Seeking for the help of the Lord,
I direct your prayerful attention to Psalm 27 and reading for our
text the last verse, verse 14. Wait on the Lord, be of good
courage, and He shall strengthen thine heart. Wait, I say, on
the Lord. Psalm 27, verse 14. A parallel verse would be that
in Isaiah 40, where we read, But they that wait upon the Lord
shall renew their strength. They shall mount up with wings
as eagles, they shall run and not be weary, and they shall
walk and not faint. Waiting upon the Lord. Now what is meant here by waiting? Sometimes you might think of
those that are servants waiting on a master or mistress serving
them in that way. That is not what this verse is
speaking of. This is speaking of patient,
waiting, expecting something to happen. Like waiting at a
bus stop, waiting for the bus to come. Or, like as we read
in James, for the farmers, they sow their field, they're waiting
first for suitable weather, then they plant the seed. And then
they're waiting for that blade to come up, they're waiting for
the time to put in their fertilizer, they're waiting for the time
for the fruits and then to send in the harvest and to know what
time to do the harvesting. Many things in a natural sense,
and especially regarding the harvest, there is a waiting on
things that are completely outside of our control. We are not able
to forward them, put them back or change it. We are waiting
what men would call on nature but really on the Lord to bring
the right conditions and to bring that grain up and to bring it
to harvest. And this is the idea in this
way here to wait on the Lord and it is to way to be of good
courage. The emphasis is here, wait I
say on the Lord, as if there is many things that will cause
us not to wait, many things that cause us to be really discouraged,
And if we think about it, how vital it is if we are waiting
that we must be sure that it is right for us to wait and that
we are waiting in the right place and the right time. You imagine
waiting, you go back to the bus stop idea and you're waiting
and waiting and the time comes and the bus is not there and
it's an important place you want to go and connection you've got
to get. what will give you courage is
to know for certain this is the bus stop that the bus is coming
to, not the one down the road, and that it is the time and that
it will come. And so in a similar way with
the things of God, we must be persuaded that it is right to
wait, and in the right way to wait, and the right things to
wait for. There are some in the ministry
that would say, well, you don't have to wait, you listen to the
word, I'm gonna bring you the gospel, I offer it to you, and
you accept it today, and if you don't, then you are lost, you
don't have to wait on the Lord. But the scriptures are very clear
that God is a sovereign in blessing us all, and he is first in salvation. He which hath begun a good work
in you will perform it unto the day of Jesus Christ. But that
does not mean that there is a right waiting for those that are unregenerate,
and for those that have been quickened into spiritual life
that are waiting for the Lord's blessing in their souls. And you think of the psalmist,
speaking of really all of the creation and the birds of the
air, that they all wait upon thee to give them their meat
in due season. We're surrounded with many life
parables of waiting on the Lord. And we read in James of Job written
as an example. I mean, Job was brought into
his trials. Could he deliver himself? Could he shorten the trial? No,
he couldn't. But he was given that patience,
endurance to wait. All the days of my appointed
time will I wait, he says, till my change comes. And so this
is a very important thing. in a spiritual sense and that
we don't abuse it in a fatalistic way and say, well, the Lord will
appear. If I'm saved, I'm saved. If I'm
not, I'm not. There's nothing that I can do.
And you just go through life just like that, careless way.
That's not waiting on the Lord. So it is necessary for us to
really know what is actually here, what is being enforced
and set before us. Wait on the Lord be of good courage
and he shall strengthen thine heart wait. I say on the Lord
now one thing That we in a gospel day do not have to wait on and
that is for the Lord's first coming all of the promises in
the Old Testament and of the Lamb of God that should take
away the sin of the world, they're all pointed to Christ, they're
fulfilled in Christ's coming, and he has finished the work.
He declared it at Calvary, it is finished. Now, I don't know
if any Jews are listening online today, but if you are, Then look
at this, what was said in the scriptures concerning the second
temple. The glory of this latter house
shall be greater than the former. That latter house is destroyed.
Before it was destroyed, Jesus of Nazareth came to it. He is
the Christ. He is the Messiah. He has come. There is no possibility of wrong
waiting. If you are waiting for the Messiah
now, He has come. He cannot come again. He will come again with power
and great glory, but the first time to put away sin by the sacrifice
of Himself, that waiting time for the church is over, is finished. And we in these gospel days proclaim
this, proclaim that God sent his only begotten son into this
world, and that he was made flesh and dwelt among us, and those
that were alive then, we beheld his glory, the glory as of the
only begotten of the Father, full of grace and full of truth. And the witnesses declare his
life, his death, his resurrection, and his ascension up into heaven,
and is this finished work that he has proclaimed. And the Lord
has given us in the ministry the authority, and that is the
only authority we have, to go into all the world and to preach
the gospel to every creature, and with the promise that he
that believeth shall be saved, and he that believeth not shall
be damned. And there's added to that, he
that believeth and is baptized shall be saved. And that's another
thing that we do not need to wait on. And I know there are
that do wait on it. And in one sense, I did. If you
are a believer, you do not need to wait on the Lord for a word
to be baptised. The Lord joins them together.
He that believeth and is baptised. When the Lord blessed the eunuch
through Philip's preaching, immediately he, see here is water, what doth
hinder me to baptise? Many would divide the two as
if the Lord would need to do one and then do another. And
really we shouldn't, we shouldn't go away from the scripture pattern
in that. Many of the conversions are quick
conversions. They didn't need to have a theological
degree. They needed to believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ. If they are believers with all
thine heart, they are amazed. And those that look on and those
that look on in the church, they will often see like Philip saw. the lead up to it. He was called
to that chariot. Where was the eunuch reading?
The Lord gave him his text. And it's a blessed thing when
you can see these things, that they work together for good and
for the soul. So be careful. There are some
things that you shouldn't, that I shouldn't be waiting for the
Lord for. I made a mistake years ago. When
I should have come forth for baptism, I had been blessed.
And yet, foolishly, I asked my mother, what did she think? She
said, well, wait. Now, she might have well thought,
if you've got to ask me, you should wait. But really, if I'd
have been blessed, I should not have consulted, even with a parent. I mean, I was in my 20s then.
I should have gone forward. I didn't. When I did have to
go, then I'd lost the sweetness, the savour. And I wish I hadn't
of waited. And if ever I could convey to
others, when you're in the sweet savour, the blessing, then go
tell the church then. And tell the people of God then. And the church be very careful
to saying to one, well, you wait. Sometimes maybe there are situations
I remember being told years ago, some of you may remember Mr.
Roos, and he passed away now, but some 26 years before he was
baptised, he'd gone before the church and he'd been told to
wait. And he did. And he never ventured again. It wasn't until Graham Hadley
took the pass for it and that he said, this is wrong. And he
went to him, he said, you know, you should be in the church.
And it was put right. But we've got to be very careful
we don't quench that flame. The spirit is tender at times,
so we've got to be very careful on that. So there's two things
I would say we don't wait for. We have in these gospel days
a beautiful, blessed reality of the coming of the Son of Man,
of putting away of sin by the sacrifice of Himself. But then,
we must look then, what is it then that we wait for and we
look for? We read of the husbandman, he
waiteth for the fruits of the earth. Our Lord, when he suffered
at Calvary, he knew all of those for whom he suffered, bled and
died, a particular redemption, a love that bore the sin of his
people, and in time, And you think the Lord waits, doesn't
he? We're told he waited in the days of Noah. He waits to put
his people chosen in eternity into the world and where they
should go. Why were we born in this century? Why were we not born several
hundred years ago? The Lord chose what time, he
waited. This was the time that you should
be here. and then for the time to be called
by grace. How that should be so? Some are
quickened while they're young, some later on in their lives. And it is the Lord that waits
when he quickens and calls a sinner by his grace. So it is especially
in that attitude of the calling and quickening and also in life's
journey, waiting upon the Lord. I want to look then at three
points. Firstly, what we are to wait
for. Let us be clear on that to start
off with. And then how we are to wait.
I've hinted at how we can wait so wrongly. So how should we
wait? And then lastly, why? Why we
are to wait. Just think of some of those reasons
why. But firstly, what are we to wait
for? We gather in the house of God,
we hear the word of God preached. What are we waiting for? Well,
there's a real clear hint of this in 1 Thessalonians 1, because
Paul says of those Thessalonians that they received the word,
not in word only, but in demonstration of the spirit and of power. That's what we want, the power
of God. The Lord said to the disciples,
tarry at Jerusalem until ye be endued with power from on high. The church at the very start
had to wait for that power. And there are times when it is
put forth and times when it is not. Why was it that 10 years
had to transpire from Pentecost, which was the pouring out of
the Spirit upon the Jews, to the time in Cornelius's house
when it was poured out upon the Gentiles. Then hath God given
to the Gentiles repentance unto life. And Peter was the one that
was chosen in both cases, so he could say to the apostles,
he fell on them as on us at the beginning, one witness not telling
to another, rehearsing it secondhand, he saw it. And so God was sovereign
when the Gentiles were visited in that way, when the Jews were
and every blessing of God is by the power of God. He must needs go through Samaria,
we read when the Lord was on the earth, a time to find out
that woman and to bless her and Zacchaeus come down from the
tree, I must dine at thine house. God's appointments, Zacchaeus
thought it was just. Curiosity to see who he was. And the woman of Samaria just
going to the well daily to get water, but the Lord had other
appointments in that. So we want that power, the promise
of the Father, the power of the Holy Spirit, and God sovereignly
gives that. May that be one of the expectations
that we wait upon in the Church of God, that the Spirit be poured
out upon us from above. Then we think of the blessing
of the Lord, the blessing of the Lord that maketh rich and
addeth no sorrow with it. And some of us here, we have
known those times, we've been suddenly blessed and favoured
in our souls. Paul speaks of this in Ephesians,
with spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. And those are sacred times, those
special times, can be in the house of God, can be in ways
we hadn't thought of. I remember one time at Melbourne,
feeling very, very low in my soul. And it was a time when
I was, before I was in the ministry, reading services. And so I thought
I'd give out this hymn, 722, which was, what am I and where
am I, estranged myself, paths of fear. I was in a low place. And when I gave the hymns to
the organist, I made a mistake, in my mind. I gave him the wrong
number, and he put the wrong number up on the board and chose
the hymn for that number. When I came to give it out, there
was a shuffling around, and they said, ?Well, that?s not the hymn
on the board. What do you want sung?? I got confused. I said,
?Just sing what?s on the board.? Well, it was the next hymn, or
was it one before, 721? To him that loved us ere we lay,
concealed within the passive clay. And he sung it to old hundredth. And you know, I just burst into
tears. It was as if the Lord said, you
didn't know where you were, but this is where you are. And we
sang of all the blessings of calling and quickening and what
the Lord had done. They thought I was upset because
I'd made a mistake with the hymns. But that wasn't why. The Lord
had touched my heart. And those are special times. When the Lord comes and blesses
and favours the soul, and many times, and no doubt you've had
those times like that too, at home or in the house of God,
and he's lifted your soul, he's glad your soul, and you say it's
good for us to be here. And so, may we Wait for that,
wait for liberty as well. If the Son shall make you free,
you shall be free indeed. Loose from bondage, loose from
snares, loose from the law, loose from condemnation, set free. And the Lord does that, like
He did to Lazarus. Loose Him, let Him go. We should wait as well for the
goodness of the Lord. We think of the context here
that is spoken of. Verse 13, I had fainted unless
I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the
living. Sometimes we might have such dark views, we think, I'm
never going to see good. Nothing will change, all is dark.
You might be like Hannah, and she's childless, and she thinks
one year is going to be the same as the next year, next year,
and it's never going to be the same. And you might think that.
In a dark place now, it's going to be the same five years ahead. But waiting on the Lord to see
His goodness. The Lord promised with Moses,
I will make all my goodness pass before thee in the way. May we be held to wait upon the
Lord to see his goodness, to see his mercy, and again in the
context here, to deliver from enemies, and we all have enemies. Those of you in the ministry
may often find it, and I find it so, I found it today. You're
driving along to the ministry and you get bombarded with temptations
and things to take your mind away and to drag you back to
the pit of your old corruption. And you think, what does the
devil know that I don't? Why doesn't he want me to come
to Shaw's Corner this afternoon? And sometimes that can encourage
me because of those Attacks and those temptations when I want
to be spiritually minded and all the filth is coming up to
make it kindly Minded you might have come to the house of God.
I want a good hearing I want to hear the word of the Lord,
but this is all in my heart and how can the Lord to live me from
that? And we need the Lord to set us
free and to deliver us from that and But then there is waiting for
the counsel of the Lord. In Psalm 106, we have it with
the children of Israel said that they waited not for his counsel,
in verse 13. The children of Israel didn't.
Is that the case with some of you? Something before you? You're not waiting for the counsel
of the Lord? You think that you know what
is the best thing to do? and not waiting for the Lord's
counsel. We need to wait for the Lord's
counsel. Another thing to wait for is
for the Lord to appear in providence. Providence unfolds the book and
makes his counsel shine. There's one thing, and I think
it was Thomas Boston said, they take more stock on providence
than on words from the Lord. A person can say, oh, I've a
word from the Lord for this, for that, to do this or that.
We can be mistaken on that. I wouldn't take away from any
who's had a word from the Lord and the Lord has proved it to
be right and good. But providence you can't argue
with. You can say, I had a word from the Lord, I'm gonna marry
that girl. And you propose to that girl, that girl says, I
don't wanna marry you. Well, that's the end of the matter, isn't
it? You go and say, I have a word from the Lord, I'm gonna work
for you. He said, I don't want you to work for me. And the doors
shut. Shut doors is as good as a direction
as an open door. And we wait upon the Lord who
opens and no man shuts and shuts and no man opens. He that will
watch providence will never lack a providence to watch. It's a
good thing to watch Providence. Something we're praying about
from yesterday. You know, before our Thanksgiving
services, I did a targeted leaflet with invitations to those I knew
in the town, those I've spoken to a lot on their souls. And
one of them was my daughter's teacher from when she was nine
years old, year four. And we kept in touch with her
a lot. There's a lot of things that happened there. One of the
things, the Bibles first went into Cranbrook and they did an
assembly on Mary Jones and her Bible. And this teacher just
happened to be turning around her things and came across with
all her notes for this assembly. And there is Maestas handwriting
in the parts that she was gonna write, and she did, and she said,
the whole class. And she said, I just found this,
and then through the letterbox comes your invitation to come
to the, she said, I felt there was really timing, the Lord timed
that. The amount of times I pleaded
with her for her soul. And she came to the chapel. She
heard your pastor. There's much to pray for. Even
she noticed the timing of those, that finding that and the invitation. And it's good to wait and to
pray for these things, but we must move on. Dear Job, I mentioned
how that he waited till his change come. And that is for us, you
know. We all must die. Job, he spoke
it as a change. You think of this solemn bill,
assisted by a dying bill, that is being put through Parliament. If anyone might be said, well,
we better end his life. Job, in all his great afflictions,
curse God and die, his wife said. But no, Job, he says, I will
wait. Whatever affliction, whatever
trial, I will wait till my change come. What a picture he had of
death, a change. Paul says, absent from the body,
present with the Lord. And it's a good thing to be,
again, like those Thessalonians in 1 Thessalonians 1, that after
they'd received the word with power, they were called. to wait
for his son from heaven. Where we truly are quickened
and called, we are waiting, we are looking for his son from
heaven. We're looking for him to come
again. So may that give us some idea
of those things that we wait for. Now, I want to be clear
on this for those that do not yet know the Lord, because there
is a difference. And so I want to think of how
to wait. If I was to take my own case
of being called by grace when I was 19, I never waited for
the Lord for his word for power, because I didn't believe. I was
dead in trespasses and sins. I could hear anything from the
pulpit, I'd just shut it out. And there's no doubt there's
some of you here are dead like that, spiritually. The natural
man cannot receive the things of God. They're spiritually discerned,
he cannot know them. And you hear outwardly, you might
even be able to argue with other people about religion, but it's
never dawned on you that you've got a soul. and that you need
conversion, you need spiritual life. Until the Lord does that,
then you still remain in your position. It comes to mind, you
know, Mr. Raven, I believe, was the pastor
here and with Smallfields. And his pastor was Quay Hazelrigg. And Mr. Raven said that he can
never remember a time that he did not love the Lord and like
going to the house of God. There might be some of you here
like that. But he knew there was something missing and his
pastor knew there was something missing. You can have a natural
religion without actually spiritual life. But the time did come when he
was given spiritual life. When we are in that situation,
what we've said are the first thing to wait for. Waiting for
power. That is what you want. Surely
you know the difference between just receiving the word and perhaps
imagining things or applying it to yourself. There's a great
difference in that word coming with authority. and with power. And it's a blessed thing. If
those of you here, you can say, and it will be only those who
have been called by grace, who have the new birth, that will
say, I know the difference. I know the difference between
just hearing the word and hearing it with power and authority. Because that actually moves. It does things. It changes the
heart. It renews the life. the imparting
of faith. I passed by thee when thou wast
in thy blood, and bid thee live. The Lord is the author and beginner
of faith. But this does not mean that we
come in and out of the house of God And we say, well, there's
nothing I can do. Salvation is of God. Therefore,
I'm not going to be concerned at all. So I want to look, how
are we to wait? And the first thing is not to
wait in a fatalistic, careless way. Now think of this in a natural
way. So say if we're the farmer. Say
if he puts in his seed, and he spent thousands of pounds for
that seed, and he puts it in the ground. Do you think he's
going to be careless whether that springs up or not? While
he's waiting for that blade to come up, is there not going to
be some real anxious care? And if he's one of the Lords,
he'll be praying that that seed will germinate, the weather will
be right and it will come up. You know, the more we know the
value of something, the more concerned we'll be. Those of
you that wanted to go to a certain university, you wanted the grades,
you wanted to be able to go, and the more you felt the value
of it, if I'm going to get the job I want, I need that grade,
I need to go to university, And then there's that degree of concern. But how is it for our souls to
come into the house of God and say the minister is saying things
that imply that I am spiritually dead, not ready to die, not ready
to stand before God. Am I going to be at all concerned? When we know that it must be
with power, won't there be trying to pray you. So how can I pray
without the Spirit? Remember the Lord said, you will
not come unto me that ye might have life. And he said, ask and
it shall be given thee, seek and you shall find, knock and
it shall be opened unto thee. And he said this, if you being
evil know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much
more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them
that ask you, asking for the Spirit? Yeah? You see what hard-hearted
or what you think as dead prayers would be? There's some of the
Lord's people, many of the Lord's people, can never put a time
and say, that is exactly where the Lord gave me spiritual life.
You know, you could come in that door dead, and then something
that is said by the minister, and it makes you concerned. It
makes you suddenly start to pay attention. and prayers start
to rise up in your heart. Don't just squash them and think,
well, I'm dead in sin. I'm not alive, I can't be expecting
anything. No, if we're waiting, tied in
with the waiting, there's an expectation. And I'll give you
some expectation. If you've been born into a family
that fears the Lord, There is an expectation the Lord will
bless your soul. It does not come through families.
It does not come through blood. It's very clear in John chapter
one. But if you're going to send your
child or someone precious to you away for a holiday somewhere
or away to stay in lodgings for university, you look out to send
them into a place that will look after them and be good for them
and be good for their soul, wouldn't you? And when the Lord sends
his people into this earth, for the most part he will bring them
to where they shall be nurtured up in the sound of the gospel. Not always, sometimes Ruth's
and Rahab's, but don't let the devil say, ah, power of God,
real religion, nothing. You just look, you look at all
the families. Is there children that have been
brought up that go to the house of God? If they'd been a Muslim,
they'd be a Muslim. If they'd been a Hindu, they'd
be a Hindu. There's nothing about grace. But when we believe in a God
of providence and a loving God who loved his people eternity
and he sends his people where they shall be brought up under
the sound of the truth, there's already a reason why we should
really hope and believe that the Lord has intentions of mercy
for us. Take hold of that and plead that
before the Lord. Lord, thou hast put me in a family
where I hear the word of God. I thank thee for that privilege.
Bless me with the power of God. Bless me with a new birth. And
you take his own, what he has done, and use it to plead with
the Lord. Our Lord says in Luke of those
that may you be like of those that wait for their Lord. that
our whole attitude be as to waiting upon him. In Proverbs we read,
of those are blessed are the man that heareth me, waiting
daily at the posts of my doors. So it is, if we're truly waiting,
we'll be praying, trying to pray. What hardhearted prayers will
do? Reading the word of God. You
say, well, I don't understand it. No, nor did the eunuch either.
And the Lord sent a minister to come right with a place he
didn't understand and blessed him. He found Christ there. How many, they don't read the
word of God. They don't read it. You know,
the late Dr. Alan Cairns, he was asked, how
do, how should I study the Bible? He said, you might think this
is a strange answer, read it. Many people like to have a way
that they can study or find out by asking people, but they don't
regularly, methodically, consecutively read the Word of God. Do that. If we really are looking for
the power of God and waiting for the power of God to be joined
with the Word, be in the Word. The Bereans, they heard Paul
preach once. once a week, and they searched
the scriptures daily whether these things were so. Therefore,
many of them believed. What examples we have in the
word of God of a right waiting and an expectation, feeling our
great need, having that right apprehension of what it would
be to lose one's soul, to not be saved. Our Lord exhorts to
redeem the time because the days are evil. Those that were in
Babylon, in captivity in Babylon, they were to build houses, they
were to go about their daily work. Even though we may be really
waiting on the Lord for salvation, you diligently do your studies,
work for your employer, Do your calling, fulfill your duties
as a husband and as a wife, and you'll be seeking the Lord all
the while you're occupying in that way. The devil will find
easy things for people that are not occupying. We don't have
to go into a monastery or separate ourselves from what God has put
us in to be saved. I can testify of the blessings
I've had at work, at my desk and in the middle of the lunchroom
with people all around me reading the word of God or other magazines
sharing words in one case. Seek the Lord as you're going
about these things. Now sometimes a passage of time,
those of you that are engineers, no doubt you've done like I've
done, many calculations on bending moments, stresses, power, and
everything, many calculations in engineering, you use time.
The amount of times I've done that sum and I've thought, I've
got time in this sum, but by the time I've done this sum,
I've used 10 minutes. 10 minutes of my life is gone
doing this sum. Many times I've thought that.
Have you redeemed the time? Time be precious to us. Be mindful
of it. Waiting in that way, not careless. Not like Martha. Martha was loved,
you know, of the Lord. But she was cumbered about with
much care, much serving, and couldn't wait. on the Lord and
hear his word. And we don't want those things
to take away the hearing from the word of God. We want to come
then quickly to our third point, why we are to wait. Well, first thing is that we
are told to wait. The Lord tells us to do so. And
if he tells us to do so, there is an expectation. What would
you say if you were a parent and you said to a child, when
the child was wanting something, you wait? But you had no intention
to ever give them what they were waiting for, or what they'd asked
you for. But when God says to wait, bound
up with that as an expectation there is something to wait for. The next thing is the folly of
not waiting. You think of Saul, King Saul.
He was told by Samuel to wait, wait till Samuel come to offer
the sacrifice. Wasn't the part of the king to
offer the sacrifice, but the Philistines were coming and he
was fearful. And so he forced himself and
offered the sacrifice and then Samuel come. And he said how
foolish he was. He didn't wait for the Lord.
You think of the children of Israel in Joshua's day, when
you had the giving nights coming, they made out they came from
a far off country, and all of their victuals, they said that
the same. You know, one thing that we should
be very careful of is when we think something is so clear,
and of course, all scammers do this, don't they? You must act
now. Now, quick, now, give me your
bank details." As soon as someone is saying, you can't wait, you
mustn't wait, it's urgent, you've got to do it now, then there's
the alarm bells, isn't it? You might say, well, isn't it
urgent that we seek salvation? Yes, it is. But in God's way,
waiting for the Lord, not our own counsel. And with the children
of Israel, Well, it had effects for them right through their
history. They were deceived with the Gebenites. If they'd have
only asked the Lord, the Lord would have told them and discovered
to them what the thing was. They didn't wait for his counsel.
What a reason why we should wait. Another reason we should wait,
the ability of the Lord to go before us, to do exceeding above
all that we can ask or think. Sometimes comes right at the
last time. You think of Abraham being tried,
first day, second day, third day, knife raised, and the Lord
appears. We have these instances in scripture
to wait on the Lord. expecting him to come, looking
for his appearing. Now in our text it says, and
he shall strengthen thine heart. Now notice it says strengthen
thine heart. And this is why we should wait.
Every time we look I think of Abraham, he wouldn't wait. He
got Ishmael, he put his hand to it. But I can look when I
had to wait 10 years for my dear wife after a promise. I had to
wait when I was four and a half when we went over to Australia
and had the exercise. Even then, as a child that one
day I'd come back here and then been called by grace, that was
the thing I waited, watched and prayed over. And the amount of
times it hits me as I'm driving along, I'm in England. The Lord
has brought this about, what was my life. And I thought, I've
been 26 years back, 27 years or so back here, and I must have
had that exercise for four, to when I was 33 or so, 26 years. I've been back here as many years
as I had that burden that one day I'd be brought back here.
And it was so strong with my parents when I was eight. They
said, we're going to buy a plot of land to get buried wherever
our family home was in Melbourne. You can't do that. We've got
to go back to England. You can't be buried here. The
idea that I would go back and the family would not, that didn't
enter my childhood brain at eight years of age, but that's how
it was. But then when I first preached when I was 25, then
I went into bondage for seven years. Exercise, burden for the
ministry. We had meetings with the deacons
and we tried to pray and try to bring it forward. And I said
to them, until the Lord loses my bondage, I cannot preach,
I cannot go. And they tried to push and get
me. I said, no use, you can't. But
the Lord did appear and he blessed me very quickly and brought me
forth. But it was seven years of waiting. and there was nothing I could
do to forward it forward on. And there's many times, times
in selling a house, times in buying a house, times that we've
waited, times with a job, the job that I had when I came over
here. I never answered a job advert,
I never wrote an application letter, I never gave a CV, I
never made an appointment for a job interview, but I had two
interviews arranged by a colleague of mine. The whole thing was
done by other people that knew I was looking for a job, and
they did the lot. Ten minutes before lunchtime, my colleague
says, oh, he's arranged an interview for you across the road. He said,
you better go. I disappeared into the toilets
and poured out my heart before the Lord. I said, Lord, help
me. And my colleague said, I've told
them all about you. You're a Christian. You don't
have a television. You don't swear. You don't curse. And he
ringed up all these things. And I thought, you've noticed
this about me? And that was how I got that job.
And yet before I tried to put my hand to it, it would have
stopped me, hadn't it? But he appeared and I've got
so many times like that in my life. And when you read like
this, and he shall strengthen thine heart to look back over
one's life. So I waited for the Lord here
and he appeared. I waited here and he appeared.
And many times of spiritual blessings that the Lord has given. And
he has come and he does come. And it really strengthens The
Lord is my God. He does watch over me. He does
look to bless. He does come. He is worth waiting
for. He is a true God, a living God,
a God that hears and sees, a God that waited when the children
of Israel were in Egypt, when they're groaning under their
burdens, and He waited 80 years, sending forth Moses, and then
sending him, preparing him in Pharaoh's household, and then
in the desert, and then bringing them out. Our God waits, He is
patient. May we wait for Him. and wait
for him in a right way, in the midst of a sinful world and in
tribulation, the promises, the blessings attached to it. Wait on the Lord, be of good
courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart. Wait, I say, on
the Lord. Amen.