Let me read this article. A people hungry after righteousness
and a preacher anxious to feed their souls will act in sweet
harmony with each other when their common subject is Jesus
Christ the Lord. Our scripture reading for this
morning is Psalms 90 verses 1 through 17. Psalm 90 verses 1 through 17.
This is the word of the Lord. A prayer of Moses, the man of
God. Lord, thou hast been our dwelling
place in all generations before the mountains were brought forth,
or ever thou hast formed the earth and the world, even from
everlasting to everlasting. Thou art God. Amen. Thou turnest
man to destruction and sayest, return, ye children of men. For
a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday, when it
is past, and as a watch in the night. Thou carryest them away
as with a flood. They are as a sleep. In the morning
they are like grass which groweth up. In the morning it flourisheth
and groweth up. and in the evening it is cut
down and withereth. For we are consumed by thine
anger and by thy wrath are we troubled. Thou hast set our iniquities
before thee, our secret sins in the light of thy countenance.
For all our days are passed away in thy wrath, we spend our years
as a tale that is told. The days of our years are threescore
and ten, and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years,
Yet, is there strength, labor, and sorrow? For it is soon cut
off, and we fly away. Who knoweth the power of thine
anger? Even according to thy fear, so is thy wrath. So teach
us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom. Return, O Lord, how long, and
let it repent thee concerning thy servants. O, satisfy us earthly,
Oh, satisfy us early with thy mercy, that we may rejoice and
be glad all our days. Make us glad according to the
days wherein thou hast afflicted us and the years wherein we have
seen evil. Let thy work appear unto thy
servants and thy glory unto their children. And let the beauty
of the Lord our God be upon us and establish thou the work of
our hands upon us, yea, the work of our hands, establish thou
it. And may the Holy Spirit add blessing
to this holy word. Open your Bibles this morning
to Jeremiah chapter 29 if you would, and you can set your Bibles
right now in your lap. We're going to read a couple
of verses there, and I would like to expound on them. Jeremiah
29 and while you're turning there Come to the father through Jesus
the son Throughout scriptures our Lord
teaches us to seek after him When Peter was called to come
to the Lord out on the water, and he walked out. Now, you remember
the story. The story was that the seas were
boisterous. That means the waves were getting
pretty loud. The winds were whining in the
area around you, in your ears. You could hear the winds blowing
hard, boisterous. And Peter, as he looked to the
Lord Jesus, he was fine. But as soon as he took his eyes
off of Christ, now, I want to point this out to you. If you think that you're, oh,
I wouldn't do that, you're sadly mistaken. You see, as God's people, we
know the weakness of this flesh. It takes but one moment for me
to look away from the one that I should be looking to all the
time. Seeking the Lord all the time. As soon as Peter took his
eyes off of him, he began to see. Now, thankfully, and what
a blessing. Here's some reassurance to you.
Oh, I know what you mean, Pastor. I had a day this week that just,
man, I took my eyes off the Lord. The world was surrounding me. The waves were banging against
this little ship. And I felt like, where's God
today? He's not hearing me. Where is
He? I took my eyes off of Christ.
I know I'm supposed to look to Him, but I took my eyes off of
Him anyway. I pray. I pray the Lord is giving me
a message today that will encourage you to keep your eyes on Him. That will maybe not just encourage
you, but maybe you'll be in that situation next week where the
world is raising its ugly head up around you, where maybe your
family of religious folks is getting a little boisterous,
and you know, that church you go to up there to rescue, that's
just, you know, you guys are isolationists. And you think
to yourself, just, ah! Ah! Lord, cause me. God, we look
to You. Look at verses 13 and 14, if
you would, of Jeremiah 29. And He, this is God inspiring
the prophet Jeremiah to speak to Israel. Not that country over
there in the Middle East that's going through all this problems
right now, but God's Israel. God's people, chosen people from
before the world ever was. Ye shall seek me and find me
when ye shall search for me with all your heart. Isn't that wonderful? And I will be found of you, saith
the Lord, and I will turn away your captivity. Have you got
a sin that's bothering you? A sin that's rearing up its ugly
head in your life? A weakness that's consuming you? I will turn away your captivity
and I will gather you from all the nations and from all the
places whither I have driven you, saith the Lord, and I will
bring you again into the place whence I caused you to be carried
away captive." What is it to seek the Lord? What does it mean to seek the
Lord? In Jeremiah 29, we read, he says,
and ye shall seek me and find me. In another passage of scripture
in Isaiah 55, 6, the Lord declares, seek ye the Lord while he may
be found. Call ye upon him while he is
near. Think about this for a moment. If this is not true, please stand
up and dispute it. But when we want something real
bad, we'll go after it, don't we? I decided I wanted to take a
ride to Sturgis in August. My son-in-law convinced me to
do it. So I found a way to do it. I went out and bought a bike. Don't you do the same thing?
You know, today's just a beautiful
day. Tell me if this is not true.
Today's such a beautiful day, just got to go out and play some
golf this afternoon. Yeah. I'll go with you if you need
it for it. We want something bad enough,
we're going to go after it, don't we? we're going to go after it. That's
what going to college is all about, isn't it? I didn't do
that, but some do. I just fell into my career, but
you know, I wanted to be with somebody. I didn't want to be
alone. I went after her. And I kept
going after her until I got her. You went after her. And you kept
going after her until you got her. Yeah. If we want something bad
enough, we're going to go after it, right? If a person really wants wealth,
they're going to go after it. They'll go get an education to
get it. If a person really wants a political
office, they'll go after it. They'll seek that very thing
diligently. They'll give their time and their
effort to study, to accomplish what their goal is. People are
also taken up with good health, aren't they? They want to be healthy, they
go see a doctor. What can I do to be a more healthy person? I don't do that either. They read books about good health,
they diet, they exercise. They do all these things trying
to get good health and a healthy body. That's what people do if
they really want it. Some people want love and companionship,
like I mentioned a moment ago. What I'm saying is this, that
what we truly want in this world, we'll go after it. We go after it with all of our
hearts, our strength, and effort. If it's something that we just
feel we gotta have. This is also true spiritually.
If a person really desires to know the living God, they will
desire to know the true and living God in true faith. We must worship Him in truth
and in spirit. They'll desire to know the true
and living God. They really want to know who
He is and desire it and enjoy His presence. They'll desire
His mercy. They'll desire His grace and
the riches of His love. If a person really desires to
find the favor of God and the fellowship of God and the forgiveness
of sins, then that person will do one thing, and that is seek
the Lord. just like any other area of our
life. If we want something badly enough,
we'll go after it. We'll give our time and effort
to attain that very goal. I needed something one day when
my brother lost his son. We were gathered at his home. I said, well, I'm going to go
up to the church. What? Why? Because I have to. At that time, the sorrow of what
happened was so hard, not just only in my brother and his wife's
heart, but it was in all the family. Mom, Kathy and I both. There was no peace for my heart
gathered with the family that day. The only place I knew where
to look was right here at Rescue, where the truth was being preached. I'm not saying Lee and Shirley
didn't need the same thing. I'm saying God led me to look to Him. when the waves were crashing my little boat. And when I wanted it bad enough,
I went and got it. See, that's what the Lord does. He
brings us to the point where we have to have it. Sometimes that can be very painful. Remember when a woman had an
issue of blood spoken about in the Bible? She bled for 12 long
years. She spent everything she had
on false physicians. She'd gone to this quack and
to that quack. Nobody could do anything. Finally she had heard about this
one called the Lord Jesus Christ. How do you get a call on somebody
you've never heard? Twelve long years she cried and
called on people who could do nothing for her. Yet the Lord
caused her to seek Him. She said, if I can but touch
His clothes, I will be made whole. She wanted Christ so bad that
she got down and crawled to Him amongst the people. She couldn't
even get to Him standing up. She had to get down and crawl
where there was room between people's legs. If I could just
but touch the hem of His gown. What about blind Bartimaeus?
You know that story. He was blind from birth. When
our Lord walked out of the city of Jericho, we just looked at
that recently, He stood. He stopped. For those of you who
aren't able to join us on Friday night, did you know that when
Joshua called by the power of God for the sun to stop, it was
over Jericho? I mean, the sun, you know, the
ball of flames, all that, it stopped. It stood still. What a picture we have of Christ
Jesus as He was leaving Jericho, the wicked city. And a man cried
out, he cried out, Lord Jesus, now Son of David, Savior, What a commotion there was going
on. Someone said, Jesus of Nazareth is passing by. And he cried out,
Jesus, now son of David, have mercy upon me. What was it he
needed? He needed to see. Everyone around
him could see the colors of the sky. He had no idea what it was. He wanted that. God gave him
a need. You ever think about that? If the Lord had caused John Reeves
to be blind from birth, that I would come to him at some point
and say, Lord, I need you. Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord
for my blindness. He didn't leave me to myself
as he very well could have, as I deserve to be left to myself. What about the wealthy Ethiopian? Remember him? What did he do? He had all the riches of his
land, of Ethiopia. He was in charge of the queen's
treasure. He had all of that. Yet that's not what he was seeking,
was it? No, he went all the way. And remember, they didn't have
cars back then. They didn't have airplanes. They
had to get on camels and ride a long ways across the desert.
So he goes all the way across the desert saying, OK, somebody
told me Christ is over here in Jerusalem. He gets over there,
and that does nothing for him. Now he's going back to his land,
and he's like, ah. Reading scriptures, reading the
Word, and the Lord sends him a pastor to preach. Do you know what it is you're
reading? No, I don't. Is it this man that, is it this
one you call the Messiah, or is it another? Philip preached Christ. The Lord
caused him to need a Savior. Cornelius, Lydia, the thief on
the cross, and the women who washed his feet are illustrations
of people who needed mercy, who needed grace, And they sought
it through Him until they found Him. Our Lord said these words,
Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness. Did you catch that? What is it we're supposed to
seek? First the Kingdom of God and His righteousness. I'm not talking about a land.
I'm not talking about a country. The Kingdom of God, folks, is
Christ. It's wherever He dwells. And
if He dwells in the hearts of His people according to His Word,
then that's where the Kingdom of God is, right? If I'm seeking
with all my heart Christ, all other things will be added
unto you. his righteousness. Seek ye the
Lord while ye may be found, call on him while he is near. He also
said these words, ye seek me and find me when you search for
me with all your heart. And I will be found of you when
you search for me with all your heart. I will turn away your
captivity, I will make you whole. What is it to seek the Lord? That's my first question. When the Scriptures say unto
us, seek the Lord, what is it to seek Him? What prompts a person
and what is involved in this seeking of the Lord? You ever
get curious about that? What is it for me to seek Him? What was it for Peter to keep
his eyes on Christ? What was it for Peter to not turn away? Remember when
the brazen serpent was raised up? Remember it talks about you've
got to raise up the brazen serpent like Christ. You've got to raise
Christ up just like that. You look to the brazen serpent
and you'll be saved from the fiery serpents. Remember that?
Folks, if you take your eyes off Christ, you're still getting
bit by the serpents. Looking. unto Him is what the
Scripture tells us. What does it mean to seek the
Lord? What prompts us to seek Him?
What is involved in the seeking of the Lord? Well, I'm going
to tell you four things, if I can get you all four of them. First
off, I'm going to tell you in the plainest terms, in the plainest
language, and in hopes that we can understand it through this
way, what is it to seek the Lord? That by nature, what comes natural to us, that we do not know who he is. One of my favorite parts of singing
hymns are these very words. But now I see. I never understood that before.
Oh, it's a great tune. Real catchy tune. Just you get
it in your head and it goes along. Real catchy. Yeah, it's got a
good tune. Got a little beat to it. When we sing songs now,
songs of truth, well, here's the truth. Once I was blind. but now I see. We have to be taught, we have to be taught that there
was a time that we did not know, we did not have the Lord is our
Lord. You see a man doesn't seek what
he already I got a motorcycle. I don't need another one. Why
would I go looking for another one? That'd be just foolish to
have two of them when I can only ride one. Man seeks what he wants,
what he needs, what he desires, what he does not have. What I'm
saying is this seeking the Lord and where it begins and where
it has to begin is to discover that I do not have the Lord and
I do not know who He is. That was the whole point, sitting
here on the edge of my chair when my sister Shirley poked
me in the side with her elbow and said, look what you're doing,
you're sitting on the edge. What was I doing? I was sitting
there listening about somebody I had never heard about before.
I grew up in religion. I heard the name Jesus Christ,
usually not in a very good way. But I'd never heard about one
who rules over it all. I'd never heard about one who
doesn't need me for anything. All the ones I'd ever heard about
was, if you'll just accept Him into your life. If you'll just
do this, if you'll just do that, if you'll just do it on Saturday,
if you'll just do this. How am I going to seek for somebody
I've never heard of? I discovered by the Word of God
that through the power of the Holy Spirit and the preaching
of His Gospel that I did not know the Lord, and that's the
first thing. If you've never heard about Him
before and you want to seek for the Lord, understand this, that
in your natural world you were not looking for Him. He's the one seeking the lost.
He's not lost! The Word of God tells us that
our sins have separated us from our God. When Adam fell in the
garden, all men died with Adam. They died spiritually and they
were separated from him. Our sins almighty, righteous,
holy God, and no man by nature knows Him. That's what scriptures
tell us. No man knoweth the Father but
the Son, and He to whom the Son will reveal Him. No man has seen God at any time. That's what it says, isn't it?
The invisible God dwells in a light to which no man can approach.
Remember the mountain that Moses went up onto the mountain? Remember
Moses was a picture of the Deliverer? Remember that? And he went up
onto the mountain to where the bush that continued to burn was? Anybody else? They tried it. Anybody else touch that mountain?
Anybody else step on the ground of that mountain? Boom. That's the separation that sin
has done to man. Our God is infinitely high, infinitely
holy. We are sinful creatures, and
that sin is the great gulf between Almighty God and us. We did not
and do not know God for who He is. for what he's done. What is it to seek the Lord?
It is to first establish and face this very thing that we
by nature do not know Him. Secondly, what is it to seek
the Lord? It is to sincerely desire to know Him, to know the
living God. Is that why you're here today?
Is that why you dear folks on the internet are joining us this
morning? Are you here because it's Sunday and it's time to
go to church? Or are you here to sincerely
know who Christ is? Only you can answer that. What is it? To seek the Lord,
it is to sincerely desire to know Him, to know the living
God, to be satisfied with nothing short of a fellowship with God
Almighty. Fellowship. That means that we're
not here just to know a couple of facts. Oh, yeah, I know He's
the Son of God, and I know He created all there is. I've read
that. Yeah, but is He your Savior? Do you have fellowship with him?
Lord, I know, well, you know that I just sinned. You know
that was just going through my mind. You know all these things. I'm sorry. Forgive me. We're not here this morning just
seeking religion. We're not here this morning to
seek some kind of experience like they do when they dance
across the stage pretending to be filled with the Holy Spirit.
Or they wave their hands in ways, oh, I'm filled with the Holy
Spirit! We're not seeking approval from
those around us. I went to church on Sunday, I'm
okay. I want to know God personally. I want to know Him as my Savior. I want to know Him as my God,
my Lord, my all and all. Do you? You know what? I'm going to say, I'm going to
answer for you. I believe you do. Because people who preach
like me, natural men don't come back. They hear the words that
we speak here at Rescue and they're just like, ah, that's not the
God I know. The God I know loves everybody
and is waiting for them to do the work. I'm not going back to that. They
call us the frozen chosen. This is what the Apostle Paul
said. He said, this is all that I may win Christ and be found
in Him. There's no other hope. There's
no other hope. Mike Loveless was in one of those
kinds of religions where they put all their hope in what they
did, and he got to the point where the Lord showed him, plain
and clear as a bell, that there's no hope in this. There's no salvation
in what I'm doing knocking on doors, calling people. And then
he heard about the Lord Jesus Christ. He cried out for Him,
just like Blind Bartimaeus did. I know that what I was before,
I was dead. And if there's any life in me
now, it's only Christ Jesus my Savior. That's it. Paul said
these words, he says, even the good that I do, I see evil. That's a child of God right there. I got no hope in these feelings
this body puts out. I got no hope in these thoughts.
Here's where my hope is, the story of Christ Jesus, my Savior. Oh, that I may win Christ and
be found in Him. Oh, that I may know Him and the
power of His resurrection. Paul's saying, I'm not seeking
benefits, I want the benefactor, I want the one who all the benefits
come in. Don't get me wrong, eternal life
is great, but without Christ there is no eternal life. You've
got to seek after Christ. What he's saying is this, he
says, I'm not seeking after the gift, I'm seeking after the one
that gives them. I want the giver. He says, I'm
not seeking after the Kingdom of God, I'm seeking the King
Himself. If I have the King, I have all,
everything else. He that spared not His only Son,
but gave Him for us, how shall He not give us all things? Isn't
that good news? Let me tell you something, if
you're a sinner, that's great news. If you realize how blind,
if you've been taught how blind you were, this is good news! This is the gospel! Christ Jesus
and Him crucified, that's the gospel! God Almighty sending
His Son to be made in the likeness of men in the flesh, that He
would die the death that we deserve. That's good news! He said, as the thirsty deer
panteth for the water brooks, so panteth my soul after thee. Do you pant for God? Do you get up in the morning and
you say, Lord, I need you today, just like I needed you yesterday,
just like I'm going to need you tomorrow? So panteth my soul after Thee,
the true and living God." Our Lord is, in that great high priestly
prayer, He said this, this is eternal life. You want to know
what eternal life is? Here it is. This is the Lord
telling us, not John Reeves, not Don Fortner, not Gene Harmon,
not any man, but the Lord Jesus Himself, He says this, He says, This is eternal life that they
might know. And that's a personal thing.
This is intimacy. This is what a husband and wife
have. Personal, intimate knowledge. That they might know Thee. The
only true God. and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast
sent." What is it to seek the Lord? Well, it's to start out
right and to discover by nature and by birth and by sin that
I do not know the Lord, I do not know God. It is like the
blind man to whom the Lord had given him sight. He said, well,
who is he that I might believe on him? Saul of Tarsus said this
on the way to Damascus It is to know in my heart that
by nature I did not know him. It is to really desire to know
him that I must have Christ in him alone. I must know him personally. I will not be satisfied until,
Lord, you reveal yourself unto me. Or like Jacob of old said,
I will not let you go until you bless me with the knowledge of
yourself. What is it to seek the Lord?
Now watch, listen to this carefully. It's to be willing. Willing. He said in Isaiah 1, verse 19,
If you will be willing and obedient, you will eat of the good of the
land, thy people shall be willing in the day of his power, is what
he said in Psalms 110, verse 3. You got to be willing. To seek the Lord is to be willing
to seek Him and to accept Him on His terms. See, that's the problem with
the world. They don't want to accept Him on His terms. That's not
the God I know. The God I know loves everybody. There's no place in the Bible
that says He loves all mankind. Preachers and religious people
dictate terms all the time. You must be filled with the Holy
Spirit and speak in tongues. You must come down to the front
of the church and pray the prayer. You must get into the waters
of baptism and be baptized. You must show up on Saturday
and worship the Lord. That's their terms. They won't
come to Christ on God's terms. God's terms are this, the wages
of sin is death. Our Lord doesn't owe us mercy.
If he owed it, then it wouldn't be mercy, would it? The Lord
says himself, he says, if I needed anything, I wouldn't ask you.
Good, get a wrong answer from me. Folks, we've sinned, we've
challenged And we did it in the Garden of
Eden, and we're doing it right now. We rejected His sovereignty
and His Son. Our hands are dripping with the
blood of His Son, Almighty God, whom we crucified. We are in
trouble. And if I come to God, then I
have to come to Him on His terms. What are His terms, you say? In the Word of God it says repentance
towards God and faith in Christ Jesus. That's his terms. Repentance. Paul said that in the Acts 20. And he summed it up, his ministry
with this, he said, God everywhere preaching repentance toward God
and faith in Christ Jesus. What is repentance toward God?
And I won't be much longer. Repentance toward God has to
do with the heart. A new heart. You must be born
again. We must know that the old stony
heart that shook our fist at God had to be cut away and there's
only one who can do that. That's the Lord Jesus. Our Lord said this, He said,
God resisteth the proud and He gives grace to the humble. Here
is the language of repentance, I am a sinner. All have sinned
and come short of the glory of God. All we, like sheep, have
gone astray. We've turned everyone to his
own way. I have no righteousness of my
own. I have no goodness in this flesh.
In my flesh dwelleth no good thing. Isn't that what we heard
Paul? Paul's a good example for sinners. To seek the Lord is to be willing
to seek Him and accept Him on His terms and His terms alone.
of genuine repentance. God said this, He said, except
you repent, you will perish. Saving faith is a heart work.
It has to do with seeking Christ, seeing Christ for who He is.
Paul said this, he said, repentance toward God. Being turned towards
God. Being taken away from what you
thought your ways were to His ways. which are not our ways. All these religions we see in
the world are nothing more than that very thing, people making
a god according to their way. Repentance, repentance Faith is towards our Lord Jesus
Christ. This faith sees in Christ all
that God is, and all that God requires, and all that redemption
demands. Listen to these words. In the
fullness of time, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made
under the law, to redeem them that were born under the law,
that might receive the adoption of sons. Christ has suffered
for sin, the just for the unjust, That's His way. It says in scriptures,
in Christ dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily and we
are complete in Him. That's His way. That's turning from man and turning
to God. What is it to seek the Lord? It is to know that we need Him.
It is to desire Him above all things. It is to come on His
terms. And it is to be willing to part
with all that stands between me and full fellowship with Him. A lot of folks ran into problems
with that. Remember their young rich ruler? Love your mother and father.
Love God with all your heart. I've done all that since my youth.
Alright, now give all that you have away. Sell it and give it
all away. And come follow me. That's where
everybody has a problem right there. Give up my family? Our Lord says this, He says,
if any man would come after me, let him deny himself, take up
his cross, and follow me. He that loveth father or mother
more than me is not worthy of me. He that putteth his hand to the
plow and looks back is not fit for the kingdom of God. If any
man draw back, my soul has no pleasure in him." There are clear declarations
from the lips of the Son of God. Christ Jesus will be Lord of
all, or He will not be Lord at all. To know Christ is not to have
a religion, on the side. Abraham believed God and sojourned
on this earth looking for a city. He never did on a piece of land.
Did you know that? All he did was believe God. He didn't even withhold his only
son because he believed that what God said he was able to
do. All that he promised and it was
imputed to him for righteousness. What is it to seek the Lord?
It's to discover by nature, birth, and religious tradition that
I do not know Him and never have. Secondly is to really want to
know Him. This is not a doctrine to argue,
but to know Him, to know Him is to seek Him on His terms. And it is to be made willing
by the Spirit of God to turn from my idols whatever they may
be. That's what that's a picture
of when he tells us to turn from our father and our mother. Turn
from our idols. This is the worst idol that John
Reeves has right here standing before you. These are the worst idols that
you have. Pride. Self-righteousness. Here's my last question for you.
How do true seekers seek the Lord? How do they seek Him? What
is it to seek after Him? Scripture tells us this, you'll
seek me and find me when you search for me with all your heart. That's what you're doing here
this morning. That's what you're going to do
here next Sunday. That's what you're going to do next Friday
night if you join us for Friday Night Bible Study. We're seeking
the Lord. We're seeking to know Him. We're
seeking to grow in grace in what? In the knowledge of the Lord
Jesus Christ. To seek Him in His Word. To the
Law and to the Prophets should not a people seek their God? If they speak not according to
the Word of God, it is because there is no light in them." That's
the Word of the Lord. Don't seek God in the clouds.
Don't seek God in feelings. Don't seek God in the Word, that
is where He is revealed. They seek Him while He may be
found, that is, now seek ye the Lord while He may be found. My
point is this, that they that seek Him seek Him with a single
person. There's only one thing that I
have desired and that I will seek after, that I may dwell
in the house of the Lord all the days of my life. That's the
only place there's hope, folks. There's no hope in this flesh
that we walk in, but there's all the hope we need
in our Savior, the Lord Jesus.