Psalm 83. You could probably guess the
title. The Hidden Ones. The Hidden Ones. Hide me, O my Savior, hide, till
the storm passes by. Now we know that the Psalms are
basically messianic. They speak of Christ and it's
Christ speaking. They also have their spiritual
application to us, the church. Israel in the Scriptures is a
type of the church. There were wheat and tares growing
together in that day, just as there are wheat and tares growing
together in the church today. There were true believers in
Israel in that day, but there was a lot of tares among those
wheat, tares among those wheat, and the same as today. Israel had many enemies, And I don't know if you caught
this as I was reading it, many of their enemies was their own
relation. Moab, that's descendants from Lot, you know, his daughter,
the ancestral relationship, but Moab, Ishmaelites, Ishmael, they
were coming against Israel to destroy them as a nation. The Hagarians, These came from
Hagar, from another husband, not Abraham, but another husband.
You know, that's Hagar. Our Lord said that a man's foes
would be they of his own house. They will turn against you. And if you notice as I read this,
how all seem to come against God's Israel. And if you look
at all these Nations that were mentioned,
they were in the north, the south, the east, and the west. They
came from all directions. All directions. They came to
cut them off. Cut them off. It says there in
verse 4, They have said, Come, let us cut them off from being
a nation. That's how much hatred they had
of Israel. That hatred is still around.
for the church. It's truly still around for the
church. That the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance. That is how hated God's people
are. That's how hated God is. This world hasn't changed. The true God of the Bible and
the true people of God are still hated. Turn over to Revelation
chapter 12. Let us get a glimpse into what's
going on. You see, we can see the physical
things and you and I, since we're such creatures of appearance
and we judge by appearance, we actually miss what's going on.
We really do miss what's going on. There's a real spiritual
battle going on. And we are so given to judging
by appearance. But I want you to listen to this.
I'm going to read this whole chapter. And there appeared a
great wonder in heaven, a woman clothed with the sun and the
moon under her feet. She's speaking here of the church.
He is speaking of the church. And upon her head a crown of
twelve stars. And she, being with child, cried,
travailing in birth and pain to be delivered. And there appeared
another wonder in heaven, and behold, a great red dragon, having
seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns upon his head. And his tail drew the third part
of the stars of heaven and did cast them to the earth. And the
dragon stood before the woman which was ready to be delivered
for to devour her child as soon as it was born. Satan is ready
to devour Christ as soon as he's born. What did Herod do when
he heard about that? He had all the children from
two years old and under killed. Put to death. And she brought forth a man-child,
who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron. And her child
was caught up unto God and to His throne." Can you see Christ
and His resurrection? This is the Lord. This is Him.
But now listen. And the woman fled into the wilderness,
where she had the place prepared of God. God had prepared her
a place of protection, a place, a hiding place, a hiding place
to protect her. The church would be wiped out
if it wasn't for God preparing a place for her to go and hide. That they should feed her there
a thousand, two hundred, and three score days. That's three
and a half years, I believe. And there was war in heaven,
Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon
fought his angels, and prevailed not, neither was their place
found any more in heaven. Neither was their place found
any more in heaven. And the great dragon was cast
out, that old serpent called the devil, and Satan, which deceiveth
the whole world." This whole world is under his deception.
It's under his deception. He was cast out into the earth. Remember, God asked him where
he was. He said, going to and fro, up and down in the earth.
He's a very real person. And he goes up and down to and
fro in his earth. He was cast out into the earth
and his angels were cast out with him. And I heard a loud
voice say in heaven, Now is come salvation and strength in the
kingdom of our God, and the power of His Christ. For the accuser
of our brethren is cast down, which accused them before our
God day and night, constantly accusing them. And they overcame
him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony,
the gospel. And they loved not their lives
unto the death. Therefore rejoice, ye heavens, and ye that dwell
in them. Woe to the inhabitants of the earth and of the sea!
For the devil is come down to you having great wrath." He's
angry. He's angry. He's angry that he
got cast out. And he's angry that God's getting
the glory. And he's taking his anger out on God's people as
God lets him. Now listen, he's on a chain.
The pit bull is on a chain, he's not running loose. But he's come
down and he has great wrath because he knows that he has but a short
time. He knows his time's short, and
he's going hard at it to try and destroy God's people, God's
glory. And when the dragon saw that
he was cast into the earth, he persecuted the woman, the church,
which brought forth the man-child. And to the woman were given two
wings of a great eagle, that she might fly into the wilderness,
into her place, where she is nourished for a time, times,
and half a time, from the face of the serpent. And the serpent
cast out of his mouth water as a flood after the woman, that
he might cause her to be carried away of the flood, try to drown
her, and wipe her off the earth. I couldn't help but think of
the Apostle Paul making havoc, wreaking havoc, in the church,
trying to destroy it before God saved him. And the earth helped
the woman. The earth belongs to the Lord.
The earth is the Lord's, the fullness thereof, and they who
dwell therein. Psalm 24. God used this earth to help her. And the earth opened her mouth
and swallowed up the flood which the dragon cast out of his mouth.
And the dragon was wroth, angry with the woman, and went to make
war with the remnant of her seed. That's me and you. That's me
and you. Which keep the commandments of
God and have the testimony of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Now,
when you get up every day, you see the world differently. This
is how I see the world through the Word of God. This is how
I see it. When I read the Word of God,
this is what's going on. Don't be fooled by looking at
men and what you see going on with men. There's a spiritual
war going on. Satan is angry and he's after
the church. He's after God's people. You
know, if somebody hates you personally, if they hate you, you know the
best way they believe they can get at you? Your children. They go after your children. I was watching a movie some time
ago. It was a mafia movie. And anyway, the mafia was making
a threat on a guy, and they held up a picture of his family. And
if you don't do what we say, we're going to take your family. We know where they live. They
told them where the address, the address of the family, where
they all live, what time they went to school. I mean, they
did all that. And that's what Satan is trying
to do. He's going after God's children. But here's the comfort
we have. He's hid us. He's hidden us. Why should I tell you, this is
comforting. Now listen, things have not changed
because evil hasn't changed, Satan hasn't changed, men haven't
changed. We do not live in a godly world
and we do not live in a godly nation. We don't live in a godly
nation. There's one godly nation under
heaven, it's the church. It's not America. It's the church. And other than that, there's
no other godly nation. And you can see this in the nation
we live in now. My soul. It's awful. And the whole scheme of darkness
is to bring down God's chief glory, that's His redemptive
glory, and that's you. That's you. Do you have any idea
how many times that Satan, the spirit of darkness, and his angels
try to trip us up every day? Not only a thought, but indeed, tries to trip you up every day.
Satan is subtle. He comes at the church in all
directions, from the north, the south, the east and the west. He comes at you. If He'll come
at you this way, then He'll come at you another way. He never
stops coming at you. Never. And I'll give you an example,
and this is an example that came to my mind as I was thinking
of this. This country has legalized same-sex
marriage. Now, this is more than a difference
between liberals and conservatives. This is the subtlety of Satan,
because he knows how to set this nation against the church. Because you know and I know that
when it comes to the Word of God, that the Word of God is
going to stand. It's going to stand if the laws that this country
makes is against the Word of God. Listen to Leviticus 18.22. Thou shalt not lie with mankind
as with womankind. It is an abomination. It's an
abomination. Now, this world and even this country,
they don't look at the Word of God. They don't look at the Word
of God and see what it has to say about it. They don't do that.
But I tell you, someone who knows the Word of God, Satan knows
that. He knows that. He knows that's
written in God's Word. And he knows that the way to
drive a wedge between the nation and the church is to turn on
God's Word. Turn on God's Word. That's subtle. That's so subtle. It's subtle. Now this prayer, let's look at
this prayer. We'll look at these hidden ones.
The hidden ones are the ones I want to look at. But this prayer is
against the enemies of Israel. But if you'll notice in verse
2, as he prays, he calls them the enemies of the Lord. They're
the Lord's enemies. You see, His enemies and our
enemies are the same. They're one and the same. Christ
said, if they hated Me, they will hate you. If they don't
hate Me, there's a problem. Isn't there? There's a problem.
If they hate the God of the Bible, as He is, if they hate Jesus
Christ, who's revealed in these Scriptures, and they don't hate
Me, there's a problem. The Lord said, No, they're going
to hate you because they hate Me. They hate Me. So the psalmist, he speaks of
God's enemies here in verse 2. For lo, thine enemies make a
tumult. They're making a noise. They're
rejoicing over this. They're clamoring. And they're
your enemies. And they that hate thee have
lifted up their head like they're somebody. Like there's somebody. But now if we look at this as
a prayer of our Lord, it is no more than right that He should
pray against our enemies. Does He not know who they are? I know my sheep, He said. I know
my sheep. He prays for us. But in praying
for us, He has to pray against those who are our enemies. You know, there are some that
are not chosen. That's a fact. There are some
who are the seed of Satan. I caught this reading today.
I want to show you this over in Genesis 3. It just really
jumped out at me. Genesis chapter 3. Listen to what God says to Satan
in verse 15 of Genesis 3. "...And I will put enmity between
thee and the woman, between him and the church, and between thy
seed..." Whose seed? Satan has a seed on this earth. Thy seed and her seed." And we
know her seed is Christ, but He's against us in Christ. We
are His seed, aren't we? We are His seed. But boy, I tell
you, He said, I'll put enmity between thee and the woman, between
thy seed and her seed. And this is who our Lord prays
against. The enemies of the church who
are the seed of Satan. He knows who they are. He knows
who they are. Remember He said in John 17,
I pray not for the world. I pray not for them. But let me give you some comfort. Let's find some comfort tonight
from the Word of God. I want to talk about the hidden
ones. These hidden ones are the chosen
ones. chosen by God before the foundation
of the world. They are loved ones, they are
loved with an everlasting love. They are the redeemed ones, redeemed
by the blood of Christ. They are the holy ones, they are the sanctified ones,
they are the justified ones, and these are the hidden ones.
He hid us in that covenant of grace before the world began.
He hid us in Christ. We'll see this here in a minute.
And because we are hidden, the world doesn't know us. That's
what it says in 1 John 3. Look in 1 John 3. In 1 John 3, verse 1, "...Behold,
what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we
should be called the sons of God. Therefore the world knoweth
us not." You know, when the world looks at us, let's say our old
old companions, old worldly companions. When they look at us, the people
that knew me growing up, when they see me, you know what they
see? They see me. They don't see no difference.
They see John. They don't see the new one. They
don't see that new John. They don't see that new creation.
They can't see that. They can't understand. They look
at me and they don't see... They see a difference in your
conduct. They do. They see a difference in your
conduct, your conversation. They do notice that. That is
a difference. I went to a doctor once that
knew Henry. He grew up with Henry's son. And I went to his asthma
doctor, and I went to him, and I told him, I said, Henry Mahan
referred me to you. And I'd been there two or three
times, and I told him finally who had referred me. And he said,
oh, I grew up with Henry's son. He said, I knew there was something
different about you. He said, I knew there was something
different. And I know what he was saying. He knew I sat under Henry's ministry.
He knew I sat there. He knew I believed the gospel.
He said, I knew there was something different. They know there's
something different, but as far as looking at you, they can't
tell you're a son of God. All they see is just the person
that they grew up with. The world knoweth us not. We're
hid from the world. They can't see that. Now, let's look at the implication
of this. What it means to be hidden. We all know what the definition
of that is. To be hidden, you can't be found. Nobody can see you. They don't
know where you are. But let me give you some implications
here. The hidden ones are protected. I wouldn't have thought you and
I could realize how protected we are. I wish we could realize
that we have Angels protecting us. Angels
watching over us. The Scripture calls them the
face of their angels. Their angels behold the face
of their Father. You know that Scripture. The angels watch over
us. We are protected. It's like Obadiah
there in 1 Kings 18 speaks of him hiding a hundred prophets
in the cave from Jezebel. He hid them. She didn't know
where they were at. She didn't know how to get to
them. And how often God has hidden His servants. He's hid them in
the wilderness. He's hid them in the mountains.
Go over to Hebrews 11. They were in the mountains and
hidden in the caves. God has hidden His chosen ones, His loved ones.
You're hidden. You're hidden. You're protected.
You're protected. And then your spiritual life
is hidden. It says in Colossians 3, 3, 4, "...for ye are dead,
and your life is hid with Christ in God." Satan can't get to your
life. You know, whenever he wanted
to touch Job, God allowed him to touch everything but his life. He touched his health, he took
his kids, I mean, all these things were touched. But he couldn't
touch his life. because his life is hid with
Christ in God. And that can't be touched. My
real life cannot be touched. It can't be taken. That's why
the Lord said that I'll lose none of them. I'll lose none
of them. As the life of the branch is
in the vine, so our life is in Jesus Christ. And it can't be
touched. Our spiritual life Cannot be
touched. It's hidden. And it's God who
hid it. God has hidden every one of His
children. It's written in Psalm 31 20.
Thou shalt hide them in the secret of thy presence from the pride
of man. Thou shalt keep them secretly
in a pavilion from the strife of tongues. Think about this. I thought about
this today. We read here in Psalm 83, all these nations, and one
of them is Assyria. Assyria, at that time, became
the greatest nation on earth. Powerful nation. They are surrounded. They are coming at Israel. They
are coming at them. Well, here it is, 2021. And there's still a nation over
there called Israel. What was it, 1945? Hitler tried
to extinguish the Jewish race, and here they are today. They
became a nation. What was it, 1965? Well, apply that to the church.
The church of the Lord Jesus Christ. It's God who hides them
from the pride of man. He hides them from the strife
of tongues. If He did not hide us, we would be goners. We would be goners. If you walked
into your place of work, or wherever you go tomorrow, if you walked
in there, and it was very evident, that you were a son of God, they'd
kill you. I promise you they'd kill you.
If they could get to you, they'd kill you. If they could see that
you really are a son of God. Because darkness hates light. Evil hates holiness. It hates the very presence of
holiness and righteousness. It will not come to the light
lest this deed should be reproved. They would kill you if it were
possible. And He hides us and takes care
of us by His providential care. You remember one time when our
Lord, they wanted to take His life, and it says He walked through
the midst of them. And it just hit me today as I
was reading this. You and I walk through the midst
of an evil world every day. Every day. And then now, what does this
truth suppose? What does it suppose? Well, it
supposes this. If God has hidden us, We must
be precious in His sight. You don't hide things of no value,
do you? There's things that you have hidden, you've got them
in a safe. There's things you've got hidden away because they
are very valuable to you. There's things you leave out.
You leave out. You don't go on vacation. You
don't hide everything. But you do hide things of value.
That's what you do. You hide jewelry. You hide things
that are precious to you, heirlooms, things that are precious. You
know, in Malachi 3.17, God calls us his jewels when he makes up
his jewels. And then it is written in the
Scriptures in 1 Peter that we are redeemed by the precious
blood of Christ. That's why we're precious to
Him. We're costly to Him and we're precious to Him. Each one
of God's children have been bought with the precious blood of Jesus
Christ. And then it supposes this, that
if God hides us, we must be exposed to danger. I said earlier, we live in an
evil world, don't we? We don't know how evil it is.
We really don't know, because God restrained the human race. If He didn't restrain the human
race, God would not have His hidden
ones in danger. He allows them from time to time
to touch this one and this one, like the martyrs. But they still
don't touch their life, they just touch their bodies. They just touch their bodies,
not their life. You know, our Lord bids us to
watch and pray. The world, the flesh, the devil,
they're always doing us harm. Always doing us harm. I watched
some something the other day. I don't remember if it was on
TV or billboard or I think it was on TV or something I saw
or heard it on the radio. But anyway, a couple days later,
that came to my mind. It was a useless thought. It
was a totally useless thought. And that came to my mind. And
I thought, if I hadn't heard that, I wouldn't have thought
of it. I wouldn't have thought of it.
And I thought how Satan lays traps constantly for your mind,
for your mind. And you think of this, and you
think of that, and it's like totally useless thoughts. We're constantly exposed to danger.
And our minds are constantly exposed to evil, to evil. And then what does this truth
lead us to? What does knowing this lead us
to? What does this knowledge lead
to? I tell you what it leads to. When it's really burned into
your heart that God has hid you, you're safe. You're safe. Your life is safe. We don't have
to worry about losing our life, do we? It's hid with Christ in
God. It leads to this, a deep, deep
love for God. He put you among His hidden ones. I didn't put myself there. He
did. In Psalm 100 it says, We are
the sheep of His pasture. He has made us, and not we ourselves. He has made us. And then it leads
to a real contentment. A real contentment. You know,
not anxiousness, not worry, but a real contentment. Where we are, the Lord has put
us where we are, and He keeps us. He protects us. We're safe. And here's something
else it leads to. Not murmuring. Complaining. Remember this, and this struck
me when I thought about this, not complaining because we're
protected, we're loved, we're redeemed, our life can't be touched. Remember, I thought this, I thought
to myself, I said, John, remember this, not all are chosen. What do I have to complain about?
Has God chosen me? Has He given me an interest in
Christ? There's a lot out there that don't. I have nothing to
complain about. And then it should lead us to
confess Him before men. Being hidden doesn't mean we
are silent. It doesn't mean we're just like,
shh, be quiet so they won't see you. It doesn't mean that. Being hidden means you're protected
and cared for. No harm can take your life. And
then it leads to this. Oh, it leads to thankfulness. Thank you, Lord, for saving my
soul. That's a song, isn't it? That'd
be a good one to end with. Thank you, Lord. Sometimes it
just comes while you're preaching. Thank you, Lord, for saving my
soul. Let me read, I copied this, I
read it today and I thought it was good. Those whom the Lord
has set apart and guarded as His own peculiar possession,
those whom He has undertaken in a special manner to protect,
those whom God holds in the hollow of His hand, those to whom He
is a wall of fire round about them that none may do them hurt,
those to whom He says, He that touches you touches the apple
of mine eye, which is the pupil. The pupil. Now I want you to
listen to these Scriptures, and this will give you confidence
and comfort. Keep me as the apple of the eye, hide me under the
shadow of thy wings. Psalm 17, 8. Psalm 27, 5. In
the time of trouble he shall hide me. He shall hide me in his pavilion.
In the secret of his tabernacle shall he hide me. Psalm 31 20. Thou shalt hide
them in the secret of thy presence, I read this to you, from the
pride of man, thou shalt keep them secretly, secretly in a
pavilion from the strife of tongues. Psalm 91 1. He that dwelleth
in the secret place of the Most High, shall abide under the shadow
of the Almighty. Your life is hid with Christ
in God." Colossians 3.3. This idea that they are the Lord's
hidden ones is to be cherished by God's people and a source
of rest for them at all times. That's comforting to me. That's
very comforting.