Let us turn tonight to Hebrews
chapter 13. Last Wednesday night, we looked
at one of the many promises of God that he has for his children
scattered all through the scripture. We looked at 1 Corinthians chapter
10 and verse 13, which says, there hath no temptation taken
you, but such as is common to man. But God is faithful, who
will with the temptation make a way of escape. Who will not suffer you to be
tempted above that you are able, but will with the temptation
also make a way to escape. that you may be able to bear
it. Tonight, I want us to look at another promise that is found
here in Hebrews 13, the last part of verse five. I will never
leave thee, nor forsake thee. You might think that I asked
Brother Bill to lead that first hymn, Never Alone, but I didn't,
he picked that out. It's always, I think, more special
to the preacher than maybe to the people. But when we have
a message that God has given us, and then the hymn leader
on his own, on his own, led by God the Holy Spirit, chooses
hymns that go right along with the message. And the promise
I want us to look at this evening is, I will never leave thee,
nor forsake thee. And I have five things about
this promise I'm going to point out to us. I will never leave
thee, nor forsake thee. What a promise, right? Never alone, never alone. What a promise God gives to his
children. Five things about this promise. First, the promise is a quotation. It's a quotation. Paul, the writer
of Hebrew, says, for he hath said. Let's look back, keep our
places here, but let's turn back to the book of Joshua. I read a message one time by
Charles Spurgeon from the text that we're looking at tonight.
I think he had about five or six places in the Old Testament
that he had found where the Lord had said, I will never leave
thee nor forsake thee. But I think it has reference
to this one, especially Joshua chapter one and verse five or
verse six or verse five, Joshua one and verse five. There shall
not any man be able to stand before thee all the days of thy
life. As I was with Moses, so I will
be with thee. I will not fail thee, nor forsake
thee. I will never leave thee, nor
forsake thee. We know that the Apostle Paul
had the Septuagint copy of the Old Testament, that was a copy
in Greek of the Old Testament, and he also had the Hebrew copy
of the Old Testament. He knew both of them, there's
no question about that. And though he doesn't quote verbatim,
the truth of the text is given to us here in our translation
when God told Joshua, I will not fail thee nor forsake thee. The promise in Hebrews 13 is,
I will never leave thee nor forsake thee. What may we learn from
this fact? That it is a quotation. What
may we learn from this fact? That it is a quotation, this
promise that is given to us. Well, there are two things I
would mention. First of all, we may learn the importance of
reading all the scripture, reading all the scripture. The Old Testament
and the New Testament make up the Word of God, and we may find
precious promises, precious promises for us, as in this case, in the
Old Testament. Someone might say, yes, but are
these Old Testament promises ours? We know this one is. We know this one is because Paul
uses it, quotes it in our text. For he has said, I will never
leave thee nor forsake thee. Someone one time said, when God
opens a well, you know, people dig wells to seek for water. Water's a necessary thing that
we all need. When God opens up a well, for
his children, for one of his children to drink from, he doesn't
fence it off so that that person alone is able to drink from that
well. He opened this well, we would
say, for Joshua, but he didn't fence it off. All of us have
the privilege of drinking from this well, from receiving instruction
from this promise. And how many other Old Testament
promises may we find as we read the Word of God. So the first
thing that I point out we learn is the importance of reading
all the Word of God. Now, I've heard people make a
comment something like this, well, I just read the Psalms.
That's the only part of the Bible that I read. I just read the
Psalms. I love the Psalms. Well, we all do, don't we? And we cannot help but Realize
as we read the book of Psalms, the various experiences that
David had and how Christ is presented to us in the book of Psalms.
We see that. But I would encourage all of
us to read all of the Bible, all of the scripture, Old Testament
as well as new. It's all inspired of God. It's
all given by inspiration of God and it is all profitable for
doctrine, for reproof, for instruction in righteousness that the man
of God might be throughly furnished unto all good works. So that's
the first thing we should learn. We should remember that the Old
Testament saints were like Us, we refer to ourselves as New
Testament saints. That is, we're in this new dispensation. They lived in that old dispensation,
but they were loved with an everlasting love, just like we are. Those of us who know Christ and
live in this new dispensation, they were loved equally with
an unchanging, eternal love as we are. They were all redeemed
by the same blood, the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ that
we are. They all had an interest in the
eternal everlasting covenant of grace. Well, there's only
one covenant that brings a sure salvation to God's people. And
it is that everlasting covenant of which Christ is the surety. The surety. Remember David said,
this is all my salvation. He hath made with me an everlasting
covenant, ordered in all things and sure. So the first lesson,
the importance of reading all the scripture, Old Testament
as well as New Testament. And then a second lesson that
came to my mind I think we should observe that this promise was
given to Joshua and the condition, the situation that Joshua was
in when God gave him this promise. Now he had been, we might say,
Moses' minister or understudy for a number of years. He had
been right along with Moses and he saw the people. that he was
being charged now to lead into the land of Canaan. And he was
being charged to lead them in and conquer, defeat the inhabitants
of Canaan. Remember, God promised the land
of Canaan to Abraham, but he told Abraham that their iniquity,
the iniquity of the Amorites was not quite full. And so they
would possess the land when the iniquity of the Amorites was
full. And now that time had come. You
know, God's patience, God's patience is such a wonderful truth and
a blessing to all of us. He's patient with us and He's
patient with His creatures. But there comes a place, there
comes a time when God's patience comes to an end. Just like it
did for the Amorites and God's, commanded the Israelites to go
into the land and to destroy every man, woman, boy, and girl. Sometimes people say, well, how
could God do that? They were being judged. The Israelites,
God was using as instruments in his hand to judge these wicked
people that God had given a long space of time in which to repent
and turn from their wickedness and their idolatry, but they
didn't turn. And so judgment came. And we
know that's going to happen. We read that Psalm just a minute
ago, Psalm 96, that ended by saying that God's going to come
and He's going to judge the world in righteousness and in truth. Don't want to hear about that,
but it's true, isn't it? God's coming again. The Lord's
coming again. And he's coming to judge this
world. But I think of the condition
of Joshua. Here he is charged with all this
responsibility. He knew what the people were
like. He had seen how they murmured against Moses. He knew that they
were prone to unbelief. to complaining, and now he has
the responsibility. It's falling upon his shoulders. He's charged by God to lead these
people into the land of Canaan and possess the land. And what
a promise, what a promise God gave him. I will not forsake
thee. I will be with thee. What a promise. What a mercy
to receive such a promise. And this promise is to you and
it's to me. What a promise. What a mercy.
And this promise that God gives us, I will never leave thee nor
forsake thee. So that's the first thing that
I mentioned about this promise. It's a quotation. For he has
said, for he has said, I will never leave thee nor forsake
thee. The second thing I point out about the promise is the
promisor is God. He has said. The antecedent for
that pronoun he, you find in verse four, is God. God has said. Now I said last week that the
promisor of any promise, if a man makes you a promise, a woman
makes you a promise, That promise is only as good as the person
making the promise, right? It's only as good as the person
making the promise. We always have to consider the
promiser. This is God. God promises this,
I will never leave thee nor forsake thee. The thing about God, the
truth about God that I saw especially in that promise last week is
God's faithfulness. His faithfulness. There hath
no temptation taken you, but such as is common to man. But
God is faithful. God is faithful. As we look at
that promise, we meditate upon the Promiser and His faithfulness. God cannot, that's what the Word
of God says, God cannot deny Himself. Now, when I look at
this promise, The truth about God that stands out to me is
His immutability. He doesn't change. This promise
was made when Paul wrote the promise out here in Hebrews chapter
13. The promise had been given, what, 2,000 years before? And
now here we are tonight, some 4,000 years later, and the promise
is still good. Why? God doesn't change. is immutability. What a wonderful attribute that
is. Our God never changes. He's never needed to change.
We change with the wind many times, don't we? Man does. That's one constant about man,
his changeableness, but not God. A.W. Pink made this comment about
Paul writing here, for he has said, for he has said, and I
quote, it is more forcible writing, more forcible than writing for
God has said, more forcible than writing for God has said when
he wrote for he has said. It is the character, and I quote,
it is the character of the one with whom we have to do that
is held up to our view. He has said. Who has? He has said. Who has? Who said this? Who has said? Why? One whose power is omnipotent? He's the one who said this. One
whose wisdom is infinite? He's the one who said this. One
whose faithfulness is inviolable, he has said this. One whose love
is unchanging, he has said this. I will never leave thee, nor
forsake thee. The third thing about this promise,
we see that it was given as a remedy for two particular sins. covetousness and discontent. Look at the whole text. Let your
conversation be without covetousness and be content with such things
as you have. For he has said, I will never
leave thee nor forsake thee. The promise is given as a remedy
for two particular sins, covetousness and discontentment. You know,
you might look at these two sins as two sides of the same coin. Covetousness on one side and
discontentment on the other side. They usually go together and
are described like this. What is this? Covetousness and
discontentment. An immoderate desire of riches
That's covetousness, isn't it? And a moderate desire for riches,
the love of money is the root of all evil. I believe the scripture
says that, don't you? It didn't say money's the root
of all, it's the love of money is the root of all evil. Covetousness. And a moderate desire of riches,
and then discontentment And over-anxious care for worldly things. And
over-anxious care for worldly things. Colossians, the letter to the
church at Colossae, the Apostle Paul said, covetousness is idolatry. It's idolatry. We don't ever
think of covetousness like that, do we? But that's what the scripture
says. We think of worshiping idols as bowing down before some
statue or something like that, and that is idolatry, no doubt
about it, but also being covetous, having a covetous nature. Now, I think it should be noted
that discontentment is not the same as laziness or indolence. We don't believe in fatalism. We don't believe in fatalism.
We know that God is a personal God. We know all things are determined
by God, but fatalism is more like a machine or something like
that. It just runs and spins and spins
and always the same. Now we know that God is a personal
God, And he has commanded us and he's given us days of the
week, six days for the Jews in the Old Testament to work, to
better themselves, to improve their condition, to feed themselves
and their families. We're not talking about laziness
when we talk about contentment. You know, the Apostle Paul said
he had learned. He had learned. No matter what
state he was in, he said he knew what it was to be, let me just
paraphrase, he knew what it was to have plenty, and he knew what
it was to have nothing, and at the same time to be content,
whatever God sent. One of the cures for discontentment
is to think about the sovereignty of God, and God does, The scripture
says he makes rich, he makes poor. God gives talents. Our Lord gave more than one parable,
didn't he, where different people received different amounts of
talents. One man, I believe, received
10 talents. One received five talents. One
received one talent. God was sovereign in giving out
those talents. And the same is true, to learn
to be content. And the remedy for covetousness
and discontentment is this promise, God's presence, God's presence. You know, people, and I know
people want to accumulate as we go through this world, but
you know, it's all God's, no matter That house that I live
in, it's got my name on the deed, but it's God's. I'm going to
leave it one of these days, whether I want to or not. And everything
I have and everything you have, God gave it to us and he can
take it from us. And if he doesn't take it from
us, he's going to take us from him. We know that's true. It's all his. And what greater
blessing could anyone have than to have the presence of God? A person might have a mansion
and millions of dollars in the bank and be godless. Would you envy that person? Of
course not. Oh, but to have God and to have
God promising, I will never leave thee nor forsake thee. What a
promise. John Brown, in his commentary
on Hebrews, made this statement. This contentment does not consist
in a slothful neglect of business of life, nor of real or pretended
apathy to worldly interest. It is substantially a satisfaction
with God as our portion and with what he is pleased to appoint
for us. It is to oppose covetousness
or the inordinate desire for wealth and to unbelieving anxiety,
dissatisfaction with what is present, distrust as to what
is future. The fourth thing about this promise,
the promise spelled out, I will never leave thee nor forsake
thee. We know the New Testament was
written in in Greek, and the language, the Greek language,
unlike English, to emphasize something, they repeat the word. They repeat the word. And here
it's a negative. I think in English, a double
negative, the second negative, it destroys the first negative
or something like that. But in the Greek language, repetition,
no, no, no, never, never, never, nor, nor, nor, just emphasizing
the truth. And several of the writers said,
it's almost impossible to translate this particular text, this particular
promise. But one great scholar said, this
is the closest that I can get to it. I will never? No. Never leave thee, nor ever forsake
thee. I like the words of that hymn
that we sing, how firm a foundation, which says what more can he say
than to you he has said, to you who unto Jesus for refuge have
fled. The promise here gives us peace
for the present and gives us assurance for the future. Here
we are promised God's presence, God's protection, and God's provision. I will never leave thee nor forsake
thee. And the last thing about this
promise, this promise is repeated or reiterated
by the Lord Jesus Christ, I believe, in John 14 and verse 16. When
he told his disciples the night before he was to be crucified,
I will pray the father. And the father always heard him,
didn't he? Always heard him. I will pray the father, and he
shall give you another comforter that he may abide with you forever. The promise that we have here
of God that he would never leave us nor forsake us, the promise
given to his children. Our Lord repeated that promise
when he said, I will pray the Father and he shall give you
another comforter that he may abide with you forever. Christ
in you. The Apostle Paul said, Christ
in you, the hope of glory. How is Christ in you tonight?
The Holy Spirit is in you. He's in you. He came to reside.
Your body is His temple. And He'll never move out. He'll
never leave. And even when this body is put
into the ground and turned back to dust, He'll watch over even
the dust of His people. Precious in the sight of the
Lord is the death of His saints. What a wonderful promise we have
here tonight. There are just so many of them,
right? So many through the scriptures. May the Lord bless His word to
us here this evening.