Well, good evening, everyone.
If you would open your Bibles with me to the book of James,
James chapter 5. We'll begin our reading in verse
7. Be patient, therefore, brethren,
under the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth
for the precious fruit of the earth and hath long patience
for it. until he received the early and
latter rain. Be also patient. Establish your
hearts, for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh. Grudge not
one against another, brethren, lest you be condemned. Behold,
the judge standeth before the door. Take my brethren the prophets,
who have spoken in the name of the Lord, for an example of suffering
affliction and of patience. Behold, we count them happy,
which endure. You've heard of the patience
of Job. and have seen the end of the Lord, that the Lord is
very pitiful and of tender mercy. But above all things, my brethren,
swear not, neither by heaven, neither by the earth, neither
by any other oath, but let your yea be yea and your nay be nay,
lest ye fall into condemnation. Is any among you afflicted? Let
him pray. Any merry? Let him sing psalms. Is any sick among you? Let him
call for the elders of the church and let them pray over him, anointing
him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer of faith
shall save the sick and the Lord shall raise him up. And if he
have committed sins, they should be forgiven. Confess your faults
one to another and pray one for another that you may be healed.
The effectual, fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much. We'll end our reading there.
All right, Sean. Okay, if you would, turn in your
hymnals to song number 17. We'll sing, Come Thou Fount. Come thou fount of every blessing,
tune my heart to sing thy grace. Streams of mercy never ceasing,
call for songs of loudest praise. Teach me some melodious sonnet,
sung by flaming tongues above. Praise the mount, I'm fixed upon
it, mount of thy redeeming love. Here I raise mine Ebenezer, hither
by thy help I'm come, and I hope by thy good pleasure safely to
arrive at home. Jesus sawed me when a stranger
Wandering from the fold of God, He, to rescue me from danger,
Enterposed His precious blood. O to grace, how great a debtor,
daily I'm constrained to be. Let thy goodness, like a fetter,
bind my wandering heart to thee. Lord, I feel it, prone to leave
the God I love. Here's my heart, oh, take and
seal it, seal it for thy courts above. OK, if you would now turn
to page 40, song 40, sorry. Great is thy faithfulness. Great is Thy faithfulness, O
God my Father. There is no shadow of turning
with Thee. Thy compassions, they fail not. As thou hast been, thou forever
wilt be. Great is thy faithfulness, great
is thy faithfulness, morning by morning new mercies I see. All I have needed Thy hand hath
provided, Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me. Summer and winter and springtime
and harvest, sun, moon, and stars in their courses above. Join with all nature in manifold
witness to thy great faithfulness, mercy, and love. Great is Thy faithfulness, great
is Thy faithfulness, morning by morning new mercies I see. All I have needed Thy hand hath
provided, Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me. Pardon for sin and a peace that
endureth. Thine own dear presence to cheer
and to guide. Strength for today and bright
hope for tomorrow. Blessings all mine with ten thousand
beside. Great is thy faithfulness, great
is thy faithfulness. Morning by morning new mercies
I see. All I have needed thy hand hath
provided. ? Great is thy faithfulness,
Lord, unto me ? All right, let's open our Bibles
now to Exodus chapter 15. Exodus chapter 15. We'll begin reading in verse
22. So Moses brought Israel from
the Red Sea, and they went out into the wilderness of Shur.
And they went three days in the wilderness and found no water.
And when they came to Marah, they could not drink of the waters
of Marah, for they were bitter. Therefore, the name of it was
called Marah. And the people murmured against Moses, saying,
what shall we drink? And he cried unto the Lord, and
the Lord showed him a tree, which, when he had cast into the waters,
the waters were made sweet. There he made for them a statute
and an ordinance, and there he proved them, and said, if thou
wilt diligently hearken to the voice of the Lord thy God, and
wilt do that which is right in his sight, and wilt give ear
to his commandments and keep all his statutes, I will put
none of these diseases upon thee, which I have brought upon the
Egyptians, for I am the Lord that healeth thee. And they came
to Elam, where there were 12 wells of water and three score
and 10 palm trees, and they encamped there by the waters. Thank God
for his word. Let's bow together in prayer. Our Father, it is with grateful
and thankful hearts that we come before your throne of grace,
so thankful that you have given us another opportunity to meet
together with our brothers and sisters and to worship your matchless
name. Father, what a blessed privilege
that you've given us this time to open the very word of God,
to read it and study it, hear Christ preach from it. Father,
how we thank you and how we beg that you'd send your spirit upon
us tonight And Father, that you give us an hour of true worship,
how we beg of thee that you deliver us from going through the motions
of religion and having a religious sounding service. Father, enable
us to worship thee from the heart. Father, send your spirit, enable
me to rightly divide the word of truth, to preach the gospel
of Christ in truth and with a heart of compassion. for sinners. And Father, enable your people
to hear. Enable each one here tonight, I beg of thee, to leave
here trusting in the Lord Jesus Christ as our all and in all. And Father, I thank you for the
many blessings of this life. On top of every spiritual blessing
that you can give to sinners, you've given to us in our Lord
Jesus Christ. And on top of that, how you blessed
us materially and physically, and Father, we thank you, knowing
that we haven't deserved the least of thy mercies, but how
richly you've blessed us. Pray, Father, that you'd give
us both a thankful heart and a generous spirit with all the
things that you've so freely given to us. And Father, for
those that you've brought into the time of trouble, we pray
for them. We freely confess that we are,
this group is the most blessed people in the face of this earth.
But in this flesh, we're a poor and a needy people. Father, for
those that need you particularly at this time, that for your hand
of healing and comfort and guidance, Father, we pray you'd be with
them. Be with them in a mighty and special way. Father, deliver
as soon as it can be thy will, as soon as the trial's accomplished
your purpose. And all these things we ask,
and we give thanks in that name which is above every name, the
name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. I've titled the message
this evening, The Lord That Healeth. And tonight what I want us to
see is something very simple. I want us to see our need of
spiritual healing. I want us to see that only the
Lord Jesus Christ can heal us and that he is everything that
we need. Now you remember we looked at
this last week, the children of Israel had just experienced
God's miraculous deliverance at the Red Sea. Boy, when they
had crossed that Red Sea and they looked back and they saw
Pharaoh and his army drowned in the Red Sea, they sang the
Moses Song of Praise, didn't they? I mean, they sang it with
all of their might, with all of their heart. They were so
thankful. They were worshiping God, weren't
they? But just three days, all it took was three days for them
to murmur and complain against God and against Moses. To my shame, I will tell you
that sounds a whole lot like somebody else I know, me. Maybe it sounds like somebody
you know. And if so, I pray this message will be helpful. Now
verse 22 of Exodus chapter 15, so Moses brought Israel from
the Red Sea and they went out into the wilderness of Shur and
they went three days in the wilderness and found no water. After they
sang this Moses song of praise, they followed Moses away from
the Red Sea toward the Promised Land, but to get there, they
had to go through the desert, had to go through the wilderness,
no way around it. And after walking for three days,
they couldn't find any water. All they could see in every direction
was sand, as far as you could see. I'm sure before they left
the Red Sea, people probably filled some skins with water
or buckets with water or something, you know. But after three days,
all their hoarded resources are gone. I mean, I just can't imagine
being in the middle of the desert like that. I mean, their feet,
they're burning, the sand is blowing, you know, the wind is
blowing sand up in their eyes and in their nose and their mouth.
They don't have any water to rinse off their face or rinse
out their mouth. Their lips are dry and cracked.
Their skin is starting to be sunburned and cracked. And then
they look at their children suffering the same thing. Their tongues
are swelling. They're so thirsty. Their cattle
look like they're getting ready to die of thirst. I mean, these
people are in real need. They're in desperate straits.
Spurgeon said this was no holiday parade. I mean, this was a tough
journey. And then, verse 23, Then they,
and when they came to Mara, they could not drink of the waters
of Mara, for they were bitter. Therefore, the name of it was
called Mara. Here they are in the middle of
the desert, and they see an oasis, and it wasn't a mirage. Oh, I
mean, can you imagine how excited that they were? I mean, they
ran to that water. I mean, is there, you know, they
could just taste it. They could just feel how refreshed
they were going to be because of this water. I mean, there's
just nothing like water. to quench you when you're really
thirsty, are you? And your body needs it. Your body's craving.
You think, oh, I'm finally going to get this water that I need.
And then they get there. And the water was bitter. They
couldn't drink it. I looked up. I wonder why that
water was bitter. And they said there's minerals
sometimes that get in the water of an oasis that makes it bitter
and undrinkable. Could be plants decaying or whatever
in it, you know, and making the water undrinkable. But that water
was so bitter they couldn't drink it, and they were so disappointed. Now the water was bitter, and
the people were bitter too. And boy, that's when the murmuring
and complaining started, verse 24. The people murmured against
Moses, saying, what shall we drink? Now remember, Israel had
been in Egypt. They saw all the plagues of Egypt.
They saw all the power of God in those plagues. Just three
days ago, they walked through the Red Sea on dry ground, and
great walls of water stand on either side of them, and they
walked through on dry ground and saw Pharaoh and his army,
the mightiest military force on the earth, drowned in the
Red Sea. The Lord, by his power and grace,
had delivered them. Now, after having that experience,
one would think Maybe I'm gonna trust the Lord in this situation
too. The Lord's proven his faithfulness to me. He's proven how gracious
he is to me. He's proven his power to save.
Could be maybe he'll take care of me now. Could be I could trust
him after everything he's done for me. You'd think what a person
would do is call on the Lord in prayer with some confidence
The Lord can help me. With all confidence in this world,
the Lord can help me. Now, is he going to? I don't
know, but I do know this. He can. He can. I'm gonna pray
for him and ask him to help me. But instead of that, they murmured
against the Lord, and they murmured against God's prophet. Now, the
children of Israel, I feel like I need to point this out all
the time. We're not looking down our noses at the children of
Israel, are we? They have the same rotten, sinful,
faithless nature that we do. Any of us, if we're honest, can
say, I've been there. I mean, it brings tears to my
eyes to say, I have found myself questioning the providence of
the Lord. Why is the Lord doing it this
way? It feels like the Lord's doing something bad. Have you ever thought, you found
yourself in a situation, you thought, oh, I just, I don't
know what's going on. I'm going to do everything I
can do to find an answer to this. Whatever I can do to fix the
problem. When you would have been a whole lot better off just
stopping everything and just praying. Just praying to the
Lord and waiting. Waiting on the Lord. Pray and
wait on the Lord. I was talking to a dear friend
of mine today, and he said, what every believer knows, or either
will know very soon, that the hardest thing in this world is
to wait, to wait on the Lord. But to jump out ahead of him
is a disaster, and to murmur against him is shameful. Well,
here's three million people, I mean three million people,
and they're murmuring against Moses. Now, three million people's
a lot of people, Moses is in a fix. I mean three million people
are mad at him. It's hard to tell what's gonna
happen. So Moses did what everybody should have done from the very
start of this situation. Moses prayed. Verse 25, and he
cried unto the Lord, and the Lord showed him a tree, which
when he had cast into the waters, the waters were made sweet. There
he made for them a statue and an ordinance, and there he proved
them. Now Moses prayed, And the Lord
answered his prayer. The Lord showed Moses a tree
that was beside this water in this oasis. Now, the tree was
always there, but Moses didn't see it before. He only saw it
after the Lord showed him. And when Moses did what the Lord
said, put that tree into those bitter waters, the waters became
sweet. And everybody drank. Everybody
had their fill. Everybody had just what they
needed. 26, the Lord says, if thou will diligently
hearken to the voice of the Lord thy God, and will do that which
is right in his sight, and will give ear to his commandments
and keep all his statutes, I will put none of these diseases upon
thee, which I brought upon the Egyptians, for I am the Lord
that healeth thee. Now this is one of the seven
names of Jehovah given to us in the scriptures. This one is
Jehovah Rapha, the Lord who healeth thee. Now I see three pictures
here of how the Lord, Jehovah Rapha, heals his people. In every situation, he is what
we need. Now the first one is this, and
obviously this is by far the most important. The Lord heals
his people spiritually. The bitter waters of Mara. That's
a great picture of sin. You know, from a distance, those
waters look so good. That's what sin, sin's deceiving.
It is so deceiving. It looks good to the flesh, but
eventually you'll find sin does not satisfy. To chase after it
all you want, all it's gonna do is leave you empty. It's gonna
leave you disappointed and bitter, just like Israel was bitter to
find these waters of Mara that were so bitter. And for God saves
anyone, he's gonna bring every one of us to these bitter waters.
The Lord's gonna make his people realize the bitterness of our
sin. He's gonna make me realize the
bitterness of my sin nature, my sin nature. It's not somebody
else's sin, it's my sin, because it comes from my sin nature.
I got nobody to blame but myself. The Lord makes us realize the
bitter punishment, the bitter condemnation that our sin deserves.
Now seeing the corruption of our nature, That's bitter, isn't
it? That's bitter. I think how often
I tell my grandson, oh, you're a good boy. You're a good boy.
And you hear that all your life. And then you find out your sin
nature is bitter. Oh, it's bitter. And it makes
us feel like we have no hope. We feel like we have no hope
because all we're looking at is ourself. The corruption of our
sin nature, there's no way anything about this nature can satisfy
the holy God. And when the Lord brings us to
the end of our ropes, we think, I got no hope. Only then will
the Lord heal the bitter waters. Before the Lord gives a man a
drink, he always salts him. Always. He always makes him thirsty
and desire it first. Before the Lord clothes a man,
he always strips him. Before the Lord gives a sinner
life, he always slays him. The great physician, Jehovah
Rapha, heals every disease. But before he heals, he wounds. He wounds. And the way that the
Lord heals his people spiritually is pictured by how the Lord made
these waters of Mara bitter, this bitter water sweet. It was
done by a tree. Now I have no doubt that this
tree by the waters of Mara is a picture of another tree, Calvary's
tree. And when that tree was thrown
into the waters of Mara, the waters became what they were
not. They became sweet. That's what
happened to Calvary. At Calvary, the Lord Jesus Christ
was made what he was not. He was made sin for his people. What does that mean? Nobody can
explain it, but that's what scripture says. He was made sin for his
people. Jehovah Rapha, the Lord that
healed thee was immersed in the bitter sin of his people. The
father made the holy son of God to be guilty. of all of the sin
of his people, even though he never once committed a sin. And
at the very same time, the Father made his elect to be the righteousness
of God in the Lord Jesus Christ. See, Christ our Savior, Christ
that healeth us, our Jehovah Rapha, he traded his righteousness
for the sin of his people. He took the sin of his people
into his own body on the tree. And he put that sin away by the
blood of his sacrifice. By his blood, he paid the debt
in full. You know, in the past several
years, I've gotten to know a few doctors on a first-name basis. Been around several. They're
good doctors. I mean, I have a lot of confidence in them.
I'm thankful that they're my doctors. But you know, I go see
the doctor and the cure, you know, is, well, we're going to
give you a pill or we're going to shoot radiation in you or
we're going to do these things, you know. Never once did it come
up that the doctor would take my sickness away from me and
take it into him and give me his health. Never once did that
come up. That's what our Jehovah Rapha
did for us. He took our sickness, our sin
sickness, and gave us his health, gave us his righteousness. He
made his people to be righteous. He made them to be what they're
not. He healed them. And Peter says,
that's what happened to Calvary. First Peter two, verse 24, by
whose stripes you were healed, not by whose stripes you could
be healed. not by whose stripes you will
be healed someday, by whose stripes you already were healed. That's
what happened to Calvary. By his stripes, we are healed. That's what happened at the waters
of Marah, and that's what happened to Calvary. Now the old writers
say that this tree was a bitter tree. How they know that, I don't
know, but it does stand to reason, doesn't it? A tree growing by
bitter waters would be bitter. And it just does not seem logical
to cast a bitter tree into bitter waters and that'll make the water
sweet. But that's what happened. Now
that's a picture of the cross of Christ. What the Savior suffered
at Calvary was bitter. It is more bitter than we can
imagine. Today, when we think, about the
suffering of Christ. It's horrifying. It really is. It's horrifying. I promise you
it's a whole much more bitter than what we think. He suffered
all the bitter curse of sin. He suffered the bitter condemnation
of sin. It does not make sense that one
man could suffer for untold millions and make them all righteous and
pay all their sin debt by one sacrifice. That does not make
sense, does it? But that's what happened. That's
what happened. And when Christ suffered all
that bitterness of sin for his people, there was sweet peace
made between God and men. By his blood, he made peace for
his people. Now, if there's someone here
tonight And you're in this wilderness, this wilderness of sin, this
wilderness of despair. It's made you so tired, you need
rest. It's made you so hungry and thirsty,
thirst after righteousness. You say with David, as a heart
pants after the water brook, so my heart pants after thee,
oh God. You're hungry, you're thirsty,
you're weary, you're desperate, you can't find any way out. Let
me tell you what to do. You come to Christ. This is what
our Lord said. Here is your warrant to come
to Christ. If any man thirst, let him come
unto me and drink. You thirst for righteousness.
You know, when our bodies are thirsty, it's our body's way
of telling us we don't have enough water in us. Are you thirsty
for righteousness? As Lord showed you, you don't
have any righteousness in you. Our Lord said, come unto me and
drink. Come drink, come to Him and be made righteous in Him.
You go to Christ. He doesn't just have the water
of life. He is the water of life. Now
you go to Him. The name of our Savior is Jehovah
Rapha. The Lord that healeth thee. There's not any question if He
has the power to heal you. The Lord that healeth thee. He
heals all of the sin sickness of his people. He heals the sin
sick souls of his people by taking our sickness and giving us his
health. You see, the Lord is a Lord of
means. God is a God of means. Could God have just said, I have
an elect people and they're all saved? Well, he could, he could
have, but he didn't, but he didn't. He used means. He used the means
of the obedience and the sacrifice of his son in the flesh to justify
his people and to make them righteous. He used means. The second means
that the Lord uses is preaching. It's the preaching of Christ
and him crucified. You know, somebody has to tell
us who Christ is or we're never going to know him. Somebody's
got to point us to Christ or we're never going to know where
he's at. We're never going to see him. We're never going to
believe him. And that happens by preaching. It pleased God
by the foolishness of preaching, to save them that believe. Faith
cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. Now remember,
God's a God of means. But could God just will the salvation
of his people? I mean, could he just speak audibly
from heaven or send an angel or something? Well, he could.
He could, absolutely, he could, but he doesn't. He sends a preacher
to show us Christ. And that's what happened at the
waters of Marah. Remember, the Lord had to show
Moses the tree. The tree was there all along.
Moses just didn't see it. He didn't know what to do with
it until the Lord revealed it to him. My friend, Christ is
always there. He's always there. We just don't
see him until God gives us eyes to see. And somebody tells us
where to look and we see him. And when a sin sick sinner sees
Christ in the gospel, the moment we see Christ, we're immediately
healed of every spiritual disease. Now, do we know everything there
is to know? No, we do not. We're gonna learn, we're gonna
grow, but no matter how long you live, no matter how long
you hear the gospel, you're still not gonna know everything there is to know.
But I know him, but I see him. But I see him immediately healed
of every spiritual disease, made perfectly whole and righteous. And when Christ enters the heart,
that bitter sinner is made sweet. Now that's true. But I put in
my notes, we should be a whole lot sweeter considering everything
that God has done for us. I should be much more forgiving,
considering how God's forgiven me. I should be much more patient,
considering the Lord's goodness and faithfulness to me. We should
be a whole lot sweeter. But there's still a change. When
God takes up residence in the heart, now there's a new sheriff
in town, and there's a change. There's some sweetness there
in the new man. So the Lord uses preaching. And
the other means that the Lord uses in saving his people is
prayer. Moses prayed, and then the Lord
showed that tree to him and told him to throw it in the water.
Now you just can't overestimate the importance of prayer. No
sinner will ever be saved until he prays and begs God for mercy. I tell all of us here tonight,
Whatever it is that you're in need of, spiritually, mentally,
physically, emotionally, pray. Pray, lay these cares out before
your God for he careth for you. Pray. Don't ever think, well,
I'd like to be saved. There's nothing I can do about
it. You know, if God liked me, I'll be saved. If he didn't,
I'll be damned. There's nothing I can do about it. If there's anybody
here tonight thinking that way, or anybody listening to this
recording thinking that, let me tell you something. There
is too something you can do about it. There is. You can pray. You can pray. You can beg God
to have mercy on you. Now, your prayer will not save
you. Christ saves. But God never has
yet saved anybody who did not pray. Now, that's just so. Why did Ananias feel confident
to go preach to Saul of Tarsus? The Lord said, for behold, he
prayeth. He prayeth. The Lord, remember, is going
to bring us to the bitter waters where we have no hope. We have
no option. And then and only then will we
cry out to him in prayer. And that's true about everything.
You know, I would tell you about coming to these services. And I hope when you come that
you get a blessing from God's word. But if you didn't get a
blessing, let me ask you this. Did you pray and ask God to give
you one before you came? Our Lord said you have not because
you asked not. You know, we read in James to
open the service about prayer, prayer. Now I know that so, because
the Lord made a statute and an ordinance for them about it.
He's talked about it in verse 26. If you'll diligently hearken
to the voice of the Lord thy God, if you'll do that which
is right in his sight, and you'll give ear to his commandments
and keep all his statutes, I'll put none of these diseases, I
won't put any of these spiritual wounds and bruises and putrefying
sores upon you, which I brought upon the Egyptians, for I am
the Lord that healeth thee. Now, when you first read that,
that could sound a whole lot like a covenant of works, couldn't
it? God says, if you do this and you do this and you do this
and you do this, then I won't damn you, then I won't curse
you. But that's not what the Lord's talking about here. The
blessing is dependent upon obedience, but the Lord's not talking about
our obedience to the law. The Lord is talking about our
obedience to the commandment of God. to the commandment of
the gospel to believe on and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. And like I said earlier, if you
trust the Lord Jesus Christ, you trust all of your soul to
him, he will heal you of every spiritual disease. You trust
Jehovah Rapha, the great physician, he'll heal every wound, every
bruise, every putrefying sore, and he will make you whole. And
I tell you how you're gonna see him. The Lord said, diligently
hearken. Diligently hearken, diligently
listen to the gospel. And you see if that's not so.
All right, that's how the Lord heals his people from their spiritual
diseases. But second, the Lord heals his
people from trials. Now this situation where the
Lord brought Israel to the bitter waters of Marah was a trial of
faith for the children of Israel. See that at the end of verse
25, and there he proved them, or he tried them. The Lord tried
the children of Israel, and they failed the test. Well, I know
how that feels, don't you? We never pass any test or any
trial that the Lord ever sends us. We fail every single one
of them. See, this is why I say we always need Christ. We need the Lord to give us faith,
and we need him to keep us faithful. He has to make us trust him,
and then he has to make us keep trusting him. We'll fail without
him every time. Now I say to the child of God,
this world is a barren wilderness. Many of you have been out in
it today. You've been out in it. I've had
such a blessing. I did not leave my house until
it came time to come here to the surface. I've been locked
up in my study all day, and that's a blessing. But you've been out
in the wilderness, haven't you? It's a barren, dry, dead place. And you've got to pass through
it. Just like when they left the Red Sea, the children of
Israel had to go through that wilderness to get to the Promised
Land. Between here and glory, we've
got to go through this wilderness. Now you're just passing through
it. Take comfort in this. You're just passing through.
This is not your home. Don't put down roots here. We're
going through this place, going home. But as we pass through,
you just rest assured of this, we're gonna have trials over
and over and over again. Our Lord said, in this world,
you shall have tribulation. But our Lord also said, you be
of good cheer. For I've overcome the world.
I've overcome this barren wilderness that you're walking through. When I was a young man, I used to like to sit and listen
to old men. I liked to hear old men talk
and see what I could learn. And I loved to listen to Cecil
Roach. I loved old Cecil. And he told
me one day, he said, now when I was a young man, He said, I'd
have a bunch of blue sky, and there'd be a little storm come.
And after that, there'd be a bunch of blue sky. He said, the longer
I've lived, the shorter the blue sky and the bigger the storm
clouds, to where it seems like it's one big storm cloud. He
could have crushed me with a feather when he said that. I was kind
of hoping I'd grow stronger and all this and be used to these
things. But that's all you can expect from the wilderness. You
can't expect anything better from this world. But you take
comfort. The Lord's gonna send relief
to his people. When the trial's accomplished,
God's purpose, he's gonna send relief. And what is God's many
purposes in all the trials that he sends? I guess it's varied
depending on the person, I don't know. But I do know this is in
every trial. Every trial that God sends to
his children is to increase our trust in the Lord and to decrease
our trust in ourselves. That's the purpose. When the
Lord comforts us in the trial, you know what's going to happen
in the future? I'm going to trust him more to comfort me in the
next one too, because he's already comforted me before. When the
Lord delivers, I'm gonna trust in the Lord even more to deliver
me from the next one too. He's gonna send relief. Now,
sometimes the Lord will bring relief just by bringing into
the trial. Sometimes that happens. But you
know, sometimes the Lord does something very special. He'll
bring something or someone into our life right in the midst of
the trial that gives us relief from that bitter trial. The trial
is just as hard and as hot and as difficult as it ever was,
but the Lord sent us someone to be a blessing and a help and
a comfort to us, and it takes away some of that bitterness,
doesn't it? Sometimes, and this is special, sometimes the Lord
removes the bitterness of the trial simply by giving his child
willing submission to his will. You know, it's one thing to say,
this is God's will for me, I submit to it, and I'm happy with it.
It's one thing to say that. It's another thing to mean it.
If the Lord can make you mean it, that'll take the bitterness
of the trial away, won't it? Remember, I told you about the
seven names of Jehovah. One of those names is Jehovah
Shammah. The Lord is there. Now you remember that, as you're
going through this world, going through this wilderness, this
tough, tough, tough, tough journey, you remember this, the Lord is
there. Just like that tree was there,
Moses didn't see it, wherever the child of God is at, the Lord's
there. The Lord's there. And if he'll give us a sense
of his presence, we will not notice the bitterness of the
trial anymore. That's a fact. That's a fact. I've lived it. Honestly, that's true. If he
will give us a sense of his presence, the bitterness of the trial,
you just don't notice it. You just don't see it because
his presence is so glorious. I've got a front porch light. And for years, it was too dim. And I thought, I'm tired of this. I'm tired of this light being
so dim. So I went to Lowe's. I got these LED lights. And I
didn't know, I grew up when you had watts. I don't know how many
lumens, whatever it is. But I looked for how many ever
lumens. I got the biggest number that I could get. People can
see my front porch from space. I mean, woo! But the sun comes up on that
side of the house. Or the sun, I'm sorry, it sets
on that side of the house. And when that sun just comes
over the neighbor's roof and it's so bright, I don't want
to see that porch light anymore. That's the presence of Christ.
If you have his presence, nothing else matters. We'd be wise to
pray in the midst of trial that the Lord give us a sense of his
presence more than we keep asking the Lord to take the trial away.
We really would, we'd be better off. And one of the reasons that the
Lord sends these trials, it says, so we'll know this name, Jehovah
Rapha, the Lord that healeth thee. The Lord that healeth thee. He's healed you. If you're a
child of God, he's given you faith, he's healed you. Now you
remember this, just like the Lord did not bring the children
of Israel out of Egypt to the waters of Mara to die, The Lord
did not deliver you from sin just to die in the wilderness
before he takes you to be with him. He'll always give his people
grace that's sufficient for the hour that he's putting me in.
I promise you he will, and we'd be wise to pray for it. Will
the Lord deliver me from the trial? I don't know. I don't
know, because he hasn't promised it. If he would or not, I don't
know. But he has promised grace sufficient for the hour, hasn't
he? Best way to pray. is ask the Lord to do what he's
already promised to do. All right, here's the third thing.
The Lord heals his people from physical sickness. I don't wanna
make too much of this, but you know, this is, but it's still
true, and it's a blessing for God's people to know this. You
know, it's our sin that causes all of the sickness that we have,
body, mind, everything that we suffer, it's all because of sin.
And if we become sick and then we're healed of any of these
sicknesses, it's Jehovah Rapha that healed us. Now we may have
gone to the doctor and took treatments and done all these things, but
it's Jehovah Rapha that healed us. But I know this, that's why
I say don't make too much of this because the Lord will not
heal all of our physical diseases. He's not going to do it. One
day something's going to kill this body, right? That's why
these faith healers out here, they're preaching a lie. And
don't one of you ever fall for it? They make me so angry. They're
telling people, now the Lord will heal you if your faith is
just strong enough. Well, now you show me somebody
whose faith is strong enough. You know, if you do everything
right, that they tell you that the Lord will heal you. But that's
not so. From the time of Adam till now,
with the exception of Enoch, something has killed the body
of every single son of Adam. But if the Lord sends some disease
that kills the body of one of his children, you know what he's
done? He showed himself as the mighty
Jehovah Rapha. He's plumb healed you. He's plumb
healed you. Taken directly into his presence,
made just like our savior. So if our bodies healed from
some dread disease, or if we're plum healed. Either way, it's
Jehovah Raphael that healed us. But now remember this, God's
a God of means. That's why I say, no, you can't
take this thing too far. If you get sick, use the means
that God has provided to get some relief. If you get sick,
don't do nothing. Say, well, you know, if I'm gonna
be healed, you know, the Lord's gonna heal me and I'm not gonna
take any medicine. That's just foolish. That's foolish. I like what Brother Don Fortner
said. He said, faith and good sense go hand in hand. You know,
these people say, well, I'm not going to take any medicine and
I'm not going to go to the doctor. They do not get that idea from
scripture. No, they don't. Scripture is
plain for us to use the means that God has provided. James
says the first means is prayer. Now you pray. Pray that the Lord
will heal you. Pray that the Lord will comfort
you. James says, is there any sick among you? Let him call
for the elders of the church and let them pray over him. Pray.
Pray for healing. Pray that the Lord will give
those doctors and those nurses some wisdom and some compassion
as they treat you. Pray that the Lord will use them
as a means to help you. But also take the medicine, do
these things. That's the anointing oil that
James speaks of. In that day, that was oil. He
wasn't talking about us getting oil and rubbing it on your head
and you'll be healed. He's talking about medicine.
Take the medicine that God gives you. Use the means that God has
provided. Those waters of Marah would have
stayed bitter if Moses hadn't thrown that tree in them, wouldn't
they? They'd have stayed bitter. God could have spoken, made the
water sweet. He could have just willed the
waters to suddenly be sweet, but he didn't. God uses means. He used that tree. Now let's
use some common sense and use the means that God's given us
in every situation. In salvation, do I need to be
saved from my sin? Do I need God to save me? Do
I need God to have mercy on me? Well, come hear the gospel. Come
hear the gospel. Faith cometh by hearing. And
pray. Beg the Lord to have mercy on
your soul. Beg him to forgive you. Do I need a spiritual blessing? Am I starving to death? Pray. Ask the Lord to feed you the
bread of life. Come hear the gospel preached.
Are you in a time of trial? Pray. Pray that the Lord will
give you his comforting presence. Pray that the Lord will teach
you what he'd have you to learn. Pray. Ask for grace for the hour. Lord, you promised you'd never
leave nor forsake your people. Lord, be with me. Let me have
a sense. Pray. Are you sick? Pray. Pray and
go to the doctor. You know, it's a big joke in
our family because over the years, this has proven to be true. I
don't care what's wrong with any of us, any of our family.
Janet has a three-fold thing. You at least start with these
three things. I don't care what it is that's wrong with you.
You start with these three things. Janet says, number one, you pray.
Number two, you drink water. And number three, go for a walk.
Well, I was at my doctor a week or two ago. And his PA came in
and was talking to me. And I was laying out all my issues
to her. And you know what she told me?
She found out I was a pastor, so she's kind of going to get
religious with this thing. But she said, she said, I know
you prayed about this. I said, oh, yeah. She said, oh,
keep praying. Keep praying. And she said, drink
lots of water. Your body needs water. And get
some exercise. And I thought, by golly, Jan
was right. But in that good common sense,
in everything, pray. Oh, pray. Are you in a time of
need? Pray. Has the Lord blessed you? Pray. Praise His holy name. Thank you,
Lord. Oh, thank you, Lord. Use the
means that God's given us. And the number one thing we need
is the gospel of Christ. Well, come listen diligently.
Maybe the Lord shows something. Maybe. I hope so. Let's bow together. Father, how we thank you for
this blessed portion of your word. How we thank you for what
your son accomplished on the tree of Calvary. Father, how
we thank you. How we thank you for full, free
redemption in the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. How we thank
you for complete healing of every spiritual disease in the sweet
balm of Gilead, the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. Father,
how we thank you that as we go through this journey here below,
you've given us the blessed privilege to look to thee, to call upon
thee, to come before you in prayer, to come before your throne of
grace. Father, how we thank you. Father, I pray that you would
keep us mindful and faithful that in every situation to turn
and pray. Ask for your leadership, ask
for your power, ask for you to to take care of the situation
and give us the faith to wait on thee. Father, it's in Christ's
name. For his sake, we pray and give
thanks. Amen. Okay, Sean. Okay, if you would, turn in your hymnals
to song number 125, and we'll sing Jesus Paid It All. And in
my book, I don't know if it's been changed in yours, but in
the chorus it says, all the debt I owe. And so if you would please
stand and we'll sing Jesus paid it all with that change to the
chorus. I hear the Savior say, Thy strength
indeed is small. Child of weakness, watch and
pray. Find in me thine all in all. Jesus paid all, all the debt
I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain,
he washed it white as snow. Lord now indeed I find thy power
and thine alone can change the leper's spots and melt the heart
of stone. Jesus paid it all All the debt I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain. He washed it white as snow. For nothing good have I Where
by thy grace to claim I'll wash my garments white In the blood
of Calvary's Lamb Jesus paid it all All the dead I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain. He washed it white as snow. And when before the throne I
stand in Him complete, Jesus died my soul to save, my lips
shall still repeat, Jesus paid it all, all the debt I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain. He washed it white as snow.