Go back to Psalm 20. It's on. Mixler's on. Mixler's on, everybody. I'm so thankful that people want
Mixler to be on. People are waiting, waiting to
hear this. I'm so thankful for that. This
is a prayer. Psalm 25. Go back there. This
is a prayer. It begins and ends. David says,
I lift up my soul today. Oh Lord, here's my soul. Here's
my heart. Take it. Keep it. Don't let me
be ashamed. It would be a shame, Ms. Chrysler.
It would be a shame to say you believe Him and trust Him and
someday leave. Wouldn't that be a shame? It would be a shame.
This is what David says. Begins and ends as psalms. Let
me not be ashamed. Let none that wait on Thee. None that wait on Thee be ashamed. That's why He begins and He ends. Waiting. Waiting is the most difficult
thing for us to do. It's absolutely the most difficult
thing. We're creatures of time. We're
subject to time. We don't know what's going to
happen 30 seconds from now. It's hard to wait. It's hard
to wait. You know, the scripture speaks
of our Lord waiting over in Isaiah. It says He'll wait that He may
be gracious to you. He waits for His time and His
purposes to be fulfilled, which is one of my points tonight. But time is of no... essence
to God. A thousand years is a day, a
day is a thousand years. He's not subject to time. Known
unto God are all His works from the beginning of the world, but
not us. And we have to wait to see what's
going to happen. And what this waiting, I'll go
ahead and tell you what it means. It means to trust the Lord. It
means to wait for Him. Wait for Him. It's the hardest
thing we have to do. And now, more than ever, we live
in a generation of hurry up. I want it now. I want it now. More than ever, now. God's people
need to just wait. Wait. Wait. Wait. Another word for faith. Hope,
trust, watch, look for, look to, and wait on the Lord. That's who we're waiting on.
We're waiting on a word from Him. We're waiting for His direction. We're waiting for His leadership.
We're waiting for answers from His Word. We're waiting on Him
to come and get us. I just told you the whole message.
This shallow, vain, worldly world that we live in, about all people
are waiting on is the next paycheck, waiting on the next TV episode,
waiting on a package from Amazon. Isn't it? That's it. Surely our
expectation, the word wait means expect, to hope for something,
surely with something better. Surely we're waiting on something
better, things that are higher, things that are nobler. Have
these allured your sight? I believe they have, I know you. David said, what do I wait for?
Job, waiting on the Lord. Job, the first time this word
wait is used in Job 14, 14. You can remember that, can't
you? Job 14, 14. He says before that,
if a man dies, shall he live again? You're all going to die. You know, we're all really waiting
to die whether we know it or not. All men are waiting to die. The world doesn't want to think
about it. I want you to think about it. I want us to think
about it. Because we're waiting to die.
We are. And it's not a morbid, it's not a terrible thing. Scripture
said it's better than birth. And so Job said, first time the
word used, he said, all my days I will wait till my change comes. The world is waiting for the
world to change. We're waiting on the change of
worlds. Did you hear me? We want to change worlds. Not
going to change this world. God's going to melt it. But he said, rejoice in that
which, this is my last point and I'm getting way ahead of
myself. But he said, rejoice in that which I created. Rejoice.
New heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness. Joy,
I'm going to wipe away all tears. Why wouldn't he? Oh, wait. You'll see. God can't lie. So
that's point number four. I couldn't wait to get through
that. Oh, may we be waiting with great anticipation on the Lord.
Let me give you a few things what it means to wait on the
Lord. Turn to Psalm 65. Psalm 65. Here's a few things
what it means to wait on the Lord. And here in Psalm 65, verse
1, and I was surprised. I know you're like me, you look
up these words in the Greek and the Hebrew, don't you? If you
don't, you should. And if it gets you bartered,
you say, all you need is a Bible and a dictionary. That's all
you need. I told you that Sunday, didn't
I? Although I was reading from a commentary. Did anybody catch
that other than my wife? And I did that to show you that
out of the mouth of two or three witnesses. That's why I was reading
from that. Okay? But all you need is a Bible and
a dictionary. All right? And we look up these words. And
I was surprised when I read the meaning of the word wait. Kabbalah
was the Hebrew word. The first meaning means to gather
together. That fits, doesn't it? Look at
Psalm 65 verse 1. Praise waiteth for thee, O God,
in Zion. Unto thee shall the vow be performed. Praise waiteth for thee. That's us. We gather together. The Lord's gathered us. What
you said, what I said, that's what the Lord said. Blessed is
the man who thou choosest and gathers us together. Oh, man. You know, whoever and whatever
it is you love and enjoy, you'll wait for it, won't you? And it
doesn't matter how long, you'll wait, won't you? People wait
for the most foolish thing. We went to Disney World When
Hannah was a little girl, you know, and these rides down there
last five minutes. We waited in line one time an
hour and 15 minutes for a five minute ride. I'm not going back
to Disney World. I'm sure glad Hannah grew up.
You remember that? People wait on the most foolish
things. that you wait on whoever or whatever you love and enjoy,
you'll wait for it. You'll gather with others who
love the same thing. Gather with others who wait on
the same thing, don't you? And it helps when you've got
others around you to talk to while you're waiting. Well, what
are we waiting on? It says, Praise waiteth for thee.
We're like waiting to praise the Lord. We come here, we're
waiting, hoping to really worship the Lord from our heart. I've
been here too many times, you have too, where we didn't really
worship. Like we said Sunday, we sit in these pews, and our
minds wander, and we're here, but we're not here. We're here,
but we don't hear. You, me, it's all of us. And every now and then, the Lord
brings us here, and we worship Him. We enter into these songs,
we enter into the prayers, we enter into the reading of the
Word, and the Lord blesses a man to preach, And we said, oh, that
was worth waiting on. Praise waiting. Do you know how
the Lord will bless somebody if they came with great anticipation
and waited and with anxiousness? I thought about the Lord preaching
on that sermon on the mail. But if you had leprosy, if you
had somebody blind, if you're poor and needy and have nothing
to eat, and somebody said, the Lord Jesus Christ is going to
sit and preach to us, would you be waiting? Oh my, can you imagine? Would you like to hear one word
from Him? Praise waiteth there. And it
says there in verse 1, it says, unto thee praise waiteth on thee,
O God, in Zion. That's his church. That's where
the Lord meets. That's where the blessing of
the church. Unto thee shall the vow be performed. We're waiting
on this vow. We're waiting to hear about this
vow. We're like the bride. We're waiting to hear him say,
I do. I will. Like Ezekiel 36, I will,
I will, I will, and you shall. It's like a bride waiting on
the groom. Modern marriage, as you know, is all wrong. It's
man-made and the ceremonies and everything, but it's just all
wrong. Got the groom waiting down here on the bride. I sure
hope she shows up. Isn't that modern religion? Oh,
I sure hope she says, I do. I want to be her husband so bad.
That's not our Lord Jesus Christ. The bride's waiting on the groom.
And we sure hope he says, I do. And I will. And tells us the
vow. And repeats the vow again. What's
the vow? It's his covenant. It's what
he's promised to do. I will. In the volume of the
book, it is written of him. Lo, I come to do thy will. Will you do it? I will. Did he
do it? He did. That's why we've come
to hear that again. Again, do you want to hear that
again? Praise waiteth for thee. Wait
for the vow to be performed. What he's promised. That's what
we do. Waiting and we're listening to
the gospel preached, the word of God, all these blessed promises.
that helps us escape from the corruption that's in this world,
these blessed promises, and we're waiting, we're hearing a man
say it all over again, and that's what keeps us waiting. That's
what keeps us coming, to hear about this vow that our Lord
has promised and performed. The bride waiting on the groom. Look at verse 4 here in Psalm
65. Blessed is the man whom thou choosest and causest to approach
unto thee, that he may dwell in thy court. We shall be satisfied
with the goodness of thy house, even of thy holy temple. Satisfied. Coming in here, poor and hungry,
I hope, waiting to be filled. And you know what he said? If
you open your mouth real wide, I'll fill it. I've said this
so many times, and nearly everybody, I bet you say everybody in this
room has been to John and Irene Davis' house, haven't you? Did
you go hungry? Did you come home hungry, I should
have said? Did you get filled? Was there
enough to go around? Well, this is Solomon's table.
A greater than Solomon. This is his table. All you've
got to do is come. You don't have to bring a thing. I've never
brought one thing to your house, haven't I? And I've never gone home hungry. That's our Lord. Come hungry. Open your mouth. I'll fill it.
Open your ear. May He open our heart. Fill it up. Go home full. Full. That's what we're waiting
on. Waiting on the Lord's blessing.
Waiting on a blessing from the Lord. And this is the greatest
blessing of all. Oh, to wait with great anticipation. And if we would, we'd just be
thrilled You'd be thrilled. Mindy and Hannah and Gabe and
I went to a concert. I told you what a concert is,
where all the pieces of an orchestra get together and play music. And if they're all in tune, well,
Isabella was in the concert. And it was all the students from
all over the different high schools all over the state of Tennessee. gathered together with this great
conductor, this Japanese man well-known all over the place.
You may not like classical music, but I do. But the fact that my
granddaughter was playing it, I was early, real early. Sitting in this, I couldn't get
close enough, okay? I wanted to see her performing,
and I wanted to hear this music. And when it started, And they were all in tune. There
wasn't one note out of tune. I was amazed, y'all. And they
were playing. And, buddy, a chill went up my
spine. It chilled me. It thrilled me. And tears came
to my eyes. Just wait for that heavenly performance
where every voice, every heart, every mind will be in perfect
tune, and our great conductor It stands up. I said, now, sit. You're talking about thrills
and chills. And we won't be able to cry,
though, tell you. How are we going to do it? How are we going to sit through
it without tears running down our face? Tears of joy, waiting to hear this great concert. performance, what our Lord performed
on our behalf. You ready to go? To wait on the
Lord is to gather, to wait. To wait on the Lord is to wait
on a word from the Lord. David said in Psalm 130 verse
5, he said, I wait for the Lord, my soul doth wait, and in His
word do I hope. We need a word from the Lord,
don't we? We need a word from the Lord. And we need to wait
on a word from the Lord, an answer from the Lord. And this is how
He answers us. This is how He speaks to us.
This is how He leads us. This is how He guides us. This
is how He directs us. He answers all our questions,
all our needs, everything we need to know. This is how He
answers. We need to wait on a word from Him, don't we? We need a word from Him of wisdom
unless we do something foolish. In a world full of foolishness,
the voices of fools everywhere, we need to stop our ears and
come and sit and wait on a word from Him whose wisdom it personifies. We need wisdom from above. We've
heard enough foolishness. It's fun to hear a word from
our Lord. We come to hear the truth. Everything
we hear around us is nothing but lies. And people are falling
for them. I don't want to fall for them,
do you? I need to come. I need to hear truth. Is this
the truth? Oh, out of the mouths of babes
and suckling. One time, my daughter, when she was about three or four
years old, was standing. I've told you this, but somebody
hadn't heard. But when she was about three
or four years old, it was Sunday morning, three years old, because
we were still in Nashville. And back then I would turn on
the TV. Dad was on TV. And then these
false prophets would come on, you know, before I got a chance
to turn them off. And she's standing there, that
little, like it was yesterday. She's almost 40 years old. That
was yesterday. I'll never forget that little
body standing there. And a false preacher, Oral Roberts,
one of those guys, she looked at me and said, is he preaching
the truth? Don't you wish everybody would
ask that? Is this the truth? I need to hear the truth. The
truth will make you free. The truth will deliver you from
liars. Bless your heart, comfort your
soul. Truth will give you peace. Truth, what's truth? One word. Everybody, one word. Christ. He can't lie. He is the truth. We need peace in the midst of
a place that's nothing but war. Nothing but warfare. War is without
and war is within. I need to come and hear peace,
don't you? How Christ made peace for me
by the blood of His cross. How I went peace with God. God's
not angry with me. God is angry with this world.
Every day. It's not like these liars are
saying. It's the opposite of what they're saying about God.
But God is not angry with His people. Why? Give me one word. Everybody give me one word. Christ.
We're going to preach this together, okay? I need peace in the midst of
this world. It's nothing but wars and rumors
of war. When one war finishes, you're going to hear about another.
When one plague comes and goes, you're going to get another.
I need some peace. I need to hear some comfort.
I need to know who sent this so I can rest. And you're not
going to get it anywhere but here. I need to hear comfort. in all this trouble. A man that's
born a woman's few days is nothing but trouble. I need to hear some
comfort, don't you? Again, I need to know, and this
is my third point, that I need to know who sent this trouble.
Why? What's going to happen? Preach
the message. Go back to our text, Psalm 27.
Go back there. And this is one good thing. about the Bible. You know what
the Bible means? It means book. This ain't a book. This is a book. And you know
one good thing about this book is you'll be looking at one side
of the page and glance over and see the other side of the page.
Are you with me? God wrote a book. Moses wrote
a book and people been looking at a book all their life and
now modern man has a better way. No, it's not a better way. Can't
tell you how many times I've been looking over here and God
direct my attention over here. And if you look all through the
pages, you'll see this word weight. Three or four times in that song,
we'll look at Psalm 27. Is this anybody's favorite song? I preached the message one time
on waiting on something good to come out of trouble. Waiting
on some good to come out of all this trouble. Psalm 27 verse
13 he says, I would have fainted. I would have quit. I would have
gone away unless I had bleed to see some goodness of the Lord
in the land of the living. Wait on the Lord. Did you see
it David? I sure did. All the trouble. Psalm 107, is
that your favorite? Oh, they all got in all sorts
of trouble. All kind of trouble. Any trouble
you can imagine, Israel got into it. And so have I. What did the
Lord do? Saved them out of all their trouble. And one of those
times, John, it says that He sent His Word and healed them.
Saved them. That's how He heals us. That's
how He gets us out of all this trouble. Wait on the Lord. Be of good courage. He'll strengthen
thy heart. Wait, I say, on the Lord. So we've come here to wait and
get a word from Him. We're waiting on light and darkness,
aren't we? You look to this earth and all this darkness and anguish,
spirit, dimness, and vexation, aren't you? Oh, but the people
that walked in darkness, some of them, seen a great light. Give me one word for light, somebody.
Everybody. You don't have, bless you God, All God's people know the answer. Christ is all. Ask any question,
one word will answer it, Christ. Oh, we're waiting on light. Light
shone in darkness. Here's condemnation. Men love
darkness rather than light. I did. I did. It's time I walked in darkness.
Time you walked in darkness. I didn't see the light. Blind.
Following the course of this world, the prince of darkness
is following them blindly. But God said, let there be light. Let there be light. The word
gathered may have gathered the waters in Genesis 1. That's the
same word you just waited. Light and darkness. Faith. I need faith in the midst of
all this fear, don't you? And all comes from our God. All
comes from His Word. All comes from looking to Him.
We need a word from our Lord. We need to wait on a word from
our Lord before we make a move. We've got decisions to be made.
No. We've got choices to make. We're faced with things all the
time. And we need to wait on the Lord. Wait on an answer. Teach me. This is what David
says all through the psalm. Lead me. Teach me. Guide me. Restrain me. Let me give you four or five
things. I wrote an article one time. Any decision to be made can be
made on these criteria. Number one, is this scriptural?
There's a precedent in God's Word for everything we ever go
through. Anything that's going to happen,
any choice, anything. There's a precedent, there's
an example, there's a story. There's nothing new under the
sun, you understand? And if we look, we'll see what
we should do, where we should go, what we should do, where
we should live, and on and on we go. This is Scripture. What's God's
Word say about it? Number two, is it for God's glory? That should be our number one
concern. Is this for God's glory? How is this decision I'm going
to make, is it going to give God glory or dishonor my Lord? Here's another thing. How is
this going to affect the church, the body of Christ in which I'm
a member of? I'm vitally joined to my body,
like a husband and a wife. What she does affects him. What
he does affects her. You cannot make a decision without
her or him in mind, can you? No, these two are one. How is
what I'm going to do, where I'm going to go, how is that going
to affect the body of Christ of which I don't remember? You're going to make a reproach on them.
Can you leave them? Somebody one time was going to
leave church. He said, I think it's God's will.
He said, is it God's will to hurt people? You're going to
hurt a lot of brothers. No, that's not God's will. Unity
is God's will. How is it going to affect the
church of which I'm a Biden member? Is that not a good criteria? How is this going to be for the
furtherance of the gospel? Do you know that's our ministry? Every member of the church, do
you know that? That's our ministry, the furtherance of the gospel.
You're a member of this church to glorify God, to worship God,
but not just that, but to get this gospel out. So others, to
support this gospel, so that others will hear this gospel
and the Lord will bring them into His kingdom. Right? Everything on the top side of
God's earth is for the furtherance of His kingdom. And that, we're
a vital part of that, members of that. Are you with me? How's
this going to affect this decision? How's this going to be for the
good, the spiritual good of my family, which I am responsible
for? How's this going to affect the
spiritual good of my children, the decisions I make for them?
That you have a responsibility to those that God has put in
your care, their souls. Yes, you do. How is this decision
I make going to affect their spiritual good? Am I more concerned
about their spiritual good than I am their material good? You can judge every choice, every
decision on these things. Yes, you can. And lastly, how is this going
to affect my spiritual good? You see, we're at last consideration.
God's glory, good of the church, good of others, like Rahab. Rahab
wanted her family saved before she mentioned herself. So, we're waiting on a word from
the Lord. Don't make a move. Don't do anything. Wait on the Lord. Wait on a word
from Him. And He'll find it in His word. His will is And this
brings me to this point. We're going to wait on His providence,
His Word, but we're going to have to wait on His providence.
God worketh all things after the counsel of His will. God
said, I do all things. No one unto God are all His works
from the beginning, but not us. We don't know. We're going to
have to wait. We're going to have to trust.
We're going to have to hope in His will, His word, His wisdom,
His love, His goodness, His kindness. Turn with me to Ecclesiastes
3. Here's what I'm trying to say. Ecclesiastes 3. Right after Proverbs. Ecclesiastes
3. You know these verses well. Ecclesiastes
3. You see, the Lord does all things.
He creates. He destroys. He giveth. He taketh
away. He kills. He makes alive. In
verse 1 of Ecclesiastes 3, you have it? To everything there's
a season. Time to every purpose. Purpose under heaven. The world doesn't believe everything's
happening on purpose. We do, don't we? For everything to happen on purpose,
somebody's got to make this purpose. To be on purpose, somebody's
going to have to purpose it. And that's our God. And everybody
here knows Romans 8.28. And the world quotes it, but
they don't know it. But it says, it begins, and we
know, talking about God's Word, and we know that all things work
together for what? Good. to them that love God,
who are called according to His purpose." I wanted to holler
there. When my dad first heard that,
it opened his blind eyes. Learn something about purpose,
God's purpose, and you'll know something about the God of the
Bible. Everything's happening on purpose. People say that,
I think everything's just going to turn out alright. Why do you
think that? What makes you think that? I just do. Is that just a wish? A hope?
Rabbits for love? Cross your fingers? We know everything's
going to turn out alright. Why? We know who's turning left. We know who's doing it. We do. Ecclesiastes 3. Everything is
a purpose. It's God's purpose. Time to be
born. Time to die. I told you we're waiting to die.
yeah but I'm waiting on a birth when we die it's going to be
our birth but not just that I believe since this gospel is still being
preached and the doors of this building is still open and this
gospel is still going out everywhere there's going to be a new birth
somewhere And I just believe it's going to be in here. We say this all the time. I can't
wait. But you're going to have to. You're going to have to. I say that all the time. When
we say something we hope for and look forward to, I just can't
wait. I can't wait. I look forward in great anticipation
to see somebody walk through that door we've been waiting,
hoping, and praying for all these years. I've seen it happen. I've seen
people come back after being gone a long time. Will you tell my joy? Put one of our children in that
pool, confess Christ, it's worth waiting on. It's worth everything
you give to hear this gospel. Everything you give and all the
years you pray in, it'll be worth it. There was a song we used
to sing, it will be worth it all. It was going to have to
wait. Time to be born, time to die,
time to plant, time to pluck up, time to kill. My mother,
it's been waiting a long time. 70 years, well it's soon. Eighty? Well, surely. The Lord's
coming for me now. Eighty-five? Ninety? A hundred? We're going to have
to wait. We can't decide. My dad did that. I'd go over to his house in his
last days. Stephen, I'd go over there. One
time, he was lying in his bed. He was just hoping to die. Go
be with the Lord. He said, feel my pulse. It's getting weak in there. I grabbed him and said,
Dad, it stopped. It's weak in there. Surely it's
soon. Yeah, it is. But you're going
to have to wait. You're going to have to wait. My old dog got sick and got to
where I couldn't. I knew the day that I couldn't,
that he couldn't jump up in the back of my truck, that the end
was soon. And I was, for the longest time,
I was picking him up and putting him in the back of that truck.
And then he got lumps all over him. You know how it is. Hannah and Mindy kept saying,
we need to put him down. I said, no. I'll decide that. I told you about this one day.
I went and I dug his grave, prepared for it. And I brought him with
me. I said, come on, Abner. He said, lie down. I need to
measure. Johnny, I need to measure his grave. I said, lie down in
that grave. He did. He didn't know what's wrong.
But he trusted me. And then when I decided, it's
the day I decided, and the way I decided, and the hour I decided,
I said, it's time. And I had him put down. And that's
you. That's you. And that's me. The
day, the way, the time. And God says, it's time. And
it's not the end. It's just the beginning. It's
just the beginning. Dogs die, and they are no more.
We don't die like dogs. We live like dogs. We end up
angels. We want to wait until our change
comes. Wheels of God's providence move
slow, somebody said, but they move. We can't see them. Let me give you a few illustrations
of this. You've got to wait. You've got to wait on God's providence. Abraham was called at 75 years
old. Seventy-five. At 80 years old, God promised
him a son. He said, you're going to have
a son. Me? That old man? Yep. You're
going to have a son. Having a son at 80 was not nearly
the miracle as him being saved at 75. Right? That's the greatest miracle of
all. Well, at 80 years old, he was promised a son. And 19 years
later, nope, no son. Twenty years. A hundred years
old. He thought, maybe we shouldn't wait on God. His wife said, let's not wait
any longer. Surely God meant... No, God meant
exactly what He said. See, this is what happens if
you don't wait on the Lord. Maybe He meant what He said. Wait! I said. He didn't wait. He caused himself the greatest
heartache he ever had. That one, he had to kick that
boy out. A boy of his making. But then that son came along. And the hardest waiting of his
life was three days long. Three days. He waited 20 years for that boy.
And then when God gave it to him, and then when he became
like 17, 18 years old, God said, take that boy. up on that mountain
and kill him to me. Three days. What happened? How did it turn
out? It had to happen. Jacob. Oh, Jacob. Aren't you
Don't you love Jacob? Impetuous, impatient, impulsive
Jacob. Jacob, at 52 years old, he's
running scared. Well, he finds a wife. He finds
the woman he wants. Rachel. He had to wait seven
years. Well, that wasn't long enough. God says you've got to
wait seven more. Fourteen years waiting for this
woman. Okay, everything's happy now.
Alright, Rachel gives him his only begotten son, his true legitimate
son, Joseph. Oh, now life is good. He's 17 years old. And they came
and brought him loose. Your boy's dead. Joseph's dead. Something killed him. Got his
blood on his garments. 30 years went by. He thought that
boy was dead. Are you with me? Get ready to
shout now. 30 years he thought that son was
dead. And somebody came and told him,
he's alive. He's on the throne. And he's
calling for you. And you're going to see him. You're going to see him. Margaret,
you're going to see Him. The Son that was killed. The
whole world thinks He's dead. That husband you thought died.
He's alive. And He's calling for you. The
Lord's calling for you. You're going to see Him. You
can't lie. You can't lie. Rahab. We just looked at Rahab
today. Joshua sent word. Sent word through
these two men. Promises. Destruction everywhere,
but salvation for Rahab. He said, Rahab, you take this
scarlet line now. You tie it in that window. You
keep it there. And you stay here. You bring
your family here. And when we come back, we're going to bring
you out of here. Promise. Joshua promised Rahab.
You just wait. You're going to hear the trumpet
sound. And Joshua's going to send us to bring you out of here.
So you just wait. And they left. And we don't know
how long they're waiting. Every day. She had business to attend to
outside, you know. She had to go to the grocery
store, and the kids went to school and all that. But what's she
doing? Waiting. She's waiting. Go back to that
house. All the time. The line's still
here. And one day, She heard the trump.
The trump sounded. Two days. Three days. The seventh
day. Redemption's come. He's come
for you. I'm gonna wait. Wait on His coming. And I close with 2 Peter 3 very
quickly. 2 Peter 3. Close with this. What are we waiting on? Who are
we waiting on? We're waiting on our Lord to
come take us after Him. Like Rahab. 2 Peter 3. Let's just read this. Okay? 2 Peter 3. And if you want somewhere
to read next, go to Matthew 24 and 25. In both of those chapters,
the Lord, the disciples said, Lord, when's all this going to
happen? When are you going to come back? In Matthew 24 and
25. Long chapters. Full of events
that are going to happen. The Lord tells us everything.
He tells His disciples everything. All we need to know. To wait. To keep us patiently waiting
on Him. Matthew 24 and 25. And He gives
the illustration of ten virgins waiting. Five in all. That's us. I hope we have that
forward. In 2 Peter 3, the second epistle,
beloved, I write unto you, in both of them I stir up your pure
minds by way of remembrance, that be mindful, not forgetful
of the words which are spoken before by the holy prophets.
David, just now, the commandment of us, the apostles of the Lord,
Savior, know this, remember this, They'll come in the last day,
scoffers, walking after their own lusts. Saying, see, they
don't want the Lord to come. So they're saying, where's the
promise of His coming? Since the fathers fell asleep,
everything's just like it has been. Verse 5. Well, they're
ignorant of this. The heavens were created of old,
the earth standing out of the water by the word of God, and
the world overflowed with water, perished in the flood. They're
ignorant of that. Willingly ignorant. Ignorant of creation. But, verse
7, the heavens and the earth that are now are by that same
word of God. kept in store reserved under
fire against the day of judgment. Noah waited a hundred years,
120 years for rain to fall. God told him that rain was going
to fall and he had to wait 120 years. What was he doing while
he was waiting? Preparing an ark. For what? The saving of his house. That's
what we did. That's what we did. In the right way. And as in the
days of Noah, Matthew 24, as in the days of Noah, it's going
to come. Fire is going to follow. Read
on. Beloved, don't be eager of this one thing. Verse 8, one
day is with the Lord a thousand years. A thousand years is one
day. Times of no essence to Him. He's not on our schedule. But
everything is on schedule. The day of the Lord will come.
Joshua's coming. Christ is coming. The thief in
the night. That's Matthew 24 and 25. In which the heavens shall pass
away with a great noise. What noise? A great trump. Or the great pronouncement. He's
here. The elements shall melt with
a fervent heat. The earth and the works therein, everything
that man holds dear is gone. What do you hold dear? Seeing then, verse 11, all these
things will be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to
be? What should we be doing? All holy conversation, that means
things of God and Godliness, looking for what we're doing,
we're looking for waiting. coming, hasting. And that word haste means to
look forward to. The more you wait on something, hope for something,
the more you look forward to it. And the nearer it becomes. Verse 13, we according to His
promise look for new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth
the righteous, so beloved. Seeing that you look for such
things, be diligent. Give diligence, he said, in another
place. Make your calling and election
sure. That's to be found in Christ, in peace with God, without spot,
and blameless. That's Him, robed in His righteousness,
covered in Him, by faith. How can you be in God's presence
holy and unblamed and unreproved? Faith in Christ. That's it. But down in verse 17, Beloved,
seeing you know these things, beware lest you be led away with
the error of the wicked. You fall from, you're only steadfast
as you quit waiting. What if Rahab had gone out there
and didn't come back? Where is she? She needs to make
some extra money. She's not with us on the Lord. No, no. There's one thing to
eat for. Forget all that. The Lord's going to provide all
that. We seek You first, King of God. All the way. Grow in grace the
knowledge of our Lord Jesus and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be
glory both now and forever. What do you say to that? Amen. You're dismissed.