Trust in God

Trust in God

A Sermon Delivered by Pastor Jim Scott Orrick

February 18, 2001

I begin the scripture reading with verse 3, which is where I began last week and preached a sermon entitled The Weariness of Wickedness. I will be making some reference back to these verses that I preached from last week, and so I begin again with verse 3.

But come here, you sons of the sorceress, you offspring of the adulterer and the harlot! Whom do you ridicule? Against whom do you make a wide mouth and stick out the tongue? Are you not children of transgression, offspring of falsehood, inflaming yourselves with gods under every green tree, slaying the children in the valleys, under the clefts of the rocks? Among the smooth stones of the stream is your portion; they, they are your lot! Even to them you have poured a drink offering. You have offered a grain offering. Should I receive comfort in these? On a lofty and high mountain you have set your bed. Even there you went up to offer sacrifice. Also behind the doors and their posts you have set up your remembrance; for you have uncovered yourself to those other than Me, and have gone up to them; you have enlarged your bed and made a covenant with them; you have loved their bed, where you saw their nudity. You went to the king with ointment and increased your perfumes; you sent your messengers afar off, and even descended to Sheol. You are wearied in the length of your way; yet you did not say, "There is no hope." You have found the life of your hand; therefore you were not grieved. And of whom have you been afraid, or feared, that you have lied and not remembered me, nor taken it to your heart? Is it not because I have held my peace from of old that you do not fear me? I will declare your righteousness and your works, for they will not profit you. When you cry out, let your collection of idols deliver you. But the wind will carry them all away, a breath will take them.

Here in the middle of verse 13 begins my text for the day: But he who puts his trust in me shall possess the land, and shall inherit my holy mountain. And one shall say, 'Heap it up! Heap it up! Prepare the way, take the stumbling block out of the way of my people.’ For thus says the High and Lofty One who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: 'I dwell in the high and holy place, with him who has a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones. For I will not contend forever, nor will I always be angry; for the spirit would fail before Me, and the souls which I have made.’ This is the word of the Lord.

I know of a man who needed to transact some business in a part of town that he believed to be dangerous. He felt that his life might be in danger to go there. So just for safe measure, he took along a pistol, and I think he had it hidden in the glove compartment or under the seat. As he went into that part of town and parked his car, waiting for the man who was to meet him there, as he had feared, some threatening-looking characters began to gather around his car, walking by repeatedly as though they were sizing up the situation. When the man saw what was happening, he reached into his glove compartment or under his seat, pulled out the pistol and laid it up on the dashboard. He said that soon all the characters disappeared. He didn't open the door and shout at them. He didn't point the gun at them. He just quietly laid it on the dashboard. What was he saying? He was saying, "If you attempt to do what I think you're thinking about doing, there will be trouble, but if you go on and leave me alone, there will be no trouble."

I have a dog, and I've been training this dog for several weeks. One of the things that I've trained him to do is to walk by my side. I tell him to heel, and he walks right there beside me. While I was training him to do that, I used a leash, and the leash had a collar on the end that would administer a mild correction to him if he misbehaved. Occasionally I would administer a correction to him with the end of the leash that I held in my right hand. After being smitten once or twice with the end of that leather leash, all I had to do was just dangle it a little bit; he could see that leash out of the corner of his eye, and then he would correct himself. When I let that little end of the leash dangle down, I didn't shout any threats to him. I didn't hit him. I was just letting him know with the end of the leash, "If you don't behave, there will be consequences." Of course sometimes we use the same procedure with our children. It's not always necessary to spank them when they're misbehaving. Sometimes all that is necessary is just to go get the paddle, come back into the room, and lay the paddle down on the counter, and they get the message. They know, "If I don't repent, if I don't change what I'm doing, then I'll feel the sting of that paddle." Along with that paddle, if you wanted to, you could put down a little piece of candy or a chocolate bar, something that would delight the child, and by that action, you would be saying, "There are consequences to your bad behavior, and there are rewards to your good behavior."

That is what the Lord does. Sometimes when His people are misbehaving, all He does is go in the other room and get the paddle, or lay the pistol out on the dashboard, or dangle the end of the leash where we can see it out of the corner of our eye, and if we are smart, then we'll take the warning. But along with that threat of punishment, God also puts down the promise of reward, like that little piece of candy that we might put down to induce and encourage our children to do what is right. Sometimes God gets out the paddle and He tells the prophet, "You tell the people I'm going to use this." He did this to Jonah. He said, "You go to Nineveh, and you tell them that in forty days Nineveh is going to be destroyed." And so Jonah went, and he said, "Forty days and Nineveh will be destroyed." God put the pistol out on the dashboard. The people of Nineveh saw it was coming, and they repented in sackcloth and ashes. So what did God do? He took the pistol off the dashboard. He did not destroy Nineveh. And in dealing with His people Israel, there were times when He said, "I'm going to destroy you." And it was equivalent to the action of our laying the paddle out. He was saying, "I'm going to destroy you if you don't repent." There were times in the history of Israel when the people heeded the warning of the paddle out on the counter, and they repented, and they received God's blessing. But finally the people of Israel forced God to do what He said He would do, to take up the paddle and administer the discipline. But in the midst of that threatening, and in the midst even of the administration of the discipline, God also gives the promise of reward.

God's threats of punishment, then, are calculated to bring about repentance in us. We turn from our wicked ways and go to the Lord and say, "I'm sorry, Father. I should not have done that. Please don't spank me. I know that I deserve it, but I repent. I come to You. I ask You to stay Your hand and don't give me the spanking that I know I deserve. If I will indeed repent, then please stay your hand."

In our text we can observe how the Lord dealt similarly with the children of Israel. Isaiah prophesied several years before the paddling finally came, and we observe him pleading with the people. "Turn from your wicked ways, and God will have mercy upon you. But even when the paddling does come, even when the discipline does come from the Lord, then I want you to know that He is not casting all of you off forever. There will be a time when, in spite of the vast obstacles that are in your way, He will prepare a way for you to come back to Him." That is the piece of candy, the reward, the promise of reward that begins in my text in the second half of verse 13. After describing the weariness of wickedness in the first part of the chapter, and after describing the futility and sinfulness of seeking after other gods, and the pursuits of pleasure outside of Him, after doing that in the first part of the chapter, now God comes in the last part of verse 13 and says, But he who puts his trust in Me shall possess the land and shall inherit My holy mountain. In the last part of verse 13, then, we have provision made for trusting sinners. That's the first point of the message. In the last part of verse 13, God says that He will provide for sinners who put their trust in Him. And then in verse 14, God says to prepare the way. We will see that there is preparation made for returning sinners. And then in verses 15ff, there are some promises made to humble sinners.

Let's look then at verse 13, first of all at the provision made for trusting sinners, for sinners who will put their trust in God. Notice first of all that trust is the remedy for all of the ills that have been mentioned in the first part of the chapter. When I was a little boy, sometimes I would watch cartoons, and one of my favorite cartoons was Popeye the Sailorman. Popeye would get into trouble. Bluto would be mashing him around, and Olive Oil, his girlfriend, wouldn't be paying any attention to him, and just when the situation looked very bleak, Popeye would get some spinach. He would eat that spinach, and then no matter what advantage Bluto had over him, Popeye was able to beat Bluto up. Well, there is something like Popeye’s spinach for the Christian. Sometimes it's as though Satan is bullying us around, and we feel like we have been deserted by God. What's the cure? What's the can of spinach for the Christian? It's this: trust in God. I want you to think about this: at the bottom of all sin is unbelief. God says one thing; our desires say another. We don't believe God; we believe our desires. At the bottom of the sin that comes is unbelief. God says one thing; the world says another. We want the approval of the world. God says the approval of the world is not as valuable as His approval. We disbelieve God and believe the world, and sin results. Give that some thought. At the bottom of virtually every sin is unbelief. Well then, what is the sword that we should bring against the enemy of unbelief? It's belief! Or, another word is trust. We believe God when God says, "My pleasures are more pleasurable than the pleasures of the world." We say, "God, I believe You. Even though I may not see it right now, and even though my flesh like a magnet is drawing me away from You, I believe You, and I'm going to trust you. I commit myself unto Your care." Trust in God, then, is the remedy for all the ills that have been mentioned in the first part of the chapter.

Trust in God is the light that shows us out of the darkness that has been described in the first part of the chapter. Let me give you some examples. We saw back in verse 10 that pursuing pleasures in the way of sin results in weariness. Look at verse 10 again: You are wearied in the length of your way; yet you did not say, "there is no hope." You have found the life of your hand; therefore you were not grieved. Even though this style of life wears you out— I admit that it doesn't wear everyone out, but for many it does—even though this style of life wears you out, and you sometimes ask yourself, "Why do I continue doing this?" you always find something in your hand that keeps you going. The promise of a better weekend next weekend, or the promise of a better relationship next time, or the promise of a better turn of luck the next time that you undertake this venture. There's always something that keeps you going, but still you're just weary and tired. Trust in God is returning from this weary journey in sin and coming home to the Father. You are able to say finally, "Sin will never give me the pleasure that I crave, and sin will never give me the rest that I crave." So Jesus says, Come to Me all you who labor and are heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. So trust is the light that shows us the way out of the weary paths of sin into the restful pastures of the Father.

Then look at verse 11. Of whom have you been afraid or feared? It is amazing how much of our behavior is motivated by fear—fear of rejection, or in the case of the Israelites here, they were afraid that if they never offered sacrifices to the local gods, those local gods would keep them from having good crops. And so just to be sure, they would offer sacrifices to the true God, and they would offer sacrifices to the local gods as well. They just wanted to have all of their bases covered. Why did they do that? Because they were afraid of the repercussions that might come down upon them if they neglected to give honor to these local gods. The same sort of fear often motivates us to sin. We're afraid of the disapproval that will come to us. We're afraid that all of our friends will begin to say, "Why? Are you chicken? What's the matter with you? Don't you want to have fun? You sure are weird!" And since we fear the disapproval of our peers or the disapproval of the world, then we try to keep both God and the world happy. But God says to us, "How long will you waver between two opinions? If the world is most important, then serve the world, but if I am most important, then turn your back once and for all upon the world." "But Lord, what if the world attacks me?" "Well, what if the world does? I'll take care of you." "But what if they eventually kill me?" "If they eventually kill you, then I'll give you a greater reward in heaven." How can we turn our backs on these ones that we fear? How can we do it? Only by trusting in God. Only by believing that God will do what He has said that He will do. And so trusting God is the light that shines our way out of the dark cavern of fear of whatever it is that causes us to have a divided heart and divide our loyalties between the world on the one hand and God on the other.

Look again in verse 11. Not only does trust in God deliver us from the weariness of sin and from the fear of the world, but it also delivers us from the lie that we have been living outside of God. Of whom have you been afraid, or feared, that you have lied and not remembered me? As I said last week, sin is a lie. It promises what it can never deliver. It can give pleasure for a season, but in contrast to that, at the Lord's right hand, there are pleasures forevermore. Now which would you rather have? Pleasures for a season or pleasures forevermore?

Jesus told a story about a man who was very wealthy. He fared sumptuously every day. That means he always had the best food to eat. He was clothed in the very finest. He wore purple, which in that day, was unusual. Only rich people could afford purple because the process of making purple cloth was very expensive. So he was clothed in purple, and he had the very finest of food. And outside his gate there was laid a very sick man. He had a disease called leprosy, and leprosy was so terrible not only because of what it did to the person's physical body who had leprosy, but also because the person who had leprosy was not allowed to live at home with his family anymore. He had to go out and just live in the streets or maybe with other lepers outside of the town, and anytime that he saw someone approaching him, then he would have to warn them, "I'm unclean! Don't come near me!" Now can you imagine what a life that would be? This poor fellow who had leprosy was so sick he never had any friends. The dogs would come, and they would lick his sores. No doctor would come near him. It was just the dogs that would come and lick his sores. Which one would you rather be? The rich man who had all this nice food and all these nice clothes? Or the poor man who was so sick that he couldn't be around his family, and dogs came and licked his sores? Which one would you rather be? If that's the end of the story, there's no question. I'd rather be the rich man. So would anyone with a lick of sense. But listen to the rest of the story. Jesus said that the rich man died, and he went to hell, but the poor man died, and he went to heaven. And the rich man in hell lifted up his eyes, saw the poor man in heaven and said to father Abraham who was there, "Send Lazarus." That was the poor man's name. "Send Lazarus to just dip his finger in a bit of water and put it on my tongue. I'm tormented in this flame." Father Abraham said, "Son, remember. Son, remember." When Abraham said "Son, remember," the smoke of his torment ascended because he had a lot to remember. He said, "Son, remember that in your life you received your good things and Lazarus his bad things. Now he's comforted, and you're tormented. There's a great gulf fixed between us; he can't come to you, and neither can you come to us."

And then let me tell the end of the story even though it doesn't serve my purpose right now. At the end of the story the rich man in hell says, "Father Abraham, please send someone to my brothers because I don't want them to come here." It makes you wonder, weren't there any believers who lived in his brothers' neighborhood? Wasn't there a faithfully preaching synagogue or priest in the neighborhood? I wonder when people die in your neighborhood, do they cry out and say, "Please send someone to my neighborhood who will bear the light"? My purpose in telling that story was to ask, which one would you rather be? At the first of the story we'd rather be the rich man, but at the end of the story, we'd rather be the poor man. While the rich man was on earth he believed a lie. He thought that maybe this world is all that there's going to be.

Perhaps he was like that other rich man about whom Jesus told a story. He had had an unusually good year with his farming business, and he assumed that he was well set for many years to come. He anticipated saying to himself, “Soul, take it easy. You have plenty stored up for the future. Eat, drink, and be merry!” But that very night God said to that man, "You fool! This night your soul will be required of you, and then who will get these things?" There are some of you in here who know that you have thought about giving your life to Christ and repenting of your sin. Perhaps there's the fear in your mind that you say, "If I give my life to God, maybe he will make me be a missionary. Maybe he will make me marry somebody who is really ugly." We imagine all of these things. "If I give my life to God, then He is going to inflict some kind of punishment on me, and rather than do that, I'll just keep charge of my own life." I remember well when I was a little boy praying to God, trying to be sincere, using the model prayer as my guide, but I would always stop when I was supposed to say, "Thy will be done." I was at a dilemma. I thought, “God sees my heart. He knows that I don't really want His will to be done. I want my will to be done. If God's will is something other than my will, then I don't want God's will to be done. I want my will to be done.” And so there were times when I had to just pass over that phrase -- as if anything else that I could say would be accepted once I had refused the Lordship of God! I was living a lie, like some of you. I thought, and maybe you're thinking, “After I live a little bit, then I'll give my life to God. I want to experience some of the pleasures of the world first. Then I'll come to God.” And that's a lie. Maybe you think like I thought, “I have plenty of time.” Maybe you do. Maybe you don’t.

I remember a boy that I went to high school with. We were good friends, and I would witness to this boy all the time. He would say to me, "Jim, one of these days, I'm going to surprise you. You're going to look up, and you're going to see me coming in the back door of the church." You know, he was right. One day I did look up and see him in church, but the problem was, he was dead, in a casket. “Some day,” he said, "I'll come." Some day he had every intention of getting things right, but he never did. You know why? Because he believed a lie.

If I've not mentioned your lie, then let God the Holy Spirit convince you of what your lie is because it's a lie that keeps you from coming to God, and the only cure is to trust in God. It is the light then, that will show the way out of the forest of deception, and Jesus says, "I am the way for you when you're lost. I am the truth for you when you have believed a lie. I am the life for you when you are dead in trespasses and in sins. To avail yourself of all that I am for all that you need, you must trust in me." Trust then is the remedy for all the ills that are mentioned in the first part of the chapter.

Then notice further, Trusting in God is the cure for the foolishness of trusting in our own righteousness. God frankly declares in verse 12, I will declare your righteousness and your works, for they will not profit you. In other words, the Lord is saying, “I will give you credit for every good thing that you have ever done, and it will not profit you.” My friends, there have been some days when I've been better than others, done more things right, had more trust in God, read the Bible, prayed. There have been days when I have had more of a devotional frame of spirit, and out of all of my life there has been one day—I don't know when it was—but there has been one day when I was most dedicated to God. Out of that twenty-four hour period, there was one hour when I was most intensely in God's presence, loving God more than I have loved Him any other hour in all of my life. And even within that one hour, there would be one minute that I was at the purest that I have ever been in my whole life. That one minute stands shining brighter than any other minute in all my life. Let me tell you this: I would not trust that one minute to get me into heaven. If God could say, "You choose the best minute out of all your life, and then I'll weigh the good against the bad in that one minute, and if you've got more good in that minute than bad in that minute, I'll take you into heaven," I would say, "No, God. Oh no! I'll not trust the best minute I've ever lived; instead I trust in You. The just shall live by faith! I trust in You, Lord, to take care of me and not in my own filthy rags of righteousness." Trust in God, then, flips on the light and enables us to see that our righteousnesses are all filthy rags. We take them off and the Lord says, "Here, put this on," and He holds up the righteousness of Jesus Christ. You say, "But what about all these rags that I'm wearing?" And Jesus says, "You give them to me; I'll wear them." He takes the rags of our filthy sin and puts them on Himself. He bears the wrath of God in our place. He gives us His fine coat of righteousness.

Trust in God is the cure for all of these ills that will keep us playing in the dirt of earth and wandering in the wilderness of sin and crying out in the despair of the darkness of the cave of wickedness! Trust in God is the light that shows the way out. Trust in God, then, is the remedy, it's the only remedy. It's the light that shows the way out of sin. Trust in God is the hand that receives the provisions that God makes for repentant sinners.

Notice verse 13. It says, But he who puts his trust in me shall possess and shall inherit my holy mountain. Two things: he shall possess the land; he shall inherit my holy mountain. One of the fears that keeps us from trusting in God is, Am I going to get along all right in the world after this? Will I have everything that I need? God answers, "You will have everything that I want you to have. You will possess the land." He'll give you a competent portion of this world's goods as long as it is for your good and for His glory to do so.

He who puts his trust in me will have everything that he needs in this life as long as I want life to continue, and shall inherit My holy mountain. The first promise has to do with temporary blessings of earth, and the second blessing has to do with the eternal blessings of the kingdom of God. And those eternal blessings of the kingdom of God commence right now. They're summarized here as "My holy mountain." The first blessings, the temporal ones of earth, are no good unless you have the second blessings, the eternal ones of the kingdom of heaven. The way to have both is to put your trust in God. So here at the end of verse 13, we see that there is provision made for repentant sinners.

Then in verse 14, we see that there is preparation made for returning sinners. Remember that Isaiah has threatened God's judgment upon the children of Israel, and that punishment was that they would be taken captive into foreign lands. It's hard for us to appreciate what that meant. Our modern conveniences have blurred our perception of how difficult travel is under primitive conditions. So we think about the children of Israel going into captivity and we think, "Well, they were just three of four hundred miles from home. What was to keep a bunch of them from leaving and just going back home?" There were tremendous impediments in the way. There were valleys and dry gulches that had to be gone through, places where there was no water. You can't travel very far without water. And there were mountains in the way. You can't climb very many mountains without having food to eat and water to drink. So even though it may have been only a few hundred miles from Babylon to Israel, there was no way, there was no road. But God's saying that there's going to come a time when my people will be brought back, and He anticipates that the people would object and say, "How? There's no road." This verse tells us that God is fully capable of making a way where there is no way. One shall say, "Heap it up! Heap it up!" And this is the command of someone who would be like a road construction foreman. There's a deep place here. Fill it in. Prepare the way. Some people are going to be coming this way. Prepare the way for them to come.

And so as we consider ourselves in the distant land of captivity to sin, slaves to Satan and to the lust of the flesh in the world, and we look at heaven, and we see the place to which God calls us, we say, "How can I get from here to there? There is a great gulf fixed. How can I make it?" The Bible teaches that God has made a way, and Jesus stands, and He says, "I am the way. The way has already been prepared." There are some who stumble over the way. They think, "How could God possibly get me from this land of captivity and distress into this land of peace and happiness and promise, a land flowing with milk and honey? How can God make bridge great distance through a man who could not even keep himself safe from a band of religious zealots in his own day? How could that happen?" There are some people who stumble over the way that God has provided, but God has taken this way that is a stumbling stone, and He has made it the chief cornerstone. He has made it the most important rock in all of His construction. He has made it the most important road on all of His map of roads. This is the way—Jesus Christ.

And for those who do not stumble over the way, God says, "You make preparation that they will not stumble in the way." Notice verse 14: Prepare the way, take the stumbling block out of the way of my people. Years ago I read a sermon by C. H. Spurgeon. I believe he took this as his text, and it was a topical sermon on various stumbling blocks that would be in the way of people who were trying to come to Christ. They would think, "Well, my sin is too great for Christ to save." They were willing that Christ should save them. They weren't stumbling over the way, but they thought that they were too bad. Spurgeon would proceed that no one is too bad. God has said, "I will save to the uttermost those who come to me by Christ Jesus." And so Spurgeon would mention various roadblocks, and then he would remove them out of the way, and that's the sort of thing that we can be doing. Do you remember when Christian and Pliable fell into the Slough of Despond? Pliable got out, and he went back to the City of Destruction. Christian called out for help, and Help came and lifted him out. "Why is this place here?" asked Christian. And Help responded, "Well, there are steps to help people get across this slough, and there's a lot of good teaching that has been poured into here, but still people fall into the Slough of Despond." Sin burdened pilgrims despond because they think that their sins are too great and God cannot or will not save them. In this case, clearing the stumbling blocks out of the way of my people entails an explanation that
God is able to save even the chief of sinners, and Christ is able to save the most vile. Preparation has been made for returning sinners.

Then finally in verses 15-16, there are promises made to humble sinners. Notice first of all, the greatness of the Promiser and then secondly the graciousness of the promises. There are promises that are made to humble sinners.

Let's see first of all the greatness of the Promiser. For thus says the High and Lofty One. God describes Himself as High and Lofty. Maybe it's most helpful to you to know what is meant by high. We think of a similar expression that we have on the other end of the spectrum. We might say concerning someone's dastardly deed, "That was low of him." What we mean was that it was inconsiderate. It was mean. It was low-down. We know what we mean by that. Well, you just turn that completely around, and know that God is high. He is considerate. He is kind. He is loving. He is morally perfect. He is high. Well, how high is He? He is the Lofty One. He is High and Lofty. I think that the word high refers to God's perfections just considered in Himself, and lofty refers to God's perfection seen in contrast to everything else.

When I was a little boy, my daddy took me to a high school basketball tournament, and one of the teams had a player who was over seven feet tall. We had not yet seen this particular player in action, but when we were in the lobby between games, my dad asked me, "Would you like to see the basketball player I was telling you about?" I said, "Yes." He reached down and picked me up. (My dad is about as tall as I am). He picked me up so that my head was on a level with his, and I could see over the heads of everyone and across the lobby I saw the boy. Everyone else's head just came up to his shoulders. There he stood—head and shoulders above everyone else. He was lofty in comparison to everyone else, and that is how God describes Himself. He is high. He is tall. How tall? Let me lift you up and show you. He is the lofty one.

Let's see further about the greatness of this Promiser when verse 15 says that He inhabits eternity. I have been thinking about a series of sermons that I hope to preach soon, and I want to preach on the infinity of God. The only problem with that is that I don't know what it means. And so here I am, I want to preach an entire sermon on the infinity of God, and I don't know what it means, and so when I take my walks in the morning, I think about what it means for God to be infinite. I still think that ultimately we're going to have to just talk all the way around it and say, "Well, it's something like this." Our mind gets boggled when we start thinking about terms like infinity and eternity. But God lives there. God is eternal. He dwells in eternity. Now that means that God never changes. A returning sinner might say, "You made these promises years ago, but are your promises still good today?" And God says, "I dwell in eternity. I never change." So these promises are made by a very great one. He is high. He is lofty. He inhabits eternity, and He has perfect rectitude of character.

He is holy. His name is holy. My definition of holiness is always loving and choosing what is best. God always loves and chooses what is best. He is holy, and He dwells in the high and holy place. Oh, this is the sort of God that our hearts crave: a supernatural one. This is the sort of God that we look to. He is high. He is lofty. He is inscrutable. He inhabits eternity. We long to wrestle with someone who can pin us down every time and there's no question about it. And God is that kind of God. He inhabits eternity. His name is holy. He dwells in the high and holy place.

But then I want you to notice the second part of verse 15, the gracious promises that this great Promiser makes. Not only does He dwell in the high and holy place, but He also dwells with him who has a contrite and humble spirit. The word contrite means remorseful, sorry for sin. It's exactly what Jesus was saying in the Sermon on the Mount when He said, Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. The mournful are those who are sorry about their sin. And God says for those who are sorry about their sin, and those who are humble, "I will live with him." When you're humble you have a small opinion of yourself. I believe that God here makes promises to someone who is the opposite of the proud and self-confident character idealized in much of our modern educational system. John Calvin says this in the Institutes , "If someone were to ask me, 'What are the three most important character qualities for a Christian?' I would answer, 'humility, humility, and humility.'" John Bunyan says that the Pilgrims came across a shepherd boy who was very poor, but yet he was singing, and he was happy. He was singing this, "He that is down need fear no fall. He that is low no pride." When I think of that poem of Bunyan's, I sometimes think of an old saying (Well, I don't know if it's very old, but I heard it about 15 years ago), "No matter how hard you try, you can't fall off the floor." That's just the sort of position that we should want to be in before God. "I am so low; you need not take me any lower, Father." And God says, " I'll lift you up then." Humble yourself in the sight of the Lord, and He will lift you up. Humble yourself in the sight of the Lord, and He will make His home in you because He dwells in the high and lofty place, but also with those who have a contrite and humble spirit.

Then what else will He do in this gracious promise? Not only will he dwell with those who have a contrite and humble spirit, but He says, "I will revive the spirit of the humble and revive the heart of the contrite ones. Even though you may feel like you're dead, I will bring you back to life." That's what revive means, to revivify, to bring to life again.

And then verse 16 concludes when He says, I will not contend forever, nor will I always be angry. God may sometimes contend with his children, but He will not contend forever. God may sometimes be angry with his children, but He will not always be angry. Why? Well, He takes some motivation for mercy from the way that we are. He says, "If I were always contending, and if I were always angry, it would be too much for you. You would be overwhelmed. The spirit would fail before Me and the souls which I have made. It would just be too much for you." And so, child of God, sometimes God does display His anger through you. Sometimes God does correct you. Sometimes God doesn't just put the paddle out, but He picks it up, and He uses it. Some of you may be going through times like that right now. In times such as that, be comforted by this: I will not contend forever, nor will I always be angry. He remembers that we are but dust.

I would like to make some application of this sermon. Close your eyes if that will help you to think about what I'm saying and to apply it to your own life. First of all, this matter of trusting in God. Do you? Some of you have never yet begun to trust in God. Will you today? He puts out the paddle as a threat of the wrath that is to come, but I believe He puts the paddle out today as an encouragement for you to repent, and if you repent, then He holds out this tasty morsel, this sweet thing that you will like. And then there are some of us who do trust in Him, but yet we don't walk by faith all the time. Let's pray that God will help us to walk by faith and to trust in Him so that we won't be deceived by the lies of the world, so that we won't trust for one moment in our own righteousness, so that we won't be afraid of the disapproval of the world, so that we will not make the mistake of wearying ourselves in the pursuit of wickedness. Then let's praise God for the great provision He has made in giving us a way, a way that we could not traverse without Him. He has made a way, all the way, from the land of destruction where we live to His holy and lofty dwelling. That way is Jesus Christ. And then let's glorify the Lord because He is such a great person. And let's thank Him for His gracious promises. They're made to sinners. If they were made to righteous persons, we could have no claim in them, but He dwells in a high and lofty place, and also with those who are contrite and humble in spirit.

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Scripture from The Holy Bible, New King James Version. Copyright 1982 by
Thomas Nelson, Inc.

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