Brother Gary Wednesday Evening 9/30/15

Brother Gary Wednesday Evening 9/30/15

I am very thankful for the Word of God.  I have preached and exhorted from Isaiah 32 many times.  It is one of my favorite chapters and God brought me back to it in my preaching on the Holy Spirit.  It is a beautiful account, a prophecy of Jesus Christ, of His people, and other things.  It shows the dangers of lukewarmess and of apostasy, and it shows the outpouring of the Holy Spirit of God. 

Isa 32:1  Behold, a king shall reign in righteousness, and princes shall rule in judgment.

In a world that is defeated, there is a king that is reigning in righteousness; there is a Church Triumphant.  Amidst the things that are disturbing, we are thankful for the things that are sure and the record that God left us in His Word.  We have experienced over and over again that God always comes through.

There is a King, a King of kings.  He is crowned with many crowns.  He goes forth conquering and to conquer.  He is reigning in righteousness.

As sad as it is, even some of the same-minded people that are not saved realize that it is sad, children are not allowed to be children.  It is wonderful that Jesus is reigning in righteousness and princes are ruling in Judgment.

The Holy Spirit convicts and reproves the world of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment.  It is wonderful to have experienced the place where we say, “We want the judgment of God.  We want to honor you in every way in our life.  We don’t want to displease you in any way.”

It is wonderful that there is that conviction of the will of God that we don’t want to be ignorant, but we want to know how to act and how to react in every situation.

Isa 32:2  And a man shall be as an hiding place from the wind, and a covert from the tempest; as rivers of water in a dry place, as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land.

A man shall be a hiding place:  that is Jesus.  “The name of the Lord is a strong tower the righteous runeth into it and is safe.”

Those that are in a storm tonight are not looked at as substandard in any way.  There was a storm that Paul was in, in a ship.  Paul told them, “Be of good cheer, there will be no lives lost.” 

If you are in a battle tonight then be of good cheer.  We serve a God that can calm any storm.  There are all sorts of spirits of unbelief, of discouragement, of error...  A lot of these battles where the winds are blowing all around us are sometimes new experiences to us, but they are old experiences.  That is the reason that hymns have been written such as, “Are you adorning the doctrine?”

Shortly after the Holy Spirit was poured out, not even 50 or 60 years after, people began to drift.  They wanted to go back to the old law or to this or that. 

The tempest is when there is moisture and other things storming all around you.  There will be times that we have stormy times literally before this time next year.  (It is hurricane season in the South East.)  The tempest will come to you and I but let us not forget that Jesus is the hiding place.

Sister Maxwell was laying along the foundation when the tempest, a tornado, began to take her away and Brother Maxwell took a hold of her leg and kept her from being blown away. 

The storms will come, they will not all be in Oklahoma.  There is a king; we want to practice crowning Him in the storm.  If not daily then almost daily, there will be storms that will come in and try to get you down.  Have it settled, “I am going to have victory right in the middle of this.”

As rivers of water in a dry place:  it is wonderful that there is a place to go to get a good drink. 

Sunday afternoon I felt the power of the message I had preached about not grieving the Holy Spirit of God.  I prayed, “Heavenly Father, help me to find something that will help me to get to sleep.”  I went down stairs and picked up Brother Chancellor’s hymn book.  I started in the first verse of the first song that the brother wrote. 

I read his testimony:

Step by step, day by day,
I am walking up the King’s Highway. 
Many things new to me, but by grace as He leads,
The Lord is meeting all my needs. 

Step by step, day by day,
It is glory all the way.

He became so sick that I believe he was bedfast if not for months than for years.  He did not have an easy life.  There was a pastor that forbid him to pray for his own daughter.  This man will be at the judgment.  That is just one of the little things in his life.  Stay true to God. 

There will be times that you need a drink.  Praise.  “Nearer my God to Thee,” may have been written by a president’s wife: Sarah Adams.  Other songs we sang tonight, “I am Satisfied in Jesus”, “Happy in the Savior”, and “The Love of God.”

Thank God for water in a dry place.  There are a lot of dry places.  Thank God there are some springs that you know where they are and you can go back to.  “I have been here before.”

As a shadow of a rock in a weary land.  It is ok to get tired, to own you are tired, and to tell God, “I am exhausted physically, emotionally, and spiritually.”  Let me get to that Rock and rest a while.  Don’t try to face life exhausted; have a plan to face it with the strength of the Lord.

The eyes of them that see shall not be dimmed:  Keep a vision.  Keep your eyesight.  One of the senses is seeing.  May God help your and my senses to be, “God we don’t want to grieve you.”  If we apostatize then our eyes will become dim.

Eli’s condition of eyes going dim was not just because he was old.  He apostatized.  His sons were living terrible.  Instead of him holding judgment, he kept quiet. 

You have enough pictures in your library of people that once loved God and truth but then gave way to the spirit of apostasy.  It is mind boggling today: they are still praying, thanking God, but they are miles away from God.

God keep our vision and our hearing real.

Isa 32:3  And the eyes of them that see shall not be dim, and the ears of them that hear shall hearken.

Isa 32:4  The heart also of the rash shall understand knowledge, and the tongue of the stammerers shall be ready to speak plainly.

The heart of the rash - the hasty individual: just because something comes to your mind, don’t act on it.  Don’t act on impulse.  There is a difference between impulse of the flesh, of the mind, or other things and being directed by the Holy Spirit of God. 

We all will have thoughts and impulses.  I was thinking today of trading little red for however many cords of wood I can get from Danny Risland.  I am not sure that is the thing to do.  If he feels that little red is only worth a half cord of wood, he doesn’t know how many people have tried to buy little red.  That truck has been borrowed by more people than I can name.

Shall understand knowledge: We learn; you only have to mess up a few times making hasty decision.  It makes you say, “God I want to know the will of God.”  You learn, “I want to wait on God.”

There are truths that you may not have fully understood when you got saved that now you understand.

Isa 32:9  Rise up, ye women that are at ease; hear my voice, ye careless daughters; give ear unto my speech.

Isa 32:10  Many days and years shall ye be troubled, ye careless women: for the vintage shall fail, the gathering shall not come.

Isa 32:11  Tremble, ye women that are at ease; be troubled, ye careless ones: strip you, and make you bare, and gird sackcloth upon your loins.

Isa 32:12  They shall lament for the teats, for the pleasant fields, for the fruitful vine.

Isa 32:13  Upon the land of my people shall come up thorns and briers; yea, upon all the houses of joy in the joyous city:

Isa 32:14  Because the palaces shall be forsaken; the multitude of the city shall be left; the forts and towers shall be for dens for ever, a joy of wild asses, a pasture of flocks;

One thing that we want to keep real: don‘t let lukewarmess, apostasy, unbelief, or slothfulness get ahold of your soul.  The best messages I have ever heard on slothfulness were preached by my mother.

Pro 24:30  I went by the field of the slothful, and by the vineyard of the man void of understanding;

Pro 24:31  And, lo, it was all grown over with thorns, and nettles had covered the face thereof, and the stone wall thereof was broken down.

Pro 24:32  Then I saw, and considered it well: I looked upon it, and received instruction.

Pro 24:33  Yet a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep:

Pro 24:34  So shall thy poverty come as one that travelleth; and thy want as an armed man.

Isa 32:1  Behold, a king shall reign in righteousness, and princes shall rule in judgment.

May God help us to not just catch a little glimpse and go on.  Over 7,000 times the word ‘behold’ is in the bible.  “Behold a king shall reign in righteousness.”

Isa 32:15  Until the spirit be poured upon us from on high, and the wilderness be a fruitful field, and the fruitful field be counted for a forest.

Until the Spirit be poured upon us from on high: This was 6 or 7 hundred years before Jesus Christ.

One day there were 120 people praying in the upper room.  They had been there praying for quite a while.  Jesus had told them to tarry.  The Spirit came as a rushing mighty wind.  One of the men that had failed God, Peter, stood up and preached a powerful message from God.

Isa 32:16  Then judgment shall dwell in the wilderness, and righteousness remain in the fruitful field.

Isa 32:17  And the work of righteousness shall be peace; and the effect of righteousness quietness and assurance for ever.

Isa 32:18  And my people shall dwell in a peaceable habitation, and in sure dwellings, and in quiet resting places;

Isa 32:19  When it shall hail, coming down on the forest; and the city shall be low in a low place.

When the spirit of God is in our vessel, the work of righteousness shall be peace, peaceful habitations.  If you are in a storm then hold still, remember that God always comes through.

Isa 32:20  Blessed are ye that sow beside all waters, that send forth thither the feet of the ox and the ass.

The effects of the Holy Spirit: Blessed are ye that sow beside all waters.   Sometimes it is just your life that is preaching; sometimes there is an open door.

Send for the ox and the ass.  “God Here I am, what labor can I do for you today?”