Psalm 135, we've been looking
at our Lord's attributes. 17 of His character traits, His
precious character traits, who He is, who He is and why He does
what He does. things that God himself has revealed
in his own word. And a man named Arthur Pink wrote
them down. The Lord revealed them to that
man and he wrote them down and we've been looking at them. And
I want to combine two of them this morning. I want to combine
the supremacy of God, supreme and the sovereignty of God. We're
going to look at two of his attributes together. The reason I want to
combine them is because the definition of the word supreme is sovereign. And the definition of the word
sovereign is supreme. So you can't really look at one
without looking at the other one. I do want to say that the definition
of the word Lord is sovereign, supreme. Okay, that's the definition
of the word Lord. Ruler, owner, creator, that's
what Lord means. But to understand these two character
traits Our Lord, we could say it this
way to separate what is together. Our Lord is supreme. He is highest. He is greatest
in everything that He is. He is supreme. Everything that He is. Our Lord
is sovereign in everything that He does. What this means is God is God. That's what this means. God is God. That's the title of this Bible
study. That's what I want to get across. That's what I want
us to leave here understanding. God is God. Now look with me at Psalm 135
verse 6. whatsoever the Lord pleased,
that did he in heaven and in earth, in the seas and all deep
places. You know what that verse of scripture
means? God is God. That's what it means. God is
God. Daniel 4.35 says, He doeth according
to his will in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of
the earth, and none can stay his hand or say unto him, What
doest thou? Nobody, nothing can stop what
he is doing. None can stay his hand. Nobody
can even say to him, nobody even has the ability to say to him,
what are you doing? Nobody. You know what that means? You know what Daniel means when
he writes that? God is God. This world would
be so blessed to come to that understanding. God is God. He's God. Now let me show you
a few more scriptures that tell us this. Look with me at 1st
Chronicles 29. Back towards Genesis. 1st Chronicles
29. It's after Kings. First Chronicles 29 verse 10. Wherefore David blessed the Lord
before all the congregation, and David said, Blessed be thou,
Lord God of Israel, our father, forever and ever. Thine, O Lord,
is the greatness and the power and the glory and the victory
and the majesty, for all that is in the heaven and in the earth
is thine. Thine is the kingdom, O Lord,
and thou art exalted as head above all. That's supremacy. He is head above all. Both riches
and honor come of thee, and thou reignest over all, And in thine
hand is power and might, and in thine hand it is to make great
and to give strength unto all." David said, you're God. That's
what he was saying. You are God. We acknowledge that you are God. People ask me all the time, you
have conversations and they want to know, what do we preach here?
What do we believe here? And I want to tell them this
much stuff in this amount of space. And I struggle to, in
two sentences, tell what we believe. And it would be simple to say
we believe God's Word, but everybody says, oh yeah, I believe God's
Word. But the one thing I want to get across to people when
I have that opportunity is we believe God is God. We believe
God is God. We believe the God is our God. The sovereign God is our God. Now what does that mean for us? We believe that. What does that
mean for us? To have the sovereign God be
our God, what does that mean for us? I want to show you what
sovereignty looks like. We say that he is sovereign. All right, let me show you what
sovereignty looks like. Go with me to the next book,
2 Chronicles chapter 20. Now this is what sovereignty
looks like, okay? 2 Chronicles 20 verse 1 says,
it came to pass after this also that the children of Moab and
the children of Ammon and with them other besides the Ammonites,
they came against Jehoshaphat to battle. All right, Jehoshaphat
was the king of Judah, and these three nations together were going
to come against Israel in battle. Verse two, then there came some
that told Jehoshaphat, saying, there cometh a great multitude
against thee from beyond the sea on this side Syria, and behold,
they be in Hazazon, Tamar, which is in Gedi. And Jehoshaphat feared
and set himself to seek the Lord." What a wise man. He was afraid and he immediately
set himself to seek the Lord. And he proclaimed a fast throughout
all Judah. And Judah gathered themselves
together to ask help of the Lord. Even out of all the cities of
Judah, they came to seek the Lord. And Jehoshaphat stood in
the congregation of Judah and Jerusalem in the house of the
Lord before the new court and said, O Lord God of our fathers,
art not thou God in heaven? And rulest not thou over all
the kingdoms of the heathen? And in thine hand is not there
power and might so that none is able to withstand thee? Are
not thou our God, who didst drive out the inhabitants of this land
before thy people Israel, and gave it to the seed of Abraham
thy friend forever?" When God delivered Israel out of Egypt,
He said, I'm going to give you this land, and you're going to
drive these nations out. You're going to go to war with
these nations, and you're going to kill these nations. Verse
eight, and they dwelt therein and have built thee a sanctuary
therein for thy name, saying, if when evil come upon us as
the sword, judgment, or pestilence, or famine, we stand before this
house and in thy presence, for thy name is in this house, and
cry unto thee in our affliction, then thou wilt hear and help. And now behold the children of
Ammon and Moab and Mount Seir, whom thou wouldest not let Israel
invade when they came out of the land of Egypt, but they turned
from them and destroyed them not." Those three nations, God
said, don't destroy them. Those three individual nations.
Go this way. That's what Israel did. Verse
11. Behold, I say how they reward us to come to cast us out of
thy possession, which thou hast given us to inherit. Oh, our God, wilt thou not judge
them? For we have no might against
this great company that cometh against us. Neither know we what
to do, but our eyes are upon thee. We didn't destroy each
of them. And so now they have all banded
together and they're coming against us. And this is a great company
that we cannot go against. Verse 13, and all Judah stood
before the Lord with their little ones, their wives and their children.
I adore that. There they stand, the whole family,
all of Judah with their wives, their children. They're all standing
there saying, God, you are God. You're our God. And you said
we could come to you for help. And we are about to die. We're
in a state of absolute desolation. Please help us. We can't do anything. We're helpless. All we can do
is stand still and wait. Lord, please be with us. Please
help us. Verse 14. Then upon Jehaziel
the son of Zechariah, the son of Benaiah, the son of Jeiel,
the son of Madaniah, a Levite of the sons of Asaph, came the
Spirit of the Lord in the midst of the congregation. The Spirit
descended down on this man and he stood up in the midst of the
congregation. Verse 15, and he said, Hearken ye all Judah and
ye inhabitants of Jerusalem And thou King Jehoshaphat, thus saith
the Lord unto you, be not afraid nor dismayed by reason of this
great multitude, for the battle is not yours, but God's." First
of all, that's what it means to have a sovereign God. It's
not yours, it's God's. Tomorrow, go ye down against
them. Behold, they come up by the cliff
of Ziz, and you shall find them at the end of the brook before
the wilderness of Jeruel. You shall not need to fight in
this battle." That's excellent news. It's called the gospel. You don't have to do anything.
Set yourselves, stand ye still, and see the salvation of the
Lord with you. O Judah and Jerusalem, fear not,
nor be dismayed. Tomorrow go out against them,
for the Lord will be with you.' And Jehoshaphat bowed his head
with his face to the ground, and all Judah and the inhabitants
of Jerusalem fell before the Lord, worshiping the Lord. And
the Levites and the children of the Kohathites and the children
of the Korites stood up to praise the Lord God of Israel with a
loud voice on high. And they arose early in the morning
and went forth into the wilderness of Tekoa. And as they went forth,
Jehoshaphat stood and said, Hear me, O Judah. and ye inhabitants
of Jerusalem, believe in the Lord your God, so shall you be
established, believe his prophets, so shall you prosper. And when
he had consulted with the people, he appointed singers unto the
Lord, and that should praise the beauty of holiness as they
went out before the army." Now, every time I read this to you,
I have to point this out. I adore this. God said, this
is what God said, The battle is not yours. The battle is God's. You will not have to fight in
this battle. You just go meet them. So Jehoshaphat
said, I want all the singers and all the musicians on the
front line. I want all the trumpets in front
of the bows and arrows and the swords. You're going in first.
All right? So verse 21, he consulted with
the people. He appointed singers unto the
Lord, and that should praise the beauty of holiness. And as
they went out before the army, and to say, Praise the Lord,
for His mercy endureth forever. And when they began to sing and
to praise, the Lord set ambushments against the children of Ammon,
Moab, and Mount Seir, which were come against Judah, and they
were smitten. For the children of Ammon and
Moab stood up against the inhabitants of Mount Seir, utterly to slay
and destroy them. And when they had made an end
of the inhabitants of Seir, everyone helped to destroy another. And
when Judah came toward the watchtower in the wilderness, they looked
unto the multitude, and behold, they were dead bodies fallen
to the earth, and none escaped. And when Jehoshaphat and his
people came to take away the spoil of them, they found among
them in abundance both riches with the dead bodies and precious
jewels, which they stripped off for themselves more than they
could carry away. And they were three days in gathering
of the spoil, it was so much." You talk about a turn of events.
Verse 26, and on the fourth day, they assembled themselves in
the valley of Bereka, and that means blessing. For there they
blessed the Lord, therefore the name of the same place was called
the Valley of Bereka unto this day. Then they returned every
man of Judah in Jerusalem and Jehoshaphat in the forefront
of them to go again to Jerusalem with joy, for the Lord had made
them to rejoice over their enemies. And they came to Jerusalem with
psalteries and harps and trumpets unto the house of the Lord. And
the fear of God was on all the kingdoms of those countries when
they had heard that the Lord fought against the enemies of
Israel. So the realm of Jehoshaphat was quiet for his God gave him
rest round about. That's God. That's God. That is not the God that people
preach today. That's God. That right there
is a God to love. Don't you love that God? That
is a ruling God. That is a reigning God. Nothing is more comforting to
weak, trembling sinners than the sovereignty of their God.
Nothing. I mean nothing. Now, I want to
show you a short, let me show you another example, a very short
one. Go to Exodus 34. This right here is comforting. Exodus 34 verse 23 says, Thrice in the year shall all
your men, children, appear before the Lord God, the God of Israel. Three times a year, all of the
males of Israel were required by God to leave their homes and
go up to Jerusalem and worship. All right, all the males. Now,
we just saw that they lived in a hostile environment. Okay, the Lord did, they took
land from other nations. And those other nations wanted
that land back. They wanted to get their land
back. And God said, three times a year, all the males have to
leave the land. All right, now tell me this,
what's gonna stop all the other nations while all the men leave?
What's going to stop all the other nations from coming back
and taking their land back? Taking all the farms back, killing
all the women and children, taking all the cattle, seizing it all. What's going to stop them? Verse
23, thrice in the year shall all your men children appear
before the Lord God, the God of Israel, for I will cast out
the nations before thee and enlarge thy borders Neither shall any
man desire thy land when thou shalt go up to appear before
the Lord thy God thrice in a year. He said, I'm not going to allow
them to desire it. Not only are they not allowed
to come take it, I'm not going to allow them to want it. They're
just not going to, they're just going to sit there. You're going
to go worship me three times a year. I want all the men to
leave. You leave your women behind, you leave your children behind,
you leave your stuff behind. You go worship God and they're
not even going to be allowed to want to come take it. That's
a sovereign God. That right there is a sovereign
God. That's supremacy. That's sovereignty
and that is our God. That's our God. The King's heart
is in the hand of the Lord. As the rivers of water, he turneth
it whithersoever he will. Is that not comforting? In every
detail of our life, he is in complete control of it. Every
detail. He not only controls us, he controls
everything around us. He not only controls our hearts,
he controls the hearts of our enemies. That is comforting to
me. He controls the hearts of our
enemies. Nothing can hinder, nothing can
stand in the way of his providence concerning us. Nothing. It has
always been that way. It is that way. It's always going
to be that way. Always. Job said, I know that
thou canst do everything And that no thought of thine can
be hindered. No thought. You can do everything
and nothing can be hindered. Now, go with me back over to
Psalm 135. I'm gonna have to move on. Psalm 135. Verse 6 says, Whatsoever the
Lord pleased, that did he in heaven and in earth, in the seas,
and all deep places. He causeth the vapors to ascend
from the ends of the earth. He maketh lightnings for the
rain. He bringeth the wind out of his treasuries, who smote
the firstborn of Egypt, both of man and beast. Now you think
about this. He said all the firstborn are
gonna die in one night. In every single house, every
firstborn of man and beast is gonna die in one night. That night came, they all died. They all died. Men, some tragedy
happens. You know, I told you my story
about the hurricane and Katrina and that woman told me God didn't
want this to happen. I kill. I make alive. Right? He said it. It was done. All the firstborn
of man and beast are going to die. It was done. It was done. Verse 9, he said, Who sent tokens
and wonders in the midst of thee, O Egypt, upon Pharaoh, upon his
servants? Pharaoh and his servants, they
finally got the final token. God told his people, I'm gonna
deliver you out of their hands. I'm gonna deliver you out of
Pharaoh's hands. He said it, right? So here they
go, and Pharaoh starts chasing them, and he pins them up against
the Red Sea, and they're so afraid, and what are they gonna do? God
told Moses, you hold up that rod. Lift up the rod, if the
rod be lifted up. That rod is Christ. who was lifted
up for the destruction of his people. And Moses lifted up that
rod and as soon as he did, that water was a wall unto them. And
I love how it says that, it didn't just back up and make way for
them, it was a wall. And I forget now how deep it's
estimated it was, but it was huge. And they walked across
on dry land. As soon as his people were out,
And all of Pharaoh and his people were in, God closed it up on
them. Boom! And they were delivered.
It was done. He said it. It was done. That's how a sovereign God works.
It's said and it's done. Our God is not trying to do anything. Our God is not begging us to
let Him do anything. I mean nothing. He does whatever
He pleases. We would be so wise to get a
hold of that. This world would be so wise to get a hold of that.
God is God and He does whatever He pleases. I mean whatever He
pleases. All right, now I want to very
quickly, I'm going to close here, I want to give us three things
to remember about our sovereign God. I'm going to be very quick.
The first one's a warning. The second one is a word of wisdom.
And the third one is a word of comfort. Okay, here's the first
one. Look quickly at Isaiah 45. Isaiah 45 verse 9 says, woe unto him that striveth with
his maker. Let the potsherds strive with
the potsherds of the earth. And shall the clay say to him
that fashioned it, what are you doing? What makest thou? Thy work he hath no hands. Let men argue with men all they
want to. Men love to argue doctrine. They
love to argue religion. They love to argue God. But don't
strive with the maker. Whatever he says, that's what
it is. We all have certain things we
believe. And then we find something in the scripture that contradicts
what we believe. You know what we must do? change
our belief. Oh dear God, keep us from striving
with our maker. His word, his word. The apostle
Paul said, who art thou that replies against God? I know it
says it, I still don't believe it. The potter has power over the
clay. Once we see this sovereign God's
hand in something, we need to bow to it. We just need to bow
to it. People get angry with God, don't
they? They get angry with God. Something happened and I'm so
mad at God. Don't do that. Don't do that. Man, he can break
a vessel just as fast as he makes it. So here's our word of warning. Let's bow to the sovereign God. Let's all bow. Here's the second
thing. Go to James chapter 4. James chapter 4 verse 13 says, Go to now ye that say today or
tomorrow we will go into such a city and continue there a year
and buy and sell and get gain. Whereas you know not what shall
be on the morrow, for what is your life? It is even a vapor
that appeareth for a little time and then vanisheth away. For
that you ought to say, if the Lord will, we shall live and
do this or that, knowing that our sovereign God controls it
all. Knowing that he is absolutely
controlling every step, every breath, everything, we would
be wise to always keep that in our vocabulary. Not just with
lip service, I mean in the heart, right here in the heart. May
God always give us a heart that remembers you are in control. You are in control. Everything
I plan to do is dependent on what you allow me to do. If you're
willing, I'll do it. If you're not willing, don't
let me do it. I'm not gonna do it and don't
let me do it, Lord. I bow to your word. If the Lord
wills, if this sovereign God wills, if he allows it to be
so. Here's the third thing. Romans,
don't turn it. Romans 8 28 says, and we know
that all things work together for good to them that love God,
not the Jesus they made up in their mind. The actual God as
he has recorded himself to be in his own word. All things work
together for good to them that love God, to them who are the
called according to his purpose. Every single thing. This is our
word of comfort. Every single thing that this
sovereign God does is for the good of his people. Every single
thing. The Lord took our brother last
Thursday morning. He is currently the only interpreter
that we have for Mexico right now. So as of this moment none
of the pastors from America can go down and preach to the brethren
in Mexico because there is no interpreter. So what does this
mean? I will tell you what it means. That's what it means. Good. It's good for them. It's good for us. It's good for
the gospel. It's good for His sheep. It's good for... It's good. It's all good. This sovereign
God is good and everything that He does is good. This flesh never
understands it. Rarely when something happens
do we understand it. Rarely. But this is what we can
rest assured in. It's good. It is so good. Thank God, He is God. And what I mean by that is, thank
God, God is the one who's God. Thank God. He said, I'm God.
Rest. Because everything He does is
good. And everything He says is going to be done. So let's
rest in it. Okay, you're dismissed.