2021-05-30 The Only Safe Place. 10am Sunday Service

good morning everyone well it feels a lot like we have all been here before doesn't it pg and i were really hoping to have seen the last of preaching to a camera but there you go here we all are again and if the 111 days spent apart during melbourne's long lockdown has taught us anything it has taught us that god is still god and he's bigger than our circumstances and his purposes will prevail in spite of any circumstances that we might be in and we are still called to be his church and to be his representatives to a weary world come to me all who are weary and burdened says jesus and i will give you rest take my yoke upon you and learn from me for i am gentle and humble in heart and you will find rest for your souls for my yoke is easy and my burden is light two thousand years ago jesus spoke these words to a people who were oppressed by sin and weighed down by the legal burdens that were being placed upon them by the pharisees come to me says jesus take my yoke says jesus and learn from me it's a call to follow him it's a call to discipleship to walk beside him and to learn from him and it is the means by which a weary world will find rest jesus never promised that he would take all the yokes away instead the offer is to share the yoke with jesus to be yoked to him to walk in his ways and to learn from him this is how we navigate through difficult times and that is how we prevail in spite of any circumstances this is not our preferred means of worshiping together but we are still church and god is in still in control and he still calls to us come to me all who are wearied and burdened and i will give you rest so let's be sure that we take him up on that offer i've got a few announcements to share with you this morning they are nothing like the announcements that we had originally planned before she left on wednesday rose gave me the order of service for the day and there is not a single thing on that order of service that is the same today is what it was then but we've gotten used to living with that sort of change haven't we things that we had planned for this coming week are not going to be happening anymore so we had kids games which was due to be happening right about now in the upstairs hall that event is obviously been postponed kids we will try and make sure that that happens as soon as we can when we get back together after church service this morning we were supposed to be gathering for our general meeting and then for a lunch the meeting will be going ahead as it is necessary for us to fulfill our reporting obligations but it is now going to be held on zoom and so the details of the login have already been sent out via email so please log in as soon as this service finishes obviously there won't be any lunch afterwards except whatever you provide for yourself youth encounter were scheduled to meet next sunday afternoon and their topic is what's the big deal about jesus so please if you're in that group just look out for updates from danny and jason during the week when we know whether or not that's going to be going ahead and that advice of course applies for almost all of our activities when we did our first live stream back in march of last year i used psalm 27 as the basis for our prayer and i'd like to lead you again in prayer using that psalm so would you join with me in prayer from psalm 27 the lord is my light and my salvation whom shall i fear the lord is the stronghold of my life of whom shall i be afraid lord you are the stronghold of our lives when uncertainty and fear grips our neighborhoods lord may our lives reflect the truth that you are always in control and our destiny is always secure one thing i've asked of the lord that i will seek after that i may dwell in the house of the lord all the days of my life to gaze upon the beauty of the lord and to inquire in his temple lord at the moment this building that you have provided for us sits mostly silent and empty but over this last difficult year you have reminded us that our building is not where you dwell and a church is not bricks and mortar but it is people people that make up the church and your presence in them breathes life into your church verse 5 for he will hide me in the shelter in the day of trouble he will conceal me under the cover of his tent he will lift me high upon a rock father you are our shelter in times of trouble may we who know your comfort seek to extend that comfort to others in the midst of what for us is mostly just an inconvenience may we remember those whose lives are at stake here and elsewhere around the world may those of us who are concerned about whether schools remain open or closed be mindful of those children children for whom school is a welcome relief from their home environment or in some communities where it is the only place that they receive a decent meal help us to remember those parents who have no option but to leave children at home unattended as they go out to work to pay the rent while we look to our excellent health system for testing and treatments and vaccinations lord help us to be mindful of those who have no health system to depend on at all we pray for refugees packed in refugee camps we pray for those living hand to mouth cramped in unhygienic conditions have mercy on them we pray lord we pray for our brothers and sisters in india in the nations of south america and in the philippines malaysia and a great many other nations who are all struggling under the burden of this disease have mercy on them we pray and while we are increasingly housebound we pray for those who wish that they had a home to be bound to lord we pray for those living in the streets and in the parks for those sleeping in cars all over the city at this cold and dark time of year lord have mercy on those who are sleeping rough help us to remember these most vulnerable and not just to think about them but to remember them in the biblical sense of the word and to seek to act on their behalf teach me your ways o lord and lead me on a level path because of my enemies lord use this time of slowness and confinement to teach me and to draw me to yourself help me to hear your voice i believe that i shall look on the goodness of the lord in the land of the living lord we believe that we will see the good things that you have in store for us here at pathway in this life and we look forward to what you will do among us and we ask you to use us each one for your good purpose wait for the lord be strong and let your heart take courage wait for the lord we will wait for you lord help us to wait well to wait with joy and to demonstrate love in our words and actions we will wait for you lord amen well in just a moment i'm going to hand over to pastor glenn to open up the word of god for us this morning but in the light of the events of this last week he's chosen to alter his message a little bit and he'll be speaking to us this morning from psalm 91 so let's prepare ourselves to receive the message that he has for us as we sing together this beautiful prayer lord i need you [Music] lord i come i confess bowing here i find my rest and without you i fall apart and you're the one that guides my heart and lord i need you oh i need you every hour i need you my one defense my righteousness oh god how i [Music] your grace is found is where you are and where you are [Music] lord i am free [Music] holiness is christ in me and where you are lord i am free holiness is [Music] [Music] so teach my song to rise to you when temptation comes my way and when i cannot stand i'll fall on you [Music] jesus you're my hope and stay and when i cannot stand i'll fall on you [Music] jesus lord i need you every hour [Music] my righteousness lord i leave you every [Music] oh you're my one defense my righteousness oh god how i need you [Music] please grab your bible and turn with me to psalms 91 psalms 91 the psalms have gained prominence among christians since the rise of kovic 19 and psalms 91 has been particularly popular and of course this is very understandable given that it speaks of how god will save you from the deadly pestilence deadly disease and the assurance that pestilence and plague will not come near you and it's brimming with declaration and promises of god's protection and during this time of global pandemic with kovic 19 this psalm speaks of god's presence speaks of god's power speaks of god's protection against fear and i cannot tell you how many times i receive messages about psalms 91 reading through it and covering over yourself as if it comes out some kind of immunity when you memorize it and pronounce it and recite it every day so i want to address this uh topic and give you a balanced view on god's protection and god's safetyness so but i want to read to you the entire psalm first psalms 91 so psalms 91 whoever dwells in the shelter of the most high will rest in the shadow of the almighty i will say of the lord he is my refuge and my fortress my god in whom i trust surely he will save you from the fowler's snare and from the deadly pestilence he will cover you with his feathers and under his wings you will find refuge his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart you will not fear the terror of the night nor the arrow that flies by day nor the pestilence the stalks in the darkness nor the plague that destroys at midday a thousand may fall at your sight ten thousand at your right hand but it will not come near you you will not only observe with your eyes and see the punishment of the wicked if you say the lord is my refuge and you make the most high your dwelling then no harm will overtake you no disaster will come near your tent for he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways they will lift you up in their hands so that you will not strike your foot against a stone you would tread on the lion and the cobra you would trample the great lion and the serpent because he loves me says the lord i will rescue him i will protect him for he acknowledges my name he will call on me and i will answer him i will be with him in trouble i will deliver him and honor him with long life i will satisfy him and show him my salvation it's very comforting as you look especially the first two verses the very first two verses itself we are told exactly who god is and hidden in plain sight are four of god's powerful names mentioned in verse one and two the most high the almighty the lord and my god they say whoever dwells in the shelter of the most high which in hebrew means el jon he will rest in the shadow of the almighty which is el shaddai i will say of the lord which is translated as yahweh he is my refuge and my fortress my god in whom i trust my god comes from the hebrew word elohim so it is beautiful to say that this god is going to protect you doesn't matter what the circumstances may be but how are we to interpret such claims in the psalms because the reality is there are many many christians who died of kovic there are many great christians leaders who died of kovic does this some doesn't apply to them does it not include them as the believers or i heard back in march last year the biggest church the largest church in singapore the manga church pastor joseph prince which have grown prominence across the globe he's building his church building costs 500 million dollars can you believe that he includes a shopping complex and all that and he made a very bold announcement while preaching psalms 91 he promised the protection of kovic 19 over his entire church in singapore and his bold claim was we are completely protected because of psalms 91 and so people use psalm 91 during times of pandemic with the notion that its use will ultimately save them and their loved ones however many get disappointed particularly when they lose their loved ones despite using the psalms and i don't know whether anyone from his church joseph prince church actually died of kovic in singapore i don't know despite all the pronouncements of of they are completely protected and this had caused many to lose their faith or wondering what's wrong with them if they are not protected by god but of course it is worthwhile for christians to know that beyond the promise of deliverance as stated in psalms 91 there is an everlasting protection promised by god this is the ultimate deliverance that will ensure we escape the eternal separation that will come upon the world on the last days so what i want to do is did you know that when when in some in matthew chapter 4 when jesus went to the temptation the devil came along and asked jesus one of the three questions he asked jesus was the second one that he wrote the devil took jesus to the holy city and set him on the pinnacle of the temple and then he said to jesus if you are the son of god why don't you throw yourself down for it is written and then now the devil the satan start quoting psalms 91 verse 11. he said why don't you throw yourself down from this building because psalms 91 he didn't say something 91 because it is written that he will command his angels concerning you on their hands they will bear you up lest you strike your foot against a staunch so the devil satan was actually tempting jesus and said why don't you jump to sit down because his promise in psalms 91 that you that someone will protect you you will not strike your foot against a staunch basically satan was telling jesus don't go to the cross don't suffer if god really really loves you he wouldn't let you suffer that's what psalms 91 says you know you see how brilliant the devil is look at the strategy if the devil can get a christian to believe now that i'm a christian god will not let any big bit of bad things happen to me he may allow some minor battle but in general nothing major will happen to me because i'm the child of god if you believe that then are going to pull back from god if something really bad happened to you because you're beginning to doubt whether or not psalms 91 really really is what the promise that god made you're going to say that this promise of psalm 91 didn't work and that is exactly what satan wants you to believe because satan knows that if you take you only take these sums at face value you are going to become confused and deeply disappointed and will probably pull back from god which is what many people have done not necessarily in an event or covey could be any crisis suffering problem cancer bankruptcy but jesus understood however the psalms 91 doesn't offer an absolute promise to be declared or assumed and so he responded to satan by saying by quoting deuteronomy chapter 6 verse 16 do not put the lord your god to the test so how should we look at psalms 91 then what i want to do for the remaining time that i have is to give you a more balanced view more i would say a more biblical view in terms of god's protection and how you are saved in the arms of god because there's an important principle in bible interpretation you interpret certain bible passages in light of the rest of what the bible says in fact this is where a lot of false doctrines get started holding one passage in isolation from the others is what satan tried to do to interpret these psalms apart from the rest of the bible and we must not expound one place of scripture that is repentant to another you cannot take a portion of scripture and read it in such way that is in complete contradiction to another scripture text for example in colossians chapter 3 talks about you must obey your parents in everything but what is your parents ask you to do something that is completely evil what do you do and how about romans chapter 13 talks about obey the government but we also have passages in in the book of daniel that shadrach meshach and abednego and daniel himself refused to bow down to the dam the statue that king nebuchadnezzar has erected for himself so we should look at scripture in its entirety and and so this is what i want to do i want to look at three other passages in the bible and then we will have a clearer picture as we endeavor to answer this question what do you mean by god will keep you safe what does it mean that god will keep you safe so the first step that i want to first text that i want to refer to is genesis chapter 50 verse 20. it is very common passage that we are all aware of is the story of joseph's towards the end of his life that he told his brothers that you intended it for sorry you intended to harm me looking back his entire situation he was he became he was thrown into slavery he went to prison and all that kind of stuff he told his brother well you intended to harm me but god intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done the saving of many lies and so joseph we know the story of joseph he was sold into slavery and then he he was imprisoned he was betrayed he was accused of he was all kinds of things happened to him but now as he looked back of his entirety of his life on a high side now he's able to say whatever actually happened to me yes you may play a part you intended to harm me because you you were jealous because jacob was especially treated me with special favor you intended to harm me you intended to get rid of me but now i look at the whole picture of it what has been achieved i can say with great confidence well while you intended to harm me but god intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done so god was actually keeping me safe jose was saying when he sold me to slavery god was actually keeping me safe when he kept me in the dungeon in hindsight he was keeping safe but in the moment it didn't look like that but now that i look back over the big picture of it i looked at all my life i realized that god's hand has always been it and each moment of my life he has kept me safe despite of the crisis that he has to accept and endured at that time he might not seems that he was in the protection hand of god but now as you look back he can say that god is in the picture god saved him and god kept him safe right throughout so that many wonderful things can come out of it so that's first text or the balanced view of that the second text i want to referring to again is a very common verse that we all are familiar with if you have been a christian for a long time and that is romans 8 28 but i also realized that all familiar verses that we all knew sometimes we don't really pay too much attention to it thinking that we already knew that verse so well romans 8 28 actually reached and we know that for those who love god all things work together for good all things work together for good it didn't say all things are good but all things work together for good some things are bad no matter how which anger you try to look at it some things are really really bad and no matter how you look at it it is still bad but romans 8 28 actually says that god is working all things together for good work together for good does not mean that bad things are really good things in disguise it means that god takes genuinely bad things and brings his power to bear in them so that they will be better off for them having happened it means that from the vintage point of eternity we will be able to see how god exercised his power in such a perfect way that all the evil that happened will in the end only lead to greater glory for god and greater joy for us i mean that's the ultimate defeat of evil isn't it the the evil that it was meant to be evil that god was able somehow to use this evil that's inflicted on humanity to use it to further his great cause so all evilness ultimately accomplish the reverse of what their authors intended and that to me is the ultimate defeat of the devil of evil in that sense we see glimpses of this right throughout scripture for example in the book of acts all of satan's attack on the church lead instead to the spread of the gospel it's like he's trying to stomach a fire that only spreads it so god allows god worked through all this persecution for the furtherings of the gospel message to other parts of the world and of course we see it most clearly where in the cross at the cross on the cross that was where satan and evil people did their worst and yet at the same time god turned even dead around for our salvation as a believer we can assured god is doing the same thing with whatever things that we may be struggling with this will say together god will work out something good he will use everything to fulfill his ultimate will everything will move to its ultimate ultimate end sovereignly and safely in the hands of god where bad things happen is bad really bad no matter how you look at it it is bad evil terrible and god is still able to use it all to map out and move towards his ultimate will to be fulfilled in the universe i don't know whether you heard of this story about a little bit this story comes from america this little bird flying south for the winter but he got a late start so he got caught in the snow storm and the storm was so bad that ice form on his wings and he couldn't even fly he went down for a crash landing and couldn't get back up he thought well great now i'm going to freeze to death here but then suddenly a cow came and put on him at first the little bit thought that he had gone from bad to worse but then he realized that the manure had warmed his wings and was stalling them that was out outdoing them he was so excited that he started to chip and sing but this attracted a cat who came along and ate him you know you can learn three lessons about your life from this story number one not everyone who drops manual on you is your enemy number two not everyone who digs you out is your friend lesson number three when you are in manure sometimes it's helpful to keep your little triple shot and just wait it out because god may be up to something that is awesome god works together all things for good and we believers are part of that we must see our life as part of that that even though we are going through suffering trials god is using that using that to further his kingdom work here on earth in forms that is beyond our comprehension so that is the second text i want to bring to you to balance up what is to to just unpack what it means by god will keep you safe thirdly which is a very interesting text in luke chapter 21 here in luke chapter 21 jesus is telling his disciples warning his disciples that they will be persecuted and bad things will be happening to them but jesus promised them that he would stand by them and keep them safe and luke chapter 21 verses 16 junior says this he said you will be delivered up even by parents and brothers and relatives and friends and some of you they will put to death you will be hated by all of my name's sake but not ahead of your hate will perish but your endurance but your endurance by your endurance sorry you will gain your lies strange isn't it jesus was warning his disciples that some of you actually will be put to death and yet at the same time you say but not a hair of your head will perish how does it happen what does it actually mean by by by saying that some of you will be put to death and yet at the same time but not a hair of your age will perish it seems so contradicting and by your endurance you will gain your lies it must be pushing something that is beyond isn't it it's not just your physical danger it must be moving towards something that is ultimately our inner life our soul the safety you know if you want to talk about being safe if there's anything in your life that that you and i plays more important than god whether it be our career whether that be our our money in the bank whether that be our son or daughters or or the love of our lives if we can place them if we ever place them before god then let me assure you that you will never be safe you'll never be saved s-a-f-e because the minute that thing has been removed from you you lost it the most important thing in your life is taken away from you you will lose it you will start to step in you will lose your life you'll lose meaning of life lost your purpose of life circumstances will come and threaten the very thing that you and i cherish the most and then we will lapse into disappointment into depression into a sense of meaninglessness and and unless that our allegiance and our main focus our priority our uh most important person in our lives is god then we will always be safe then all these circumstances will never never be able to take that away from you we are not protected from trouble not even in trouble but through trouble look at the story of those who have done kyb we've been looking at the book of daniel look at the story of shadrach meshach and abednego in daniel chapter 3 god allowed them to be thrown into the burning furnace why didn't god protect them by not allowing them to go to the into the burning furnace he did not protect them from but he protect them in the first how about the chapter 6 daniel himself he was not protected from being thrown into the lion's den but he was protected while in the lion's den and the only certainty that you are protected and safe is here in the analogy of psalms 91 in verse 4 it says that he will cover you with his feathers and under his wings you will find refuge the image of a mother bird covering the children covering his cheeks is not only the image that we see in psalms 91 but it is also used when jesus entered jerusalem on the final week trying for an entry entered jerusalem and in matthew chapter 23 he looked back into the city upon a hill he said jerusalem jerusalem you who killed the prophets and you who stoned those sent to you you say how often i have longed to gather your children together as a hand gathers her cheeks under her wings and you were not willing the mother but image is shielding and protecting and that is what jesus did on the cross he took what you and i deserve for our sins so that you can know for certainty that we are not punished for our sins we have been kept safe no matter what happens so being something's not he wants and look at the entirety of the scripture keeping kept safe does not mean to say that there'll be no trouble doesn't mean to say that you will be forever be free from any form of sickness or health or any crisis any trials being saved from a christian anger biblically is not dead it is not that if you were to move down to verse 15 and 16 towards the end of psalms 91 it become clearer it says here he will call on me and i will answer him i will be with him in trouble you're in trouble god he said i will be with him in trouble i will deliver him i will honor him with long life i will satisfy him and show him my salvation with long life i will satisfy him and show him my salvation he is not talking the long life he's not simply he's not talking about simply adding pain-free years to our lives it's not about pain-free like you just mentioned that i will be with you in trouble so the long life god is not promised seeing us that he's going to add pain-free years life to us he's talking i believe about adding despair free life to our years so can i just repeat that again he's not talking about adding pain-free years to our lives he's talking about adding despair free life to our years that as we go through life there will be crisis there will be troubles there will be problems but god is going to sustain us god is going to see us true god is going to use everything even through our crisis through our issues whatever that may be to further his work in the ultimate grand weaver there's a book called the grand weaver god is the grand weaver looking everything weaving everything the small little thing happen whatever that may be is weaving something beautiful out of it so the last two verses of psalms 91 summarize the aim for god's protection and that is to save us eternally god has made provision for the greatest rescue and honor there remains a sure guaranteed to satisfy us with everlasting life and show us his salvation while there are many testimonies of recitation and meditation on some 91 and perhaps recovering from sickness the psalms apply to ultimate victory ultimate recovery and that is salvation i don't know whether you have read of this book written by elizabeth elliot elizabeth elliot the wife of the late jim elliot which was a famous missionaries that we heard about the five young missionaries that were slain on the beaches of ecuador in the 1950s and interestingly he wrote this book and it and she titled this book shadow of the almighty using sams91 content and and used that verse in this one as the title of her book shadow of the almighty the title is is ironic isn't it when you think about the fact that jim elliot was literally pierced through the heart with a spear and killed which is something psalms 91 promises won't happen she caught a book shadow of the omadi because she was utterly convinced that the refuge of the people of god is not a refuge from suffering and death but a refuge through it and a refuge from final and ultimate defeat indestructible indestructible indestructible in the book uh jim elliott quote i'm immortal until my work on earth is lunch i will always be immortal until my work on earth is done and so here you go i hope i can i have given you a better and proper a balanced perspective of what being safe means in scripture that is not that nothing will happen to us as believers because the reality is that we have struggles we have pain there are many christians who died of cancer have loved one that has met accident and taken away from them many things and some died from kovac many we can pray for god's protection we do but biblically speaking from that angle that if you look in an entirety of the scripture that the safe being safe protective protection of god is not just only in terms of our physical side of it all a refuge through it is not a refuge from suffering and death but a refuge through it and a refuge from finer and ultimate defeat and that is the biblical understanding of save so that you and i who believes in god when we go through our life when we walk with the lord when we encounter problem when we have pain when we have suffering when we have illness and all that we don't have to doubt our faith we don't have to think that we have done something wrong that god is not blessing us that god is not looking after us we must be have some terrible things in us that god is punishing us we don't have to think that way some of the greatest men of god i know go through tremendous amount of pain and suffering in their lives so when we face life-threatening situations such as the kovic 19 pandemic we can rest assured that for those who dwell under the shadow of the almighty god there will be deliverance and recovery whether in life or in death and the comfort in psalms 91 is not a long trouble free pandemic free life on this present earth but assurance that those who receive the lordship of christ will ultimately be saved in the arms of god let me finish with this quote by timothy keller the new york minister he said the gospel does not promise you better life circumstances it promises you a better life strike off the word circumstances the gospel does not promise you better life circumstances but the gospel promises you a better life in whatever form it may take god is our refuge our strength our ever-present help in terms of not just only in our present life but more importantly safe and secure in our future life father thank you for your word thank you for these beautiful psalms of great assurance of your protection upon us he who dwells in the shelter of the most high will rest in the shadow of the almighty i will say of the lord he is my refuge he is my fortress he is my god in whom i trust he will call upon me and i will answer him i will be with him in trouble i would deliver him i will honor him with long life will i satisfy him and show him my salvation thank you the lord what a joy to know you what the greatest joy is to know you as our savior and lord and when we accept you as our savior and lord we will live our life differently now we are under the rule of a king sitting on the throne of our heart we have a mission we live life meaningfully purposefully because we want to do your will that's what really matters now when we live on earth we want to do your will whatever form it may take it really doesn't matter so long as we are doing your will no genuine christian or any sound mature christian would deliberately want to choose suffering but if suffering is doing your will then that is that's what really matters that is sufficient because what matter is doing your will well we now serve a new king our king and we take order from this king so we thank you lord gives us strength to to be strong help us never to be fearful because our lives is in your hand whatever is ahead of us we know that you will go ahead of us we have nothing to fear we only know that you are with us and that is sufficient give us courage in this time of crisis to shine for you to bear good testimony by not whinging by not complaining by not displaying any form of fearfulness in our lives we trust in a god and therefore we are your representative as uh pastor kerala reminded us we represent the gospel we represent you and therefore we have this confidence that is a testimony there is a gospel message live out in a person that people may see christ in us thank you lord we bless you in jesus name amen well we have a closing song to sing and then maybe five minutes break and we ask you to quickly go and lock on we just have the general meeting very soon let's think outrageous grace [Music] there's a lot of pain but a there's a lot of trouble [Music] is [Music] there's [Music] there's a lot of trouble but a lot more [Music] is oh outrageous grace [Music] oh [Music] [Music] [Music] is there's a lot of darkness [Music] there's a lot of hair shapes [Music] [Music] grace [Music] oh [Music] [Music] is [Music] is love [Music] but a lot more [Music] [Music] love [Music] [Music] [Music] jesus i can't stand you

Channel: Pathway Baptist Church

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Length: 58min 32sec (3512 seconds)

Published: Sat May 29 2021