were here for our last meeting. I hope you're glad to be here.
I know I am. And I know our first preacher
is happy to be here. I saw that it's 17 below in Rock
Valley, Iowa this morning. When I asked Joe about coming
to preach our conference, he said, Florida, January? Yeah.
Didn't have to think about that long. Psalm 89 verse 1. You don't have to look it up.
I'm just going to read the first verse. I will sing of the mercies of
the Lord forever with my mouth while I make known thy faithfulness
to all generations. Number 222. There is a fountain
filled with blood drawn from Emmanuel's veins. Sinners plunge
beneath that flood, lose all their guilty stains. Let's stand
together. Number 222. There is a fountain filled with
blood Drawn from Emmanuel's veins And sinners plunged beneath that
flood Lose all their guilty stains Lose all their guilty stains
Lose all their guilty stains. And sinners plunged beneath that
flood Lose all their guilty stains. The dying thief rejoiced to see
that fountain in his day. And there may I go vile as he. Wash all my sins away. Wash all my sins away. Wash all my sins away. And there may I, though vile
as he, wash all my sins away. Dear dying Lamb, thy precious
blood shall never lose its power. Till all the ransomed Church
of God be saved to sin no more. Be he saved to sin no more. Be he saved to sin no more. Till all the ransomed Church
of God, Be he saved to sin no more. E'er since, by faith, I saw the
stream Thy flowing wounds supply. Redeeming love has been my theme,
And shall be till I die. And shall be till I die. And shall be till I die. Redeeming love has been my theme,
And shall be till I die. When this poor lisping, stammering
tongue Lies silent in the grave, Then in a nobler, sweeter tongue
I'll sing thy power to save. I'll sing thy power to save Then
in a nobler, sweeter song I'll sing thy power to save You'd like to turn with me in
your Bibles to Isaiah chapter 40. I want to read a passage that's, I know,
very familiar here. Our folks know this is one of
my favorite, favorite passages of scripture. And I can say that
I have been comforted this weekend. And I hope to experience that
same comfort again this morning in knowing that all my sins have
been put away. that Christ has accomplished
everything necessary for me to be able to stand in the presence
of God. And that's what the Lord says to the preacher, verse 1
of Isaiah chapter 40. Comfort ye, comfort ye my people,
saith your God. Speak ye comfortably. Speak from
your heart. Speak to their heart. This is
not an intellectual thing. This matter of faith is a heart
matter and it's the work of the Spirit of God that gives us a
heart able to hear. Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem
and cry unto her that her warfare is accomplished. Every single
one of us raised our fist in rebellion against God and our
father Adam. We set out in warfare against
him. And the Lord has fought that
battle for us and won it. Tell them their warfare is accomplished.
Tell them her iniquity is pardoned, for she hath received of the
Lord's hand double for all her sins. Righteousness, justification,
all our sins have been put away. We have a righteousness in Christ,
makes us perfect in the presence of God. The voice of him that
crieth in the wilderness, and there's the preacher. Prepare
ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway
for our God. Every valley shall be exalted,
all those who are humbled shall be lifted up. And made low, I'm sorry, and
every mountain, those that are proud, and hills shall be made
low. And the crooked shall be made
straight, and the rough place plain. The glory of the Lord
shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together, for the
mouth of the Lord hath spoken it. The voice said, cry. And basically what Isaiah is
saying in verse six is, Lord, where do I start? Where do I
start this message? What do I say? Tell them that
all flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the
flower of the field. The grass withereth, the flower
fadeth, because the Spirit of the Lord bloweth upon it. Surely
the people is grass. The grass withereth, the flower
fadeth, but the Word of our God shall stand forever. Let's pray
together. Our merciful Heavenly Father,
You have told us that If any man sin, we have an advocate
with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous one. Lord, we know that all we can do is sin. Oh, how we need an advocate,
how we need a sin bearer, how we need one to be our surety,
to stand in our stead before thee, to present himself on our
behalf. We thank you, Father, that you've
allowed us to hear of him. This weekend, we pray again this
morning that Christ to be lifted up. Father, that your people
would be comforted in knowing that their iniquity is pardoned,
their warfare is accomplished. Oh, Lord, what great hope and
comfort we have when we look upon Christ. Would you send your
spirit Cause him to be the focus of our attention and the hope
of our salvation. For we ask it in his name. Amen. Tom's going to come and lead
us in number 176. Break thou the bread of life
and then Joe will come and preach for us. This is our hope that
the Lord would break open the bread of life, feed our souls. Let's stand together. Break thou the bread of life,
dear Lord, to me, as thou didst break the loaves beside the sea. Throughout the sacred page I
seek My spirit pats for Thee, O Living
Word. Bless thou the truth, dear Lord,
to me, to me. As thou didst bless the bread
by Galilee, all fetters fall, and I shall
find my peace, my all in all. Thou art the bread of life, O
Lord, to me ? Thy holy word, the truth that
saveth the world ? Give me to eat and live with
Thee above. Teach me to love Thy truth, for
Thou art love. O spend Thy Spirit, Lord, to
bow unto me, that He may touch my eyes and make me see. Show me the truth concealed within
Thy Word, And in thy book revealed I see
the Lord. Please be seated. I was guilty with nothing to
say. And judgment was upon me that day. When a voice from heaven was heard and said, Take me instead, and I should
have been crucified. God forms a spear deep in his
side, and his blade Those who rushed in at us were
waiting for me. Jesus. have honored the cross in this
grace. But Jesus, God's Son, Would you open your Bibles to
the 130th Psalm? Psalm 130. And while you're turning
there, let me express my appreciation for having me here, not only
for the very obvious reason that the 60 or so degrees we have
right now is a whole lot better than the negative 15 to negative
20 that's going on back home. If you ever ask me to come for
a conference in July, I might have to think about that one,
but there's never any question whether I'd come in January.
And no, it's been a blessing to me to be here, a blessing to be able to listen
to someone else preach. I love the life that the Lord
has given me as a preacher of his gospel, but I love hearing
other men preach it. And I do believe that there is
a application of that scripture. Faith comes by hearing. And yes,
my soul is often encouraged even as I'm doing the preaching, but
it's more often better encouraged when somebody else is. And I'm
just sitting listening and taking it in. So to be able to listen
to the other brother preach has been good. And I thank you for
your words of encouragement. I mean, when us fellows get done
preaching, we learn something about how much we preachers live
by God's grace. We already understand that with
regard to eternal things. We know that every blessing we
receive comes because of what Christ has done. But when we're
done preaching and you come up and say, thank you for that message,
we realize we are appreciated because of what Christ has done.
We preachers got nothing, nothing of our own. And yet both from
heaven and from God's people on earth, we receive blessing
because of what Christ has done. And I thank you for being the
channel of that blessing and encouragement to me. Now let's
read this entire Psalm. It's only eight verses, Psalm
130. Out of the depths have I cried
unto thee, O Jehovah. Now I'm reading it like that
simply because we want to distinguish the different uses of the word
Lord in this scripture. It was mostly a Jewish superstition. that has caused us to read that
name of our God as Lord. It is written, thou shalt not
take the name of Jehovah thy God in vain. And they said, well,
one easy way to keep from doing that is never use it at all.
And so they would not speak the name. And when they came to that
name in the scriptures, they would say either Adonai, which
means my Lord, or some would say Hashem, which simply means
the name. And they thought by that that
they would not be taking the name of the Lord in vain. And
when they translated the Old Testament into Greek, the translators
followed that tradition and used the Greek word for Lord. It became
the standard practice. But when you see it all in caps,
that is either the name Jehovah or the shortened version Yah. O Jehovah, my Lord, Hear my voice,
my king, my master, hear my voice. Let thine ears be attentive to
the voice of my supplications. If thou, Jehovah, shouldest mark
iniquities, O my Lord, who shall stand? But there is forgiveness
with thee that thou mayest be feared. I wait for Jehovah, my
soul doth wait, and in his word do I hope. My soul waiteth for
my Lord more than they that watch for the morning. I say more than
they that watch for the morning. Let Israel hope in Jehovah, for
with Jehovah there is mercy, and with him is plenteous redemption,
and he shall redeem Israel. from all his iniquities. Now, the Psalms are a treasure
of the experiences of the people of God. There is systematic theology,
which is the kind of theology we normally do, and by that I
mean we take the various declarations of Scripture and we organize
them into doctrines, and there's nothing wrong with that. because
the scriptures themselves do that from time to time. Paul
would assert some truth and he would back it up with scriptures.
And it's simply a declarative way to tell the truth. But the
Psalms are full of what I would call the theology of experience. We can derive from them many
doctrines, but this is the record of those who lived the doctrines,
who believed them. Maybe that's the better way to
put it. They believed them in this world. And this is a record
of how it went for them as they believed this truth in the world. And one thing we find in many
of the Psalms is that believing God in a godless world is a very
difficult and trying experience. Those who wrote the Psalms went
through terrible experiences, and they showed us how to face
them, how they experienced them, and how to find deliverance through
them and in them. The psalmist says, out of the
depths, out of the depths have I cried unto thee. Now the depths
is where the believer spends a significant amount of his time. And this puts the lie to that
form of religion that teaches you if you believe God, things
will go well. Noah, Job, David, whoever it
was wrote this psalm. Many others would say to such
preachers, I have no idea what you're talking about. Now, if
the life of faith leads to a life of ease, of carefree ease, why
is our Lord the most faithful man that ever lived? Why is he
called the man of sorrows and acquainted with grief? Even he
who is perfect in every aspect, including the perfection of faith. You say, Christ wasn't a believer.
Yes, he was. He says, I put my trust in him. He lived as a believer and there
was much of his life spent in sorrow, in being cast down, in
groaning. How many times do we read his
spirit groaned within him? And so don't frustrate yourself. When you hear some preacher say
that the life of faith is a continual life of joy and unobstructed
blessedness, it's not. It is more difficult in this
world to live the life of faith than it is to live the life of
unbelief. Now, I wouldn't choose the life of unbelief from the
perspective of one that's been born of God. I would never choose
to go back to not believing God. And there are also joys in this
life that only the believer can experience. And so I don't want
to just paint a completely black picture, but I'm reminded of
that guy, Bob Ross. You all remember him, the painter
with the happy little clouds? Okay. I was watching once as
he was showing how to draw or paint one of those pictures,
and you wanted a bright spot in the picture. You know what
he did first? He painted the entire canvas
black. The joys of the believer are
painted upon a very dark canvas. And sometimes it's only the canvas
that we're experiencing. It's only the depths. Out of
the depths, I cry unto you. Trials encompass the people of
God. I believe it was Scott Richardson
who said, God's people are always in one of three relations to
trouble. They're right in the middle of it, barely coming out
of it, or just about to enter it. But there's hardly any time
when we are not experiencing some kind of trouble. The depths
are the common experience of those who believe God, and every
child of God endures such thing. And every child of God has the
privilege to cry out to God from the depths of whatever he's experiencing,
whatever those depths may be. I appreciate that the Apostle Paul
never told us what his thorn in the flesh is, because if he
had, And that wasn't the thorn I have. I couldn't take any comfort
from that statement. My grace is sufficient for thee.
I'd say, well, that may grace, God's grace is sufficient for
his thorn, but what about mine? He left it blank. Kind of like
they did if you remember your algebra class, it's kind of an
X, you know, fill it in with a variable of your own experience. God's grace is sufficient for
you. Out of the depths, I cry unto
you. what depths the believer endures. Some of you may be going through
some very severe and troubling trials right now. Most of the
time we have no way of knowing when someone is going through
these kind of trials because we have been taught always put
on a happy face. Particularly when we come to
worship, we hide what we're really going through. Now I'm not telling
you, I'm not trying to exhort you here to come to the church
and wear your experiences and your emotions on your sleeve.
But I'm saying this, a lot of times we're doing that because
we think if we're not smiling we're not being spiritual and
somebody will see us not smiling and think we're not spiritual.
We're putting on a religious show. We're hiding. the reality of us. We pretend
like we're full of confidence when instead we're crumbling
inside. We feel and speak as though we're assured of our interest
in Christ when really we are encompassed with doubts. We pretend
we're happy when we're miserable. And therefore no one knows unless
they're particularly perceptive of things like that. So We live
in the depths and pretend we're on the heights. And go on pretending
if you want. But let me give you this word
of encouragement. When you are in the depths, don't
believe that God has abandoned you there. Now it's God that
put you there. Don't question that. But I even
find some encouragement in that. The same hand that with love
and grace drew you to Him for the forgiveness of your sins,
for the establishment of a spiritual life in you, and for all those
blessings in the heavenly place. The same hand of love and grace
that did that put you in whatever pit you're in. And He did it
for His glory and for your good, and it'll be over when His glory
has been established and all the good that can come out of
it has been squeezed out of it for your sake. So do not let
the devil, and this is what the devil does to us in our trials,
he comes and says, now if you were a child of God, I mean,
come on, this wouldn't be happening. Don't believe it. It's because
you're a child of God that this kind of thing is happening. There
may be some of you right now suffering some trials of circumstance. That is, things external in your
life, a lost job. That happens. And it may be a
lost job, and you've been looking for one for a long time, and
you can't find one. And if you had some savings that
are about to dry up, or they dried up long ago, you don't
know what you're going to do. Day-to-day life has become a
chore, a trial, and a misery. You can think of other things.
That's just a common example. But it just seems like the world
is falling in on you. Your life as you knew it when
it was essentially carefree has collapsed. Maybe that's the kind
of difficulty, depth you're in. There's trials of health. All
of us get sick from time to time. And most of us have learned to
deal with these short-term sicknesses, but there are some whom the Lord
has afflicted with illnesses that seemingly go on forever. These chronic illnesses for which
even modern day medicine has no treatment. Maybe they can
relieve some pain. Maybe they can make life a little
better than it would have been a hundred years ago if you'd
have had that disease, but they don't know what to do about the
disease. And it just goes on and on. Maybe there are some
here with a terminal illness. Now that's a depth I've never
been in except the common terminal illness of all of us, which is
life, because we are all afflicted with a terminal case of death.
But you know what I mean? It may be the doctor has shown
you some x-rays and said, it won't be long. And there you are down in a pit.
I would imagine such a person feels so alone. For even though
they are alive, they feel cut off from the land of the living. And out of that depth, you cry
out to God and you feel as though God has abandoned you
there. There's home troubles, all home troubles. I spoke to
you of home the other day and how we like to go home because
home is where there's peace, home is where there rest, not
always. Sometimes home is the most miserable
place to be and it's made more miserable because it's supposed
to be such a delightful place But maybe your home has become
a place of contention and strife, family troubles, children troubles. I would say
probably most of us have had at least some contact with that
kind of religion that says if you'll raise your children right,
they'll do right. Didn't work for David. Sometimes you do all you can
to teach your children what's the right thing to do. You raise
them, you tell them the truth, you bring them to church, you
do what you can at home to instruct them in the truth, but once the
parental leash is taken off, they run wild, they get themselves
in all kinds of trouble, or they just simply show no interest
whatever in gospel things. Oh, what a depth that is. To have marriages broken up.
To look at that one in whom you once delighted and find out they
no longer, if ever, delighted in you the least bit. And to
have that rug pulled out from under you must be awful. I thank
God such things never been my experience, but I've seen it
as the experience of others. What a crushing blow. What a
depth. And out of such depth, the child
of God cries out. There are emotional troubles.
There can be hardly anything I can imagine worse than that
misery which comes upon people when everything is just fine. Those who suffer what medicine
now classifies as mood disorders, emotional illnesses. Now let
me tell you, if that is your place, then I can say such as
John did, I am your companion in this tribulation. I know what
that is. I know what it is to look at
my life objectively and see that everything in it is just wonderful. That many people would be jealous
or envious of the life that I have. And yet I feel utterly miserable
and know that it is foolishness to feel miserable. I know what
it is to have the most wonderful woman as a wife, to have three
children, all of whom confess the name of Christ and yet feel
unblessed. I know what it is to preach the
gospel with clarity and have people come up to me afterwards
and tell me how blessed they were. And inside I'm saying,
why wasn't I blessed? Why didn't I get anything out
of the message that I just preached? Oh, what a depth that is. A depth
that nobody can do anything about. to be filled with such misery,
which often can turn into a bitter anger. And what you feel like
you need to do is crawl back in a cave somewhere so that you
don't come into contact with anybody and say something ugly.
And then somebody comes up and strikes up a conversation. And
you got to talk and try to bite your tongue and sound happy when
you're absolutely miserable for no reason. I believe one psalmist knew what
that was. I've read some books on depression,
anxiety, and other mood disorders. And I remember reading one, and
the guy was trying to point out some examples in scripture. And
I thought, you missed the most glaring example. Why art thou
cast down on my soul? Why groan within me? Why? Why? You say, well, a child of
God wouldn't be like that. Then I'm not a child of God. And many notable believers from
times past were not children of God. We sang, there is a fountain
filled with blood written by a man who suffered horribly under
that kind of affliction. Charles Spurgeon to a lesser
degree, Martin Luther. Men who had what we would consider
a remarkable faith and yet experiencing such depths of darkness
emotionally. And if I could speak a word of
encouragement to you, if you're such a person, it is not a testimony
of God's disfavor with you. It's not. It doesn't mean you
don't believe God. It's an emotional problem, not
a spiritual one. This may surprise you, but do
you realize God's people don't have spiritual problems? They
don't. They have a lot of fleshly ones,
but they got no spiritual problems. They believe God. And they are,
every one of them, feel that or experience that It's a misuse
of the word, but nonetheless, that's schizophrenia of, Lord,
I believe, help my unbelief. And some of us seem to be more
on the Lord, I believe, and others of us seem more on the help my
unbelief side. But nonetheless, that dichotomy,
there's your word, that seemingly incompatible set of feelings
is in every believer. And understand this, and I'm
just telling you some things I've learned from my own experience
with it. There is a privilege that you've been given, if this
is your way of life, that you've been given the opportunity to
experience, probably to as much degree as anybody, what our Lord
said and what he meant when he said, you believe because you
see. Blessed are those who believe
but have not seen. And many people, what seems to
be their strong faith is really the fact that it's not being
challenged. It's not being challenged by
their own inner emotions. It's one thing to believe God
because you think everything's and feel like everything's going
well. What do you do when you have absolutely no testimony
of the presence of God other than his bare word? You believe
his word and ignore everything else. There's a debt that God's people
experience. But here's the thing. None of
these is what the psalmist was talking about. Now, I'm not saying
that you cannot apply this psalm to these other things, but this
is not what he's talking about. He goes to the very root of it.
He goes to what actually brought about all these other troubles.
He says in verse 3, If thou, Jehovah, shouldest mark iniquities,
O my Lord, who shall stand? Now I'm not saying that for any
one of us, whatever debts we may be experiencing in our natural
lives, that they are the result of some particular sin that we
have committed. But they are all the result of
sin. Because everything other than
the blessedness of paradise has come because Adam sinned long
ago. Why do we die? Because Adam sinned. Why do we get sick? Because Adam
sinned. Now I'm not trying to throw it
off on Adam as though we haven't given our hearty amen to what
he did. But nonetheless, it is sin that
has brought every bit of misery and suffering that anyone has
ever experienced. And God may have saved you, but
you still live in a world under the curse. And you still live
in a body that's under the curse. Fuel Jehovah. should us mark iniquities. There
is no depth for the believer like that depth he experiences
when the knowledge of his sin just falls in on him. I remember, and this is one reason
I like this text of scripture so much, I remember one time,
and the night time is the worst for this kind of thing, laying
there in my bed, covered up with doubts. I could say, help my
unbelief, but I couldn't come up with anything to say, Lord,
I believe. And the reason I was so full of doubts is because
of an acute awareness of my sin. I was raised, probably as many
of you were raised in religion that says that if God has saved
you, you're going to be getting better and better as time goes
by. And that God's going to take away those sinful tendencies. Tell
that to Paul, because evidently Paul was never saved because
he said, oh wretched man that I am. And I believe he said that
as a believer, because I don't think an unbeliever says that.
Oh wretched man that I am. But I was laying there thinking,
not of Adam's sin, Not of my sinful nature, but of my actual
transgressions. And it just seemed impossible
that someone who was a child of God could do that, those things. And certainly that God was going
to lower the boom on me. And in the midst of all that,
and I know it wasn't an audible voice. But I don't know that
an audible voice would have made it any more powerful. It was
as if the Lord said, Joe, if I were watching for you to sin
in order that I might destroy you, you'd have been gone long,
long ago. And do you think that now for
this failure, I'm going to do what I've never done before?
Destroy you? If I were marking iniquities,
you couldn't stand, but here I am standing. And I don't mean
just in this flesh. What's that mean? God's not marking
my sin or I'd be gone. There is forgiveness with thee
that thou mayest be feared. Now there is the fear of the
Lord that comes from the knowledge of judgment. And that's the general fear of
the Lord that makes civilization possible. Men act better than
they normally would if they live under the idea that God's going
to make hell hotter if they sin certain sins and if they sin
other ones. Or maybe the possibility that if they live good enough,
God will take them to heaven. And it does restrain the worst
outbreaks of human wickedness. But there is a fear of the Lord
which only the believer possesses. And he fears the Lord because
he's been forgiven. It is one thing to sin against
law. It's another thing to sin against
grace. It is one thing to think that if I sin, God will punish
me. It's another thing to realize
that every sin I've done was punished in the Lord Jesus Christ.
And I realize we're 2,000 years removed from that event. And it's not like if we sin once
more than God thought we were, God's going to have to crucify
Christ again or something like that. But we cannot help but
re uh, think if we're thinking from the viewpoint of the gospel
and from his grace, when I see him as in, in some, it's like
it added to the burden of our Lord Jesus Christ. How can I
sin and add to the tally of him who must bear my sin? Now, the
Psalms, when you listen to them, or when I read to them, I hear
two voices. I hear our voice and I hear the
Lord's voice. Because so intertwined are the
experiences of the Lord Jesus Christ with his people. They're
quite often singing a duet, but it's a unison duet. But sometimes the notes diverge. You see, verses three and four
are experiences that we can enter into, but the Lord Jesus Christ
has never experienced them. You see, the Lord's never experienced
forgiveness. First of all, He didn't experience
forgiveness because He didn't need it. And He did not go to
the cross bearing our sins to be forgiven. And He wasn't. It says, If thou, Lord, shouldest
mark iniquities, you know what? There was a day He did. And the
reason that the Lord does not mark iniquities on you is because
Christ went to the cross to be marked with those iniquities.
To have the Lord keep the tally and charge them to Him and mark
them in Him and deal with them there, not forgive them, not
pass over them. I was going through this sitting
there in the pew before services started and I tend to think visually. And I guess it's because of my
elementary school experiences where teachers sometime would,
you know, if you did something wrong, they'd write your name
on the board and go next to it. Did it once, did it, you know,
and I thought, yeah, and my name was up there significant times.
Believe it or not, the teacher said, I talk too much. Can you
believe that? And that was the picture that
came to mind, and I thought, no, that doesn't, that won't work.
Because you can go up there with an eraser, and it's gone. It's
gone. That would be to illustrate sins
as easily removed. No, they were not, they didn't
have chalkboards back then. How could they make marks? Jesus
Christ is not a chalkboard on which things were written and
then God came and erased them at the cross. He was stone into
which God chiseled, chiseled our offenses deep, not a mere
scratch, a chisel. And there's nothing you can do
to remove a chiseled in message. But this utterly destroy the
rock in which it was chiseled. And that's what happened. The
reason we say, if thou, Lord, shouldst mark iniquities, thinking
about being marked against us, the only reason we can have any
hope in that is because we realize that a day came when someone
was marked, marked deep, and then those sins were put away,
not with an eraser. The rock was utterly pulverized,
such that none could ever reassemble it and find out what had been
chiseled in it. Oh, those marks will be looked
for, says Jeremiah. They won't be found. All they're
going to find is a pile of dust. For he was crushed, pulverized,
and the marks are gone. And three days later, he came
out of the tomb, a new man with no marks, but the testimony that
the price had been paid. The record was gone. Brethren, I don't want to suffer
anything. I don't want to go into any kind
of depths. But save me from those depths.
If I've got to choose, save me from the depths that Christ went
into. And I would be glad to deal with
what other depths may come. Because whatever depth you're
in, it shall end. And the only reason that our
Lord, that the depths He went into ever ended, is because He's
the Lord. He's the only one that could
die and finish dying. He's the only one that could
actually suffer the penalty of sin completely. The reason hell goes on forever
is because the price of those sins is never paid. The dying's
never done. but Christ did it. He went into
that depth and he climbed out through the
power of his person. He endured it. He endured being
pulverized. What do we do? In our depths,
verse five, I wait for the Lord My soul doth wait, and in his
word do I hope. Now, for the various depths of
our lives, the common circumstances that we experience and the troubles,
there is sometimes something we can do about it. Are you sick?
Go to a doctor. Go to a doctor. Are you poor? Well, if you don't have a job,
look for one. Or look for a better one. Do
what you can. Do what you can. Are there troubles at home? Do
what you can. But when you're done doing what
you can, there's only one thing left to do. Wait. Wait. And wait, no matter how long
it takes, knowing this, at the right time, the Lord will come
and deliver. But what about this business
of our sin? There's only one thing we can
do. Wait. Sure, we try to restrain the
worst outbreaks of it. We do what we can not to be so
destructive with our fleshly wickedness. But in the end, we
do realize this, we're not becoming less sinful. We're not changing
anything about our person even as we change something about
our conduct. We are what we were. There's only one thing we can
do. Wait. The Lord will come. He will come
for us as our flesh finally wears out and dies. And he will be there right then. In fact, It's my belief that
it's not as though at that time the Lord will come for us, but
we shall open new eyes and find out He's been there all along.
He shall not appear at that time, it's just we'll be given sight
to see Him. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow
of death, I will fear no evil, not because you're waiting at
the end of the valley, because thou art with me. And you've
been with me through all the valleys and on top of the hill
and everywhere in between. Our Lord said, I'll never leave
you nor forsake you. The reality of our Lord's presence
is the same at all times. It's just sometimes we can see
it better than others. And when we die, God be thanked,
we'll see it perfectly. And maybe some of us will be
of that blessed generation who never goes through that experience,
but the Lord shall return in a visible form that all men can
see. But I know this. Wait, He will
come. And when He comes, you will say,
that was exactly the right time. You say, why didn't He come now? Because it's not time. Why didn't
He come? Because it'll be better for you
if He waits. Imagine, the news comes to the Lord. He whom thou
lovest is sick. And we think the Lord should
have gotten up and rushed to Bethany and stopped this thing. What does he do? He waits two
more days before even starting. And you can imagine disciples,
oh Lord, we're talking Lazarus here. This is one of your people.
Now come on, you heal everybody else. This is one of your special
beloved, why not go? And in essence, our Lord said,
because it'll be better for him if I wait. It'll be better for
the glory of God. It'll be better for the faith
of everybody involved. And our Lord waited and he waited
until the situation got absolutely beyond human fixing. And then he did what nobody but
he can do. He called a four day dead man
out of the tomb. And it was such a notable miracle
that not even the enemies of the Lord Jesus Christ denied
that it happened and that it was a miraculous work. In their
rebellion, they said, well, now that he's done this, how are
we ever going to stop him by any other way than killing him?
Isn't it amazing they thought that a man that could raise somebody
who'd been four days dead, that you could kill him to any advantage
to yourself? Such is spiritual blindness.
Wait, wait. And I hope the Lord, I preach
these things, and all the time I'm up here, I'm saying, boy,
I hope the Lord doesn't put me in some long-term trial now and
say, all right, you told them to wait, let's see how you can
handle it. But I'm trying to give you a
word of comfort, even if I myself am not in need of this right
now. But I don't care how long it's
been, brothers, sisters, wait. He's coming. He's there. He's there and He will deliver. You just
cry out and wait. And tomorrow, if you feel the
need, cry out again. When our Lord said, don't pray
with vain repetition, He doesn't mean. that you cannot pray as
often as you please for the same thing if it lays heavy upon your
heart. Vain repetition was that idea
that simply by repeating the prayer over and over every time
you repeated it, it made it more likely to come true. That's nonsense. How much prayer on the part of
the prophet did it take for rain to come? Once. But as often as the burden is
upon your heart, and as often as you feel that you are deep
in that pit, cry out. If it's every day, if it's a
hundred times a day, cry out. The Lord does not weary of your
voice, ever. If there was anything that would
weary Him, it's the lack of your voice. It's the lack of your
crying out that would be more troublesome to the Lord if we
speak of the Lord in human terms. My soul waiteth for the Lord
more than they that watch for the morning. I say more than
they that watch for the morning. We realize that these are written
as song lyrics, so to speak, but I don't think that the psalmist
was simply trying to write one of those worship songs where
they just say the same thing over and over and over. I can
just see him now. Out of his own experience, he
says, my soul waits For the Lord, like those that wait for the
morning, those that wait for the morning. Who's he talking
about there? Who's he comparing it to? Well, some say it was
to those watchmen of the night. And there's watchmen at all times.
And I tell you, the watchmen of the night have the hardest
time because the enemy is most difficult to discover. And that
would be legitimate. And you can imagine how happy
those men are to see the sun come up. Not only is their shift
over, But the danger of nighttime stalkers is past. And there's
a legitimate application there, but here's at least how it speaks
to me. You ever lie awake at night,
troubled? There's something about the nighttime
that makes all troubles worse. And you're just waiting for the
sun to come up. Just say six or eight hours,
whatever it is, seems to stretch out as though it were weeks that
passed in one night. But brethren, wait for the Lord
with the longing that you wait for the morning and with the
confidence that no matter how long it seems, the sun will come
up. It will come up. Let Israel hope
in the Lord. How blessed of the Lord to give
that corrupt bunch of people the name Israel. They are like
their father Jacob, scoundrels, deceitful, wavering, self-serving
people. I identify with the name Jacob,
don't you? In myself, I am Jacob. But God
came to that first Jacob whose name means deceiver. He came
to that first Jacob and says, no longer shall you be called
Jacob. Your name's Israel, which means
a prince of God or one who prevails with God. Someone who has held
in a high position with the Lord. You say, how can that name be
mine? It's called grace. It's a name given, not a name
earned. And while we cannot understand
why God gives us that name, that is our name if we are believers
in him, and let Israel hope in the Lord. Now, the apostle teaches
us that we don't hope for things we already have. Do you realize,
child of God, virtually every blessing held out in this gospel
is something you do not yet have? But you hope for it. That's where
your eye is. I'm looking there. I'm tolerating
life because I know what comes at the end. The hope of righteousness. The
hope of the face of our Lord. The hope of uninhibited worship. Boy, this has been good, but
it hadn't been perfect. I was talking to someone last
night and I said, you know, the church is doing the same thing
as the saints in heaven. The saints in heaven do it a
lot better. Won't that be nice? And there's only one preacher
up there, the Lord himself. And I appreciate when you folks
say, that was such a good sermon. Wait till you hear him preach.
You'll be glad. Okay, and just we'll wrap it
up. Let Israel hope in the Lord, for with the Lord there is mercy,
and with him is plenteous redemption. He shall redeem Israel from all
his iniquities. How do you know if you're Israel? You know you're Israel in some
measure if you feel like Jacob. You know you're Israel if you
feel that wretchedness within you of a Jacob, a deceiver, a
scoundrel, a ne'er-do-well. I believe it was you that said
it's those that feel wicked that are righteous, and those that
feel righteous are wicked. Those that say, I'm good enough,
they are yet in their sins. Those who say, oh wretched man
that I am, have no sin in the sight of the Lord. Out of the
depths, that's where you live, cry out. May the Lord add his
blessing. I believe that's what that Isaiah
40 passage was talking about. Comfort ye, comfort ye my people.
Thank you, Joe. I was thinking about what Isaiah
said. All ye that wait upon the Lord
shall renew their strength. They shall mount up with wings
as eagles. They shall run and not be weary.
They shall walk and not faint. Oh, that God would give us faith
to wait on Him. We're going to sing Rock of Ages.
I think it's number 170, no, 126. 126. Rock of Ages. Let's stand together. Thank you. Rock of Ages, cleft for me, let
me hide myself in thee. Let the water and the blood from
thy wounded side which flowed be of sin the double cure. Save from wrath and make me pure. Could my tears forever flow? Could my zeal no longer know? These for sin could not atone. Thou must save and Thou alone. In my hand no price I bring,
Simply to Thy cross I cling. While I draw this fleeting breath,
When my eyes shall close in death, When I rise to worlds unknown,
And behold Thee on Thy throne, Rock of Ages cleft for me,