So may it please Almighty God
to be with us and bless us together this evening. Let's turn to the
first book of the Chronicles, chapter four and verse 10. The first book of the Chronicles,
chapter four and reading verse 10. And Jabez called on the God
of Israel, saying, O that thou wouldst bless me indeed, and
enlarge my coast, and that thine hand might be with me, and that
thou wouldst keep me from evil, that it may not grieve me. And
God granted him that which he requested. Well, we don't know anything
about Jabez, really. All that we know that he was
recorded and his prayer was the prayer that he offered up to
God. And we can see the importance and the relevance of it. And we should be very grateful
that God, in his mercy toward the Church of God, has recorded
such prayers. As we know, there are well-known
prayers in the Bible, Solomon's prayer and David's prayers, and
Ezra and Nehemiah, and there are much longer prayers and good
prayers. We also have a very short prayer,
the Phoenician woman, just simply three words, Lord help me. So it's not the length of prayer,
it's obviously the relevance of it and the importance of it.
And here we have in this tenth verse in this fourth chapter
in the first book of the Chronicles a number of requests. There are
four requests really in this verse which we read, this tenth
verse. And we're told that Jabez called
on the God of Israel. Well there were many false gods
in the age in which he lived. And there are many false gods
today. And some people say, well, there's only one God. Doesn't
matter who you pray to. Well, it does matter who we pray
to. And there is only one true God. And what we read here is very
true. The God of Israel. The God who
created all things. The God who ever lives. The God
who always was and is. and ever will be. It's just a
great mystery for us today. Our little minds are couched
in time. We understand time. We cannot
understand eternity. We may try and think of the length
of it. Well, there's no harm in that,
and it's good sometimes to try and do that. But we won't really
be able to reach a conclusion because it's something that you
and I can't understand. So here we have a God, the God
of Israel, who, as I've said, always was and is today and always
will be. And that in itself should be
a wonderful strength and a wonderful encouragement to each one of
us. So that as we come in prayer,
we don't come to an unknown God. You may remember when the Apostle
Paul was on Mars Hill in Athens, he saw there was a notice to
the unknown God. Well, bless God that we can come
to a God, a true God. And it's a great blessing if
you and I know that God. if we pray to him and we've known
what it is to be blessed with what we might term access at
the throne of grace so that we know that our prayers do enter
in to the holy place where Jesus is and our prayers are accepted
not because they're very good prayers that we've put together
No, because they're presented to God the Father in glory by
His Son and our Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ. You see, we always must realise
that God the Father is a holy God. He cannot look upon sin,
and we cannot actually approach directly to Him, but we can through
the Lord Jesus Christ. And what a wonderful, glorious
truth that is. We as unworthy sinners. And again,
it's a blessing if God has shown to us that we are a sinner. The
amazing truth is that although we're sinners, through the Lord
Jesus Christ, we can come and pray. We can cry unto our God,
just like Javis did here. called on the God of Israel. Well, may we remember that God
is always awake. God doesn't sleep. He's alive
forevermore. And that's an amazing truth for
you and me because we are of the earth and we only work in
time. We don't understand eternity, but to think that this God always
was. Always was. That's beyond our
comprehension, isn't it? And He was the God that created
all things by our blessed Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ. And He
always will be. He'll never die. And you and
I, my friends, each one of us, will one day face that God. face to face, we're told every
eye shall see Him, you and me. Well, it'll be a great and glorious
blessing if you and I possess the wonderful favour from God
to know that we are born again of His Spirit and that Jesus
has taken away our sins And it's well with our souls. Because
if that is so, we have nothing to fear. Nothing to fear. And we'll know that it is well
with our souls. What a great blessing that is.
So here we have Jabez calling on the God of Israel. And may
we therefore be encouraged by that. and may we each be found
calling on the God of Israel sometimes we can be very casual,
can't we? in our prayers and sometimes
it's almost as though we treat God as just another human being
and yet God is high and lifted up you may remember in Isaiah's
prophecy Isaiah had that vision of God And he saw him as high
and lifted up. Oh, it was a great view. My friends,
God is high and lifted up. And yet to think that we can
come to him with our prayers, through our great and glorious
Saviour, that wonderful high priest, the Lord Jesus Christ. Well, Jabez called on the God
of Israel. And may we all be found calling
on the God of Israel with sincerity. And as we come to find that we
come believing. We read together, didn't we,
in that fifth chapter of the epistle of John, the need there
is to believe. And so it is for each one of
us as we come to our God in prayer, we are to believe. that he is
indeed the great and the almighty God. And that fifth chapter commenced
with these words, whosoever, whosoever, that's very comprehensive,
isn't it? Whosoever believeth that Jesus
is the Christ is born of God. And everyone that loveth him
that begat loveth him also that is begotten of him. By this we
know that we love the children of God when we love God and keep
his commandments. We see the relevance of such
a great truth as this. And it's a wonderful word, a
gospel invitation, isn't it? Whosoever believeth, that Jesus
is the Christ, is born of God, and we can pause and ask ourselves
the question, do I believe that Jesus is the Christ? Do I believe? You know, we may
have been brought up in religious circles, we may have always assumed
such a truth, but the reality is, You and I stand before God. And we have to answer God. And
we have a statement here, a great statement. Whosoever believeth
that Jesus is the Christ is born of God. And as I mentioned in
prayer, you can read the third chapter in the Gospel of John
and find out the words of the Savior, where he said so very
clearly, you must be born again. That was an answer to Nicodemus,
who came trying to justify himself. He didn't understand it. But
nonetheless, what a blessing if you and I come to God. with
that faith to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. And so here
was Jabez calling on the God of Israel, clearly believing
that he was coming to the true God. And then there are four
questions really, which he asks. And the first one is, O that
thou wouldest bless me indeed. Now it's very interesting to
note that it's a statement, it's a big statement, it's a comprehensive
statement, but he doesn't dictate to God. He doesn't say, I want
this particular blessing, I need this particular situation. He comes in all honesty and yet
very simply and asks God that he would bless him indeed. That
means that he left the issue with God. And sometimes we think
we know what we need. The reality is God knows truly
what we need. We may think we know what we
need, but we may be far short of the mark. It's far, far better
to come to God in these simple terms, and ask in similar words
to those that Javis did. Oh, that thou wouldest bless
me indeed. You see, God knows what you and
I need. He knows everything. And there
may be things that you and I are not really aware of in our spiritual
life, also in our natural life. You see, God, he deals with all
things. He deals with all things. And
clearly Jabez had faith in God because he was willing to come
in this very direct and yet very simple way and calling on God
with this straightforward request, O that thou wouldest bless me
indeed. I wonder if we've prayed that
prayer. Only you know whether you've
prayed that prayer or not. You may not have thought it was
relevant. You may have thought your prayers are wonderful. You
may have got them all nicely in order as far as you think,
but they may not be in accordance with God's will to answer them
in the way that perhaps you want them answered. You see, God's
ways are higher than our ways. His plans are perfect. Our plans are imperfect. And you may ask me, why is it
that our plans are imperfect? It's because we have a sinful
heart. And because we have a sinful
heart, there are those prayers that we may put up thinking they're
pure prayers. But if God answered them, perhaps
in the way that you and I wanted them to be answered. The question
is, would we give God all the honour and all the glory? And
probably, in the back of our mind, we'll be thinking, oh,
well, I prayed that prayer and therefore God's answered it.
Well, you see, God is a holy God and also God is a jealous
God. And God will have. the honour
and glory in our lives. So we have here a very simple
and a very direct statement, O that thou wouldest bless me
indeed. We don't know what the result
would be. And perhaps in our lives, if we came like that,
we might not know what the result would be. But we do know this. that the result would be a good
result. You see, you and I can make mistakes
in our lives. You and I can ask for things
which won't bring honour and glory to God. You and I ask for
things perhaps that we would consume ourselves and pat ourselves
on the back and rather than bring God the glory, they would perhaps
tend to bring us to glory. Well that won't work will it?
God is almighty God and he will have the honour and glory. So
God in his love, we must always remember this, God in his love
to us, even today, has given us such a wonderful and simple
example as how we should pray. I owe that thou wouldst bless
me indeed. What a wonderful mercy, if you
and I come to God with an open heart, not a great list of requirements,
but just a very simple statement, leaving the issue with God. And
you might just ponder this, you see, you and I don't know what's
going to happen tomorrow. You and I don't know what's going
to happen in a week's time or a month's time. But God does. Because God knows the end from
the beginning. And God knows what has been ordained
for you and me. And to think that God has ordained
those favours, those blessings, sometimes those corrections,
sometimes we expect God to answer in a certain way and it will
bring with it wonderful blessings. Well sometimes God does answer
but it doesn't bring a blessing in the way that we perhaps expect. Sometimes God graciously corrects
us, corrects us and perhaps brings things into our lives that we
realise we've been on the wrong track. We haven't been doing
God's will. We've been doing our will. The devil is very subtle. We
should always remember that. If we need any encouragement
as to the truth of that, you only have to read the third of
Genesis and you see how subtle the devil was. He hasn't changed
his skills. He still operates the same way. So let us realise that God has
given us here a very simple prayer. It's been recorded in the Word
of God for our benefit. And we shouldn't therefore think,
well it's irrelevant to me. It might suit other people, but
it doesn't suit me. Well perhaps if you do a little
more examination, into our hearts, we might find it is suitable. And it is an adequate prayer. O that thou wouldest bless me
indeed. Well, that's the first point
then in this prayer of Jabez. And then he comes with the second
point. And he asks, and enlarge my coast. You may think that's a fairly
vague term. Well, it probably is a fairly vague term. We're not told whether it relates
to his natural life or if it relates to his spiritual life. But nonetheless, he is totally
open to what the Lord has in store for him. And he comes and
says, O that thou wouldst bless me indeed and Enlarge my coast. Enlarge perhaps his spiritual
understanding. I wonder how often we pray for
that. We may pray for natural things.
We want this and we want that. We expect God to bow down and
answer it almost immediately. And yet you see there's the far
greater need that you and I have to have our spiritual coast enlarged. What does that mean? It means
to have greater understanding of God the Father, greater understanding
of God the Son, and greater understanding of the work of the Holy Spirit. It's a wonderful consideration,
as we may ponder, what God is doing for us what he has done
for us and to commit our way to him that he will give us an
enlarged understanding of his grace his grace of course is
unmerited favour well it's a blessing if you and I know something of
his grace the unmerited favour and then to desire that that
might be enlarged. You see, very often our minds
are very small. And yet it's good if God shows
to us what he has done for us, what he has shown us. We may
not always realise what God's done for us. We may not always
realise he's shown to us our need. He's given us spiritual
desire after spiritual realities and we may not always understand
that but you see it's God's gracious and loving way to enlarge our
coast and the truth is when God enlarges our spiritual understanding
or perhaps in our natural life and when it's so clear that it's
God's work it's he that's done it It's not our own natural ability. We're very easily sidetracked
to claim our own natural ability to have understood certain things.
But you should realise that it is the mercy and goodness of
God. It comes down to this, really.
It's His love toward us. He hasn't left us, as it were,
on the shelf. No, He's dealing in love with
our soul. And my friends, God is dealing
in love to our soul. He's enlarging our coast. He's
enlarging our coast for this great and glorious reason. To bring honour and glory to
His name. So that He is lifted up in our
estimation and we desire to praise and honor our God. We don't want
to claim glory to ourselves. We want to give God the honor
and God the glory. You only have to trace out the
lives of God's saints in the Word of God and especially the
prayers which have followed God's blessing. The prayers of Solomon
and David and Ezra and Nehemiah, they're very wonderful and they
set forth what God has done. Oh, it's good to be able to trace
out what God has done. And this brings us then, doesn't
it, to this position. And enlarge my coast. And God
has graciously enlarged our spiritual understanding, enlarged perhaps
our natural understanding. And it's God that's done it.
And God then gets the honour and glory. And we come and we
stand amazed and we think, I would never have understood that myself
but God has taught us and God has shown us and the result is
this that we've grown spiritually, we've grown in grace and in the
knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ that should be the
constant desire and aim of each one of us to spiritually grow
not remain just in a very, very minor way. The Gospel's so glorious. The work of God is so wonderful.
And it's lovely to sit down and meditate upon God's plan of salvation. It brings glory to God. It brings
comfort to our souls. And we can rejoice in the work
of God. Oh my friends how wonderful it
is and it gives us confidence to press on although we live
in perhaps a difficult age at the present time to realize that
God reigns God's in charge of everything and things can't occur
in this world unless God gives permission We sometimes forget
that great and wonderful truth. And so here we have this statement
before us here. And enlarge my coast. Enlarge my coast. And that must
really and truthfully centre upon an enlargement in our hearts
of what Christ is. what God the Father is, and God
the Holy Spirit is, and to have greater views of their glorious
work, and glorious views of the wonderful plan of salvation,
and the wonderful consideration to think that you and I, unworthy
as we are, are part of that great and wonderful plan. and that
one day, by his grace, we shall be with him in glory. Oh, that thou wouldest enlarge
my coast. And then he says, and that thine
hand might be with me. You may say, well, what does
that mean? That means that we want God to take us by our hand
and lead us on. Lead us on. I wonder if again
if that is a real desire that we have before God, that God
would indeed lead us on. You may remember the 107th Psalm
gives us a wonderful picture of God's taking Israel by their
hand. He says, O give thanks unto the
Lord, for he is good, for his mercy endureth for ever. Let the redeemed of the Lord
say so. We're not to be silent in these
things. That's the problem in the day
and age in which we live. We're often there with our mouths
closed, talking about everything under the sun apart from the
greatness and mercy and the redemption of God. And gathered them out
of the lands from the east and from the west, from the north
and from the south. They wandered in the wilderness
in a solitary way. They found no city to dwell in. Hungry and thirsty, their soul
fainted in them. They cried unto the Lord in their
trouble, and he delivered them out of their distresses. The
Lord does, in his love, mustn't forget that, to our souls, bring
us into difficulties, into times of trouble. And what he does
then is to deliver us out of them. And when he delivers us
out of them, it's then that we truly desire to praise and honor
and glorify our God. And that's why David goes on
in the seventh verse and he tells us very clearly, and he, that
means God, led them forth by the right way. God doesn't
make any mistakes. Here was this wonderful and simple
prayer that was put up and that thy hand might be with me. So here we have this, and he
led them forth by the right way. You and I, my friends, left to
ourselves, would make no end of mistakes. We'd find we'd go
in the wrong way, we'd find it might be a dead end, find it
might be a very sinful way, but God leads in the right way. he
led them forth by the right way that they might go to a city
of habitation and what this shows to us is you and I are on a journey
we were born into this world we're on a journey we're passing
through this world And what a great blessing if God is leading us,
taking us by our hand, leading us on this journey to bring us
safely at home to that glorious city of heaven that might go
to a city of habitation. How humbling to have the evidence
in our own hearts that God has and is perhaps hearing A prayer
like this on our behalf, O that thou wouldest, O that thou wouldest,
that thy hand might be with me. Yes, God's hand. It's wonderful
if you and I have proved it in our lives. We can see how God
has brought us to the present moment of time. He's led us forth
by the right way. that they might go to a city
of habitation. And with those first seven verses
in this 107th Psalm, that then gives us a wonderful picture.
And David then breaks out with this statement, O that men would
praise the Lord for his goodness and for his wonderful works to
the children of men. How often do we do that? How often do we praise the Lord
for His goodness and for His wonderful works to the children
of men? Have you got reason to do that?
Well if we're the children of God we definitely have. We definitely
have. And yet so often the devil silences
us. He's very skillful and he'll
tell you You don't want to say anything about that because all
it will do is to bolster your pride. God knows how to deal
with you and me and our pride. You do that what's right. You
do that which brings honour and glory to God. Oh that men would
praise the Lord for his goodness and for his wonderful works to
the children of men. And so then as Jabez says, oh
that thou wouldest Bless me indeed, enlarge my coast, and that thy
hand might be with me. Yes, do we look for God's hand
to lead us? Do we expect God's hand to lead
us? You know, and that's not just in big things, it's in small
things. Small things. But it's good if
it's in all things. We want God's hand to lead us,
don't we? With having husbands and wives, the Lord provides
that and the Lord can direct, the Lord can provide. We need
things also, where to live, what to do, perhaps what car to get. We need all those directions. Let's not forget, God is the
one who can kindly guide and direct us in these things, so
that we can be very thankful for His goodness and mercy toward
us, and then desire to praise Him and thank Him for His wonderful
works to the children of men. We might ask ourselves, ask the
question, what works has God done for you and me? our souls. Any work of God in our souls
without any doubt is a wonderful work. Have we praised God for it? Have we thanked him for it? For
his goodness and for his wonderful work? My friend he's worthy of
praise isn't he? He could have left us. He could
have forsaken us. Because, as it were, cast us
overboard. It's wonderful, isn't it, to
think that we have such a God and we can surely understand
a little more then why such a prayer is so succinct, so simple, and
yet so necessary and so powerful. Well, David knew it, he knew
the the blessing of it, and he tells us, for he satisfieth the
longing soul. He was, Jabez, longing, wasn't
he? He was longing after the blessing
of the Lord. He was crying out for it. He was praying for it. And so
we're told, for he satisfieth the longing soul and filleth
the hungry soul with goodness. What promises we have in the
Word of God. What great truths we have in
the Word of God. And may we praise and thank him
for it. And we can't go through all this
psalm, it's quite a long psalm, but just one more comment perhaps.
Such as sit in darkness and in the shadow of death. being bound
and affliction and iron because they rebelled against the words
of God and contend the counsel of the Most High. Perhaps you
and I have rebelled against the words of God. We're not very
happy how things are working out. The plans that we hatched
don't seem to be running smoothly. It seems that there's a cog in
the wheels. It seems that things are being upset. Well, and sometimes
it may be, therefore, God then brings us like this. We're sitting
in darkness. We thought it would all be light,
but it's not. Why is it? Because we're walking
contrary to God. Believe me, the Word of God is
very clear. If you and I walk contrary to
God, He will walk contrary to us. He leaves us and gives us
very clear directions in his word, but sometimes we don't
like the directions and we turn away from them. But then he tells
us, because they rebelled against the words of God and contend
the counsel of the Most High, therefore he brought down their
heart with labour they fell down and there was none to help do
you know what that is sometimes? to be surrounded with difficulties
and problems and you fall down there's no one to help and then
as you examine yourselves you'll see that you and I are the problems
we brought it on ourselves We rebelled against the path the
Lord is leading us in. Well, therefore he brought down. What did they do? What did Israel
do? And what are we to do? Just like
James did. Then they cried, they prayed
unto the Lord. their trouble, and he saved them
out of all their distresses. He brought them out of darkness
and the shadow of death and brightened their bands in sun. Oh that men
would praise the Lord for his goodness and for his wonderful
works to the children of men. And so here we have this grand
statement O that thou wouldst bless me indeed, and that thy
hand might be with me. And then the fourth point is,
and that thou wouldst keep me from evil, that it may not grieve
me. We often perhaps don't realise
the significance of such a cry of such a prayer. O that thou
wouldest keep me from evil, that it may not grieve me. And that
in itself is really a comprehensive statement. It doesn't mean that
you and I have got to go out and rob a bank or kill somebody. It can just be thoughts in our
mind. Evil thoughts. Evil thoughts. see how subtle the devil is and
my friends he can bring evil thoughts into our mind just like
that and we think how did that come? it's because the devil was on
the watch to see little gaps in our armour and jump in when
he gets the smallest opportunity and so here we have this statement,
this prayer O that thou wouldst bless me indeed, and that thou
wouldst keep me from evil, that it may not grieve me. Well, it's
a wonderful thing, isn't it, to have a mind which directs
us to the situation that quite easily we can be overcome Don't
think you and I are strong. Don't think we can keep ourselves.
We're told no man, no man can keep alive his own soul. That's why we need to have a
little prayer like this, to constantly pray unto God, O that thou wouldest
keep me from evil, that it may not grieve me. And then what
he said, then what do we read? Well, we read the prayer, the
four points in the prayer. And then what's the result? And
God granted him that which he requested. Now you will note
that in all those requests, they were all general requests. There
wasn't any specific things. They were all general requests
because God knows how to bring about deliverance and what to
do and God is in control and what a blessing and what a mercy
it is and so tonight we should really come and we should thank
God that there is in the Word of God a simple prayer like this
and I hope you all will remember where it is it's in the first
book of Chronicles and the fourth chapter and the tenth verse And
it's a good prayer to go to again and again. You may be in difficulty,
in turmoil in your mind. Well, we're not told what James
was like, but we are told he prayed this prayer. And so by
the grace of God, may we all take to heart the significance,
the relevance of such statements and be blessed with the wonderful
favor that Jabez was, and God granted him that which he requested. And Jabez called on the God of
Israel, no one else, the God of Israel, didn't look anywhere
else, the God of Israel, saying, O that thou wouldest bless me
indeed and enlarge my coast, that thou in hand might be with
me, that thou wouldest keep me from evil, that it may not grieve
me. And God granted him that which
he requested. Well, we can say, blessed