The book of Isaiah chapter 26.
There are so many, many verses, wonderful verses in this chapter
that a man could use for a text to preach a sermon. So many of
them. And this is a blessed chapter,
along with many of the other chapters in the book of Isaiah.
But I want this morning to look at verse 20. There have been
several things that have been on my mind recently. I felt the
Lord leading in this direction, and I trust that this is a timely
message, something that we'd remember, something that would
do our hearts good. But in verse 20, the prophet
says, come, my people, speaking in God's stead, enter thou into
thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee. Hide thyself, as
it were, for a little moment, until the indignation be overpassed. Well, we sang the song, Will
Your Anchor Hold? I meant to use a couple of verses
out of that song at the beginning of our message this morning,
and we'll do so. Because I was thinking this week, when listening
to some of the news concerning the hurricane that brushed the
east coast of the United States, and how that there was such flooding
along the coast, the mass exodus of people out of those crowded
cities up and down the coast, I thought a great deal about
this verse of scripture that I will use this morning for our
text and also about this song. Will your anchor hold in the
storms of life when the clouds unfold their wings of strife? When the strong tides lift and
the cables strain, will your anchor drift or firm remain? You know, there's a question
mark, I think, each one of our life as to how we would handle
various calamities and difficulties that come into our life. I know
we like to think that we're very strong in and of ourselves and
that we're great believers. Or that we just believe God in
spite of anything that would happen. Whatever it might be,
we just trust the Lord. That's what we would do. That's
what we think we would do. But we recognize that many, many
times that we're just fair weather Christians. And when real problems
come, I mean when the winds really blow, and when they do not hit
our neighbors or somebody way off, but they hit our lives and
capsize our boat on our little sea, then we begin to ask these
questions while they're not our anchor really will hold or not
in the storms of life, when the clouds unfold their wings of
strife. And then we had the shootings
in Texas this week, and we, previous to that, had had the shootings
in Colorado. And we heard, we listened and
heard several preachers and religious figures talking this week about
why, the whys and the wherefores, asking again some of the questions
that have been asked over and over so many times about why
these things happen and how did these difficulties, why did they
befall just the people they did and so on. But we need to recognize
that there are certain truths in the Bible that we need to
get familiar with. And we need to really anchor
our souls on those truths. Now, there are many storms in
life, not only in the physical part of our lives, but there
are storms spiritual. And we wrestle not, Paul said,
with flesh and blood, but we wrestle with demons and with
spiritual wickedness in high places. Many great tests that
come into the lives of God's children. Now, judgment also,
we believe, is coming on the world of the ungodly. We think
there is coming a day when God is going to show his arm and
that his wrath is going to come upon this world. We think the
world is ripening every day for judgment, that God's going to
deal with this world. We believe in a sin-punishing
God, and we believe that because And the main reason I believe
it, I believe because the word of God teaches it, but I believe
it because of the way that our Lord treated his own son when
he was here in this world. Our Lord, when he made him to
be sin for us, he dealt with him as a transgressor and a sinner.
And all of his life, he was a man who experienced sorrow and grief.
And then in the end, he hung on a bloody cross and bled out
his life's blood in order to pay the debt of our sin, the
sins of those that God had chosen and give to his son in the eternal
covenant. And I'll tell you, if you don't
believe in the wrath of God, if you don't believe in the judgment
of God, you just look at the cross. Behold the Lamb of God. Behold the Lamb of God. Look
and see what great wrath that God poured out upon his own son,
how that he unsheathed his sword and plunged it into the very
heart of his only begotten son, when he was made to be sinned,
when he was sinned, looked upon by God the Father as being a
sinner just like I am. And the Father looked upon him
and dealt with him as a sinner. And I believe that that proves
that God is going to punish sin. And so those of you that are
without a substitute, those of you that are outside of Christ
our Lord and have no standing in Him, those of you that are
lost, you must understand that God's judgment is going to come
upon you. It'll come upon you and God will
deal with you and according to the word, your sentence is an
everlasting sentence to that place that where the worm dies
not and the fire is not quenched into everlasting burning, into
eternal death. And may God be pleased to show
you that in order that you might flee the wrath to come. Wasn't
that the message of John the Baptist? Flee the wrath to come.
Flee the wrath to come. How do you flee it? Well, you
run into Christ. Just like those ran into the
ark before the flood, they got into the ark. That was the only
place of safety on the face of the earth was that ark. And all
of those that did not get into the ark, they all perished in
the flood of that day. And so I would say to you this
morning, flee to Christ. because Christ is God's ark for
us. And if we would be saved, we
must get in to that ark, must be in him. Now then this morning
in this verse of scripture, come my people, enter thou into thy
chambers and shut thy doors about thee. Hide thyself, as it were,
for a little moment until the indignation be overpassed. When times of great troubles
come, The Lord thinks I believe especially of his people. He
drowned the antediluvian world, but not till Noah, as we said,
was safely in the ark. He burned Sodom and Gomorrah,
but not till Lot had escaped to the little city called Zor.
In all of his judgments, he remembers his mercy toward his believing
people. Now, I recognize that many times
when things happen in this world, that there's some of the Lord's
people that are involved in it, and God being an all-wise God,
for some reason, he allows some of them to be taken when various
calamity happen, various problems happen in this world, and like
the shooting in Texas, I don't doubt that maybe some of those
young people or some of those student leaders, that some of
them were believers. I don't doubt that. But nevertheless,
they were taken out of the world in a hail of gunfire, just like
some of those maybe that were unbelievers. But God has a special
mercy toward his people, and the Lord is always, always, and
they're shut up in the purpose of God, and the world can only
destroy the body, it cannot destroy the soul, and God has those people
in the hollow of his hand, and for some reason, known only to
God himself, they're allowed to be swept away when judgment
comes upon others. But a child of God today, we
need to remember that our Father's eye is lovingly fixed upon His
people, those that believe Him and those that trust Him, and
He cares for them every moment of their life. Moment by moment,
we're kept in His power, kept by His love. But unhappy is the
soul who never trusted God, who said, You remember the Lord said
that he was the preserver of all men, but especially of those
that believe. Well, unhappy is the man who
never trusted this God. I remember as I meditated on
this chapter, what a blessing it was to read verse three and
four. Thou will keep him in perfect peace whose mind has stayed on
thee. because he trusteth in thee. Trust ye in the Lord forever,
for in the Lord Jehovah is everlasting strength. Happy is the poorest
and the most tried who knows that the Lord is his refuge,
his high tower, his defender and provider, his God and his
all. Blessed are those who trust in
the Lord Jehovah. Now, beloved, we cannot see,
as we said earlier, to the future, but the Lord can. And God has
a foresight which he exercises on the behalf of his own. And
God knows every step we take because he gives us every breath
that we breathe. And if the father of the family
knows what is to occur, his children will not be without due warning. I believe by that that God will
give us insight into what he's doing and will give us a word
as to how we can deal with the various problems and calamities
and troubles that come in this world. And God, when he foresees And when any great calamity is
coming, he will provide for them, his people, a shelter in the
time of storm. Let us thank God for this, that
he will not leave us, that he will never leave us nor forsake
us, so that we may boldly say whatever be our situation. If
the waters are coming down and the floods are coming up, and
if we're driven out of our homes, we must leave all. When we leave,
remember this, that God is with His people and God is for His
people and God will sustain His people. If you have no God this
morning, then your future must often look very dark to you.
If you have no God to trust in, if you have no faith in the living
God, then your future must look very, very dark. And especially
when you think of death. When you think of death. Now
some of the most spiritual men that ever lived in this world
would tell you that they could not stand to think of death,
of judgment, of coming into the very presence of God without
being in the Lord Jesus Christ. They couldn't stand to think
of it. Because we know that for a person to die, and leave this
world means for them to face the judgment of God, for them
to face their sins at the judgment. And we know that the river of
death must be crossed by every one of us, and every one of us
must take a plunge into the river of death. And when we do so,
oh, that we'll not have to cross Jordan alone, but that our Lord
will be with us. But those of you that have no
God, remember that you too shall be called to cross that river
and plunge into the darkness. And for all eternity you will
be in darkness if you have not the light of life. if Christ
dwell not in your soul. Now, in contrast, the heir of
heaven knows that whatever lies before him, all is ordained and
fixed, arranged and settled by our God, by the infinite wisdom
and the love of God, and he can trust himself without fear, that
is, the believer can trust himself without fear to the Lord's preserving
mercy. Now we would consider ourselves
to be wise if we could do before an event what we would wish we
could do after it, would we not? If we could do before something
happened, what we would do after something happens, we would consider
ourselves to be a very wise person. Well, unfortunately, we cannot
do that. I do not know a better definition
of a fool than that he is a man who is wise too late. God will make us wise in time
if we'll take the advice of his word, if we'll take the advice
of our text this morning. Listen then to the advice that
God here gives to us to help us when trouble comes. And as
we've said, it's certain to come. Well, notice this verse, come
my people. Now the first observation that
I want to make on this text this morning is that before or in
times of trouble, it is well for us to come to the Lord or
to draw near to God. Draw near to God. So here is
the sketch of what God would say to us this morning. Trouble
is coming, bound to come, what are we to do? Come my people.
James 4 and 8 says draw nigh to God and he'll draw nigh to
you. As the hen gives her cluck when the hawk is in the air to
get her chicks to hide under her wings, so the Lord says,
come, my people, come, my people. Now, you know, sometimes when
trouble is brewing, storm is raging, people go away from God. And we've seen that so often
when people have uh... trouble in their life and real
problems come and it's just that they they just the foundation
is shaken of their lives that they go away uh... when trouble
comes but god says come my people come don't don't be driven away
be not driven away by affliction but be driven uh... to me by
the adversities and the trials that come into your life you
come my people to me the clouds are in the sky the lightning
is flashing and hasten home. Be quick about it. Draw nigh
to God. It's time to draw near the Lord. It's time that every
one of us begin to examine ourselves and in our paralysis, because
many of us are, it seems, paralyzed, by fear and apprehension, and
by fear of what's coming, and we dread what's coming, but my
friend, listen to me, it's time that we linger not, but that
we come home to God, and that we begin to seek His face and
cry out unto Him. You say, well why would we need
to draw near to God? We're getting along pretty well
the way it is, and you know when people are getting along pretty
well, in their lives and they seem not to have any storms in
their life, they do, as we said, when they get paralyzed and they
just simply do not seek God. They do not cry to God as they
ought to. God generally, in order to cause
us to seek his face, and I say that he must cause us most of
the time to seek his face. Some of you may be doing so as
a duty or as a habit. But I believe that most of the
time when men are stirred up to seek the Lord and lay hold
of God is whenever God causes it to happen in their life, when
there's something that moves them toward the Lord. Well, why should we draw an eye
to God? Well, first of all, it would
be to spread our case before God. And the question might be
asked, do you fear what may happen in this world? Do you fear what
may befall you in this world? Now we know that every day that
people are suddenly, as the people, the young people and As the Christian
workers in Texas there were taken out of the world and over in
Colorado, the shootings over there, nobody knows anymore. Wherever they're at, somebody
can burst in, somebody can feel that they got a bad business
deal, and somebody may feel that they were fired wrongly or that
they were not treated as they should have been, and they can
rush in. with a gun and try to settle
all their problems with a gun. But you may wonder, and I think
that we need to be very cautious in this world. And you would
say, well, you know, somebody mentioned here just recently,
I was talking with one of the members of this church here the
other day, and he was saying that he had had some apprehension
a few months ago when we had some people that came for a little
while and then went out, and they became very upset and angry
with some of us, and they were very apprehensive. about this
particular gentleman was about the fact that they could come
back and maybe they would. Enemies of the gospel, enemies
of the grace of God, and they could come back and they could
do harm in the services. Well, what should we do? Should
we arm a certain brother and set him in the back and and just
wait for a situation like this to occur? Well, absolutely not.
We must trust God, but we must go on. But we can have, and do
have many times, fears of what may happen. And something dreadful
could happen. It will not always happen to
somebody else. Well, we know that we should
not just walk down blind alleys or walk down alleys where we
could fall into certain trouble and problems. There are certain
things that we could do, but I believe that what the Lord
would have us to do is come to Him, come my people, and lay
out their case before the Lord. Tell it to the Lord Jesus Christ. Make your complaint to the Lord. Spell out your problem. The old
song says, tell it to Jesus. Tell it to Jesus. He is a friend
that is well known. There's no other such a friend
or brother. Tell it to Jesus. And remember how Hezekiah acted
when he received the letter from the Syrian general, Rab Sheketh. He took it and he spread it before
the Lord, and we must do the same. This general was making
his threats against the Lord's people, and Hezekiah laid it
out before the Lord. He spread the letter out. And
he talked to the Lord about it. And we remember that the Lord
delivered his people. So come, my people. He calls
us to God first. Calls us to God, I say, first. Tell him all about it. He'll
listen. Spread your case before him. The next thing you should
do in coming to God is to consider his mind about your case. When we consult a lawyer, it
is because we want his point of view. We expect that he's
had to deal with something like our case before. And brother,
sister, if you turn in your Bibles when trouble comes and begin
to read the word of God and seek the mind of God, you will find
that God knows how to deal with your particular case. And if
I'm going to lose my loved ones, I ought to know what the Bible
says to people that are in a bereaved state, and what promises it makes
to people who have lost their loved ones. If I am to have an
extended illness, Or maybe there's an illness to come upon me that's
going to be a terminal illness. Then I should know how to deal
with that situation and how to face life each day and how to
deal with it. Well, the Word of God will furnish
me with an understanding if I'm going down in the world. And
you know, it may be that you'll eventually have to go down in
this world. People do not always go up, you
know. There comes times when businesses fail and when hard
times and difficult times come and people get between a rock
and a hard place. And you may not always be that
you'll have all of the comforts of life and all the blessings
that you enjoy today. Well, how's a person going to
deal with that? when they're going down in the world, when
their stock is going down. Well, what would the Bible say
to me about my situation? Well, seek God's face. It will
not be in vain for you to do that. And my main question as
I thought about this is not how can I avoid trouble. How can
I avoid it? How can I stay in a certain region
of the country where I won't have trouble? Or how can I stay
out of trouble? That wasn't my main consideration. Or how can I get out of trouble
if I'm in it? But here's the main question.
How should I behave myself in trouble. When I get into trouble
and when things really get bad, what ought a child of God to
do under the circumstances which I have now come upon me? What
should a child of God do? Well, the only answer to that
is come, my people, and tell the Lord about your anxieties
and ask, what would your will be about my situation? And I
know sometimes we can be in such a dither about our situation
that we hardly have time to pause and to hesitate and to wait with
patience upon the Lord to find out His mind about how to react
about a certain situation. But the Bible says in the book
of James 5 and verse 8, it says, be also patient. Establish your
heart. The Lord draweth nigh. coming
of the Lord draw nigh. But that part right there, be
a patient, establish your hearts. should speak to us this morning
right here in this particular part of the message. You look
to the Lord, but be patient when you're under trial. God's gonna
show you the way out. He'll make a way. He'll make
a way. He'll show you the way out of
your circumstances, but your heart must be established, you
must be patient, and remember that the Lord, the coming of
the Lord draweth nigh. Things will come to an end one
day. I know you can listen to what What is that fellow, that
prophet way back, Nostradamus or whatever it is, he says that
it's not going to happen until 3719 or something like that is
when the world's going to end, but you don't need to pay no
attention to that. A child of God needs to read the Word of
God and to be ready always, watch and pray. Be ready always, because
the Son of Man cometh in an hour that you think not. The Lord's
coming is drawing nigh, and we need to keep that in mind as
we deal with our various problems and difficulties in life. Be
sure of this, in your greatest calamities, whatever happens,
you cannot lose your greatest, your best jewels. You remember
the little phase that John Bunyan talked about, He was robbed down
Dead Man's Lane. And they said that there were
three sturdy rogues that robbed him. Faint Heart, Mistrust, and
Guilt was their name. They fell upon him and they robbed
him of most of his spending money. But he had certain jewels that
they never found, which they therefore could not rob him of.
So the world may come, calamities may come, difficulties may come,
and take away many of our external and temporary comforts, but we
have a treasure that the world never gave us, and it cannot
take from us. It cannot take from us. The true
riches the true riches of the gospel. That which really matters
in our life was a gift of God to us and the world never had
anything to do with it. They didn't give it to us and
they cannot take it away from us. Nothing can take the true
riches from a child of God. Now that'll establish your heart.
Nothing will affect those true riches that the Lord has given
to you by his pure sovereign grace. Nothing can affect that.
So if the most important things are secure, That cannot we trust
the rest and leave the rest. I would say the little things
of life Can we not leave them in the hands of the Lord? Can
we not trust them with God's hands? So when we go to God with
our troubles, I Think we should say do what you will Lord. I leave the care and the burden
of all this trial to you I'm too foolish and I'm too weak
to deal with it and Therefore undertake for me, I leave it
entirely in your hands, I will be quiet even as a weaned child,
and whatever happens, it is the Lord let him do what seemeth
good unto him." Now that's the way we should pray in the hour
when all of these things are tearing at the foundation of
our life, and when we're so confused and shook up that we may not
know how to put together words, that's the just of the spirit
of our hearts. Let us pray in that fashion.
Now second, we're told here in our text that we're to enter
in to the chambers of Force he says enter thou into
thy chambers now if you would this morning this is Isaiah chapter
26 and verse 20 and He said you enter in to thy chambers and
shut thy doors about thee and hide thyself hide thyself well
picture if you will a large house and There this house has many
rooms in it and And this is your chambers. These rooms, various
rooms, are your chambers. And one of the rooms has a sign
on it that says, Divine Power. This room is called Divine Power. And you'll enter into that room,
and there you're to hide yourself. with the thought that God is
able to bring you through every trial, whatever it is. That's
one of the chambers. This idea that God is all powerful,
that God is able, that God has absolute power and wisdom and
ability and that he can bring you through every trial, that
God is able to bring good. out of all evils that come upon
us, and that God will, some way or another, He'll take the awful
situation that's just now happened in our lives, and that He will,
by His power, do that which is right, and that we will come
out, and that God will be glorified, and it'll be for our good in
the end, that God has the power. Nothing can happen to you which
will be beyond the scope of the power of Almighty God. And now
that's a room that you went into and you shut the door of that
room and you're there in that place of safety with God's absolute
power. David said, I said it once, I'll
say it again, the power belongeth unto God. Jesus said, all power
is given to me in heaven and earth. And so God's people are
are blessed with this attribute of God, He is almighty. And so we can shut ourselves
up in that room and be comforted and be kept until the indignation
be overpassed. Well, there's another room and
on that door is the words divine wisdom. And so we can go into
that room and we can shut the door. So you're in trouble now
and you're perplexed, but God is not perplexed. God is not
perplexed. Have you ever thought about that?
Have you ever been so perplexed with your situation you didn't
know how to even start to deal with it? But remember this, that
God is not perplexed. You may see no way. You may see
no way out, but He is not in the dark. God is not in the dark. God is infinitely wise, and we're
poor fools, and I've done this, and nothing came of it, and yet
there's a higher wisdom than any man's. And you say, I've
tried everything. I've tried everything. I've tried
everything that I know to try, but God has a higher wisdom than
any man's. And that's why we should consult
the Lord first. In our situation, you get sick,
look to God first before you go to a doctor, before you go
to a physician. Because sooner or later you're
going to have some decisions to make. This doctor is going
to tell you this and that and something else. You're going
to believe what he says or you're going to seek the Lord first
and feel in your mind that God will direct your mind, that God
will direct you as to what to do. You better look to the Lord
first in every situation. You say, I've got a financial
problem. You better look to God first. Because there's people
that give you all kinds of advice in this world that'll lead you
down a path that you don't want to go. You need to trust God
and look to Him first. And so God's wisdom, my friend,
God's wisdom, how wonderful it is to trust in a God that knows
everything. And he didn't come on it this
morning. He knew it from the beginning. Known unto God all
of his works from the beginning of the world. God has a map.
And that is a map of every one of our lives. And God knows perfectly
what's going to become, what's going to befall every one of
us. And He has every detail under control. God is an all-wise God. Now I know that God started our
salvation. It was started by God. And I
know that nothing is going to befall the people of God that
His wisdom is not capable of delivering. I think that provision
has been made for us in the eternal covenant of God's grace. Now
there's another room and that room has over divine love. And
certainly he loves us from the foundation of the world. Scripture
says we were chosen in him and through his love we were made
holy without blame before God. He spared not his own son because
he loved us, delivered him up for us. How shall he not also
freely give us all things? You know the love of God is without
beginning. We were loved everlastingly by God. We were loved without
measure. And without end, God loves his
people. And so we need, my friend, to
believe the love of God toward us. Now John said, in 1 John,
he said, we have known and believed the love that God hath toward
us. Now there are times when we have known the love of God
because we can see it. We can sit down at our table.
Our table's heavily laden. We can see our children around
about the table. They're all in health. We know
that all is good. We're prospering and we see the
love of God. We feel good. We have health.
And everything seems to be wonderful with us. And we see the love
of God. But there are other times, my
friend, when you're going to be called upon to believe the love
of God. The children may be sick. One
of your children may be taken from you in death. Other problems
may be surrounding your life, and you'll have to believe the
love of God. You won't be able to see it.
You'll have to believe it. And some of them poor people
up down the coast whose homes are underwater and everything
is They're full of dead rats and snakes and all kinds of problems
they have in North Carolina, South Carolina, New Jersey, all
of these places where there's just misery, utter misery this
morning and everything is gone and wasted by these terrible
floodwaters. And you must then believe the
love of God towards you. Believe it. And so there's a
difference, you see. But the love of God is real,
and you need to shut yourself up in that room. Now, the fourth
room that we come to has divine faithfulness on it. God is true,
God is faithful, God keeps his promise, and God will never fail
you. and you're bread and water, the
scripture says, we'll be sure God is faithful. So you go into
this room and you shut yourself up in this room. God is faithful. He's faithful. Do you believe
that He is? Amen. Do you believe that God
is faithful? God will never fail you. God
will be there. He is near you and He will bring
you out. He will deliver your soul. All
right, there's another room. The fifth room is God's immutability. God said, you go in that room
there. And what that means is that I'm never gonna change.
Whatever you've known me to be, I am right now. Even if you don't
feel like you've got a rock to stand on, if you don't feel like
there's anything stable in your life, I'm just exactly like I've
always been. Nothing has changed with me.
I am immutable. I change not. I am the Lord. I change not. Now, beloved, that's
been a great comfort to me many, many times. To fall back on the
fact that God hadn't changed. So-and-so's changed. Somebody
said, so-and-so's not like they used to be. Oh, they're different
now. So-and-so's. This has happened.
That's happened. Circumstances have changed people.
And oh, we do. I mean, time has made a change
in the old home place, the song says. And time has made a change
in each smiling face. Time has made a change. And it
will. But Jesus Christ is the same
yesterday, and today, and forever. He will not change. And so you
go into that room, when it looks like, and whenever in life, and
we see it so often, when people are betrayed, and when people
are just literally lied to, and deceived, and we look around
and we say, my, how could that have ever happened to me? You
go into this room. You go into this room, and this
is the room of immutability, where God will be the same. God
will be the same, and whoever else changes, God will never,
will never change. Next, I want to say just a little
bit about shutting the door here, because to me, that's a blessed
thing that we're able to shut the door, and we shut out all
doubt as to his power. First of all, you know we mentioned
that particular room, the room of His power and how we went
in. Well, the Lord said, you shut
that door. Is anything too hard for the Lord? Shut the door!
Nothing too hard for Him. The Lord's gonna do it. Wisdom. Do not charge God with foolishness.
There's been a mistake, somebody said. Well, why would this ever
happen to me? Providence has erred. Surely
not. Shut the door, my friend. Shut
the door. Go into the room of God's wisdom
and shut the door. Don't have another thought about
it. Nobody's made a mistake. No, you say, well this couldn't
have ever happened to me. But God is too wise to err, my
friend. Shut the door! God's wisdom is
real. God's wisdom is true. And you
can trust God. And then do we question His love? I said there was a room that
divine love. Is there an if? If God loves
me, did you ever say that? If God loves me, shut the door. The love of God is unpurchasable
and it's unpurchased. If he loved, if he ever loved
you, he always will love you because of the reason he loved
you. Now, why would he love you? Some of you could give me some
answers. Oh my, could you give me some answers? God loves me
because of this, because of that, because of something else. But
I'll tell you this, that God loves his people because they're
lovable in Christ. That's why he loves them. The
reason for the love of God is Jesus Christ. That's the reason. God loves his people because
he views them in the perfectness and the completeness and spotlessness
of the Lord Jesus Christ. And you could just offer reason
after reason, little, little, little reasons why you're lovable
in God's sight. I wouldn't give you a nickel
for any of it. Oh, I know that some of you are more lovable
than others, but I know that as far as God is concerned, He
sees through you, He sees everything in you, and He knows you. And He is not in any way, shape,
or form affected by your little differences that you think are
a plus. and that God is going to love
you because of that. There ain't but one reason why
God would ever love a sinner, and that's because of His Son.
If you're in Him, you're lovable to God, and God looks upon you
favorably, and God will bless you because of His Son. And so
you shut the door. If you're in Christ, it settles.
God loves you if you're in His Son. Now then, somebody said,
God used to love me. God used to love me. But now
shut the door, my friend. If he ever did, he still does.
The poet said, whom once he loves, he never leaves, but loves him
to the end. If he's God, he must ever be
the same, and he will continue to love you. Shut the door. You
went in that room, shut it. Whatever's going on, you say
awful storm outside, let it blow. Go in there and shut the door.
God loves you. if you're in Christ. And nothing
ever is going to change that. All right? We must shut ourselves
in with God. Shut ourselves in with God and
trust nothing else. Sooner or later in life's path,
it's going to come to that. Sooner or later, we're going
to have to shut ourselves in with God. There's going to come
a day when no doctor is going to be able to do a thing for
you. Nobody's going to be able to come alongside and help you.
You're going to be shut up to this. You're going to have to
get in with God, shut yourself up with the Lord, and be shut
in with Him and His will and His purpose and His way. Whatever that be, you're going
to be shut up with Him, with the Lord. And that's, my friend,
like we say, is where we're all coming. We're all coming there. And how wonderful it would be
if we could just shut ourselves up to it and get in the habit
of it. Shutting ourselves up to the Lord. Day by day, week
by week. Shutting ourselves up with Him.
So that when the time does come, it's kind of like Paul said,
I die daily. He practiced dying every day. So when time comes
to die, he's ready to die. And so we gotta practice this.
Shut ourself up. Just go into the room and shut
ourself up with God. Lord, your will, whatever it
is, I bow to it. I submit myself to it. And I
know one day, Lord, I'm not gonna have the strength to do what
I'm doing now. But I just bow to your will, your way, and to
your mercy. Shut myself up. Well, last thing
here we see is that we're gonna comment on here is hide thyself,
as it were, for a little moment. Hide thyself, as it were, for
a little moment. Now what that means to me is
that the trouble will not last long. That it's a little moment. Whatever your trouble is, you
say it's lasted a long time. Preacher, I've been having problems
for a long time. Haven't been able to get any comfort. Not
been able to get out from under them. Had these health problems.
Not been able to get out from under them. I've had all kinds
of afflictions in my marriage and other things. I just can't
get out from under them. Nothing will work. Can't seem
to get any relief. Well, he said a little moment.
Hide yourself a little moment. 2 Corinthians 4, 17 says, are
light afflictions which is but for a moment. Works for us. This exceeding great reward. Well, I know we don't think so.
I know we don't think that our trials will ever end. But the
poet said, a script on our back and a staff in my hand, I march
on in haste through an enemy's land. The road may be rough,
but it cannot be long, and I'll smooth it with hope and cheer
it with song. So having hidden ourselves for
a small moment from the present troubles, we'll wake up to endless
joy at God's right hand forever and ever. I like the last verse
of that song, Will Your Anchor Hold? When our eyes behold through
the gathering night, this city of gold, our harbor bright, we
shall anchor fast by the heavenly shore with the storms all past
forevermore. Those words, I woke up to those
words this morning. I like that part. We shall anchor
fast by the heavenly shore with the storms all past forevermore. So we're living in a world where
these storms now, I don't want to take too much more of your
time here, but I was listening to this, these people the other
day was talking about this great hurricane that was coming toward
New York City and that it will hit sometime. They feel certain
of it. I think the last one to hit there
was 1893, I believe so. But anyway, they claimed that
if a size four or five hurricane were to hit New York City, what
an awful, awful thing it would be. What a terrible thing. And they showed what possibly
would happen. All of the surge of the waters
and many, many people drowned and it would just be impossible
to get the people out. of the city of New York. And
those big bridges that have these huge cables that support them,
how that those bridges would swing and that in 150, 160 mile
an hour winds, and would snap them, huge cables, and those
bridges fall, terrible, terrible calamities. But you know, as
I thought about all that, it may very well happen in our lifetime. You may see it. happen. But there's coming a time and
on a shore that God's going to take us to where the storms of
life are past forevermore. No fear of it. No fear of any
kind of a storm. It'll all be over. We shall be
with the Lord forever and ever. My friend, get your eyes on the
Lord. Get your eyes on the Lord. Come my people. Draw near unto
God. A time to move toward the Lord.
If you're God's child, believe, trust in the Lord Jehovah, for
in him is everlasting strength. Father, in the name of Jesus,
we thank you for a word this morning for your people, and
I pray that it may please you to enable each one of us to hide
these things away in our hearts and to practice them day by day
when troubles come, that we may just find us a room of divine
power and divine wisdom, divine immutability, divine love, and
we'll go into each one of those rooms, as it were, and shut ourselves
in with you, the living God, and trust you whatever befalls
us, knowing that you're a faithful God and you'll bring us out,
and that you have purposed our end, and that our end shall be
one of blessedness forever with our God. We pray it in Jesus'
name, for his sake, amen.