Morning everyone. Good to be with you today, and as always, we look forward to the Lord's Day. I do, and I appreciate being able to come together and honoring God in the way we do. I for some reason, and I guess this happens from time to time, I have especially enjoyed, and better said, benefited from what we've done for the past 30 minutes. I think all the men who have led us in what we have done over the past few minutes have done it exceptionally. And I think we've already been given a lot to think about, a lot to praise God for, and a lot to think about in terms of helping us be better spiritually. And I very much appreciate that. We have those who are watching our broadcast online this morning. I know we always do, and I appreciate you joining us in that way, and I hope that you benefit from it, and if you can come and be with us in our assembly, but nonetheless, we're glad you can join us today in this capacity.
Kenneth just read from Psalm 42. Psalm 42 is a song or a psalm, rather of lament. It is a song too. And if you compile the songs of lament that are titled Psalms, you would probably be around 60, which is a significant amount of the 150 psalms that are in our Bible. And even this morning Gene, when he prayed, I don't know if you remembered that or not, and hopefully you thought about that as he was praying, because he was praying for all of us. He mentioned those who are physically sick. He mentioned some of those who are physically sick by name, and I personally appreciate that. It calls those people to mind. And he mentioned, also, he did say, and asked God to help those who are spiritually sick. And he used the term struggle, I think he used the term who are struggling spiritually, and that's really what a Psalm of lament is. It is a psalm in which someone is struggling and they express, and they, and if you will, they pour out their, their their hearts to God. And some of the lament psalms are individual. Some of them are corporate. Some of them are psalms that are pouring them out to God by way of saying, Our nation is struggling. And that's easy to understand how those differentiate. But there is, though, there are those psalms that are filled with that idea of suffering and discouragement. That's a common part of the human experience. And everybody looks to a higher power to help in that. It may be that you're not looking to God. Some people don't look to God. Some people don't know who God is. Some people don't even believe in God. But when they fall into suffering, when they fall into discouragement, they're going to look somewhere because they can't find it within themselves to help themselves. They may try, but that falls short because that's -- because man's limited. Man is finite. Man is finite in every way. Whatever infinite way in which we're not finite God's given to us because He is eternal. That's because of who He is. But we can't help ourselves. At some point, it's just impossible to do, although we try. And there are no good answers, sometimes, when we struggle. There are no good answers when we try to understand what's happening to us. And so what does happen oftentimes is this suffering and this discouragement leads to loneliness, because we don't really know where to turn. And because of that, even it's not just loneliness, but it is a feeling of isolation. It's as though, you know this is happening to me, and it doesn't happen to anybody else. And so why, Lord? And that's really the extent of how some of those psalms are created. When the the psalmist says, here's what's going on, and it may be personal, or he may be reiterating what's what somebody feels. It is so often isolation, and it is so often desolation.
And even when we intellectually understand the problem of suffering, and all I mean by that is we understand why sin came into the world. When sin came into the world, it gave way to what was perfect. It's very early in Scripture that tells us that. God looked at everything at the end of Genesis one, it was all very good. It was perfect. Genesis three, sin entered the world, and it became imperfect. There became sin, and all of the things related to that. So there was sin, and then there were the curses that were announced. And part of the curses was, man's going to die. Before sin, man never would die. He'd always be with God. But because of sin, we're cursed, and we get that intellectually. I think everyone here this morning, if I say to you, why does suffering happen? Well its because sin entered the world. We all understand that intellectually, academically. We read the book and God explains. This is why these things have happened, but we still struggle with how to deal with it practically.
If you feel lonely, if you feel isolated, if you suffer, if you're discouraged, if you feel like God's just not there. The question is, When's he going to be there? How long God before you do what you say you're going to do? We struggle with that, and we may sometimes even struggle with, is he going to help? It's been so long since I've been involved in this. Are you going to help? Have you refused to hear me? And we ask ourselves questions. So it's how will I get through it? Is he going to help? When will he help? Those are our questions, right? It's not a question of, Does he exist? We don't have that. It's not even a question of, Will he help us? For most of us, because we know he will. And part of that's because we know he has. We may not always understand how, but we're confident, and we have confidence in what he says, and so we acknowledge that, and we work our way by faith through all of that, because we know what he's going to do.
And we expect God to act on our behalf. We have an expectation. I don't know everyone's circumstance, but just in a casual glance in this audience, I'm looking at people, some of whom I know the problems you've either had, you're having or I don't know what you will have, but I know what's -- I know what part of your life has looked like in the past, and I know for some of you what your life looks like right now. And the reason you hang on is because you expect God to help you, because he said he's going to, and that's all natural. That's good. That's exactly what he wants us to do. But we expect certain things of God, and for good reason, and part of this lesson is for us to look at maybe some some things that affect how we view God and how we view what we think God ought to be doing in our lives. The gospels show us that Jesus was often times judged by what people thought he ought to do. If you go to John 18, when Jesus is standing before Pilate, and the Jews have said to Pilate, you need to take care of this matter for us. And there's a dialog in John 18, I'm not going to take the time this morning to read out you're familiar with that. Familiar with that dialog, but the Jews had their ideas of who Jesus was. We're going to look at another aspect of that in just a moment. But the Jews had their idea of who Jesus was, Pilate had his idea of who Jesus was, and Jesus knew who he was. It wasn't a question of, I don't know, no, he knew exactly who he was. And if you go back and read John 18, and there's a segment of verses there, when they're in the Praetorium, whereJesus asked Pilate questions. Pilate asked Jesus questions. And all of that is surrounded by, what did the Jews think about this? And even today, people who know little or nothing about God think they know what God ought to be doing, don't they? Everybody wants to talk about God. They may not know anything about him. They may not have read anything about him in the Bible. They don't really know who God is, but they always have an ability to express what they think God ought to be doing. They may not know what the Bible says, but they think they know. And because they think they know, they think they can give some sort of legitimate reason, an idea about what God ought to be doing. Even those of us who know what God says about himself, and I mean that, I don't mean in the full sense, but even those of us who have spent most of our lives studying about who God is, we have we have an idea in our minds. This is who God is, and this is how he's going to act. We have a pretty good sense about that. We're smart people. We've read the Bible, we've analyzed it, we've concluded and we have ideas about who God says that is. But because we have been influenced by the world, sometimes we step out of bounds, sometimes we find ourselves saying some of the same things they're saying because of what we want, and our feelings cause us to hurt, and it cause us to even question God, and so we react to that. But our feelings do not change the fact. Because we feel a certain way, does not change God. Because we feel a certain way does not change the facts of who God is and what his will is, and what he's going to do in the world. How we feel about that doesn't change any of that. But the facts that we do know should change our feelings. That's really something I want you to remember. The facts that we know about God should change our feelings about God. Not feelings over facts, but facts over feelings. Now that won't dismiss the feelings that we have, but it will solidify the feelings that we have. It should shape the feelings that we have. It won't make the feelings go away, but it will shape our feelings when we know what the facts are, because facts help us have the right expectation of God, even when our feelings are mixed or unsure about what God is going to do.
Let's practicalize that. There's my word. I made that. I made that word up. I like that. I'm going to see if I can't get that in the dictionary officially. Practicalized. Let's practicalize all that today, and let's see what God would say about all that with other people who dealt with the same kind of things. I call your attention to Luke three. Luke three, beginning in verse 15 says this, "Now, as the people were in expectation," there we go. That's our that's our title this morning. There it is. "As the people were in expectation and all reasoned in their hearts about John," that's John the Baptist, as we sometimes commonly refer to him as, "whether he was the Christ or not. John answered and said to all, I indeed baptize you with water, but one mightier than I is coming whose sandal strap I'm not worthy to loose. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fan is in his hand. He will thoroughly clean out his threshing floor and gather the wheat into His barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire. Under many other exhortations, he preached to the people, but Herod, the Tetrarch, being rebuked by him concerning Herodias his brother, Philip's wife, and for all the evils which Herod had done, also added this above all that he should shut John up in prison." The people had expectations of John. They reasoned about it. I'm sure, you know, as they had their morning coffee, or as they went to the barbershop or wherever it was that they had, they sat and they talked about this coming messiah, Who's he going to be? And when John came, they questioned whether or not he was the Messiah. And the text tells us that John preached to them. Everybody thought they knew who John was, and yet, when they said what they said to John, John said, Let me tell you who he is. Let me tell you I am. Let me tell you who he is. And so that was the scenario, but they felt what they felt. And then John stated the facts. Here's the fact: one's coming, and he's much different than I am. As a matter of fact, I'm not even worthy. You shouldn't even be saying his name with my name, or my name with his name, I guess is a better way to say it. What we're about are two totally different things. Now we we're helping each other, but you need to understand. So John preached to them. What did he preach? He preached the facts. He preached the facts.
And John states even more facts, because while he's in with Herod, he talks about Herod's brother's wife, Herodias, and his brother Philip, and the the marriage in which they're engaged that they have no right to be in. And to top it all off he says and Herod, there's you got all sorts of problems yourself. So, where are you going to end up? Well, he ends up in jail. He ends up in jail because of what he says. If you go back in John's gospel, John three, verse 30, John the Baptist, says, you know, the Lord must increase. He uses a pronoun. He must increase, and I must decrease. Verse 24 of John three, would indicate that John said this before he was cast into prison. John seven, though he's cast into prison, and I'm not sure, I'm not sure if John, if that was the way John thought he was going to decrease, because when he got on into prison, he definitely decreased. He couldn't do anything. He was incarcerated, and I'm confident he didn't really know what was going to happen, but he couldn't increase. He may have talked to some who were in the prison, maybe who were guarding them. We don't know anything about. But he was locked up. That's what it is. He was in prison. He was shut up in prison. So, he was going to decrease in a specific way.
So, that brings us, as I said to Luke, seven and John, now he's in prison. Remember that. He's now been isolated, and he hears reports, according to verse 18, of Jesus' activity, and then the disciples of John reported him concerning all these things. He was hearing about what Jesus was doing. My guess, he knew -- not my guess, I feel confident he knew that Jesus was going to do this. And his disciples bring information to him that says, This is what's going on out there. So, beginning in verse 19, there's a very interesting exchange, I think. "And John calling two of his disciples to him, sent them to Jesus, saying, Are you the coming one, or do we look for another? When the men had come to him, they said, John, the Baptist has sent us to you, saying, Are you the coming one or do we look for another?" They were good disciples of John. Evidently, they just repeated what John had asked him to repeat. Are you the coming one or should we look for somebody else? What's going on? Well, verse 21 after the messengers of John came to Jesus with the question that John wanted them to ask, verse 21 says, "and that very hour," that very hour, "he" referring to Jesus, "he cured many of infirmities, afflictions and evil spirits and the many blind He gave sight." The clear indication is when they asked him that then he went out and did that. That very hour. And this wasn't just one miracle. Look at what said in verse 21, "he cured many infirmities, afflictions and evil spirits and to many blind He gave sight." As if to say, you know, if John wants, if John wants, some proof about who I am, come watch this. I don't mean Jesus is saying, Come watch what I can do. Jesus is saying, if he needs proof, come watch.
What's going on? I think John knows what's happening. The questions are a little odd to me. He sends word. Go ask him, Are you the one that we ought to be looking for, or is somebody else coming? That seems a little odd for John to even ask Jesus that question. Doesn't that seem odd to you? Because you remember what had happened several years ago. Mary shows up at Elizabeth's house. Elizabeth's carrying John the Baptist in her womb. Mary's carrying Jesus in her womb. Mary walks in and says hello to Elizabeth and John, who is in the womb of Elizabeth leaps when she hears the voice of the mother of Jesus. And just think about that for a minute. When he hears the voice of the mother of Jesus, he leaps in the womb of his own mother. I don't think it's coincidence. That's exactly what the text says happens. And then John later had -- later baptizes Jesus, and he sees the dove ascend. And it's clear he's not baptizing just some other person in Judea. It's clear that he's baptizing the Son of God. John knows the facts. So, here's my question, why did he send? Why did he send word? Why'd he send the two of his disciples that Jesus is asked, Are you the coming one or should we look for somebody? Why did he do that? I'll tell you why I think. Because I think he's like us. I think he needs reassurance. I think he needs reassurance. They asked two questions, and Jesus said, Let me show you what you go tell John.
So, when you get to verse 22 Jesus answered and said to them, this is after he's done what he'd done. Verse 22 he said, You go tell John the things you've seen. "Go tell John the things you've seen and heard." Here's what you tell him, "the blind, see, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have the gospel preached on them." Those were Jesus' words. My guess is when they went back to John, that's exactly what they said. Go tell John what you've seen, give him an update. Why? Because I think John felt alone. I feel like he felt isolated. I feel like he was discouraged. He knew who Jesus was. He knew he was God, but I think he's just simply asking. That seems like the only reasonable explanation to me. I just want little reassurance. I know what you said. I've been following you all my life. We're cousins. If anybody believes in you, it's me. I just need a little help here, because intellectually, John knew Jesus, who he was, but isn't that us? When we struggle, when we have difficulty, we don't lose faith. We don't go, You know what I believed in God all my life, but this has happened to me, so I'm abandoning God. We don't do that. We don't say, you know, I know what Jesus said. I know he said, I'll take care of you, I'll comfort you, I'll be with you forever. I don't believe that anymore. We don't do that. We don't do that, but we struggle. But we struggle because how we feel, because we know how we feel, and if we're honest with ourselves, that's what we say to God. God, I know you're there. I know what you told me, but, man, I need a little help here. I know what you've said, but I need some help, and that's me. From time to time.
The Bible is full of stories where God's great People of faith feel discouraged. They feel fearful, they feel isolated. The Bible's filled with stories like that. I want to share one with you that I'm sure you remember, but I'm sharing it with you because it's so extreme. It's found in First Samuel 21. I want to read it with you. It's unlikely. It's a powerful, unlikely story. As a matter of fact, it's even funny, I think. Let's read it. "Then David arose and fled that day from before Saul and went to Achish, the king of Gath, and the servants of Achish said to him, is this not David the king of the land? Did they not sing of him to one another in dances, saying Saul has slain his 1000s, and David is 10,000? Now David took these words to heart and was very much afraid of Achish, the king of Gath, so he changed his behavior before them, feigned madness in their hands, scratched at the doors of the gate and then let his saliva fall down on his beard. Then Achish said to his servants, look, you see, the man's insane. Why have you brought him to me? Have I need of a madman that you have brought this fellow to play the madman in my presence? Shall this fellow come into my house?" King Achish of Gath and his servants -- David finds his way to evidently where the king is and where the people who surround the king are. Now I want you to remember where this is happening. Achish was the king of where? Gath. Goliath was from, where? Gath. You know, if I was going to go somewhere to seek refuge, and David, remember, in this scenario, David is fleeing from Saul because Saul's trying to kill David. Because David has already been told you're going to be the next king. And David is fleeing from Saul, and he, this is hilarious to me, and he ends up in Gath! With the king of Gath! And those and when he gets there, the messengers look at him and go, is this not, is this not the guy that's been killing all of us? And his own people say, you know, Saul's killed this but David's killed this many. David is -- David is David! And when David hears them say that, he says, You know what? I think I'm going to play like I'm crazy. And he does. He starts scratching at the door. That's kind of a freaky looking picture, right? I thought, well, it's close to Halloween. I put something up there to kind of scare everybody.
David realized Achish knew him and what he had done, and David was, the text says, he was very much afraid. That's how he felt. He felt abandoned. He felt scared, yet the Lord had helped him defeat Goliath. This had this is post. -- this is the post valley of Elah time. Now, may I just ask you a question? If you had been David and David and God had done for David, what he had done for David up to this point, would you have had to feign madness in front of the king of Gath? I'm just asking. Would you not have thought, You know what, Saul's chasing me, but God's with me. God's the very one who's told me he's going to take care of me. I'm going to be the king, so God's going to take care of me. But yet, I'll tell you what David was. David was like us sometimes. I know what you said. I know what the facts are. I know what they say, but you don't understand how I feel, and I think that's why David's life story is compelling for us, because David's life story, in many ways, is our life story. Well, I know you're there, Lord, You've helped me in so many ways, but this time, I'm really scared. I'm not sure you're going to help me through this. I don't know how this is going to turn out, so I'm really scared, and I'm not quite sure about you, and I have these certain expectations, and you're not fulfilling an expectation. That's kind of how we think from time to time.
Go back to Luke seven, Jesus answered, said to him, Go tell John the things you've seen. And we and we read that a few minutes ago, the blind, what happened to the blind, the lame, the lepers, the dead. And there's even some preaching that's going on, because everybody needs to understand what I'm going to do. So, he goes back, and he tells them what to say. And John's messengers didn't have to depend on eyewitness testimony. John's messengers didn't have to say, well, you know what, I'm coming back and I'm asking the question, can you tell me what you've seen Jesus do? How about you? Can you tell me what you've seen? How about you? Can you tell me what Jesus has done? They didn't have to do that. They were the eyewitnesses, and apparently, they were the eyewitnesses, in a way that nobody had been eyewitnesses to that point in time. Jesus just went out in that very hour and he did all these things, and they're watching all this. And so that's an overwhelming assurance for John. And Jesus tells you, You go tell John what you've seen. And now verse 23. I think verse 23 is the key. Look at verse 23, "and Blessed is he who is not offended." This is what Jesus said. "Blessed is he who is not offended because of me." What's Jesus saying? Blessed is he who is not offended because of me. What is Jesus saying? I think he's saying, Blessed are those who let me be me. Blessed are those who let me do what I do. Blessed are those who let me work like I want to work. Blessed are those who understand you may feel that way, but I'm God, I'm going to do what I'm going to do. Blessed are those who are not offended by me. What's another way to say that? Blessed are those who trust me. That's another way to say it. That's the way to say it in the positive. The negative, blessed are those who are not offended by me. What's the positive? Blessed are those who trust me. Blessed are those who don't hold me hostage to what they think I ought to be doing for them. Blessed are those who let me decide. That's hard to do. That's hard to do. But even when it's hard to do, we got to go back to what we know. And I think what Jesus is saying as well is when he says, Blessed are those who are not offended by me. I think what he's saying, Blessed are those who know that I am the king of kings, and I am the Lord of lords, and I am Jesus. I have authority over all, and I always know what is best. And as the King of kings, those who are not offended by me will accept what I do. They will allow me to act like I act. They will allow the facts to trump their feelings, and that my good friends is hard to do. I'll admit it.
So, let's close this morning with just a few things to remember. Okay? So, let me mention these things, when, when we when we find ourselves expecting God to act in ways that he may not, at least not initially, or he may never act. Let's remember a few things. Okay, here they are. When we allow doubts to govern how we feel, go back to the facts. What's the fact? The fact is, he said, I'll be with you. He didn't express in great detail how that's going to happen. He just said, I'll be with you. No matter what you go through. I'll be with you. I'm never going to leave you. I'm never going to forsake you. I'm always going to be with you. So, go back to that fact, and put our head in charge of our heart. Our heart is -- our heart will be heavy. We're not going to eliminate that. That's not going to go away. That's not going to go away, not easily. But don't let it-- don't let it get pushed to the front. Let it get pushed to the back. Faith flourishes when facts are pushed ahead of feelings. If feelings are what govern your life, if that's where you find the greatest opportunity to get answers, then I'm going to tell you what's going to happen. It's going to change. It's going to change all the time, because your feelings change. Because you can't operate the life that God wants you to operate based on your feelings. You have them, but you can't operate on them. You operate on the facts, what you know Him to be, who you know Him to be, and how you've seen Him operate in your life already. Let God be God.
And finally, let your expectations of God be what he decides, not, what you think or feel. You hear me say this an awful lot. This is hard stuff to me. The reason, I know because it's hard for me. It's hard for me, it's hard for me to just push my feelings aside about how I think God ought to deal with my suffering and my troubles and my discouragement. It's hard for me to put that aside, how I feel about that. But what gets me through it is I'll always know what he said. I've said this again to you before in the past, I've gone through some difficulties. I've gone through some pretty serious difficulties in my own personal life. And as I look back on those, the thing, the thing, now, let me rephrase that. A thing, one of the things that got me through that was because I knew I would get through that. Because God's promised me I'd get through that. That's one of the things that got me through it. He said, you'll get through it, Kenny. And I did, and I kept that. I never will, I never will, ever forget those those times. I never will forget the fact that even telling myself, all right, you're going through a difficult time, but you're going to get past that difficult time. And if you're sitting here this morning, you're going through a difficult time, here's what I want you to remember. You're going to get through a difficult time. You got to keep telling yourself that. But let God be God. Let him do what he said he'll do. Let him do what he decides he's going to do, and trust him. Don't be offended because of him, but trust Him and have confidence in him.
Let's pray together: Father, when difficulties come, and they will, we've heard it, not just from me this morning, but from Patrick, and we've read about those things. We know the difficulties come. And help us to simply trust in you, even through the difficulties that appear to be the absolute worst that our lives can imagine. Help us to put our trust and our confidence in you, and help us, yes, to expect some things from you, but to expect those things in your time and in your ways, because you always know what's best. And we're grateful for that. We're grateful that we're not the ones who decide that. We're grateful that you do and help our faith to be strong enough that we get through those times. May that be what happens in every one of our lives. In Jesus name, amen.
Thank you for your kind attention. If you're in this audience this morning and you need to respond to the invitation of Jesus Christ, we would like to help you with that. If you need to be saved from your sins, if you have need to have your sins washed away because of the world in which we live in, because of decisions you've made in reference to those things, then Jesus is there for you. Matter of fact, he said on two occasions, unless you believe that I am the Son of God, you're going to die in your sins. And the clear, the clear fact of Scripture is, if you die in your sins without Jesus, you're not going to be with Jesus forever. You're not ever going to be with Jesus. That's a better way to say that. But He gives you that opportunity. And if you this morning, want to make that decision, it'll be the best decision you've ever made. We can help you with that. We'd like for you to come while we stand and sing.
