Come up here and see the church
in New Jersey. Been looking forward to it. I've moved south to North Carolina. That church will do about anything
for me except sing Yankee Doodle Dandy. They're not going to sing that. I had to say that. The thought that came to my mind
when Don was preaching, and it just struck me, it just struck
me so strong. is that God had to put into the
heart of Hosea to love such a woman. But nobody put that into God's
heart to love such a people like you and me. That's just who he
is. God is love. God has to put it
into us through a new creation for us to love one another. But no one put it in his heart.
No one put it in his, he loved. He did it because that's just
who he is. Turn to Psalm 46. When your pastor read, comfort
ye, comfort ye my people, I thought that goes right along with this
psalm. a comforting psalm. I titled
the psalm, or this message, Be Still, My Soul. Be Still, My Soul. The hardest
thing for any of us to do is to be still. To rest, to be quiet,
and know that God is God. It's all in his hands, whatever
it is, it's all in his hands. Now you'll notice in this psalm,
Psalm 46, it says to the chief musician for the sons of Korah,
a song upon Alamoth. There's no name given here as
to the author of this psalm. Yet we know who the author of
this psalm is. It's our Lord. It's our Lord. He's the author of this book. Our Lord inspired the writer of this psalm
to write this for the comfort of his people. But I also know
that our Lord, the Lord Jesus Christ, the man Christ Jesus,
found comfort in his God and our God. He believed God just
like you and I believe God, except he believed God perfectly. He
believed him perfectly. One of the charge when he was
hanging on the cross was this. He trusted in God. Yes, he did. He trusted in God perfectly.
Everything he did, he did perfectly. And our Lord our elder brother,
our savior. He found in God the refuge that
he's given us to find in him, that refuge in God. Here's what's strange. Here's
what's over our head. The man Christ Jesus trusted
in God And he's the God he trusted in. That's over our head, isn't
it? He's the very God he trusted
in. Now, since the fall, every creature needs a refuge. We need a refuge. It is written
over in Proverbs that Coney is a feeble folk, but he makes his
house in the rocks. The bear, as ferocious as it
is, has its den. It needs a shelter. And we have
our houses. We are made in such a way that
we must have a refuge in order for us to live in this world. We must have a refuge. How much
more do we need a refuge in the spiritual realm? Seeing we are a sinful people,
and that God is holy. Holy, holy, holy is what they
cry day and night. They praise his holiness. You
see, when we are sinful and God is holy, we must have a refuge
from his wrath because God must punish sin. And that's exactly
what I am. I'm sin. And he's got to punish
it. We need a refuge from the curse
of the law for the soul The scripture says, the soul that sinneth shall
surely die. We need a refuge from Satan,
for he goes about seeking whom he may devour. He's a very real
person. And I don't want to deal with
him. I don't want to deal with him. He's too much for me, but
he's not too much for our Lord. He's not too much for him. I
heard someone say one time, he's nothing more than a pit bull
on a chain. He does God's will, whether he likes it or not. All
these years, all these years, he's thinking he's gonna bring
down God's people, he's thinking he's gonna blemish the glory
of God, and all the while, all the while, he's doing God's will. You'd think that he would figure
this thing out, wouldn't you? That's how dumb sin makes us.
That's how dumb sin makes us. 6,000 years and he still hasn't
figured it out. That God's just using him to accomplish his will
and his purpose. But I have good news here in
this psalm. The believer has a sure refuge
in the Lord Jesus Christ. Now it starts out, God is, and
that's a good place just to stop right there. God is. God is who he says he is. Not
who I think he is, he is who he is. God is who he is. And the God that is, and there's
only one God that is, and the God that is, is our refuge. He's our refuge in a very present
help. He's our refuge in strength,
a very present help in trouble. You know, when you use the name
God, when you say God, for the most part, people will agree,
most religions, if not all religions, will agree that God is holy.
They will agree that God is powerful, that he has all power. They will
agree to that. They will agree that God created
the heavens and the earth. They will agree to that. But
when you identify God as being Jesus Christ, then you lose the
majority. Because that's who Jesus Christ
is. Jesus Christ is my Lord and my God. He's my Lord and my Creator
and my Savior, my Redeemer, my all-in-all, as what you're saying,
Paul. My all-in-all. We can say this correctly. Jesus Christ is our refuge and
strength, a very present help in trouble. Paul said, I can
do all things through Christ who strengthens me. all things,
there's nothing, absolutely nothing I can't do through Jesus Christ. You would think that we'd be
a, when you consider who made us, it's like David said, why
art thou cast down, O my soul? Hope thou in God. Look who made
you. Infinite wisdom, knowledge, power,
He's our creator. Oh my soul, we ought to expect
big things of God. Really, we ought to expect great
things of God. We think too little of God. We
think way too little of God. It says in Isaiah 32 too, a man
shall be a hiding place from the wind and a covert from the
tempest as rivers of water in a dry place as a shadow of a
great rock in a weary land. And that man is Jesus Christ. It's the Lord Jesus Christ. It's
in him we find refuge and strength and help in time of trouble.
And this word refuge here means also this. It means a shelter
from pursuit. It's a shelter from pursuit from
the avenger of blood. Remember the cities of refuge?
God provided them. God provided them. And God has provided in the Lord
Jesus Christ a refuge from the avenger of blood, the curse of
the law, Satan. Boy, there's nothing more he'd
like than to have you. He said, let me have Job. And
Peter, the Lord said, Peter, Satan has desired you to sift
you as wheat. He'd love to just have you. He
said, let me have him. Let me have him. I can break
him. And all he does is end up glorifying the Lord. Job, at
the end of it, said, by the hearing of the ear, I've heard thee,
and by now mine eye seeth thee, and I abhor myself as sackcloth
and ashes. He glorified God and put himself
in the dust. And God used Satan to do that.
He used him to do that. He's a refuge from the law. He's a refuge from Satan. He's
a refuge from men. But listen, God is especially
a refuge from God himself. The best place to hide from God
is in God. That's the best place to hide
from the wrath of God. The anger of God against sin
is in God. Listen, your life is hid with
Christ in God. That's where it's hid. It's hid
in God. When Satan was going to touch
Job, God said, you can touch all that he has, but you can't
touch his life. You know why? Because his life
is sitting on the throne. Christ who is our life. The scripture
said, when he shall appear, he's our life. And you're not going
to touch him because he'd have to touch Christ again. And that's
not going to happen. That's not going to happen. Your
life is hid with Christ in God. And here, he's a very present
help in trouble. He's one who's always found in
times of trouble. You know, it's hard to find somebody
when you're in trouble. Most people don't want to be
around. When trouble comes, most people don't want to deal with
it. But God's right there. Our Lord is right there. A very present help in trouble.
So often, we view God far away beyond the stars. We just view
Him way out there. But listen, that's not so. That's
not so. He's near. In Him we live and
move and have our being. Just because I cannot sense His
presence does not mean He's not here. Where two or three are
gathered together, He said, there am I in the midst. Do you believe
God's here tonight? That Jesus Christ is here tonight? That to me is an awesome thought.
That the Lord is in our midst. Listen to this scripture. Christ
in you, the hope of glory. Now it doesn't get any nearer
than that. He's in you, the hope of glory. And in times of trouble, the
very present help in trouble, in times of trouble, all trouble,
inward. You know, the believer has inward
trouble that the world knows nothing of. There's a warfare
that goes on in the heart of a believer. that flesh and spirit
warring against each other, struggling against each other. You know,
before the Lord saved me, I didn't have trouble with sin. I had
trouble figuring out how to do it, how to accomplish the lust
of my flesh, how to get it done. That was my trouble. That's the
only thing that troubled me. Mom and dad was in the way. My
dad was strict. You know, he's like, I'm like,
we should go somewhere. I want to, there's some things
I want to do, places I want to go. But after the Lord saved
me, and He saved you, now there's a warfare going on inside. There's
a real battle going on in your heart, in you. And then you got
all these outward troubles. But the Lord has told us in the
Psalm, back over in Psalms 3 and 4, I believe it is, that He's
our shield. You know what that means? It
means he surrounds us. We are literally surrounded by
the Lord Jesus Christ. He said, all power and all authority
is given to me in heaven and earth. He has all power over,
he says, over all flesh in John 17. I'm a shield to my people. I
surround them. He's not way out there somewhere.
He's here. He's here. And because of this,
therefore, will not we fear? Fear plays a big part of our
lives, doesn't it? How many times did the Lord say to the disciples,
why are you so fearful? Why are you so fearful? was in the garden. God created
him, put him in a perfect garden, perfect situation. There was
no fear. He wasn't afraid of the animals,
the lions, the bears. There was no fear until sin entered. And when sin entered, Adam heard
the voice of God walking in the garden in the cool of the day.
And he said, Adam, where art thou? And he said, I heard your
voice and I was afraid. And we've been afraid ever since.
We've been afraid ever since. But our Lord says here, therefore
will not we fear. That doesn't mean we won't have
any apprehensions or anything, but we're not going to be overtaken
with anxious fear, worrisome, wringing the hands, fear. Though the earth be removed, And though the mountains be carried
into the midst of the sea, listen, if they are removed, God did
it. Our Lord did it. Here's a question. What do we
have to be afraid of? Are we ever really in danger?
Are we really ever in danger? When the disciples were in the
boat, and it was in a storm, and the Lord was asleep, in the
back of the boat. There's an example of perfect
faith, being able to sleep no matter what the storm, being
able to rest no matter what the storm is. But he's asleep there
in the back of the boat, and they are about to fall apart. They're bailing out water. Don't
you care that we perish? Were they ever really in danger?
Charles Spurgeon said, if they had drowned, they couldn't have
been in better company. They couldn't have been in better
company. They had nothing. We are as safe sitting here as
those who are gathered around his throne right now. I'm serious.
I'm serious. Just as safe right here. Just as safe on a battlefield.
as if we were surrounded by the throne of God. If we really ever
get a hold of that, we're going to really understand something
about peace. We really understand who God
is in Christ. He's our shield. He's our refuge. He's got us. He's got us. And listen. We have nothing to
fear, no matter what comes our way, because it's ordained of
our Father in infinite wisdom before the creation of the world.
Everything that you will experience in your life has been ordained
of God. That matter was settled before creation. That matter settled before creation.
We have nothing to fear. And nothing will destroy us,
but everything, even the things that we feel like it's going
to tear us apart, is for our good. Our good. You know, if you go prune a bush,
a fruit tree, if you really prune it, it looks like you're killing
it. But you're really doing it good, because it's going to bear
more fruit. Out of that, it's going to bear
more fruit. may remove, it says here back,
let me go back here to this verse. Though the, therefore would not
we fear though the earth be removed, the very things that we live
upon, this earth, this, you know, we've known nothing but this
earth, have we? But you know what, someday it's gonna be removed.
Someday it's gonna, don't put your hopes or your interest or
your investments in this earth. It's going to be removed. And
the mountains carried him to the midst of the sea. This may
have reference to the political landscape or whatever it is that's
going on. If God removes, he's removed
kingdoms, hasn't he? And he raises up, brings up,
raises and brings them down. God does this. God does this. And though the waters thereof
roar and be troubled, Though the mountains shake with the
swelling thereof, one of the most powerful forces on earth
is raging water. I think it's one of the most
scary things there is. But I tell you this, the heavy
trials that come into our souls will not take us away. They will
not take us away. Our Lord assures us He assures
us, as our brother read, when you pass through the water, I'll stand on the other side
and I'll watch you. Come on, you can do it, you can
do it. No, he said, I'll be with you. He was with the disciples
in the boat. I'll be with you. And through the rivers, they'll
not overflow you. And when you enlist, you notice
something here. When? Not if. There's not an if you go through
the water. There's not an if you go through the fire. It's
when. It's going to happen. Just as
sure as you are a child of God, it's going to happen. You're
going to go through the water. And you're going to go through the
river. And you're going to go through the fire. But we have
his promise. He says here, the water, it will
not overflow you. and the rivers will not overflow
you, and when you walk through the fire, thou shalt not be burned." Our Lord did walk through the
fire of God's wrath, and it burned upon Him. It burned upon Him. But it will not burn upon you
and me. All it will do is accomplish
the purpose that God has sent it for. All it will do is remove
some dross. It will remove some dross that
needs to be removed. You know, I used to have a machine
shop and I did Babbitt bearings. And no matter how many times
I heated that pot up, you know, you heat it up to 800 degrees,
and it would just be, it's, Babbitt is like lead. But anyway, you
heat it up to 800 degrees. And then before you would pour
it, you'd take the dross off from it. You know, no matter
how many times I heated that babbit up, I always had dross. I was always amazed how much
dross was still in it. I would heat it up to use it,
and I would skim off a bunch of dross. And then the next time
I'd use it, after it cooled down, I'd heat it back up again. Same
thing. Same thing. And that's what trials
do. He just keeps skimming off the
dross. You think, I don't have that much. Oh, yes, you do. Oh,
yes, you do. And he just keeps skimming off
the dross. That's what they're for. But he's promised us this,
that they will not do us in. No matter what he's saying here,
no matter what he takes away, the Lord giveth. and the Lord
taketh away. He gives an infinite wisdom and
He takes an infinite wisdom. He gives us what we need and
He takes away what we need taken away. He does that. And the flames, He said, will
not kindle upon you. Is God good for His word? God's
good for His word. I don't have to worry about the
fire kindling upon me because it kindled upon my Lord. He took
it away. He took it away. But now I want you to know something.
The first three verses had to do with this life. It had to
do with this earth. It had to do with the things
we live upon, the things that we count on. You know, growing
up, we counted on these things. But now he's going to talk about
the things above. And notice the stability. The things of this earth are
shaken, removed, and are melted, but now the things above, quiet,
steady, steady. There is a river, the streams
whereof shall make glad the city of God, the holy place of the
tabernacle of the Most High. The usual process is for streams
to flow down from the hills and the mountains, and they flow
down into the valley, and they make a river. But here, when
I read this, it's in the reverse. The river is above, and the streams
are flowing down from the river. The streams of mercy and grace
are flowing from the river. Listen, Revelation 22.1, and
he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal,
proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb. Christ
is that pure river of water. And from him, the streams of
mercy and grace and forgiveness, all the blessings that God has
for us are streaming down to us from this river. And there's
no boiled water advisory on this river. It's called pure. It's
pure. It has all the spiritual nutrients
in it we need for time and eternity. Listen, I need a Savior not just for
eternity. I need one now. I need one today. I need one who can save me today
from the power of sin, from the power of indwelling sin. I need
a Savior that can save me now from that, as well as save me
when this is all over with and stand in God's presence. I need
salvation for time as well as I need it for eternity. And I
have that in Jesus Christ. I have that in Him. Now here's another reason not
to fear. God is in the midst of her. As
I said earlier, God is with us. God is among us. God's in the midst of her. She
shall not be moved. God shall help her. Isn't that
right, Hurley? Here's the source of the church's
strength and gladness. God, the Lord Jesus Christ, who
is God, is in the midst of her. I in them, he said, and thou
in me. This is union. This is union. Christ is one
with his people. He's the head and we are the
body. And he gives us a promise here.
She shall not be moved. Come what may, in Christ we are
secure. I'm not worried. I tell you the
truth. I'm not concerned and worried about the political landscape
right now and what's going on. It doesn't tear me up. It does
not tear me up. You know what I find more disturbing?
Is that we're not more concerned with the kingdom of God as we
are with the kingdom of men. We are told in the disciples
prayer to pray thy kingdom come. Our greatest concern is to be
with the kingdom of God. God's controlling all this going
on out here. Our Lord Jesus Christ, the man
Christ Jesus, the captain of our salvation, he's orchestrating
all this. He's taking care of it. And his help is present. It's
early. You know, Martha and Mary thought
he was too late. Lord, if you'd been here, my
brother wouldn't have died. My brother wouldn't have died.
I tell you what, he was right on time. They didn't just witness the
resurrection of the brother, but they got to see the resurrection
and the life standing in front of them. They kept looking for
an event, and he showed them a person. Everybody's looking
for that event, you know. The rest of the church, you know,
looking for the event of the resurrection. Christ said, I'm
the resurrection. Look for me. Look for me. We're looking for him to come. Her foundation is sure, for she
is built upon the rock, Christ Jesus. Remember there in Luke,
he talks about the man who built his house upon the rock. The
winds blew. Storms came but that house stood
because it was built upon the rock. Now he says there in verse six
that the heathen raged. They always will, they've been
raging since the fall. Kingdoms were moved. God raises up and brings down. But notice his power here. He
uttered his voice and the earth melted. He didn't have to assemble a
great army. He uttered his voice. He spoke. Where the word of a
king is, there's power. What are troubles before God?
You know, you and I, we go through troubles. Man born of troubles,
as the sparks fly upward. Man born of one, a few days,
full of trouble. But is anything really a challenge
to God? There was a woman who asked,
I believe it was G. Campbell Morgan, after the service
one morning, and she said, is it right for me to pray about
the little things and not just the big things? And he said, lady, ma'am, everything
with God's little. Everything with God's little.
They may be big problems to you, but they're not to Him. They're
not to Him. Listen, here's encouragement.
The Lord of hosts is with us. That's who's with us. The Lord
of armies. He commands the heaven and the
earth. You know everything that exists serves Him. Everything. It's interesting, when he brought
all those plagues on Egypt, he didn't bring armies of men. He
brought locusts, frogs, and flies, and lice. He's like, I don't
need to bring spears and chariots. I'll just bring my creation.
I'll bring my creation and let you handle that. Isn't that amazing? Everything
serves him. If he wants to bring an army
of ants, he could rule the world with them. He could rule the world with
an army of ants, if he so willed. He could. The Lord of hosts is with us.
The God of Jacob, the God of election, the God who receives
sinners and eats with them is our refuge. Our shelter. Our
shelter. He's with us. We have his presence.
Scripture says if God be for us, who can be against us? The
friend of sinners is with us. Are you a sinner? Oh boy, you're
in good standing. You're in good standing. The Lord who commands heaven
and earth is with us. He's with us. It's like he's saying, take a
trip back in time with me. Come, take a walk with me. Behold
the works of the Lord. Look back over history. Look
at the works of the Lord. Look what, and Don had mentioned
it. He gave Sheba and Seba, he said, for thee. Look at Egypt
and what he did to them at that time. These are the works of
the Lord. These are not the works of men.
These are the works of the Lord. History is his story. It's his
story. Behold the works of the Lord,
what desolations he has made in the earth. Oh, that we would set our hearts
on things above. This God who has made such desolations
in the earth is our God. That we would set our hearts
to know him. To learn of him. Christ said, take my yoke upon
you and learn of me. To learn God is to learn Jesus
Christ. You cannot, you cannot know God
apart from Jesus Christ. Can't be done. He maketh wars to cease until
the end of the earth. He breaketh the bow and cutteth
the spear and thunder. He burneth the chariot into fire.
Here's reconciliation. Reconciliation's his. He hath
reconciled us to himself. It wasn't a cooperation on my
part with him. It's not me and the Lord working
this thing out. He reconciled us to himself. Now he tells us
to be reconciled. That's lay down your gun. Lay it down. Reconciliation is the Lord's
work, it's his work. He make wars, if he didn't, they
wouldn't. Wars would not stop if he didn't
stop them. You say, well, we won the war. He made it stop. Because in a
little while, there'll be another one. And then he'll make it stop.
After he's accomplished his purpose, he'll make it stop. And then
another one, he'll make it stop. And he'll do that until time
is no more. Now, let me wind this up. What are we to do? What are we to do? At all times,
whether the sun is shining or it's storming, be still. That's hard to do. Be still,
know that I'm God. I'm your creator. I'm your sustainer. I'm your provider. I'm your all
in all. Christ is our wisdom, righteousness,
sanctification, and redemption. He's everything we need. Now
be still and know that I'm God. I'll be exalted among the heathen.
I'll be exalted in the earth. We learn most when we are still. We learn most when we are still.
I was telling the church here a couple weeks ago, my grandfather, he was a quiet man. He didn't
say much. He didn't say much. But he said to me one time, I
was just a teenager, he said to me one time concerning a certain
lady, he said, if she had to be still, her ears would slap
her brains out. Isn't that us? Isn't that us? We just can't
be still. It's just like, but, but, but,
and we keep wanting to raise our hand, you know, but, let
me, no, be still. And watch me work. In Providence, watch me work. And what you're going through,
watch me work. Sit back and watch me. Just watch me. You know, when I read the Gospels,
one of the things that I like to do, when I read it, I don't
just read it, I like to watch the Lord move. I like to watch
Him move through the crowd. I like to watch the way He handles
sinners. I like to watch the way He handled those Pharisees
and the scribes. I like to watch Him because I'm
watching God. I'm watching God. He came into
his own creation, became a man. And I'm watching him move among
sinners. I'm watching how he's handling
them, how he's handling the sinners, and how he's handling the self-righteous.
Now be still and watch me. Observe. Observe. Have you ever seen anybody sit?
Now just sit there and observe me. Observe what I'm doing here.
I'm showing you something. You know every day has its lesson.
If we'd pay attention, we might learn it, but every day has its
lesson. And then he repeats it. The Lord
of hosts is with us. The God of Jacob, our refuge. The Lord of armies with us. And
this being so, rest and be still. Be still, my soul. I'm taking
this from the psalm. The Lord is on thy side. The
God of Jacob, the God who receives sinners, the God of election
is our refuge. Apart from Him, listen, there
is no refuge. There is no refuge. If you do
not have the Lord Jesus Christ, if you do not believe on Him,
if you do not love Him, you don't have a refuge. You're in trouble. All right.