Thank you, Joe. Would you open
your Bibles to the book of Exodus tonight, the second chapter. Exodus, the second chapter. And I want to read just a couple
of verses to you. Exodus, the second chapter. verses 21 and 22. And I realize that we've gone through
chapter 2 in our studies on Wednesday night, but I've got something
else I want to focus on here. Exodus 2, 21 and 22. And these first few words, this
is the title of the message. And Moses was content. Moses was content. Well, what
was he contented with? He was content to dwell with
the man, that is, with Reuel. And then that man gave Moses
Zipporah, his daughter, and she bare him a son, And he called
his name Gershom, which means a stranger. For he said, I've been a stranger
in a strange land. Moses was content. What is contentment? Joe read to us there at Philippians
chapter four. where, and we'll look at it again
in a few minutes, Paul said he had learned to be content. What is contentment? Well, it means a satisfaction
with that which God brings our way. It is actually delighting in
God's will. Contentment is not having the
attitude, well, I know it's the will of God, so I might as well
go through this. That's not contentment. You read
the old writers, and they used to use a word, acquiesced. So what in the world does acquiesced
mean? It means to be delighted. and joyfully satisfied with God's
will. And here's what the scripture
is saying, what the Holy Spirit is telling us about Moses. He acquiesced. He was contented
with God's will for him. Now, we don't read that he was
contented when he was in Egypt, although I am certain that for
the number of years that he was there, whenever he got to the
age to understand what was going on, because, you know, he was
raised in the household of Pharaoh's daughter, She fetched him out
of the river, out of the reeds when he was just a few months
old. But I'm certain he had a good
measure of happiness and satisfaction in Egypt. Because in Egypt he
had everything and anything that he desired. Egypt was the most influential
nation in the whole world. Most powerful country of the
world. And Moses, growing up in the
house of Pharaoh's daughter, he would have hobnobbed with
the most influential people in the world. The scripture says he had the
wisdom of the Egyptians and he was great in his deeds and in
his words as well. He had riches. He had influence. He had power. He had prestige. He had all of those things in
Egypt. But God made those things to
be distasteful to Moses. I don't know how much time that
Moses went over and spent with his mother and dad, Amram and
Jochebed, but he being of nobility, living in the house of Pharaoh's
daughter, He had the right and privilege to go anywhere he wanted
to go. And my suspicion is that he spent
a good bit of time with his parents. He certainly must have visited
with them and he learned the history of Israel. And he learned of the God of
Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. When he was 40 years old, he was growing very dissatisfied
with Egypt. Egypt's a picture of the world. The Lord showed him there's really
no joy or happiness or contentment in having all of the things that
this world has to offer. And he grew very discontented
with Egypt and with the ways of the Egyptians. And he saw
an Egyptian mistreating one of the Israelites. And Moses went
down and put himself in the middle of him and proceeded to kill
the Egyptian and bury his body out of sight. The next day he
saw two Israelites quarreling, and the one who started the fight,
Moses goes down and he divides them, he separates them, and
the one who initiated that confrontation said, have you come to kill me
like you killed the Egyptian yesterday? And Moses then knew
what he had done was exposed, and he left. He left Egypt. and he goes into Midian. Now,
he was banished from society. And you're talking about a great difference in his life. You can't imagine, and I can't
imagine, just what a drastic change took place in the life
of Moses. He went from being a great man
in Egypt to being nobody in Midian. He went from having all the riches
that he wanted and all the fleshly desires that he craved to having little to nothing in
the land of Midian. He went from the very prestige
of Egypt, where shepherds were despised, to being a shepherd in the land
of the Midians. He went from wearing very expensive
garments to wearing the kind of rough-smelling garments of
a shepherd. What a drastic change. And as far as the things of this
world were concerned, he went from up here to down here. But the scripture says when he
was put down here, then he was content. Isn't that interesting? That's when he was content. Doesn't
say he's content when he had everything he wanted. You'd think
that's when he had been content. But there's no real contentment
there. He is bowed to the will of God. He has a God-honoring attitude. And he's content. He's satisfied. No regrets. No murmuring. See, here's what
contentment is. It is the realization and the
delightful memory that whatever my circumstances are right now,
they've been decreed by my God. who does all things well. And he does all things according
to his infinite wisdom. You see, that's what Paul was
saying in that passage that Joe read to us. Go back over there
to Philippians 4. Philippians 4. You know, he's in Rome, Paul
is, and he's awaiting death. for preaching the gospel of the
grace of God through the Lord Jesus Christ. I was thinking about this if
they were imprisoning preachers today for preaching the pure
gospel of grace, the pure gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ and
his successful work of redemption If they were imprisoning preachers
today for preaching the gospel, wouldn't be too many men in jail. There wouldn't be too many men
in prison. You would be. Yeah. And I would be. Bill would be. And several others. But the jails
would have lots of room. Isn't that sad? What's wrong with preachers today? My take on it is this. They haven't
seen the glory of God in the face of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Otherwise, they'd preach the gospel of Christ. And I'll get
to this passage in Philippians 4, but years ago, Brother Jack
Shanks and I, we were quite close. He preached here several times
in Bible conferences in years gone by, and of course Jack's
with the Lord now, has been for several years. I was pastoring
down there in Texas, and of course he was, and we'd often get together,
and he said, Jim, I want you to go with me to hear this certain
preacher. He said, I've known him for years
and years, and he's a much older man, Jack said, than I am. And he said he's in very poor
health. He said, it's probably going to be the last time I'll
ever hear him preach. Let's go hear him. I said, OK.
So I drove over. I drove over from Tyler, Texas. And I went with Jack to hear
this man preach. And he said absolutely nothing. It was a very pitiful message. And Jack and I greeted him, and
then we left. And Jack said, you'd think that
a man who's on death's doorstep would be so excited. about nearing that time when
he'd go home to see the Savior. He'd be so excited that he's
going to be with the Master. You'd think that he would get
up and brag on the Savior and talk about the one he loves,
talk about how the Savior laid down his life for him and took
that life up again to save him. how glorious Christ had been
to him throughout his life, how good, how gracious, how merciful,
how wonderful that he was forgiven of all of his sins by the satisfaction
of Christ's death, that he's made the very righteousness of
God in him, and he didn't say anything like that at all. That's very sad. I offer this advice to anybody
who'll take it. If you have an opportunity to
speak to eternity-bound sinners, would you consider this? Think of that opportunity this
way, and this would be Sunday school teachers, And those who
speak from here, and I take this advice myself, speak to people
as if, now listen to me, as if it's the last time you's ever
gonna speak to anybody. What would you want to say to
your Sunday school class? What would you want to say to
your congregation? What would I want to say to all
of you, to those of you who are watching? What would you want
to say when you speak for me? What would you want to say when
you speak for me? What would you want to say? We
got some men who are going to be speaking for me because I'm
going to be going to Hawaii to preach over there in just a few
weeks. Just a couple of weeks. If you
knew, if you knew, this is the last time I'll ever be able to
talk to people about the things of God. What would you say? Wouldn't you brag on the Savior?
Wouldn't you talk about His bloody sacrifice and His righteousness? And let me turn this right around.
What if you knew this was the last message you'd ever hear? Rick, can you listen just a little
bit closer? Would you pay just a little bit
more attention? One old writer said, I speak
as a dying man to dying men. And he said, I speak as though
never to preach again. What if this is my last message?
Because one of these days, it will be. It will be. I thought about the last message
that Mike heard me preach. Mike Sturm. I went back and looked
at my notes. Did I tell him about the blessed
Savior? Did I talk about His blood? Did I talk about Him being the
satisfaction of God's justice? Did I point Him and everybody
else to the dear Savior? You hear, shame on you, shame
on you, and shame on me if we fail in doing that. That's a
terrible, terrible crime. That's a criminal act. If we
don't take advantage of every opportunity to preach the gospel,
to tell folks how God can be just and justify the ungodly,
they don't know and they won't know unless somebody tells them. And that's our responsibility. Here's the Apostle Paul. Faithful
in preaching the gospel of the grace of God. And he says something
that I fear very few of us know much about. And that's contentment. He's in prison. He had certain
liberties so that he could receive guests and preached to them,
but he wasn't free to get out. And it's not going to be very
long before his head will be laid on a Roman chopping block, and he's going to be beheaded
for the cause of the gospel. And he says this, In verse 11,
I have learned. Philippians 4.11, not that I
speak in respect of want. He said, I've learned in whatever
state I am, when I'm full and when I'm empty. I have learned in whatsoever
state I am, therewith to be content, realizing My Lord is my sufficiency. And in Him, I have all things
that matter. You may have aches and pains
and you can't rejoice, well, I'm glad I'm aching and I'm glad
I got pains and I'm glad I got problems. That's not what contentment
is, but contentment is realizing whatever state I am in, God put
me here and I'll give Him the glory and I'll give Him the praise
and I'll thank Him because He's too wise to make a mistake regarding
my life. Oh, God, help us to acquiesce
in His will. And you can't just make up your
mind, well, I will. You have to learn it. And I'll
tell you who the only teacher is, the Spirit of God. He'll teach you. He'll teach
you. Job, at first, knew something
about contentment. The Lord killed all ten of his
children. Took them all away. I don't know
how a man could bear that. To lose one is horrible. To lose
all ten? And he wept. He had a broken
heart. But he worshipped God. He worshipped God. He blessed
the Lord. And he said, the Lord gave, and
the Lord hath taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.
Did he hurt? Of course he did. Did he have
a broken heart? Yes, he had a broken heart. But
could he rejoice knowing my God does his will in all things? Yes, he did. And he acquiesced in the will
of God. I tell you, few people, very
few people know the joy and the peace of contentment in believing
the Lord. And I want to know more about
it myself. I want Him to teach me contentment. I'll tell you five things and
I'm going to come back to the first one, but I'll tell you
five things which to the extent we believe these five truths,
we will learn contentment. To the extent we believe them.
I talked to a man yesterday about the things of God after the funeral
service. He knows them. I don't think
he believes them. What was it Barnard used to say?
A lot of people are going to miss heaven by 18 inches. Something
like that. You remember him saying that?
Distance from here to here. From the head to the heart. We
got a head knowledge of a lot of things. God's sovereign. Well,
He is. He sure is. God is the God of
purpose. Amen to that. But when God's purpose runs contrary
to our desires and to our wishes, that's when our feathers get
a little ruffled. and we're not so happy anymore.
We're not so contented anymore. See, anybody can be contented
as long as the waters are smooth, skies are clear, family's well,
got a little money in the bank, got no car trouble, finally paid
off the mortgage on the house. Oh, I'm content, preacher. Yeah, we'll see how content we
are when some tragedy strikes, some unforeseen difficulty arises. Let's see if we go to pieces
then. Tell you five things, which to
the extent we believe these things, we'll learn contentment. Number
one, the purpose of God. All things great and small, good
and evil, they come to pass according to God's eternal, unchangeable,
all-wise purpose. Turn back with me just a few
pages to Ephesians 1. You know, I've thought about,
obviously, the passing of Brother Mike, Mike Sturm, I know who brought that to pass. The Lord did. When David and I visited with
Mike's wife Sunday afternoon a week ago, she said, Mike, she said, Jim,
she hugged me and I hugged her. I said, Jim, Mike didn't want
a funeral. Because in 2018, when his mother
died, it just tore the family up. And he grieved. And he told his wife and daughter,
I don't want to put my family through that. So I don't want
a funeral. And I talked to her about that. And I said, the thing of it is,
a funeral will give closure. for the family. She said, well,
I'm thinking about it. And she decided to overrule his
wishes. And then that service that she
wanted to have was delayed until yesterday. Yesterday. And that was a day when people
were off from work. A lot of people would be free
to attend the service, and they did. I talked to the funeral
director. She said it's the largest funeral
they've had at that funeral home, just up the street from us, overflowing
into the other room. Who arranged all of that? I mean, to begin with, there
was to be no service at all. But you see, God had purposed
that His word go forth, Christ be exalted. God had ordained
that one of His servants would preach to all of those people,
and there's a bunch of people there. I caught them off guard,
I'm sure, what I had to say. God's people rejoiced. But there's
a good many people there who had been listening to the music
and listened to the eulogy. I don't think they had any idea.
In fact, I'm sure they didn't have any idea what the preacher
was going to say. But you see, the Lord had arranged
all of that. He's the God of purpose now. We don't just give lip service
to that truth. That is the honest to God truth. He's the God of purpose. Chapter
one of Ephesians, verse 11. In whom, in Christ. You go down
through here, in whom, in whom, in the beloved, in Christ, in
him. Over and over and over again,
Paul emphasizes the fact that everything God has for sinners
is in his Son. And outside of Christ, he has
nothing but death, judgment, and condemnation forever. And now he says in verse 11,
in whom in Christ we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated
according to the purpose of him. Watch this. who worketh all things
after the counsel of his own will." How many things does he
work after the counsel of his own will? All things. That excludes
nothing and includes everything. Why should we ever murmur or
fuss or charge God foolishly with what He does when everything
is being worked out according to the counsel of His own will,
which is good and sovereign and wise? And you can keep these
three things in mind. The purpose of God involves really
basically three, I'll give you three things, and really I shouldn't
call them things, three issues. The purpose of God. What is the
purpose of God? What does it involve? Number
one, His glory. His glory. That's what God is
purposed to do. In all things that He gets the
glory. In creation, in providence and in grace. God's purpose involves necessarily
His glory. The Lord said, I'm going to stain
the pride of all flesh. He said, I am the Lord. That
is My name and My glory will I not give to another. He's not
going to give His glory to your free will. He's not going to
give His glory to your works or to your worth. That's His
glory. He'll always have the glory.
Whatever He does and whatever He does with you and whatever
He does with me is for His glory. Secondly, the purpose of God. What is it involved? His glory
and His Son. That's right at the heart of
it. Right at the heart of the purpose
of God is the Lord Jesus Christ. It pleased the Father that in
the Son should dwell all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. That's what it pleased God to
do. And He has sent His Son into
this world to redeem and save His people, which has already
been accomplished. He finished that work of redemption. And He's gone back to glory.
He's ascended. The Father seated Him at His
own right hand and said here, "'Til I make you in Me as your
footstool.'" That's what God is doing. The purpose of God
involves His glory And His glory necessarily involves honoring
His Son. Everybody's going to honor the
Lord Jesus Christ. Whether you believe Him or don't
believe Him, you're going to give Him honor. If effectually drawn to Him by
the power of the Spirit in this life, It'll be to the praise
of the glory of His grace. If it's at the judgment, you're
going to bow the knee to Christ and acknowledge He is the Lord. Jesus of Nazareth, the despised
Galilean. That's God manifest in the flesh. And every knee is going to bow
Every tongue's going to confess that He's Lord to the glory of
God the Father. This is necessarily involved
in the purpose of God. You with me? His glory and His Son. And I'll tell you the third thing
that is necessarily involved in it, certainly important to
God. His glory, His Son, His people. His people. So dear to the heart of God. Chosen in grace before the world
began unto salvation. entrusted to the Lord Jesus Christ. The surety of the covenant of
grace joined to Him by sovereign might and by God's purpose joined
to Him as one. So that there will never be any
divorce between Christ and His people. God views us in Him. He has always viewed us in Him. And we are accepted, we were
accepted from old eternity in the Beloved, in Christ Jesus. No divorce. No separation. In Romans chapter 8, it begins
with no condemnation and it ends with no separation. God's glory. God's son. God's people. And the one in
the middle, he's all important in the purpose
of God. And he's all important to the
people of God. He's the one we look to. In him we have righteousness.
In Him we have the full forgiveness of all of our sins in Christ,
the purpose of God. If the Lord would ever teach
us of His purpose, that His purpose is good, it's wise, it pertains to all things, And God has purposed that he
get the glory in everything. He's purposed that his son receive
all the honor, all the recognition, all the worship, and his people. You know what God says about
us? He says, he that touches you touches the apple of my eye.
How important is your eye to you? That's mighty important. Don't touch my eye. I don't know
how anybody could wear contacts, to be honest with you. I couldn't. Some of y'all do
wear contacts. I don't know how in the world
you wear contacts. I can't stand for anything touching my eye.
You get an eyelash in my eye, I can't stand it. I gotta get
that eyelash out. And God says, somebody touches
you, touches the apple of my eye. When the Lord Jesus comes back,
you know who He's gonna gather unto Himself? His jewels. That's what we are to Him, Alan.
We're His jewels. More precious to God than gold
or silver or anything else. More valuable to God than diamonds. Those things don't mean anything
to God. He buried them in the earth. They're nothing to Him. But His
people and the salvation of His people, that's His glory. Don't
you dare try to steal His glory. That's why I said this morning,
people who believe in salvation by man's free will, they're trying
to steal God's glory. He's not going to allow that.
You're going to pay for that. You'll pay dearly for that. If
you think by your will or your worth, your goodness or your
works, that you kind of tip the scales in your favor as far as
God's concerned, My daddy used to say, you got another thing
coming. I'd say, Daddy, I think. And
he'd say, well, you better hush up or you'll have another thing
coming. You'll think differently. I tell
you, don't try to steal His glory. In the purpose of God, His glory
is all important, and His Son, and His people. And if we could
understand something about how valuable the purpose of God is
to our Lord, then we'd be making some headway toward contentment.
That passage in Romans 8, 28. And we know that all things work
together for good to them that love God, to them who are the
called according to his. What's that last word? Huh? Purpose. That's right. Purpose. Now, my purpose, what I intend
to do, may or may not come to pass. There are a lot of variables
involved. I've got some, my week's laid
out already what I'm going to do. I've told Nancy, I've got
to do this, I've got to do that, I've got all these things I want
to do, got some visits I want to make. But my purpose, may
run into some obstacles that I can't possibly overcome. But there are no insurmountable
obstacles to the purpose of God. Because you see, not only is
He the God of purpose, number two, He's a God of providence. He worketh all things according
to the counsel of His will. That's what He's doing. What's
God doing today? What's God doing today? I'll
tell you what God's doing. He's bringing His eternal purpose
to pass. That's called providence. Predestination is God has ordained
all things that will ever come to pass, and providence is simply,
and that's maybe not the right word to use, but providence is
God bringing His predestination to pass. Is there anybody who
can put an obstacle up and stop God from doing what He purposed
to do? And the answer is no. Even a
heathen king by the name of Nebuchadnezzar, he learned that. And he said
of God, he doeth his will in the armies of heaven. How many
are the armies of heaven? How many angels are there in
glory? Ever how many there are? Nebuchadnezzar
said he does his will in heaven. and among the inhabitants of
the earth." Do you know what a powerful statement that is? How many billion people do they
estimate live on the earth? What, seven or eight billion?
Is that what they say? I don't know how many. And he
does his will in every last one of them. Grasp that if you can. That is divine providence. That's why this idea of free
willism is an absolute foolishness, foolish concept, and a lie started
by Satan. That's one of Satan's great big
lies, that you have a free will. You do not. To begin with, 2 Timothy 2 says
that Satan holds men captive at his will. So you don't have
more power than Satan's will. And in all things, everything
is subject to the will of God. Everything and everybody and
every event, everything that ever happens. Providence. And you see, if God ever teaches
us that he's working his will, and
not only in all these big things that are happening, but I mean
in your life and in my life, I don't understand what the Lord
is doing, even for me. I know this. In the ministry,
I have a greater urgency than I've ever had before. Because I was telling somebody
the other day, I got less of my ministry left than I've got
less remaining. Most of my ministry's gone. I
don't know how much longer I've got. That's the reason I try
to stay busy in the ministry. And God's preachers do that.
We don't have much time left. Do you know better than God does
how to govern your life? No, preacher. No, you don't. He is providentially directing
all things in your life. I could go around here and point
to every single person here. And those of you who are watching
by way of the internet, I'm pointing to you right now too. The Lord is governing your life too. And if we can understand His
purpose and His providence, go a long ways toward contentment,
I'll tell you. And number three, there's something
else, the power of God, the purpose of God, the providence of God,
the power of God. No hindrances to God, no obstacles
to Him. That's what I said a while ago.
Nothing to hold Him back. Is there anything too hard for
the Lord? That's the question is. Anything
too hard? Nothing is impossible with God. There's no power. There's no
power anywhere near the power of God. All other powers are
delegated powers that come from the Lord. If all the powers of hell and
earth got together, then nothing compared to the power of God.
And He's your heavenly Father. If we could realize that, maybe
we'd know a little something about contentment. And then there's
the presence of God. How many times does the Lord
say to His people, I'm with you. I'm with you. The Lord never forsake His people.
for his great namesake because it pleased him to make you his
people. He's not gonna forsake you. We go around singing the blues. Why do we do that? May God put laughter and put
a nice smile in our souls, in the heart. Then our attitude's gonna change. God chose us. He redeemed us. He bought us. He made us righteous. We're forgiven. He called us
to be his people. We belong to him. And then there's
the promise of the Lord. All the promises. Peter says
exceedingly great promises. And when we realize that God is for us, and now what it says, turn over
to Romans 8, I'll quit. Turn over to Romans 8. God is for us. He's not opposed
to us. He's not against us. He's for us. Let me acquiesce
in all the promises of God. They're mine in Christ Jesus.
All the promises of God are yea, and all the promises of God are
amen in the Savior. Oh, He's the greatest promise
God's ever given us. For unto us a son is born, unto
us a child is given. He's the greatest promise. Look
here in Romans 8, and I'll just read these verses. Verse 29,
after he talked about the purpose of God, verse 29, for whom he
did foreknow, that is, forelove, eternally love, He also did predestinate
to be conformed in the image of his son. People are scared
to death about that word predestination. I love it. Alan, I just delight in this.
What God has purposed, and that's everything, I delight in that,
because whatever he has predestinated, whatever he has purposed, he's
gonna bring to pass, and it's only gonna work out for good
for his people, and it'll glorify him. for whom He did foreknow."
Not what He foreknew. It's not about what God foreknew. It's whom He foreknew. He foreknew
a people from before the foundation of the world. And He predestinated
them to the image of His Son that He might be the firstborn
among many brethren. Moreover, whom He did predestinate
them He also called And whom He called, them He also justified. And whom He justified, them He
also glorified. You know what I take away from
that? It's all finished. In the mind and purpose of God,
it's done. You say, but these things are
going on now. They're going on down here, but
in the mind and purpose of God, the One who ordained all things,
good is done. He calleth those things that
be not as though they were. They already happen. Well, what should we then say
to these things? Well, we'll say if God be for
us, who can be against us? Why shouldn't we be content if the Lord our God is for us? For me? Yes, for you. Yes, for you, James Ferguson
Burke. And I'm working all things in
your life for your good. Well, the Lord doesn't seem like
it to me. Well, you look through a veil darkly. You look through
a glass darkly. You don't see the way things
are. I don't see the way things really are, but he does. And
if I could just believe him, boy, if God would give me faith
to believe him, I believe I'd have a measure of contentment. After all, verse 32, he that
spared not his own son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall
he not with him also freely give us all things? Who shall lay
anything to the charge of God's elect? It's God who justifies.
Who is he that condemneth its Christ that died, yea, rather
that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who
also maketh intercession for us? Let me acquiesce in his will. Let me be contented. And I'll
tell you, Final, perfect content. We'll never be perfectly contented
here. But David says, I shall be satisfied. Perfectly content. You know when
that's going to be? When I awaken His likeness. His
body is destined for the grave. When He wakes up this body, And this mortal shall put on
immortality, and this corruptible shall put on incorruption. Then
when my soul and my body join back together, I'll be perfectly satisfied then. And I'll give him all the glory
like I want to do now. But I'll do it perfectly then.
I hope that helps you. Hope that helps you. Let's sing
a closing song.