A Hasty Expression Retracted

I want to read the 22nd verse,
verse 22, Psalm 31. For I said in my haste, I am
cut off from before thine eyes. Nevertheless thou heardest the
voice of my supplications when I cried unto thee. It has been said that We teach
best what we most need to learn. I think there's an element of
truth in that. This verse of scripture here,
Psalm 31, 22, I think if you need a title for the message
this morning, I'd call it a hasty expression retracted, a hasty
expression retracted. Charles Spurgeon said this, how
glad we ought to be that David never fell into the hand of an
ordinary biographer, for such a piece of weakness, as this
text of scripture here records, would have been carefully repressed,
lest the good man's reputation should suffer. Now, what he means
by that is that oftentimes when men write about other men, they
leave out some things about them that doesn't appear to be, you
know, too glorifying to the individual, that seems to bring them down
to an ordinary plane or a level with everybody else. They leave
that out, and they only talk about the greatness of the man.
But the Lord is not guilty of any such thing, and the Bible
is very clear, this is unique to the Bible, that God never
attempts to cover up the weaknesses of his children, the weaknesses
of those that know him and follow him. God just simply reveals
their weakness. David said, he said this, he
said, in my haste, he said, he made this statement, I'm cut
off from before thine eyes, I am cut off from before by now. Now here stands this piece of
human weakness upon the page of David's life. He made a statement
here he ought never to have made. He ought never to have thought
it, much less said it. But he made a statement here,
and it's a statement of unbelief. It's a statement of sin. And
you and I, of course, are going to have to examine our own hearts
this morning and reflect upon, and we'll be forced to, I think,
to think back upon our own lives and upon some of the things that
we've said in haste that we ought never to have fought or said.
And that, of course, this morning, if we're able to do that, I believe
the Lord will help us. And I'm glad that this is said
here because it's a comfort to us nobodies to know that and
to be able to perceive that the champions of the faith were men
of like passions as ourselves. And as a bee sucks honey out
of the nettles, So does faith find comfort even in the failings
of David. It certainly does. We find some
comfort in David's failings. Now, we do not use his weakness
and errors as excuses for our own weakness, our own unbelief
and sin. Certainly we do not. The experience
of a good man, of a great man, of a tried man like David, I
believe, is very instructive and it's impressive. Now, nothing
more tears the heart of a struggling child of God in this life than
to hear of the life struggles of the people of God who have
lived in this world and gone on before, to know something
about what happened, what they experienced, and how they dealt
with their situations in their life. Now here we have a confession. A confession of David is right
out of the heart of David, and he draws back, as it were, the
curtain from his own innermost life here, and he gives us his
experience. Now, his experience is like my
experience. I've had many a time when I was
ashamed of myself for some of the things that I thought and
some of the things that I said. in the hour of trial, in the
hour of test, in the hour of weakness, in the time of unbelief,
the things that we fought and the things that we said. Now,
was his experience, was it Christian experience? Well, I don't know. I don't hardly believe that we're
to term this as Christian experience, but it seems to be the experience
of most Christians. They act hasty, they say hasty
things. Well, Was his faith weak? Well, I believe it was. And so
is our faith weak often, which brings us to a place where we
commit the same sin. Now, we're not to imitate David
in his speaking in haste or in his saying, I'm cut off from
before thine eyes. But at the same time, let us
take care that we copy him in confessing our faults as he here
does. and in crying to God in the hour
of trouble as he tells us that he did. And also in bearing witness
to the exceeding goodness of God, notwithstanding our faults,
when he says, nevertheless thou heardest the voice of my supplications
when I cried unto thee. So we're to imitate David then
in these things. were to imitate him, I say, in
these things. But now, let's get into this
subject a little bit this morning. I felt especially my need this
morning for this message, and I hope that it meets all of our
needs. And as I prayed, I didn't pray
that it'd just help me, but that it'll help you all, and that
it'll be instructive to your hearts, and it'll keep you from
a sin that is very prevalent among the people of God. First
of all, I'd like to say And look at this utterance here of unbelief
of David, and to say this, he said, I said in my haste, I'm
cut off from before thine eyes. Let's think about that. And the
first thing I'd like to say about this is this, is that unbelief
generally is talkative. Unbelief generally has something
to say, and it says it. David said, I said, I said. Now, it would have been better
for him not to have thought this even, but when he did, it was
most unwise to speak the thought. To say this, for David to say
this, to say that I am cut off from before thine eyes, what
a statement for a child of God to make. For a man who's been
taught in the ways of the Lord, Spirit-taught and Spirit-educated,
to make a statement like this, I'm cut off from before thine
eyes. Well, I have heard it said, if
it's in the mind, it may as well come out. But this is not true,
my friend. There's a lot of things that
may be in our minds that we ought never to speak. But David said,
I said this. I said this in my haste. Now,
if I had a rattlesnake in a box up here on this platform this
morning, I do not think any of you would vote for me to let
it loose. I think you would prefer that
I kept it in the box and that I kept the lid on the box. Now, poison in a vial is deadly. It'll hurt nobody until the cork
is drawn. And then you cannot tell how
far The mischief will go. You cannot tell how far the harm
will go. Now, if you have an ill thought,
repent of it, but do not repeat that thought. It may harm you,
but it will not harm others if you let it die indoors. You ought
not to let it out. David said, I'm cut off from
before thine eyes. What a terrible thing to say.
Now, my friend, would you grieve your brethren by making a statement
that is not true, that is not sound doctrinally? Well, you
ought not to say even in the presence of your enemies anything
like David said here. Would you open your mouth to
speak against the Lord? Well, where can you say the things
that you think? Where can you say them? Well,
my friend, I believe that they ought to be buried in silence
if they're contrary to the Word of God, if they're contrary to
the truth, if they're contrary to sound theology, they ought
to be buried in silence and they ought never to be spoken even
in the ear of God, much less in the ears of men. Unbelief
does not understand holding its tongue. It doesn't understand
that. Unbelief is talkative, and it's
got to talk. It's got to go to the neighbors
and talk. It's got to go down the street. It's got to print
a paper with long columns, and you can get a new edition every
day from most of us about our troubles and our trials and our
difficulties. And our struggles in this life,
but my friend unbelief doesn't know anything about hold its
tongue. It just prattles on and chatters on Unbelief I say is
talkative. We read in the Old Testament
About the children of Israel how they murmured in their tents
They could not be quiet at home They complained of God and their
families, and there soon their murmuring in their tents became
a murmuring throughout all the camp of Israel, till they gathered
together in crowds against God and Moses, the Lord's servant.
They murmured in their tents. Unbelief will talk, my friend.
It will talk. We hear it often. I hear it all
the time, and I'm sure you do, and you hear it sometimes even
from me, maybe. Unbelief talks. Now, it's been
better and wiser for David to have bit his tongue than to have
said what he ought not to have said. However, this much is clear. Unbelief is generally talkative. It generally is going to tell
you how it feels. Well, the next thing I'd like
to say about this statement is, I'd like to say that the utterance
of unbelief, the utterances of unbelief are generally hasty. David said, in my haste. In my haste I said this. Now
there was no need for saying it at all and certainly there
was no need for getting in a hurry to say this. He said to God,
I'm cut off from before thine eyes. Now you look at this statement
and you consider it if you will. See if it's scriptural. Do you
think that it is true, David? Do you think it's really true
that you've been cut off from before the eyes of the Lord?
Well, no, but unbelief, listen to me, unbelief, even if it's
right or wrong, unbelief's got to say it. Even if it's true
or not true, unbelief is going to say it. It's going to make
the statement because unbelief, listen, unbelief, when we're
in a dither, must come to some sort of a conclusion. It's got
to. David was in trouble. He had
all kinds of trouble. He was a man that was out of
mind with the people, and the people had gotten to the place
where even his neighbors didn't want anything to do with him.
They ran from him. David was in trouble, and he
was in a dither, and he had to come to some sort of a conclusion,
and the conclusion was, I'm cut off from before thy eyes. The
Lord has just simply cut me off. That's what's the matter. That's
why I've got all this trouble I have. We gotta come to a conclusion
and we gotta do it in a hurry. Unbelief says we gotta boil this
thing down right quick and here's the conclusion. I'm cut off from
before thine eyes. Now, he said it in haste. What
a man says in haste, he generally has to repent of in leisure. He generally does. Yes, when
we once get disquieted, the temptation is there to hastily throw off
the bit and the bridle and say whatever is in our mind. Just
whatever comes in our mind, we'll say it. Well, let me say again,
frequently when a man speaks in haste, his expressions are
the result of a bad temper. Somebody says, well, preacher,
I'm of a quick temper. I'm of a quick temper. I get
mad quick. Well, if you are a quick temper,
it is very likely that you're also quick-tongued. And you're
going to say something right quick when you get out of temper.
Now, you can speak in a moment, somebody said, what you cannot
unsay in a century. Isn't that the truth? It is indeed
the truth. Now, I'm talking about when we
get hot, and when we get ill-tempered, and when things are not going
like they ought to go, and we're depressed, and we're despondent,
and we're discouraged, and we're cast down in our hearts, and
we feel like the pressure of the world, I mean, the weight
of the world is upon our shoulders, and we're being forced down,
and we're just simply not able to do what we want to do and
what we desire to do, we've got something to say about it. And
the unbelief of our hearts immediately begins when we get frustrated
and we begin to say things that we ought not say. Now, I believe
that we get mad at God. You say, well now, Preacher,
I'm not mad at God. I'm just mad at that so-and-so
over here. I'm just mad at this. I'm mad
at that. I'm mad about that. But my friend, let me just caution
you as a child of God this morning. And one of the lessons that we
need to learn, a very basic lesson that we need to learn is that
our times are in the Lord's hands. That we're in the Lord's hands.
And that men are His hands. Men are God's hands. And that
God does with men what He would have them to do. And men are
God's servants. They're God's servants. And nothing
can happen to you or I or the children of God that God has
not permitted. God is not asleep. And he's not
allowing something here. He's not going off on vacation.
He's not down on the riverbank fishing. God knows what's going
on in your life, and God is the author of all those things that
come to pass in our life. He allows them to come. Now,
many people just simply get mad at God. They get ill with God. They get out of temper with God.
And so they say hasty things. Many will not forgive God for
their troubles and for their problems they have in their life.
They won't. And when they come, listen, this is one of the things
that a Calvinist has to deal with. A man who believes that
the heavens rule, a man who believes that God reigns, a man that believes
what Isaiah 52.7, we preached it last week. Thy God reigneth,
say in desire and thy God reigneth. A man or a woman who believes
that has got to deal with this business. that God has been in
his life, God is in his life, and that God is allowing, God
is bringing into his life those things that he has to deal with.
And many people just simply will not forgive God for their troubles,
for their bereavements, for their losses, for their trials. They
will not do it. Well, we all have problems with
that. And there was a young woman one time who wore black for a
number of years after her husband had died. And there was an old
Quaker that came up to her and said, why, you've not forgiven
God yet. for taking your husband. And
that hit the nail right on the head. She had not forgiven her
husband or not forgiven God for taking her husband out of the
world and would not forgive the Lord. Now, will you sit on the
throne and judge God? Will you get mad? Will you get
ill-tempered and hastily say things? Will you judge God? Will
you snatch from his hands the balance and the rod? And will
you re-judge his judgments and be the God of God? Will you do
that? Well, we do that, don't we? We
do that when we hastily say things that are not true. Now, this
is just blasphemy. Are we to be the Lord's over
all ourselves? Are we to govern? Who is to order
providence? Who among us will be the master? In whose hands should be the
issues of life and death? Who is all wise here in our midst
this morning? Who can be God here this morning?
Well, is God to wait on us? Is he to ask our will? Is he
to do our bidding? Is it to be according to our
mind? That we speak as we do? That we're constantly mistrustful
of the Lord and that we're fretting and that we're saying things
which are dishonoring to God? Now, I think it's because we
get into a rebellious temper with God that we speak in haste
what we ought not even to think. So David confesses, I said in
my haste, I'm cut off from before thine eyes. Well, the next thing
I'd like to say about this statement is that it's very clear to me
from this text that the utterances of unbelief are frequently exaggerated,
are exaggerated. David, you're wrong. It's not
so. You're not cut off from the eyes of the Lord. Why would you
say that? Well, you may be cut off from the esteem of men, and
you may be cut off from friends who profess to love you before,
and it is true that you're cut off from the public service of
God's house, and you're obliged to hide away in the rocks and
the caves of the earth. That's true, David. But you're
not cut off from before God's eyes. You are not cut off from
the Lord's eye. You know you're not, and why
do you say you are? It's an exaggeration to say that.
That is not true. Now talk about people who exaggerate. Listen, I want to just say this
word. I've tried to talk with certain people who felt like,
and you begin to talk to them, and they have this estimate of
their trial, this estimate of their situation, this estimate
of their life, that their lot is the worst lot that ever fell
out to an individual in this world. That nobody's ever had
the trouble that they've got, nobody's ever had the problems
they've got, nobody has ever been put in the position that
they've put into, and they're crammed in a hole, and it's the
worst slot that anybody could ever have. But my friend, let
me tell you this this morning, I believe that this is not a
pretty thing. You cannot comfort those people, you cannot ever
say anything to those people, because immediately they turn
you off and shut you off and say, listen, you talk to me,
because my problems are worse than everybody's problems. My
friend, that's ugly. That sin is what that is. That's
not pretty. And when you get in that kind
of a state of mind, I want you to understand me this morning,
you're living in a state of exaggeration. It's unbelief and it's sin for
you to act that way. Is there here this morning in
this building anyone who is exaggerating their trouble? Are you making
a mountain out of a molehill, brother, sister? Are you somewhere
or another in your own mind building a situation wherein you think
that your situation is worse than everybody else? Are you
an exaggerator? David exaggerated when he said,
I'm cut off from before thine eyes. That's the only explanation
for all the trouble I got is that I'm cut off from before
thine eyes. And so we exaggerate. Well, the
next thing I'd like to say is that these utterances of unbelief
They dishonor God They dishonor God and this is very important
David he blames God. He says before your very eyes.
I have suffered this I'm cut off from before your eyes before
your very eyes Lord I'm cut off now God said that he will not suffer the righteous
to perish. That's what God said. David said,
I'm cut off. David, he was wrong. The eyes
of the Lord, the scripture says, are upon the righteous, and his
ears are open to their cry. There never was a child of God
cut off from God yet, and there never will be till time shall
be no more. God's people will never be cut
off from the Lord. All the attributes of God, hear
me out now, forbid the destruction of a soul that is resting on
the almighty arm. All the attributes of God are
pledged for the preservation of the people of God, for the
children of grace. All this dreadful unbelief that
thinks that God will be so unrighteous as to forget our work of faith
and our labor of love, to forget his children, to cast away his
own covenanted ones with whom he has entered into solemn league
by oath, saying, I will never leave thee nor forsake thee,
God going to cut you off, No, absolutely not. David, you have
dishonored the Lord by saying that I'm cut off from before
thine eyes. This is sin. And you and I, every
time we open our mouth hastily to immediately say that God has
forsaken us, God has cut us off, God has left us, God is not interested
in our life. He's not concerned about our
situation. God will just simply abandon us. We are certainly
dishonoring God. We are dishonoring the Lord.
Well, I told you, you know that verse there that I just quoted
here about where the Lord said, I will never leave thee nor forsake
thee. I told you about all of the negatives that the Lord used
in the original. And he says, I will not, not,
not leave, or he says, I will not, not, not, never, never leave
thee, is what the Lord said in the original. And so, Lord, forgive
us for dishonoring you, for saying that you have forsaken your children,
for saying in our hearts that you have abandoned us. And God
forgive David, and I'm sure that David had to repent, and he certainly
confessed it here, and I'm certain that he had to repent of making
such a statement. Well, the second thing I'd like
to talk about a little bit this morning is, is there still any
faith, is there still any grace Living in the heart of David
At the time he made this statement or does this statement mean that
he that he was lost hopelessly lost Well, let's look at it and
see and see if we can see any grace see any faith at all in
David's heart Well here we have I believe in this text here an
effort of struggling faith Listen to what he says here He says,
nevertheless thou heardest the voice of my supplications when
I cried unto thee. I cried unto thee. Well, he prayed. David prayed,
and my friend, prayer in the heart is an evidence of living
faith. It's an evidence of grace in
the heart. It's an evidence that the Spirit
of God is still working and moving in the heart when there is prayer
in the heart. And so David prayed here distinctly
to God. He said, I cried unto thee, O
child of God, you cry to a smiting God. Cry to a God even when it
seems that he's cut you off. Well, where else can you go?
Cling to the Lord. Where else is there any hope,
my friend? Where else is there any hope?
There is no other hope. And faith will bring a man right
back. It'll bring a man right back
to God. The grace that's in his heart. Well, what if providence
does seem hard? Job said, though he slay me,
yet, he says, will I trust him? Sink or swim, live or die, do
not doubt God, but still pray. That's what David did, and this
is an evidence that there is some living faith in his heart,
mixed up with all this unbelief, that there's still a living faith
in his heart. Well, what did Jonah do? when
the weeds were wrapped about his head, and when he went down
to the bottom of the mountains, where he tells us in the book
of Jonah, out of the belly of hell cried I unto thee. Down there in the fecious belly,
down at the bottom of the mountains, with the weeds wrapped about
his head inside that great fish, he cried unto the Lord and said,
salvation is of the Lord. Deliverance is of God. He kept
on crying to God and he had run from the Lord He got himself
into a lot of trouble, but he said out of the belly of hell
cried I out of the belly of hell cried I David said out of the
depths have I cried unto thee so David here cries unto God
now wherever you may have drifted and however desperate your case
I Yet, my friend, still pray. Still pray. If your hands are
bound as to any form of effort, still pray without ceasing. Still cry to God. My friends,
one of the things that the devil wants to do is to shut down prayer
in our hearts. He wants to shut her down. He
wants us to go all day long murmuring and complaining and fretting.
He wants us to go all the day in a distressed condition. He wants us to give up. He wants
us to abandon our hope in the Lord. He wants us to abandon,
to give it up. But David said, nevertheless,
he said, I made this statement in haste, but nevertheless, he
said, I cried unto thee. I cried unto thee. Now, David
prayed in downright earnest. Supplications, many prayers is
what that means. Prayers with voices to them.
He describes them under the term, I cried. His was a crying prayer. Now, sometimes we find books
that has prayers in them to read. Sometimes we find prayers that
are to be sung. But my friend, this morning David's
prayers were neither said nor sung, but cried. But cried out
to God. Out of the depths have I cried
unto thee, O Lord. Crying is the language of pain.
It is the eloquence of grief. It is the utterance of intense
longing. The intense longing of the heart.
I cried unto thee, David said. I was full of unbelief and I
thought I was cut off from you, but I just couldn't help but
cry to you. I had to pray, I had to call
on the Lord. And my friend, if you travel
with the Lord to any degree, you'll come to that place where
that you will feel abandoned and forsaken and you'll feel
that there's no hope. But yet your heart will cry out
unto God. If you're a child of grace, if
you're a child of faith, Now, we do not always give our children
what they cry for, but this is the rule of our Heavenly Father.
The righteous cry, and the Lord heareth. That's the rule of our
Heavenly Father. The righteous cry, and the Lord
heareth. Isaiah said, he will be very gracious unto thee at
the voice of thy cry. When he shall hear it, he will
answer thee. And the psalmist said, this poor
man cried and the Lord heard him and saved him out of all
of his troubles. Solved all of his problems for
him. Well, God heard David's prayer. According to your faith,
be it unto you, Jesus said. Now suppose that the text had
run like this. According to your unbelief, be
it unto you, David. According to your belief well
that God did not deal with David according to his unbelief but
according to his faith praise God Because God heard him, but
if you dealt with him according to his unbelief He said I am
cut off from before thine eye Lord, somehow or other there's
something got between me and you, and I'm cut off, and you
don't see me no more, and I don't see you anymore, and your graces
and your blessings and mercy don't reach me anymore. I'm cut
off, and the Lord, he nevertheless, nevertheless the Lord heard him
and heard the voice of his supplication. Nevertheless, God's ear was opened
to his prayer. Nevertheless, the Lord heard
him, and God dealt with him according to his faith. The little faith
there was in his heart that moved him to cry. God dealt with him
according to his faith and not according to the unbelief, the
wicked unbelief of his heart, the sinful, wretched unbelief
of his heart. How blessed be the Lord that
God does in mercy deal with us all and that he does not listen
to all of this foolishness that comes out of our hearts. And
even the utterances that we utter, it's all over with. God's through
with us. God's not doing anything anymore
with us. God's never going to do anything
again for us. God will not hear my prayers.
God never hears my prayer. We hear it all the time. We say
it all the time. And these are foolishness. This
is foolishness. These are expressions of our
heart which must be retracted because they're sinful and wicked
and they stem from unbelief. They spring from the unbelief
of our natural wicked hearts. God is a God of mercy and grace
and will hear you when you cry unto him. He will hear you. Now
there's some lessons that I learned from all of this. And there's
about four of them and I want to give them to you rather quickly
that really helped me. These are lessons that just simply
come to me out of this text here. The first is, the first lesson
that I believe that God taught me out of this is let us repent
of all the hard thoughts that we've had of our God and of our
Father. Let's repent of all the hard
thoughts. You ever think hard toward God? Why hast thou made
me thus? Why am I like I am? Why have
you done what you've done in my life? Why did you permit what
you permitted in my life? Have you ever had that? Have
you ever had any mistrustful, have you ever had any hard feelings
in your heart toward God, even for a minute? Well, my friend,
I'm forced to confess my sins along this line. I'm forced to
confess that there's a lot of things that please God to allow
in my life that didn't please me. How about you? Can you say
that? It's kind of like the fellow
walked up to the shepherd boy and he said to him, he said,
now, is it going to be nice weather today? He said, yes, it's going
to be nice weather. He said, but it might rain. He
said, that's all right if it does. He said, well, but I mean,
will it please you if it rains? He said, yes, it'll please me
if it rains. And he said, well, why, why? Well, I mean, you don't
want it to rain, do you? You're gonna have to be out there in
it. He said, yes, it'll please me if it rains, because whatever
God does, whatever pleases God, pleases me. Now, my friend, if
you ever get to that place in your life that whatever pleases
God, pleases you, your troubles are over. They're over. Now,
you think about that a little bit. And I've seen the times
when I had to go to prayer, I mean go to prayer and seek God and
seek God and seek God in order that the thing that pleases Him
would please me. Because my thoughts are not His
thoughts, my ways are not His ways. And we are not by nature,
we're not submissive to God and to His word and to His law by
nature. And God's gonna bring things
across our path that won't please us. But it's our business to
get reconciled to God and to confess it when we have hard
thoughts toward the Lord and when we disagree with God. And
to come around as quick as I can, I pray the Lord in his great
mercy will not remember them against me, those hard thoughts
that I've had against him. If he marks iniquity, who will
stand when it comes to this? Or you say, Preacher, I never
said it, but I thought it. Well, yes, and you know God hears
everything, and He even knows the thoughts of your heart. He
knows the thoughts and the intents of your heart. He knows them.
The Word of God is quick and powerful, sharper than any two-edged
sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of the joints and the
marrow, and is a critic of the thoughts and the intentions of
the heart. What you have in your heart, God knows about this morning. Everything is open unto the eyes
of him whom we have to do. He made the eye, can he not see?
He made the ear, can he not hear? God reads your heart. He reads
your heart. Well, we question his tender
love and his gracious care. And so we ought to repent. I
ought to just repent. I just ought to take, and I have,
I've asked God to forgive me. of hard thoughts toward him.
And we ought to do that. That's the first lesson. The
second lesson is this, that when we're tempted, again, to give
in to hard and mistrustful thoughts, we ought to ask God to enable
us to keep our mouths shut, because it would be better to be dumb,
not able to speak, than to dishonor the name of one that is so dear
as our God. Just pray that the Lord will
help us to keep our mouth shut. If you got nothing more to say,
then I'm cut off from his eyes. God has forsaken me. God has
abandoned me. He won't hear me no more. If
you got nothing to say but that unbelief, the chatter of unbelief,
then keep your mouth shut. Just don't say nothing. Ask God
to help you not to say a word. Just be dumb. Now the next thing
is this. Let us always continue to pray,
come what will. Whatever happens, and if you
think the Lord's cut us off, maybe you should study this chapter
a little more. You think that you got the trouble David had,
and you think you're cut off. Well, while breath lasts, and
gives power to feel a desire, never cease to supplicate the
Lord. Never cease. to supplicate the
Lord. Whatever be your situation, because
one of the first things that we somehow or other, I mean,
I swear it is with me, I don't know how it is with you, but
Satan has done everything he can. Do you know Mark's right
and he's asking God pleading the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ
and the merits of Christ, asking God for something, God's gonna
do it. God's gonna hear, God's gonna
answer, God's gonna do something. And I've seen the Lord marvelously
marvelously hear prayer, and I know that God answers prayer.
But then, brother, sister, I've seen things come into my life,
and just right after a great victory, after God had spoken
and led and delivered, and things come the very next day into your
life that just cuts the foundation out from under you, and you think,
I can never pray again. I just don't have it in my heart.
I don't have the strength to pray. I don't have the ability
to cry to God. I just don't have the ability,
I don't have the heart to keep on with this thing of praying
and crying to God. Now that's the way Satan works.
That's exactly the way it works. When my friend, the Lord, will
hear the voice of your supplication, Wherever you are and so that's
the lesson that I learned from this that while breath lasts
and gives power to feel a desire Never cease to supplicate the
Lord. Just keep on praying Even if you find yourself in a whale's
belly down at the foot of the mountains The weeds wrapped around your
neck Even if you find yourself there
I cried to God out of the belly of hell. Just don't ever give
up praying. God forgive me for giving it
up sometimes myself in my heart. Say, well, I just don't have
the heart to do it. I'll just let it ride. I'll just
let it slide and see what the Lord does. Cry to God, my friend. Now the last lesson is this. Let us always speak well of his
mercies. Because while we may have had
a hard lot, we have had mercy too. We've had the mercy of God. We've experienced the mercy of
God. While you may not be making nothing
today, you're still living, and you're living off of something,
and surely God has blessed you sometime or other, or you would
have nothing. God has blessed you. God has
blessed you, so let us always speak well of his mercy. Now,
if we have bitterly complained, let us, with equal vigor, declare
the goodness of God. David said, I said in my haste,
and cut off before thine eyes, nevertheless, nevertheless, I
must confess it, thou heardest the voice of my supplication.
You heard me, nevertheless, you heard me, when I cried to you. So we must, my friend, We must
be forward to speak well of the mercy and goodness of God, whatever
be our situation this morning. Now let's make up our minds that
just as much as I have ever disbelieved, that I have ever mistrusted,
that I have ever murmured, ever complained, so will I do in the
way of trusting and praising God. that I will attempt, just
as I have been one way, I will attempt to come back the other
way and to at least have a balance in my life. But my friend, would
we be satisfied with that? No. No, one says, well, if I
could just praise God as much as I've complained, if I could
just praise God as much as I've murmured, if I could just praise
God and thank God and talk about His goodness as much as I've
been just a downright rebel against God, then I'd be satisfied. Well, my friend, I wouldn't.
I wouldn't myself. Because I think God, I think
He should have more than that. I think that we should praise
the Lord more and more, a thousand times more than what we complained
and what we murmured. I think that it ought to, if
somebody said, well, now that fellow there, I will say this
about him, he praised God as much as he complained and murmured. Well, that's not a very good
testimony and I hope that nobody will say that about me when I'm
dead and gone. I'd like for them to say, that fellow praised God
more, 10,000 times more than he ever murmured and complained.
I wish it was that way. It probably is and I'm certainly
it's not that way now, but I have made an effort to try to keep
my mouth shut Not not complain not murmur when I could help
it, but my friend listen We must work on this. We've got to work
on this and so this is the lesson that These are the lessons that
I that I learned from this portion of scripture And I know this
is kind of a maybe a little different message this morning, but it's
so fresh on my mind that because of some things that I've experienced
recently and I just felt that this had to be brought this morning.
And maybe you're not plagued like other men. Maybe you're
not. Maybe you don't have the problems that other people have.
But my friend, I got them. I got it and I have to deal with
this and like I admitted to begin with, I was told just the other
day that a man teaches best what he has most need to learn and
so I hope this morning that what we've said here has been helpful
and that it has been encouraging to your heart. Now we're going
to have a hymn. Larry, would you

A Hasty Expression Retracted

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A Hasty Expression Retracted

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