"FINDING GOD'S PROVIDENCE IN THE PIT"

[Music] and let's make welcome all of our listening audience thank you for tuning in today we're so glad to have you [Applause] the book of psalms chapter number 40 in verse number one the bible says i waited patiently for the lord and he inclined under me and the bible says he heard my cry he brought me up also out of a horrible pit out of the mirey clay and set my feet upon a solid rock upon a rock and establish my goings and put a new song in my mouth even praise unto our god many shall see it in fear and shall trust in the lord if you know anything about psalm chapter number 40 in this chapter that david wrote on this song he's talking about god delivering him from a pit pits are not pleasant experiences pits are not something people look forward to but there are different pits of life that all of us are going to encounter before we leave this world it's going to happen to you you're going to have a disappointment you're going to have a downfall you're going to be let down you're going to get hurt it's just part of life and i wishes your pastor that i could wave a magic wand over my auditorium and make all the hurt and the pain that comes from falling go away i don't have the ability to do that but i do have a bible which gives me the ability to let you know that no matter what pitfall god allows you to have in your life way behind the scenes there is a purpose and a plan that's been divinely put together by god i want to preach this morning on the subject finding god's providence in the pit the word providence is a very powerful word as a matter of fact it's used in the wording of our constitution the word providence simply means the protective hand of god concerning an event a person or a people in other words it's a divine intervention from a sovereign god to have mercy on fallen man pits were a very common sight during bible days they didn't always call it a pit sometimes they were referred to as craters or a mine a shaft a well a chamber a socket a hole a ditch a tunnel or a concave but literally they were all pits in nature most pits that you'll find in the bible if you look the word up is a very common word in the old and new testament they were dug they would dig through the earth and they would get through the dirt they would get through the rock and finally they would get down in what we would call the marsh the average pit was about six to eight feet wide and 15 to 30 feet deep these descending chambers were hand dubbed by either servants slaves or prisoners there was one out of four basic purposes for a community building a pit number one was to trap wild game for their ability to eat number two in search of water and underground water veins so they could feed their livestock as in the days of abraham and isaac number three it was traps for the enemy that would come up at night with an advancement to take over their people they would have these pits dug and covered so that the enemy would fall into them and it would trap them and they would leave them there to starve to death and die the pits were also death chambers for those that were found guilty of crimes that were worthy of death david described it as a horrible place he meant it was terrible fearful and awful and dreadful and frightful it was a place that when you got there you were afraid the word pit means a dungeon or a ditch it means to go underground to be covered in marsh and slime it means a dark hole a snare a place of destruction and known for corruption so how is it even possible that while we are falling in circumstances that are out of our control how is it possible when we're going through something that's hurting us so bad but sometimes we wish we could die how is it when you're in the darkest emotional trauma of your life that i would dare stand up and say to you god has a hand in what you're going through it almost seems like a paradox to the modern day preacher that would have you to believe if you get saved you'll always be rich have a nice house never get set never go to a doctor all of that sounds good till you get in the pit when you get in the pit you realize that's a bunch of nonsense so why does god let stuff unravel in our lives and then have the audacity to send his word from heaven and say by the way i got a hand in what you're going through i found out and i don't like the pits of life by the way life will become the pits on you and i don't like them but i know when i get there somewhere in their darkness you'll find jesus because he's god enough to see the beginning from the end and everything in between and he knows what's best for you and he knows what's best for me so i dare not tell you something i've read out of a positive thinking commentary i declare unto you the word of the lord no matter what you are going through the day there is a providential hand that is working everything together for your good and for his glory can i get an amen on that so i want to describe three pits that we're all going to go through those of us that are saved and i want to prepare you for them i cannot eliminate you from having them i cannot warn you to get away from them but i want to teach you how to respond when it happens because if it hasn't it will i want to talk about the pit of deliverance for just a minute here it is in psalm chapter number 40. if you will study this back in the bible days what they would do with prisoners that were worthy of death they didn't have what we call death chambers they didn't have gas chambers and electricity so what they would do is they would find a pit outside the city and by the way many of these were used as septic tanks they would take the waste from the city out and dump it in these pits they were 15 to 30 feet deep and it was filled with sewage and they would take prisoners that were worthy of death and they would take them out to the pit put a rope around their waist and lower them down in this pit that's why david called it a horrible pit it was nasty and evil and filthy and here he is in a place of despair here he is guilty and worthy of death and the last thing he remembers is going down this round cylinder and it's six feet wide so he can barely get his fingertips to the ends of it and it stinks and it's nasty and there's flies and there's rot and there's filth and corruption and they're lowering him down slowly into this nasty place but he knows above everything even though it's more than he can comprehend he knows he deserves it so he silently allows him to lower him down without a complaint without a prayer to the men without anything saying to the soldiers they put him down in that nasty slime and filth and waste david has now found out when he gets down into the bottom that the slime is deeper than his than the length of his body and he has to hold himself up from keep from going under and all of a sudden they let go of the rope and it falls down into the darkened chamber with him because you see it's not only a place of despair it's a place of darkness once david was lowered down into that pit once that prisoner was let down into that slime and fill they're trying to hold herself up from going under the soldiers would take a huge rock and lay it on top of the chamber all light has now been cut off he's in a place of outer darkness he doesn't know if it's sunshine or rain he doesn't know if it's monday or friday he doesn't know if it's daytime or night he loses all sense of direction because he's not only covered in filth and nastiness of despair but he's also covered in darkness a perfect type of sinner that knows not god drowning in their own filth their own corruption and their own sin but as long as that prisoner can try to hold himself up he says nothing the only company he has in that chamber is the skeletons that are bumping up against him from past prisoners that have died because he knows he's going to die he knows he can't get out he tries to climb up on his own he becomes a mason but he slides back down he gets baptized but he slides back down he joins a church but he slides back down everything yeah everything he tries to do on his own he slides back down into the pit and then all of a sudden he realizes i'm gonna die just like i am why would god let me get so messed up in my life why would god let my marriage fall apart my home fall apart my children fall apart my parents fall apart my hair fall apart why would god allow me to be drunk why am i a dope addict why am i stuck on addictions why can't i get liberty with my life and every time you try to turn over a new leaf or try to get a new beginning or make new promises or new year's resolutions you try to climb up but you find yourself sliding back down into your own filth all of a sudden david gives up begins to go down in the slime it gets up to his lip and he knows he's about to drown in corruption which all sinners do but with one last try and one last effort he pushes himself up and he wipes his mouth and he yells help and to his amazement the stone rolls away the light shines into the darkened pit david said i cried unto the lord hey you know why your life's messed up you know why god's put you in a pit you know why everything you got's falling apart you know why your family's on the rocks you know why your kids are half crazy you know why you've lost everything you ever had god's trying to get you to the point where you will cry for help he'll let you drown as long as you want to till you realize you cannot help yourself you cannot deliver yourself or you will die just like you are you know he didn't know how to pray there's no fancy prayer all the bible said he did was cry just cried help to his amazement the stone was rolled away he'd been in darkness brother randy now the light of the glorious gospel has been shed abroad and he's hiding himself and all of a sudden david said who who is it i can't see you david it's the lord but but lord i'm messed up i'm so filthy you don't need to deliver me i look at me lord my home's a wreck i'm divorced i'm shacked up i'm a drunk i'm a dopantic i'm a fornicator i'm an adulterer i'm addicted to sin my life's a wreck there's i'm filled with corruption and evil and here's what god said god said david i didn't come just to move the rock here's what the bible said he inclined unto me you know what david said lord i can't get to you and the lord said you don't have to son all you got to do is cry and if you'll [Applause] cry i tell you something you don't have to clean up you don't have to turn over a new lead if you'll just realize you're in a mess and you'll cry here's what the bible said he inclined unto me jesus said i not only heard you cry but i'm going to come down to where you're at and he said and he brought me up also out of that horrible pit out of what i used to be out of what i used to do out of the way i used to think out of the way i used to live oh when i cried to god he came to where i was and brought me out of the pit so you see [Applause] so you see god has a hand in your life falling apart because we are so unintelligent and hard-headed that god has to let us get down to nothing before most of us were ever willing to look up now the best testimony saved while you're young stay out of the pit you don't have to worry about it but for us that were rebellious and hard-headed and never heard the gospel and didn't have any sense aren't you glad that god looked beyond our ponytails our tattoos our lifestyle where we had been what we had done and came to where and brought us out and put our feet on a solid rock [Applause] god is letting you down so he can deliver you if you don't know jesus today the reason why things can't add up no matter how hard you try is because god is trying to reveal to you you can't get life together without him that's the pit of deliverance number two i must hurry if you'll read the book of genesis over in chapter 37 i want to talk about the pit of development god lets you fall into a pit after you're saved to develop you when joseph was 17 years old his father jacob favored joseph and all the other kids knew it as a matter of fact his father had him a coat of many colors made up so that when he wore around his older brethren they knew that he was ordained to be in a place of leadership one day joseph had a dream that he would rule over his brother and excited about it he ran out in the field and told them god has revealed to me that i'll reign over you one day and we'll serve together the older brothers were filled with hate jealousy and envy they were going to kill him and just leave him for dead but reuben spoke up and said no we we can't do this and so they chose to throw jacob's favorite boy joseph in a pit when they threw him in the pit they took some animal blood put it on his coat and went home and told an aged jacob that joseph had been torn to pieces by wild animals later ruben and somebody got the feeling sorry for him so they went back to the pit and they pulled him out of the pit and sold their own brother to the mennonite uh the many night traders that were passing through that day they sold their brother for 20 pieces of silver they later traveled and sold them to the ishmaelites as a slave here's a young boy 17 years old that does nothing but want to live for god and he has a dream now as a slave he's faced a woman potiphar's wife he's 17 he's a virgin he's kept himself and here's a horse old cougar yeah you stinking old cougars some of you ladies in your 70s trying to look 20. [Music] it's like a drunk man trying to act sober it don't look right it don't look right so this old cougar tries to get him in bed and he leaves his coat but he runs out and keeps his character she lies on him he's arrested and he's put in prison for several years completely innocent he was jailed with a cup bearer and a baker and when they got out of jail they forgot about him now why would god tell a 17 year old boy you're going to be a leader everybody's going to bow down to you you're going to be at the top of the list you're going to run a country why would god tell a 17 year old boy that then turn around and put him in a pit because he's got to develop him before he can get to where god's wanting to place him see uh here's where we're at all of us want the promise we don't want the process to get us to the promise no process no promise no pit no leadership no pit no promise see jake joseph is a spoiled brat daddy loved him you know why joseph had to go out in the field and tell his brother about his dream because jacob didn't make him go the brothers had a right to be jealous joseph did not do anything they're out there in work clothes they're out there in uniforms working slaving fixing tractors or whatever joseph comes out with his coat of many colors no wrinkles in it starts to the max glow in the dark what you fellas up to something you've never done joseph called work by the way we've raised the whole generations of josephs they know how to look pretty but they don't know how to work and so joseph was a he's a little bit of a brat and the boy and the other brothers they were jealous of him and they did hate him when he come out and said you all are going to bow before me they freaked out said brother you out of your mind now if joseph would have reached his place of leadership at that point he would have flunked because he was a baby he was spoiled he got everything he wanted he never got whipped he didn't know what a whipping was you know what a whoopin is if you don't know the difference between a whipping and a whooping then you've never had a whip in you say that right now [Applause] some of your little brats i'd like to have you for a week you'd go in the whooping business when i got done with you had a lady come here one time she said i ain't never whipped my kid he's hanging on the chandelier i said yeah i can tell this ain't a zoo it's a church and so joseph was a brat he never had any responsibility show me one thing joseph ever had responsibility to do he didn't do anything god said i'm going to make you a leader joseph said i'll take that god said you got to go to the pit i don't know about this pit thing now and all of a sudden from all the can you imagine they even took his coat off of him he didn't have his coat as many colors when they threw him in the pit there he was forsaken there he was put in prison he's down to nothing he's got a horror cougar lying on him the baker and the cup bear promised to talk to pharaoh about him but when they got out of prison they didn't even mention his name and he's forsaken and he's down in another pit he's down in a prison his family's forsaking him his society's forsaking him his friends have forsaken him he's down to nothing absolutely nothing and all of a sudden pharaoh had a dream and the baker said you know what i went to prison with a guy that could interpret dreams years ago and joseph spent 13 years in prison getting ready for his promise process promise you say man i got saved i love god how come i'm going through stuff god is developing you through a process so he can get you to a promise [Applause] so joseph's 30 now he comes out of the dungeon been in the pit for 13 years and pharaoh said give me the interpretation of the dream he said we're going to have seven healthy years and years of famine and pharaoh looked at him and said you young man are going from a pit to the second person in command in the world only pharaoh of egypt was over joseph and at 30 years old god said enough process have your promise and joseph stood up and the whole world had to bow at his feet a famine came through the land here come the same brothers that sold it and they knew not joseph and they bowed at his feet and here's what joseph said this helps me in genesis chapter number 50. he looked at them boys and they said that's joseph he's going to kill us for what we did and here's what joseph said you meant this for evil but god meant this for good oh hallelujah [Applause] bless his holy name god has put you in the pit because there is a process that you've got to get to before the promise can ever be enjoyed don't quit during the process someday the sun will shine the victory will come the freedom will come and god will plant you on higher ground god must put us through the pit of developing heard illustration years ago about a little boy saw a butterfly developing in a cocoon he's out on a branch in a tree so he goes out there and grabs the dead cocoon brings it in his house sets it on the fireplace and he notices there's something inside of it moving his mother she went as much as her mama something's alive inside this dead thing she said it's a butterfly he said well why don't why don't it come out she says it's going through a process you can't get free so you go through the process so day by day the boy could hear the butterfly and i guess out of just emotions he felt sorry for it and he opened up the cocoon and let the butterfly out and it was beautiful and it looked like every other butterfly he had ever seen except one problem it couldn't fly because the wings are the last thing that develop and because it got out early and didn't stay for the full process it limited it from ever getting higher than what it is so see and by the way i don't like the cocoon i don't like the isolation i don't like the darkness i don't like the forsaken this i don't like the loneliness i don't like nothing about it but i know if i come out too early i've wasted my time and i'll never be what god wants me to be so if i gotta kick another day if i gotta develop another day if i gotta stay in another week if i gotta stay in another month if i gotta stand another year god knows what he's doing he's developing you and when that dead cocoon opens up you're gonna fly out of there hand painted by a sovereign god from heaven and you can say thank god i'm free i'm free i'm free by the grace of god that's the pit of development god's not hurting you he's developing you number three and i must hurry is one that i stood by twice this week i want to talk about the pit of death job said in chapter 17 in verse 16 that he goes down to the pit that he may rest in the dust nothing seems more horrifying and cold as the plot where we lay our loved ones to rest six feet below the sod we're in lies darkness silence and separation thank god for funeral homes that try to sue the reality of the pit by surrounding it with fake grass and greenery and presence of flowers once that casket's lowered in the mother earth we place over a thousand pounds of dirt over our loved one and there their remains are silent and dead it doesn't matter what's going on in the world the day you lay a loved one to rest the sun can be shining the birds can be singing and a breeze can be blowing but watching that casket go down beneath that dirt is a sight that's forever etched in our minds why would god terry why would god let your mama die brother's not why would god let your sister die miss brenda your brothers died any day i buried some of your loved ones i've involved some of your love i preach the funeral of some of your loved ones if god loves us and we're saved why does he put us through this pit called death because of the providence of it you see all we can see is a cold body all we can see is a silent human all we can see is a square box all we can see is a dark hole but here's what god said precious in the sight of the lord is the death of his saints how can something be painful to me and be precious to god i'll tell you how when they step out of that body brother they step in [Applause] [Music] oh thank god well glory to god hallelujah before the monitor ever goes off before the doctor ever pronounced them dead before they ever pulled the sheet over their face they're in the city of god they beheld the face of our savior and they're reunited with our loved ones that have already go i'm glad god knows what's going on on the other side of the pit i'm out of time i must close i want to talk about the pit of damnation the bible said in the book of revelation whosoever was not found written in the land's book of life was cast in the lake of fire this is the second death all through the book of revelation from chapter 19 on the lake of fire is referred to as a bottomless pit i'll tell you one pit you don't want to go to friend because you're not getting out you go to the pit of hell in the lake of fire you scream all you want you can cry all you want you can pray all you want you can sing all you want the bible said then the smoke of their torment ascends up forever and forever you will forever burn in the wrath of almighty god you will forever die but never die you will forever perish but never perish you'll beg god for mercy and you'll cry out loud and pray but it's a place where a prayer is never heard the sun never shines and the birds never sing you're headed to a place called the bottomless pit where the flames in the wrath of almighty god will lick your never dying soul throughout all the corridors of time and you'll remember that sunday morning when you sat in a little country church and i begged you by the grace of jesus to get out of your seat and let me introduce you to the one that can deliver you from every pit you will ever face in your life and it's none other than jesus christ the only begotten son of god now let me tell you how easy it is to be saved and i'm done this is how easy it is in rotterdam holland there was a man a very wealthy man he lived in a castle as a matter of fact it's still there i talked to a great grandson of one of the auctioneers that was at this situation i'm describing him and his wife decided it was time to have a family so it wasn't long she conceived and she was bringing forth their first child his wealth was surmountable he lived in one of the largest castles in rotterdam holland at that time but going through childbirth that many years ago they didn't have all the equipment and the medications as we have now and the mother hemorrhaged and while giving birth to her baby boy she died the man isolated himself he had servants he would let them go get their food he had cooks they would cook and he just kind of lived in that castle and isolated himself he never got over the death of his wife when his boy grew up and became 10 years old he had a hand painted picture of him on canvas larger than that screen turned upward and hung it over the fireplace because the boy was the only reason why he lived his son came to him and said daddy i want to be a professional horseback rider i want to join a team and i want to be trained on how to ride a horse so the servant that was taking care of the boy just a little poor community man began to bring in one of the best trainers in england in that part in holland and brought him in and started to teach the little boy how to professionally ride and cut and jump and one day i don't really don't know the details it wasn't in the story the boy was lifted up over the neck of the horse went up over its head the horse bowed down and the boy landed on his neck and out in the middle of a training field now somebody's got to tell daddy he's dead the servant that loved the boy just the community man went up through the castle said master i hate to tell you but your son just died in an open field it crushed that man it crushed him so bad brother randy that four months later he quit eating he quit drinking he quit taking bass and in four months they found him dead in that huge castle with millions of dollars it was in his will that they would sell everything no family descendants sell it all there were three parts to the wheel number one the wheel was opened up and everything was to be sold to the highest auctioneer they knew of his wealth and they knew we had ceramics that was that was merchandise of a limited number and they knew there was great wealth just in the artifacts of his house and auctioneers came from all over the world to sit in that castle to buy the furniture number one sell all the furniture sell everything auction everything the auctioneer got up there and they auctioned everything off and they were getting ready to close everything down and he opened the second part of the wheel and he said i want all this money put in one account in my main bank in my main count i want every penny put in there he opened up chapter number three and he realized in chapter one that it said save my son's painting for last so he said this is the owner's son he was killed months ago at the age of 10 this was his boy and we've got to auction this off yet so i need i need somebody to start off who who'll start off at a thousand dollars give me a thousand nobody yeah okay you all know this is the owner's son give me 500. silence people looking at their watches playing with their fingernails and brother ronnie he gets down to 25 it's my son nobody the old man that took care of him stood up in the back and said i know this ain't much i got 39 cents and i want it i ain't much but i want it and he came down paid 39 cents to hand him the picture and on the back was a note whoever loved my son enough to want him gets everything that i've left behind [Applause] you you may say to yourself i don't have much there's not much to me preacher but if you'll receive his son all that heaven is will one day be yours because you fell in love let's give the lord a hand you're glad to be here today like salvation

Channel: drphilkidd

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Id: nh3hY6dXtc0

Length: 35min 51sec (2151 seconds)

Published: Mon May 24 2021