Well, good evening. If you would
care to open your Bibles to Psalm 124. Psalm 124. If it had not
been the Lord who is on our side, Now may Israel say, if it had
not been the Lord who was on our side when men rose up against
us, then they had swallowed us up quick when their wrath was
kindled against us. Then the waters had overwhelmed
us. The streams had gone over our soul. Then the proud waters
had gone over our soul. Blessed be the Lord, who has
not given us as a prey to their teeth. Our soul has escaped as
a bird out of the snare of the fowlers. The snare is broken,
and we are escaped. Our help is in the name of the
Lord, who made heaven and earth." Thank God for his word. Let's
bow together in prayer. Our great God, our holy, sovereign,
and merciful Heavenly Father, oh, how we thank you that you've
given us yet one more opportunity to meet together to hear Your
Word open to us, to hear Your Word preached, to hear the gospel
of Christ our Savior preached one more time. Father, how thankful
we are. How thankful we are for Your
mercy and grace to this congregation, this people, over so many, many,
many years. How many years You have kept
and preserved Your gospel here in our town. And Father, we're
thankful. We beg of thee that you not allow
us to take this blessed privilege for granted, but that you cause
us tonight to seek you as a hungry, thirsty sinner. Let us hear the
gospel preached as a needy sinner, not as a know-it-all, not as
someone who's heard this before, but as a hungry, thirsty, needy
sinner. Let us hear one more time. the gospel of our Lord Jesus
Christ. Let his name be exalted and magnified. Fathers, I pray
that you give us a hearing ear and a believing heart. I beg
of thee that you, in this hour, would not leave me alone. Don't
let your people just hear the words and thoughts of a man,
but Father, uphold me with thy spirit. Speak to my heart and
open my mouth that I might declare the gospel, the glory of our
Lord Jesus Christ clear and simple terms and cause us to believe,
to rest, to find our joy and peace and comfort in Christ our
Savior. And what we pray for ourselves,
we pray for all of your people who are meeting together tonight.
Father, bless your word. Bless your word everywhere your
people are meeting together for your namesake and then for the
good of your people. Father, we dare not sin against
thee and forgetting to pray for those who are in very difficult
times of trial and trouble. Father, we pray you'd meet their
need, that you'd comfort their hearts, that you'd heal their
bodies, that you'd be with them in a special way. So thankful
that you brought our brother Cecil back to worship with us
and pray your continued blessing and hand be upon him. And Father,
we pray for our country, our world at this time, that you
would We don't even know what to ask,
Father, that you would move in power, that you would reveal
to us your glory, that you would give us some relief from this
pandemic and the unrest that is sweeping the land. Father,
thy will be done. And we do pray that you might
open up a way that your people might live peaceably, quiet,
and being able to continue to meet together and worship your
matchless name. All these things we ask and that great name that's
above every name, the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. Rock of Ages, cleft for me, let
me hide myself in thee. From thy wounded side which flowed,
Be of sin a double cure. Save from wrath and make me pure,
Could my tears forever flow, Could my zeal no longer know,
These poor sin could not atone, Thou must save and Thou alone. In my hand, O Christ, I bring,
Simply to Thy cross I cling. While I draw this fleeting breath,
When my eyes shall close in death, When I rise to worlds unknown,
And behold thee on thy throne, Rock of Ages, cleft for me, Let
me hide myself in Thee. It's outstanding. Thank you, Isaac. Alright, Psalm 124. I
titled our message tonight, A Prayer for Deliverance. This is another
one of the psalms of degrees. These are the psalms, you remember,
that the travelers would sing as they traveled up to Jerusalem
for the annual feasts. These songs keep going up and
up and up and up in glory as we travel along. But here's something
that travelers in David's day, when he was writing these psalms,
that they would have to seriously think about before they took
a journey like this. They had to think about their
safety during the journey. They could be robbed and beaten
and killed by roving criminals just almost at any time. You
know, their roadways would not nearly be as secure or well patrolled
by police as our roads are today. So this psalm is a prayer for
deliverance and safety as they made this journey up to Jerusalem.
And we can make this our prayer. We're not traveling to Jerusalem,
but we're traveling home, aren't we? As we travel through this
world below on our way home, this will be our prayer of deliverance. And our prayer for deliverance
is broken up into three parts. The first part is asking the
Lord for deliverance. Verse one, Psalm 124. If it had not been the Lord who
was on our side, now may Israel say, if it had not been the Lord
who was on our side when men rose up against us, then they
had swallowed us up quick when their wrath was kindled against
us. Now we pray, that the Lord would deliver us. Anytime we
find ourselves in difficulty, we pray that the Lord would deliver
us. And we pray to the Lord because
we know He's the only one who can deliver us. He's the only
one who's able. He's our only hope. You know,
we only ask the Lord for things that we can't do ourselves. Isn't
that right? Wasn't that everything? That's
everything. We can't do anything for ourselves.
But certainly, we know there's no way we can deliver ourselves
from the different dangers, toils, and snares that the Lord sends
our way. And David says here, he's praying
to be delivered from the wrath of man. I want to give you three
ways we need to be delivered from the wrath of man. Number
one is this. We need to be delivered from
the wrath of man that would destroy God's church if it were possible. David says, It was not for the
Lord who was on our side. When men rose up against us,
they would rise up against us and they'd swallow us up. And
you'll notice here, David didn't say they'd swallow us up quickly.
He said they'd swallow us up quick. The Word is alive. They'd
swallow us whole. They'd eat us alive is what they
would do. Now, that's going to be the nature
of man forever. Man is always going to be violent
because that's just the nature of man. Our nature is a wicked,
evil nature will always be violent. And the Lord allows some of that
violence to go on. He restrains some of it, doesn't
He? But He allows some of it to go on, too. And when the Lord
does that... I wish I could remember this
when this violence and wrath was directed at me, but this
is what we need to remember. When that is violence and that
wrath is directed at us, the Lord's allowing that to happen.
The Lord's bringing that bringing that to pass on purpose, according
to His eternal purpose. And it's for good. It's for good. Look at Psalm 76. The cross is
a perfect example of that, isn't it? That man did exactly what
man wanted to do. Everything man did to the Lord
Jesus, they did exactly what they wanted to do, didn't they?
Well, whose purpose was accomplished in all that? It wasn't theirs,
was it? It's God's purpose. The cross
is a perfect example of that. And the same truth holds to everything,
absolutely everything that happens to us in this life. Psalm 76
verse 10. Surely the wrath of man shall
praise thee. The remainder of wrath shalt
thou restrain. The only wrath of man that God
is going to allow to happen is what will praise him. And the
rest of it he'll restrain. The Lord's the only one who's
able to restrain the wrath of man that would eat us alive.
So we pray, Lord, deliver us, deliver us from the wrath of
man that would destroy us. Second, we need to be delivered
from getting caught up in the wrath of man and acting like
them, adopting their ways in our religion, in our religion. Look back at our text here, Psalm
124, verse four. Then the waters had overwhelmed
us. The stream had gone over our soul. Then the proud waters
had gone over our soul." Now, man's religion is not good. I mean, people think, well, you
know, any kind of religion is good for the community. Man's
religion is not good. It's evil. It's evil. Man's religion,
any religion that man has made up, is violently opposed to God. It's opposed to the God of the
Bible. They oppose God in wrath, in
wrath and hatred for God. Now, they love the God, the idol
that they've made up, but they hate the sovereign God of the
Bible. Man's religion is violently opposed to the message of salvation
in Christ alone. by sovereign grace alone, by
God-given faith alone. Man's religion is violently opposed
to that. I mean, you just take the legs
out of their religion, you know, their belief. What they believe
is, well, you know, I'm safe because I decided for Jesus.
I'm safe because I act better than everybody else. You just
take the legs out from under that and see what you get. No,
it's wrath. It is violently opposed to salvation
in Christ alone, by God's sovereign grace alone, by God-given faith
alone. And you think that that's not
so? I mean, you think, well, maybe it used to be so. You think
that's not so? That wrath is the very reason
those men crucified the Lord of Glory. And man's nature hadn't
changed since then, from then till today. That wrath, that
nature is why the early church suffered so greatly. That wrath
and that violence is why Fox's book of martyrs is not a short
story. Pretty thick book. because of the wrath of man that
hates, hates the gospel of God. And if the Lord does not deliver
us, we're going to get swallowed up in that. Now remember, the
first thing we need to be delivered from is getting destroyed by
it. Now I'm saying, if the Lord does not deliver us from that,
we're going to get swallowed up in it. We're going to get
carried away in it and start acting just like them. You know,
a person can get in those rushing waters and they just get swept
away by them. We can do the same thing. Our
society today is as mean-spirited and angry as I just can imagine
that it ever has been. And we've got to be careful not
to let that societal anger and division sweep us away into a
religion that's mean-spirited, that's full of wrath and hatred
instead of God's grace. Oh, I pray the Lord will deliver
us from getting caught up in that. And then thirdly, we need
to be delivered from getting caught up in the wrath of man
and acting like them in our attitude, adopting their attitude and conducting
our lives the way that they do. Like I said a minute ago, this
world is so angry. I mean, have you ever seen a
time people are just angry all the time? And if they're not,
they're looking for a reason to be angry. They're looking
for a reason to be offended. And when something goes wrong,
I mean, listen, I'm not saying there's nothing wrong in our
society. I'm not saying there's nothing
offensive in our society, but you know, when something goes
wrong, couldn't we just talk about it and fix it rather than
get angry about it? I mean, do we really have to
burn down city block after block after block to show our anger?
And we think we're justified in doing this? We're justified
in destroying people's lives just because we're angry? I don't
know about you all. I know about me and Jonathan.
My mother spanked me when I was a little boy if I threw a temper
tantrum. I mean, she made it her business to teach us, didn't
she? Don't you throw a temper tantrum? Why wouldn't we just put some
of our energy into solving the problem rather than being angry
about it? You know why? Our nature would
rather be angry. We'd rather throw a temper tantrum
than solve the problem. And this world thinks bigger,
meaner, stronger, that's the people that get ahead. And I
tell you, if the Lord doesn't deliver us from that, we're going
to get swept away acting just like them in wrath and anger. Instead of acting in grace and
love and waiting on the Lord. And if you look in James 1, James
gives us some good instruction on this very matter. James chapter
1. In verse 18. James 1.18, of his own will begat
he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of first
fruits of his creatures. Wherefore, my beloved brethren,
let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath. Four, now you think your wrath
is going to get something done? Look here. For the wrath of man
worketh not the righteousness of God. Wherefore, lay apart
all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness. and receive with
meekness the engrafted Word, which is able to save your souls."
So here's our prayer for deliverance. Deliver us from the wrath of
man that would destroy us. Deliver us from being the object
of the wrath of man. And deliver us from acting like
them. Here in the church and in our personal lives, deliver
us from being like that. Now here's the second part of
our prayer. Our prayer for deliverance is worship and praise. Part of
every prayer has got to include worship and praise. You can pray
without asking for anything, really. But it's hard to pray
without worship and praise, isn't it? Look here at verse 6 in our
text. Psalm 124. Blessed be the Lord,
who hath not given us as a prey to their teeth. Our soul is escaped
as a bird out of the snare of the fowlers. The snare is broken
and we are escaped. Now, here's another thing. We
talk about being delivered from the wrath of man. This is the
most important thing. When we talk about being delivered
from the wrath of man, this is the most important thing we need
to be delivered from. It's our sin. We talk about the
hateful nature of man. The thing I need to be delivered
from the most is this man's hateful, wrathful nature. That's what
we need to be delivered from. We need to be delivered from
our sin, and we need to be delivered from the wrath of God. We've
got to be delivered from the price God's holy justice demands
for our sin. We must be delivered from that.
If not, we'll spend eternity in hell. Now that's what the
snare refers to. The snare of the fowler is a
trap set to catch birds. You know, that's what a fowler
does. He tries to catch birds. And here's why the snare or the
trap works. It's the bait. The bait. Earl, you probably
caught birds before just to shoot them or something, haven't you?
I knew a man, Mike Marsh, used to catch them. He'd shoot them
and the dogs would go out there and hunt them or get them and
stuff, train his dogs. Well, the snare or the trap works
because of the bait. The fowler put something in that
trap that the bird likes. It entices that bird into that
trap. And then the trap is sprung.
And the bird can't get loose. See, the trap wouldn't work without
the bait. The bait fools the bird. It promises the bird something
good, but really, it gives it something bad by trapping it.
Now that is an outstanding description of sin. Sin promises things that
are appealing to the flesh, but it never gives it. It actually
gives something that kills the flesh. That was Satan's first
maneuver with Eve. Promising her life. Promising
her something that was appealing to the flesh. Oh, you'll be your
own God. Oh, you're going to be the one
to make the rules here. Oh, you shall not surely die.
Promising life. Sounded appealing to the flesh.
But sin didn't give any of that to her. Sin actually gave man
death. Sin didn't give man pleasure.
It gave man torture and sorrow and sadness and sickness. Not
pleasure. Sin gave man captivity. That
freedom? So we pray, Lord, deliver us
from sin. Well, how does the Lord do that?
That's what David's talking about here. He's not talking about
just being delivered from the wrath of man, you know, physically. He's talking about our soul,
the waters going over our soul, the proud waters that go. How
is our soul escaped? Well, number one, let me give
you two ways. Number one, the Lord delivers his people through
covenant grace. The Psalm begins, now may Israel
say, the Lord delivers Israel. The Lord delivers spiritual Israel,
God's covenant people from their sin. That's who he delivers.
He delivers them because of his covenant grace. The father chose
a people to save in his covenant of mercy, covenant of grace.
The father promised he would save those people through the
obedience and through the sacrifice of his son. And God saves those
people from their sin. Because He promised them He would
do it. He promised to do it. It's covenant mercies. And David
said here, the Lord is on our side. When men rose up against
us, the Lord's on our side. Well, who is the our? Oh, you
are. Who's the our? Who's the us here? It's God's
elect people. Those people that God chose to
save. Now, God will save us. I don't care what the wrath of
man is trying to accomplish. God will save us. Because He
promised He would. because He promised in His covenant
grace. And number two, the Lord delivers
His people from their sin through Christ, our substitute. David
says here, it's the Lord, Jehovah, who took our side. The Lord took
the side of His people. The Lord Jesus Christ became
an ally of His people when He took on Him our flesh. He took
on Him our nature so that He could be the representative of
His people. And the Lord delivered His people
from their sin. They're already trapped in the
snare of sin. They're already trapped. The Lord delivered His
people by taking their place in the snare. The Lord Jesus
Christ took the sin of His people and He made it His. And then
He took the place of His people in the prison house, the prison
house of God's justice, the prison house of God's wrath, and He
set His people free. And Christ, our substitute, took
all of the punishment that the sin of his people deserved. He
paid the price in full with his own precious blood. And now the
snare is broken. The snare is broken because Christ
delivered his people in justice. The snare is broken. It can never
trap us again because Christ, our substitute, set us free in
justice. And God's people are like that
little bird that's been trapped in that snare and it's been set
free. And that bird just soars up in
the air, just praising and thanking our God. Earlier this year, I
was out in our backyard, me and Janet. And Janet said, oh, don't
you look at that. And there's this bird laying
in our blackberry bushes. And pick this perfect blackberry. And off it flew. Well, I went
and got me some bird netting. Put some bird netting over my
blackberry bushes. And then, now listen. It's either
me or them. I mean, one of the two of us
can have them blackberries. As far as I'm concerned, it's
going to be me. Well, we were out on the porch the other day.
And Janet said, oh. And this bird had landed on that
bird netting. It was trapped. And it was so
frightened and just flapping around, just struggling so hard
to get out. Now, it's them or me. But now
my heart broke for that little bird. And I thought, well, I'm
going to go see if I can do something to set it free. And as I was
walking up there, that bird broke free. And boy, it soared up in
the air. I mean, you should have seen.
It was so happy. I watched that bird in the air,
and I thought one day I'm going to fly away. So happy, just free. Oh! That is the life of a believer.
And that's the way we feel, just soaring through the air when
we're reminded how the Lord has set us free from our sin. Now,
we're free. God's people are free. But it
seems to me like I spend more time trudging around down in
the mud than I do soaring up in the air. I don't know about
you, but that's the way I feel. But every once in a while, our Savior
lets us soar high up in the air rejoicing We're the escape to
the nations. Every once in a while, I mean,
we truly worship. Every once in a while, the Lord
just truly blesses His Word to our hearts, and we're like that
little bird, soaring in the air, free. Oh, the joy of being set
free in Christ. So one act of worship is asking
the Lord to deliver us. That's showing dependence. That's
worshiping God. And our other act of worship
is saying, blessed be God who set me free. Blessed be God who
delivered me. That's giving God the credit.
That's worshiping Him. And I say, just let me soar up
to the rooftops and let me tell people, oh, I'd like to hear
how the Lord delivered me. Nobody else but our God could
have delivered us from sin. And He has. That's what He's
done. He promised He would do it and that's exactly what He's
done. Then let's brag on Him. Let's brag on Him. That's what
these worship services are. They're just bragging on the
Savior. Eric's going to Damville Sunday. You know what he's going
to do? He's going to brag on the Savior, aren't you? Just brag on Him.
That's worshiping our God. But it's interesting to me, David
urges us to worship. Now we're that little bird that's
been set free from the fowler's snare. And David urges us to worship. He urges us to give thanks for
how the Lord delivered us. You wouldn't think that's necessary,
would you? But it is. We murmur and complain automatically. I mean at the drop of a hat,
don't we? We murmur and complain. Nobody's
got to stir us up to complain. Nobody's got to remind us to
complain. It comes real natural. But we've got to be stirred up
to worship. We've got to be reminded. Be thankful, don't we? That's
what David's doing. He said, be thankful and worship
our God. He set us free. He set his people
free. Now, we're free. God's people
are free. But I want to tell you, you still
have to be wary of the snares. This world is full of snares. I want to show you a couple of
Scripture mentions. Look at Psalm 9 first. There's some snares
we need to be aware of and pray that the Lord deliver us from.
There's the snare of our good works. Scripture calls our good
works a snare. Psalm 9, verse 15. The heathen are sunk down in
the pit that they made. In the net which they hid is
their own foot taken. They've fallen in and been taken
by their own trap. The Lord is known by the judgment
which He executed. The wicked is snared in the work
of his own hands. And then that word, hegeon, means,
think about that. Think about that, that the wicked
is snared in the work of his own hands. Now that's the way
the heathen worship God, isn't it? It's by the work of their
own hands, by their own doing, by their own deeds. And that
religion, the work of your own hands, it promises life. I'll grant you, if you can produce
perfection, you'll be saved. I'll grant you that. The problem
is we can't produce perfection. But this works religion, it promises
life, but our works can only produce death. Because our works
are sinful. The works of our hands are only
sinful. But this is the bait. This is
the bait. The work of our own hands. And
our flesh is drawn to it. Our flesh just is drawn to, even
for the believer, our flesh is drawn to this. I'd like to be
rewarded for my works. I'd like to be rewarded for my
faithfulness and my morality and my straight doctrine. That's
the bait. The work of your own hands. And
the believer's constant prayer is, Lord, deliver me from that.
Deliver me from trusting in the works of my own hands. Deliver
me from resting upon the arm of the flesh And let me rest
in Christ. Let me be delivered in Him. And
then we say, blessed be the Lord who has delivered. He has delivered
us from the work of our own hands. That's worship. Next, look at
Psalm 69. Next, we need to be delivered
from the snare of the ceremony of religion without Christ. Psalm 69, verse 20. reproach hath broken my heart,
and I am full of heaviness. I looked for some to take pity,
but there was none, and for comforters, but I found none. They gave me
also gall for my meat, and in my thirst they gave me vinegar
to drink. Let their table become a snare before them, and that
which should have been for their welfare, let it become a trap. Let their eyes be darkened that
they see not, and make their loins continually to shake Now
you know who's speaking here, don't you? This is the Lord Jesus
Christ. He's speaking from the cross.
He's praying from the cross. And He prays His Father that
those who have rejected Him be ensnared. That they be ensnared
by their religious ceremony. Their religious traditions without
Christ. Religious ceremony without Christ. Now it'll make the flesh feel
better. Our flesh is religious. Just having religious ceremony
without Christ That'll make the flesh feel better, but it will
damn our souls. It will. You know, the table
that he's talking about here is the Passover. You know, you
can have the unleavened bread of the Passover. You can eat
all the unleavened bread you want, but it won't do you any
good without Christ. You can eat the meat of a lamb.
It's been roasted with fire, but it's not going to do you
any good. without Christ our Passover being sacrificed for
us. See, you can go to hell hanging
on to that doctrine. You can go to hell hanging on
to that person with the picture. You can't go to hell hanging
on to the person. I said that wrong. You can go to hell hanging
on to that doctrine, that picture, if it's without Christ. So our
constant prayer is, Lord, deliver us. Deliver us from the snare
of the ceremony of religion. Don't let us... This is something
I say frequently, privately and publicly in prayer. God, deliver
us from plain church. Deliver us from just plain church. Deliver me from just that ceremony
and give me Christ in the heart. Don't let me trust in the ceremony
that I did A, B, C, D right, you know, did everything in the
right order. Don't let me be impressed with
the ceremony. Don't let me, make me just feel good because the
ceremony, the religious ceremony was so good. Let me worship Christ. Let me worship, worship Christ. Let me know Christ. Let me hear
of Christ. Let me partake of Him. Because
listen, Christ is the issue. Christ is the issue. all the
different political and societal things that have been issues
over the course of my life. I don't know if any of them really
account to hill beans. I mean, you know, I mean, you
know, we ought to treat people well. The most contrary thing
to grace that I can think of is racism and, you know, all
these things. But I'm telling you now, the
issue is Christ. Christ is the issue. Our prayer
is, Lord, give me Christ. And then we say, blessed be the
Lord. Blessed be the Lord who's delivered
us from this snare of religious ceremony without Christ and given
us worship. Then third, we need to be delivered
from what the Apostle Paul told Timothy is the snare of the devil.
Now the snare of the devil has got to be the snare of sin, doesn't
it? That promise of something good sin will give you, but it
really doesn't. But it can also be the snare of personal pride,
as opposed to depending on Christ. It could be the snare of the
love of riches. And Paul said that snare, the
love of riches, it sweeps men away. It drowns them. It drowns
them in destruction and perdition. It could be the snare of desiring
the praise of men. instead of desiring the praise
of God. It could be the snare of despair rather than resting
in Christ our Savior. All those things are the snare
of Satan. It's just anything. The snare
of Satan is anything you can think of that gets us looking
away from Christ. Anything. I mean, you talk about
the racial unrest that's in our society today. People of every
skin color and every nationality absolutely should have equal
justice under our law in the United States of America. Absolutely
they should. But you can get so caught up
looking at that and being taken up with that. You look away from
Christ. The snare of Satan doesn't have
to be a bad thing. It can get you looking at a good
thing. The snare of Satan could be a real good job. And you think,
oh, you know, I've got to take this job. This is a promotion.
It helps me take care of my family, you know. I mean, there's nothing
more scriptural than going out and working hard, working hard,
doing a good job. But now you get caught up in
that, it takes you away from the gospel. It's the snare of
the devil. You see what I'm saying? Anything, anything that gets
us looking away from Christ is the snare of the devil. And there's
just so many snares, and there's too many of them for us to mention
that we'd fall into every last one of them if the Lord didn't
deliver us. So we pray, Lord, deliver us.
And then we worship by blessing the Lord who has delivered us. He's delivered us from every
danger, toil, and snare we've faced so far. And He delivers
every one of them. And I'm just confident of this.
He'll keep delivering us from them until He's pleased to call
us home. I'm confident of that. And that
brings me to the third thing. Here's the third part of our
prayer for deliverance. It's the declaration of our confidence
and our reliance in our God. Verse 8 in our text, Psalm 124. Our help is in the name of the
Lord who made heaven and earth. Now here we've prayed for deliverance
and we've blessed God. We've worshiped him for delivering
us. And now we're going to say this
is our confidence. Our confidence is in our God
who made heaven and earth. I don't know what he'll be pleased
to do. But I do know he's going to do what he's purposed to do.
I know he can deliver. Our confidence is in God who
made heaven and earth. Our confidence is never in anything
that we can do. Our confidence of help, our confidence
of being delivered is in our God who's the creator. The creator. Our confidence is in the one
who's created everything. Now since he created it, he rules
it, doesn't he? Our helper has the power to speak
and create the world out of nothing. Then I believe he's got the power
to control men in it, don't you? I believe he does. I believe
he's got the power to control the wrath of man, and I believe
he's got the power to control and keep his people. He's got
to, if he's a creator, doesn't he? Our creator is our preserver,
our deliverer. Then what do we have to fear?
What do we have to fear? We don't have anything to fear.
We really don't. God's people have nothing to
fear. Yet we're still taught to pray
for help and pray for deliverance. You know, acknowledge the danger
that's around you. I mean, you're a fool if you
don't. Acknowledge the danger that's
around you. But don't become consumed with fear by it. Don't
become consumed with it. I was telling somebody this the
other day. Do you know, I never worry. This thought never ever crosses
my mind. Never. This is one of the last
things that's what I'm worried about. I am not worried about
getting hit by a car. I'm not. But I look both ways
every single time I cross the street. I mean, every single
time. I look both ways. And I trust
the Lord to carry me across the crosswalk. You just apply that
to everything. The sin that's not just in this
world, but the sin that's in you. The sin that the Lord shows
you just a little bit of it, frightens you to death. Don't
make excuses for it. Don't pretend it's not there.
But don't be overcome with fear of it. Our Savior's delivered
us from it. He's delivered us from it. And
then the evil that's in this world. This world just gets more
evil and evil and evil and evil by the day. Acknowledge it. Beware
of that. I was talking about John Chapman
the other day. He said, I'll tell you, one thing's
changed in our life. He said these protests, he said,
there's certain places I do not go anymore. That's just smart,
isn't it? That's just smart. But don't
be overcome with fear by it now. Our God's in control. Our Creator
made heaven. and earth. I want to give you
something here that Charles Spurgeon said. I think you'll like this.
He made heaven for us and he'll keep us for heaven. He made the
earth and he'll succor us upon it until the hour cometh for
our departure. That's our God, the creator of
heaven and earth. And that confidence, that confidence can only come
from knowing and trusting our God, from trusting Christ, our
Deliverer. And that confidence will help
the traveler. Now, you know there's dangers
along the way, don't you? We need to pray for deliverance and danger
along the way. But that confidence in knowing God will help you
travel through this life with caution, but confidence. Caution, but confidence. All
right. Well, the Lord bless that to
you. Let's bow together in prayer. Our Father, we thank you for
this blessed psalm. We've been able to look into
this evening. We make this our prayer. Our
prayer for deliverance. Oh, our God, would you be pleased
to deliver your people. Deliver us from sin. From not just the sin of this
world, but we do pray for that to be delivered from the wrath
of man. But, Father, deliver us from our indwelling sin. Our nature of wrath and hatred. Deliver us. Oh, deliver us. and
how we thank you for the Lord Jesus Christ, who has delivered
His people from the snare of the fowler. It's broken, and
we can never be trapped by sin or the law or justice ever again,
because Christ our Redeemer has set us free. And we're confident
that it's that same power of the same Savior that will bring
us safely home. Father, give us the faith to
truly believe in Christ our Savior and truly rest in Him. Give us the grace not to get
so wound up about all the events that are going on in the world
around us. And keep us constantly reminded
to look away from those things and look to Christ. To find in
Him our hope, our peace, our confidence, our joy, our salvation. Enable us to rest in Him. Father,
we thank you for all your many blessings to us. And as we go
back now to our homes and finish our week, we pray that you'd
watch over and preserve and protect your people and bring us back
Sunday, if it could be thy will, to one more time hear the gospel
of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is in his blessed name that
we pray and give thanks. Amen. All right, you're dismissed.