Brother Gary Sunday Morning 6/17/12

Brother Gary Sunday Morning 6/17/12

Hos 14:1  O Israel, return unto the LORD thy God; for thou hast fallen by thine iniquity.

Hos 14:2  Take with you words, and turn to the LORD: say unto him, Take away all iniquity, and receive us graciously: so will we render the calves of our lips.

Hosea was burdened with this thought because he wanted them to understand the goodness and the severity of God.  This is God’s handbook.  If you do what He tells you to do then you can rest assured that the goodness of God is laid up for you. 

The same goes for those that refuse Him and refuse to do what He says then there is the severity of God.  It is the same severity as when He opened the earth and swallowed those that resisted Moses.  It doesn’t matter what your family is or where you are from, the only thing that matters to God is if your name is written down in the Lamb’s Book of Life.

“Begin to call on God.”  There will be times in life when our mind is boggled with what is happening around us.  We need to remember that man doesn’t have the answer; God has the answer.

“Begin to call upon God.”  There is a definite way to call on God.  In Psalms 51, David recorded his heart of repentance before the Almighty God.  There are no secrets with God.  He knows all the sin.  The reality is that you and I need to confess our sins to God and for our spirit to be broken. 

The carnal and natural man has a haughty spirit.  People in management know that there are those that don’t want to be told anything.  In this, they can identify with God dealing with man.  There are those that are haughty and don’t want to be told anything.

David when he did wrong felt conviction and said, “God I’m so needy before you.”  Our spirit must be broken and we must realize that we really need help from God in order to receive help from God. 

No one ever got saved unless they realized that they were a failure.  Remember the Pharisee and the publican.  The one said that he wasn’t that bad and not even as bad as the one over there.  The other said, “Please forgive me of my many sins.”  The latter was the one that went away justified.

God is a God that takes pleasure in the prosperity of His servants.  Salvation is the beginning of prosperity.  It gives us what money cannot buy and man cannot give us.

Tit 2:11  For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men,

Graciousness is the result of the grace of God.  Grace means unmerited favor.  We don’t deserve the grace of God.  The grace of God brings salvation.  When God convicts us of our sin it is the unmerited favor of God that helps us know our need.  God shows us our need and then he shows us by His word the answer for our need.

It is the grace of God that shows us our need of salvation.  Salvation means:  deliverance, help, safety, victory, and health. 

Deliverance:  There are walls of Babylon, and sinners are captive.  This deliverance that comes from salvation delivers us from our past.  Your past can be forgiven and you can start a new life.  We are delivered from bad habits. 

Help:  whether you have just gotten saved or have been saved for years, if you have this ‘treasure in earthen vessels’ then you are going to need help from God.  Though the mountains are carried into the midst of the sea, God is a very present help in the time of need.  There is not something wrong with you spiritually if you need help from God.  You are a normal child. 

If you are a babe, learning how to walk with God, that is fine.  Children need help learning how to walk.  Crawling for a child helps develop the brain.  God is a present help. 

Especially He wants to help you spiritually.  If you don’t have food to eat then God will help you have food.  If you need a ride to church then God will send you a ride.  Especially though He wants to help you spiritually. 

My dad got his back broke on cougar peak.  He laid on a piece of plywood for a long time.  The Medical community couldn’t do anything for him.  He asked for his children to be called in and told us that he was going to die if God didn’t heal him. 

He looked at me and told me to take care of my mother.  I remember being broken hearted thinking that my dad was going to die.  He reached a real low point and then he started to heal. 

Two weeks later he asked my mother to bring the car as close to the front door as she could and he crawled to the car.  He then asked her to take him to the hill.  We were raised on the hill where Sister Sheppard has a nice house.  Mom drove him up there and he got out and asked her to leave and come back in an hour. 

My dad crawled and would lift himself up on two canes.  He did this everyday for two weeks and if he could come back he would tell you that there he learned to walk again.  He went back to work sawing logs.  I don’t know if you could tell that he’d had a broken back.  

I can hear him saying, “I learned to walk again.”

You may be here this morning and a tragic thing has happened to you.  You may have forgotten God.  It really doesn’t matter how long it takes for you to learn to walk with God but what matters is that you learn to walk.  You may have had an injury that so to speak has knocked you out of the saddle but you can learn to walk again. 

Safety:  It is wonderful that you can be protected.  Most of us shudder when we think of the evil spirits that are loosed in the world today.  You don’t need to be afraid of those spirits.  As long as you have the robes of salvation on and are walking in the light of the Gospel then you don’t have to fear any spirit out there.  The devils tremble when the saints of God pray.  Though I walk in the midst of trouble God will protect me.  Safety is ours because we don’t override the checks of God.  Safety is of the Lord.

Victory:  “God hasn’t given us a spirit of fear but of power, of love, and of a sound mind.” We can trust God to give us the victory.  No matter what trouble you encounter you can trust God to give you the victory over it. 

Health:  it is wonderful that we serve a God that sent his son so that we could be healthy physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually.  God doesn’t want you to just feel good so you can hike into lakes but He wants you to serve our brothers and sisters in Christ and help those that don’t have all their needs supplied.

Tit 2:12  Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world;

The grace of God is our teacher.  It is a wonderful teacher.  It is alright if people ask you, “What are you looking up for all the time?”  The grace of God has taught me to look to see if Jesus is coming.  We want to be looking and we want to be ready.

Hos 14:2  Take with you words, and turn to the LORD: say unto him, Take away all iniquity, and receive us graciously: so will we render the calves of our lips.

800 years before Jesus came, Hosea wrote this.  Paul spoke it this way:

Heb 13:15  By him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name.

Hos 14:3  Asshur shall not save us; we will not ride upon horses: neither will we say any more to the work of our hands, Ye are our gods: for in thee the fatherless findeth mercy.

Asshur was a rich king.  The rich will not be able to bail you out.  They will not be our salvation.  The powerful will not be our salvation.  It is not going to happen.  Don’t think in your mind that some man will save you.

The horses were strong, beautiful, well-groomed, and fast.  That will not take care of your problems.  Don’t trust in horses and chariots.

Sometimes people try to set a scene up so that everything is just how they want it but they will be disappointed.  If you do this, you will realize that you put a lot of effort into this and it is just not going to work.  Idol worship in our day is people giving their life to something in the world besides God, making it an idol.  Always they will come to the realization that it has left them empty and disappointed. 

We honor the dads that are in this congregation.  Most that are here if time terries will find our self fatherless.  Hosea was a great man that did some remarkable things even in the human side of his life.  God spoke to him that “In God the fatherless find mercy.”

Rom 8:15  For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father.

There is a lot of fear in the world today.  This spirit of adoption allows all of us that were unsaved to become children of God.

We can now cry out to God, “Abba, Father.”  In the Old Testament times slaves were never allowed to call their owner or master father, or his wife mother.  Jesus came to bring Jews and Gentiles all under the same covenant and have God as our father and refer to Him as Abba Father. 

He is not just the father of the Jew.  This was a big thing to Paul and to the Romans because there was the Jew, the Gentile and the distinction between them.  Today in Western Montana it is not a big thing but it is a big thing that we can call Him, “Abba Father.”

It is a wonderful thing to be a child of God this morning.

Rom 8:16  The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God:

You may not be the sharpest tool in the shed, or the most talented individual in the World.  If you are saved then the Father looks upon you and witnesses that you are a child of God. 

Rom 8:17  And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together.

There was a time that we couldn’t call God, “Abba Father.”  This father’s day is a special day because we have received the spirit of adoption.  I am not the step child and you are not the stepchild.  We have received that spirit of adoption.  It is beyond my mind this morning.  He loved us that much and the son loved us that much. 

We are joint heirs with Christ.  An heir can receive anything down to a dollar and still be called an heir but God doesn’t have it that way. 

Think of everything that you can think of that is good.  God created it.  All the beauty God created.  God created the beautiful flowers the seed that we hope produces beans.  God created love, joy, peace, longsuffering… 

Everything that is good here God made.  He told us to enjoy it.  Look at it, enjoy it and thank God.  When you see a new born baby enjoy that which can only come from heaven.  I look at Seth here and think, the beauty of seeing sweet old men! 

God made it.  All glory to God.  We are heirs with Christ.  This is all His, go ahead and enjoy it.  Enjoy peace and enjoy being happy.  Rejoice and be glad and enjoy today. 

We are an heir of God.  Jesus did some marvelous things when He was here.  He already had fish cooking when he called the fisherman in. 

We are joint heirs with Christ. Jesus prayed for us and asked God to help us to be able to come where He and God were.

Rev 21:7  He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son.

There will be something to overcome.  If the steak gets burned and the salad doesn’t turn out just right if the coffee is too weak or too strong it is ok, it is just something for you to overcome.

“I will be his God and he shall be my son.” 

Matthew Henry:  It is God’s prerogative to help the helpless. 

God takes delight in helping, challenging lives destined for failure.  Will we believe?

“If thou wilt believe then all things are possible.”