The writer of this, quoting our
Lord, Fear not, I'm with thee, O be
not dismayed, For I'm thy God, I will still give thee aid. That's
wonderful, isn't it? The soul that on Jesus hath leaned
for repose, I will not, I will not desert to his foes. I will
not do it. Turn with me if you would to
2 Thessalonians chapter 3. 2 Thessalonians chapter 3 and look
at the first line of verse 3. But the Lord is faithful. That's good news, isn't it? That's
the gospel. That is the gospel. I read that,
you know, we go verse by verse. And I read that that first line
and I thought, man. But God, that's the gospel. But God, but the Lord is faithful. This word declares the absolute
horror of the truth about you and about me. The horrible, horrible
truth. It is horrible. It's so horrible. And then it declares, but the
Lord is faithful when it comes to you and me, buddy, it's horrible.
But the Lord is faithful. This word says concerning us,
me included, concerning us, it says, you will not come to me
that you might have life. It says you by wicked hands,
crucified and slayed the Lord of glory. It says, you despised Him. You rejected Him. You hid your
face from Him. It says, you have done nothing
but sin and rebel against Him all the days of your life. It
says, but the Lord is faithful, still faithful. Still that is,
that is just, that's just wonderful. Still faithful. Amazing. It's amazing grace. Now we're
going to turn quite a bit tonight. I thought I'd go ahead and warn
you of that. You can, you can be ready for it. I want to, I
want to glory in and rejoice in as much of this word as we
can. And we're going to start in Deuteronomy chapter 7. Go
with me over to Deuteronomy chapter 7. Deuteronomy 7 verse 9 says, that the Lord thy God, He is
God. Know that first. Start with that
first. Just like when Rahab the harlot
hid those spies in Jericho. You remember the spies were sent
into Jericho and Rahab hit them and this is what she said to
them. We've heard of your God. We've
heard of what your God has done. We've heard of how He has defended
you and protected you and slain your enemies. She said fear has
taken this place. And this is the reason why. The
Lord your God, He is God. In heaven above and earth beneath. He is God. We cannot glory and
we cannot rejoice in anything concerning our God until we get
ahold of the fact that he is God. We have to start with that. There's, there's no room to rejoice
until we enter into the fact that he is God, because it means
he is able to do. Whatever he's purposed to do,
whatever he has declared concerning himself must be, if I tell you
I'm going to do something, I'm going to try, but it doesn't
mean I'm going to do it. But whatever this word declares
concerning Him must be. It must come to pass because
He's God. He's God. All right, now entering
into that, listen to what the word declares Him to be. Verse
9 says, Know therefore that the Lord thy God, He is God, the
faithful God. which keepeth covenant and mercy
with them that love him and keep his commandments to a thousand
generations." The faithful God, the Lord is faithful because
He is the faithful God, faithful God. He's faithful in all things,
all things, starting with the punishment of sin. Starting with
that, he said he is going to punish sin. He said the wages
of sin is death, and he is going to be faithful to his word. He
is the faithful, just, holy, righteous, God, he is going to
be faithful to his word. Verse 10 says he repayeth them
that hate him to their face. He vengeance is his. He will repay. He repayeth them
that hate him to their faith to destroy them. He will not
be slack to him that hated him. He will repay him to his face. That's a promise to every center
against him. Every single one, he will be
faithful to his promise. Verse 11 says thou shalt therefore
keep the commandments. Therefore keep the commandments
and the statutes and the judgments, which I command thee this day
to do them. Now, can we say that we have
kept his commandments? Not one. No, not one. Not one. Not one. Not to the perfection that He
demands. He demands absolute perfection. Alright, well then
what's our hope? What is our peace of salvation? Look up at verse 6. He said,
For thou art in holy people, unto the Lord thy God. The Lord
thy God hath chosen thee to be a special people unto himself
above all people that are upon the face of the earth. The Lord
did not set his love upon you nor choose you because you were
more in number than any people For you were the fewest people
of all. There was nothing in you that drew him to you. There
was nothing attractive. Verse 8 says, But because the
LORD loved you, and because he would keep the oath which he
had sworn unto your fathers, hath the LORD brought you out
with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the house of bondmen
from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt. That's our hope. Our hope is in the fact that
He is faithful to the promise of His Word. So faithful. Turn back just a few pages to
Numbers 14. Numbers 14 verse 18 says, The Lord is long-suffering and of great mercy, forgiving
iniquity and transgression, and by no means clearing the guilty. I love that. The Lord is long
suffering and of great mercy, forgiving iniquity and transgression,
and by no means clearing the guilty. Well, wait a minute now.
How did he forgive our iniquity and transgression? He by no means cleared the guilty.
That's how He did it. The Lord our God, the Lord our
Savior, Jesus Christ, faithfully took upon Himself the sin and
the sins, the cause and the effect. He took the iniquity and the
transgressions. of all of his people, every soul
the father gave to him. He made himself to be guilty. Absolutely guilty. He literally
actually took our guilt. He took our guilt. And then he
by no means cleared the guilty. He punished all of that iniquity.
He punished all of those transgressions in His own body. He punished
them all the way to the grave. He was just and right and holy
by no means clearing the guilty. And with all that punishment
being satisfied, every soul in Christ is now free to go. Free to go. You know, you hear
these things and it's so contrary to what the world believes. The
world believes now you've got to save yourself. You have to
save yourself. You wonder, all right, what about
the sin that I'm still committing? Because I still see it in myself. Christ took every single sin. He took all the guilt. I feel
guilt and you feel guilt. Oh my goodness, the guilt that
was pressed into his body. He took all the guilt. He felt
the guilt. He made himself to be the guilty
one. And then he did not clear the
guilty. And he put it away and every soul in him is free to
go. Completely free to go. That's
what he did in his faithfulness. That's the hope that he has given
to us in and through and by his faithfulness. Look at Numbers
23. Numbers 23 verse 19 says, God is not a man that he should
lie, neither the son of man that he should repent. Hath he said,
and shall he not do it? Or hath he spoken, and shall
he not make it good? Behold, I have received commandment
to bless, and he hath blessed, and I cannot reverse it. He hath
not beheld iniquity in Jacob, neither hath he seen perverseness
in Israel. The Lord his God is with him,
and the shout of a king is among them. God brought them out of
Egypt, he hath as it were the strength of a unicorn. Surely
there is no enchantment against Jacob, neither is there any divination
against Israel. According to this time, it shall
be said of Jacob and of Israel, what hath God wrought? In amazement,
that's what they'll cry, behold his faithfulness. He said He
would do it, and He did it. That's what we're going to be
crying throughout eternity. We heard about these things, we
heard about this. He said He would do it, He promised
He would do it, and He did it. He did it. Now let's just read
a few scriptures on our way back to our text. Go with me to Lamentations
chapter 3. We can't talk about the subject
to His faithfulness and not go to Lamentations 3. Lamentations 3 verse 21 says, This I recall to my mind, therefore
have I hope. It is of the Lord's mercies that
we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not. They are new every morning. Great is thy faithfulness. Great is thy faithfulness. That's
all we have to say about our standing before Him. That's all
we have to say about it. The condition and the security
of our salvation, all we can say is, great is His faithfulness
toward us. Great, great faithfulness. Go
with me to 1 Corinthians chapter 1. 1 Corinthians 1 verse 1 says, Paul
called to be an apostle of Jesus Christ through the will of God
and Sosthenes our brother. Paul is the one speaking. This
is who he's speaking to. Verse 2, unto the church of God
which is at Corinth, to them that are sanctified in Christ
Jesus, called to be saints, with all that in every place call
upon the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord, both theirs and ours. He's their Lord and he's ours.
And this is what he has to say to him. Verse three, grace be
unto you in peace from God, our father, and from the Lord Jesus
Christ. I thank my God always on your behalf for the grace
of God, which is given you by Jesus Christ. that in everything
you are enriched by him, in all utterance and in all knowledge,
even as the testimony of Christ was confirmed in you, so that
you come behind in no gift, waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus
Christ, who shall also confirm you unto the end, that you may
be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ." Verse 9 says,
God is faithful. by whom you were called unto
the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord." That's God's
message to His people. That is His message to His people. I'm faithful. I'm faithful. He was faithful to punish our
sin. And I'm so glad it's punished.
It has been punished. By His grace, He was faithful
to keep His covenant of mercy toward His people, toward us,
through His own Son. And He is faithful to call every
one of His people to the fellowship of His Son. The Apostle John
said, that which we have seen and heard, declare we unto you,
that you also may have fellowship with us and truly our fellowship
is with the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ. And how glorious
that fellowship is. How glorious that union is. How desperately needful that
fellowship is. Our comfort and our safety and
our life is in that fellowship. Our hope and our rest Our peace
is in that fellowship. Look with me at 1 Corinthians
10. Verse 13 says, there hath no
temptation taken you, no trial taken you or come upon you, but
such as is common to man. But God is faithful. Trials and
tribulations and things will come, they will come. But God
is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that
you are able, but will with the temptation also make a way to
escape that you may be able to bear it. What is that way of
escape? It's Him. He is the way. He is our escape,
and every trial, every temptation that takes us, they come one
right after the next. Every now and then, we get a
little lull between the trials. But we're always either coming
out of one, in one, or about to be in one. And in every case,
every time, even though the burden may be a heavy one to bear, sometimes
they are heavy burdens to bear. But every single time, we can
always run to Him. Always. Always. And He is always
faithful to receive us. He said, I will in no wise cast
you out. I will in no wise. So back in
our text, go to 2 Thessalonians 3. Verse 3 says, But the Lord is faithful, who
shall establish you and keep you from evil." He said, the
Lord is faithful to establish you. He will establish you. Establish you in what? Well, he said in chapter 2 verse
16, now our Lord Jesus Christ Himself And God, even our father,
which hath loved us and hath given us everlasting consolation
and good hope through grace, he will comfort your hearts and
establish you in every good word and work. He will establish you
in the word of Christ. He will establish you in the
work of Christ, not man's word. God's people are not established
in man's word. And God's people are not established
in man's work. Not man's work at all. God's
people are established in Christ. Completely established in Him.
He said in Romans 16, look at that one with me, go over to
Romans 16. Romans 16 verse 25. Now to Him that is of power to
establish you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus
Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery, which was kept
secret since the world began, but now is made manifest and
by the scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment
of the everlasting God made known to all nations for the obedience
of faith, To God only wise be glory through Jesus Christ forever. Amen. He will establish you in
His Word. He'll establish you by His preaching,
through His Word, by the commandment of God. He will establish us
and He will keep us from all evil. Establish us in the truth
of everything that Christ has done and that will keep us from
all evil. He is faithful to keep us from
the evil one. We go about our life not realizing
that our adversary as a roaring lion is seeking whom he may devour. But our God is faithful and he
will keep us from the evil one. He will not give us over to His
evil ways. He will not do it. We just sang
about it. He will not give us over to this
evil world. We live in an evil, wicked world. And we read in John 17, I pray,
Lord, not to take them out of the world, but that You would
keep them from it. And He's faithful to do that. If we were left to ourselves,
what would we do? We'd soak it up. We'd run into
it. But He is faithful to not leave
us to ourselves. He will not give us over to our
own wicked, sinful, evil flesh. He will not do it. He will not. He's faithful. Our Lord said, I pray that you would keep them.
He said, I kept them in thy word. Thy word is truth. Sanctify them
by your truth. And if that's what he asked for,
that's what he will receive. Peter said, we are kept by the
power of God. We are kept by the power of the
faithful God. So if your hope is in Christ,
if that's where your hope has been caused to be, If it's in
His Word, if it's in His work, if it's only in His Word, and
only in His Word. Because we see how unfaithful
we are. We see how unable we are to keep ourselves. If He is our
all, if that's all we have is His faithfulness, what is the
only thing that you have to go meet God with? The faithfulness
of Jesus Christ. If you stand in Him alone, then
find some comfort and find some rest in this verse right here. Go to 1 Thessalonians chapter
5. 1 Thessalonians 5 verse 24 says,
Faithful is He that calleth you who also will do it. Will He call His people? Absolutely
He will. He will do it in spite of us. I love that poem that John Newton
wrote. He said, When I turn my eyes
within, all is dark and vain and wild, filled with unbelief
and sin. Can I deem myself a child? When we look within ourselves,
nothing gives us any hope of redemption. Nothing. But when
we turn our eyes to Him, and when we see Him, when we see
that He is faithful in spite of us, even though we're dark, even
though we're vain, even though we're wild, we have the comfort
and the promise of His Word in spite of us, He is faithful. He is faithful to His promise.
The Lord is our rock. In Him, we hide. And in Him,
He'll keep us from evil. Now, I want to read this to you.
I don't know where this came from. I've got a little folder
of things, and this was in there. But this blesses my heart. This is my hope. This is my comfort. It's titled, Christ My All and
In All. It says, there is a holy God
that I cannot please, but Christ did. There is a holy law that I cannot
keep, but Christ did. There is a perfect righteousness
that I cannot earn, But Christ did. There is a convicting record
of sin that I cannot erase, but Christ did. There is a great judgment that
I cannot endure, but Christ did. There is an eternal death that
I cannot rise from, but Christ did. And if he has been made
to be my all and in all, he will raise me up with him in the last
day. So, so unworthy. We're so unworthy,
aren't we? So insufficient. But glory to
God in the highest. He's faithful. He's faithful. All right, let's all stand together.