PT2 "God's In The Middle Of It" | Pastor John Hansford | POWER CHURCH GLASGOW

there who knows yes and so it will sound even more and more wizzy and this is really uh for us and for the live streaming but also for friday fires i'm giving you advanced notice we used to do friday fires oh years ago in a joint collaboration with healing rooms and gpc as we were then and we we had about 500 i think and it was just a service to the city and we would go around the uh the council properties you know cooper institute and places like that and we're restarting those soon uh once all the tech is in place it's only a handful of two or three weeks and then you'll hear about it and that's in here for just worship and encounter no teaching no preaching but just uh long evenings i think they're going to be seven to ten is that we just worship and encounter in this space claire chairs uh cleared a little bit and just space to go deep in the presence of god because we appreciate that one service in a week doesn't fulfill every need does it so we just want to be those who are lingering so watch out for friday fires coming back very soon as we get all that i mean it's amazing isn't it doesn't that just want to make you salivate in the spirit is there such a thing your spirit man which we've now woken should be salivating yes yes brilliant okay did i get everything david where's he gone he's probably in the live streaming room helping peter that's that's it you can pop your head around the door there and see how much tech they've got there brilliant right dad hi it is my great pleasure to come up and uh and when did you last oh you preached last sunday online but how long is it since you preached a sunday circus with coved sunday morning two years two years probably oh you're all wired up anyway so um i mean you know what an absolute privilege it is to have a man of this stature in our midst his understanding of the word you know it's it is it is please honor him and uh the years of theology and the reading and the training and david and i you know often say what do you think about this i had a revelation about 666 this week in the beast and i know i know i know i need to check check it with you but to have you know somebody who keeps us right in such a deep way it is a gift so uh dad uh do your best thank you well it is good to see faces rather than just screens and your picture of yourself as well too um i really want to take us on a little bit further from what i was speaking about last sunday it doesn't matter if you were not here or you didn't what you're not not here but you didn't see it streamed then it will be complete in itself our world the world in which we live is full of catastrophes of almost apocalyptic proportions today and one gets the sense that time is rushing on and maybe time is running out with regard of the future of our world and i said arthur that we desperately need a map at this time because we find the events happening around us scary we find them sometimes doubting i wonder what's going to happen and we feel very vulnerable as we live today and god knows perfectly well everything that's happening everything that happens in your life personally and he realizes that for us we are facing unprecedented times and he knows that and when we face an unknown future then often we start to feel anxious because the things that give us a sense of security and well-being are no longer in place we no longer see those markers we no longer feel those anchors emotionally and where do we turn for help when the sort of tidal waves of life experience threaten to overwhelm us and maybe to drown us now you and i know that self-generated optimism doesn't take us very far does it it's got nothing to help and say to us of any great value but we have to remind ourselves that we are people of faith and so we look to god the position or if you like the posture that we as christians are to take in these unprecedented days is one of faith we are called very simply to live by faith and i think that little phrase lived by faith is worth thinking about we live we live today now by faith we live tomorrow by faith we live next month by faith that's the thing that we live by and we say don't we as the psalmist said in psalm 3 and i was really overjoyed by reading this psalm 3 this week you o lord are a shield about me my glory and the lifter of my head you o lord are a shield about me my glory and the lifter of my head okay that's a tremendous verse isn't it let's say it together then you o lord are a shield about me and my glory and the lifter of my head and so we say that to establish ourselves in this position of faith and so we turn from whatever emotion is churning around in our hearts at this particular moment and time and we renew our confidence in god and remember this christian folk that trust in god trusting god is the channel through which the deliverance and the power of god flows into our life that's where it comes if there's no trust then that power and deliverance doesn't flow but that's the channel living by faith trusting in god is the channel where these blessings come into our life we took as a sort of basic text joshua 3 and verse 4 god saying very reassuringly and comfortingly to his people the those words you have never been this way before and remember they were on the edge of about to cross the river jordan to go into the promised land i mentioned that joshua is a book of transition it's a bridge book and a lot can be learned from reading the book of joshua and the book of acts together i don't mean just read you know joshua there and then read acts intermingle the chapters sometimes and you get this wonderful interaction of supernatural history tremendous great way to read those two books together now i shared last week as well an encounter that i had with god in august 2020 and in this i don't want to go over it again but it seemed that god wanted me to confess to him and say to him god something that i would say to him on that day when i stood before him and his throne at the end of time and that was you have done all things well so i said it and i said it many times god wanted me to say to him you have done all things well that was after a period of having read and studied the life of joseph now as time went on from there i asked myself god why did you want me to do that now it didn't come straight away afterwards i enjoyed the sense of god's presence very much and felt yes i could confidently say yes god you do all things well and so i started to think what god was there a lesson you wanted me to learn what had i really learned about the ways of god what have i really learned over nearly 60 years of christian experience of the ways of god and certainly i felt perhaps well i need to think a bit more clearly about the ways of god and god said this to me he said john the closer you get to me the more i request or require you to respect my sovereignty john the closer you get to me the more i re ask you and require you to respect my sovereignty okay step number three to this experience that i had was my asking god how can i show respect for your sovereignty how can i do it if god says show respect for his sovereignty then how do i show respect for his sovereignty and i i waited and i got the feeling um because i didn't hear from god straight away and as though god was saying john don't you know don't you know you know you have you had those conversations with god i hope you do and because don't you know and uh then the penny began to drop and i thought god was saying john primarily what is my calling upon your life and i said god that was to teach the word of god well then teach the people to respect my sovereignty teach the people to respect my sovereignty so that's what i'm going to do this morning a question who is responsible for the state of our world at the moment where did kovid 19 come from what's the origin of it why did god allow things to happen in your life that you've never found the answer for who decided that this or that or something else should happen in your life in your family in our world you see the biggest question that i get asked again and again and again is this why did god let this happen to me why did god let this happen to me i have been asked in the crematorium i have been asked it at an open grave side even as the coffin is being laid into the ground i have been asked it as i walked beside a father carrying a tiny tiny white coffin containing the body of their six day old baby i've been asked it at 3 00 a.m in the morning in hospital with a woman 78 years of age as she sat by her 40 year old son in the hospital bed watching him suffer a brain hemorrhage from which the medical profession could do nothing further to help and there was just in the room a compassionate nurse who sat behind his bed and mopped up the blood as he bled and i said to her i said do you still want to stay you're okay i said i think i'm going to have to go out i'm just going to have some fresh air it was a sight i had never witnessed in hospital and she said no john i'm going to stay so i went out and came back again but i stayed with this lady for two hours further before uh her son actually died at about five o'clock uh early on a sunday morning and had to get in the pulpit from 11 o'clock that day and preach have no night's sleep then why did god let this happen now that question can only be asked if you believe two things about god you can't ask that question if you don't believe two things about god only if you believe firstly that he is all good and loving and secondly that he's all powerful do you have a problem with god's sovereignty that's the challenge if you believe god is all good and all loving and if you believe he is all-powerful as well then you ha and i have a problem you see if god is weak and not all-powerful and therefore cannot help those things often which happen to us okay there's no problem there if i if i believe that god is weak well he couldn't do anything about it it's just the power of the thing itself just overwhelmed me or if god is strong and powerful and not loving then what is he well he's a sadist he enjoys hurting his creatures and causing them pain but you see to anybody who believes in god that he is both powerful and all loving you have the problem and it's put like this and we can ask the question did god do this thing maybe amongst nations in the world in your life personally or did he allow it did he do this did he cause it or at the lesser level did he just allow it and permit it now i believe in both situations what is caused and what god permits i believe god is responsible god is responsible not just for what he causes to happen in your life and mind and in our world but he is also responsible for what he permits surely that must be so you can't say that he's not let me just just put something in there i believe that god is responsible for what he permits but he is not responsible to us i'm talking to you about respecting the sovereignty of god he's responsible but he's not responsible to us you see people who said to me i can't believe john that a good god lets such awful things happen i'm sure many of you have talked to jews and they've talked to you about the holocaust and you've spoken to them about the holocaust and they say they can no longer believe in the god of israel and the god of abraham isaac and jacob who allowed six million jews to perish in the holocaust because i can't believe the in god of abraham if that happened and some people say that christianity has no answer to these sort of questions that i've raised and that in fact we shouldn't have an answer to those sorts of things well i think that's really sad we do have an answer or if we didn't have an answer and we didn't have something else to say we would just be obscurantists if we didn't ask you see we believe jesus christ upholds all things don't we we believe he upholds things the only verses of hebrews reinforce that everything included in the entire universe is upheld by the word of his power or some of the other versions saying jesus sustains all things by the word of his power so we are therefore bound to ask did god cause this crisis or did he consciously and voluntarily permit it some meaning well meaning well christians often have said to me well satan couldn't cause these sorts of things to happen since a good god would never be responsible for anything bad have you heard that a good god can't be responsible for anything bad just to quote my daughter and a word that she often uses nonsense that is nonsense friends it really is listen to these words when disasters come to a city has not the lord caused it many times i struck your gardens and vineyards destroying them with blight and mildew locusts devour your fig and olive trees yet you have not returned to me says the lord i sent plagues among you as i did to egypt i killed your young men with the sword along with your captured horses i filled your nostrils with the stench of your camps yet you have not returned to me says the lord that was the message of amos and his time we've had awful fires in australia we've heard and seen pictures of them we saw pictures also as swarms of locusts who went across a countryside in africa destroying crops who is to say that god would not do that who is to say that god would not do that some of us choose to believe just what is pleasant and only what is pleasant about life because it makes us feel good listen to what isaiah says i form the light and create darkness i bring prosperity and create disaster the passages don't seem to me to reconcile to a lot of what i've read in christian periodicals and online over the past few months and a little bit of online preaching that i've listened to that doesn't seem to be coming through and yet as the proverb says there is a way there is a way that seems right to a man but the end is the way of death now that's a real challenge to the patterns of our thinking isn't it that there is a way that seems right then we think we've got it this must be right i thought it through but the bible says it seems right but its end is the way of death and proverbs 16 25. so where is god when what's happening in our world in 2021 and where is god in the upheavals that rock our individual lives is satan more able than god well the answer is in the title i picked for this talk this morning god where is he he's right in the middle of it god is responsible yes for what he ordains yes he is responsible for what he permits but as i said before he's not responsible to us now i'm sure i have stirred up some thoughts in your mind and stirred your feelings and you might be saying john back up what you say from the bible or else we'll chase you out of your pulpit i came across a scholar just a week or two ago um uh quite an erudite sort of guy and uh he came out with a very simple comment so i thought oh that's not the normal sort of simplicity that this guy writes with he said this for every new testament doctrine there is an old testament story that's absolutely right for every new testament doctrine there is an old testament story now i i have always believed that in a sense um just a little aside just to give your brain a little bit of rest um in children's activities and children's work work and children reading children's books i have loved the narnia stories by c.s lewis and when i was preaching a particular truth or trying to teach it to people i often said what does c s lewis say about this in the narnia tales has he got a story which will elucidate at a very simple level for me what this truth is actually saying so all that came back into my mind recently as i was thinking these thoughts through and i thought well as a prophetic community we believe in deliverance ministry don't we we think that's really important yeah high value that we that we have here i thought to see is lewis say anything about deliverance ministry so i sort of scratched my head and i thought ah samuel's reading through some of these books at the moment and he hasn't got to the voyage of the dawn treader but in the voyage of the dawn treader eustace who who really is a bit of a brat on occasions but eustace is he's had some problems with some very bad habits and sins in his life and he can't get rid of them and he can't deal with them so aslan comes along and he gives a piece of advice to folk who are trying to help eustace and he says what has got to happen to eustace is that we've got to d dragonfire dragon him and i thought what a great picture that even for kids learning about that lewis says we've got to de-dragon him and he pictures evil in the imagination as as a dragon so anyway we have to look to the bible for a story that will illustrate what i've been saying to you and the powerful one i give you is from the old testament and i think this story in exodus 3 is has a strong theological lesson moses sees a bush on fire but the bush does not burn up extraordinary thing is happening it catches moses attention this was so strong and it was so interesting and strange that moses decides to go straight over to the bush and find out what's happening the causing the bush to burn in the desert but not to go up in smoke and as he approaches the burning bush god intervened and spoke to him and said in my paraphrase moses stop moses stop and he heard the voice and then the voice said do not come any closer take off your shoes you are on holy ground now you'll remember that moses has spent many long dreary years apparently living purposelessly in the wilderness looking after somebody else's sheep his father-in-law but now his whole life was about to be revolutionized predictable day had followed predictable day for him until he heard this voice speaking to him but it was not just any voice that he heard he felt the presence a presence with him so glorious that the text says he dare not look at god but he hid his face he dare not look at god but he hid his face his sandals must be removed the actual ground where he was standing on had been made holy by this breathtaking presence that he sensed all around him and moses hid his face because he was not prepared to look and continue his investigation as to why the bush hadn't been consumed instead moses chose to fear god the text says he was afraid he was willing not to know but instead to fear god willing not to know but instead he chose to fear god and so the lesson here is this i believe that god will not allow us to figure out what he does not want us to figure out have you got it god will not allow us to figure out what he does not want us to figure out he's a sovereign god and there are some things god wants to remain a mystery about events that happen between nations and the complexity of those events sometimes is overwhelming but also the private things that happen in your life and in mine as well god will not allow us to figure out why something happened if he doesn't want us to know and remember you aspiring theologians who spent this past week learning your basic steps in theology remember this that god the god that we worship is uncreated he is unthreatened he is untainted and i pick those words instead of the usual theological jargon but the final thing i want to say about god that i want you to remember is that god is self-defining i don't define what god is like you don't define what god is like or what he allows or what he doesn't you don't stand in judgment on him god is self-defining and he reveals himself to us because he is sovereign so this event of supernatural history in the wilderness teaches us the difference between what god causes and what god permits and i'm saying to you that i think it is teaching us that the difference between what god causes and what god permits is holy ground okay the difference between what he causes and what he permits is holy ground it is the very place where you and i take off our shoes and worship because the ground is holy and we worship in the middle of a mystery and we acknowledge that he is sovereign you see god lets us go so far in our understanding and then he says no further and sometimes we are in great danger of allowing our reason and our desire for logic rather than for the scriptures to control the conclusions that we make about life and about truth the truth is this that we must stay with scripture and not try to figure everything else we must be willing not to know and we can be absolutely sure that god will not allow us to figure out what he doesn't want us to figure out and the danger is this that if we push things with god and we go on and on and on and we want things always to be neat and tidy and we want all the loose ends knotted and tied up we will often land ourselves in the position of believing what is not true and if we don't believe something that's not true then we will believe something that is utterly bizarre about god and really quirky okay that's the old testament picture and i can do this just in a few minutes let's take a new testament example where we need to take off the shoes and worship if we're going to have a respect for god's sovereignty i ask a very important new testament question who crucified jesus who crucified jesus who was responsible for the crucifixion of jesus there are six at least six views and let me tell you each of them is true number one pontius pilate did it being roman governor the jews needed his authority his permission to crucify jesus and pilate ordered the crucifixion okay pilate did it number two the roman soldiers did it they were the very men who literally did the horrible job of crucifying jesus number three the jews did it they were the ones who had persuaded pilate to order that jesus be crucified and they were the ones who said his blood be upon us number four satan did it i've got all the biblical references for these but they're all backed up with verses satan did it the devil we are told entered into judas iscariot who then betrayed jesus in fact satan it seems to me from reading the new testament thought that he he had masterminded the crucifixion of jesus he thought he was in the driving seat here and had satan and the rulers of this present age they felt that they were overseeing the crucifixion of jesus number five you and i did it yes yes yes you and i did it we contributed to the crucifixion of jesus it was our sins that led him to gal gotha never forget that we did it and then sixthly god did it remember isaiah saw this hundreds of years before he said jesus was smitten the messiah was smitten by god it was the will of the lord to crush him and he has put him to grief and then if you go to peter's sermon on the day of pentecost the crucifixion we read there was carried out according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of god and that jesus was killed by the hands of lawless men peter says that as well so he recognizes the complexity when we're thinking about the will and sovereignty of god and then in acts 4 28 when the early church was meeting to pray and they noted that herod and pontius pilate along with the gentiles and the rest of the people of israel had sort of consulted together to crucify jesus he says whatever your hearts and your plan whatever you had in your hearts and whatever your plan was it had been predestined to take place so the crucifixion of jesus is the most evil act of human beings in world history nothing compares to it it is an example of infinite injustice infinite injustice enough said jesus was responsible or god was responsible for what happened on good friday god was god was responsible for it and i think i've given you enough examples to explain uh the importance of this and all those other people took part in the crucifixion of jesus until at the end god stepped in to give the to be the ultimate cause of the crucifixion of jesus now i want to bring that to a conclusion and say this don't forget isaiah 55 8-9 for my thoughts god says are not your thoughts neither are your ways my ways says the lord for as the heavens are higher than the earth so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts that is a vital verse you just bath in that verse i don't quite know what there's a metaphor to give you for that just bath in that verse it's fundamental we are not commanded to figure out everything i believe we can figure out some things they are god does allow us that he's given us minds and brains and we all figure out certain things what do we are commanded to do is that we are commanded to worship it doesn't matter what we can figure out and what we can't figure out but we are all commanded to worship and god says you have never been this way before that was to his people and i think it applies to his people and as it applies to nations as well into individuals you have net and families you have never been this way before but god says as he said to joshua i am with you and i will never leave you and i will never forsake you and remember this that these words were spoken as a prelude to a wonderful miracle the parting of the red sea and the people of god going across on the dry ground unless god did a miracle at that point then his people would never have got into their inheritance and they would never have enjoyed it god performed a miracle and i believe that there is coming god will perform miracles we've sung about it in our worship already this morning there will be miracles and we will be amazed at the hand of god respect my sovereignty how much do you respect the sovereignty of god where would you put the marker from one to a little ten to a lot what respect do you have for his sovereignty take the shoes from off your feet this is holy ground why don't you just stand to your fate and worship team as if you can play as we respond father we come before you in repentance father we repent for being nosy about things that did not concern us father we repent for being arrogant thinking we had answers that we did not have father we repent for our lack of integrity that led us to make up conspiracy theories and prophesy nonsense rather than say we don't know it's in the hands of the sovereignty of god we're sorry father god for our human musings our human wisdom our human words our human ways that we brought as solutions where the world needed to know that god knew what he was doing and he was worth our trust father have mercy where we deified ourselves as all-knowing where we kicked you off your throne and said follow me i know buy into this revelation have mercy on your prophets who've told the world where covet came from and when it would end and not one of them was right because you hid it in sovereignty and mystery have mercy on your prophets who spoke politicians into place and not one of them was right because you hid it in sovereignty and mystery you do all things well we are an arrogant people god we are stiff-necked and stubborn father we row light our thoughts and social media to the applause of man and you roll your eyes in heaven cause we shout that we've got answers that we don't have and father we think of one of our emerging prophets christine whose husband is in a covid ward in america with not long to live father we think even of the death of those that we've lost recently who were part of the global prophetic alliance and our hearts ache we know we're going to stand at grave size in the future as we have done in the past and we know we will have questions and god we want to end the days of being like job's friends who find nothing useful to say and as we reflect on the pain of our past and the pain yet to come and the confusion father that we may feel as you come as a judge may our hearts always be fine saying i trust your sovereignty i trust your sovereignty we trust your sovereignty we fear your name and though we do not see it and though we cannot understand it may my life live the message in my conversation with others that you do all things well and his coming tribulation approaches on the horizon and his persecution is increasingly secure and as laws are made that squash your truth may we cling to the truth that you are always on the throne that you know what you're doing that you are not a god who abandons us and that your sovereignty is certain and though it may look like we've lost battles and oh it feels it do thank you jesus that you win wars thank you for heaven thank you for the cross thank you for eternity thank you that you are not just my savior or my friend or my provider i thank you that you are the emperor and the coming king put integrity jesus back in your prophets come on put integrity back in your national prophetic voices put integrity back in the prophetic movement jesus save us from conspiracy nonsense maybe be may we be the people who say i trust you in christ alone my hope is fined in christ alone my hope is fined christ alone cornerstone i cannot trust [Music] in jesus [Music] [Music] i did not [Music] the holy trust in jesus [Music] christ [Music] is [Music] [Music] the is [Music] [Music] [Music] christ the lord [Music] is [Music] is [Music] oh [Music] is [Music] [Applause] [Music] oh [Music] is [Music] in christ [Music] so i bless you this week to stand firm in the mysteries and the sovereignties of god and i bless you to come back into all and i bless you to come back into wonder at his higher ways and his higher thoughts and i bless you to be captivated and held in places where you don't know when you won't perceive captivated by his beauty in jesus name amen if you want somebody to pray for you and with you we're going to start to do that just on the platform behind the worship band we'll not do that with the tea and coffee with the children running around parents if you can keep an eye on your children so because outside isn't always the safest for them to run around but if you want a ministry please make your way up there and we will come and pray with you and we'll see you next week amen do foreign [Music] my [Music] you

Channel: Global Prophetic Alliance-Glasgow Prophetic Centre

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Length: 54min 53sec (3293 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 05 2021