Name of the message is rejoicing. Now, in this world, there's a
lot of sorrow for the believer, but we can take heart that the
only soul and suffering and pain that we're ever going to see
or endure is upon this earth. The saints who've gone home to
be with our great God and King are in the land of no mores,
no more pain, no more sorrow, no more suffering. And they're
in the land of pure rejoicing, aren't they? Rejoicing without
sin. Now, our trials can weigh us
down and tribulations can weigh us down. Sorrow can weigh us
down. We can be weighed down by sadness.
But one thing that we as believers have is an underlying sense of
joy, an underlying joy that is afraid of the spirit, that amidst
times of trials and suffering and so we can still rejoice,
can't we? Because we know that our great God is in control.
We know that the trials and tribulations that we go through are sent by
our God and they draw us closer to Christ. They always do. Ultimately, that's what trials
and tribulations and suffering does for the believer. It actually
draws us closer to Christ. So let's look at Habakkuk chapter
3. We'll be reading from verses
16 to 19. Habakkuk writes, again, inspired
by the Holy Spirit of God, When I heard, my belly trembled, my
lips quivered at the voice Rottenness entered into my bones, and I
trembled in myself, that I might rest in the day of trouble. When
he cometh up unto the people, he will invade them with his
troops. Note the words there, that I
might rest in the day of trouble. Although the fig leaf shall not
blossom, neither shall fruit be in the vines. The labor of
the olive shall fail. In the field shall yield no meat,
the flock shall be cut off from the fold, and there shall be
no herd in the stalls. Yet. So amidst all those trials
that he's just mentioned. Yet. And again, we know, don't
we, brother, that this comes from the Holy Spirit giving us
joy. Yet. I will rejoice. In who? in the Lord, in the self-existent
one, in God who is my salvation, the one true living God, Jehovah. I will joy in the God of, look
at this, my salvation. Beloved, rejoice, God saved us.
I keep saying that. The God of our salvation, brother
Zane, the Lord Jesus Christ, God incarnate in the flesh. He's
the God of our salvation. Look at this, the Lord God, Jehovah
God, is my strength. Well, Paul writes, when we're
weak, he's strong. It's the opposite of what the
world says. The world says, well, don't be weak. But the believer,
we see our weakness, don't we? We can't save ourselves. We lack
the ability, right? But he's strong. Christ can say
whosoever comes to him. We know the elect will come to
him. We know that because the scripture declares that, and
hear not lose one of them, but we still put the call out, whosoever
will, let him come, taking the water of life freely. Oh yeah,
look at this. The Lord God is my strength,
and he will make my feet like hind's feet. You ever see these
sheep, these mountain goats, and you see a cliff, and their
feet, they're walking like they're on level ground. That's what
this is talking about. Although we see a cliff of trial
and a cliff of temptation, a cliff of sorrow, a cliff of sadness. Yet he'll keep our feet like
we're walking on solid ground, because who are we walking in?
Christ. And what does the scripture say?
The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord, right? How are we
good? We're not good on our own, are
we, Zane? But we're good in Christ, aren't we? Oh yeah, we're perfect
in Christ. My, oh my. Yet we're still sinners.
This is the thing that blows our minds away every time. Oh
my, it's incredible. And look at this. He'll make
my feet like hinds feet and he will make me to walk upon mine
high places. Oh my. So the prophet, his name
Habakkuk means strong embrace. Strong embrace. Well this speaks
of the man who's clinging and holding to Christ. He's one who's
clinging to Christ. He's one who's clinging to God.
What do we do as believers? We cling to Christ. Remember,
remember we saw in the book of Acts? that I believe it was Peter,
he told the Jews who the Lord saved, he said, or no, he told
the Gentiles who had been saved, he said, cling to Christ. Cling
to Christ, cling to the Savior. Cling to he who is the rock.
And that's what we do as believers, we cling. So this means strong
embrace. And also, on the other side,
think of this, God's got us in his grip, doesn't he? It's a
strong embrace. And He'll not lose one of us,
will He? Not one. So more so, it's not about our
grip in Him, it's about His grip on us. We always got to bring
it back to our King and give Him all the glory, honor, and
praise. Because the only reason we cling to Him is because He's
got a hold of us. And it's wonderful, isn't it?
It's a strong embrace, too. It's a strong embrace. So God's
people cling to Christ and Christ keeps us and holds us Look at
verses 18 and 19 yet. I will rejoice in the Lord. I
will joy in the God of my salvation The Lord God is my strength and
he will make my feet like hinds feet and he will make me walk
upon high places Says to the chief singer on my stringed instruments
God's people are continually cleaving to the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what we do. We cleave
to Him. We hear a gospel message, we
cleave to Him even more. We read the Word of God, we cleave
to Him even more. In prayer, we're going to God,
aren't we? Pleading to God. Oh, giving him, telling him,
and we know he's our only refuge. This is why we cleave to Christ,
because we have no refuge for our soul other than the Lord
Jesus Christ. There's no other hope. There's
no hope outside of Christ. None at all. And we see in Habakkuk
a plea to God on the suffering of the righteous under tyranny
and admits the prosperity of the wicked before the righteous.
We see that today. That has actually been happening.
since the beginning of time, isn't it? The wicked prosper. Oh my, but you know, David said,
I know their end. They may prosper in this world,
and that's it. Oh, keep praying for those around
us. Keep praying for those who are still dead in trespasses
and sins, because that's where God saved us from, that state. We were in wickedness. We were
the wicked. And we're still sinners, but
saved by grace. It's amazing. Oh my. And so we see here in this text
great comfort, knowing that what we see going on around us, we're
in the midst of an election here, and we know as God's people that
God's in control, right? He's ultimately going to put
in power whom he will. And we know here he will take
care of us. We don't know if we're going to have to suffer.
We don't know. But if we do, he's still going to take care
of us, isn't he? He's always going to get us through, whether
it's taking us home to glory or bringing us through situations.
But we don't have to fear. We don't have to fear, beloved.
We have the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords on our side.
Oh my, now think of this too, Bikki and I were talking to Joshua
recently. And we were talking, not only
is there turmoil here in our country here, but also in my
homeland in Canada, they're going through some political things
right now that's just upheaving the country. But we were also
talking, and Josh keeps bringing this up too, he says, there's
upheaval in the whole world. And I said, yeah, you see it
more, don't you? You see it. But you know, it's always been
like that because we know that because there's nothing new under
the sun. But we live now in the age of instant news. So we see
things more than other people used to see. I remember as a
little kid, you know, we got the paper, we'd be reading the
paper, we'd be reading things happened two, three, four days
before. And the news just getting us. You remember that, Zane?
We get the paper, we're like, oh, wow, that happened way over there.
And we'd have to get a map out even, didn't we? We'd have to
get a map out, put a map out on the table. Oh, there it is,
that's the country they're talking about. You grew up when Vietnam
was on TV and everything. You'd see it on the daily news.
Oh my, what was going on over there? Far, far away, but still,
war. And I said to Joshua, I said,
you know, the problem is, and it always has been, is sin. It's
always been the problem. But what we see now, too, is
there's a lack of hope. There's a lack of hope in this
world. It's rampant. It's rampant. So if you have a hope in God,
which we have, don't we, brother? Praise God for that. Because
there's so many people And I was talking to somebody about how
I was before the Lord saved me. I was hopeless. I didn't have
a hope of eternal life. I didn't have a... I had a religion,
but I didn't have a hope. But we see in the world now,
there's people without hope. And you know why? They've forgotten
God. They've said, we don't want God
at all. Which, again, nothing new under
the sun, is there? Because what did we do before
we were saved? I don't want them, right? But there just seems to
be, amongst young people, this real lack of hope. And I can
understand why. They don't have hope. They don't
have Christ. What a blessing for us, who are believers, that
God has given us a hope. And we can tell others, there's
hope. There's hope in this world. You need to look to Christ. The
only savior of sinners. And we also see in this world
that there's no fear of God anymore. And really, that's nothing new
under the sun either. There's nothing new under the
sun. You know, we think, oh, it's especially worse. You ever
hear this? It's even worse than it was years
ago. It's still just as bad as it was years ago. The Romans
and the Greeks were doing the same things we're doing now. The Canaanites and all them,
they were offering their babies up to their gods and sacrificing
their babies. There's no difference, is there? See, Solomon writes to us and
says, there's nothing new under the sun. And it's true. There
is nothing new under the sun. Man in his depravity will continue
to repeat the same things. I used to have a friend of mine,
he used to tell me, he was a history teacher, he said, what's the
one thing that man doesn't learn from history? That man doesn't
learn from history. Man never learns. We are doomed
to repeat the same things over and over again. Because we're
a bunch of sinners. And we desire in our sinfulness
the same thing that the folks back then desired. Right? Oh my. It's only the restraining
hand of God, beloved, upon this world. So we see We see tensions,
we see terrorism, we see different situations in various countries
in this world. We see freedoms evaporating for
certain people. We see serious consequences going
on of decisions that leaders are making in the world, but
yet we have hope and we can rejoice. Even amidst all that, beloved,
we can rejoice. Isn't that amazing? You ever
had somebody say, why are you so calm amidst everything going
on? Because we know who's in control, right? When you know who's in
control of the whole universe, in control of everything that
happens, you can have a peace. And that peace is what's called
in the scripture, the peace that passes all understanding. Because
in our natural state, we can't understand that peace. Why are
you not freaking out? Because I know who's in control.
Do I still get concerned about things? Of course I do. But it's
not to the point where I'm terrified of what's going on. because I
know God's in full control. I was walking, here's something
funny. This is just how I think sometimes. I'm walking down the
ramp here the other day. I'm walking down the ramp and
there's a leaf. I stopped and I got my dog with me and I stopped
and here comes this leaf, coming on the ground, right? Just blowing
on the ground and I'm watching this leaf. I'm thinking, God,
you're moving that leaf to wherever you want it to go. Is that not true? And I watched
that leaf, and it tumbled, tumbled onto the land, onto the grass,
and it kept tumbling. And then I left, and I thought,
that leaf is gonna stop exactly where God wants that leaf to
stop. It's gonna disintegrate, and it's gonna nourish the ground.
Isn't that amazing? Every leaf we see falling is
fertilizer, beloved. It's going to break down and
nourish the ground all around us. It's incredible. We see them
geese flying. I was doing a funeral last week,
and there must have been 500 geese that flew by. It was absolutely
stunning. Before I preached the funeral,
these geese, and there's an old gravel pit, and they all come
down into the gravel pit and land in there. I didn't know. I asked them, I said, I wonder
where they're heading. They said, oh, they're heading to the old gravel pit. I'm like, oh,
that's what they're doing. And it was the most beautiful
thing to see. And I'm watching that and I'm
going, every one of them geese is flying exactly where the Lord
wants them to go. And they're going to land in
the water at the exact place that God wants them to land. Somebody might say, you're looking
into that too much. No, I'm not. No, I'm not. Because my God is
in full control of all things. All things. Even the little microscopic
things we don't even see underneath the ground. Oh my. It's absolutely amazing. So we
can draw comfort. We can draw comfort knowing that
our God is in control. Knowing also that none of the
things that have caught us by surprise, right, which things
always catch us by surprise, not one of them has caught God
by surprise. Not one of them. We're often
caught by surprise by the things that go on in this world. We
hear something and go, oh my gosh, are you kidding me? No. But it didn't catch God by surprise,
did it? Not at all. Not at all. It's absolutely amazing. And he orders all things according
to the counsel of his will. Think on different circumstances
which have beset God's people in scripture. Think Joseph was
sold into slavery. Sold into slavery. Some might
say, well, why? Well, because he's to be prime
minister of Egypt. And he's to be in such power
that he's able to have his father come and all his family, and
they're saved from the famine that's going on in their land.
And this is all ordered and ordained by God and all taking place according
to the will and purpose of God. Now, they will go into slavery.
Yes, they will. But they will be set free 400
years later by the mighty hand of God in such a way, in such
a way that Egypt's never recovered. oh my my oh my my oh my and think
about how again israel labored under the harsh egyptian world
and the lord sent them to deliver didn't he think of how we labored
under the the harshness of our sin oh trying to think thinking where
well i'm a good person no you're not the scripture says no i and
i'm talking about me no you're not wayne Because I used to think I was
a pretty good guy. No, you're not, Wayne. And neither is anyone
else. Them folks you thought were good
folks over there, them folks you thought were outstanding
citizens, they're just a bunch of sinners like you, Wayne. And
see, God's got to reveal that to us, doesn't he, Zane? He's
got to reveal that to us. Or else we just go on our merry
way thinking we're fine. I was talking to someone and
I said, you know, God wasn't obligated to save anyone. He
chose to save His people from their sins in eternity. He'd have been perfectly just
for us to go to hell. You ever think of that? He'd
been perfectly just to send us to hell. But God in His mercy
and His love, and I'll tell you what, You talk about it's the
goodness of God that leads men and women to repentance. When
you start to think that God would be just to send us all to hell,
and that he chose to save some according to his mercy and his
grace, those who are the receivers of that, you say, look at God's
goodness. Right? We've tasted, wasn't it
Peter who wrote, we've tasted that the Lord is good. Haven't we? all our sins forgiven
and washed into the precious blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. And we can also draw comfort
from the fact that we can look through the scriptures and see
that God has always taken care of his people. Look at all the tribulations
and trials Paul went through, right? God preserved him, kept
him, and then he took him home. Then he delivered him from all
that. Took them home to glory. And we can see that. You ever
read Christian Fox's book of Christian martyrs? Oh my. What our dear brethren went through. And God preserved them. Took
them and then took them home. Oh my. See, there's some try
to rewrite history and say, that stuff never happened. I was talking
to a Catholic the other day, and I said, I said, you ever
heard of a book called Fox's Book of Christian Martyrs? And
she said, no, I never heard of that. I said, you ever hear of
the Inquisitions? And she said, no. I said, well,
I'm an ex-Catholic. And the Catholic Church murdered
millions of Christians. She said, what? I never heard
of that. Man been rewriting history for
a long time, haven't they? Oh, man. She's got blood all
over her hands. We thought Hitler was bad. Stalin. Start looking into the history
of the Catholic Church and how they hunted down Christians like
they were animals. Start looking how I think 20,000
Huguenots in one day died in France and their blood flowed
like a river down the street. Because the Catholics were slaughtering
them. And they believed like we believe,
beloved. And they wouldn't bow their knee
to Rome. They wouldn't bow their knee to false religion. Some
of them escaped. Some were slain, but some escaped
and came to other countries. Some here to America. Some to
England, some to Scotland. Oh my. God always delivers his
people. Job went through many trials,
didn't he? And he said this, he said, thou hast clothed me
with skin and flesh, and thou hast fenced me with bones and
sinews. Thou hast granted me life and
favor, and thy visitation hath preserved my spirit. God preserves
his people. Listen to this in the Old Testament,
talking about the preservation of God. And see, this is something
we can rejoice about, beloved, that God preserves his people.
No matter what they go through, God will always take care of
his people. Some he may just take home. Others he may preserve
them through the whole trial and tribulation, and they come
out the other side. And then after a while, they
go back into something else, don't they? Scott Richardson was right when
he said the believer is either going into trouble, into trouble,
or coming out of trouble. You know, I didn't have any trouble
before I was saved, not that I thought of. I had a lot of
sorrow, though. But I didn't have people. I didn't have people who look
at you And like they want to kill you sometimes. Because you
tell them you're a bunch of sinners. I experienced that at the gospel
mission. Didn't bother me at all, though. You know why? Because
if the Lord took me home, I'm going home, right? And those guys are in the same
boat I was in. Right? So we preached the gospel.
Look at Paul. Five times, 39 stripes. Did he
say, well that's it, I'm done? I'm done, I'm not doing that
anymore. No, he kept preaching the gospel. You know why? Because
God preserved him, didn't he? God preserves his people. Listen to this in the Old Testament.
Psalm 37, 28. For the Lord loveth judgment
and forsaketh not his saints. They are preserved forever. Isn't
that beautiful? But the seed of the wicked shall
be cut off. My, he preserves his people forever,
beloved. When we leave this earth, when
we breathe our last breath, we are ushered into glory where
we will be forever with the Lord. Now listen to this in the New
Testament, in Jude, in verses 1 and 2, it says this, Jude,
the servant of Jesus Christ and brother of James, to them that
are sanctified by God the Father and preserved in Jesus Christ
and called. There's the Father, Son, and
the Holy Spirit at work in that verse. And look at this, I'll
read it again. Jude, the servant of Jesus Christ,
the bondslave of Christ, and brother of James, to them that
are sanctified by God the Father and preserved in Jesus Christ
and called. Who does the calling? God the
Holy Spirit. We're preserved, look at that.
We're preserved by God, we're sanctified by God the Father
and preserved in Jesus Christ. God preserves his people, beloved. That can be a great cause for
rejoicing for us. We know that people are going
to come against us, don't we? We know that. We know that. It's going to happen. The Lord
said, in the world you shall have tribulation, but be a good
cheer. I've overcome the world. And remember this, greater is
he that's in you than he that's in the world. Right? Oh my. Our King is God. Our Savior is God. Our Lord Jesus
is God incarnated in the flesh. And the believer lives by faith.
Look at Habakkuk chapter two, verse four. Turn over one more
chapter back and look at this in verse four. How do we live?
This is the key verse in this book. This is the key verse right
here in this book. How does a believer live in this
world? How do we live? We live by faith.
In faith, we hope for that which we've not seen, right? Because
if you see something, you don't hope for it anymore. We've never
seen Christ, have we? But by the eye of faith, we've
seen Christ. And we have a hope in Christ
by the eye of faith. But one day, Brother Zane, we're
going to see him. Face to face, brother. And so how do we live
right now? We live by faith, don't we? And
look at this. Look at this verse. This is a
remarkable verse. So we come into this world sinners, right?
We're dead in trespasses and sin, right? Do you know that
to be called just means that you're sinless, that you're holy
and without blame? Even though we know we're still
sinners, I will never say that we're sinless while we're on
this earth. We will be sinless one day. But
we are sinners saved by grace. But look at this, in the eyes
of God, mark what we're called. Mark what we're called. And this
is only in Christ Jesus, our Lord, who's called the just one,
the holy one. Look at this, Habakkuk 2, 4. Behold, his soul, which is lifted
up, is not upright in him. But, so we're a bunch of sinners,
but the just, Who's the just? Christ is the
just one, right? But who are those in him? They're
the just ones too. The just shall live by faith. Faith. By God's faith, right? God-given faith. He gives us
faith to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Isn't that remarkable? It's amazing. So the theme of
this book is the just shall live by faith. No matter what comes
our way, we can rejoice because we live by faith, not by sight. If we live by sight, we'd be
as shook up as everybody else, because that's how they're living.
Do you know that? They're living by sight. And we used to live
that way, didn't we, brothers and? I used to be terrified. I'd see a war going on over here,
or this going on over here, or before the Lord saved me. And
even in religion, I'd still get, I'd be terrified in religion
too. But in grace, I don't get frightened by the things going
on anymore. It doesn't catch me, it doesn't catch us by surprise
anymore, does it? We're surprised at the circumstances,
but then we're like, well, that's just man. That's sinful man. And we'd be right there if it
wasn't for the grace of God. Do you see how merciful God is?
Do you see how good God is? So we live by faith. Now that doesn't mean we don't
get anxious. That doesn't mean we don't get
depressed. That doesn't mean we don't get down. Because we
do. Even David did. Elijah, I'm the
only one left, Lord. No, you're not. No, there's 5,000
who haven't bowed their knee to Baal, brother. Or, you know,
the Lord says to Elijah, and for us, our brother. Well, we
can look back at that and say that now, but have we not been
in a place sometimes where we think, oh Lord, I'm all alone? I've felt that way, have you?
But we're never alone. And we have that constant reminder
that God's ever with us. the darkest days of my life,
before I was saved and even after, Christ has never left me. And
it's so for you too. That's so comforting. That can
bring rejoicing from lips and eyes of tears and lips of sorrow. It can bring rejoicing, knowing
that our God is in full control. And we battle this flesh, don't
we? This flesh, oh my, it's our worst enemy, beloved. I always
hear people say, well, Satan and this and that. No, this flesh
is my worst enemy. I'll tell you why. Because the
spirit's willing, isn't it? But the flesh is weak. Oh my. And only Christ can give us rest,
knowing that we are just. How are we just? By the imputation
of Christ, his righteousness. We are clothed in his righteousness.
That's the only way we can be called just, is in Christ. Outside of Christ, there's none
who can be called just, except for Christ himself, who is the
just one, the perfect one, the sinless one. and to think that
he lived a perfect life for us to save us from our sins and
then went to that cross and had those nails nailed into his hands
and his feet and hung upon that cross after they planted a crown
of thorns in his head and blood was streaming down from his wounds. And then he said, my God, my
God, why has thou forsaken me so that we would never be forsaken,
brother Zane? And then he cries those wonderful
words, all the wonderful words of a complete salvation, a finished
work, that nothing can be added to. And he says, it is finished. And then God's so satisfied with
that sacrifice, three days later, he raises him from the dead.
Remember, Sunday school, God exalted Christ. God exalted Christ. God did that. He's the one who
exalted Christ. Christ didn't exalt himself,
God exalted him. Wherefore God has highly exalted
him and given him a name which is above every name, the name
of Jesus. Every knee shall bow and every
tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of
God the Father. Oh my. And we're saved. The ones who are made just by
Christ will live by faith. Faith is a conduit for grace,
beloved. Oh my, it's a conduit for mercy
and peace from God. And faith, again, you hear me
say it, and I'm gonna keep saying it, faith has one, God-given
faith has one object. When it says, for by grace are
we saved through faith and that not of yourselves, that faith
has one object, and that's the Lord Jesus Christ. It doesn't
look to self. It looks away from self. He doesn't
look for righteousness within, because there's no righteousness
in us. And we've been taught that by
God, the Holy Spirit, who gives us that faith. And Ephesians
2, 8, 9, for by grace are ye saved. Look at that. For by grace
are you saved. It doesn't say, well, by your
works and grace you're saved. It says, for by grace are ye
saved. not of yourselves. It's right
there, isn't it? But we will never see it unless
God reveals it to us. And then it says this, speaking of that faith in that grace given
to us, it is the gift of God, not of works. There's the contrast,
right? There's the contrast, beloved.
See, we know these verses, but look at the great contrast within
that verse. Right? Look at the great contrast. Not
of works. It is the gift of God. It's the
gift of God. What is? The faith given to God's
people comes by His grace and His mercy. It's a gift of God,
not of works. So what does that mean? It means
it's not of works. Right? It means there's nothing
we can do to earn it. There's nothing we can do. We
don't merit it, certainly, but there's nothing we can do to
merit it. It's not of works, not of our works. Yeah, because
we were dead. Dead men can't, can it, and this
is the thing that we, that we need to keep telling people,
even, even, is that, ask them, just ask them simply, can a dead
man, can a dead man do any work? None. I've been to many funerals. I've seen my loved ones buried,
and not one of them has got up and did any work. They're gone. They're dead. The soul is gone,
and the body is there. I remember one preacher, I think
it was Big Don, He went to a grave site one day. He was out hunting,
and he stumbled across a graveyard. And he said, just to make sure
that it couldn't happen, he said to the grave, he said, any of
you fellows buried in this graveyard, if you can rise from the grave
right now, I'll give you my daughter to marry her. Nothing happened. Because none of them can raise
from the dead, can they? They can't raise themselves. Even
Lazarus. Lazarus come forth. At the command of the Almighty
King, at the command of God incarnated in the flesh, he burst out of
there. And then he's coming, he's still got all them grave
clothes wrapped around him, doesn't he? He can't even loose himself. You know what? And God tells
his disciples, go and loose him. Well, that picture's a preaching
of the gospel. and them grave clothes start falling off. That
happens to all of us, beloved. I still got grave clothes falling
off, do you? Oh my! And we rejoice when they
fall off, the grave clothes of religion, I'll tell you what.
So Christ, he lived a perfect life and died as our substitute
upon Calvary's cross, and the only way we can be called just
is in and through the Lord Jesus Christ. And this gives us great
comfort as God's people. Great comfort. Look at verse
17. Although the fig tree shall not
blossom, Habakkuk 3, 17, neither shall fruit be in the vines,
and the labor of the olive shall fail, and the field shall yield
no meat. The flock shall be cut off from
the fold, and there shall be no herd in the stalls. So even
when there's a famine in the land, which I think there's a
famine right now in the land, in the world, of the preaching
of the gospel, there's still, God's still got preachers preaching
the gospel. But there's a lot of false religion in this world. And there's a lot of it. You
hear about some of the stuff going on, people calling themselves
prophets and apostles and saying they got a word from God and
this from God, they're a bunch of liars. Then you got the word
of faith guys and this stuff's being broadcast all over the
world, isn't it? Now you got YouTube and every false teacher
can get on YouTube and spread their poison everywhere now. There's a famine in the world,
but you know what? God will have his sheep come to the preaching
of the word That's why we love sermon audio. That's why we love
the internet We can put the message out there and God God does it
with it. Whatever he pleases doesn't he? Whatever he pleases
and we hope he uses it to the saving of lost sinners in the
building up of God's saints so this this This verse here is
bringing forth in verse 17 a time of severe trial and tribulation.
Dark days, days of divine judgment, religious apostasy. Days like
Elijah was in. Oh my. And when we think that
we're alone and when we think that there's no herd in the stalls, right? While we don't see many
converts, God's still saving people. God's still moving, beloved.
And we don't have to see them results, do we, Brother Zane?
Nope. We just have to be faithful and
preach the word and send it out. And God does the work, beloved.
And we rejoice. We see two or three new people.
We get all excited, don't we? And that's good. There's nothing
wrong with that. I like that too. But never forget, God's
still working. No matter what, God's still working.
Things are not always as they appear. We look out in the world
and say, well, there's not much going on. There's a famine in
the land. Yeah, there is. of the word of
God, but God's still saving, isn't he? Things are not always as they
appear to be. And we can rejoice over that, can't we? Because
God hasn't stopped saving his people. He hasn't stopped drawing
in his lost sheep. We can still preach in freedom.
Other people around the world can still preach in freedom.
Now, there's some places where it's being suppressed, yes. And
we need to pray for our dear brothers and sisters there. but
we still have freedom here to gather together and to preach
the word of God. God's still saving his sheep.
Oh my. And our blessed Savior's still
going forth for the salvation of his people. And this is the
hope that God's people had. This is the rest that God's people
had, even in Habakkuk's time, and we have that here now too.
We can rest in the fact that God's will is still being accomplished,
and it ever will be. No one's going to thwart it,
are they? No one in heaven, no one on this earth, no one in
hell, no one. No one. The devils and his angels
are all subjected to Christ. My, oh, my. So how can a believer rejoice
during times of sorrow? Well, we can sing praises to
God's name. Thank you, Lord, for saving my
soul. Thank you, Lord, for making me whole. He's done that, hasn't
he? God's done that. Thank you, Lord,
for saving me from all my sins. Thank you for justifying me before
God. Thank you, Father, for sending
your Son. Thank you, Father, for salvation's plan. Thank you,
Holy Spirit, for regenerating me. Oh my, thank you for my dear
brothers and sisters in Christ, your encouragement to me. Thank
you for a church to come to and worship God. Thank you for being
able to listen to other preachers now all over the world that we
didn't even know about. Thank you, Lord, for the preaching
of your gospel. Thank you, Lord, for saving people
and not leaving us where we were. And who are the ones who rejoice?
And who do we rejoice in? First of all, who do we rejoice
in? We rejoice in the Lord, don't we? We rejoice in the Lord. The world
rejoices in self. The world rejoices in sin. I
know, we were there, weren't we? The world rejoices looking out
for number one, but we rejoice in the Lord. We rejoice in the
self-existent one. We rejoice in Jehovah. This world
is just temporary. Everyone and everything we see
is temporary. Everything. But Christ is eternal. He's God, and those in Him have
eternal life and will be with Him forever, beloved. So we rejoice
in the Lord. Our text, look at verse 18. Yet
I will rejoice in the Lord, I will joy in the God of my salvation. We rejoice in Him. Oh my, and Paul, he learned whatever
circumstance he was in, he learned to rejoice in the Lord, didn't
he? He said rejoice in the Lord, and again I say rejoice. And
remember, he's under house arrest when he's writing the Philippians.
He's in Rome under house arrest. He's saying rejoice. Rejoice
in the Lord, and again I say rejoice. Listen to what he says.
He says, but I rejoice in the Lord greatly that now, at the
last care of me hath flourished again, wherein ye were also careful,
but ye lacked opportunity. Not that I speak in respect of
want, for I have learned in whatsoever state I am therewith to be content."
Paul learned Christian contentment, no matter what state he's in,
whether he's rich or whether he's abased. Oh my, I know both
how to be abased and I know how to abound everywhere in all things.
I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound
and to suffer need. I can do all things through Christ
which strengthen me. And then he says this, rejoice
in the Lord always. And again, I say rejoice. My. We have many reasons to rejoice,
don't we, Brother Zane? Mine. And who are the ones who
rejoice? God's people rejoice. And who
do we rejoice in? The God of our salvation. The
Lord God of our salvation. Oh, our joy doesn't come from
ourselves. I remember in my old ways, I
used to find joy in things that I did, and now I know that there's
no joy in them, and I actually found out back then that there
wasn't joy in them. It was just a temporary way to
extinguish the pain I was feeling inside my own self. But when I came down from all
that stuff, or whatever it was, I always felt, here comes back
again, right? My, oh, my. So our joy doesn't
come from us. Our joy is the Holy Spirit works
it in us. It's God working it in us. And
we have joy. It's a fruit of the Spirit. It's
one of the fruits. It's one of the part of the cluster
of the fruit of the Spirit. God works that in us. We never
rejoiced in the Lord before, did we, Zane, before the Lord
saved us? My, oh my. You know what I used to do in
religion? Well, I'm not like that personally. You remember
that, Zane? We, oh my, rejoicing in ourselves,
weren't we? Oh, look at me. I'm nothing but a self-righteous
Pharisee. Now I'm saved by grace. And now
the difference is, I say, there go I but for the grace of God. Oh, my. I was talking to Joshua
today about hypocrites in the church. And I said, every believer
says, there go I but for the grace of God. Oh, and for the grace and mercy
of God. And we can even be hypocrites
ourselves, can't we? Oh, yeah. And what's God do?
He just takes us down a few notches, doesn't he? In love, though. Always in love. Do you know God
never disciplines his people in anger? Do you know that? His
anger that was against us for our sins has all been poured
out on Christ. He's not angry with his people.
You know, when I was in religion, I used to think, oh, I did something
wrong. Oh, that must be why this is happening. Because I did... Who's the focus on? Bing! Right here. I. I, instead of saying, looking
to Christ and saying, oh, please forgive me, Lord, and knowing
that all my sins are forgiven. But I didn't know that then.
I had a form of godliness, but I denied the power thereof. But when God saves you, when
you're truly born again, you say, oh, Lord, I am amazed that
you had mercy upon me. I'm amazed that you saved my
soul. I'm amazed. And I know, as D.J. Ward said,
if God hadn't saved some, heaven would have none. My, oh my. And praise God, we're
part of the sum, brother. My, it's still amazing, isn't
it? It's still incredible. And I
think even in glory we'll be in awe. Oh my. My, oh my. So the joy the believer
has comes from resting and trusting in Christ and Him alone. Resting
in the fact, the old timers used to call it reposing in Christ.
It's a word we don't use a whole lot anymore, but to repose is
what you're doing right now, Zane. You're sitting in that
seat. You're reposing in that seat. It's holding you up. We rest in Christ. He holds us
up, doesn't he? He keeps us from falling. He
preserves us to the end and then he takes us home. Why? Because
he redeemed us with his precious blood. Because he loves us with
an everlasting love. So Christ is our spring of joy
amidst the trials and tribulations of this life. He's the shelter
in the time of storm as we sing. He's our shield. He's our defender. He's our hope. He's our redeemer. God is our salvation. God himself
has saved us. God in the flesh, the Lord Jesus
Christ. And the whole reason he became
a man was to save us from our sins. That's the whole reason. There's no other reason. He came
to save us. Praise God, he saved us, didn't
he? And we didn't do anything to
deserve it. We didn't do anything to merit
it. We didn't add anything to it. And He still loves us, brothers
and sisters, so much that He went to the cross and died for
us. And He loves us so much that He's promised He's going to keep
us, brother. And He will not lose one of us. That's why we
say he's able, as the scripture says, he's able to save to the
uttermost those that come to God through him. And those he
saves, I'll tell you, I was talking to someone, I said, doesn't matter
how dark your sin is, I'll tell you it doesn't matter. I know
how, we know how dark our sin was and is still, don't we? He
saved us, didn't he? I remember John Newton, who wrote
Amazing Grace. I was reading something about
him, and somebody came into where he was, into his study, and said,
Brother John, you won't believe who the Lord saved, like this. And Newton just looked up and
went, mm-hmm. And he said, such and such, the
most notorious drunk in the whole town. And John Newton says, Well,
since the Lord saved me, I know he can save anyone he chooses
to. Is that not true? And we come to Christ because
he purchased us, because he saved us. I was talking to some guys
this week, and I said, I want to, I'm going to close with this.
I said, I want to talk to you about something. And I know that
they don't really enjoy the doctrine of election. And I said, can
I ask you guys an honest question? And they said, sure. And I said,
who saved you? Who saved you? And they said,
well, Jesus. I said, yeah, that's a perfect
answer. If you're saved, it's Jesus who
saved you, right? And they were like, oh yeah,
yeah. And I said, did he save you by accident or
was it on purpose? Well, I said, if he saved you,
it was on purpose. And then I took him to Acts 13.
I said, look what I preached this weekend. As many, and I
had them read the scripture. I had my buddy read the scripture,
because just me reading it, I said, read what it says in Acts 13,
48. And he pulls that out. As many as were ordained to eternal
life believe. I said, you're going to go vote,
right? Oh, yeah. And I said, you're going to choose
one candidate or the other, right? You're going to make a decision
and say, I'm going to choose that person, right? And if the
country all decides that that's what they want, whether it's
through the electoral college, Right? They will be what? Appointed
to president, won't they? And he's like, yeah. And I said,
you know the Greek word for ordain there means to be appointed? As many as were appointed to
eternal life believed. See, God doesn't save anyone
by accident. He saves his people from their
sins on purpose. And we say, hallelujah. Amen and amen.