May it please Almighty God to
come and bless us together this evening as we meditate in His
Holy Word. Let's turn to the first epistle
of Paul to the Thessalonians, chapter 5, and we'll read verse
24. The first epistle of Paul to
the Thessalonians, chapter 5, and reading verse 24. Faithful is he that calleth you
who also will do it. The Apostle here is encouraging
the Thessalonica Church to have their confidence in Almighty
God. And of course that situation
has not changed over the years and we should still desire to
have our confidence in Almighty God. And therefore, in these
few words, he tells us, faithful is he that calleth you. Faithful
means to be trustworthy. And we can believe that everything
we read in the Word of God is indeed trustworthy. There's no
error in it. And we can therefore believe
the great truths that we read in the Bible. And may the Holy
Spirit enable us to take them to heart, to realize that they're
not fables, they're not fairy tales. They are the very word
of God that God himself breathed into those men who wrote it years
ago. As you mostly know, I expect
there were some 40 people that actually wrote the scriptures
and they were all moved by the Holy Spirit to write those things
which that spirit dictated to them. And so we have today the
very Word of God. And we're thankful it's being
translated into our own language. We're very grateful to God for
that, and we should realise that as such, of course, our nation
has only had it for some 600 or 700 years, really, in our
own language. What a blessing it is, and I
hope we all really appreciate it and recognise the wonderful
favour that it is. And also it describes then to
us the faithfulness of God. And that means that what God
speaks through His Word is true and it won't change. The Word
of God tells us, I am the Lord, I change not. Therefore ye sons
of Jacob are not consumed. It is right. It does remain.
It is true. And may we take it to heart and
not pass over it as something which is transient and irrelevant. It really is the most relevant
book for each one of us. the most relevant truths for
each one of us. Because we are passing through
time as I often refer to and we must never weary of considering
that our life is but a vapour which vanishes away and then
eternity. To realise it's good sometimes
for you young people to just sit back sometimes and think
about eternity. Try and visualize it. You won't
be able to because our minds can't cope with the enormity
of such a word. Nonetheless, it is there. The Bible is full of telling
us about eternity. The Lord Jesus in the New Testament
tells us so many times about eternity. which will never finish. You see, we are used to time,
and we know that days and months and years come, but in eternity
there is no time. There's no night in glory and
there's no light in hell. There's a great difference, a
vast difference, and every one of us must spend eternity somewhere. We have a never-dying soul. The devil will try and convince
us that in actual fact we'll be annihilated when we die, that's
the end of everything. How many has he deceived? And
what a terrible awakening for those who pass out of time without
Christ. Well, may none of us come into
that category, but may we all be found in Christ and all be
found looking forward to that glorious day when we shall be
with him forever. What a mercy therefore to realise
that we have before us in the Bible the faithful word of God
which tells us all that we need for our natural life and indeed
all that we need for our spiritual life. And as the Apostle starts
in this last chapter warning us about the situation and he
tells us for yourselves know perfectly the day of the lord
so cometh as a thief in the night and when they shall say peace
and safety then sudden destruction cometh upon them as travel upon
a woman with child and they shall not escape. None of us shall
be able to escape that day. And it will come very suddenly. And what a mercy. And then the
apostle goes on to really confirm the great blessing to those who
are called. This 24th verse says, Faithful
is he that calleth you. And those who are called are
the children of light and the children of the day. We are not
of the night nor of darkness. And what a blessing for you and
me if we have the evidence in our hearts that the light of
the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ has shone into our hearts. And if that is so, would have
done two things really. Firstly it will show us our true
condition or at least perhaps part of our true condition of
how we are sinners and how we deserve to be forever cast out
from God and then also then that light shines and directs us to
the glorious Saviour and His sin-atoning death. That's the
wonder of the light which shines. And my friends, all of us, young
and old, need to have the evidence of the wonder of that light shining
into our hearts so that we do rejoice in it and we are thankful
for it. Faithful is he that calleth you. What a mercy it is to know the
call of Almighty God. The Apostle Paul tells us himself
in his epistle to the Galatians, and in the first chapter, he
tells us this, a bit worth verse 15, when it pleased God. And
that's exactly the same in your life and my life. when it pleased
God, who separated me from my mother's womb, and called me
by His grace to reveal His Son in me, that I might preach among
the heathen. Immediately I conferred not with
flesh and blood. Yes, the gracious call of God
came to the apostle Paul and we know of course when it happened
when he was on that Damascus road and there he was at enmity
with God Yes, and trying to find all those who opposed those things
which were wrong and followed those things which were speaking
of Christ, opposing them, and got them put into prison. the
Lord came to him and with such power that he fell down to the
ground yes it was a light from heaven we're told when he tells
us of that account that light was above the brightness of the
midday sun it was an exceedingly bright light well perhaps not
to the same extent but nonetheless to all true believers The light
does shine. We pass from darkness to light. We're born in darkness. We're
born spiritually dead. There's no life. But what a great
mercy when God comes and gives us life. And when He gives us
life, the light shines. And we see those things which
we never saw before. We never realized. We just heard
about them. They never had an effect upon
us. But my friends, when God calls us, like he called the
apostle Paul, it has an effect. Well, says the apostle in these
words, faithful is he that calleth you. Well, the great question
surely For us, each one of us today is to know that God has
called us. That through that call he's made
us spiritually alive. What's happened is our ears have
been opened to hear the truth of God. And it's only you who
know whether that's occurred in your life. What a blessing
it is if you have the wonderful evidence that the light of the
glorious Gospel has shone into our souls so that we are indeed
the children of light and the children of the day and not of
night nor of darkness. Well, it would be a great blessing.
It would be a wonderful blessing. It would be the greatest blessing
you can ever received because what it really means is we receive
the gift of eternal life. The gift of eternal life. And
that gift is set forth with the glorious light of the gospel. Well the Apostle Paul knew what
it was. He knew that he was called and
he was able to speak and tell us Well, my friends, we have
to each come before God and we each have to examine ourselves
as to whether we are in the faith or not and whether God has called
us or whether we're still wandering
around in darkness. You see, we have a great enemy,
the devil, who would always try and convince us In actual fact,
we're okay. Don't worry, you're alright.
You know, you go to chapel and you perhaps read the Bible and
you do this and you do that. And you'll pass over the great
evidence of the light shining into our hearts. And you'll probably
try and convince us It's not necessary. Well, it is necessary,
because it is the evidence. It is the faithful testimony
of Almighty God to our souls, and that we have passed from
darkness to light, from death to life, and never belittle such
an important consideration. I never think it's irrelevant. I never think, well, I needn't
worry very much about that. I'm only a young person. Remember
this great truth. The old must die, but the young
may. None of us know what a day or
hour will bring forth. And what a blessing, therefore,
to know that we have a God who is gracious and kind and merciful. and strengthens us and helps
us. The journey of life to the Christian
is not an easy one. It never has been, it never will
be. And the Word of God tells us
very clearly that Lord Jesus himself, when he was on the earth,
towards the end of that long sermon to his disciples, he said,
it is through much tribulation you and I shall enter the kingdom.
But be of good joy, I have overcome the world. So although we face
hardship, we face difficulties as we journey on through this
world, and we should expect it, and we shouldn't be surprised
when it occurs, but what a mercy to know that we have a kind and
gracious God who is doing these things. showing us that we are
therefore amongst those whom he has loved with everlasting
love because he's dealing with us as sons and daughters of the
Most High God and he is gracious and faithful to us and what a
mercy therefore if we do have such a kind and faithful God
who looks upon us and remember He's dealing with us in love
to our soul. He's dealing with us in faithfulness. Faithfulness. You know when Moses
spoke to the children of Israel, and he left that wonderful record
in the book of Deuteronomy, as he starts Deuteronomy and he
goes through it, And he speaks, he gives them a history, really,
of, first of all, of what they'd passed through, how God had been
with them, just to remind them, and it's good for us today to
be reminded of how God has led us and how
God has indeed directed us. And in the 31st chapter, right
towards the end of this long account, he says to the Israelites,
Be strong and of a good courage. Fear not, nor be afraid of them. And that, of course, is all the
enemies. For the Lord thy God, he it is
that doth go with thee. He will not fail thee. nor forsake
thee.' Moses had proved it through his life. You know the history,
I'm sure. Forty years in Pharaoh's palace. Picked out of the water in that
basket by Pharaoh's daughter. Looked after those forty years. And then, forty years in the
backside of the desert. having to learn much and then
40 years leading Israel through the wilderness. And he was able,
therefore, to speak from a personal experience and say that he will
not fail thee and nor forsake thee. What a wonderful truth
and what a wonderful testimony that is and how good it is for
us to realise the wonderful truth that is contained in his word. And we should be encouraged by
it. And so the apostle says, faithful
is he that calleth you who also will do it. Everything that God
speaks and tells us, he will do. He never fails. But let's just be careful when
we think of that. First of all, God has his way. Secondly, God has his time. And usually, those two truths
don't correlate with our own thoughts and considerations. God may speak to us And it's
very easy for us to straight away put our own conclusion on
how things are going to work out. Generally speaking, we find
that God's ways are higher than our ways. God's ways are better
than our ways. And through that path, we learn. God teaches us. He directs us. And what does he do? He brings
us closer to himself. He shows us what's in our heart. He shows us the evil of our nature. And he leads us to the great
and glorious Saviour himself, the Lord Jesus Christ. This is
the blessed work of the Holy Spirit. This is the wonderful
leading of the Holy Spirit as he calls us and directs us and
is faithful to us in the way that he leads us. It's a great
blessing to know that God's hand is upon us. He's not leaving
us to ourselves. No, he didn't leave the Apostle
Paul to himself. He doesn't leave any of his people
by themselves. He allows them perhaps to wander
here wander there sometimes like a lost sheep they wander away
but the Lord knows where we are the Lord goes after us and finds
us brings us back sometimes he carries us back because sometimes
we've weakened we've become weakened We weakened our strength in the
way. Our strength, not God's strength.
We're told He weakens their strength in the way. We don't perhaps
like that. We don't like to have our strength
weakened. But God does it for a very great
and glorious reason. And that's to make us realize
our dependence upon Him. And to make us realize that God
is faithful. We don't learn these great truths
by just wandering on aimlessly through this poor old world,
but we learn these truths as the Lord sees fit to direct us
and instruct us and teach us. And what a blessing it is to
know that we have a faithful God A merciful God. Indeed, God's prophet Jeremiah tells
us in the Lamentations, it is the Lord's mercies that we're
not consumed. We deserve to be consumed. We
deserve to be cast off. Have you ever thought of that?
Have you ever looked at yourself and realised really how bad you
are? and how you don't deserve favour
you don't deserve mercy and yet realise that because of God's
faithfulness He's called us by His grace He will never, no,
never forsake us and what a wonderful blessing that is what a wonderful,
wonderful favour it is to know that God has graciously and gloriously
called us. You know, Solomon knew what it
was in his life to be called, and he tells us when he wrote
the Proverbs, and he tells us these words of the Lord speaking
in the eighth chapter, and the fourth verse tells us this, unto
you, O men, I call. Well, what a blessing if you
and I are one of those men or women. Obviously, it has the
same application unto you. Amen. I call and my voice is
unto the sons of men. Oh, you simple understand wisdom. And ye fools, be ye of an understanding
heart. What a great mercy it is when
God gives you me. and understanding that He is
looking upon us and dealing with us as sons and daughters of the
Most High God. It's very humbling to think that
the great God is dealing with us in that way. And we never
deserved it. We never will deserve it. But
what a mercy to have a God who deals with us in love to our
souls in this way and to realize He is gracious And he says, hear,
for I will speak of excellent things, and the opening of my
lips shall be right things. You see, when God speaks, he
speaks wondrous things. He speaks right things, excellent
things, which will do our souls good. It may not satisfy us in
a natural way, but what a blessing if it feeds our soul. And that's
really what we need, don't we? You and I are passing through
time, as I've already said, and we need, as we're passing through
time, to be sustained in our spiritual life. And we're sustained
in our spiritual life with heavenly food and heavenly drink. which
emanates from the good hand of God, and that heavenly food really
is only partaken of that which is through the wonderful Saviour,
the Lord Jesus Christ. We're told in the sixth chapter
of John, except ye eat the flesh and drink my blood, there is
no life in you. There's no life. And as we're
partakers of Christ, there's no life. We're just spiritually
dead. We may have a wonderful knowledge.
You know the scriptures. You may learn all the scriptures.
You may be very proud of it. You may think how much you can
quote etc. etc. But the reality is you and
I need that spiritual evidence of God's calling to our souls
so that we desire spiritual food which is centred in the flesh
and the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Tonight, as you know,
we have the Lord's Supper and there we have set before us two
very simple symbols. One, his broken body, and two,
his precious blood. And now there, for us to understand
the reality of true religion. True religion is centred on Christ. It's not centred on anything
else. And what a mercy therefore if,
as we read such words, faithful is he that calleth you. If he
calls us, by his grace he will open our spiritual understanding.
Yes, we should be blessed with a right understanding. And I
mean that, a spiritual understanding. And it's when the Holy Spirit
speaks and touches our heart, reveals to us things that you
and I would not by nature understand. But what a mercy to be blessed
with that wonderful realization that God is looking upon us and
dealing with us as sons and daughters of the Most High God. Well, the truth is, he that calleth
you, we're told, who also will do it. If he's begun a good work,
he will finish it. God doesn't do half a work. God
doesn't give up. Perhaps we might think we deserve
for God to give up with us. But my friends, He's very patient.
The Word of God has a lovely word, long-suffering. Think that Almighty God is long-suffering
towards you and me. It's because He has promised
to do it. to fulfil His calling and not
to cast us off halfway through our life. Because if He's loved
us to begin a good work, He's loved us with that call, it is
an everlasting love. And just think of that word.
It means that it goes through life and into eternity. It's a love which never fails
and never stops. Well, remember this, faithful
is he that calleth you who also will do it. Yes, he'll complete
his work in your life and my life. We walk different paths,
don't we? We have a different life to live,
each one of us. but that life is ordained by Almighty God. And Lord Jesus again speaking
to his disciples in the 15th of John, he tells us, ye have
not chosen me, but I have chosen you and ordained you. Ye should go and bring forth
fruit and that your fruit should remain. And God is faithful in
that. faithful in that and we should
be very very thankful that he is faithful to us and we should
bless God for it and he doesn't deal with us he doesn't leave
us he is a faithful God to come and bless us and so he gives
to you and me all that we shall need to pass through this life
and into eternity now The standard of what you and I need is shown
to us in the Word of God. It's not other people's testimony.
We can think sometimes, well that's a wonderful testimony
and I don't understand that and I don't know this and I don't
know that. The great truth is that we each lead an individual
path and that path is laid down in the Word of God. But there are common areas. Common
areas. And those common areas really
can be put into two categories. First of all, ourselves as a
sinner, and then the Lord Jesus Christ as a saviour. When I was a youngster, we had
an old deacon And he had a very simple and
very succinct definition for a true believer. And he explained
it like this. Such would realize themselves
as a perishing sinner and the Lord Jesus as a precious Christ. Simple, isn't it? And that's
the wonderful evidence that you and I need. And that's the wonderful
faithfulness of Almighty God who will give us to know those
great truths if we are one who He has called. We will realise
that in and of ourselves we are a perishing sinner and that we
need a great and glorious Saviour. And the only one is the precious
Lord Jesus Christ. You see, when this is made over
to us through the blessed work of the Holy Spirit of God, we
will have the evidence that we are amongst those who are to
be with Christ forevermore. Faithful is he that calleth you,
he also will do it. You see, it's because of his
faithfulness that he will complete the work that he starts. What
a mercy that is. It's left to us, you know, you
and I wouldn't finish it. We wouldn't have perhaps the
desire to finish it. We wouldn't have the ability
to finish it. But God will do it. What a mercy that is. and He will do it in His way
and He will do it in His time and both of those truths bring
about this great fact that God gets the honour and glory. How important it is for us today
to realise that your life and my life on this earth is really
for that single reason to glorify God. It's not to glorify ourselves,
but to glorify Him in His calling. To glorify Him in His faithfulness. To glorify Him in all that He's
done in the completion of His work. What a blessing that is. What a favour it is. And we need
that, every one of us. We need to have a real religion.
Not a false religion. A religion which is given to
us by Almighty God. You know, we have a wonderful
little word in John's Gospel. In the 14th chapter of John,
we read this. The 14th verse. If ye should
ask anything In my name, I will do it. If you shall ask anything
in my name, I will do it. What a mercy that is. And, you know, in the earlier
verses in this beautiful 14th chapter of John, we're told,
believe it or not, that I am in the Father and the Father
in me. The words I speak unto you, I
speak not of myself, but the Father that dwelleth in me. He
doeth the works. Believe me that I am in the Father,
and the Father in me, or else believe me for the very work's
sake." We spoke this morning about the need to believe. And
what a blessing it is if we are given faith to believe. And so the Lord goes on. This
is the Lord speaking. You may remember to the 11 disciples
in the upper room, that wonderful sermon he preached to them after
having introduced the Lord's Supper and Judas Iscariot had
gone out. And therefore he tells us, verily,
verily, I say unto you, he that believeth on me, the works that
I do, Shall he do also, and greater works than these shall he do,
because I go unto my Father, and whatsoever ye shall ask in
my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in
the Son. If ye shall ask anything in my
name, I will do it. What encouraging words they are.
Now we have a God, a God who loves to hear and loves to answer
prayer. And so often we are so backward
in our prayers, in our requests. We're very self-centred. We ask
for those things which will just be for our own benefit. What
a blessing if we ask for those things which will bring honour
and glory to God. so that his name is lifted up
and surely it brings us to this point to be able to say he is
indeed worthy he's worthy of all praise he's worthy of all
exhortation and let's not forget that you and I are blessed even
tonight to be able to gather for worship to even have the
Word of God to read and to think of the billions the billions
in the world who do not have this benefit, who do not appreciate
it, who care nothing about their eternal soul, who carry on aimlessly
in this world, assuming that, well, when they die, that will
be the end, not realizing there is an eternity before them. And yet you see, to the church
of God, to the true child of God, to the true person that
is called by the grace of God, a wonderful prospect to realise
that by His grace we shall be forever with the Lord. Forever with the Lord in utter
peace, in union, nothing to disturb us, no sin, no sorrow, no jealousy,
no utter complete unity and with the Saviour and that forever. Well, it's something worth thinking
about, isn't it? It's something pondering and
it does, you know, put things in a right perspective. It's
good to have a heavenly view of these things and not be left
to just an earthly view. The devil, we want you and me
to concentrate just on the things of time and we'll push the things
of God to the side into the background and concentrate on all the poor
things of this world, which perish with the using. And yet to realise
we have an ever dying soul. And remember, we have a God who
is faithful, a God who will hear and answer prayer as we come
to God. We're encouraged to come. Trust
in the Lord at all times. He people pour out your heart
unto him. God understands us. You can tell
someone else about your desires, your fears. They won't understand. But God understands. God knows
everything. He knows the end from the beginning.
He knows His purposes for you. He knows His plan for you. He
knows what He's doing with you. He knows everything. What a blessing
it is then to come and to pour out our heart before God. to be blessed with a wonderful
privilege of prevailing prayer. It's a good thing to pray for,
that God will give you true prayer, that God will give you prevailing
prayer, and that you may realize and experience the wonderful
faithfulness of God as he leads you into all truth as it is in
Jesus. My friends, I believe this, when
the Lord works in our hearts and touches our heart, it's an
experience which is above the things of this world. And it
brings peace to our hearts, peace to our soul, joy to our soul. That's why the apostle says,
rejoice evermore. when we have the evidence of
this wonderful light in our hearts we can rejoice and we can rejoice
truthfully because it's a joy which won't fade away it may
get dimmer but it will still be there because it's the work
of the Spirit of God and what a mercy to be able to look back
in our lives to remember all the ways led us time when we
were without Christ A time when we didn't care about the things
of God. A time when we only concentrated
on our life. The things of God took second
place. And then, when that time came,
when God called us out of darkness into his glorious light, there
was a wonderful change. Behold, all things become new. And we then see the value and
the preciousness of the blood of Christ. As the hymn writer says, invaluable
blood. Without it, we are lost. With
it, applied to our heart, we are forever saved. Faithful is
he that calleth you, who also We'll do it. You see, it's good
to just home in sometimes on these very short and simple expressions
that we can understand the Lord has said He will do it. The Lord has given you and me
a word. He will do it. You may need patience. Yes, your
time is always and my time is not yet, but He will do it. And He said so. God is faithful
and he doesn't say that which is not true and therefore we
can rely upon God's word. Well I hope tonight you and I
by the grace of God can rely upon God's word and blessing
for it and indeed rejoice in it and have the evidence in our
hearts that we are amongst those whom God has called. That means God's spoken to. that
we were dead in trespasses and in sins, death, no sight. And God came and called us and
our ears were opened and our eyes were opened. And we saw
the glory of the gospel and we rejoiced in it and praise God
for it. And we went on our way rejoicing. The word here is rejoice evermore. When we are shown that we are
amongst those whom God has called, we can rejoice and we can rejoice
forever because God is faithful. He won't remove that which he's
done. Now, as I said the other day,
it's like having an iron pen writing in the rock. It can't
be removed. And God's words to our heart
won't be removed, can't be removed, because He's done it. And we
have to conclude it's all of grace. It's all because of His
love. It's all because of His great
mercy. And what does it do? It humbles us. And what does
it do also? it created a desire in our heart
to praise his name we thought didn't we this morning on that
occasion in Jehoshaphat's life and the people what do they do? they praise the Lord oh my friends
may we have much cause and much reason to praise our God and
to bless his holy name for all his goodness a mercy which has
been to us. And perhaps we're able then to
enter into what David said. Surely goodness and mercy shall
follow me all the days of my life. And I shall dwell in the
house of the Lord forever. Amen.