Brother Gary Sunday Morning 9/23/12

Brother Gary Sunday Morning 9/23/12

Somebody sought me when I was wandering.
Out in the desert all laden with sin.
Somebody saw me with compassion.
Called me gently, “come in.”

Somebody saved me when I was sinning.
Somebody rescued my soul from the grave.
Somebody folded me close in His bosom.
Oh it was Jesus mighty to save.

Somebody helped me when I was searching.
Somebody showed me errors of sin.
Somebody helped me when I was tempted.
Somebody gave me strength within.

Thank the Lord He goes seeking after men and women that are lost.  Rebecca began to do drugs when she was about 12 years old.  She spent about 10 years on the streets.  She is now 21 and has been in multiple facilities and they haven’t been able to help her. 

We have a job to do to reach to souls that need to hear the Gospel.  There is one that will work with us and will go where we cannot go. 

Bro Bill brought us a good word vision of the prodigal this morning.  The difference between religious people and the true people of God is compassion.  Everyone desires to be loved.  Many are searching for love, help, satisfaction, contentment, and companionship all in the wrong places.  They will never be found in the world. 

There is hope for individuals this morning.  There is hope for Rebecca.  There is hope for that individual that looks like they haven’t brushed their hair once in their life. 

The grave is not the end.  It is never wrong to want to be held.  I remember when I was sick, I wanted to go home and have my mom and dad take care of me and my children, but there was no home to go to.  There is a heavenly father and he cares for us.

There is nothing wrong even when we are adults to feel like we want to be held.  We know a God that sent His son that reached further down than we could possible reach up to take us into His arms.  “Somebody folded me close to His bosom, Oh it was Jesus mighty to save.”  There is nothing too hard for God.

Every time you visit with some people they bring up their past.  People are troubled by the past.  It is wonderful that we have this wonderful message for people that are troubled by their past.  We enjoy talking of repentance and our sins being cast as far as the east is from the west. 

God ordained water baptism as a picture to show that the past is buried.  God thoroughly deals with our past.  Literally casting it as far as the east is from the west as the scripture says, “never to be remembered against us again” and visually showing us that He takes care of it by example of baptism. 

God forgives and don’t hesitate to make restitution.  We are going to leave everything here behind.  Those that are troubled by their past are blessed.  If I get the opportunity to tell them of God’s forgiveness, I’m not going to pass it up or wait for someone else to do it.

Zep 3:14  Sing, O daughter of Zion; shout, O Israel; be glad and rejoice with all the heart, O daughter of Jerusalem.

Zep 3:15  The LORD hath taken away thy judgments, he hath cast out thine enemy: the king of Israel, even the LORD, is in the midst of thee: thou shalt not see evil any more.

Zep 3:16  In that day it shall be said to Jerusalem, Fear thou not: and to Zion, Let not thine hands be slack.

Zep 3:17  The LORD thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; he will save, he will rejoice over thee with joy; he will rest in his love, he will joy over thee with singing.

Zep 3:18  I will gather them that are sorrowful for the solemn assembly, who are of thee, to whom the reproach of it was a burden.

Sing: Good things are in store.  In that day: the Gospel Day. 

In a very difficult time for the Children of Israel, in the days of captivity and with the need of Jerusalem to be rebuilt, God always had someone bring a message for his children.

As dark as our world is today and brazen and sin is today, as dark as the picture is today, as far as the world, laws, and political system is concerned, we need to always keep in mind that God will send His message to His children. 

Never give up on reading, studying, or on the Word of God.  God knew exactly how things would be today and how they will be in the future.  This Word is for us today.  We can believe in the Word of God.

God told them to sing, be glad, and rejoice with all their heart.  There will be times when we find our heart heavy and burdened; we need to remember that God wants us to get those burdens to Him.  Lay them on the Lord and have the faith of God.  This God can do anything can’t He!

He wants us to not live under a cloud but have a song in our heart.  Judgment begins at the house of God and judgment is laid to the line and righteousness to the plummet.  This word of God is clear cut.  There are some things that are without question in the Word of God.  There is no question, argument or debate on it.  It was Jesus Christ alone that paid the sacrifice for our sin.  Unless people are willing to have the blood take their sin they cannot be saved.  You cannot do it in yourself.

I was recently exposed to someone saying, “I can love many women, not just my wife.”  Just a minute, the Bible is clear about marriage.  When we take the Judgment of the Word of God and apply it to our lives then judgment ceases to be judgment and becomes a joy. 

Everyone that is saved here can rejoice that the devil isn’t sitting as king on their heart.  That thing that worked to control us no longer holds us.  The things that I once loved I don’t love anymore.  All that is in the world: the lust of the flesh, the lusts of the eyes, and the pride of life, it is wonderful to not love that anymore. 

When you come to Jesus confessing, repenting of sin, you come to a condition where you don’t love self anymore.  The greatest idol that there is, is the idol of self. The idol of self and the pride of this life are closely related, people are full of self and of pride of what they have done.

If we will allow God to lead guide and direct then we don’t have to go back to that pig-pin of sin anymore.  Fear not.  Verse 16. 

God is mighty.  Hymn 26: “What a mighty God we serve.”  Fear not, God is mighty and has promised that He will save.  We can thoroughly rejoice that God will save to the uttermost.  When I got saved, I wondered if I could live it.  Fear not, if you get saved then you can live it.

Before we get saved we kind of see serving God as a hard load.  My father was a drunken lumber jack that got saved, He didn’t like the song that said that serving God was hard.  He said, “I want to tell you that I tried that road of sin; don’t refer to the highway of holiness as a hard road, I’ve tried the other.”

He will save to the uttermost.  Remember the parable of the 99 sheep?  They were all safe but there was one lost.  That shepherd was not satisfied until he found the sheep that was lost.  He went looking for the lamb.  He didn’t use the staff to drag him back.  He picked up the lamb and put it on his shoulders.  He didn’t even beat him for being lost.  He picked him up and put him on his shoulders and headed back to the fold.

When he got to the fold, he called His friends and said, “Come rejoice with me.”  This is the way when someone gets saved.  It doesn’t matter what their nationality or skin color is, it doesn’t matter if they are related to someone in the congregation or not, we rejoice.

Luk 15:7  I say unto you, that likewise joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine just persons, which need no repentance.

Heaven rejoices over one sinner that repents.  God is happy that you are saved; He loves and cares for us.  Every once in a while God comes down and knocks on our door.  He doesn’t come alone, He brings something with Him.  He sups with us.  This is the way the saints are, they come with something good.  They have a burden, a good thought, or something to give.  They come with a burden as an expression of faith.   They believe God and know that where any two agree in prayer touching any one thing then it shall be done.

God rests in His love:  I am shocked; I’ve observed some things that upset me and caused me to want to pray.  You would think that children would be so thankful to have parents that want to take care of them.  Yet when they are told to do something they don’t want to do it. 

My whole thought is, you would think that people would know to love God.  It is an Old Testament teaching.  God gave it to Moses, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, soul, mind, and strength.”  It is also a New Testament teaching. 

You would think that all of us brothers that have children and a wife would love them.  We men have to be taught to love our wife.  The bible says, “Husbands love thy wife, dwell with them according to knowledge.” 

I’ll never forget my dad told about the neighbor lady, just like a workhorse, and that is how she will be remembered when she dies.  I don’t want you to only know my wife by that she works hard.  We need to know how to help our wife.  “That your prayers be not hindered.”  This is what the Bible says.

Children obey your parents.  Parents love your children and bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.  You wouldn’t think that parents would need to be taught to love their children.  It seems dads would think that “this bundle that has come into my life I am responsible to care for.”  Unless people come under the gospel, many don’t feel any responsibility to care for their children.

God made an expression of His love to us.

Joh 3:16  For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

God loved us this much.  If it wasn’t for God, how lost would I be?  Some of us believe that we would already be in hell suffering if it wasn’t for God. 

The angels announced the birth of the only begotten son of God, “Peace, goodwill toward men.”

This goodwill is that God loves us.  He loves us.  The provision of God’s love to us is that He will take care of us.  God loves us enough that if we will still ourselves before Him he will take care of us spiritually.  He warns us, “Don’t meddle with that; don’t touch that.” 

God takes care of us emotionally.  God sometimes tells me that I need to go for a long walk.  He tells me that I need to be restored emotionally.  “You need to come apart and rest.”  He loves us so much that He speaks to us.

His love helps us to know how to be a family of God locally and how to be the family of God with those that we know that are not of this local assembly.  When we go somewhere we go with an attitude to be an encouragement.  God helps us to know how to be a family in the thought of being a family to the extended family of the family of God. 

I didn’t get to greet Sister Teri’s children in Carmichael; I’ve felt bad for that ever since.  I’ll tell you why: I love Sister Teri and I want to show love to her family.  There is something about being able to identify with the family of the family of God.  It does something to our heart to know that the saints are concerned about our family.

The love of God teaches us goodwill toward men.  It teaches us to love His Word, to love Him, to love each other, and to love the lost.

Zep 3:17  The LORD thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; he will save, he will rejoice over thee with joy; he will rest in his love, he will joy over thee with singing.

He will rest in His love:  Karen and I have been married for forty years.  She loved me when I was too sick to provide for her.  She didn’t take her inheritance and run.  She stayed right there and paid the bills; she stayed with me.  I can rest in her love.

God has manifested such love to us.  He has been there whenever we have called on Him.  He has manifested His love.  He has showed Himself strong to us.  What a mighty God we serve!  He has showed His love to us.  Now as He said to Peter, “Lovest thou me more than these?”

All of us have the ‘these’, whatever these are, you and I are asked, “Do you love him more than anything else?”

Peter said, “I love you well enough.”  Jesus asked again, “Do you love me above and beyond everything else?”  Peter answered, “Yes Lord I love thee, I will identify with you above anything else, and I will take my eyes off of myself and feed your sheep.” 

Who shall separate us from the Love of God?  We don’t know what today will hold or tomorrow but we must have this as a part of our consecration:

Rom 8:35  Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?

Rom 8:36  As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.

Rom 8:37  Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.

Death cannot separate us.  Then He came to life: life has many seasons to it.  Your life may be in a difficult season right now, you may not know what it holds.  No one knows what life holds, we need to have it settled that nothing will separate us.

Angels, I have meditated on this, there are at times angels of light that come that are actually angels of darkness.  People have the thought, “it is so dark, it is so straight and narrow”, don’t let that separate you.

There are times when it looks like everybody is shooting at you, all fingers point at you, everything is stacked against you.  We cannot let that separate us. 

Powers:  there are times that the enemy moves in like a flood. “I’m going to hold right on to Jesus.”

Present:  opportunities may lead you away from God, stay close to God.  In the present distress, whatever it may be, have it settled, “God, you can rest in my love.” CW Naylor was sick for many years; God rested in His love.  We can go right on loving God whatever the challenge is.

God has challenges for us in this audience.  Spiritual challenges: depths to reach, heights to climb, and things that He wants us to do.

Disappointments: it is an allotment of everyone’s life.  Are we going to allow our present disappointments to cause us to move away from God and His Word?  Whatever your plans and hopes are, you may be disappointed.  But have the attitude, “I have to go right on serving God.” 

It could be that you have a present failure.  You may feel that you were in a situation and you failed in that situation.  Are you going to let that separate you from God?  If you owe an apology then face it and make it.  Whatever it takes take care of it.

Heights:  There are some young people in this audience that may have some real opportunities.  These Kelly kids learn fast and are talented.  May we help them, to whatever height they go, to turn around and say “All glory goes to God.”  I’m sure that they want to make Brother Gyme the chief officer at ST Pats, stay humble Bro Gyme.  $200,000 isn’t that much, stay humble.

If you dear sisters in real-estate make a million don’t let it faze you. If you have had some disappointments financially, it is ok, God is still God.  We are not going to charge God foolishly because things didn’t go the way we had planned and things came up that took the money that we had other plans for.  We can rest.

When your heart is broken:  You can rest.  We know a healer.  We are not over Matthew Sampson, we are not mad at God; we are not ready to give up.  Sister Alice proved, “I’ll go right on serving God.” 

Persons:  we all have persons in our life that we love, but we cannot let them separate us from His love.  Let Him rest in His love in us.

“Somebody sought me, somebody heard me when I was praying.”