Chapter 33. The title of the message is, God
Thy Refuge. God Thy Refuge. And we'll take our text from
verse 27. Deuteronomy 33 and verse 27,
Moses says, the eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are
the everlasting arms. Here, in this text of Scripture,
we have the last sermon of Moses, the faithful servant and prophet
of God, This is the last words of his lips before God took him
and he died. The eternal God is thy refuge
and underneath are the everlasting arms. Now, after this message
was preached, after 40 years in the wilderness, after God
leading his people from Egypt to Sinai, from Sinai to Jordan,
And from Jordan to the wilderness, and now they have returned to
Jordan. I love this. The trip from Goshen,
you remember, I told you this before, the trip from Goshen
to Canaan, to the River Jordan, was as far as it is from Louisville
to Knoxville. It should have only took them
a month to two months to make that journey. Yet, it was 40
years. The Lord led them about for 40
years, and now they have come to the end of this journey. Now, I ask you this. Do you suppose
that Moses' doctrine changed? Do you suppose that it changed?
Did he begin with a certain doctrine and then through this wilderness
journey, through all of his experience, somehow did his doctrine change? No, I tell you by the affirmation
of this text, Moses' doctrine did not change. It was the same
at the beginning as it was at the end. Do you suppose that
the backsliding experience of Israel, his own backsliding and
idolatry would cause his opinion of human nature to improve? Do
you suppose that he started out thinking man was depraved and
all these 40 years he got a better opinion of man? Do you suppose
that happened? No, absolutely not. Do you suppose that during
this 40 years He felt that men somehow got better as they went. Well, we know that's not the
case. And you suppose these 40 years caused Moses to devalue the grace of God? No, I tell you this. These experiences
that Moses had in these 40 years did not change his doctrine,
but rather affirmed it. It affirmed it. Moses knew of
the depravity of man, but I tell you, his experience through the
wilderness only affirmed that to be true. His value of the grace of God
was the same at the beginning as it was at the end. But yet,
I tell you, it was more needful at the end than it was for Him
at the beginning. Even so it is with all of us.
This journey that we are on, this wilderness trek that every
believer is on, it doesn't change our gospel. It only affirms it. What God is doing is affirming
His gospel through the wilderness, through our trials, so that our
doctrine at the beginning is the same at the end. The only
difference is it's more affirmed. We're more sure. by the experiences
I'm sure Moses at the end here of his journey he was about to
depart this world he was about to leave this world and his message
was the same and here it is the eternal God is thy refuge and
underneath are the everlasting arms this is Moses deep conviction
That the depravity and ruin of man, he was affirmed as well
as the grace, the superabounding of grace of God in Christ. Now,
this is just not true of every saint of God. We who are saved
by the grace of God, God finds us in the very teeth of our depravity. God quickens us to life so that
we see the ruin of our nature. We see the helplessness and hopelessness
of our condition of sin. The light of God's holiness shines
in our hearts and we are hopeless and helpless before His presence.
But by grace, by grace, He sweetly quickens and quenches the thirst
of our souls for righteousness through the gospel of Jesus Christ. This is the experience of grace
for every believer. Every believer experiences this
grace. Therefore, by grace we are saved
through faith in Christ alone. And no matter what happens in
this journey, that doctrine does not change. It does not change. It only affirms. God only affirms
this doctrine through our trek. And though we, like Moses, are
brought through the wilderness, Isn't this right that God brought
Moses to the wilderness of sin? You remember that where the serpents
bit them? Was that accidental? Or was that
on purpose? You bet it was on purpose. And
those serpents bit them as they were directed of God. And I tell
you this, isn't this where he led us to know the serpents bite
the sin? He showed us, didn't He? He showed
us our wickedness and our depravity. He showed us our helplessness.
But then, in grace, what did He do to Israel? He lifted up
the serpent in the wilderness. Even so must the Son of Man be
lifted up. And as Christ was lifted up,
He shows us Christ, and we are healed of the serpent's bite. This is the experience of grace.
This is what God does to every believer. And yet we must pass
through this wilderness. Even as Israel must have passed
through the wilderness to get to Jordan, even so must we pass
through this life, which is truly a barren wasteland. Have you
not found that so? Has not everything that you thought
would bring you joy in this life only hurt you. Yes. Because the joys here are fleeting. They're passing away. They only leave a bitter taste
in our mouth, don't they? But yet we must endure the trials
and troubles of this life So often we, like Israel in the
wilderness, are so full of backsliding and sin and murmuring and complaining. Isn't that our lot? Isn't that
true of us? But I tell you this, believer
in Christ, no matter their murmuring and complaining, God led them.
didn't he? He patiently, lovingly guided
them every step of the way. Even so will He lead you, you
child of God. In back in Exodus 33 verse 16,
I'll read it to you for time's sake. It says that Moses said
this, For wherein shall it be known that I and thy people have found
grace in thy sight? Is it not that thou goest with
us So shall we be separated, I and thy people, from all the
people upon the face of the earth. And the Lord said unto Moses,
I will do this thing also that thou hast spoken. For thou hast
found grace in my sight, and I know thee by name. What's the difference between
God's people and the rest of lost humanity? Here it is. God goes with us and not with
them. That's a difference. The grace
of God is the difference. Who maketh thee to differ from
another? Or what hast thou that thou hast
not received? Is it not all of grace? Everything
is of grace. And now do we see Moses' message
of grace is not changed in our text as it was from the beginning.
Moses believed God had a people. He said, God, you have a people.
You chose a people. And how is it that we know that
you are with us even because you go with us? And so then,
all their journey to this place, to this text, has led up to this. It only affirmed the doctrine
Moses knew from the beginning. It only affirmed it. It only
proves the gospel of Jesus Christ in whom we are complete. And herein is Moses' doctrine,
and I want to give it to you. Here it is. He says this, The
eternal God is thy refuge. Now, what is a refuge? What is a refuge? Well, some
of the writers put it like this. A refuge in some of their day
was they used these wooden ships and these big sails on these
ships. And they would put these harbors
of these ships in between two mountains. So as the storm would
be absorbed by the mountains, and they called that the iron
refuge. The harbor of iron refuge. It
protected the ships and it absorbed the storms and kept them safe. But I would not go into detail
because I don't know much about it. About ships and harbors and
things like that. So I'll just give you something
I know. In the Word of God, There were twelve cities, six on one
side of Jordan, six on the other, and they were called cities of
what? Refuge. Refuge. And what were they for? You remember, if a man accidentally
killed another man, the family of the slain man had a right
to kill. The manslayer. They were called
the Avengers of Blood. And as soon as the man accidentally
killed the other man, the law required that he should flee
to one of these cities. These cities of refuge. And if he made it to the city
of refuge, he was safe. The Avenger of Blood could not
kill him. so long as he was in this city
of refuge. And you know what one of the
law was of that city of refuge? He had to stay there, and if
he got out of that city, he could kill him. Unless the high priest
died. Unless the priest died. And oh,
how sweetly this opens up to us of the gospel of Jesus Christ. How sweetly are these cities
a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ who is our refuge. You see, we have sinned unknowingly in Adam. We all sinned. Were you there? Did you see the
sin of Adam? No. It was unknowing. Yet we
were all victims of this sin. God made Him our representative. And when He sinned, we all sinned. Therefore, we were born dead
in sins without life and hoped to save ourselves. And I tell
you, the avenger of blood, that's a picture of God's justice. And
by the grace of God, we were quickened to see our need of
a refuge. We by the Spirit of God heard
that Jesus Christ was a refuge for sinners, and by grace we
fled to Him and believed on Him. And He, as our High Priest, has
died for our sins. Refuge. Listen to me. You will never run to a refuge
if you don't think you have need of one. Isn't that right? What good is a refuge if a man
doesn't have need of one? We who have fled Christ, we understand
our need of a refuge. We understand our sin, our guilt,
our misery, and we only find relief in Christ. We only find shelter in Him. Now, man by nature has no need
of a refuge. So long as his conscience is
clear, so long as he has no troubles or convictions of guilt or eternity,
He won't need a refuge. But once trouble comes, sickness
and sorrow and trouble, once his conscience is awakened to
his sin and his mind is directed to matters of eternity, listen
to me, every man will run for a refuge. Take a man that's dying. You
put a man in a situation where he's dying and you watch. He'll
plead. He'll beg. He'll run! He'll try to find some place
to hide himself. Some kind of comfort. Some kind
of assurance. He'll look back in his life.
He'll look all around him to try to find some help from somebody.
He's gonna look for a refuge. Man will look for a refuge. You
remember when Adam and Eve sinned? When they sinned, they knew they
were naked, and then what? They looked for a refuge. And
what was their refuge? Fig leaves. They said, surely,
if we could cover ourselves, we should be safe. Then they
heard the voice of God, and they needed more than leaves. They
needed the whole forest. They ran and hid in the garden,
thinking the forest would cover them. They truly, sincerely believed
that. Even so now, some of you may
be scurrying about in your mind looking for someplace to hide. The lost man would desire to
leave and flee at the voice of God? Desire to flee from His
Word and run from Him? And some men run to this. Listen.
I want you to understand this. Some lost men run to sin as a
refuge. What do they do? I tell them
about sin and judgment, and they want to run into sin so much
that it sears their conscience. They want to plunge headlong
into it like those pigs of Gadara that ran down into the sea. Man
will run back to his sin and try to find a refuge in his sin. Does that not prove the depravity
of man to run to the very thing that damns him? That's just proof. That's just proof. But I'll tell
you the most common refuge. Listen to this. The most common
refuge is self-righteousness. Religion. That's the most common
refuge for man. Legalism. This refuge is the
most common because it is the most natural. The most natural. These men who make covenants
with, these are men who make covenants with death and with
hell and say that the scourge shall not pass over me. I've
already made a covenant with God. I've made my peace with
God. If you've made your peace with
God, you have no peace with God. I want you to understand that
you have no peace if you've made it. If you made it, there is
no peace with God. You've made a covenant with death
and with hell and God will disannul your covenant. Every man knows there is a God.
They know that judgment is coming. But what they fail to see is
their absolute ruin. They fail to see the absolute
perfection of God that He demands. Therefore, Jesus said, except
your righteousness exceed, exceed, superaboundingly exceed the righteousness
of the scribes and the Pharisees, you shall in no case, no case,
there is no case in which God will accept a man based on his
own righteousness. No case. No case. Why? Because man by
nature is unrighteous. And so then religion of works
and self-righteousness is no refuge at all. And I'll give
you a third refuge that men run to. Listen to this. Doctrinal
intelligence. How deceiving is this one? Doctrinal
intelligence. Most of our children have heard
the gospel. I know this, I was raised under
the gospel. I heard it myself. And you know what refuge I ran
to? This one, right here, doctrinal intelligence. I knew all about
grace. I knew all about total depravity,
limited atonement, irresistible grace. I knew all of it. And
so my rest and my hope was in my knowledge of the gospel. Friends, that is no refuge at
all. That is no refuge at all. There are some who, when they're
convinced of sin, they turn to the refuge of some profession
of the true gospel, and they seek shelter in a doctrinal refuge. These deceived folks are convinced
themselves that because they are not Arminians, they're saved. That is a false refuge. But unless they themselves experience
the grace of God, there's no hope. You can know all there is to
know about Calvinism, but if God, the Holy Spirit, does not
come and quicken your dead soul to life, there's no hope. Your refuge is empty. Your refuge
is empty, except you be born again. by the Spirit of God to
faith in Christ alone, you have no refuge. You've got dead orthodoxy. How many are so deceived under
this banner of gospel truth? How many believe in the reformation
of doctrine but have no reformation of the heart? Is it any better than blatant
Arminianism? No. Have you fled to Christ for
refuge? Who needs a refuge? You're looking at one. I need
Christ as my only refuge. All other refuges are dumb. They're worthless. There are no refuges at all,
but a refuge of lies. God, listen, God will never allow
His people to hide in any of those. Never. He will never allow
His people to hide there, but will by grace destroy all false
shelters. A man by nature will not let
these go. They will hold on to them as
long as they can until God pries it from our hands. Is that not
our experience of grace? That God pried these things from
our hands. That's so. He took them all away. He destroyed them all. Has God
destroyed all your false refuges? I'll show you this is the experience
of every believer. Go to Hosea. Hosea. I want you to see if you can
identify with this because this is what believers identify with.
I know this to be true because this has happened to me and it's
happened to every believer from the beginning. Look at this.
Hosea chapter 2. Look at verse 10. Look what God does. Before He
brings a believer in, He must destroy their false refuge. He
says in verse 10, yeah, verse 10. He said, now will I discover
her lewdness. Is that not true of you, believer,
if God not discovered your lewdness, your sin to you? Verse 11, he
says, I will cause her mirth to cease, her feast days, her
new moons, her Sabbath, and all her solemn feasts. What does
that mean? He takes the pleasure of sin away. Sin that we once
loved, now it has no pleasure. Now it becomes a burden. Now
it becomes a weight on our shoulders. And He not only does that, He
takes away our religion. He says, I take away your feast
days and your days of mirth, all those things you thought
would save you. I take them away from you. I
rip them from you. Look at this. He said, I will
destroy her vines and her fig leaves. What did Adam and Eve
cover themselves in? Fig leaves. He covered the fig
trees. He's taking it away. All of our
works and self-righteousness become withered leaves and dead
trees around us. Verse 13, He said, I will visit
upon her the days of Balaam wherein she burned incense to them. In
other words, He brings to mind our what? Sin. Our idols. Our self-righteousness. He brings
all of our sin to bear on us. But then look at verse 14. Then,
therefore, behold, I will allure her and bring her into the wilderness. and speak comfortably to her.
Isn't this what God does? Isn't this the grace? Isn't this
grace? He strips us of everything and
then he speaks so comfortably to us. He says, I'll speak comfortably
to her. I will give her her vineyards
from thence, and the valley of Achar for a door of hope." Remember,
her vineyards. That's her inheritance. What's
your inheritance, believer? Righteousness. Eternal life. This is yours. Obtained by Jesus
Christ and now given to you who have fled to Christ for refuge.
And the valley of Achar, you remember that's where Achan the
man died in the stead of Israel. Isn't that what Christ did for
us? And then what? We see Jesus Christ
as our refuge. Refuge. May God the Holy Spirit now,
even in the power of God, blow on all our false refuges. and show us the only one that
stands. Jesus Christ and Him crucified
is the only refuge for sinners. And listen to this. Go back to
your text now. Refuge. We know what a refuge is. It's
Jesus Christ. Now then, look at this. The eternal God is thy
refuge. The sweetness and assurance of
the gospel message lies in this, this little word, thy. Luther said that, I thought that
was really a good thing. He said the honeycomb of the
gospel rests in personal pronouns. Thine, mine, thy. It's personal. Listen, you believer
in Christ, you who have fled to Christ, the eternal God is
thy refuge. Thy refuge. There's no comfort
in joy or peace in knowing of sovereign election, particular
redemption, effectual calling, unless I'm the one being called. Unless I'm the one redeemed.
Unless I'm the one chosen. There's no peace in that for
anybody but the elect, are there? And there's not going to be any
peace for me unless I know I'm numbered among them. Are you
numbered with them? You are, if all your hopes have
been crushed, if you long that God destroy all your dreams and
false refuges, and you only to be found in Christ. Is that your
heart? Then you listen to me. According
to God's word, God himself is your refuge. The Eternal God is thy refuge. Now note this. The Eternal God
is thy refuge. See the difference in contrast
between all false refuge and our refuge. A false refuge is
always something that begins in time. Works. Work is something that
must begin in time, isn't it? And you know when it ends? When
the person dies. He can only work so long as he
lives. Knowledge. Knowledge is something
that men run to for a refuge. It begins in time. But when a
man dies, where's his knowledge? It's gone. So is opinions, theories,
and Will. All of those things are something
that begins in time. If your refuge is based in time,
it surely has an end. What good does that do an immortal
soul? You see, I need something that
endures time. I need a refuge that lasts longer
than time. I need a refuge that begins in
eternity and ends in eternity. I need a refuge that lasts forever. And let us consider you who are
in Christ. For the eternal God Himself is
your refuge. Our refuge began in an eternal
covenant of grace before the world began. God in purpose put
you in Christ and made Him to be all your wisdom, righteousness,
sanctification, and redemption. God purposed, God purposed that
the glory of His grace should be praised by the election, redemption,
calling, and glorification of your immortal soul. I want you to understand what
you get with this eternal refuge. Absolute security. You see, God
has tied His glory with your salvation. Therefore, the only way to separate
you from your eternal refuge is to stain the glory of God. And that just ain't gonna happen.
That just cannot happen. God Believer, our refuge and
salvation for our souls is eternally tied to the glory of God. And now behold the comfort to
you in the wilderness, you who are struggling in this wilderness.
The eternal God is thy refuge. What then could change this doctrine? The eternal God is thy refuge.
So what in time should change this doctrine? What could you
do to change this doctrine? Nothing. Matter of fact, everything
that happens in time only affirms this doctrine. The eternal God
is thy refuge. Secondly, underneath are the
everlasting arms. The first of all wants to see
this. Moses uses this word again. He uses first eternal and then
he uses everlasting. He says things, he's repeating
himself basically. He's saying the eternal God and
the everlasting arms. Why does he do this? For the
assurance of the people. Most people Ask preachers of
the gospel, why is it that you always preach the same thing?
For the assurance of the people. We preach Jesus Christ and Him
crucified always. They said, man, you don't have
half a dozen tunes to play. You just play the same thing
over and over and over. I tell you, I've only got one
tune. I've only got one string. And I'm going to pluck this string
every time I preach the gospel. Jesus Christ and Him crucified.
It's the only string that matters to God's people. We harp on this over and over
again because He is our refuge. And I desire to hear it again
and again. And so Moses, he's playing the
same string twice, isn't he? The eternal God, the everlasting
arms. The eternal God is thy refuge,
everlasting arms underneath you. He says the same thing twice.
Now what does Moses mean by this expression? The everlasting arms. Well, Philpott says this, I like
this, he said, the best way to get to the meaning of promises
is by looking at the contrast. By looking at the circumstances,
we can sometimes gather the spiritual meaning of the promises. Here's
an example. God says in Isaiah 33, verse
16, he says, bread shall be given. So by looking then at the hunger, we gather a clearer view of what
is meant by the promise. In other words, if there's no
hunger, what good would be that promise? If you had all the bread
in the world and I promise you bread, so what? That doesn't
lean any weight to the promise. But if a man's starving and then
there's a promise of bread, do you see how much weight that
gives the promise? Because he's starving. Man is
starving to death for righteousness. Then there's a promise. Bread
shall be given. Another one is this. I will clothe
thee with a change of raiment. This is only precious to one
who's naked. Isn't that right? If you have
all the clothes on, I promise you clothes, and what good is
it? But here it is. Man by nature is naked, and Christ
says, I will clothe thee with righteousness. Now that's a good
promise. And in our text, he says, the
eternal God is thy refuge. Well, only those in need of a
refuge find that promise appealing. And so it is with this, underneath
are the everlasting arms. Consider, believer, our poor
natural condition as a paralytic child. We, by nature, are as
Mephibosheth. You remember, he was fetched. Weren't we fetched by grace?
Mephibosheth was lame on his feet. That's how we are by nature. And therefore he was fetched,
and he was carried into the presence of David, where he bowed down
and confessed, What is thy servant but a dead dog? Isn't that what
happened to us? Weren't we carried into the presence
of Christ by grace? And now then Mephibosheth is
made to sit at David's table and eat of the king's food. But
you know what the Scripture says of Mephibosheth? he was still
lame on his feet so what about this promise of the underneath
of the everlasting arms that only is precious to the lame
to those who can't walk themselves This promise is only meaningful
to us who are still lame on our feet. You see, this message of grace surely does
put an end to all our boasting, doesn't it? For we are still lame on our
feet, We are still without strength to finish our journey. One preacher
said this, if God were to put one foot into heaven and bid
me shift my other foot to heaven, I surely would fall off headlong
into hell. See then the beauty of the promise,
believer. God has not put one of your foot
into heaven expecting you to put the other one. God is carrying
you to heaven. This is the promise. God is our
refuge and God is carrying you to glory. Underneath you is omnipotent
strength to carry you to heaven. so that none can impede Him or
stop Him. We are carried from eternity
to eternity by the everlasting omnipotence of God. Jesus said,
when a man having a hundred sheep, if one be lost, he would leave
the ninety and nine and find the one. And when he had found
Him, laid Him where? On His shoulders. and carries
him home. You now see the picture? Who's carrying you through the
wilderness? Thy God. Thy God is carrying you. It's just not our experience
of grace in our journey. We Are we not so weak and lame with
sin that if any part of our salvation depended on us, we would surely
die? Therefore, believer, be not afraid. The eternal God is thy refuge,
and underneath are the everlasting arms. And when are these arms felt
the most? When we are weighed down the
most. If you put a bunch of straws
under my arms, I would feel no weight. You would not be able to see
my strength displayed, would you? If I was just carrying some
straws. Now you put a weight in my arms and I lift the weight,
then you can see my strength displayed. And what God is doing
by putting weight on us is displaying his strength and your weakness.
He's displaying your weakness, and in doing so, He is displaying
His strength to carry you all the way. And so all these burdens
you think you bear, you don't bear any of it. He does. What are you bearing? What are
you carrying to glory? You can't carry yourself. Who's doing the lifting? You
or God? You bet God is. Underneath are the everlasting
arms, and He will bear all of His children to glory. And lastly, look at this, the
promise of victory. He says this, and He shall thrust
out the enemy before thee. Do we not have real enemies?
I tell you, if you don't think
you have real enemies, you're deceived. We do have real enemies. But God says, the God that is
your refuge, the God that carries you, He says this, I will thrust
them out before you. Did he not thrust them out at
Calvary? God says in, I'll read it to
you just in closing. Let me read it to you. Zephaniah
chapter three, it says, O daughter of Zion, shout, O Israel, be
glad. Rejoice with all the heart, O
daughter of Jerusalem. The Lord hath taken away thy
judgments and hath cast out thine enemy, the King of Israel. Even the Lord is in the midst
of thee. Thou shalt not see evil any more. Do you believe that? Do you believe what God said? He hath cast out thine enemies. Satan, who accuses us, is cast
out. Can he accuse what God justified?
No. Your sin, your guilt, your shame,
hath not Christ borne it? Is God not satisfied with His
death? Then it's cast out. And listen
to me, everything in your life is not evil. It's good. Oh God, give us such faith. Give us such faith that looks
only and always to Christ. And through Him we know this,
God Himself is our refuge. Underneath are the everlasting
arms. Therefore, He says to us, destroy
them. Destroy your self-righteousness. Cast out all your pride and bow
to Christ. And you know what he says next? He says, Israel shall be what? Safe. Safe in the arms of Jesus. Safe on his gentle breast. Thereby his love was shaded.
Sweetly my soul shall Is this your doctrine? This is the doctrine of all God's
people. This is not only our doctrine, it's our experience. Nothing I've said to you who
are believers, you know that to be true. And I pray that God would use
it right now to comfort you and you can rest in Him. I refuge. I stand and will be
dismissed in prayer.