The title of the message is Good
News for the Poor and Needy. So the problem is not with the
good news. It is good news. It is real. It is precious. But
finding someone who's poor and needy. All of us like to think
about the second part of this verse, and we'd like to apply
it to ourselves. The Lord thinketh upon me. The
Lord thinketh upon me. That part of the text has a lot
of takers. But the first part of the text
has few takers. I'm poor and needy. Most of us
will admit this is scriptural. This is good theology. I'm poor
and needy. No question about that. There's
none good, no not one. That's what the Bible said. But
can I say spontaneously and mean it from my heart, I am not good. I am not good. There is none
good, and that means I'm not good. This is good theology. They all together become unprofitable. Can I say spontaneously and in
reality and mean it from my heart, I am to God unprofitable? There are not many takers of
this poor and needy part of the verse. There are a lot of them
that wish the Lord would think upon them or believe the Lord
does think upon them. But the prophet wrote, I am poor
and needy, and the Lord thinketh upon me. This is good theology.
Man at his best state is altogether vanity. Now, can I say from my
heart sincerely, I am altogether, in my best moment, in my best
prayer, in my most righteous hour, I am altogether vanity. Spurgeon said one time, there's
a good possibility that when we feel nearest to God, we're
farthest away. And when we feel farthest away
from God, there's a good possibility that's about as close as we've
ever been. Man at his best state. God knoweth our frame. He remembereth
that we're dust. Do we remember it? He remembereth
that we are dust. I could say this is good theology,
and we believe it. In my flesh dwelleth no good
thing. In my flesh, not in flesh in
general, not in the world's flesh, but in my flesh, right now, even
standing in this pulpit with the open Bible before me, looking
into the face of those whom I love, and talking about the God in
whom I believe, and the Master whom I trust, about a salvation
that I claim to have. In me there's nothing good. Can
you really say that? That's what we're talking about.
It's one thing to hold this position theologically, and I'm afraid
of holding anything theologically that I haven't experienced. I told our preacher's class Saturday
a week ago, yesterday a week ago, preach what you know. Don't
try to preach what you don't know. And what you know is what
you've experienced. A man can't tell what he doesn't
know. He can't preach what he hasn't experienced. He can talk
about it, but he can't preach it. He can't enter into it, and
the people listening to him are well aware that he hasn't entered
into it, and neither can they. It's one thing to hold this position
theologically. It's quite another to experience
it, to be able to say with a broken heart, with a contrite spirit,
I am poor and needy. It's a whole lot easier to recognize
our good qualities It's a whole lot easier to talk about them.
It's a whole lot easier to talk about our good qualities and
our good fortunes. It's a whole lot easier to say
I'm rich and increased with goods and really have need of nothing.
What should we pray about? Well, what is there to pray about?
Well, a man who's poor and needy has a whole lot to pray about.
Maybe that's the reason we don't pray. Somebody says, I don't
pray like I ought. Maybe you're not in need. I guarantee
you, everybody who is in trouble prays. Everybody who's needy
prays. The reason our children don't ask
us for things is they don't need anything. They have everything.
Maybe the reason we're not talking to the Heavenly Father about
our needs is we don't have any. Or somebody gets sick and we
all start praying, or somebody dies and we all start praying,
Somebody gets in an accident and goes to the hospital, we
all start praying. Or somebody gets in trouble,
we all start praying. But we are poor. I am, listen,
I am right now poor and needy. So as I say, there's no problem
with the message. I have a message. I have good
news. I am poor and needy, yet the
Lord thinketh upon me. But the problem is finding someone
who needs this message? Is there someone here tonight
who can say, I am poor and needy? What about you, pastor? Are you
poor and needy? What about you, elder? Are you
poor and needy? What about you, deacon? Are you
poor and needy? What about you, mom, dad, young
person? Are you poor and needy? Joseph
was. See him sitting down there in
the jail, in the dungeon. He was accused of rape. He didn't have a friend in Egypt. His reputation was gone. He was
plumb broke. He was accused and punished unjustly. He was reproached. If there's
any man in Egypt that was poor and needy, his family thought
he was dead. His father thought he was dead.
If there was any man that's ever been totally alone and totally
deserted and totally poor and totally needy, it was Joseph.
But Joseph, I got good news for you. The Lord thinketh upon you. All is well. All is well. What about Ruth? Ruth was a Moabitess,
the heathen. She'd come from a heathen country
that did not believe in Jehovah, did not worship the Lord God,
and she was here in Israel. You talk about a stranger in
a foreign land. Not only was her language strange,
but her religion was strange, and her habits were strange,
and everything was strange. Here she was, a beggar with no
friends, ragged, poverty-stricken, out in the field. following along
behind the reapers, picking up what they left. But Ruth, you're
not alone. Though poor and needy, the Lord
thinketh upon you. All is well. What about the apostles? poor fishermen with their little
boats and their worn nets. They were always mending their
nets. Have you ever noticed that through the Scripture? They were
always mending their nets because their nets had been used a long
time. They were smelly, they were dirty, they'd never amount
to anything. And here they were down by the
Sea of Galilee, mending their nets, hoping they'd make a catch
tomorrow for their livelihood depended upon catching fish sometime
during the day. But I'll tell you this, James
and John and Peter, you don't know it, but the Lord thinketh
upon you, and all is well. What about the Samaritan woman? Here was a woman who had had
five husbands. Here was a woman who was living
in disgrace, for she was at that time living, and everybody knew
it, with a man who wasn't her husband. She was the talk of
the town. She was the scarlet woman. She was absolutely friendly. She was living outside of accepted
moral. She was alone and unhappy. She
came to the well when nobody else came. She came in the heat
of the day when the burning sun was scorching down upon that
part of the country at noon when she knew she'd meet nobody. But
I can just see her, she left that house empty and desolate
and in despair and reproach and with friendless and lonely and
tired and weary and disgraced and walking towards that well,
hoping she'd meet nobody, unconscious of the fact that the Lord was
thinking upon her. Oh, I tell you, that thrills
me, just think about it. The Lord was thinking upon her. Good thoughts. Merciful thoughts,
gracious thoughts. Oh, I'm sure some more folks
were thinking about her too, but not that way. The Lord was
thinking merciful thoughts. Samaritan woman, the Lord thinketh
upon you. We'll go a step further. Here's
a dying thief. Somebody said he was the outcast
that the outcast cast out. Condemned and convicted and doomed
to die and already nailed to a tree. People walking around
his cross laughing at him. Ridiculing him, mocking him.
No one cares. Watching his blood stream off
his hands and drip to the sand. And mocking his suffering and
agony. Nobody cares for you, thief.
You're getting what you deserve. You admit it yourself. There's
somebody thinking of him. The Lord thinketh on thee. The
Lord God, he thinketh on thee solitarsis. This may be applicable
to somebody here. Saul of Tarsus, wrapped in his
religious robes and in his garments of personal merit, and here he
is, angry with God and angry with Christ and angry with the
people who worship Christ and didn't know the living God, wrapped
in his traditions and heritage and pride, and going about to
destroy and devour everybody he could, a persecutor, injurious,
ignorant, a blasphemer, If anybody thought on Saul of
Tarsus, he thought with fear. Because when the Lord came to
Ananias and said, you know a man named Saul? And Ananias said,
Lord, I know him. I know him. He's to be avoided. He's to be feared. The Lord said,
he's special to me. He's special to me. In all of
his hate and blasphemy, in all of his persecution, in all of
his ignorance, I'm thinking on him. Boy, I tell you, if it's
anybody here tonight who's poor and needy, I've got some of the
best news you ever heard. Look at that verse again. I'm
poor and needy. I'm poor and needy, fallen and
addled, distressed, despondent, broke, weary, sinful. I'm poor, am nothing, have nothing,
know nothing, needy, I need all things, I'm empty. Yet the Lord
thinketh upon me. Well, let me give you four things
that I believe this suggests. First of all, this verse ought
to encourage our faith, every one of us. This ought to encourage
our faith. First of all, somebody says,
But how can I believe this? I'm so little. I'm so little. You realize you're talking to
somebody that's so little. How can God, the infinite, eternal,
immutable God whom the heavens will not contain, how can he
think upon one so finite, so little, so small? Well, let me ask you this. Let
me ask you two or three questions. First of all, is there anything
that's not small to God? If God thinks on anything which
He does, it's got to be small. Turn to Isaiah 40. Let me show
you something here. In Isaiah chapter 40. This ought
to encourage your faith. You say, but I'm so small. I'm
so insignificant. People of the town don't even
know me. People that live next door to
me don't even know me. I'm nothing. I'm so little. Well,
anything God thinks on is going to be little. Because it says
in Isaiah 40, verse 15, listen to it, Isaiah 40, 15, Behold,
the nations, the nations are as a drop of a bucket, and are
counted as a small dust of the balance. Behold, he taketh up
the isles as a very little thing, and Lebanon, Lebanon, the forests
of Lebanon, are not sufficient to burn, nor the beasts thereof
sufficient for burnt offerings. All nations before him are as
nothing, and there counted to him less than nothing in vanity. Look at verse 22. It is he that
sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof
are as grasshoppers. Yes, everything is little to
God. God is greater than all His works,
and therefore His thoughts must be on little things. Our God
doth inhabit the heavens. Did you ever hear a scientist
describe the universe? How absolutely vast it is, how
many millions and millions and millions and millions of miles
it goes, and how many billions of stars are out there, and planets
and heavenly bodies, and God Almighty, all of them are in
God? Everything is little. The whole earth is little. The
nations are little. If God thinks upon anything,
he thinks upon that which is little. Here's another question.
You say, but I am nothing. I'm so little. I'm so sinful. Why would God think upon me?
Let me ask you this. Who needs God the most? Why,
the poor and needy. If you see a physician hurrying
down the street, a doctor, And I want to ask you, where is he
going? Well, you'd say he's going to the house of a sick person.
How do you know? Well, he's a doctor. And that's
what our Lord said to those people in his day. He said, the well
don't need a physician but they that are sick. Even so, the Son
of Man has not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance. So if I see a doctor coming this
way, he's not coming to see me. I know he's not coming to see
me because I'm not sick. He's coming to see somebody who
needs him, and the God of grace is a God of grace to the guilty.
I believe most churchgoers and most people in the world have
the wrong conception of God and His grace and His mercy. The
church is a hospital for sick people, sin sick people. Somebody says, well, I don't
go to church, I'm not good enough. You see, this is the very thing,
Jay, that this is the very idea people have, that I don't want
to go there with those people. I'm not worthy. I'm not good
enough. Listen to me. Anybody here that's good, please
leave. You contaminate us. We're all sinners. That's like
the king who went to the prison one time, and his custom was
that when he went to the prison that he'd release one person
in honor of his visit. Every time he'd go to the prison,
in honor of his taking the time to visit the prison and all,
he'd release one man. And he came to the first man.
He said, why are you here? I've been framed, he said. Your
Majesty, I don't belong here. I'm basically a good person.
And it really wasn't me. It was the fellows that were
with me that committed the crime. He went to the next fellow and
said, why are you here? Well, he said, I don't belong here.
He said, and if you'll let me out, he says, I can promise you
I'll be a rehabilitated man and I'll be a good citizen. He found
that all the way. Finally, he found a fellow sitting in his
cell and he was weeping. And the king says, why are you
here? And the man looked up at him and said, Your Majesty, you
shouldn't even be talking to me. I'm a guilty man. In my rage
of temper, I killed a man. And he said, I'm guilty, and
I'm judged, and I'm condemned, and I'm going to die, and I deserve
to die, and I deserve no mercy because I showed no mercy on
my victim. The king called the guard and said, Release this
man. He said, This sinner doesn't belong in here with all these
good people. Turn him loose. Our Lord is merciful to the guilty. I want to preach to sinners who
know themselves to be sinners, who are genuine, bona fide, self-confessed
sinners, because Christ died for sinners. For whom did Christ
come into the world? He said, this is a fateful thing.
Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. I told the people Wednesday night,
there's a church down in the south that hasn't taken the Lord's
table for I think two, three or four years. And then somebody
asked them, why don't you observe the Lord's table? They said,
we're not worthy. We're going to wait until we're worthy enough,
then we're going to observe it. We've got this thing all wrong.
Our Lord, for whom did Christ die? Turn to Romans chapter 5,
Romans the fifth chapter. For whom did Jesus Christ die?
Just ask yourself this question. Did Jesus Christ die on the cross
for good people, for moral people, for religious people? No siree.
For whom did Christ die? In Romans chapter 5, listen,
verse 6. When we were yet without strength
in due time, Christ died for the ungodly. Boy, not a whole
lot of people that admit to being ungodly. Verse 8, God commended
His love toward us while we were yet sinners. Christ died for
us. This is a faithful saying, Christ
came to the world to save sinners. You go through the Bible, you'll
find this the attitude, I know, I don't know who's saved today,
or how many know, really know, genuinely know the Lord. I know
a lot of people are religious. Well, I don't know how many really
know the Lord, but it's some I know who knew the Lord. I know
Abraham did. I am positive Abraham knew God
because I have the very testimony of the Holy Spirit in the Word
of God that Abraham knew God. And I read Abraham making statements
like this, I who am dust and ashes have taken upon myself
to speak to God. Now you think about that. There's
the attitude of a man who knows God. I know that Job knew the
Lord because the Lord said he knew him. The Lord said, Job
is my serpent. Job is my own. He belongs to
me. Listen to Job. Behold, I am vile. I'll tell you, I've been to a
lot of religious meetings and I've heard a lot of testimonies
and I never heard in all my 34 years of preaching and experience,
I never heard anybody ever stand on the floor of a church and
give a testimony and say, behold, I am vile. Have you? And I expect in 34 more years
I won't hear it either. I wish I could. I wish I could
worship with some honest people, don't you? They tell the truth
on themselves. We'll tell the truth on the other
fellow, or what we think the truth is. Behold, I am bowed. Listen to David. I know David
knew God. I know this man knew God. God
said twice in the Bible, David is a man after my own heart.
I want you to listen to him. He says in his prayer, Who am
I and what is my house that God should look with favor upon me? I don't deserve your favor. I know Isaiah knew the Lord.
I'm sure he did. It says in Isaiah 6, he saw the
Lord. In John chapter 12, he saw the
Lord. And here Isaiah says, I'm a man
of unclean lips. I know Paul knew the Lord. I'm
sure he was a servant of God. God said himself, he's a chosen
vessel. And Paul says twice, I'm nothing,
nothing, nothing. I'm less than the least of all
the saints. I'm the chief of sinners. He said, I'm a wretched
man. So brother, I tell you this,
and I know God thought upon those men. God's thoughts were toward
them, God's thoughts were upon them, and God's mercy was toward
them. I know that. That ought to have
helped my faith, shouldn't it? I'm poor and needy. I'm poor
and needy. I'm poor and needy. We turn to
Luke chapter 15. Let me show you a verse that
just keeps coming back to me. I believe it's Luke 15. It'd
be easy to find over here. Luke 16. Yeah, Luke 16, 15. That's it. Listen to this verse.
This is us. Listen, when our Lord was here
on the earth, will you think with me a moment? And I know
our concept of religion in this day is all wrong. And I hear
the preachers, I turn on my TV and I listen to those fellows,
and I hear them talking about their victories and their successes
and their fastings and prayings and their freedom from sin and
their walk with God and their goodness and all their accomplishments
and their successes and all of these things, and I think, that's
not me. I don't live on that silver cloud. I don't live in
that bubble palace. I don't live. That's not my thoughts. I'm poor and needy. Oh, wretched
man that I am, I feel that deeply. And I'm uncomfortable around
those thoughts. And I read in Luke chapter 16,
verse 15, and he said unto them, you are they. which justify yourselves
before me. That's who you are. But God knows
your hearts. I'm glad nobody else does. It'd
be embarrassing, wouldn't it? But God knows them. And hold it, we're going to read
this to the rest some more. Our Lord, when He was here, He
said His kindest words were for sinners. His harshest condemnation, his
words, his scathing words of rebuke were for the religious
leaders. He picked out the highest religious
leaders. He picked out the scribes and
Sadducees and Pharisees and men who wore the broad phylacteries
and read the scripture on the straight corners and preached
on the straight corners and prayed on the straight corners and gave
their tithes down to the penny and fasted twice a week and prayed
and were moral and never broke the law. He reserved for them
these kind of words. You're a generation of snakes.
You're a bunch of whited sepulchers. On the outside, you're white,
but on the inside, you're full of dead men's bones. You're like
a cup that's been cleaned up on the outside, but on the inside,
you're full of rust and canker and evil." He didn't talk that
way to Samaritan woman. He didn't talk that way to the
woman found in adultery. He didn't talk that way to Zacchaeus,
who was one of the biggest crooks that ever walked in shoe lather.
He didn't talk that way to Peter. He didn't talk that way to these
sinners. But he did to these fellas because he knew their
hearts. He didn't need that anybody should
tell him what was going on inside. He said, it's not that which
you put in your mouth that's sending you to hell, it's that
which comes out of your mouth, for out of your heart comes these
evil thoughts and blasphemies and sin. You justify yourselves
before men, but God knows your heart, and that which is highly
esteemed among men, Luke 16, 15. What do we highly esteem? We
highly esteem our so-called morality and reputation and goodness and
piety and religion, religious deeds and successes, and he said
that's an abomination to God. And Paul in Philippians, he talked
about, he said, I'm a Hebrew of Hebrews. I had a Hebrew mom
and a Hebrew daddy. And he said, I was a Pharisee. And he said, I was born of the
tribe of Bethlehem. And he said, considering the
law of Moses, he said, I was blameless. But he said, I count
all these things but rubbish that I may win Christ and be
found in him. Oh, if we could just... Old Barnard
used to preach a sermon entitled, Honest People Don't Go to Hell.
Honest people don't go to hell. He didn't mean by that that people
that never stole a watermelon and people that never did this
or never did that. He's talking about folks that
are honest in their attitude and their spirit toward God and
confess themselves to be poor and I'm poor and needy. Yet the Lord thinketh upon me."
They said, why does your master eat with publicans and sinners?
Why doesn't he associate with us? Because our Lord came to
save sinners, the poor and needy. And our Lord, can you imagine
the Savior saying this to those religious leaders? Now you think
about this. This is hard. And if I were to say it, I'd
upset a whole lot of folks. But can you imagine him picking
out the president of one of the leading denominations, and the
leading evangelist, and the leading district superintendent, and
the leading moralist of our day, and pointing his finger in their
face, and saying, publicans and harlots will enter heaven, and
you'll find yourself cast out. But Jay, isn't that what he said?
That's exactly what he said. Now, no wonder they nailed him
to a cross. I can understand a little bit about it, can't
you? He was telling them how God shows mercy to sinners, and
they weren't sinners. They said, we'd be not sinners! All right, this ought to encourage
our hope. I'm poor and needy. The Lord thinketh upon me. This
ought to encourage our faith. Secondly, it ought to encourage
our hope. Our hope. The Lord thinketh upon me. The
Lord thinketh upon me. Now wait a minute, I can understand,
this will help you a little, I can understand how the Lord
could think upon a world of sinners. Christ, God so loved the world
that he gave his only begotten son. Christ died for our sins,
not for our sins only, but for the sins of the world. Men out
of every tribe, nation, kindred, and tongue unto heaven, God is
going to redeem. I can understand how God could
think of his elect, of all generations, back from Adam, Abel, Seth, Noah,
Enoch, Abraham, millions of them as the sands of the seashore
and the stars of the sky. But wait a minute, me? God thinketh
upon me? His thoughts are toward me? Me?
Yes, sir, let me ask you something. If Jesus Christ had come into
the world, to save one sinner or ten sinners or one million
sinners, what would he have to do? He'd have to do just exactly
what he did. That's right. He'd have had to,
as a man, obey the law, tempted, tried in every point as we are.
He would have had to go to the cross and suffer and die the
same death. It's not how much blood was shed
that saves, it's whose blood was shed. It's not how much he suffered,
it's who suffered. It's not how long he hung on
a cross. You say, you mean to tell me one man could hang on
a cross six hours and redeem men from an eternal hell? Yes,
sir, because of who that man is. Christ died. God thinketh
upon me as much as if there were nobody else in this world to
think on but me, as if I were the only child, me. And I'll
tell you something else beautiful. Let me show you this. When God
created man and put him on the earth, you know what he did before
he made him? He made the world for that man
to live upon. The whole earth was prepared
for that man. When Adam got here, there was water to drink. There
was fruit to eat. There was grass upon which to
lie. There was a sun to warm him. There was a night to cover
him. There was a tree to shade Him.
All of those things God prepared before He ever put Him here.
And I'll tell you this, this old sinner came into this world,
and before there was ever a sinner on this earth, God prepared salvation. The water of life, the bread
of life, the shadow of a rock in a weary land, the fountain
that flowed from the Savior's side, for He was the Lamb slain
before the foundation of the world. God thinketh upon me.
Salvation wasn't an afterthought. I beg your pardon. I hear people
talk about that's Old Testament, this is New Testament, that's
at dispensation, this is another dispensation. Let me tell you
this. In the matter of salvation, every
sinner that ever has been redeemed is redeemed by the blood of Christ.
Some looking to the cross and some looking back to the cross.
Some waiting for the Savior, some rejoicing that He came.
Every dispensation, Moses wrote of me, Abraham saw my day and
was glad. Abel, the blood of righteous
Abel, speaketh to this generation. He trusted the living Christ.
God's thoughts to me. Now let me show you this. God
thinks upon me, one insignificant little being. To everybody else
but to God, I'm important. Just how important am I to God?
But I'll tell you, to save me, He gave His Son. That's pretty
important. He gave His Son. For me, Christ
died for our sins. God gave His Son. And He had
His Son prepared for us and all the benefits and blessings of
redemption before we were ever born, before we ever came to
this earth. And you know something? If I can lay hold upon this verse,
I'm poor, empty, needy, but God thinketh upon me, I'll tell you
this, if He's ever thought upon you, He'll always think upon
you. Now let me show you that turn
to 2 or 3 verses. First to Malachi chapter 3. What I'm saying is this. You
know, in turn to Malachi 3, when those fellows came to the judgment
in Matthew 7, they said, We're preachers. Don't you know we're
preachers? We preached in your name and Lord, we're miracle
workers. We cast out devils in your name.
And Lord, we're builders of the kingdom. We did many wonderful
works in your name. He said, I never knew you. I never knew you. Because if he ever knew you,
he still knows you. If He ever thought on you, He's
thinking of you now and always will. Because Matthew 3 verse
6, I am the Lord, I don't change. Therefore you sons of Jacob are
not consumed. It's not because you deserve
it, but the fact that you're not consumed right now, the fact
that you're not devoured by the flames of hell right now, the
fact that you're not cast off from the presence of God right
now, the fact that when you see Him, You're not damned right
then. It's because God says, I don't
change. You change. Now let me tell you
something. We make a lot of, we make a lot upon what we believe
right now. But now let me tell you something.
Some of us are getting older. I don't know what the future
holds. And I don't know how my mind will react. I don't know
how I don't know what the future holds, I don't know about the
failures of emotional, mental, faculties and all these things,
but I know this, my Lord never changes. I may change, I may
fail, I may fall, but He never changes. He abides faithful.
That's right. And my position in Christ does
not rest upon my holding on to Him. It's because he never changes.
Let me show you Romans chapter 11, verse 29. Romans 11, 29. Romans 11, 29. Otherwise, my
friend, as you go through the Bible and you find, you read
about the experiences of men like Abraham, who twice denied
that Sarah was his wife to protect himself from the wrath of a king. And you know, I've been reading
this week about those men back in King Henry VIII's day, Latimer
and Ridley and Bilney and those men who were burned at the stake. They came out of Catholicism.
And every one of them, every one of them, Latimer and Ridley
and Bilney, do you know every one of them recanted, some of
them two or three times? I'll give you an example. In
other words, Bill Mead. Now these men lived in the day of oppression
when the Roman Catholic Church controlled the souls of people.
People weren't allowed to read the Bible. These men were distributing
Tyndale's New Testament that had been translated into English,
and the laity wasn't allowed to have the Bible. See, the church
superseded the Bible. The word of the pope and the
synods and those things told people what to believe. They
weren't allowed to have Bibles. They weren't allowed to hear
and they believed that the body of Christ was present in the
mass, they believed in purgatory, they believed in violent indulgences,
and these men denied these things, preached against them, distributed
the Bible, and they were arrested. And they were brought to the
council and they were put on the rack. Some of them's bones were pulled
out of socket and they said, recant, deny what you're preaching
and we'll let you go. Bill only did twice. Latimer
did twice. And finally, Bilney was so ashamed.
He loved Christ, but I tell you this, if the whole world's against
you and you're standing all alone, I don't know what I'd do to you.
And somebody's got me on a rack pulling my body apart, I'd like
to say, well, I'd like to say, kill me, I trust Christ, but
I don't know. But later on, he came back to
the believers, and he was so ashamed that he had recanted
that he got a New Testament, went out on the street, started
preaching and waving the New Testament. Well, they arrested
him and burned him at the stake. And Latimer also was burned at
the stake, and others. But what I'm saying, Peter, sitting
by the fire. The Lord thinketh upon him. The
Lord knew him. He was God's own. And yet he
sat there, and he warmed his hands, and Christ was led off
to trial. And somebody came, tapped him
on the shoulder. Don't you know he jumped? And
looked up, and the fellow said, you're one of them. He said,
no, I'm not. No, I'm not. I'm not one of them. The fellow
said, well, I know you're one of them. You talk like them.
No, no, no, I'll cuss a little so you won't recognize my talk,
you know. And he went on. And three times
he did that, three times. And then he looked up, and he
saw the master. And he went off and cried his
heart out. But I'm just saying we're human. But look at Romans
11, 29. Old Job said, the root sent me.
That's where it is. The root sent me. Old Job said
some things he ought not have said. He sure did. He bragged
about his righteousness. His friends thought he was acting
more righteous than God. But he says in Romans 11, 29,
the gifts and calling of God. What's the gift of God? Eternal
life. What's the gift of God? Jesus
Christ, the unspeakable gift. What's the calling of God? Whom
he foreknew, he also called. His gifts and calling are without
change. Huh? That's what it says. In
James 1, verse 17, let's look at this. This ought to encourage
your hope. James 1, verse 17. Listen to
this. In James 1, verse 17, it says
this, Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and
cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no
bearableness, neither shadow of turning. He never changes. Oh, I tell you, if God ever thought
on you, then He thinks on you now, and He always will. I'll
never leave you, He said. I'll never forsake you. David
said, though my mother and my father forsake me, the Lord will
take me up, because the Lord never changes. I do, you do,
we change, we vary, but with Him there is no variableness,
no shadow of turning, not even a shadow of turning, not even
a hint of turning. I'm His. All right, thirdly and
quickly, this ought to encourage your love. It says, I'm poor
and needy and the Lord thinketh on me. Brethren, if He thinks
on me, my thoughts ought to be directed toward Him. Mr. Spurgeon said, when I look at
a tree, I ought to think He bore my sins in His body on the tree. When I sit on the beach, I ought
to remember He cast my sins into the depths of the sea. You know
what it says? When I walk by a river, I ought to think about
that fountain of blood that flowed from Emmanuel's veins. When I
walk through a door, the verse ought to come to my heart, I
am the door. When I eat bread, I ought to remember Christ is
the bread of life, I'll never hunger. When I drink water, I
ought to think Christ is the water of life. When I lay my
head down at night, I ought to think the Son of Man hath no
place to lay His head. When I walk the street, I ought
to say in my heart, someday I'll walk on streets of gold. When
I hear someone call my name, I remember He calls my name. My name is written on his hands.
When I see a sparrow, the Lord takes care of the sparrows. Are
you not better than the sparrow? When I see a lily clothed in
its beauty and whiteness, I ought to remember that Solomon in all
his glory was never arrayed like one of them, but the Lord who
takes care and clothes the lilies will clothe me. Oh, I tell you,
when I provide for my children, I ought to remember that If you,
being evil, know how to give good things to your children,
how much more shall the Father give good things to them that
ask Him? How precious are His thoughts to me! How frequent
ought to be my thoughts to Him. And I close with this. This ought
to encourage our rest. The Lord thinketh upon me. Well,
if God thinks upon me, I ought to be done. Listen to me now. Let's every one of us confess
our sin right here. If God thinks upon me, then I
should be done with all worry and anxiety and fretfulness and
fear about myself. If God thinks on me. How many
of you have ever said to your wife, things are not going good
around the house and things are problems and all and she's all
upset and you go to her and you just pat her on the arm and say,
now honey, you let me worry about it. Have you ever done that?
Hundreds of times. What do you mean? You mean for
her to quit being anxious. That you're big enough to take
care of it. That's in your power and in your responsibility and
in your sufficiency to settle the matter so you just don't
worry about it. Well, I tell you, my God's big
enough. He's able. He's able to save
to the uttermost. He's able to keep that which
I've committed unto Him. He is able. to present me faultless
before the throne of grace. He is able to raise my body. He's able. Somebody told me one
time, I don't know whether it's true or not, it's a good illustration.
Somebody told me one time, if a fellow fell into the sea, into
the ocean, if he'd remain quiet and lie still, he'd float. But
the more he struggles, the faster he sinks. Is that not true of
us? If we'd just be still and know
that I'm God. If we just cast all our cares
upon Him, He cares for us, huh? What kind of cares? All our cares. All our cares. You got a troublesome
son? Give him to the Lord. Commit
him to the Lord. You got a troublesome daughter?
Hand her over to Christ. You got a problem with a job,
with your home, with an enemy? Just put it, take your burden
to the Lord and leave it there, huh? Leave it there. You're troubled
about growing old when your youthful days are gone and old age is
stealing on and your body bends beneath the weight of care. He'll
never leave you then. He said, I'll go with you to
the end. Take your burden to the Lord. We do that, but here's
our problem. We don't leave it there. Leave
it there. I'm guilty. I'm guilty. You're guilty. The Lord thinketh
upon me. He's thinking about me. I'm going
to be all right. A fellow was walking down the
road one day, a dusty road, and he had a big pack on his back.
Here's a big pack. And he was bent beneath that
pack and walking down the road, and a fellow pulled up in a truck.
And the fellow said to him, you going downtown? He said, yes,
sir. He said, well, why don't you get in and ride with me?
He said, I sure appreciate that. So he got in the truck and sat
down, you know, and shut the door and just kept sitting there
with that big pack on his back, Jim. He just didn't take it off.
He just kept it right there on his back. And the fellow driving the truck
along looked at him and said, why don't you take that pack
off and put it in the float? Oh, he said, I couldn't do that.
And the driver said, well, why can't you? He said, well, he
said, I don't want to impose on you. He said, you picked me
up and you're carrying me. I couldn't ask you to carry my
pack too. And the fellow looked at him
and he said, now friend, he said, whether you keep it on your back
or put it on the floor, I'm going to still carry it. So you just
suit yourself. And that's what I've got to say
to me and you. The Lord is going to carry me and my family, me
and my job, me and my health, Me and my enemies. Now, if I
want to keep them, Charlie, on my back, just suit myself. But
if I want to, I can lay them on Him, too. Cast all your cares
upon Him.