May the Lord be pleased to bless
his word, as we meditated upon it this morning, to the blessing
of our souls. Let's turn to Jeremiah's prophecy,
chapter 32, and we'll read verses 26 and 27. The prophecy of Jeremiah,
chapter 32, reading verses 26 and 27. came the word of the Lord unto
Jeremiah, saying, Behold, I am the Lord, the God of all flesh. Is there anything too hard for
me? There are some words in the word
of God which really stand out and signify to us the greatness
of God and the things of God. And this indeed is one of those
statements where the Lord comes and says, behold I am the Lord,
the God of all flesh, is there anything too hard for me? And the Spirit of God couches
these words in this particular form. Behold. We are to behold such a God. We are to recognise that we today,
as did Jeremiah, come before such a God as this. This is not a God of stone or
wood. This is not a toy God. This is
the ever-living God. This is the God who created all
things. This is the eternal God who ever
lives and ever reigns. This is the God that you and
I stand before today and every day. This is the great God that
you and I will stand before on that great day of judgment, when
we have to give an account of the deeds done in the flesh. This is not a dumb God. This is the real God. There is only one real God. And this is the Lord God, Jehovah. the only real and true God, Father,
Son and Holy Spirit. So Jeremiah was wonderfully blessed
to hear God speaking to him in this very true and very direct
way. And Jeremiah had some understanding
of the greatness of the Lord as We read his prayer prior to
this statement and how he begins his prayer. He said, I prayed
unto the Lord saying, O Lord God, behold thou hast made the
heaven and the earth by thy great power and stretched out arm and
there is nothing too hard for thee. So he goes on. But we have a similar
statement really by Jeremiah acknowledging how great God is
and then God himself specifying how great he is. It is so important
for us today as we live on the earth to recognize that we are
before this great almighty God. That God who does everything,
controls everything, nothing happens, nothing happens in this
world without the divine permission of Almighty God. How good that
it is if you and I have some appreciation of this God. Wonderful it would be if today
we are found beholding this Lord, this God, who is the God of all
flesh, the God of all flesh. So the Lord makes this wonderful
statement, is there anything too hard for me? There is nothing too hard for
our God to unravel. There may be difficult situations
which exist in our lives that were indeed in the life of Israel. But you see, the Lord had a divine
plan which was to be worked out in the life of Israel. And my
friends, the Lord has a divine plan for you and me in our life. We're not excluded. There is
a plan, a plan laid down, an eternal plan for your life and
for my life. And what a blessing it is if
we are found submissive to that great and glorious plan of the
Lord for us. Now you see, Israel, they would
not submit to the Word of God. They would not submit to the
will of God. And it's really, to a large extent,
a tragic account of rebellious Israel, having been so wonderfully
favoured. And indeed, as Jeremiah comes
before God and speaks to him, and as it were, reminds God of
his greatness and what he's done, which has set signs and wonders
in the land of Egypt even unto this day. Yes, all those things
which were passed even unto this day. And it was a long time afterwards
that he begins with and is brought forth by people out of Israel.
It was probably something like about 800 years. And there was
this period of time when the Lord has still been gracious
to his people. and had blessed them and has
brought forth thy people Israel out of the land of Egypt with
signs and with wonders and with a strong hand and with a stretched
out arm and with great terror and has given them this land
which thou that it swear to their fathers to give them a land flowing
with milk and honey we go back don't we to hundreds of years
before that when the Lord promised Abraham when the Lord brought
about those promises which he has spoken. My friends, God today
still brings about his promises which he has spoken. Yes, my
friends, what God has spoken comes to pass. And you and I
will not be able to alter God's plans. See, Israel tried to alter God's
plans. On many occasions, my friends,
God had a plan for Israel. They were to be brought at last
into Canaan. They were to be brought safely
there. And the Lord demonstrated on so many occasions His great
power in performing this for them. And they were reminded, were
they not, in that journey of who God was, how great he was,
and also in that journey they were directed on a number of
occasions to the Lord Jesus Christ. And what a wonderful mercy it
was that God did not leave them to themselves, but he dealt with
them And so the prophet says, Thou showest loving kindness
unto thousands, and recompensest the iniquity of the children
unto the bosom of their children after them, the great, the mighty
God The Lord of hosts is his name. Well, Jeremiah had a view
of the greatness of God and he was able to pray to God and to
hear God's voice. And where was it? Where was he? In prison. In prison in the king's
house. You might be surprised to read
that. There was a prison in the king's
house and there was poor old Jeremiah. That faithful servant
of God, who proclaimed the truth of God in the King's house, but
not in a comfortable apartment, not with a nice bed and armchair,
in prison, in the King's house. But, although he was in prison, he
wasn't left. God knew Jeremiah was in prison. Sometimes we might find ourselves
in a spiritual sense in prison. And it's not a very comfortable
place. But it is a place where we can still pray to God. Yes, perhaps it may seem the
devil shut us in. Well, we have some wonderful
occasions in the Word of God when The Lord was with his people
when they were, as it were, in prison in times of great need
to demonstrate his power. Just pause for a moment and think
of Daniel. Well, he wasn't in prison, he
was in a worse place than that. He was in the lion's den. Was he left by himself there? God was with him. God shut the
lion's mouth. Amazing wonder that was. God
shut the lion's mouth and God was with Daniel all through that
night. What a night it was. It was a
night of deliverance. The morning dawn. Daniel was
set free. The King came. The King had prayed. The King had not had a comfortable
night himself. He had come up early in the morning
to discern whether Daniel's God had kept him alive. So we can be thankful to know
that God is in these difficult places. He doesn't leave his
people. He doesn't leave them or forsake
them. He's with them. He was with Jeremiah in this
prison. And of course, in that place,
in that prison, we find that the Lord spoke to him and told
him what was going to occur to Jerusalem. What was going to
occur to the inhabitants of Jerusalem? What was going to occur to their
houses? Yes, and it's a very solemn statement,
isn't it? When we read of that, we read
it this morning. What occurred to their houses?
They're going to be burnt up. Those places where they'd worship
the devil. They'd worship the devil. And
that's a very striking statement to us, isn't it? Because there
they were, they were apparently worshipping God, living in Jerusalem,
no doubt attending the temple services, but nevertheless, while
they were worshipping Baal and offering incense in their houses,
they were serving the devil. And it's important for us today
to think of that in our homes, that we're not left to be found
serving the devil. You see, we can all turn up to
chapel on Sunday and all appear very good and proper. And as
good as it is so, my friends, I hope we haven't been serving
the devil in our homes in the week. See, I can't tell looking
at you this morning whether you've been serving the devil in your
homes in the week, but you know whether that's been so. Well,
you know, that was a very dramatic outcome, wasn't there? All those
homes were going to be burnt down. And worse than that, Israel
were going to be taken down into Babylon, a long way away, into
captivity. And they were to learn a very
hard lesson there. Seventy years of captivity. Because what have they done?
They turned their back upon God. They turned their back upon God. And so Jeremiah is blessed with
this word from the Lord, the bad news and also the good news. The Lord would have compassion
on them. The Lord would remember them
for good. And the Lord will cause, if you
read the last verse of this chapter, I will cause their captivity
to return, saith the Lord. A returning captivity. are returning. I will cause their
captivity to return, saith the Lord. And of course, we know
it came to pass. Naturally speaking, we see the
situation which developed. The word of God came to pass.
Jerusalem was taken. Nebuchadnezzar came and as it
was destroyed, the walls were broken down and people went away
for all those years. But yet the Lord brought them
again. He brought them back. The walls of Jerusalem were rebuilt. The temple was rebuilt. The Lord
favoured his people once again. They were able to come and worship
in that place. Did they deserve it? Not at all.
But God was compassionate upon them. And so we can thank God
today that still we have the same God, who is still gracious,
who still looks upon us, amazing though it is, in love to our
souls, and does not deal with us as our sins deserve. And so this morning, we have
this wonderful word, Behold. I know that you and I might have
that faith today to truly behold this God. If we possess faith
to behold this God, we'll be a different people. We'll be moved by the Holy Spirit
of God. And we'll realise how great He
is. I am the Lord, the God of all
flesh. The great God who controls everything
and looks upon us and observes every thought, every intent of
our heart, all the good and all the evil. What will it do? Well, it will make you and me
tremble as we realise how great God is and how we've been treating
that God, not in a way that we should, We haven't honoured him
as we should. We haven't glorified his name
as we should. Oh no, we've gone about. We've done this and we've done
that. What have we done? We've really
spent time pleasing ourselves. We've had our plans, we've had
our desires, we've had our scenes. Was God in them? Was it God first? Was it God first? It's a great question, isn't
it, in our lives. Is God first? Day by day, night by night. Oh, how important it is that
God is indeed first in our lives. relegate him to really a little
God and that we address God and we bring him into our lives when
it suits us and when we want something done and we want a
particular course to be worked out and it's then that we look
to this God to suddenly come in some amazing way and yet we
haven't treated God as we should. We haven't put God first. You
see, Jeremiah put God first. What was the result? He was put
in prison. We perhaps think sometimes, we
put God first, everything is going to be wonderful. Well it may be, but it may not
be. It doesn't alter the fact that the Lord God is this great
God. I am the Lord, the God of all
flesh. It doesn't alter the fact that because God may sometimes
bring us into prison, it's the wrong path. We might think, well surely,
I shouldn't be here. Sometimes God brings us into
these places And you know when Jeremiah was in prison, he wasn't
distracted by many things, was he? Maybe so in our lives. When God brings us in a spiritual
way into prison, other things then don't distract us like they
would have done. Perhaps like they have done. What's the situation then? Well,
it's God first, isn't it? Just pause for a moment and think
of the life of John Bunyan. Now, there was a man who served
the Lord. There was a man who did that
which was right in God's sight. He was only concerned for the
honour and glory of God. And what happened? He was put
in prison. Just for a day? No. Just for
a week? No. But for years. John Bunyan
was in prison. And it wasn't a comfortable place.
And he wasn't well fed. But God was with him. And as we know, He was able to
write. God blessed him with wonderful
meditation upon the things of God. God blessed that time of prison
of John Bunyan for the benefit of the Church
of God. And so we know that Jeremiah's
time in prison was indeed for the benefit of the Church
of God. So we are then to behold, I am
the Lord, the God of all flesh. Is there anything too hard for
me? we might think that we would
read a number of times in the word of God about this. Is there
anything too hard for me? Well, we do read of it. We read
it in a very similar word, of course, in the earlier verse
here, when Jeremiah is speaking. And Jeremiah says, and there
is nothing too hard for thee. And God says here that, God also
says, in this question, is there anything too hard for me? And
the other occasion when we read of this is in the life of Abraham,
when Isaac was promised and the Lord said to Abraham, is there
anything too hard for me? Now at that time in Abraham's
life of course it appeared to be an utter impossibility that
Sarah should conceive and have a son. But it was God's divine
purpose, that through this way, there will be an amazing and
wonderful blessing. And what was occurring? God was
proving, He was proving that He was the
Lord, the God of all flesh. No one else could have produced
baby Isaac. It was the work of Almighty God. Yes, it was a hard thing, but
it wasn't too hard for the Lord. And so, today in our lives, we should realise that there
is nothing too hard for our God. The question is, is there anything
too hard for me? Now, we know There is nothing
too hard for God, nothing too difficult for God to bring about. We have in the Word of God so
many, many accounts of God's wonderful appearing, when His Holy Spirit came and
did wonderful things, great things. My friends, Bless God that we
still come before that same God today. Is there anything too
hard for me? We may think we've got hard things
in our lives. It may seem impossible that things
will come to pass. It seems impossible that the
Lord will perhaps have heard our cries, heard our prayers. It may seem that Just like Jeremiah
said, you know, Jeremiah thought in his life that God wasn't hearing
his prayers. And we can read the words of
that in the lamentations that he wrote. And it's good sometimes
just to ponder these things, because here was Jeremiah blessed
in this way, praying to God. But we also see the other side.
And the other side is this. I am the man that has seen affliction
by the rod of his wrath. He hath led me and brought me
into darkness, but not into light. That's not what we expect, is
it? We expect God to bring us into light. He brings us into
darkness sometimes for my friends to show us the glory and the
benefit of the light when He reveals Christ to us. Brings us into darkness. So then when the light shines,
when the light shines in the face of Jesus Christ, then it
is real and precious to us. And then it is that we know then
that there's nothing too hard for our God. He comes where we
are in that prison house, in that darkness. And Jeremiah felt
surely against me as he turned. He turned against me all the
day. You're wrong, Jeremiah, but that's
how he felt. My flesh and my skin, if he made old, he hath
broken my bones. He hath built it against me and
encompassed me with gore and trouble. He hath set me in dark
places as they that be dead of old. He hath hedged me about
and I cannot get out. He hath made my chain heavy."
Sometimes God gives you a heavy chain so you can't move around
very much. You've got to stay where you
are. That's what Jeremiah found. No doubt he would have loved
to have got out of the dungeon. But he got a heavy chain, he
couldn't get out. And then he comes and says, also, when I
cry and shout, he shutters out my prayer. Now that's a very
hard thing. And that's a very difficult thing
to bear. When in a dungeon, a dark place,
You can't pray if you want to. Well, remember this. Is there anything too hard for
me? I believe God graciously brings
us into these situations to prove us the test of faith. Jeremiah didn't give up. Jeremiah proved the faithfulness
of his God. And he tells us, it is the Lord's
mercies that we are not consumed. Because his compassions fail
not, great is thy faithfulness. My friends today, we come before
a great and a faithful God. Is there anything too hard for
me? There are many things too hard
for us. Many things too hard. We can't
solve them. We can't work them out. We don't
understand the path. Is there anything too hard for
me? No. God's purposes will ripen fast. Unfolding every hour, the bud
may have a bitter taste, but Sweet will be the flower. See, that's for God's purposes
for you and for me. As we journey through this life
to realise we come before a God who is dealing with our souls. That's the great thing, you see.
He's dealing with our souls, my friends. And that dealing
means that we're being dealt with to
prepare us for our eternal home. Now you see, if you and I have
a very easy life in this world, all the comforts and no difficulties
and no trials, you'd want to stay here, wouldn't you? You'd
want to stay, you'd want to settle down. Well this is alright, I'm
enjoying this, I'm enjoying that. This situation has developed
nicely. My friends, God doesn't work like that. For here we have no continuing
city, but we seek one to come. And I believe in measure God
makes our life on this earth as it were uncomfortable. So
we're seeking that city yet to come. And what is the glory of
that place? Jesus in the midst. That's the
glory of heaven. My friends, that's the glory
of our life here below. As we know, there's nothing too
hard for the Lord. Nothing too hard for Him. He
can come, reveal Himself unto us, as He does not unto the world. And you may perhaps be in darkness.
You may be longing for the light to shine. The time will come. The blessing will occur. The
Lord will not leave us desolate. He will not leave us, nor forsake
us. so that we may boldly say, the
Lord is my helper. I will not fear what man can
do unto me. Yes, the blessing is that God
is our helper. It's wonderful to know that we
have such a God, a God who goes before us, a God who makes the
crooked things straight, and the rough places plain, and the
mountains to flow down at His presence. Things which are impossible with
us are possible with God. And that's a wonderful blessing
to realise. You see, you and I look at it
naturally, don't we? And we say, well, that's impossible. No,
it's not. We think the Lord will never
deliver us. Yes, He will. God is faithful. God hears the
cries of his children and he hates to put away those cries. But there is a time, a set time
to favour Zion. And when is that? God's time. It's not your time. So you think
of, go back to Abraham, go back to his situation. Well, God had
given that promise. Is there anything too hard for
the Lord? They didn't want to wait for God's appearing. They
tried to push the schedule ahead, didn't they? And well, we know the result. Ishmael was born. He wasn't the
chosen one. Isaac was that one who God had
ordained. The Lord appeared. I had to wait. My friends, God appears still
for us today. We may have to wait to find how kind and gracious
He is. Your time is always, but my time
is not yet. But the appointed time does roll
on. Today nearer, deliverance. Today nearer, blessing. It's a denierah, the wonderful
appearance of God. It's a blessing to know those
words, to hold on our way, hold on our way, and not to give up. This is the God. Behold, I am
the Lord. The God of all flesh, is there
anything too hard for me? My friends today, let us realise
that we still come before this same God. Why? Because He said, I am the same
yesterday and today and forever. That's why. It's the same God. May we bless God for it. May
we be thankful for it. May it increase our faith today.
That we may be able to believe those words, he who has helped
me hitherto, will help me all my journey through and give me
daily cause to raise new Ebenezers to his praise. The Lord God is
worthy of all praise, for all his mercy toward us, and as we
look back in our lives, look back today, and to be able to
say, no, well, I'm not where I would be, but I'm not where
I was. The Lord has looked upon me.
He has touched my heart. He has given me a hope in his
mercy. Press on and pray on to this great and greatest God,
who is so high and so mighty and so lifted up, and to believe
the glory of this truth. He says, Behold, I am the Lord,
the God of all flesh. Is there anything too hard for
me? Amen.