If you have a pew Bible, you'll
find it on page 366, 1 Samuel chapter 30. And I want to read
the first six verses to you. 1 Samuel chapter 30. And it came to pass, when David
and his men were come to Zaklag, on the third day that the Amalekites
had invaded the south, and Zaklag had and smitten Zaglag, and burned
it with fire." The Amalekites invaded the south. They invaded
this little town of Zaglag and burned it with fire. "...and
had taken the women captive that were therein. They slew not any,
neither great nor small, but carried them away and went on
their way. So David and his men came to
the city, and, behold, it was burned with fire. And their wives
and their sons and their daughters and all their belongings were
carried captive. Then David and the people that
were with him lifted up their voice and wept until they had
no more power to weep. And David's two wives were taken
captive, Ahinaam the Jezreelite and Abigail the wife of Nabal
the Carmelite. And David was greatly distressed
for the people's faith of stoning him Because the soul of all the
people were grieved, every man for his sons and for his daughters. But David encouraged himself
in the Lord." David encouraged himself in the Lord. And I want to speak with you
this morning some things that encourage me, that strengthens
my heart and my spirit, inspires me to go on as I walk with the
Lord by faith and seek His will and seek to live my life as a
believer. Some things that inspire me.
Now, I think verse 6 shows the importance here of encouragement. What it means to be encouraged. Can you imagine what condition
David was in at this time? I think this is probably the
greatest trial that this man faced in his lifetime, and he
faced some severe trials. One of the reasons we love the
Psalms is because David speaks from the depths of his soul.
In the midst of his affliction, he talks. This was a man who
was very tender in his heart. Boy, he could feel. He could
feel. When he suffered, he felt it. And that's what he wrote
about in the book of Psalms, and that's why we love him so
much. But can you imagine how he felt here? This was his last
place of refuge. King Saul had hunted David, had
his whole army seeking to kill him. They had ran him out of
Israel. David said, I know if I stay
here in Israel, Saul is going to kill me one day. So he went
down to the Philistines to a man by the name of Achish, the king
of Gath. And Gath gave him this little
community, this little town by the name of Zaklag. And David
took his wives and 600 men and their wives and their children
and their sons and all their belongings and they moved down
here to this little community of Zaklag. And they lived there
and protected the place. They owned it. And David and
his soldiers had gone off to try to fight in a battle. They
came back and these cruel Amalekites had invaded the land. They had
burned Zaklag down. They had taken all their belongings,
their wives and their sons and their daughters, and they went
back towards Egypt. And here David comes and his
men, and this is what they find. Can you imagine how they felt?
This was not only their last place of refuge that they had
to hide out in. Now they had lost their wives.
They had lost their children and all their belongings. And
we know how they felt. They wept until they had no more
strength to weep. They had no idea what they were
going to do. And this was not only their only place of refuge,
and they had lost everything, but now David had faced this.
His men were so grieved they were ready to stone him. Now,
he had some dear friends. These men were his friends for
the most part. He had some rascals among his
men, and I doubt seriously if his friends would have let them
stone him. But they spake of stoning him. That's how serious
the situation was. And we're told right in the midst
of this, in the last part of verse 6, this is the way that
the Lord encouraged David to face this situation. You know
he had only two options available to him. It seems to me he had
two choices. In this awful, awful dilemma
he faced, he could either despair. He could either just throw up
his hands and say, we're hopeless and we're helpless. We don't
know what to do. Or he could do what he did. Encourage
himself in the Lord. And that's what he did. He encouraged
himself in the Lord. and the Lord his God. And I love
the way he says that. During the last part of verse
6, David encouraged himself in the Lord his God. The Lord was his God. And that means he's David's covenant
God. Because this is the way the covenant
runs, isn't it? I will be their God, and they
shall be my people. He was David's covenant God.
And David said, if he's mine, that means I'm his. And he encouraged
himself that God was his covenant God. And I'm sure he encouraged
himself in this, that God was the Almighty God. Boy, that had to be encouraging,
that there's nothing outside of God's control and outside
of His power. Here are these wicked men. had
come in and burned Zak Lag and taken their wives and their children,
and who knows what they had done with them and done to them. But
David encouraged himself to know this, that though this was a
mighty cruel army that had did this to them, there was one that
ruled over them. He is the Almighty. He is the
King in heaven and in earth. You say, Bruce, are you sure
that David believed that? I am certain he believed that.
Because they asked him one day in his trouble, they said, David,
where is your God now? And what was his answer? My God's
where He's always been. He's in heaven. And He hath done
whatsoever He hath pleased. And David encouraged himself
in this. In the providence of God, that though things seemed
so bad, and it was for them, God still ruled in heaven and
He ruled in this earth. And one commentator said this
about the last portion of verse 6, David encouraged himself in
the Lord. And this commentator said, this
literally reads in the Hebrews, that he encouraged himself in
the Word of the Lord. And who would that be? Well,
that's Jesus Christ, isn't it? That's the Son of God, the living
Word. David knew the Son of God. He
says, He's my Lord. And he knew as well as you do
and I do that there's grace in the Lord Jesus Christ. And Paul
told Timothy in his trouble, he said, be strong in the grace
that's in the Lord Jesus Christ. So David encouraged himself in
Christ and in the grace that's in Christ. Be strong in the Lord
and in the power of his mind. And I bet you he encouraged himself
in the wisdom of his God. David saw no way of remedying
this awful situation they found themselves in. But he knew that
God was wiser than he was. And though he couldn't see a
way, he couldn't see the avenue to take, he went to the Lord
and said, Lord, You're wise. And though with man this is impossible,
with God all things are possible. And that's the way he encouraged
himself. Now, you and I know how this
turns out, don't we? We know how this story turns
out. Look in verse 8. We know how it turns out because
we've read it. Look in verse 8. And David inquired at the
Lord, saying, Shall I pursue after this troop? Shall I overtake
them? And the Lord answered him, and
this is what he said, Pursue, for thou shalt surely overtake
them, and without fail recovered all. And in verse 18, here's
what David did. And David recovered all that
the Amalekites had carried away, and David rescued his two wives,
and there was nothing lacking to them, neither small nor great,
neither sons nor daughters, neither spoil nor anything that they
had taken to them. David recovered all. Now, that's the way the story
is. And he took their stuff as spoil. But don't this show us
how important it is to be encouraged? Some of these stories you see,
and you see in some of these stories a turning point. Some
of the stories it's so evident, a turning point in the situation
that they find themselves in. And where was the turning point
in this story? when David encouraged himself
in the Lord. It shows how important it is,
brothers and sisters, for us to speak to ourselves and encourage
ourselves in the Lord. And David often did that. Remember
the time that he said to his soul, Why are you cast down,
O my soul? Why are you disquieted within
me? Why are you so troubled? Hope thou in God. in your sovereign
God and Savior. I shall yet praise Him who is
the help and the help of your countenance." He encouraged himself
in the Lord. And being encouraged in the Lord
may not always change your circumstances for the better. But it will change
your attitude for the better. And I'm telling you, when our
attitude changes, that's half of the battle. We may have to endure unfavorable
circumstances, but we don't have to endure unfavorable attitudes. We can encourage ourselves in
the Lord our God. And isn't there enough in our
God to encourage us? He's our covenant God. He's our
God as much as He was David's. And isn't there enough in Jesus
Christ and His grace to encourage us? Well, sure there is. And
there is enough in the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of promise to encourage
us. So we have a trial in God as well as David in the same
God. And you and I ought to encourage ourselves in the Lord. And I
want to quickly, I'll just keep you a few minutes, I want to
give you seven things that encourage me. Seven things in the Lord
that encourages me. And first is this, I find encouragement. in the Lord's people. I find
encouragement in you. When Robin came in this morning,
I saw her come in the door. It just encouraged me to death. I'm encouraged in the Lord's
people. You know, we're commanded to
assemble as we are this morning. But you know that's not a legal
commandment. We don't threaten people with
hell. If you don't show up When the church doors are open, I'm
telling you, you're in big trouble. You're probably going to hell.
That's not the way. And that's the wonderful thing.
That's the encouraging thing about it. Why are you here this
morning? Because you love the Lord. You
love Him because of what He's did for you. You love Him because
you believe in Him. And you're here this morning
to show that. There's no place you'd rather
be this morning but in the assembly of the saints. And I'm telling
you, not just as a pastor, but just as a believer, it encourages
me to death when the saints come together in unity of spirit to
worship the Lord in spirit and in truth. I tell you, I've been,
and some of you have too. You've been where you didn't
have the saints together with. There's been times when me and
my wife and my family had to go off someplace to try to find
a place to worship, and we came home wishing we'd have stayed
home. That's how bad it was. But you come here, and you announce
the page to sing, and you sing in your heart, and that's so
encouraging to me. And you listen to the Word preached,
and you delight in it. And that's encouraging to me.
And when we pray and when we read the Scriptures, you're interested
in that because you love the Lord. You love His people. And
I'm telling you, that's encouraging to me. And all the things that
goes on in a little congregation even like this is encouraging
to me because a lot of times it's just about worship, isn't
it? You ladies, almost every Sunday, Because of the type of
worship that we have to have here, you cook a meal for us. And I'm telling you, that's encouraging
to me. What would we do in our evening worship if you girls
didn't do that? Some of the people wouldn't be
allowed to stay. Barb would have to go home if
we met at six o'clock like we used to. This yard back here
has to be mowed. Somebody does that. Somebody
cleans this building. We got a dear brother that every
week he spends time studying his Bible to teach our children
and our grandchildren. That's encouraging to me. We
got men that take time out of their schedule and they pour
their heart into studying God's Word to come here in our Sunday
school class and teach to us what we heard this morning. That's
encouraging to me. And for you who gather here and
sit patiently to hear and you want to be here and you delight
to be here. That's encouraging to me. You're
encouraging to me. And I tell you sometimes when
I'm down, I think of you folks and I think of your faithfulness
and all that you do in your work and in your worship here. And
that's encouraging to me. Very encouraging to me. I see
God's people coming together to maintain public worship. I
know a church down in North Carolina, and it's almost ready to close
its doors. There are just a handful of old,
old people left. A young man has gone there to
teach them, but he said when they're all gone, they're just
going to close the doors. Isn't that sad? Don't you hope
and pray that doesn't happen here. public worship. It's so important. It's so essential. And that's why I'm encouraged
in you folks. I'm encouraged. That's the first
thing. I encourage myself in the Lord's people. Secondly, it's encouraging to me to know
that I'm a sinner. It's not encouraging to me to
be a sinner. I tell you, that's the most discouraging thing that
I ever faced, is being a sinner. But it encourages me that I know
it. There was a time in my life I was ignorant of it, and I didn't
need a Savior. I didn't seek a Savior because
I didn't feel like I needed one. But now I know my need of a Savior,
and I rejoice that I have one, a great Savior. But it's because
I'm aware that I'm A sinner. I mean a bad sinner. If you want
to hear a good message, Pastor Todd Nybert down at the conference
Friday night, he preached on, Are You a Roman Seven Sinner?
And man, when he was finished, he sized me up. He told me just
exactly what I was and how I was. And I agreed with everything
he said about me. Listen to what Paul said in Romans
7 and see if you can't relate to this. He said, When I would
do good, evil is present with me. You never live your life,
dear child of God, not one moment's time when evil is not present
with you. And where is that evil coming
from? He said, In me, in my flesh, dwells no good thing. It comes
from within us, doesn't it? It comes from this old nature
that we'll never get rid of as long as we live in this world.
We're sinners. Listen to what he said in verse
22. I delight in the law of God after
the inward man, but I see another law in my members, warring against
the law of my mind and bringing me into captivity into captivity
to the law of sin which is in my members." Paul said, I'm just
like a man that has been kidnapped. I'm like a man like David's wives
were. I've been taken captive. And
the Amalek has taken me down and put me in jail and I can't
get out. I'm captive. Captive to what? To sin. To sin. And boy, I tell you what, I don't
know if somebody's here this morning and they're self-righteous
and they're legalistic and they don't know themselves, this statement
is just going to grieve you to death. And you may be tempted
to get up and leave, but here's the way it is with God's people.
You cannot not sin. Have you ever did anything that
sin wasn't mixed with it? When I would do good and, oh,
I would do good and you would do good. Evil is present, and
it corrupts and influences everything I do, and I can't get away from
it. I can't get out of this situation.
I'm taken captive by sin. You know, we talk about being
sinners, and I think some people understand that sometimes and
think, well, but you're a good little sinner. You know, you're a nice little
sinner. But that's not the way we are. Boy, there's a warfare
going on inside the believer. The sin that's struggling there,
that's warring there, that you can't do anything. But sin is
mixed with it. Evil is mixed with it. All your
motives, all your thoughts. In your faith, it's full of unbelief. In your repentance, there's a
hard heart. You know what the Lord told His
disciples one day? And I tell you, the Lord knows
His people. He told His disciples, if you, being evil, know how
to give good gifts. Are you evil? Are you evil? I'm evil. He calls me evil. That's His judgment, and I know
it by experience. But I tell you this, I'm encouraged
by this. And the reason I'm encouraged
by this, I know that God knows what I am. He knows our frame. He remembers that we're just
dust. He knows we're fallen sinners.
And He sent us a Savior, a great one. He knew what kind of a Savior
it was going to take to save such people as we are. And Jesus
Christ by His grace and His merit and His worth is well capable
of saving sinners just like you and just like me. And that's
what encourages me to death. I think the Lord has to bring
us to a place to know ourselves so well that He forces us to
seek for salvation outside of ourselves. And a man never will
do that until God teaches him he's a sinner. He'll always be
looking to himself. I need to get my act together.
I need to do better. And he's always making these
promises to God and always vowing, always resolving. I'm going to
do better. I'm going to get better. But
you can't. So what do we do? We look to
one outside ourselves to save us by His righteousness, by His
obedience. Old John Bunyan wrote a book,
Justified by an Imputed Righteousness. It's the most wonderful book.
And in that book, he said, this is an amazing thing, that here
I am, a poor sinner upon this earth, have a righteousness of
one who is in heaven. Ain't that amazing? And that's
the way we're saved. But if you're not a sinner, you
won't seek a salvation outside of yourself. So I'm encouraged,
not that I'm a sinner, but I'm encouraged to know that I'm a
sinner. And then I can seek a great Savior
that's able to save a sinner like me. I think about that often,
don't you? Paul said, I'm chief of sinners,
didn't he? I think everybody thinks that about themselves.
Thirdly, this encourages me when I think about this. I encourage
myself to know and believe that I have the Holy Spirit abiding
in my heart. I often remind myself of that,
and I believe. I live by faith that the Holy
Spirit, the third person of the Sacred Trinity, has been sent
from heaven into my heart." Crying, Father, Father. And you know
something? This is why I feel about myself
the way I do. It's because He's there. You
want to know why I know myself to be a sinner? He's taught me
what a sinner I am. And He's revealed Jesus Christ.
He opens my heart to look outside of myself to the Lord Jesus to
trust Him and rest in Him as my Lord and my Savior. He gives
us grace to believe, doesn't He? That's why you believe. Isn't it amazing after all these
years? It's been 44 years. I've been
on the way for 44 years. And I am absolutely amazed that
I am still believing. I began to believe 44 years ago,
and I'm still believing. That's amazing to me. Because
I couldn't believe back then of myself, and I can't maintain
this faith. But the Holy Spirit within me
that gave me this gift, He upholds it. He upholds faith. And He implants within us the
graces of the Holy Spirit of love and joy and peace and long-suffering
and goodness and gentleness and faithfulness. You know why you're
so gracious. You know why the Lord's people
year after year are so merciful and long-suffering and patient? Because they have the Spirit.
They have the Holy Spirit within their hearts. And He just enables
us to keep on struggling. You know one of the ways you
know that God has begun to work a grace in your heart? You're
struggling. When He comes into your heart,
that's where the war begins. The flesh lusters against the
Spirit, the Holy Spirit. And the Spirit lusters the wars
against the flesh. And these two are contrary, the
one to the other. Isn't it amazing that there's
two armies within us? And they're fighting against
each other. And we don't get so discouraged that we just give
up and quit. Year after year, we just keep
struggling. And it's because the Spirit of God is in us. And He'll maintain His gifts.
He'll maintain His gifts. Listen to how Paul says it in
Ephesians 3.16. Here's what he prays for those
believers. That He would grant you, according
to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might by
His Spirit. in the inner man. I was talking
to Jean one day. She was really, really sick.
And I asked her something about how I should pray for her. You
know what she told me. And I will forget Jean telling
me this. It wasn't so important that I pray for her body, but
you know what she told me. She said, pray that the Lord
would strengthen me in my inner man. Well, that's what Paul was
talking about, isn't it? that He would strengthen you
with might. That's what enables you to keep
believing. That's what enables you to be long-suffering and
gracious and forgiving. You're strengthened with might
by His Spirit in your inner man. Paul was writing to Timothy,
and here's what he said. That good thing which was committed
unto you, keep by the Holy Ghost. that dwells in you. What is that
good thing? Well, in Timothy's case, it was
probably the gift of preaching. That's a good thing, isn't it?
Well, if you sit under a good preacher or a good pastor, you
say, man, that's good. That's good. Where did he get
that gift? The Holy Spirit imparted it to
him. And Paul said the Holy Spirit will uphold that gift in you.
And you know, I've seen this in myself. Well, sometimes, church,
I'll be honest with you, I'm just ready to quit. I mean, when
I open God's Word day after day and there's nothing there but
blank pages, and you pray for a message and all you get is
the difficult warfare, and you say, man, it doesn't make no
sense to me trying to get anything to feed those people. I'm as
empty as I can be. But then, just in time, the message
comes. Why is that? The Holy Spirit
has given a gift and He upholds it. And that's it, isn't it? And you can apply that to every
child of God. When He gives you His gifts,
He upholds His gifts in your heart. I tell you, one of the
best gifts He can give to the church is the gifts of helps.
That's one of the gifts, ain't it? The gifts of helps. And there are some people that
just help everybody. That's all they do, just help,
help, help, help, help. And how do they keep doing that
all the year? The Holy Spirit gave them that
gift, and He upholds that gift. That good thing kept by the Holy
Ghost. Look in Colossians chapter 1,
verse 11. We've been hearing a lot about
Pentecostals in our last day. I told you last week about how
me and Gibb felt about that whole doctrine of the Pentecostal. One of the arguments the Pentecostals
have about gifts, they say the gifts never ceased. The gift
of tongues and the gift of miracles, of healing and all of this never
ceased in the New Testament church. Well, miracles didn't cease,
did they? He still does miracles, my goodness.
One of the greatest miracles he's doing today is taking an
old dead sinner and giving him life. A man is lame, spiritually,
and he gives him legs. That's a miracle, isn't it? But
they say, well, you shouldn't say the miracle of these tongues
and things has ceased. Well, here's a miracle. Here's
a gift. Look at this in Colossians chapter
1, verse 11. Strengthen with all might. Strengthen with might in your
inner man by his spirit. according to His glorious power
unto all patience and long-suffering and joyfulness." Man, there's
a gift, isn't it? Strengthen to be patient. Strengthen
to endure trials. Strengthen to be long-suffering
one with another and to do it all cheerfully and joyfully. Man, that's a gift we need. That's
a miracle we need in our hearts. I'll take that over tongues any
day, won't you? If somebody's going to lay hands
on me, I want them to pray, Lord, put your power in him and give
him patience. Don't give him another tongue,
he's having trouble with the one he has, but make him patient.
Give him strength to be patient. The fourth thing is this. I encourage myself in the Lord.
I encourage myself in this. This is such an encouragement
to me. Listen to this now. That every person, without exception,
that God has elected to eternal life will hear the gospel and
believe it. And in believing it, they shall
never fall away and be lost. Now that's encouraging to me.
I spent a lot of my Christian life trying to save people. And
as the pastor, I thought, boy, if people aren't being saved,
it's your fault. We talk about a burden now, Wayne.
You carry that burden around a while. And when people sat
under the gospel and they left, that just tore my heart out and
I blamed myself. But you know I got over that
for the most part. And I refuse to carry that burden
anymore. That's a charge that God has
laid on Himself. Him choosing His people, Christ
redeeming His people, the Holy Spirit calling them and saving
them and keeping them is not a charge He's laid on me. I could
not bear it. That doesn't mean I get slothful.
That doesn't mean I'm neglectful about warning and encouraging
and preaching to people. It just means I do not accept
the responsibility to save people and keep people anymore. That's
His business. That's His business. And I'm
telling you what, since I gave up on trying to do it, it seems
like things are going well. You know what he said? The Lord
added to the church daily, such as should be saved. And you know
what else he said? Except the Lord keep the city,
the watchman waketh but in vain. And if people just got me watching
over them, you're in trouble, bud. That's all I've got to say. I can't keep you and I can't
save you. And that's a big load lifting
off of me. And always I go around reminding myself, Lord, this
is your business. You give me a message, I'll preach
it, and then it's between you and them. Do with it what you
will and do with them what you will. Do with my grandchildren. Do with my children. Do with
everybody what you will. I'm satisfied with that, brothers
and sisters. Because I know in the end, everybody
that God has chosen to life eternal, the Holy Spirit will bring them
to faith in Christ. He'll bring them to hear the
gospel. And that's encouraging, isn't it? It's encouraging. He's
kept me. He's kept me all these years.
And He's kept you. And He's keeping everybody that
He saves. Fifthly is this, I often encourage
myself in this, that God is my portion. God is my portion. Listen to what a man by the name
of Asap wrote in Psalm 73. He said, My flesh and my heart
fails me, but God is the strength of my heart and He is my portion
forever. Now, sometimes you read Psalm
73 and look at the context. You remember what kind of shape
Asap was in. He was envious at the wicked. He saw how they'd prospered and
they weren't in trouble like everybody else. And he began
to get jealous. He began to envy them and lust
and covet. Oh, he began to think in his
heart, I wish I was like that. I wish I had what they had. He said, they just curse, they
covet, they heaped at themselves all these things and they prosper.
Even when they die, in their death, there's no bans, there's
no fear. And he said, I'm troubled every
day. Every morning I get up, God's chastening hands upon me.
And finally, he went into the worship service and somebody
preached on the end of the wicked and said, God has set them in
slippery places. And it's just like he's asleep.
But when he awakes, he's going to despise their image. And they
may not have any fear in their death. But he said, one moment
after their death, they're utterly consumed with terrorists. Man
better be careful not being afraid of death. If you ain't afraid
of death, you better make sure it's because you've got a hope
in Him who died for you and rose again. Because if you don't have
an interest in Christ, my friend, death will consume you. It will
consume you. And he came to his senses and
realized him coveting them after what the world had and the ungodly
had was so wrong. And that's the context of this
verse where he finally comes to say, God is my portion. My wife has always given me credit
and too much credit. for being so generous. She keeps
telling people, he'd give everything we had away. I give him a hundred
dollars and it don't last him a day. He just goes and gives
it away. She has no idea how covetous and stingy I am in my
heart. You know the reason I do that?
Because I want to hang on to it so bad. And I know if I don't
give it away and let go of it, he's going to get a hold of me.
And this is what helps me, brothers and sisters. I've got too much
now. I've got too much of this world
now. But here's what encourages me. Whether I have a lot or have
little, it means nothing in the light of this. God is my portion
forever. I'm an heir of God and joint
heir of Jesus Christ. What in the world does that mean?
He's given everything to His Son. And His Son belongs to me. He's mine. And everything He
has is mine. And He's my portion. If Christ
is yours, everything He has is yours. And the last time I read,
the earth was the Lord's and the fullness of our heart. Everything
is His. He's my portion. I was in Tennessee, coming out
of Tennessee, Saturday morning. Must be time for election down
there or something, and I noticed these signs. I didn't know what
they were to start with, but I saw a friend of mine. I went
to high school with him. He's a freewill Baptist preacher.
He's not freewill, but he is freewill. He doesn't have freewill
on his sign on his church, but he's freewill. He asked me to
preach for him one time. I preached for him one time.
But I saw his picture on there, and I thought, he's advertising
his church. trying to get people, telling
people where the church is, and he had a big picture of himself on there.
Then I kept seeing them all the way down the road. I kept seeing
these billboards and signs on the side of the road, and I slowed
down and looked at one of them, and he's running for county commissioner. I thought, I know he's got all
kinds of money. I know he's got a great job too,
and yet he's trying to pastor, and now he's running for another
office? You know what's the matter with
some people? They're not content with God being their portion.
They've got to have the power. They've got to have the name.
They've got to have the stuff. I have a dear old neighbor. She's
gone now. And she was talking about her grandchildren. And
boy, I mean to tell you, we know them. They were just keeping
everything. I don't know how they're supporting everything
they have. And she said, you know what your problem is? They're
not content with Christ. They're not content with Christ.
Is He your portion forever? Isn't that encouraging? We're
going to lose everything. I mean, we brought nothing into
this world, and it's certain we ain't going to take nothing
out. Isn't it wonderful, then, to know that the eternal God
is your first portion forever? You'll never lose Him, and He's
everything, and He's your portion forever and forever. You'll inherit God, whatever
in the world that means. This often encourages me, this,
secondly, two more things, and I'll close quickly. This has
encouraged me now for I don't know how many years, that I have
complete and continue access to God and to His throne of grace. Free, continue access to God. No matter how I feel, no matter
how tired I am, no matter how weak my faith is, no matter how
darkened my understanding is, I have complete and free access
to go into the very presence of God in prayer and be accepted
every time I go. Through Jesus Christ, my Lord. Paul said, we have access by
Him. Sometimes when I'm out in my
study, late nights when I was out in my study, I had to do
some things, and man, I was wore out. When I went in the house,
I was wore out. But you know, I went to prayer. I said, Lord,
I couldn't hardly open my eyes. But I went to prayer. And you
know what encouraged me to go to prayer? The door is wide open,
and the Father is able and fully willing and does accept me in
His Son and through His Son. He sent Him at His right hand
on purpose to give us access. Oh, dear soul, if you knew this
morning, saints and lost people alike, if you knew this morning
How Jesus Christ had thrown the door of mercy and grace and salvation
and help wide open to every sinner that approaches Him to God the
Savior. You'd run to Him. You'd run to Him. It don't matter
what kind of condition you're in. It don't matter who you are
or what you've done. None of that matters. The door
is wide open. And Jesus Christ is the door. Lastly is this. Number seven
is this. I was reading a lot of that.
I was reading about Charles Spurgeon. And they said Charles Spurgeon
would be talking to you. And all of a sudden he just quit
talking to you and go talking to the Lord. They said that happened
all the time. They said it was strange. You'd
just be talking to him, and he'd be talking to you, and all of
a sudden, he'd just start bowing his head and talking to the Lord.
That's how free of access we are. Go to him any time, under
any circumstances. Go to him always. Four hundred
and ninety times a day, go to him. And I'm telling you, you'll
find a free access in the very presence of God your Father,
through Jesus Christ the Lord. And lastly is this. I rejoice
in this. God has an eternal purpose, and
that purpose is infallibly fixed. It's infallibly fixed. It's not blind fate. It's not whatever will be, will
be. It's God has a purpose, and He's working in His mighty power. and wisdom to bring that purpose
to pass. And it will come to pass. Known
unto God are all His works from the foundation of the world.
I have purposed it, I'll also do it. And if you're here this
morning and He's called you and He's showed you that He's concluded
you in His eternal purpose, then know this, your destiny is fixed. Your destiny is fixed. And no
circumstances you find yourself in will change that. Boy, I'm
going to fix now. That's what David said. Well,
what are we going to do now? All of your doubts and all of
your fears will never change God's purpose. It's fixed. Your eternal happiness has already
been decided by God. Isn't that wonderful? Don't that
encourage you? Nothing else matters, does it?
What else matters? Why should suffering get us down
when our eternal happiness is fixed? So what if we lose everything? So what if we lose our health?
We'll not lose our salvation. It's eternally fixed. I'm encouraged
in the Lord, and I hope you are too. God bless you. Let's pray.