I read this chapter 54 of the
book of Isaiah, and I want to call your attention to the last statement in the fifth
verse and talk to you a little bit
here this morning. about who's running this world
and see if that will be of any help
to us. We're glad to see Charles and his wife. Charles is a native
of this Marion County. He's been away in Florida for
a whole lot of years. We loved his mother, his father,
Charles, his brothers, good friends, fine brethren. We're glad to
see you, Charles, and your wife. It says, The God of the whole
earth shall he be called. The God of the whole earth. and
all therein. He's the true and the living
God. There's only one God. One God
in three persons. Three in one and one in three. He rules and He reigns. and there's no limit to his right
to rule and reign. He's over all and he's above
all. None can say unto him, Stay thy
hand. It says here, The God of the
whole earth shall he be called. Who is running this world? several theories as to the answer
to the question, and I'll make mention of some of the theories
that are very prominent and pertinent. The first one is this. How do things come to pass. Now, there is a notion, there
is a view of man that things come to pass according to a fixed
law. And those that hold this view
are referred to as rationalists. They refuse to believe anything
that cannot be explained. Now, that's one view. If you can't explain it with
natural means on natural grounds, it will not be accepted by this
group. And then there is a view or a
notion that things happen by a sort of chance. Now, according
to this view, there's nothing fixed or there's nothing sure
or there's nothing certain. One thing is likely to happen
as another thing. Now, a third view or position
or notion which is held is that everything comes to pass by a
cold, impersonal force called fate. And of course, there is
a biblical view, which I certainly believe, and I prefer to believe
that over and above these other views, because I believe that
whatever is written in the Bible is written by the finger of God.
And everything that is written in the Bible is true, absolutely,
and there are no uncertainties or no questions about it. So
this biblical view is this, that things come to pass according
to the providence of God Almighty. And according to this view, the
Creator God is also the administrator of all that comes to pass. Not only is it from His finger
and from His heart and from His hand, but He is also the administrator
of all that takes place. Now, the government of God in
the affairs of this world certainly is a subject of great importance
primarily to the believer. It is of great importance to
the unbeliever, too, but it is of a greater importance to the
believer, for it is only by the right and proper view of Now,
we've talked about that here in recent days, the right view
of who God is. If you have the wrong view of
who God is, you start off wrong and you're going to wind up wrong.
In order to have the right view of God, to start off right, you're
going to wind up right. make a big mistake on that. So
the subject is of great importance to the believer because it's
only by having the right view and understanding of God and
His providence that the believer will learn to look for and will
be able to see God's hand in everything that transpires. And
there's very few among Adam's fallen race, believers or unbelievers,
that can see and do see the hand and the heart and the finger
of God in everything that transpires and takes place in this world.
God is behind it all. It's either his command or the
will of his command. It's either his purpose or it
lies with faith. So I see the finger of God. All things work together for
good. Now, what happens to us? We go to that verse of Scripture
in the 8th chapter of the book of Romans where he says that
all things work together for good to them that love God, to
them who are the called according to his purpose. Now, if you don't
believe that God's running this show, that He's in charge and
He's the boss, and He's the only one that's qualified to run this
government and the affairs of government and the affairs of
this world, if you don't see that then, then you'll have no
comfort out of the fact that all things work together for
good to them that love God. Little things and big things. Things that we call accidents.
things that are unforeseen to us. All of them in the mind and
the will and the purpose of God, they are working out for our
good and for the glory of God. So it is subject of great importance
to the believer, especially to the believer. You see, God is
not idle. He's not up there twiddling his
thumbs. Our Lord said Himself, He said,
My Father worketh, hitherto I work. God is the one person always
on the job. He's not like the ball player. I watch the ball games now and
then on the television, sometimes go and see I haven't for a long
time, but sometimes I have, and maybe I will again before I die. I don't know. But they're not
like ball players. Take time out to rest. When they play a baseball game,
they have one team is out in the field, and the other team
is sitting on the bench resting, and one fellow's up to bat. And
when he bats, Another fellow gets up, he strikes out, he comes
back and rests. Not like ball players taking
time out to rest, not like the tired farmer who must, out of
need, he must eat and he must sleep to recuperate strength
for another day's work. It's not like the prize fighter
who goes to the corner between rounds and gets patched up and
cooled off. God is not idle like those. Our God knows nothing of weariness. He never gets weary. He knows
nothing of weariness and He knows nothing of emergencies. Nothing ever slips up on God's
blind side that he can't see or that he doesn't know about.
He is never at wit's end. You've heard that expression
many times. Well, I've just come to wit's
end. I've come to the end of myself. I don't know what to say. I don't
know what to do. I don't know where to look. I'm
just completely flabbergasted. I'm exhausted, I'm at wit's end. He's never at wit's end. He always
knows what to do, when to do it, and how to do it. He's the
one and the only person qualified to rule and to control his creation. That is Jehovah God, the one
God, the true and the living God who knows all things, who's
at all places, at all times, who had no beginning and he has
no ending. He is self-existent, the true
and the living God. Well, there's a lot of people
who might think that God is doing a bad job in governing this world. They feel like that it's out
of control, that there is no main man at the head of the helm,
that there's no one steering the ship. And if there is anyone
steering the ship, he's asleep on the job because he's not doing
it like it ought to be done. Well, they say it's a bad job
in governing this world. But they say if they were in
control, they said they'd propose some changes. They change things
around a little bit. Some think that on the account
of the condition of this world, which we've talked about many
times, which you all know about, everyone knows about the condition
of this world, that there's just everything going on, things that
are unthinkable, things that are taking place now that never
took place 100 years ago, and just the condition in general.
It's a mess. And so they say, like, I remember
when I was a boy and the Depression was on and people didn't have
jobs and they had bread lines and you went to the, you'd go
to the union hall and they'd give people a sack of flour and
cornmeal and stuff like that. and just hard times, and there
came a politician on the scene, Mr. Roosevelt, and they characterized
his program as a new deal. He proposed a new deal, and his
new deal brought about some relief to a downtrodden nation and starving
people, his new deal. And that's a little bit like
what some people would like now who think that this show is not
being run right and it's kind of out of control. And if they
had their way, they'd propose a few changes and bring in a
new deal. Well, some might suggest and
have suggested and many times that God ought to kill the devil,
that that'd take care of all this, that if God had just cut
the head off of the devil and do away with him, everything
would be all right. But they're not taking into consideration
that all men, all men outside, of the Lord Jesus Christ. Those
men that are not in Christ are out of Christ, and they're just
as bad as the devil, because their human nature is to pray. It's to pray if there's no good
in them. So if you'd have them running the world, it'd be worse
shape than what it is now. Well, some suggest that. Let's kill the devil. Why don't
God just kill the devil? Why don't God put men like Benito
Mussolini and Adolf Hitler and other warmongers, why don't He
just do away with these kind of people? Why did He ever leave
them, come to the surface to begin with? Why don't, why didn't
He put them away and replace them with peace-loving men, men
that love peace and let them be in charge. Well, if God is
the Almighty and He is in control, which He is, He is the Almighty
God and He is in control, and He could easily do any one of
these things, but He will not be told what to do. You can't
tell God what to do and how to do it. because he's on the throne,
and he's running the show, and it'll be run his way, or it won't
be run at all. Now, if God's not running this
world, who is? That's a good question, isn't
it? If God's not on the job, if he's not on the circle of
the throne, if he's not doing his bidding, well, then who is?
Who do we attribute that great and universal kingship and throneship
to if God is not on the throne? Well, a whole lot of people think
that the devil is. Well, others think it's the politicians. I've heard that. It's the politicians
that's got this world in the mess that they're in. Well, we
didn't used to do this, and we didn't used to do that, and we
got this politician with his liberal thoughts, and we got
this one with his conservative thoughts, and they've just messed
things up. It's the politicians they're
to blame. Others think that it might be the gangsters or the
racketeers or the mafia, the drug dealers and all of that,
and some of those lords of drugs down in South America. Venezuela
and Colombia and Peru and those places, if we could crack down
on them. Well, there's no doubt in my
mind, though, that Hitler, that he meant to rule this world.
But his end came to an end, didn't it? Men ruled, but God overruled. Man turns, but God overturns. If God, who created the world,
and He's not running it, why isn't He running it? Is He not running this world
because He can? Because He lacks the power? Is
that the reason God's not running this world? Oh, listen, if He's
not running this world, why isn't He running it? Well, it must
be because he does not want to or he's not able to, one of the
two. He's not able to or he doesn't
want to if he's not running this world. But Bob and I and Margaret,
now we agree, don't we Bob, that God on the throne and he's running
this world and it's It's being run just exactly as God has planned
and purposed and willed it to be run, just exactly. Everything
is going on just like God purposed and planned and predestinated
it. Now, a believing sinner, a believing
sinner, that's what I am. I'm a believing sinner. And most
of you out there this morning, you are believing sinners. You
are not an unbelieving sinner. You are a believing sinner. You
believe the testimony of God concerning your son. You believe
that God knows all that takes place down here. He knows all
your thoughts. He knows all your ways. down
settings and your uprisings, He knows all about you. And He
knows that you're a sinner by nature and by choice and by practice. He knows there's no hope for
you, and He knows that if you are not rescued, that you're
going to wind up where God is not. And so God, in His grace,
in His mercy, in His kindness, in his everlasting love sent
the Lord Jesus Christ from heaven. In that great mystery, God came
down and become a man, and as a man stood responsible for all
of those that God gave to Christ before the world ever was. Now,
a believing sinner will own and admit in a New York minute that
God is on the throne and God will do as he pleases to whom
he pleases as often as he pleases without hesitation. Now this
kind of, the kind of a world that God is running, That's an
important question, I think. What kind of a world is this
that God's in charge of, that is running? Well, in the first
place, the first thing that comes to my mind as I attempt to answer
that question, the kind of a world, what kind of a world is God's
running, I say the kind of world that God is running has a devil
in it. There is a devil in this world,
and he is not by himself. He has demons. There were many
angels in heaven, and some of them fell, fallen angels, all
the fallen And the devil and his demons are in this world. And they are our enemies. And
they would do us in if they could. And it's only by the power and
the wisdom of God that they don't. And everything is going according
to schedule. The kind of world God is running
has a devil in it, and the devil is more popular with the citizens
of this world than God the Creator is. They give him more attention
than they do the Creator God. Satan, the devil, is called the
God of this world. He's the God of this world, but
the God over the God of this world is God Himself, and for
reasons unknown to me, but not reasons that are unknown to God,
He permits the devil to be the God of this world, the prince
of the power of the air. And he said about the rest of
the world, unbelievers, he said that you who are not a believer
or a follower or an honorer of the Son of God, he said, ye are
of your father. Ye are of your father who is
a liar and the father of lies. These are the kind of people
that's in this world that God's running. They have a devil in
it, the cheap enemy of man, and they have fallen angels and demons,
and the average citizen thinks more of the devil than he does
of God Almighty. He's more popular with them than
God is himself. Now, at the beginning of human
history, our first parents, Adam and Eve, deliberately, of their
own accord, by their so-called free will, rebelled against the
will of God and became the devil's friend. They took the side of the devil
against the side of God. They transferred their loyalty
and allegiance from the God of truth to the Father of lies. The Lord Jesus The Lord Jesus
himself told some in his day that they were hypocrites and
that their father was the devil. Now, the world that God is running
is full of depraved men and women and boys and girls who are the
offspring of Adam and Eve. It was by one man's disobedience. It was Adam, our federal head,
who acted in our state. We fell in Adam. And if we rise again, It will
be in Christ. We fell on Adam, but we must
rise again in him. The world that God is running
is filled with depraved men and women. Every man, apart from
inwrought grace in his soul, is an enemy of God. The Apostle
Paul said that the carnal mind hates God. None but regenerate
people whom God hath quickened, who have been born of the Spirit
of God, are lovers of the true God. It's not to say that they
don't have a God, but they do not know the true and the living
God. Their God is the God of their
imagination. They believe in a God that's
trying to do something, but He cannot accomplish it because
depraved men and women will not permit Him to have His way. They
believe in that kind of a God. Only true believers who believe
in the testimony of God concerning His Son believe in the true and
the living God. I want you to listen to the lips
of incarnate truth as found in the Bible in Matthew chapter
15. It says this, our Lord Jesus
speaking Himself, He said, For out of the heart proceed evil
thots, murderers, adulterers, fornication, theft, false witnesses,
and blasphemers. Oh, that's depravity. That's what comes out of the
natural man. Well, now we should be able to
understand that God is not running this world as he would run it
if there were nobody in it but people that were in love with
him and people that delighted to do his will. Our persons, or let me say, in relative to how
this world is being run by God now, since this world is not
made up of all people who love God and delight to do His will. It's made up of railers and thieves
and blasphemers and depraved men and women. So God runs this
world different now than he would if all of us were his children. You see, earth is not like heaven. Prisons are not run like children's
homes. If you're in prison or in jail,
you find out real quick that they didn't run that prison like
your mother runs her home or like the kindergarten that they
have in preschool that is run by these fine young ladies and
older women. God's not running this world
like they run the children's preschool or preschool, like
a prison. You've got a bunch of depraved
people in this world. Well, I know that the cry of
a lot of people is, Why doesn't God do something? Why don't he do something? Well, God is doing something,
but the problem is we can't understand God's way. If you can't see the finger and
hand and heart of God in all things, then you don't understand
His ways. He's doing something, but we
just don't see it or understand it. You see, Paul declares in
the Scriptures that the judgments of God are unsearchable and His
ways pass finding out. We must, you and I who are believers,
we've got to take God at His word. He's too wise to make mistakes. There's no mistakes with God,
no second thoughts with God. We have to walk by faith and
believe that he doeth all things well, our God. All things, not
some things, but all things. Now, God's in charge. He has
control over all things, even irrational creatures. God has
control of them. Now, he formed the beasts of
the fields, and he brought them to Adam to be named. And Adam named every one of the
beasts of the fields. And he caused two of every unclean
animal to come to Noah into the ark to perpetuate their kind
upon this earth. And then he brought seven pairs
of clean beasts that Noah might have a sufficient amount of animals
to offer for sacrifice at his bidding. He caused a swarm of
flies to invade the houses of Egypt while they did not come
into the Israelites' homes. Of his will and command, Egypt
was covered with frogs and locusts. What I'm saying is, that God
is in charge. He is in control of irrational
animals and beasts. They respond to his bidding and
to his directions. Well, it says that David was
cast into the lion's den, but God locked the jaws of the lion,
and David remained untouched." Now, Jonah did not want to go down
to Tarshish, and he got on a ship to go in the other direction
to get away from God, and God caused a great storm on the ocean. to rock the boat, and the sailors
on that boat kind of figured that Jonah was a bad omen, and
they grabbed him and throwed him off of the ship. And no more
than he hit the water, God caused the great fish to swallow Jonah. And the first thing you know,
that great fish slammed to the beach and God caused that great
fish to vomit up Jonah on the dry land. God, you see, controls
even the irrational creatures. Spit him up on the ocean. Make no mistake about it this
morning. God is in charge. I remember reading there in the
book of Luke that at God's will, the rooster crowed three times
just when the Lord told Peter it would. God is running this for the highest
good. Listen to me now. Follow me closely. God is running this world for
the highest good. What is the highest good? What is the most important thing
in the universe? Can you tell me? The highest
good is not the pleasure and the profit of the devil. He's the enemy of God. and the enemy of good. He's not
the most important person. His welfare is not even in part
of God's plan or God's objective. The highest good is not the welfare
of humankind or the human race. The highest good, the greatest
possible objective, is the glory of God Almighty, and the chief
duty of man is the same as God's objective, which is the glory
of God. Whether we eat or drink or whatsoever
we do, we do to the glory of God. Oh, my soul! Look over here in Revelation
chapter 4, Verse 11, I think I'll read that and I'm going
to quit. Listen to what it says here.
This is kind of the foundation stone of everything I've said. God's the only person in all
the universe who has the right to ask for his own glory. His
glory is the rule of his actions, and his glory is the rule. of
human conduct, chief duty of man. Listen to what it says here
now, 11th verse. Thou art worthy. He's the only
one that's worthy. There's no other being in the
universe that is worthy. Thou art worthy, O Lord, to do
what? To receive glory and honor and
power. Now, listen to this. For thou
hast created all things and for thy pleasure they are and were
created." We're created for the glory of God. And that's the
highest objective. Who's running this world? God's
running it. He always was. He always will. He'll never be defeated. That's
wishful thinking on the part of most of this ungodly generation. God will be defeated. His purposes
will be thwarted. Never, never, never, never. God's on the throne. Everything
is going exactly as God has predetermined. There is not anything out of
kilter. We look at this sad, gloomy,
terrible, terrible world in which we live. And we think, oh, my
soul, something's got to happen. But as God looks at it, it's
going just exactly as He willed it in eternity past. And that's how it'll all turn
out, just like God planned it. So I'm forced. I'm forced to bow. bow to God in Christ. This stand will be different.