(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

Okay, so we're back in the Psalms there, and I did preach for Philemon on Sunday. And so I'm just trying to pace myself at the moment, because I'm trying to prepare of returning back to preach for you guys. You know, I moved back here obviously in October, and we're doing searches for houses. Please keep that in prayer as well, as we start to, it's very hard to find a house that's suitable for our size and family. But I'm starting to just pace myself. I'm probably going to start preaching on some of the shorter books of the Bible, just in general. And then we're doing the Psalms in between as well. It's just a little bit easier to pace yourself when you're doing the smaller books. But if you look at Psalm 31 in verse number 15, it begins by saying, My times are in thy hand. I decided to call that the sermon tonight. My times are in thy hand. And you know, I just shared with you, my wife and I, we're looking at houses, we're looking at properties. You know, we're looking at the time that we want to return back to the Sunshine Coast come October. You know, that's our desire. We're aiming for those dates. We're aiming for all of that. And it can become very stressful sometimes, because you know, you find a house, you ring up, and it's already under offer. It's already sold or whatever, you know. And it's just challenging to put all these things together. And sometimes you need to just rest and look at what it said there in that verse. My times are in thy hand. My time, you know, my time is not always the best timing. You know, we can be in a rush or we may be delayed, but God has our times in his hand. And we need to learn how to trust the Lord with our time. Okay? And I just feel like my life in general, I think a lot of you can relate, many times my time just does not seem like God's timing. And yet God's timing is always perfect. It's always the best when he plays out. I can look back in my life and say, well, God's timing was like this. Well, it was for the best. I mean, if I got my way, if I got my time, and I can see where things may have fallen apart, or I may not have succeeded in certain areas or places, because we need to learn how to rest in God's timing. So let's start there in verse number one, Psalm 31. And verse number one, please. Psalm 31, verse number one, it says, Then it says, So we can see that David is asking or saying that he's entrusting the Lord with his life. He says, look, I'm giving myself over to your trust, Lord. I'm trusting myself into your hands, basically. Okay? And again, that has to do, we have a look at this, that has to do with trusting God with his timing as well. You know, understanding that God, you know, I want this job at this particular time. I want this house at this particular time. We need to learn to just trust in the Lord. You know, Lord, I want to be healed at this particular time. You know, sometimes the ladies were praying, you know, pray that my birth would come at this certain time. But sometimes God's timing is just different from our timing. And we need to learn to just trust and rest in the timing of God. But notice what else he says at the end of this verse. He says, So he's not saying deliver me according to my own righteousness. Don't deliver me or save me or help me in this time of trouble, Lord, when I think it's right, at my right time. No, you're righteous, Lord. You know what is right. You know what wrong has been done toward me. You know what difficulties I'm going through. You know what challenges I'm going through. Lord, you know what I need in my life. And I need you to come through and deliver me in thy righteousness. And so the Psalm is saying, Lord, you know the right time. You know, you know when it's the right time and the right way to help me in my challenges. And we need to learn how to trust in the Lord. Verse number two. Bow down thine ear to me. And then he says, deliver me speedily. So he wants a fast, speedily delivery, right? But then at the same time, he knows I've got to wait in the Lord. You know, he wants a quick resolution to his trials. And yeah, you know what, I think it's a good prayer to pray. You know, the Lord will speedily help us. You know, as I said, we're searching for a house. I hope the Lord speedily helps us. You know, lays something in our hands and makes it easy for us to attain. You know, and it doesn't become complicated. You know, I want the speedy, you know, resolution in many times of our life. And yeah, you know what, when the Lord's time comes in, it was done speedily. The Lord will not delay unnecessarily. When his timing is right, it's the right time. You know, it was not too fast. It was not too slow. It was the perfect time. But then it says, be thou, verse number two, be thou my strong rock, for an house of defence to save me. For thou art my rock and my fortress. Therefore, for thy name's sake, lead me and guide me. Pull me out of the net that they have laid privily for me, for thou art my strength. Verse two, three, and four, constantly affirming that God, you will deliver me, you are my rock, you are my defence. His trust in the Lord, you are the strong one. And so when he's saying these things, that you're my rock, you're my defence, you're my strength, what is he saying about himself? Isn't he saying I'm weak? You know, I can't do it on my own, Lord. You know, I've got the wisdom of man. You know, I think I'm great. I think I can accomplish. But really, Lord, when I compare myself to you, you are strong and I am weak. And we need to remember that as Christians, not to lift ourselves up too highly, not to think of ourselves above our measure, but understand the reason we can be strong, the reason we can do great works for God and great things for God, is because we serve a strong rock, a strong tower, a strong almighty God. And it's through him that we can get our strength. You know, his strength is made perfect in our weakness. When we can acknowledge that we are weak, that we are sinful creatures, that we failed in so many aspects of our life and we just humbled ourselves, we ask the Lord for his strength, and then he's going to input his strength into our life to make us do the works that he has called us to do. You know, one thing that I think about this, my times are in thy hand. And sometimes I talk to different Christians and they have certain personal desires. Maybe a man wants to get married and he's just not finding that wife. Or someone's looking for a job and he can't seem to land that job. Different things like that. You know, we have our desires, don't we? We have our dreams and we go to the Lord and we petition him for the things that we need. And sometimes the Lord just wants us to realize that he is our rock, he is our strength. And one thing that I've learned in my life is to get to the point where I say, Well, Lord, you know what? This is what I want, Lord. I think this is the best for me, Lord, but I don't know if it's the best for you. Like, I don't know if that's within your timing, Lord. I don't know if that's within your will, Lord. You know, and sometimes, you know, I have seen God answer prayers, step in and answer prayers. The most amazing answer to prayers, when I got to the point in my life and I realized, Well, God, I'm willing to give it up. This is what I want. This is what I desire. But, Lord, if it's not your will, then, you know, I'm willing to give it up, Lord. And sometimes you need to be brought to that level. I'm willing to give it up, Lord. If that's not your will for me, Lord, then please help me, help me accept that's your will, Lord. Whatever your will is, Lord, I accept it. And it's been amazing in my life how many times I was willing to say, Lord, not my will be done by thy will be done. Very hard words to say. Jesus Christ said those words, you know, going to the cross. And the way God has answered in prayers like that has just amazed me. You know, there was a time, and I've shared this multiple times with you, but, you know, it's a miracle to me where my wife, Christina, was told she would not be able to have kids. Guaranteed, no kids. You know, we got married, and yeah, you know what, the first nine months, she was not falling pregnant. Not even close. You know, there was just, it looked like the medical system was correct on their assessment, that it was just not going to happen. And I remember my wife got to the point where, and even I had to get to the point where we were just willing to say, God, you know what, if it's not your will for us to have kids, then, Lord, you know, we trust in your hands. We trust in your will, Lord. Whatever your will is, Lord, if your will is for us to not have kids, then so be it, Lord, if that's your will. And then it's like, as soon as you sort of say that prayer, I can't remember exactly the timing right now, brethren, but I reckon it was within a month she got pregnant. You know, just those amazing little prayers that you get answered, you pray for, but you almost have to be willing to give up your own will, right, your own desires, and trust in the timing of the Lord, whether it's his will or not. You know, I remember when we purchased our first house, you know. We were living in a small, it was a shed, brethren, it was a shed, okay. I mean, this space that we have here in the auditorium was bigger than what we had when I first married my wife, and we lived in a little shed. We were paying like $150 a week, I think it was, in rent. I mean, it was tiny, it was tiny. And I wasn't earning big bucks or anything like that, but my heart's desire was to buy a house. I wanted to buy a house and, you know, have a place where you could just have a roof over our heads, and, you know, you get that drummed into your head, right, by the world, you know. You're, you know, you're unsuccessful if you rent, I don't believe that for a minute. You know, Jesus Christ did not have a place to rest his head, you know. You know, I don't think that, you know, you're a better Aussie or a hardworking Aussie, just because you own a house or something like that, right. But I had that drummed into me, you know, that you've got to buy a house, you've got to buy a house. Otherwise, you're just going to be constantly, you know, behind, and you're going to, you know, whatever. You're going to have financial difficulties, and in my heart, we've got to buy a house, we've got to buy a house, trying to save up, save up, save for a deposit, deposit. I remember getting to a point in my life where I just said, Lord, if it's not your will for me to own a house, and I read that passage where Christ said he did not even have a place to rest his head. And I said, well, if Jesus did not have a place to rest his head, and Lord, if, then you know what, I have to accept, I have to accept that if your desires for me not to have my own place, Lord, then so be it, Lord. I'm willing to give it up. Like, if my desire, if my will does not line up with your will, Lord, I'm willing to give up on that. Again, I reckon it's just a couple of weeks, you know, we got into a position where we could buy a house. You know, after praying something like that, after getting to a point where God has to humble you so much, just look, stop seeking your own will, and seek my will, and leave it in my hands. Trust me, I'm your strong tower, I'm your rock, I'm your defense. When you're able to do that, brethren, I'm telling you, you're going to see amazing answers to prayer. I remember my desire to become a pastor, and my pastor at Victory Baptist Church saying, well, we can't ordain you over your end times position. I was heartbroken, brethren. You know, my desire was to be a pastor, come up to the Sunshine Coast. I already felt like I had the wheels turning, a bit of traction developing, I was heartbroken. Okay, and I remember just having to get to a point and say, Lord, if it's not your will, then, if it's not your will for me to be a pastor, Lord, please take this desire from me. I'm willing to be just a regular member of any church, just help me support, you know, a good man of God. You know, if that's your will for me, Lord, I'm willing to give up on it. And it's amazing, you know, when I was able to pray that prayer, the doors opened up for me to join a church, which eventually sent me out, or Damien sent me out. You know, I say this because I've just seen so many times, times when I just feel like it's just not going to happen. It must not be God's will. But then it was just God's will for me to say, no, I need to trust myself to Him. You know, I need to put myself in the hands of God. My times are in thy hand, Lord. And I think, you know, we need to be brought to that position many times. It can hurt though. You know, it's very hurtful because you realise you're telling God something that deep down you don't really want, but you're willing, you know, just as a Christian to accept God's will for your life. And it's amazing how many times you can just step in after that and bless you and give you the desires of your heart, just because you're willing to trust Him with it. Back to Psalm, please. Psalm 31 and verse number 5. Psalm 31 and verse number 5. Because essentially you are praying this prayer when you do that to the Lord. Into thine hand I commit my spirit. Thou hast redeemed me, O Lord God of truth. Because Lord, you've redeemed me. You've saved me. Well, you know what? The rest of my life, Lord, I'm going to commit my spirit to you, Lord. Whatever your heart's desire is, whatever your will is, Lord, I'm willing to walk in your paths. That's the best place to be as a Christian. Being in the centre of God's will is the place that you're going to get the most blessings, the most protection from God, the most answered prayers when you're right there in the middle of God's will, but you have to be willing to say into thine hand I commit my spirit. You know, I'm not desiring my own will, Lord. You know, I want your will in my life. What is it that you want in my life, Lord? I'm willing to sacrifice my own personal will. Can you please keep your finger there and go to Luke 23. Keep your finger there in Psalm 31 and go to Luke 23. I like this verse because Jesus Christ quotes this verse, okay? In Luke 23 verse 44, Luke 23 verse 44, we're going to the sacrifice of our Christ on the cross. In Luke 23, 44, it says, It was about the sixth hour, and there was a darkness over all the earth until the ninth hour, and the sun was darkened and the veil of the temple was rent in the midst. And when Jesus had cried with a loud voice, he said, Father, into thy hand I commend my spirit. So he's quoting Psalm 31 verse 5. Into thine hand I commit my spirit. So as Christ is saying, into thy hand I commend my spirit, what is he saying? Father, I'm entrusting my spirit into your hands, okay? And having said thus, he gave up the ghost. Ghost is spirit, same word. He gave up the ghost. And when the centurion saw what was done, he glorified God saying, Certainly this was a righteous man. What I love about that is Christ is at his point, he sacrificed himself, he's taken on the sins of the world, okay? Not just the physical sacrifices, but the spiritual torments, the separation from the Father, you know, Christ saying that the Father had forsaken him. This was the lowest point in his life. And even then, toward the end, some of the last words he says as he passes away, he quotes scripture. I mean, you know, Christ is the word of God, and he's quoting God's word. He's taking it from Psalm 31. He's entrusting his life, his spirit, okay, his mission, his work, to the Father, okay? And so, why I like this is because, you know, this is what God wants from us. But again, he doesn't ask something from us that he himself has not already done. Jesus Christ, the Son of God, has already gone through this. Gone through the anguish, gone through the torments, right? I mean, it was not his will. He says, not my will be done. He was asking if there's some other way, but then his will was the Father's will. He lined up with the Father's will. And he says on the cross, you know, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit. The Psalm says, into thy hand I commit my spirit. Go back to Psalm 31, verse number 6. Psalm 31, verse number 6. So, it can be hard to be willing to give up your desires and your will and just commit your spirit to the Father. It's very hard, okay? But we have the example of Christ. I mean, no one's going to suffer as much as Christ did. And yet, even then, he was able to say those same words, into thy hand I commit my spirit. Verse number 6. The Psalmist says, I have hated them that regard lying vanities, but I trust in the Lord. Boy, one of the greatest things since being a Christian in recent years is learning that I can actually hate wicked people. And it's all over your Bible. Wow! You know, because I got taught growing up, you know, as a child and in churches that it's a sin to hate. Now, hatred can be a sin. If you hate the things that God loves, it's sinful. There is a hatred of the flesh. But also there is a spiritual hatred. There's the perfect hatred. If you hate the things that God hates, it's righteous. And the Psalmist says, I have hated them that regard lying vanities. You know, it's fine to hate the wicked. You know, the Lord is angry at the wicked every day. Psalm 139, 22 says, I hate them with perfect hatred. I count them mine enemies. Boy, what a relief that that emotion of hate, I don't have to hold it back anymore because as long as it's lined up with the hatred of God, it's righteous. And you can then vent it, right? You can vent, get it out of your system and hate those, hate the wickedness and hate those that do wicked things, those that are contrary to God. And it's all over your Bible. I can't believe it. It's always there, right? But remember to hate, you know, righteous hatred, perfect hatred is hating the things or hating the people that God hates. Look at verse number seven. I will be glad and rejoice in thy mercy for thou has considered my trouble. Thou has known my soul in adversities. Now notice the next words because the title for the sermon was my times are in thy hand. We want to be in the hands of God. We want to be in his righteous perfect will, right? That we have in our lives. But you have a choice because if you leave the hand of God, where are you going to find yourself? Well, verse number eight, it says, and has not shut me up into the hand of the enemy. Thou has set my feet in a large place. And so you can see here the danger of not being in God's hands, it opens you up to be in the hands of others, the hands of the enemies, the hands of the wicked. Sometimes we do find ourselves in a place, in the hands of our enemies or in the hands of the wicked just to cause us to flee back into the hands of God and say, Lord, I need to be in your hands. You'll actually see this again come up in the psalm, you know, the comparison between the hands of God and the hands of the wicked. You know, it's our choice. You know, if you want to keep your life preserved from wicked people, you need to just stay in the hands of God, stay in the perfect will of God. Commit your spirit to the Father. It said at the end of verse number eight, thou has set my feet in a large room. Now, can you just keep your finger there and go to psalm four, please? We have looked at this before, but I like the language that's used here, thou has set my feet in a large room. Go to psalm four, please, psalm four, verse number one, psalm four and verse number one, which reads, hear me when I call, O God, of my righteousness. It says, thou has enlarged me when I was in distress. Have mercy upon me and hear my prayer. So in psalm four, we see the Lord has enlarged the psalmist, the one that's praying, right? And then we have in psalm 31 that he has set our feet in a large room. The idea there is that when we're going through some turmoil and difficulties, it can feel like the sky's falling down, right? It can feel like you're suffocating. You know, when I wear those masks on the plane here, I feel like I'm suffocating, right? I can't wait to get out of the plane and go into a large area so I can take a deep breath. That's the kind of idea when you're going through difficulties, you may feel like, you know, you're being squeezed, right? We call it being under pressure, you know, being stressed, being heavy laden. We feel these burdens upon us when we're going through difficulties. Well, the promise is that the Lord will come, deliver ourselves from the hands of the enemy and set us in a large room, a place that we can breathe, a place that we can relax, right? And have an element of peace. Verse number nine. Have mercy upon me, O Lord, for I am in trouble. Mine eye is consumed with grief. Yea, my soul and my belly. So the fact that his eye is consumed with grief, it's not that his eye experiences grief, right? Again, it's just poetic language. He's been weeping, you know, he's been weeping. And the cries, I guess the blurriness of his vision as he's tearing up is the grief that's consuming his eyes. It's not just affecting his eyes, it's also affecting his soul and his belly and my belly. And I tend to think about, have you ever been stressed and worried and you get those weird sensations in your belly? And I'm kind of feeling that right now as we're just in houses because it's stressful. I mean, it's stressful sometimes. And you get this uneasy feeling. It's like, oh man, there's a perfect house right there. I hope we get it. What if we don't get it? Ah! And you kind of feel it in the belly, you know? Well, yeah, you know, these are just feelings that, you know, different types of griefs, different types of turmoil that you may feel in your life. It's important to pay attention to those feelings that you have. They capture for us in the Bible because God has built us this way. You know, when you're feeling like that, it's time for you to recognise, I need the Lord, right? When you're tearing up and your stomach's upset, you know, even to the point when you're heavily stressed, it can cause medical conditions. It can cause ulcers in your body. You know, your emotions, if downcast, if heavy laden, can cause physical ailments, you know? And so it's important when you start to feel that in your body, you know something's not right, hey, maybe you need to find yourself back in the hands of God, right? Maybe you need to get back into the will of God. Maybe you've turned away from him for some reason. Look at verse number 10. Verse number 10, 11 and 12 and 13 basically talk about all the people that have turned against the psalmist, okay? But I like where he starts with verse number 10 because the first person that's causing problem is himself, okay? In verse number 10 he says, For my life is spent with grief and my years with sighing. Look at this. Because my strength faileth because of mine iniquity, and my bones are consumed, okay? So the first person causing him problems is himself, okay? And again, it's that mindset that exists, you know, from Adam and Eve. You know, when they've gone through difficulty, you see immediately they want to shift blame, right? When Adam was caught in his sin, he says, No, it was the woman you gave me. And when Eve is asked by God, Why did you eat of that? She said, It's a serpent, it's a devil. You know, within man we have this disgusting habit of just blaming others, blaming other people for my difficulties. And again, I like the silence because he's winning first of all before he starts complaining about others. He says, Yeah, my strength has failed, but yeah, it's mine iniquity, my own sin. You know, I'm causing problems for myself, he says. So why is he seeking the strength from the Lord? After he realizes he's done wrong, then he starts talking about the others that have turned against him in verse 11. He says, I was a reproach among all mine enemies. So we know that David had definitely a lot of enemies. We may not have enemies in the same way. Like, I don't know anyone that's trying to kill me, right? Who's trying to chase me down with a sword. Like, you know, you don't hear stories of Pastor Kevin hiding out in the middle of the woods or something, you know, hiding in some cave because some person's trying to kill him. You know, we haven't really experienced that kind of difficulties. But then he says, not just his enemies. He goes, but especially among my neighbors. Hey, maybe there's been arguments with your neighbors, with your community, you know. And he says, and a fear to my acquaintance. His acquaintances have turned against him. Maybe these people that aren't necessarily your friends but you're well acquainted with, could be your work colleagues, you know, might be, you know, your friends' friends or people like this. He says, they that did see me without fled from me. He goes, look, there's no one helping me. My enemies are against me. We know that already. My neighbors are against me. Even my acquaintances have fled from me. Verse number 12, he says, I am forgotten as a dead man out of mind. I am like a broken vessel. Now, I don't believe for a minute, like, that David was literally forgotten. Okay, because he's a king. Like, he's won a lot of victories. He defeated, you know, the Philistine. You know, he had a lot of supporters even when he was going through some difficult times. It's not like he was literally forgotten by everybody. Okay, but we're talking about someone that is emotionally downcast. And when you are downcast, it can cause you to feel like everyone has forgotten about you. It can cause you to feel like you're this dead man, you know, in the grave and nobody cares about you. They're moving on with their life. And it can be like that sometimes. It can feel like that sometimes when you're extremely down. Why hasn't anyone called me? Why hasn't anyone checked up on me? You know, and you start to have those feelings and, again, that blaming other people. It's others. Others are letting me down. But really, you don't know behind the scenes, maybe, how much people are actually thinking about you. How much people are praying for you, right? Knowing, those that know your difficulty, you know, praying and spending, you know, time, spending hours in prayer for you. These are things that when you're emotionally downcast, you don't see. You know, you're just focused on your own emotions. And this is why, you know, church is so important. You know, because we can come together, especially on a Wednesday, we can bring our prayer requests together, can't we? We can pray for one another and then you can't turn around and say, well, everyone's forgotten me. Because, you know, at least your brothers in the Lord are praying for you. You know, loneliness, I hate it. Sometimes I kind of, because I've got a big family, it can get loud. Sometimes I kind of want that quiet time on my own. But you don't want quiet time forever. You know, we've been created to have companionship. You know, the Bible, when God created Adam, he said, it's not good for a man to be alone. You know, it's good to have family. It's good to have a community. And some people grow up in a place where they don't have a family. Maybe they've got a broken family. But this is, again, why church is so important. Because we have a church family. It doesn't matter how big or how small our church is, there's a church family. And we have one major, most important thing in common, which is Jesus Christ and salvation. And we have the Holy Spirit, we have the new man. And the Bible tells me the new man loves the brethren. Sometimes the flesh may not always love the brethren, but the new man definitely loves the brethren all the time. And so as long as we're in church in the right spirit, being led by the Holy Spirit of God, it's just going to naturally come out of us a genuine love and desire, love for the brethren and the desire to pray and to think about one another. Verse number 13. He says, For I have heard the slander of many. Fear was on every side. While they took counsel together against me, they devised to take away my life. Now again, I read verse number 13, it almost sounds like Jesus once again. Like an internal voice of Jesus Christ. I mean, it could be. I'm not going to necessarily say that's the case. It's definitely David is feeling this way as well. But we know that when Christ was betrayed, you know, he was definitely deserted. His best friends deserted him. You know, even Peter, who said, No, Lord, I'll die for you. You know, he denied Christ three times. And yeah, he had people to counsel against him. There was slander of many, many people came making false accusations about Christ. So it could be verse number 13 is about Christ. But anyway, again, these are things that people may go through in a time of turmoil. But notice what it says in verse number 14. It says, But I trusted in thee, O Lord. I said, Thou art my God. That's where you start in a brethren. If you've been far from the Lord or you're going for difficulty, the first thing that you need to say to yourself or say to the Lord, Thou art my God. God, you are my father. I am your son. When I got saved, you brought me into the royal family. I'm a child of God. I've got the Holy Spirit in me. You know, I mean, think about who we are for a moment. You know, we like to say it's important to stay humble. But don't forget who we are. We are the children of God. We have eternal life. We have the words of eternal life. You know, through our actions and through the gospel, we can cause somebody to turn their eternal destiny into hell, into heaven. We can do the most amazing works on this earth. There's no one on this earth that has a more important job than what we have. Think about who we are for a moment. We are important to God. You know, again, good to stay humble. Let's stay humble but understand our purpose, understand our mission, understand we're ambassadors of heaven, understand that we've really got a place in home in heaven. Who cares about, what if I don't find a house? I've got a mansion in heaven. I've got a mansion there. It's going to be the best one I've ever seen. It's going to be better than any house on this earth that man has built. It's been built by Jesus. You've got a house built by Jesus? You do if you're saved. So when you're going through difficulties, just remember who you are and remember who your God is. Thou art my God. Then it says these words in verse number 15. My times are in thy hand. And notice again the comparison. In the hand of God then it says, Deliver me from the hand of mine enemies and from them that persecute me. Alright, so the psalmist is trusting in the timing of God. My times, I don't know how many days I've got to live. I don't know how many days you've got to live. Some of us have more than others. Right? But that time is in the hand of God. He's in control as to when we pass away. I've heard it said and I do like it said this way. I've heard it said by others that we're invincible. We cannot die until God says, Alright, your time's up. That's pretty good. That's encouraging. Right? We're not going to die before the time. Now you can die before God's intended time if you destroy your life. If you live a wicked Christian life, you know, you don't seek the will of God and you allow your sins to have, you know, they may have great consequence in your life. You may get to a point where you're just useless for God. You know, you're saved. You're going to heaven. You know, but God can't use you. So why would it keep you around? You can end your life early. Okay? But look, God has a perfect timing for us. We're keeping his will. We keep searching for him, living for him. We know that our years, we're invincible. Nothing's going to happen to us until God says so. Deliver me from the hand of my enemy. So what I want to look at now is just look at several times the Bible refers to the hands of God. You know, we're entrusting our spirit, entrusting ourselves to God. And what does that look like, you know, in other passages of the Bible? So can you please turn to, keep your finger there in Psalm, and turn to Psalm 139. Turn to Psalm 139, and I'll read some other passages to you. So the first passage I'm going to read to you is Isaiah 48 and verse number 12. Isaiah 48 verse number 12. Let's learn about the hands of God here. In Isaiah 48, 12, it says, Harken unto me, O Jacob and Israel. So the Lord God is speaking here. My cord, I am he, I am the first, I also am the last. Then it says in verse number 13, Mine hand also have laid the foundation of the earth, and my right hand have spanned the heavens. When I call unto them, they stand up together. So what's the first thing that we learn about the hand of God? That it's a creative hand. The hand that we are seeking protection in is the same hand that created all things, that created the heavens, created the earth. It's the hand of creation. It's the same hand that created you in your mother's belly. Now in John chapter 10 verse number 27, I'll read this passage to you as well. Very familiar to many of you. John chapter 10 verse 27. What else is God's hand useful for? Well, Christ says, My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. And I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. So what else is special about the hand of God? It keeps us saved. It keeps us secure. Once saved, always saved. I mean, what I love about that verse, brethren, it's not just the hand aspect. I know when we quote that verse, we quote in the fact that God's hand is strong, and of course it is. No one can pull you out of God's hand. But that's not, I mean, Christ basically in this verse tells us three times that we're eternally secure. Just read it again. It says, And I give unto them eternal life. I mean, the fact that he's calling it eternal life is already once saved, always saved. It's eternal life. It can never be death, right? Eternal means it never ends. It lasts forever. And then he says, So that's eternal life. And then he says, And they shall never perish. There's another way of saying eternal life, right? Once saved, always saved. Never perish. But just in case eternal life can never perish and doesn't convince you, he then says, Neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. Just in case you don't get those other ones, right? Once saved, always saved three times in that one verse. Okay? And then he says, Just in case you don't get it. Okay, verse number 29. My father, which gave them me, is greater than all, and no man is able to pluck them out of my father's hand. So man, we're eternally secure. I mean, to suggest that you can lose your salvation is just not to understand salvation at the beginning, right? It's not to understand eternal life at all. Okay? So what else is wonderful about God's hands? It keeps us saved. It keeps us secure, even if we mess up. Even if we end our life early with wicked sins. Hey, we are in God's hands. No man can ever pluck us out. We are eternally saved. Now you're in Psalm 139. Look at verse number 10. Psalm 139. What else can we say about God's hand? We're in Psalm 139, verse number 10. It says, Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me. I like that. You know, I think about, when I look at this verse, I think about the game of chess, right? And, you know, you're in charge of telling basically the piece where you want it to go. You know, you as the player, you're leading the piece of chess, right? So we know that once we're saved, not only are we eternally secure in God's hands, but his hand is also guiding us. It's also leading us in the way that we should live. But like a chess piece, it also says, and thy right hand shall hold me. Okay? So it's not just telling us, go this way, okay? Once God says, go this way, go, all right, Lord, I'll go that way, he picks us up and he helps us go that way. He doesn't leave it up to us alone. He takes us in his right hand, and he moves that chess piece where it needs to go. What a wonderful saviour. Go to Psalm 16, please. Psalm 16, verse 11. Psalm 16, verse 11. Many times the reason we leave the hands of God is because we think we know better. Again, we think our timing is better. You know, we think, well, I prefer going this way, Lord, because I get to fulfil my desires. But then we've got Psalm 16, verse 11, which says, that will show me the path of life. Then it says, look at this, in thy presence is fullness of joy. This is at thy right hand. There are pleasures forevermore. And so when we're far from the Lord and we're sinful and wicked, and we think, well, Lord, I want my pleasures over here. I want the satisfaction. I want the pleasures of sin. I want the pleasures of my lust, or whatever that might be, Lord. And that's away from your hand, but I want to chase it. Listen, it's not going to satisfy you. It's not going to give you lust and enjoyment. There's pleasure in sin for a season, which is why it's tempting, but then there's just destruction. But if we just stay in God's hands, we stay with the Lord, you know, it's so sad. It saddens me, you know, not just because I have kids, but just because I've been in church and I see young generations leaving church. You know, young generations say, well, you know, I don't find what I'm seeking for in church. And I can understand what they mean sometimes because the preacher can be very poor, right? Sometimes many churches have, the leaders just have a lack of zeal, a lack of love, and people are like, what am I doing here? I'm sitting in the pew. I'm giving some of my money and I get nothing out of this. And so they leave church or something like that, right? But the Bible's telling us there's pleasures, you know, in the hands of God. What does it say there again? In verse number, at thy right hand there are pleasures forevermore. You know, for the young children you are going to be challenged as you grow up to seek pleasures in this world, you know, and you will make mistakes and your parents made mistakes as well. But you need to remember that there are pleasures with God. You stay at his right hand. He will give you joy. He will give you happiness. He will give you satisfaction. He will give you exactly what's going to make you realize that just being in God's place, being in his house, being in his hands, being in his presence, this is the best place I can possibly be. It's safe. It's secure. He's my rock. He answers my prayers. He helps me when I'm sad. He takes care of my enemies. He takes care of my problems. He gives me joy. But that can only come if you stay in the hands of God. You leave that. You seek the world. You seek the pleasure of the world. Listen, yeah, you'll be happy for, I don't know, a few days, a few weeks, a few months, and then it's just going to come down crashing on you. But sometimes we need to go through that to cause us to run back to God, to humble us, to break us, to go back to the Lord. Can you please turn to, I'll get you to turn to Acts chapter 11, please. Acts chapter 11, verse number 19. Acts chapter 11, verse number 19. We're looking at the hand of God, right? My times are in thy hand. It's so good to be in the hand of God. It's the best place to be. Acts 11, verse 19. Acts 11, verse number 19. Brethren, I want to do great works for God, do you? I want to see more souls saved. I want to see our church grow in quality, in quantity. I want the best for Blessed Hope Baptist Church as well. I want to do great things for God. But again, we just have to remember that our times are in his hand. God knows the right time. We just do what God asks us to do, and Jesus Christ says he will build his church. We just have to be patient. Wait for God's timing. Now why am I saying that? Because in Acts 11, verse number 19, Acts 11, verse number 19, it says, Now they which were scattered abroad upon the persecution that arose about Stephen travelled as far as Penance and Cyprus and Antioch preaching the word to none but unto the Jews only. And some of them were men of Cyprus and Cyrene which when they were come to Antioch spake unto the Grecians, preaching the Lord Jesus. But notice verse number 21, it says, And the hand of the Lord was with them, and a great number believed and turned unto the Lord. Boy. So if we want to do great works for God, not just me as the pastor, but I want you guys to do great works for God. I want you to be greatly rewarded by God. I want you to be great in heaven. Listen, I'll rejoice if you're greater than me in heaven. You know what? Just because you're a pastor doesn't mean you're going to be great in heaven. Okay? Because there's a lot of lazy pastors. Okay? Just the average church going, you know, pew sitting member can be even greater than many pastors. Okay? If we preach the gospel, but notice we need to be in God's hands. You know, if the Lord's hand is upon us, that's going to cause a great number to believe. Do you believe a great number can believe on the Sunshine Coast? I believe it. But we need God's hands. We need to be in the hands of God. We need to do it with the Lord and not just in our own strength. Not in our timing. Alright? Not desiring exactly what we desire, but willing to go, Lord, if it's a long journey, you know, if we need to keep plowing the ground and it takes some time for this great multitude to believe and to be added to the church, then Lord, thy will be done. Thy will be done. Your timing be done, Lord. You know, we're just going to continue to faithfully serve you. Please turn to Luke chapter 4. Luke chapter 4 verse number 40. Luke chapter 4 and verse number 40. Luke 4 40 says, Now when the sun was setting, all they that had any sick with diverse diseases brought them unto him, and he laid his hands on every one of them and healed them. You know, many times when we pray for people, we say, Lord, you know, please place your healing hands upon them. Why do we say that? Because we get, you know, from here, Christ laying his hands on the sick and healing the sick So important to be in the hands of God because it's the healing hands, right? When we're going through just sicknesses and problems, you know, terminal issues or, you know, just ongoing problems. Listen, the one that can help you is the Lord. It's his hands. We've got to be in his hands. We've got to go to the Lord where he can actually lay his hands on us and heal us. Whatever that might look like. It might not even be a physical thing. It could just be different turmoil, different stresses that you might be going through. I believe in God's healing hands. I believe in them. You know, more so now than I did a few years ago, you know, where we can see where we've gone in prayer before the Lord. We've committed that sick person into the hands of God and they've been healed. Can you please now go to Psalm 32? Can you please now go to Psalm 32? Psalm 32. We are going to come back to Psalm 31. I don't want to take too much from Psalm 32. We'll leave that for next week. But just one verse. Psalm 32, verse number four. Because this is the other one that we need to remember, that if we are in God's hands and there's great blessings, there's great strength and there's pleasures and there's healing and there's the creative works of the Lord, we need to also remember that when we are in God's hands in Psalm 32, verse four, it says, for day and night, thy hand, that's God's hand, was heavy upon me. My moisture is turned into the drought of summer, Selah. So God's hand was heavy upon the Psalmist here. We also need to remember that if we are in God's hands, then he's going to use those hands to chastise us as well. That it's going to come heavy upon us when we turn away from him. But don't forget, it's a blessing. It's a blessing to be chastised by God. Because then he's teaching us. He's guiding us. He's instructing us. He's keeping us from further destruction if we just learn our lessons. I won't go into that too much because we'll look at Psalm 32 next week. But just a reminder, we can't forget that within God's hands, there's chastisement also. Verse number 16. Make thy face to shine upon thy servant. This is Psalm 31, sorry. Psalm 31, verse 16. Make thy face to shine upon thy servant. Save me for thy mercy's sake. Make thy face, God's face, to shine upon me, or you. Do you want that? Do you want God's face to shine upon you? What does that look like? You know? Oh, it's the blessings of God for sure. This actually comes from Numbers 6. Can you please turn to Numbers 6? Keep your finger there. Go to Numbers, chapter 6. I remember when I was a child, my father would turn on the radio would turn on the radio, you know, before the internet, right? My dad would turn on the radio and listen to some Christian radio station. I don't know, listen, I don't know. Listen, I would listen to my dad. I learned a lot of great things. I remember it just stirring the spirit within me. I hoped that the preacher, whatever, was saved. I can't go back in time now and confirm that, right? But I remember that he would always close his radio, what do they call it, when they have a little show, his radio show, he would end it from Numbers, chapter 6. And before I read Numbers 6, I'll just quickly read to you from Exodus 34-34 because we have the story of Moses when he spent time with the Lord. It says, But when Moses went in before the Lord to speak with him, he took the veil off until it came out, and he came out and spake unto the children of Israel that which he was commanded. Then verse 35 says, And the children of Israel saw the face of Moses, that the skin of Moses' face shone, and Moses put the veil upon his face again until he went in to speak with him. So we have a very physical, you know, what's the word I'm looking for, presentation, I suppose, of God's face shining upon someone that is within the hands of God, that is fellowshiping with God, very close to God who is Moses. And so when Moses is done fellowshiping with God, and he goes to talk to the others, his face now is shining. His face has gone bright in a physical sense. And everybody knew when they looked at Moses, this guy spent time with God. This guy is in the presence of the Lord. He's close to the Lord. You get that feeling among some brethren sometimes when you talk to them, when you listen to them, that you just know, wow, this person spends a lot of time with the Lord. And you don't have to see the face shining, but you just know it. You know it by how they behave. Look at number 622. It says, And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto Aaron and unto his sons, saying, On this wise ye shall bless the children of Israel, saying unto them. And I can tell you about that radio show. That radio, the preacher would end with these verses. And I remember just as a child, it just touched on me in a very special way. It says, The Lord bless thee and keep thee. The Lord make his face shine upon thee and be gracious unto thee. The Lord lift up his countenance upon thee and give thee peace. And they shall put my name upon the children of Israel and I will bless them. And so we can see here that the shining of God's faces upon us is the blessings of the Lord. You know, spending time with the Lord. And I remember just as a child listening to those verses and it just, you know, just like a two-edged sword. You know, dividing asunder. You know, the bone and the marrow and the soul and the spirit. And it just entered me and I'm like, God, I want you to shine your face upon me. I want you to bless me, Lord. I remember just hearing those words from God's word and thinking, I want that for me. And I didn't really understand it as a kid. I'm like, what does God's face look like? But then, no, this is what God's face looks like. It's his word. The more you spend time in his word, the more you know the word of God. The more you know who he is. The more time, you know, we cannot say we spend time with God but never pick up this book and read it. That's a contradiction. How can you talk to God if he doesn't talk to you through his word? Back to Psalm 31, verse number 17. It says, let me not be ashamed, O Lord, for I have called upon thee. Let the wicked be ashamed and let them be silent in the grave. What is the Psalmist saying? I mean, he's already told God. He hates the wicked, right? And then he says, look, can you make him silent in the grave? The Psalmist is saying, God, can you kill my enemies? That's what he's saying, right, in that Psalm. Verse number 18. Let the lying lips be put to silence, which speak grievous things proudly and contemptuously against the righteous. So I want you to notice here, just because it helps us understand verse number, verse number 18 helps us understand, oh, we're not up to it yet. All right, don't worry about it. But anyway, the wicked, the proud are the ones that are saying wrong things or lying about him and the same things against the righteous. So David refers to himself as one of those righteous. Verse number 19. Oh, how great is thy goodness, which thou hast laid up for them that fear thee, which thou hast wrought for them that trust in thee before the sons of men. Verse number 20. Thou shalt hide them, that's the righteous, in the secret of thy presence from the pride of man. Thou shalt keep them secretly in a pavilion from the strife of tongues. So what we learn here in verse number 20, there is a secret place between you and God that'll keep you from the pride of man. It'll keep you from those that speak against you, that secret place. You know, God will hide us in that secret place. He'll keep us safe in that secret place. And you know, I was kind of thinking about what could this represent? Could this be church? And yeah, you know, church can be that way many times. You know, church ought to be a refuge from the world. Church ought to be a place where we come to be refreshed to spend time with the Lord, with the brethren. So it can be that way, but it's not really secret, is it? I mean, it's a public gathering. Anybody can come off the street and come here, right, and be part of the church. But then we need to remember that we need to have our secret time with God, our secret time in the presence of God where he's going to keep us safe. It's an interesting thing because as men, you know, we like the idea of, you know, being like a strong man and you know, we can make it in this world, you know, and look at my success, but actually to be strong, we need to also hide ourselves in the Lord. We need to find that secret time, secret place in fellowship with the Lord. I'll quickly read to you from Psalm 91 verse 1. It says, He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. I will say to the Lord, Here is my refuge and my fortress. My God in Him will I trust. So Psalm 91 brings out that secret place. It's a place that we run to when we're going through difficulties, going through hardships. I've already said it many times in past sermons, but just a reminder, again, as a kid, one of the most striking images that I remember is going into my father's bedroom, you know, just seeing what my dad's up to and seeing him on his knees with the Bible open, praying to the Lord. He doesn't even realize that I came in and I'm just like, wow, my dad must really need God right now. And if dad needs God, then I must need God too. You know, my dad was in the secret place at that point in time, you know, and he probably doesn't even remember. He's probably hearing this tonight. He's probably like, well, I don't know when it happened. Right, but I just, I remember my dad on his knees, you know, and I can't remember if he was upstairs or, you know, but I did not know as a child what turmoil he was going through, right? But, and I just thought my dad was the greatest, strongest man, smartest man that's ever lived. That's what children tend to think, little children. You still think that Brody? If dad's the strongest man that's ever lived, the smartest man, yeah, amen. But see, that's what you think of your dad. But then when you realize, man, even a strong man needs the Lord when he's going through difficulty. We need to remember that, man. Verse number 21. Blessed be the Lord, for he have showed me his marvelous kindness in a strong city. For I said in my haste, so once again, we look at the timing, right? The Psalmist is in haste. He's in a hurry. He's in a rush. He says, for I said in my haste, I am cut off from before thine eyes. Nevertheless, thou hurtest the voice of my supplications when I cried unto thee. So he's responding too quickly. He's gotten really impatient. You know, his prayers have been answered as quickly as he wants. He thinks God is far from him. He goes, surely the Lord has cut me off from his eyes. The Lord doesn't even know what I'm going through anymore, he says, right? But again, we're focusing on the timing of the Lord. It's different from our timing. We need to remind ourselves. Our timing is different from God's timing. He's got the perfect timing. And even when we're in a rush, he says, nevertheless, thou hurtest the voice of my supplication when I cried unto thee. So let's not, let's, you know, let's have patience. Let's learn the long suffering, that fruit of the Spirit that God wants to develop in our lives. And just understand that if we just entrust ourselves to the Lord, his timing is right. His timing's gonna be perfect. We don't need to stress and worry. Verse number 23. O love the Lord, all ye his saints, for the Lord preserveth the faithful and plentifully rewardeth the proud doer. Now the reason I said, remember, the proud was the enemy that he had is because when I read verse number 23, when I first read it, I'm like, okay, and plentifully rewardeth the proud doer. Oh, so he's proud here in a positive sense? Well, no, because when you compare it to the rest of the passage, this is not a good reward, okay? And plentifully rewardeth the proud doer, God's rewarding them for their wickedness. Okay, that's what it's about, right? And so, so again, verse number 23 says, O love the Lord, all ye saints, we ought to love the Lord. And it's quite interesting that verse number 23 ends with that, that God's gonna reward the evildoers the proud for their wicked works. And so we ought to love the Lord that he corrects, you know, and destroys the wicked. That's pretty good, right, in the Psalm there. But again, O love the Lord, all ye saints. I'll just read a very familiar passage to you guys. Matthew 22, verse 36. The question gets asked to Jesus, Master, which is the great commandment in the law? Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. How can you love the Lord with all your mind? That means you've got to have time, spend time thinking of the Lord, meditating on his word, right? You struggle with some things in the Bible. Lord, I need to apply my mind. I need to learn from you. And it's not just emotions, but also spending time with the Lord up here, right? And I covered it last week, I think. We spend so much time with the entertainment of this world, when our minds really should be focused on loving the Lord. Then Jesus Christ says in verse number 38, this is the first and great commandment. Also in John 14, 15, he says, If ye love me, keep my commandments. If ye love me, keep my commandments. So when we look at the psalm there, it says, O love the Lord all ye saints. How can we show our love to Christ? By keeping his commandments. When you sin, when you fail, that shows me at that point in time, you did not love the Lord. Because if you loved him, you would keep the commandments. But again, we sin every day, don't we? We're going to sin till the day we die. So we need to keep this in mind that one great way to overcome sin is simply to love the Lord, to love his commandments, walk in accordance to his paths. And then the psalm ends in verse number 24. Be of good courage, and he shall strengthen your heart, all ye that hope in the Lord. Okay, let's pray.