That song was written by Alan. And such a blessing, wasn't it? Taken right out of Psalm 110.
And I expect some of you recognized the words coming right out of
the Psalm 110. Well, I want to if the Spirit
of God would enable me, speak to you from a psalm very close
to that one, Psalm 115. If you would, open your Bible,
Psalm 115. And our subject is, It Pleased God. what it pleased God to do. That's
what we're going to be dealing with this evening. Psalm 115. Those of you who are watching
by way of the internet, I hope you can get your Bible and also
follow along with the rest of us here in the auditorium. Let's ask the Lord to bless His
Word. Our Father, unless you meet with us this
evening by your Spirit, nothing of any spiritual or eternal value
will be accomplished in this meeting. We know that a man can receive
nothing except it be given him from above. Lord, we speak as needy souls. And we come to You through the
merits and through the very person of Your darling Son, the Lord
Jesus, our Savior. And Lord, on account of His substitutionary
death, our sins have been put away. You raised Him from the
dead. Your testimony that He finished
the work You gave Him to do. And Father, He's our only hope. He is our hope of glory. And
we ask You tonight to give us eyes of faith to see Him and
ears of faith to hear His voice. Lord, quicken those who are dead
in trespasses and in sins. And bless your dear people as
they feed upon the gospel of your grace again this evening. And Lord, that which we mostly
desire is to worship you tonight. Give us a spirit of reverence,
Give us love of Your Word. And Lord, give us mercy and grace
in Christ Jesus. Magnify Him even as He magnified
you in His life and in His death. And we worship our Savior who
sits at Your right hand in glory, all authority having been given
unto Him. He's our King, He is our Prophet,
and He is our Great High Priest made after the order of Melchizedek. We thank You for Him. We seek
to honor Him tonight and preach Him and that which He's done
for poor sinners just like us. So help us all, Lord, to worship
tonight. For Jesus' sake, I ask these
things. Amen. Look at Psalm 115 verse
1. Here's how the psalmist begins
this psalm, Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto thy name
give glory for thy mercy and for thy truth's sake." This is
indeed the language of one of the children of God. In fact,
this is the language of every child of God. This is our desire
for our God to have all the glory, for our God to have all of the
honor, None unto us. We don't deserve any praise.
We're not deserving of any honor. What have we done? We're born
rebels against God. We're born in transgressions,
in sin, in iniquity. We drink iniquity like water
is what the scripture says. And when the Word of God first
came to us, and before it came to us in the power of the Spirit
of God, we had no interest in the things of God. We had no
interest in the Gospel, in the Lord Jesus Christ. He really
meant nothing to us. We're not worthy of any glory.
And then when the Gospel was set before us, the Gospel of
God's substitution and the satisfaction of our Lord Jesus, His salvation
that's all of grace, that's all in the Master Himself. When that Gospel came to us in
power and by the assurance of the Spirit of God, the Lord did
a work within us. We didn't do the work. You didn't
give yourself life. You didn't give yourself a new
nature. You didn't give yourself a love for the truth. You were
still opposed to God until God broke down your rebellion. Like y'all sang in your song
there from Psalm 110. Thy people shall be willing in
the day of thy power. We weren't willing until God
made us willing. Isn't that right? We were made
willing by the grace of God. Made willing by the Spirit of
God. That's when we wanted to be saved. I want to be saved and I want
to be saved God's way. I want to be saved that way that
gives God all the glory and all the credit. And this is indeed,
these are the words of every child of God, not unto us, O
Lord, and we'll say it again, not unto us, but unto Thy name. Thy name give
glory for Thy mercy and for Thy truth's sake. If we're saved,
it's because of the mercy of God. If we're saved, it's because
of God revealed the truth unto us, the truth of who He is, the
truth of what we are. and that blessed truth that God
sent the Savior into this world to save His people from their
sins. He didn't come to try to save.
He came to save. He didn't come to try to redeem.
He redeemed. He didn't come to try to reconcile
us to God. He reconciled us to God. He finished
the work that God gave Him to do. Not unto us, O Lord. Not unto us. But under Thy name,
under Thy name, after all, Lord, You purposed this salvation back
in old eternity. You're the one who ordained a
people unto everlasting life. You're the one who gave a people
unto the Lord Jesus to be our surety, to be our shepherd, to
be our Savior. This salvation, Lord, originated
with You, not unto us. We didn't have anything to do
with that. That's all of God. This salvation is all of God
in its purpose. This salvation is all of God
in its payment price. God sent forth His Son, the Scripture
says, in the fullness of time. We didn't send for Him. In fact,
when He did come, we didn't want Him. and people hated Him to such
a degree that they killed Him. And yet that was according to
the will and purpose of God because He had to die for our sins. He had to be made sin for us,
that one who knew no sin, that we would be made the righteousness
of God in Him. This was necessary. He sent Him
in Christ Jesus. He paid the full payment price. He left nothing undone that needed
to be done for our salvation. Isn't that good news? That's
the good news of the gospel. He didn't say, I've done 99%
of it, now I'll only leave you with 1%. Well, if that's the
way it is, we're all gonna go to hell. We're all gonna perish. If He left anything for us to
do to satisfy the demands of a holy God, we'll have no hope. But he said, I finished the work
that you gave me to do. And in his dying breath, he said,
it is finished. It's done. Bowed his head and
gave up the ghost. And put his body in the grave.
His soul went back to God. Went to paradise. Where he welcomed
that thief that he saved by his grace. And then He came back
and He took that body unto Himself. A glorified body. Having paid
the very price that God demanded. The ancient question, the question
of all questions. How can God be just and justify
the ungodly? Only God found the way in His
infinite wisdom. He had a substitute. Release
them from going down to the pit. I found a ransom. That's what
God said. A ransom was found. Oh, a ransom
was found. Bless the name of God. Christ
is that ransom. He paid our price when He gave
His life. His life wasn't taken from Him.
He said, nobody's going to take my life from me. I got the power
to lay it down, I got the power to take it again. This commandment
have I received from my Father. The Romans didn't kill Him, the
Jews didn't kill Him, the soldiers didn't kill Him. He said, I give
my life, I lay my life down for the sheep. And when it was the
ordained time for Him to die, He laid it down. After all, that's what the law
of God demanded. Death. Death. I tell you, somebody's going
to die. Somebody's going to die on account of sin. Either you,
or a suitable substitute. But somebody's got to die. Scripture says the soul that
sinned shall die. Christ died for our sins according
to the Scriptures. That's what it says. And he was
buried and he was raised again the third day according to the
Scriptures. That's all according to the purpose
of God. Not unto us, O Lord, not unto
us, but unto thy name give glory. Because of your purpose of grace
and because of your purchase by the blood of the Lord Jesus,
we've been bought. That's what Peter said, you're
bought with a price. but with a price. Not the price
of corruptible things like silver and gold, but the blood of the
Son of God. Behold the purpose of God in
salvation. Behold the very price that was
paid for us. Behold that omnipotent power
of God. Power! Had to be saved by power. God put us under the sound of
the preaching of the gospel. And we sat there and we weren't
interested in the least. And then something happened.
Something happened. God went to work in our hearts. Being born again, not of corruptible
seed, but of incorruptible, by the Word of God that liveth and
abideth forever. God went to work. And I'll tell
you, he who hath begun a good work in us, he'll finish it to
the day of Jesus Christ. Philippians 1.6 says that. The
Lord raised us from the dead. He walked by the graveyard of
all mankind and He stopped at your tombstone as it was and
He said, live! It was the time of love. It was
the time for life. It was that time appointed on
God or in God's eternal calendar when you would hear the gospel
and be born again by the Spirit of God. Oh my! What kind of power
does it take to give life to a spiritually dead sinner? I'll
tell you what kind of power it takes. God's power. It's going
to take a whole lot more than your decision. Well, I decided
I'd open my heart's door to Jesus. It's going to take a whole lot
more power than that. Raise the dead. Heart surgery, that's what
you need. Need God to take out that heart
of stone and give you a heart of flesh. That's what's needed. God to do the work. Nod unto
us. Oh Lord, nod unto us. Be glory. Don't give us any glory. Under
thy name give the glory. You know, I was thinking, this
afternoon. There are so many very sweet
texts of Scripture, and I'm sure those of you who are the people
of God, and I would assume it's most everybody in this congregation,
and a good many of you who are watching, and you have perhaps
a favorite portion of Scripture that the Lord used in your conversion. God drove the Gospel home to
you. I don't know what passage it
was for you. Perhaps it was, this is a faithful
saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the
world to save sinners, of whom I'm chief. Maybe it was that
one. I don't know. But I was thinking, if God opened
up the heavens for us tonight, And if you let us listen in to
the testimony of the saints of God and what they're saying in
heaven and what kind of hymn of praise they're singing to
the Lord, well, I'm sure this one is going to be sung. I can
almost hear them. Not unto us, O Lord. Imagine
all the heavenly choirs singing praises to the Lord. I can almost
hear them singing, and I join with them here on earth. And
we sing, not unto us, O Lord. Not unto us, but unto Thy name. Thy name give glory. The name
of Jehovah. The great I Am, the name of our
Savior, our surety, our substitute. God, sacrifice the sin. Under
Thy name be glory. For Thy mercy, You didn't give
us what we deserved. You didn't give us what we deserved. You gave us what He deserved. Christ Jesus deserved. You lifted us up. He lifted us
up out of the miry clay and He set our feet on a rock. He lifted us up from the dunghill
and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Not unto
us, O Lord. Not unto us. but under thy name
give glory for thy mercy and for thy truth's sake. Oh, the truth. Our Lord said to those Pharisees
in John 8, you shall know the truth and the truth shall set
you free. That's the only way you're gonna
be free. Be free of false religion, be free of legal bondage. where it's freedom to be found,
only in the great liberator, Christ Jesus himself. You know
what he does? He sets the captive free. And
I tell you, if you're captive, if you realize you were a captive
to not only sin, but to Satan, to this world, to yourself, if
he sets you free, freedom, Freedom to believe Him. Freedom to love
Him. Freedom to follow Him. Freedom
to rest in Him. If He sets you free, He did it
by His truth. That's what He uses. He didn't
use anything else but the truth. He uses the gospel. And then He says in the second
verse here, Wherefore should the heathen
say, where is now their God? The heathen, by the heathen it
means Gentiles. Really, it's all men by nature. We used to say back in my Armenian
days, you know, we're sending missionaries to the heathen in
Africa. I tell you, missionaries need
to be sent to the heathen in America. We're a heathen nation. Wouldn't you agree with that?
We are a heathen nation. Don't know God. Don't love the
Scriptures. There's no fear of God before
people's eyes. This is a heathen nation. The heathens have no idea of
God, God's identity. They have their gods. They have
their idols. Nancy and I have been to Japan
several times, and it's nothing, of course, to go to a restaurant
or to visit somebody's, visit in their home, and they have
their little god, perhaps a little Buddha, And then in front of
the little Buddha would be a little bowl of rice and another bowl
with perhaps some wedges of oranges or something. And that's their
little idol. Those are their idols. They have
food for their idols. And I asked our son, we were
visiting with our son David, and I said, does that God eat
that food? He said, of course not, Dad. How come he can't eat that food?
Because he's dead. Just like the people who worship
him. See, throughout this psalm, you
can read it later on, but it says the people who worship these
dead idols, they're just like their idols. They can't hear. They can't see. They have no
understanding of the true God of glory. and they never will
and you never would have had any knowledge of God had God
not introduced himself to you effectually. After all, the Savior said, this
is life eternal to know thee, the only true God and Jesus Christ
whom thou hast sent. That's what eternal life is,
is to know God. It's not just to know about God
or to know that there is a God. Well, I believe there's a God.
Well, whoopee, good for you. The devils believe there's a
God. They go further than you do. They tremble. If we ever find out who God is,
that'll take the starch out of us, take a good bit of the arrogance
out of us. A fellow said to Scott Richardson
one time, he said, When God saved me, He took all the self-righteousness
and all the pride out of me. And Scott said, I don't believe
He took it all. I don't believe He took it all.
We still got some pride left on us. We still got some self-righteousness
in us too. Yeah, we sure do. It would be
wonderful when God takes that away from us. But the heathens
say, where is now their God? We've got our God sitting up
there on the mantel. On Wednesday night, this past
Wednesday night, we were talking about Laban and Rachel, his younger
daughter. She stole the idols of her dad. idols of silver and gold. Rachel
stole them, not because she believed in that silly superstition, but
she didn't think her dad was going to leave her any money,
any wealth, and so she sold the idols of silver and gold, little
ones. And they could be melted down,
you know, and she'd have some money that way. And she took
those idols and she hid them in her saddlebags of her camel
saddle. She had a saddle for her camel,
and had saddlebags, and that's where she stuffed her daddy's
idols, her daddy's gods in saddlebags. Let me tell you something, if
you can put your God in a saddlebag, you've got the wrong God. Because
the true God fills the universe. He's everywhere. You can't confine
Him. He is God. And there is none
other. The heathen said to David, now
we got our gods, where are yours? Where is your God? And David
said in verse 3, but our God is in the heavens. He's in the
heavens. Had the Spirit of God led him,
he could have given, oh, three, four answers. He could have said
he's in His Word. That's where... You want to find
God? You want to know where God is? Well, certainly He is in
heaven, in the heavens, because that's where His throne is. He
said, heaven is my throne, the earth is my footstool. You're
looking for God. You're not going to find Him
knocking on somebody's heart's door. And you're not going to
find Him down here at the table that you choose to call an altar. You'll find Him on His
throne, where He never leaves that throne. He's a God of the ages. You want to know where God is?
He's in heaven on His throne. He's in His Word. He's in His
Son, Christ Jesus. Scripture says 2 Corinthians
5, God was in Christ, reconciling the world, the world of His elect
unto Himself. Want to find God? You want to
know where God is? Right here with His people tonight.
And wherever God's people meet throughout this world, with His
people, that's where He is. You want to know where God is?
He's with each one of His children. Always. Never will leave you. He said, I'll never leave you.
I'll never forsake you. Where is God? The heathen said,
where is their God? Our God's in the heavens. Well,
what's He doing? What is God doing? If you ask an eight, ten year
old child, if you ask them and their mind hadn't been filled
with Armenian false religion junk, I know they don't know
the truth, but if their mind hadn't been warped with that,
if you ask them, what can God do? They'll answer this way,
anything He wants to do. Anything He wants to do. And
that child is absolutely correct. Whatever God wants to do, that's
exactly what He does. Nobody can stay His hand, Nebuchadnezzar
said, by the leadership of the Spirit. And nobody can say unto
Him, What doest Thou? Nobody can stop Him. Nobody can
frustrate Him. God sits upon His sovereign,
sovereign holy throne. He does His will among the armies
of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth. And nobody can
keep Him from doing what He set out to do. If you can stop God from working,
from doing what He wants to do, what He's willed to do, then
you'd have to be more powerful than God. You think about that. God starts to do something and
you grab His hand and say, No! I'm not going to let you do that.
No, you got one of them little gods that you put in your pocket.
That's the kind of God you got. But you're not going to stop
God. Well, what does it please God to do? I'll give you several
things. And if you want to jot down the
reference you can, if you don't want to, that's fine too. Number
one, it pleased God to choose a people unto salvation for the
glory of His name. The reference is in 1 Samuel
12, 22, for the Lord will not forsake His people for His great
name's sake, for it has pleased Him to make you His people. Just like God was pleased to
make Israel His one nation, the one nation He'd deal with, give
His Word to them, give His commandments to them, give the Scriptures
to them, and give His Son to them. That's our Lord came through
the lineage. He's the seed of Abraham. Abraham. God chose a people. He chose
a nation and He chose a people unto salvation. I know there
are people who get very upset when they hear about God's election
unto salvation. God chose a people unto salvation. But that's good news to the ears
of a real sinner. Because election, now listen
to me, is not your enemy. No way. That's not your enemy. That's your best friend. Because
you wouldn't know God. You wouldn't love the Gospel.
You wouldn't love the grace of God in salvation were it not
for the fact that God in old eternity ordained you to be one
of His people. And you know, we've always been
His people. There never was a time when we
weren't His people. One with the Savior, joined to
Him in sovereign election, sovereign grace. The Scripture says in Psalm 149,
for the Lord takes pleasure in His people. He'll beautify them
with salvation. Psalm 65, verse 4, Blessed is
the man that thou choosest, and causes to approach unto thee,
that he may dwell in thy courts. We shall be satisfied with the
goodness of thy house, even of thy holy temple. John 15, verse 16, Our Lord Jesus
looked at His eleven believing disciples. Judas is gone. He said, you didn't choose me.
I chose you. And I say to all of you here
tonight who believe the Gospel, the Savior says to you, you didn't
choose me, and you know that. He said, I chose you. See, I'm
convinced that people who really know God, people who have really
been born of the Spirit, The people to whom the Spirit of
God has revealed Christ Jesus, I am absolutely convinced they
know who saved them and that He did it for His glory. That
they didn't lift a finger. People may not understand God's
election of grace. I remember when I first went
to Rocky Mount to pastor there in the end of 1975, and I started preaching in the
Gospel of John chapter 10. There were some people who got
upset. There were some people who got real happy. And one of
the Sun School teachers called me up and she said, my husband
and I are studying in John chapter 10, the passage you've been preaching
from, and we've kind of come to the conclusion that really
salvation is not up to us, it's up to the Lord, isn't it? I said,
I think God's teaching you. Yeah, He teaches us. He teaches
us that in salvation, as in redemption, as in sanctification, as in justification,
as in glorification, as in righteousness, Christ is all. That's right. 1 Corinthians 1, Who of God,
Christ of God, is made unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification,
and redemption, that according as it is written, He that glorieth.
Let Him glory in the Lord. He ain't going to give you any
glory. You waiting for a pat on the
back? Maybe to help you belch or something,
but that's the only way you're going to get a pat on the back
around here. It pleased the Lord to make you His people. I'll
go quickly. Secondly, it pleased the Lord
to bless these people with all spiritual blessings in heavenly
places. You remember King Balak who hired
Balaam to, he said, curse Israel. And Balaam told him, he said,
I can't curse the people that God has blessed. Turn over, let me show you a
couple of references. Let's just take the time to look at this
real quick. Look at Numbers, first of all, Numbers 23. Numbers 23. Numbers 23, and I want you to
look at verse 27. And I'm going to give you another
verse in the next chapter. Numbers 23, 27. You there? Okay,
here we go. And Balak, this is heathen king,
and Balak said unto this false prophet Balaam, he said, Come,
I pray thee, I will bring thee unto another place. Peradventure,
it will please God that thou mayest curse me them from thence. Maybe it will please God that
you'll curse them. Now look at chapter 24 and verse
1. And when Balaam, this is the
false prophet who said a lot of good things, but he didn't
know the gospel, didn't know God, like a lot of false prophets
today. You will hear him on television
and say, you know, he said several good things, but he didn't say
the good thing. He didn't preach the gospel.
But here's Balaam. When Balaam saw that it pleased
the Lord to bless Israel, He went not at other times to seek
for enchantments, but He set His face toward the wilderness."
He said, I see now it pleased the Lord to bless Israel. And
I'm telling you, it pleased our God to bless His people with
all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ Jesus, and He
did that before He made the world. And I can say to you in Numbers
chapter 6, the blessing of God, the Lord bless thee and keep
thee and go right through that blessing that God gave to the
priesthood. But I'll tell you this, if God
blessed you in Christ Jesus before He made the world and He blessed
you with all blessings in heavenly places, no power in heaven, earth,
or hell can curse you You're blessed! You're blessed! And nobody's going to curse you. Because you see, it pleased God
to justify you by His grace through the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. And your sins are gone. And you're righteous. You're
righteous for Christ's sake. It pleased God to bless His people
with spiritual blessings. Number three, it pleased God
that the fullness of the Godhead dwelled bodily in Jesus of Nazareth. Look with me over in Colossians
chapter 1. Look at Colossians chapter 1. Verse 19, for it pleased the
Father that in Him, in Christ Jesus, in this One who created
all things, that in Him should all fullness dwell. Look at chapter
2, verse 9. For in Him dwelleth all the fullness
of the Godhead bodily. That pleased God. That man Christ Jesus we talked
about this morning, filled with the Spirit of God. The very fullness of the Godhead
dwelt in that man. No wonder we read in 1 Timothy
chapter 3, and without controversy, great is the mystery of godliness. Well, what is that mystery? God
was manifest in the flesh. What a mystery. But it pleased
God that in that man, Christ Jesus, all the fullness of the
Godhead dwelt bodily. The fullness, that word fullness,
means the totality of the divine powers and attributes. All in
that man, Christ Jesus. And he performed all those miracles
for others, but he didn't perform a miracle for himself. He released others from their
captivity. He didn't release himself because
he was appointed by God to die for our sins. That word fullness means to fill
so full that nothing can be added to it. This glass of water. Thank you for my water. You could say that's about a
full glass of water, but it really isn't full. Because you can add
some more to it. But our Lord Jesus, He was filled
all the way up to the very top. He had to be divine. He had to
be God to do business with God. And he had to be man to represent
us to a holy God. He had to be man for the suffering
of death. That's why he had to be a man.
Because God can't die. That word fullness has the same
meaning as in Mark chapter 8 verse 20 where the 12 baskets of food
were collected and it says they were full. You know what that
means? Couldn't add anything else to them. Our Lord Jesus, He's not a God. He's the God. He's the God. The God-man. There is in Him
all fullness, all fullness of grace to save us. Electing grace,
redeeming grace, justifying grace, keeping grace, teaching grace,
preserving grace, glorifying grace. There is in Him all the
fullness of the truth to teach us. There is in Him all the fullness
of authority and power to quicken us, make us alive. There is in Him all the fullness
of the Spirit to indwell us, to cause us to grow in grace
and in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. There is in Him
all the fullness of peace and joy to give us contentment in
this world. There is in Him the fullness
of comfort to sustain us and cheer us on our earthly journey. There is in Him the fullness
of blessings to make sure every need we have is well supplied. So it pleased the Lord to choose
a people. It pleased the Lord to bless
those people. It pleased the Lord, it pleased
God that all the fullness of the Godhead dwell in Christ Jesus. Number four, it pleased God to
observe the earthly life of His Son. Scripture says, in the flesh
no man can please God. But one man in the flesh pleased
God. One man. The God-man. God was pleased with his life. So it says, the Lord is well
pleased for his righteousness sake. He will magnify the law
and make it honorable. God was well pleased with his
sacrifice. God was well pleased with his
blood. God was well pleased with his
intercession. God is well pleased with his
rue. God's well pleased with His people in Him. God is well
pleased with Him. Well pleased with Christ. And
then it pleased God to save sinners by the sacrifice of His Son.
You read again Isaiah chapter 53. What did it please God to
do? To bruise Him. Now what it says,
it pleased God to bruise Him. It satisfied God. Oh, the horrors,
the horrors that took place during three hours of darkness. God dealing with God. God dealing
with our substitute. And I tell you what, when the
sun came back out and shined, a great transaction had taken
place. And God hid it from the eyes
of everybody. What happened? Jesus paid it
all. All the debt we owed. Sin had
left a crimson stain. He washed it white as stone.
Christ was pleasing to the Father in His life, in His death. He
pleased the Father and it pleased the Father to bruise Him. After all, without the shedding
of blood, there's no remission of sin. Let it please God to
save sinners through the preaching of the Word, just what I'm doing
right now. You know, there's only one message
that will meet every need of every sinner who has been made
aware of their sinful condition. And that's the message of redeeming
grace, of redeeming love of Calvary. First of all, it pleases God. What do you think we're going
to be doing for eternity? Are we going to be singing, worthy
is the Lamb that was slain, who redeemed us to God by His blood?
If we're going to go through all of eternity singing that
song of redemption, don't you think we need to learn down here?
Don't you think we better sing it down here? Let's rehearse
that song so we know it well, so when we step out of this life
and step into glory, we just join right in singing it. Salvation
unto our God and unto the Lamb. And I'm going to give you one more
reference, and I'm going to get you to turn with me to the book
of Jonah. Look at the book of Jonah. and I'll go to chapter one. And
you know the story. God told Jonah to go to Nineveh,
preach against it. Well, he didn't want to go, so
he found a ship going down to Tarshish. He went to Joppa and
he found a ship that'd take him to Tarshish. The third verse
says, he paid the fare thereof. And boy, he did pay the fare,
didn't he? That was quite a fare that he paid. But then the Lord, verse four,
sent a great storm. Chapter one, verse four. The
Lord sent a great wind into the sea, a mighty tempest. Jonah hitched hike on a freighter
or some kind of ship, and he's making his way to Tarshish, and
this awful storm came up according to the will and purpose of God. And they started throwing stuff
overboard to lighten the load. The men, they rode hard, but
they still couldn't make any headway. And so they asked Jonah
who he was. He said, I'm a Hebrew, and I
fear God. And I've been disobedient. And
he said, I think that's why this storm has come up. And he said, if you'll throw
me overboard, I think the storm will pass over right then. They said, no, we're not gonna
do that. We're not gonna throw you in the sea. We'll get rid
of some other stuff. And they rode as hard as they
could. Verse 13, nevertheless, the men rode hard to bring it
to the land, but they could not for the sea wrought and was tempestuous
against them. Wherefore they cried unto the
Lord." Now watch this. These are a bunch of heathens. But the Scripture says they cried
unto the Lord and said, We beseech thee, O Lord, we beseech thee,
let us not perish for this man's life, and lay not this, lay not
upon us innocent blood, for thou, O Lord, hast done as it pleased
thee. Isn't that something? You've done as it pleased thee. Who sent the storm? God did.
And then who sent the great fish? God did. He did all of this because
it pleased Him to do this. And here's my point on this. God all the time, He's pleased
to send storms into the life of believers. Sometimes it's because we're
disobedient, but sometimes it's just for our good to draw us
to Himself, to bring us to the end of ourselves. You say, Preacher, I'm going
through a storm right now. Please, God send that storm to
you. You can say what you want to.
I'm very pleased, God, to teach you. I hope that we'll be taught
patience. We'll learn patience from tribulation. That's one of the benefits of
tribulation. And certainly, every trouble,
every trial God is pleased to send to us is to draw us to His
Son. Anything that makes us look to
Christ more is good for us. Isn't that right? It's good for
us. Where's your God, David? He's
in the heavens. Well, what's He doing? Whatever
He's pleased to do. And we fall at His feet and we
worship and we reverence Him. Lord, Your will be done. Your
will be done. We don't want any glory for anything
because we're not due any. But Lord, You are. Not unto us,
O Lord, not unto us, but unto Thy name give glory for Your
mercy and for Your truth's sake. Well, let's sing the closing
song.