deliver me in here into Elam,
this strong, fortified city, and who's going to give me this
victory? Did God do it? First Chronicles
18.1, let me just read you part of this. After this it came to
pass, David smote the Philistines and he smote Moab. And the Moabites
became David's servants and they brought gifts. And it says, And
David slew the Syrians, two and twenty thousand men. The Syrians
became David's servants and brought gifts. Everybody listed there
that God promised David he was going to slay and he was going
to triumph over. David triumphed over. And they
became his servants. And they even brought gifts.
And you know what David did with those gifts? He carried them
all to Jerusalem and gave them to God's people and used them
in the worship of God. Now how does that picture Christ?
Christ Jesus the Lord has conquered every single enemy of his people. He's conquered them. He's conquered
all his enemies so much that he's using his enemies like a
wash pot. Like a vessel of dishonor. But they're
a vessel of dishonor. But he's using them to accomplish
his will of calling out his people and preserving his people and
glorifying God. That's how victorious Christ
is. He's called all his people, he's
calling them and uniting us all together from the east, the west,
the north, the south. He's uniting us together. Not
only that, he's conquered our enemies and he's using all the
spoils from our enemies, our enemies themselves, to provide
everything for his people in the world right now. That's what
we saw in Ezekiel. What's God doing with this virus
right now? He's conquering the wicked reprobate
and he's saving his elect people. That's what he always does. And
so let me ask you this, lastly. And don't forget this too though,
amongst those Gentiles, Ruth was a Moabite. He's going to
save his elect from among them too. None's going to be lost. Now lastly, let me show you this.
When God makes us look to Christ, our banner, that's when we try
valiantly. The Spirit of God exhausts Christ,
our banner, and our hearts, and He brings us to cry out to Him
for salvation and repent from ourselves. Verse 11, give us
help from trouble, for vain is the help of man. Up there in
verse 1, He says, God, You cast us off, You scattered us, You've
been displeased, O turn Thyself to us again. Verse 2, Thou hast
made the earth to tremble, Thou hast broken it, heal the breaches
thereof, for it shaketh. Brethren, Christ alone is the
great healer. He's the repairer of the breach.
There's no remedy but by returning to the Lord in repentance, faith,
and prayer and beseeching Him to return to us. But I tell you
when you do that, if you can do that by God's grace, He will
turn to you. He will save you. And then you'll
be fighting under Christ's banner. And then what's our assurance?
What will happen when we're brought to fight under Christ's banner?
Look at verse 12. Through God we shall do valiantly. For He it is that shall tread
down our enemies. Now turn with me to 1 Corinthians
3 and I'm going to show you what all this is saying to us brethren. Here's the teaching of this whole
psalm right here. Christ has conquered all. He's
called out all His elect. He's calling us out. He's uniting
us in Him. He's using all the enemies He's
conquered to glorify His name and to call out His people and
to save His people. And so believer, when you have
Christ, you have everything. You have everything. You don't
have any reason to worry because all worry is is glory in man. That's all worrying is, fretting,
and that's just glorying in man. Now look what he says, 1 Corinthians
3, 21. Let no man glory in men. Why? Because all things are yours. Whether Paul, or Apollos, or
Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, Are things present
or things to come? That includes the coronavirus.
This is for you, believer. It's for you. To save you, and
to save all God's elect, and to keep us in Him, and to subdue
our enemy. That's what it's for. All things
are yours, and you're Christ's, and Christ is God's. That's the banner displayed. Christ, our banner. And I pray
that's a comfort. I pray that's a comfort to you.
Isn't God's timing perfect? I needed that. I needed that. Everything's yours. You're Christ,
and Christ is God. Don't worry about man. Don't
worry about man. Amen. Let's go to the Lord in
prayer. Our great God and our Father,
Help us truly to enter into this. Lord, this is a troublesome time
if we look to the trouble. It's a time that'll cause us
to sink down if we look to the waves. Lord, don't let us look at the
trouble. Turn us from that. That's not
the devastating thing. You are the one. who's able to
save and destroy. It's you we need to look to. Turn us, Lord, to Christ our
Redeemer, that one in whom we're more than conquerors. Make us
to see, Lord, that you've conquered every enemy and that we're safe
and secure in you. Make us see that everything you're
doing in this world is for us and everything in this world
is ours. and make us rest, Lord, knowing
we're as safe as can be, we're as secure as can be. Lord, what's
happening is happening exactly as you'd have it to happen. And
you're accomplishing your purpose with it. We thank you. We glorify
your name. We pray, Lord, that the banner
has been displayed, that you get all the glory. Keep us looking
to Christ. Forgive us our sins, Lord. In
his name we pray. Amen.