-Transcript-
00:26 Amen. Glory to God. Welcome to the program.
00:30 Welcome to the cafe. Welcome to another episode of KJV Cafe. Can you believe it? It’s time for another episode.
00:37 I don’t know if you’ve ever listened or not, but if you haven’t, welcome. And if you have, then yes, truly, it’s another episode. We’re on five days a week in Tennessee and some other places, and we’re online every day.
00:50 We are online every day through the KJV Cafe podcast. So if you have a podcast app, just type in KJV Cafe and look us up. We have an episode coming out every day, just like this.
01:02 Of course, we’re on Facebook and we have a website, kjvcafe.com. Today we are looking at God’s faithfulness, how beautiful it is that we are upheld by a living, all-powerful God.
01:18 And you know what that’s called? That’s called never forsaken. Amen.
01:24 Deuteronomy 31:8, and the Lord, he it is that doth go before thee. He will be with thee. He will not fail thee, neither forsake thee, fear not, neither be dismayed.
01:37 That’s Deuteronomy 31:8. And as we see here, and of course, you’re going to say, well, Brother Clark, that’s Old Testament. And you know, why does that really apply to me today?
01:48 Isn’t that speaking to the Israelites? Well number one, are we not God’s chosen people? We are. You know, if you’ve been saved, you are one of God’s, amen.
01:58 And when you’ve been saved and you become one of God’s, now all of a sudden you have his promises. This is the idea of the great adoption, the great, the idea of being grafted in. If you, if you work with plants or trees, you’re grafted in.
02:15 You are now a child of God, right? And in Deuteronomy 31, Moses is speaking to Israel, amen. And he is telling Israel of the Lord, thy God, he will go before thee in verse three. He will destroy these nations before thee and now shall possess them.
02:35 And Joshua, he shall go before thee as the Lord has said. And so we see here that just as then, amen, that God was going to go do the work. You remember the Israelites, they didn’t want to go into Canaan land.
02:46 Why? They had sent spies over there and they saw that there were giants in the land.
02:54 And so they were afraid, they were afraid. And what Moses was expressing to them was, you don’t have to be afraid because God is more powerful than those giants.
03:07 And you simply need to believe and God’s going to do the work, right? It’s kind of like the idea of you’ve never driven a car and there’s a car there and let’s say you’re with your dad and your dad tells you, I’m going to drive you across town and you say, but dad, I don’t really feel like I could drive across town.
03:26 And your dad’s saying, no, I’m going to drive you across town. And you’re saying, but dad, I’ve never really driven like that.
03:38 And there’s a lot of obstacles in the road. And your dad’s looking at you saying, I’m not asking you to do the drive. I’m the, I’m going to do the driving.
03:43 I’m just saying, you need to believe that I’ll drive you across town. Now that’s a simple example, but God, the father is telling the Israelites through Moses and through Joshua, just go. I’m going to do the driving.
03:52 You just go ahead. Okay. You’re not forsaken.
03:57 God’s not going to say, okay, I brought you all the way here to the promised land and now I’m out of here. I’m out of here. You’re done.
04:03 You’re toast. No, quite the opposite. He was more than willing to show his power.
04:09 He was more than willing to show his grace and his mercy and his love to his chosen people. And yet they had trouble believing. So today, let me implore you to believe, do not fear.
04:17 God will not leave you on your own. God’s love for us should defeat all the fears that we have. 1 Peter 5:7, casting all your care upon him for he careth for you.
04:35 You know, you need to give all of your cares to God because he cares for you. God’s power is enough to sustain us. So we shouldn’t fear what could happen.
04:48 Amen. I mean, think about this. If you cast all of your cares upon God, is that too much for God to handle?
05:01 If every created being in this world casted all their cares upon a living holy God, is it too much for him to handle? Well, absolutely not.
05:15 It’s not too much for him to handle. So if it was the Israelites saying, okay, God, this is too much for you to handle. These giants in the Canaan land, they’re really big.
05:16 God’s like, I know I made them and I made everything else. And it’s nothing for me to knock every single one of them out, but I’ll do it in a way that, you know, the land doesn’t get overgrown. I’ll knock them out a little by a little.
05:25 Cause that’s God. He’s in the details. You know, the world says the devil’s in details.
05:30 No, God is in the details. Amen. That’s a perversion when they say the devil’s in the details.
05:34 God is a God of detail. I want you to look at your life. If you born again and you’re serving the Lord, look at your life as completely and utterly planned out by God, a sovereign God.
05:48 You know, I love that. There’s a bluegrass song that essentially says nothing happens by mistake. And I agree with that.
05:54 If you’re living for God each and every day, even the bad things, you know, they are pushing you to God, taking you to mature and building patience in you, giving you ministry opportunities.
06:05 I don’t look at things as just chance. It’s God’s sovereign power because he has that power.
06:12 Brother Adrian Rogers used to say, not a blade of grass moves without God’s knowing it or permission for it to move. And I agree with that. So we see here that God’s power is enough to sustain us and we shouldn’t fear.
06:25 Hebrews 13:6, so that we may boldly say, the Lord is my helper and I will not fear what man shall do to me.
06:36 Now I paraphrase that verse in my mind today when I was thinking on a issue and I said, the Lord is my help and I’m not going to fear what man will do to me. I kind of like my little paraphrase of that.
06:52 We can own that promise. Okay. We can own that promise that he’s not going to forsake us, that we are never forsaken by God, that he loves us and that we don’t need to worry about the world.
07:04 And the reason why I say serving God and living for God is because maybe, just maybe, if you’re backslid and you’re out in the world, amen, and you’re living in sin,
07:15 something could happen that wouldn’t be nice to maybe draw you back to God, amen, like the prodigal son, amen. God loved him. He goes out and wastes his inheritance on riotous living.
07:25 He looks at the pigs. He said, they’ve got it better than me, which has got to be pretty rough because the pigs are living in slop and whatever. And he goes back to the father and he apologizes, he’s repented, he said, I’m sorry, right?
07:35 And then he’s blessed.
07:40 And so I’m saying for the ones that are living for God, you boldly say that, the Lord is my helper. I will not fear what men shall do to me. Because if you’re boldly living for the Lord, you’re doing everything for God.
07:51 You have to at some point say, okay, God, I’ve made my life yours and I submit to you. Now do with it as you see fit. And as I go through these trials, I will turn to you and give you praise.
08:03 Look at the apostle Paul, who wrote much of our New Testament, who the Gentiles get their doctrine from, who was a mighty man of God. Can you imagine when he’s in jail, when he’s being whipped with a cat of nine tails, when he’s being mocked and ridiculed, amen,
08:18 when he’s being hunted and tried to be killed, when he’s shipwrecked, can you imagine him asking during that time, God, did I do something wrong? God, what’s my problem?
08:25 God, what do I need? You know, do I need to go see a counselor? He’s just trusting God in prayer, having faith in God and living for God and knowing that he’ll never be forsaken, never be forsaken. He wasn’t forsaken on the shipwreck.
08:42 He wasn’t forsaken being whooped. He wasn’t forsaken even in his martyrdom. He was never forsaken by God, amen.
08:49 There’s a great kind of tale out there that when it was time for Paul to be martyred, he ran to the guillotine or whatever it was because he was ready to go to heaven to be with Jesus.
08:58 So all throughout his life, when he changed from Saul to Paul and became the apostle Paul that we know, all throughout his spiritual life, God never forsake him and he will never forsake us.
09:08 And we shouldn’t be dismayed because God will see us through.
09:15 Psalm 55:22, cast thy burden upon the Lord and he shall sustain thee. He shall never suffer the righteous to be moved.Again here, don’t be dismayed.
09:24 If you have a burden, if you have something you’re going through, simply give it to God, amen. You don’t have to go to man. You don’t have to go to the world.
09:34 You don’t have to get advice from anybody. You simply can go to God in prayer and say, Lord, this is my burden. This is my burden.
09:42 Cast thy burden upon the Lord and he shall sustain thee. He shall never suffer the righteous to be moved. There’s that word righteous again.
09:50 There’s kind of the caveat, the idea that someone’s living in sin and just doesn’t get what God’s up to and all these kinds of problems are happening.
09:59 That is a different story because God could truly be trying to get your attention. He could truly be trying to break you so that you’ll then turn to him.
10:05 Amen. That would be his love to do that rather than you end up in a devil’s hell. But for those that are living right, for those that are serving God, for those that are repentant before God,
10:14 for those that are praying, for those that are living as God would call them to live, living out the commandments of Jesus, amen, living out the doctrine of Paul, those people, they are not going to be moved.
10:26 And yet, as the example of Paul, through his eyes, it must have looked like he was being moved. He must have been like, well, you know, I’m certainly being moved here and there and everywhere. But God had a plan.
10:38 The great evangelist, Paul, was evangelizing and spreading the gospel through Jesus Christ, amen. And he was the one to do it here for us Gentiles. And I thank God for his ministry today, amen.
10:46 And finally here, we are to tackle what he wants us to tackle. We should have confidence. So the idea that God’s not forsaking us is number one, to have that common peace.
11:01 Number two, to have that security, amen, and knowing that we’re secure in Christ as we live for him. And then finally, to have that confidence, to go out there and live as God wants us to live.
11:11 1 Chronicles 28:20, and David said to Solomon, his son, be strong and of good courage and do it, fear not, nor be dismayed for the Lord God, even my God will be with thee.
11:26 He will not fail thee nor forsake thee until thou has finished all the work for the service of the house of the Lord.
11:34 See here, David is telling Solomon, his son, he’s saying, look, I wasn’t allowed to build this house. And then it’s a big deal.
11:42 You’re building the house for God, you’re building the temple of God. In those days, they’re looking at God residing there, literally, amen. You build a church now you want to reflect God’s glory, it’s going to look nice.
11:53 Imagine building a church that God was actually going to be the resident of, like the cloud was going to move in. That’s what Solomon was up to. And David’s saying, don’t be afraid, don’t worry, just do it.
12:05 Just trust God, be strong, be courageous. In that fear, continue to trust God because he will be with you. He will not fail you.
12:15 He will not forsake you until you have finished all the work for the service of the house of the Lord. I took the thee and turned it into you, but you get the idea that God was going to complete what God had said he was going to complete because God told David he was going to complete it. He said, David, you’re not going to build this temple, but Solomon will.
12:34 And you see the idea that God hasn’t forsaken us should give us confidence to do what the Lord would have us to do. We should have confidence in our ministry, amen. We should have confidence in what God wants us to do.
12:44 I’m sick and I’m troubled and I’m tired on every side. And yet I sit down to preach on the radio and I have confidence that God will guide me through, that God will deliver me, that God will help me to do what he has called me to do because he called me to do it and he is not going to forsake me. You understand? And so we got to take hold of this promise.
13:06 What would stop us from taking hold of this promise? What? Can man stop us? No. Can the devil stop us? No. God has power over the devil.
13:17 Could the flesh stop us? I don’t, I don’t think so. You know what can stop us? Unbelief, a lack of faith, the thinking that, you know what, I don’t really know if this promise is true. I don’t even really know if God is real.
13:32 That will stop you in your tracks. That will stop you. And that is why we must have faith.
13:39 The Bible says in Hebrews 11, it is impossible to please God without faith, that we must have faith that God is who he says he is and a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.
13:50 You know, what does it mean to be diligent? It means to be smart and detailed and process, looking at the process of everything and the organization of everything and getting all the details, all the understanding.
14:03 And when we look at who God is and his process and his details, and most importantly his promises, oh, we know he will not forsake us.
14:09 We know that he will stand by us. Instead, fast matter of fact, he’ll stand there in us through the working of the Holy Spirit. And through that, we realize we are not forsaken and he will not leave us and we can have confidence in that.
14:23 I thank you for listening today.
14:27 Tune in next time. Take care. God bless and amen.