Don't trust me with electronics. Thank you all for having me. I'm just so privileged and thankful
to be here with you again. That article that Doug read reminded
me, the brother that's preaching for me this morning, His name
is Hugo Torres, and Hugo is Hispanic. We have a lot of Hispanic people
in our fellowship. And about 19 years ago, when
he and his wife, Zobey, had their first child, I had just preached
a message on Caleb being the faithful dog. That's what Caleb's
name means. And they decided they were going
to name their first born son Caleb. And that's not a Spanish
name. And all their family gathered
against them and said, you can't name your son Caleb. That means
the name of that boy is gonna be Dog the rest of his life.
And Caleb is 19 years old now. And he's been faithful to sit
under the gospel. All these years, so very thankful. Might the Lord be pleased to
make us faithful dogs following after the master. Let's, let's pray together. Our
heavenly father, we're thankful that once again, you've called
us out and brought us to this place where we can be blessed
with your presence. We pray Lord that you would open
what no man could shut. Pray that you would open your
word and reveal to us the glory of thy dear son. I pray that
you would open our hearts and give us faith to look upon Christ
and to follow after him. We pray for our fellowship in
Orlando and we pray for Hugo and for Robert and ask Lord that
you would enable them to speak of Christ this morning. that
you would bless everywhere where your gospel is being preached
and that you would give your people ears to hear, eyes to
see, faith to believe. We ask it in Christ's name. Amen. I have a theme I'm hoping will
carry through both hours this morning and it is the theme of
need. Need. And our first text this
morning will come from Isaiah chapter 41. Isaiah chapter 41. I used to think, I used to think
that the reason why people, including myself, were unfaithful, whether
it be in their service, or whether it be in their church attendance,
or whether it be in their prayer life, whether it be in their
marriages, or whether it be in anything else, the reason that
people were unfaithful was because of their lack of commitment. And what people needed to do,
including me, is be more committed. I don't believe that anymore.
The word commitment is nowhere to be found in the Word of God. Our problem is not lack of commitment. Our problem is lack of need.
We will commit ourselves to that thing which we have a need for. Even in the flesh, I mean, how
many times have you made a commitment to diet and exercise? And how
long did that commitment last? You were on a health kick for
a little while and then it fades away, doesn't it? And as you
get older, you find out that when the pain of not dieting
and exercise exceeds the pleasure, then you have a need, and that
need is what drives you to do something about it, isn't it?
Commitments just don't last. They don't last. Need lasts. If the Lord is pleased to make
us poor, and needy. Now that's how the Bible describes
us, poor and needy, not in need of commitment, not in need of,
you know, obligation and duty and responsibility and build
yourself up and just, you know, pull yourself up by your bootstraps
and flex your muscles and, and, and be more committed. I've heard
a lot of preaching that's just nothing more than an attempt
to inspire men to be more committed. My hope this morning is that
the Lord will make us poor and needy. If he does that, we'll
commit our souls to him by his grace. In first Peter chapter four,
verse 19, it says, let them that suffer according to the will
of God. where our sufferings in this
world are according to the will of God. Let them who suffer according
to the will of God commit their souls unto Him in well-doing
as unto a faithful creator. Paul said, I know whom I have
believed and I am persuaded that he is able to keep that which
I have committed unto him. I've entrusted everything to
him. I've got all my eggs in one basket. I don't know where
else to go. I'm shut up to the Lord Jesus
Christ because he's made me to be a sinner and I have a need.
I have a need. I'm poor. I have no righteousness. I have no claim on God. I'm poor, unable to provide for
myself, but He's able. He's able to keep that which
I have committed, entrusted unto Him. And then when the people
saw the miracles that our Lord performed, the scripture says
that many believed on him, but he would not commit himself unto
men, for he knew what was in their hearts. So he wasn't going
to entrust himself to them. The word commit is found in the
scripture, but it has the idea of making a deposit You commit
your money to the bank when you deposit it in your account. And you will commit your soul
to the faithful creator when he makes us poor and needy. You have your Bibles open to
Isaiah chapter 41. Look at verse 17. When the poor and needy seek
water, and there is none, and their tongue faileth for thirst. Now we've all experienced thirst,
but I doubt very seriously that any of us have been on the verge
of dying because of being thirsty, but that's the idea here. They're
in the desert, there's no water, And if they don't get water soon,
they're going to die. I, the Lord, will hear them. When they're dying of thirst,
when they really have a need, not when they're committed, but
when they're needy, when they're poor, they've got no place else
to go. Then I, the Lord, will hear them.
I, the God of Israel, will not forsake them. I will open the
rivers in high places and fountains in the midst of the valleys.
I will make the wilderness a pool of water and the dry land springs
of water. And I will plant in the wilderness
trees of righteousness. I will. The only time we're going
to experience God's will is when we give up on our will. Lord,
I know that you are able. Would you have mercy upon me? Proverbs chapter 31 I was in West Virginia some years
ago and I was pulled up behind an automobile and it said PROV,
or PR I guess it was, 3-1 wife. That was her license plate. She
claimed to be a Proverbs 31 woman, the virtuous woman, and she was
driving around bragging to everybody that she was a Proverbs 31 woman.
Every believing woman wants to be described by what's said in
Proverbs 31, but no child of God would go around boasting
themselves to be a Proverbs 31 woman. The glorious thing about
Proverbs 31 is that it describes the bride of Christ. It describes
the church and every assembly of God's people are described
by every verse in Proverbs 31. And in verse nine it says, she
pleads the cause of the poor and the needy. That's what she
does. When she preaches the gospel,
God opens up the windows of heaven. And the Lord Jesus Christ said,
and I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men to myself. The poor
and the needy will be quenched with their thirst, of their thirst,
by that rock, that water that came from the rock. Moses smote
that rock, didn't he? The rod of the law smote the
Lord Jesus Christ on Calvary's cross and satisfied the demands
of God's justice. And from that rock flows rivers
of living water. The Lord said to that woman at
the well, if you knew who it is that saith unto thee, give
me to drink, you would ask him and he would give you living
water. You would never thirst again. You wouldn't have to go
anywhere else. Now, she thought he was talking
about that well, didn't she? And she said, oh Lord, give me
that water. I don't need to come here anymore. Oh no. You drink
of this water, you're gonna thirst again. You're gonna thirst physically
again. But if you drink of the water that I give you, you'll
have rivers flowing from your heart, quenching your thirst. When I make you to be poor and
needy. And she was made to be poor and
needy, wasn't she? Lord made her to be a sinner. He told her,
she went back down to Sychar, you remember what she said? Come
meet a man who told me everything I ever did. He told me everything
that I am in Christ is perfect righteousness and everything
that I've ever done outside of Christ is nothing but sin. Nothing
but sin. He told me everything I ever
did and made me poor and needy. Come, drink of this fountain. She pleads the cause of the poor
and needy. And in Deuteronomy chapter 24,
the first mention of poor and needy is found here. Thou shalt
not oppress the hired servant that is poor and needy. And that's what happens in religion.
In man-made, free will, works religion, Men have turned the
house of prayer into a den of thieves and they sell the gospel
to the highest bidder. If you'll do your part, God will
reward you. Don't oppress the poor and the
needy. They don't have anything. They
can't buy salvation. The only person that can purchase
salvation is a person who's got nothing. Isaiah chapter 55, you
have your Bibles there open to 41. Turn over just a few pages
to Isaiah chapter 55. Look at verse 1. Oh, stop, listen,
behold, give your full undivided attention to this glorious truth.
Everyone that thirsteth, come ye to the waters and he that
hath no money. You see, if you make salvation
determined by something you bring, then you're not poor. You're
not poor. You've got something to offer.
And the Lord says, don't oppress the poor and the needy. Don't
give them something to do. Don't give them something to
bring. They don't have anything. They can't bring anything. And
if you make salvation dependent upon something that they do,
then you're oppressing them and you've made the house of prayer
nothing more than a den of thieves. Come ye that hath no money, come
ye, buy and eat, yea, come buy wine and milk without money and
without price. Now you look up that word price,
you know what it means? It means to barter. Some of y'all
bartered before. I've bartered with folks. I'll
do this for you, you do that for me, and it'll be a fair exchange. And that's what men do with God.
You barter with Him. Lord, I'll commit myself. I'll be more committed. If you'll
save me, if you'll do this for me, if you'll bless me, I'll
do my part. Don't come with money and don't
come with bartering. Come poor and needy. They're the only ones. Lord, I don't have anything.
I'm bankrupt. Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Now that doesn't mean
that if you come poor in spirit, that you'll be blessed with the
kingdom of heaven. That means that if you come before
God, poor in spirit, you have been blessed. You have been blessed. Only those blessed of God. Blessed
art thou Simon Barjona, flesh and blood has not revealed the
son to you, but my father, which is in heaven has made it known
unto you. What? That I am the Christ, the son
of the living God. The blessing is being poor and
needy. And those who are poor and needy
have the promise of God that the Kingdom of Heaven belongs
to them. What a promise. Lord, that's me. I'm poor. I don't have anything. I can't
do anything. I don't know anything. Psalm
40 verse 17 says, I am poor and needy. Let the Lord thinketh
upon me. Lord, that's me. I'm poor. I'm needy. I am poor and needy. Psalm 70 verse five, make haste
unto me. Oh God, be my help and my deliverer. Or I'm just poor. Don't listen to somebody who
tries to whip you up into some sort of fleshly commitment. As I said, the word commitment
is nowhere in the word of God. It's not there. Poor and needy
is. And those who are poor, and those
who are needy will commit their souls to Christ as the faithful
creator. He shall spare the poor and the
needy and shall save their souls. Are you poor? Are you needy? Most folks aren't. Most folks
aren't poor. You ask the poorest person that
you can find about their souls and they'll reach down into the
recesses of their heart and they'll pull out something that will
earn them favor with God. You know, at least I'm not like
that. You know, I used to, back in
religion, I used to go to the prison and, you know, do stuff
there. I'm ashamed of what I used to
do there. But one of the things I learned in the prisons is that
is that there's a pecking order even among criminals. There's
honor among thieves. And it never failed. Everybody in prison would point
to somebody else as being worse than them. At least I'm not like
that guy. And that's the way it is. You're
not poor. You're not poor. You're not needy. We've got something to bring
to God. I must do something in order to enable God to accept
me. If that be the case, you're not
poor. Sadly, most churches are like
the lukewarm church of Laodicea. Because thou sayest that I am
rich, and increased in goods, and in need of nothing, and knowest
not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind,
and naked." Isn't that most religious folks? I'm okay. I'm okay. And you're okay. No,
no, you're miserable. You're poor. You're blind. You're
naked. You don't have anything. And
then the Lord goes on to say, I counsel thee to buy of me gold
tried in the fire. There's the Lord Jesus Christ.
He's that gold that was tried in the fire of God's wrath on
Calvary's cross and came out pure. And he says, you buy me. Without money, without price,
you've got nothing to bring. Buy me gold tried in the fire
that thou mightest be rich and white raiment that thou mightest
have thy nakedness covered and eyesalve that thou mightest see. Buy it of me. Lord, I'm poor
and needy. I'm naked. I've got to be clothed. I've got to have my nakedness
covered. These are hard sayings. When the scripture speaks of
hard sayings, you remember they the many disciples went out from
him and listen to him no more because they said what you're
talking about is a hard saying. It didn't mean that word hard
doesn't mean hard to understand. It's very simple. It's easy to
understand. What that word hard means is
inflexible. Rigid. You mean to tell me that
I've got nothing and that I'm completely dependent upon the
Lord Jesus Christ for everything? Yep, that was the hard saying
in John chapter six. Unless you eat of my flesh and
drink of my blood, you've got no life. Unless you're enabled
by, no man can come to me except the Father which sent me, draw
him. You're completely dependent upon God to make you poor and
needy. And then when he makes you poor
and needy, you're completely dependent upon my life of righteousness
and my sacrificial death on Calvary's cross for all your hope of salvation. This is a hard saying. This is
too rigid. This is too inflexible. We, we,
we need, we need some options. No, you don't have any options.
And the poor and needy know they have no options. I've got no
place else to go. The Lord asked the disciples,
will you lead me also? And you remember what Peter said,
Lord, where are we going to go? Where are we going to go? You
alone have the words of eternal life, and we know and are sure
that thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. You've
shut us up to yourself. We've got no place else to go.
We're poor. We're needy. It isn't a matter
of us bolstering our commitment and being more dedicated. It's
a matter of being poor and needy. 2 Corinthians 8, verse 9 says,
For you know, and you do know, if you're a child of God, if
He's made you poor and needy, you know this to be true. You
know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich,
oh, He was rich, rich beyond our imagination, Eyes not seen, nor his ear heard,
nor his inner in it, the imagination of man, the things that he spoke.
Oh, John saw things that were unspeakable. He couldn't write
them. Paul was carried up into the third heaven and saw things
that were beyond any man's ability to describe. That was the glory
of Christ sitting upon his throne, ruling and reigning all of his
creation. And though he was rich in glory,
yet for your sakes, he became poor. He dressed himself in the
flesh of a man, being born of a woman, being born under the
law. God had made him a body and he came into this world,
setting aside his glory for your sakes, he became poor that through
his poverty, you might be made rich. So that all the glory that
he had now becomes yours. That's why John said, as He is,
so are we. Right now, in this world, if
we're found in Christ, the fullness of His glory is ours. And we're
able to stand in the presence of a holy God and be accepted
in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. Why? Because He made
us poor. He made us needy. Lord, I've
got no wealth. I've got no ability. Under the
Old Testament law, I'm so used to having a clock on that wall
right there. I have no idea what time it is. I don't have a watch. I'm so
sorry. In the Old Testament, God gave
laws protecting the poor and the needy. And the spiritual
application of those laws relate to those of us that are poor
and needy. And the first law is that the
poor and the needy had the right under the law to glean the fields
behind the harvesters. The Lord said don't send the
harvesters back to pick up the scraps, leave them. it's for
the poor and the needy. You remember when Ruth came back
from Moab with Naomi and Her and Naomi were destitute.
They were widow women without a man to provide for them. And
Naomi sent Ruth to Boaz as she happened upon Boaz's field and
gleaned the scraps that were left over. And it was sufficient
for her. And through that experience,
she met her kinsman redeemer. What a, what a glorious. And
what you were reading earlier, Lord, give us the scraps, Doug,
that, you know, that they fall from the master's table. That's
all. When I read God's Word, when
I attend worship, I'm just hoping as a poor man that the master
will scrape a few crumbs off the table for me. Lord, just
give me something to satisfy my hunger and my thirst for righteousness. I'm poor. I'm needy. Lord, enable
me to glean the fields behind the harvester. The second law that God gave
was that every seven years the land was to rest. It was called the sabbatical. And they weren't to plant anything
on the seventh year. And whatever came up in the fields
was not to be harvested. And you know, lots of crops grew
that seventh year as a result of the seeds that were left behind
from the previous year. But God said, don't touch it.
It's for the poor and the needy. And not only is that which comes
up in the land that's been commanded of God to lie in rest, but all
that comes from the olive trees and all that comes from the vineyards,
don't harvest them. It's for the poor and the needy.
Oh, we have a rest in the Lord Jesus Christ and everything that
He's provided is for us, the poor and the needy. It's free
picking. Free picking. You can't buy it. You don't deserve
it. And then the seventh sabbatical
was the year of Jubilee. That was the 49th and 50th year
and the year of jubilee. All the land that was sold over
those last 49 years returned back to its original owner. All
that had sold themselves into slavery were set free and all
debt was canceled on the year of jubilee. And when the Lord
Jesus Christ came and he quoted from Psalm 61 and said, this
is the acceptable year of the Lord, that word is the year of
jubilee. And the Lord Jesus, there's no
evidence from the scriptures or from extra biblical history
that the Jews ever observed the year of Jubilee. Why not? Because the people who were in
the power to make decisions were the ones who owned the slaves.
They were the ones who owned the debt. They were the ones
who owned the land and they weren't going to give it back. And the
Lord Jesus Christ said, the acceptable year of the Lord is here. And
I've come to return to you what you lost in your father, Adam.
I've come to cancel all your debt before God. I've come to set you free. No man's going to stop me from
doing it. The acceptable year of the Lord is here. The fourth
thing that God forbid the children of Israel to do is to charge
a poor man usury. You could not charge him interest
on a loan. If you loaned a poor man money,
all he had to pay back was exactly what you loaned him. Not the way the Lord is. We never
give back to him more than he gives us. He's always the giver. We're always the taker. And then
if you did take a, the scripture calls it a pledge. If you took
a pledge from a poor man, that was his collateral. Usually the
only thing he had to give you was his coat. That's all he had. He was so poor. He was like blind
Bartimaeus. Remember when the Lord called
blind Bartimaeus? And the scripture says that he took his coat and
left it. That's all he had. And if you took a poor man's
coat for a pledge, you had to return it back to him before
the sunset. Why? Because that was the only
hope he had to stay warm at night and to be able to sleep and be
able to rest. The Lord's not going to take
anything away from us that's going to cause us to not be able
to rest. Poor. and needy. The fifth law that God gave to
the children of Israel was that you had to pay a poor man at
the end of every day. You couldn't hold out his pay
for the end of the week or for two days. You had to pay him
his wages at the end of every work day. Why? Because he needed that. He had to go home and provide
food for his family. And he worked hand to mouth,
literally, hand to mouth. Isn't that the way we are? From his hand to our mouth. Give
us this day, Lord, our daily bread. I can't save up the graces
from yesterday. If I try to keep manna from yesterday,
it just gets worms in it. It rots. I need fresh manna right
now. Lord, why? Because I'm poor. I'm poor. I'm needy. I don't have anything. I can't,
I can't do anything. A lot of folks get interested
in God when they are in need. And oftentimes, what is born
in the storm will die in the calm. Meaning that when that
need passes, they no longer have a need for God. Whether it be
sickness, whether it be a financial problem, whether it be a divorce,
you know, I've seen it many, many times. People get interested
in God because they have a need. But that need's temporal. And
so is their faith. And when the need passes, so
does their interest in the things of God. The Lord Jesus Christ
said, when the comforter comes, he will convict the world of
sin because they believe not on me. If God makes you poor and needy,
your need and your poverty is not going to be related to temporal
things. Most of us are very wealthy when
it comes to temporal things, are we not? Compared to the way
most folks have had to live all through the history of mankind.
But if the Lord makes you poor and needy, I got a problem that
never goes away. It never goes away. It never
gets any better. The more I grow in grace and
in the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, the bigger that
problem becomes for me. It's called sin. And the root
of my sin problem is my unbelief. God, I just can't believe you
like I want to believe you. To will is present with me, but
how to perform that which is good I find not, O wretched man
that I am. Who shall deliver me from this
body of death? Lord, I've got a problem that
never goes away regardless of whether I'm healthy, or sick,
regardless of whether I'm financially well off or not, regardless of
whether I'm having a conflict with my wife or not, you know,
whatever my problems are or not, this problem never goes away. God makes you to be a sinner.
You will always be poor and needy, and he will always be there to
save your soul. Oh Lord, make us poor, make us
needy. This is not an attempt to rally
the troops and bolster your commitment. You know what your commitment's
like, don't you? Lord, make me poor, make me needy. If that happens, you'll commit
everything to him. Amen? All right, let's take a
break. you.