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Survival Tools · Sermon Podcast at Cartersville1st

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Hey, man, thank you, John choir and praise team.
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If you have your Bible, and I hope you do make your way to
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Psalm chapter 5 as we continue in our series in the book of
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songs that we've just simply titled Songs for Life, Songs for
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life. I'm not really sure why, but I
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love stories of survival. In fact, one of my favorite ways
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right now to listen to them is through a podcast from the
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Noiser Network called Real Survivor.
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Survivor Stories. Have y'all heard this at all?
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Anybody listen to these? Maybe it's just me, I'm weird I
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guess. So.
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The most recent one spoke of a guy named John Ritchie.
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He's the son of missionaries to West Africa who was on a fishing
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trip with his father and his uncle in right off Ivory Coast
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area in a lake, and they were in some pretty small fishing boats
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and having a great time catching some fish.
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I don't remember the type fish they were catching there, like
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50 to 75 LB fish. These were big fish they were
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fishing for out of pretty small boats, having a great time until
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their boat was rolled over by hippo.
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You're not going to laugh in a second until John Ritchie found
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himself in the mouth of that hippo drug to the bottom of that
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leg where that hippo stayed with him clamped in his mouth.
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I'm not going to tell you how it ends, but he does survive.
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You have to go and listen for yourself.
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But just absolutely fascinating, right?
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Stories of survival. Y'all remember when the show
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alone was running? I don't know if it still is.
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Lorne and I watched alone for a while, you know, where they had
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all these participants and they made them select 10 items, 10
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items only from a pre approved list and they dropped them off
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alone. It's the name of the show.
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Think they gave them five square miles from any other participant
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or contestant. And then they had the
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psychological battle, not just a physically surviving, but of
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mentally trying to remain until they heard they were the last
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one standing. One guy that won season 8 was
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named Clay Hayes. And they all would publish their
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list of 10 things. I think we have there his list
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that he put on that you can find online that these are the 10
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things that he personally selected to help him survive and
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be the last one standing on Season 8 of Alone Y'all, when we
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turn to Psalm chapter 5, it's not that we are hopefully we are
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not involuntarily fighting for physical survival on a daily
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basis. I mean, we might find ourselves.
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It's pretty unlikely you're going to get in the mouth of a
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hippo at the bottom of the lake off the Ivory Coast, but you
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might, you might all right, every now and then that might
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happen. You might, I might listen to
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your story on noise your network one day.
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All right, But hopefully on all things normal, we're not
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fighting for our physical survival, but all things being
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normal, we are fighting for our spiritual survival.
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Now when I say that don't, don't be confused.
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I'm not talking about we could spiritually die after Jesus has
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made us alive. That's not what I'm saying.
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Now I'm not saying that we could lose our salvation if we've been
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truly born again. That's not what I'm saying.
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But what I am saying is that the enemy wants to take us out
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spiritually. He wants to render us
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ineffective. He wants to render us
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inoperable. He wants us to be essentially as
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if we were not alive and existing all right.
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He doesn't want us growing and walking with Christ.
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He wants us to not quote spiritually survive.
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Well, I think when we turn to Psalm chapter 5, you can think
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of this Psalm as giving us a list of five survival actions,
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spiritual survival actions that King David gives us by his
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instruction that we learned from him that any and every believer
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you and I need to know and implement if we're going to
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spiritually survive. And so as we read this, I'll
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walk us through these one at a time.
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Let's take just the first 3 verses of Psalm 5.
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To begin with. David writes, give ear to my
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words, O Lord, and consider my groaning.
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Give attention to the sound of my cry, my King and my God, for
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to you do I pray, O Lord, in the morning you hear my voice.
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In the morning I prepare a sacrifice for you and watch.
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The first survival tactic that we learn, spiritual survival
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action, we learn from David and the Psalm, is to maintain a
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morning watch. To maintain a morning watch.
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Now, anytime someone is in a survival situation or let's just
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say a dangerous situation where there are threats around them
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and if they have enough bodies and eyes to do this, someone
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always stands watch, right? So someone can be not paying
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attention while others are paying attention to be aware of
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any kind of threat. Maybe they stay awake while
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others sleep or maybe they watch they out, you know that
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outskirts of the city, while those inside the city can't see
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what's coming. And just think about what King
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David and others like him living in an ancient city would have
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experienced, right? There'd been no radar to
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monitor, no radio to check, no text message to see or receive,
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all right, no news to turn on, all right.
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Somebody had to be on the wall in the towers, keeping watch,
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looking at the horizon, noticing it was friendly or unfriendly,
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seeing who was coming through the gate.
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David says here in verse 3, In the morning, I prepare a
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sacrifice for you and watch. This is not a physical watch for
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danger. This is a spiritual watch for
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his good, looking to God, watching God, waiting for
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anything and everything good that God might have in store for
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him. David says in the morning, I
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prepare my sacrifice and I then stand watch.
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Now if you go back to verse one, you're going to see how David
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begins this morning. Watch, notice the description.
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He says this. He's talking to God.
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Listen to how he talks to God. Give ear to my words.
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Consider my groaning. Give attention to the sound of
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my cry, My king and my God. You can't miss David's boldness
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right here, right? I mean, God three times.
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He's talking to God in the imperative like he's
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instructing, he's telling God, he's boldly asking God.
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I don't know if this is how you pray, but I love the Psalms
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because David makes me uncomfortable sometimes with the
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way he talks to God, which helps give me comfort to talk to God
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in a way that I know I should be boldly.
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David's not talking down to God. David's talking up to God with
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such boldness because of his faith in the bigness and
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greatness and goodness of God. He knows he can call and talk to
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God this way because of who God is.
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So y'all, do you talk to God with such boldness?
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Does the way David talked to God sound like the way you talk to
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God? I think David's instructing us
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to use a boldness with God, to cry out to God, to talk up to
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God, if you will, with such faith that we could talk with
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God too with the same kind of boldness.
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Then we learned not only from David's boldness, y'all, but we
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learned from the three different elements of prayer, of his
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prayer he mentions here in the text.
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Notice he says three things. He says words.
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He says give attention to my words.
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He says groans. He says give an ear, listen to
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my groaning, pay attention. And he says, God hear my cries.
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We hear him using words. Y'all words are the most basic
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thing that facilitate communication, right?
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I mean, most of the time when we think about prayer, we're going
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to think about talking to God using words, which is all right,
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But then he doesn't stop there. What does he do?
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He goes next to groans. What are groans?
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Groaning is what you do when you're trying to communicate,
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but the pain is too great to put into, and all you can do is
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groan before God. But he says, God, I know you
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hear that even when it's wordless, and all I can do is
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groan before you in pain. Then he says, God, don't just
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hear my words or listen to my groaning.
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Give attention to my what? My cries.
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Wow. What do we cry when there are
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times when mere conversation is insufficient to communicate our
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desperation? He says listen to when I'm just
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speaking words, God, listen to when I'm groaning before you in
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pain. And God, would you hear when I'm
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pouring my heart and my tears out and cries before you.
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Praise God, we see here and are instructed our prayer lives are
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to be much bigger than casual conversation of mere words with
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God. Aren't you glad God hears you
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and doesn't just hear you when you start off as if everything's
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great and grand? Our Father who art in heaven.
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Listen, by the way, if that's the way you start your prayer
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every day, just nice polite conversation with God, you're
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probably not praying the way God wants you to pray.
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You're probably not groaning before Him.
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You're probably not taking your pain to Him when it's too deep
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for words. When you cry, do you ever cry
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out before Him? Do you ever shed your tears in
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His presence as part of your prayer life?
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Or is it always nice, polite, casual conversation?
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David's prayer life was much bigger, deeper, and wider than
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just mere words. Ours ought to be as well.
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David then also, is praying in the morning, right?
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Christians have noticed by scriptural instruction, by
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experience and practice, that there are at least two times
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every day that a believer ought to give God their undivided
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attention. I'm not talking about the fact
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this is the only time we pray, but I am talking about the fact
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that believers have typically noticed by the Scripture and by
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practice and what works to walk with God effectively.
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There's at least two times a day God needs your undivided
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attention when you're doing something toward him, when
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you're not doing anything else. And they're two times of the
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day. One is in the morning when God
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should get your undivided attention for at least some span
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of time. And the other time is at the end
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of the day in the evening, when God again should get some of
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your undivided attention again, or you hit hits that pillow and
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you close your eyes. Of those two times, though,
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Christians and even Scripture seems by pattern to indicate
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that one is even better than the other if you're going to choose
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one. In fact, some have said one hour
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with God in the morning is better than two with him in the
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evening. But that's an interesting
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statement. Why is that the case?
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Well, if to put it in the words of another, the morning is the
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key of the day. It's that time that unlocks the
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rest of the day. Another way to put it would be
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to ask yourself, if you plan to live the day for God, how can
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you do so if you don't start the day with God?
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Like, I know that I don't live the day for God.
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If Kyle doesn't start the day with God, I'll just be honest
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Now, some of you, you're like Pastor Kyle, I'm not a morning
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person. I get that all right, I get
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that. But I'm I'm still saying that
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there's got to be a way that we begin today somehow giving our
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time and undivided attention to God.
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If you hope to truly live that day to the fullest for God.
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David says again in the morning, I prepare a sacrifice for you.
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That's Old Testament language when animals were involved.
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But in the New Testament, praise God, God doesn't say you got to
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show up with your animal anymore because the final full ultimate
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sacrifice through Jesus his own body life given on the cross has
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been given. So Romans 12 verse one puts it
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like this. Therefore, I beseech you,
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brothers, in view of the mercies of God, to offer yourselves as a
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what living sacrifice, holy and acceptable unto God, which is
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your spiritual act of worship. Because Jesus is the final full
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sacrifice. Now we can come before him every
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day. And he asked us to lay down our
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lives, all of our wants, all of our dreams, all of our time,
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talent and treasure, all of our energy, all of our ambitions,
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and say, Jesus, today, here I am again today, not my will, but
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thy will. I want to be a living sacrifice
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for you. This is what David is doing even
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in the Old Testament, and this is the way God calls us to start
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each day. David not only prays though
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y'all, he does what he watches. What does he mean by that?
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This is a morning watch. It's not just a morning prayer.
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It's a morning watching, praying and watching.
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What I mean by that, David doesn't just pray with his eyes
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closed. I don't even know if he prayed
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with his eyes closed or not. But here's what I do know.
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The eyes of his heart. We're open gazing on God,
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waiting on God not just to hear, but to what to answer, waiting
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and watching what was watching again, waiting on anything and
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everything good God might have in store for him that day, to
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share with him that day, to lead him in that day, to provide him
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that day. It's like this.
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David says, God, now that I put my request before you, I got
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faith enough to know you're going to do something about it.
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I'm going to watch. It's been said, we pray like a
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ostrich. You know how an ostrich acts, a
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Mama ostrich. She well, head in the ground
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kinda. Well, I'm going, it's a little
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different. She lays her eggs and she does
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what? She leaves them never to watch
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what happens. Now, I'm not blaming God for
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that. He made her that way.
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That's all good. I'm just saying that's not all
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the way we ought to pray. How often do we lay our prayers
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and leave them with no faith, no expectation, no watching to see
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what God's going to do? How often do we begin the day,
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and we've started it without any weightful expectation on God for
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anything good that he might want to provide us before we embark
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upon the How often do we not maintain a morning watch and hit
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the day like an ostrich? David says I'm going to maintain
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a morning watch on God. God ought to be the first
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person, first thing you put your eyes on and you speak to every
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day with your undivided attention as a living sacrifice.
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Maintain. This is a spiritual survival
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tactic. If you don't do this, you should
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not expect to thrive spiritually.
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You've got to do this as a believer #1 listen to verse 4
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through 6. For you are not a God who
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delights in wickedness. Evil may not dwell with you.
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The boastful shall not stand before your eyes.
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You hate all evil doers. You destroy those who speak
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lies, the Lord of horrors, the bloodthirsty and deceitful man.
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The second thing we've got to do to spiritually survive and
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thrive is to stay sensitive to God's disdain for sin.
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To stay sensitive to God's disdain for sin, we tend y'all
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to have a nice neat box we put God into, don't we?
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You know, with a nice theological framework where God
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stays right here, never gets out of that.
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Just like a nice folded cardboard box.
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And God, all I know and understand, He all fits right
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there. I understand it all.
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I get it. All part of what Psalm 5 says
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does not fit in our God box, if we're being honest.
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What do you mean? Well, just follow along a little
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closer this time. You ready?
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For you are not a God who delights in wickedness.
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Now we track with this right God.
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You're a God we understand that takes absolutely no delight and
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no pleasure in sin. We get that God is holy, holy,
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holy. Evil may not dwell with you.
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God and sin don't cohabitate. Sin is not under the roof of
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God's house. You're not going to find it
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there. It's not in his bedroom.
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It's not on his night stand. It's not on his computer, it's
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not on his phone, it's not on his tongue.
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It's not before his eyes. God and sin do not cohabitate.
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We get that again, don't we? We, we track with that God is
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holy, holy, holy. The boastful shall not stand
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before your eyes. God, we get that you oppose the
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proud that you give grace to the God is going to cut the knees
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out of the prideful one day when their knee bowels and their
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tongue confesses that Jesus is is Lord.
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We get that what David says next is a little harder for us in our
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box. Buckle your seat belt.
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Here's what he says. You hate all evil doers.
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You destroy those who speak lies.
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The Lord of horrors, the bloodthirsty and deceitful man.
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You ever tried to shove more in a cardboard box and you can fold
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in that like overlapping way where it stays shut?
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You ever tried to zip more in a suitcase then the zipper wanted
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to zip? This is where in our spiritual
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suitcase we might find ourselves shoving something in that just
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doesn't seem to to fit right. I mean, what do we what do we
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say to this right? And in case we think this is
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just a one off random biblical statement, I could point you to
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others. I'll name 1 Psalm 11 verse 5
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just a few Psalms down the road. It says this David writes it
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like this. The Lord test the righteous, but
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his soul hates the wicked and the one who loves violence.
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What do we make of that? Where does that fit in our God
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box? You know what we say right?
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Hate the sin, but love the and that's exactly right for us.
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This is that's exactly way God has called us as his children to
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respond, hating sin, having this disdain for sin, but even loving
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our enemies and anyone and everyone else in between.
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Right. But then you got to ask yourself
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the question when you read this Psalm, what about God?
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What about God? Does he operate the exact same
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way? I'm going to borrow the words of
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another just because I want to be very clear.
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I just want you to listen closely to this.
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I think this, I hope, will bring some clarity on a part of the
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word of God that we can't dodge because there it is.
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OK. The Bible, which tells us that
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God is love, also tells us that God hates.
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The very perfection of God expresses itself in love, and
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the gift of His own Son on behalf of guilty sinners also
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expresses itself in holy hatred against the workers of iniquity
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in judgment. From the beginning of Genesis to
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the end of the Revelation, the hatred of God against sin is
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given equal prominence with the love of God for repentant
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sinners. Yes, God loves the Sinner, for
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God so loved the that He gave His one and only, that whosoever
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should believe in him should not perish, but have everlasting
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life. And yet, for those sinners who
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refuse to repent of their sin and refuse the offer of His love
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and continue in their sin and unbelief to the grave, they
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become objects of the hatred of Almighty God.
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Believe it or not, God's hatred actually empowers our love.
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Here's what I mean. Knowing God is holy and is going
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to have the right and righteous response against the unrighteous
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who refuse His love allows us to stand and love others no matter
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what. Our job not being to show
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anything but love even in the most difficult of situations and
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in the face of the greatest evil, loving in return if
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personally done wrong, knowing God and all vindication and all
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judgement and all wrath that is righteous and one day will
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reverse all wrong to be made right God will handle and we
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don't have to. So our job is to hate sin but
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love the and we leave the remaining part should it come to
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it, after refusing God's love to God.
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The thing I want to remind you of here, brothers and sisters in
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Christ, is that these verses remind us to stay sensitive to
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God's disdain for sin. If God doesn't take sin lightly,
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neither should we. If God doesn't let sin dwell
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with him, neither should. If God sees the severity of sin,
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so should wait. Do you follow me?
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If you're going to survive spiritually, you've got to
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remain sensitive to God's disdain for sin.
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You got to remember to run from it, to flee temptation, to
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resist it, to remember that God's not allowing you to be
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tempted any more than what is common to man.
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And God will always provide. What a way of escape.
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The greater is he who is in you than he was in the world.
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By the power of the Holy Spirit you can say no.
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Staying sensitive to God, sustained for sin.
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Listen to verse 7:00 and 8:00. But I, through the abundance of
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your steadfast love, will enter your house.
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I will bow down towards your holy temple in the fear of you.
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Lead me, O Lord, in your righteousness because of my
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enemies, and make your way straight before me.
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Survival tactic #3 Daily worship and walk with God.
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Daily worship and walk with God. You see, unlike evil and
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wickedness in the the wicked and the unrighteous and the boastful
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that cannot enter the presence of God, David confidently and
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boldly says here, I'm going to enter God.
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I'm going to enter your house. That's a bold statement right
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there. By the way.
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I want you to turn to your neighbor and says today I'm
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going to enter your house. Turn to your neighbor, look at
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him and say today I'm going to enter.
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Actually don't do it. Just stop where you are.
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They're not going to react well to that.
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If you tell me today, Kyle, I'm going to enter your house about
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1:30, I'm going to say, no, you're not.
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I'm going to be asleep taking a nap.
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Don't come to my house. All right, we don't talk to each
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other like that. You don't just tell me when
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you're going to show up, and I don't just tell you when I'm
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going to show up. All right?
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Now, there's times we have exceptions to that, but that's
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not how we talk to each other. I'm not going to boldly claim to
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cross your threshold uninvited. So why in the world is David?
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Because he's been invited. Notice he says here through the
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abundance of your steadfast love, David's not barging in,
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David's not entering in his own righteousness or his own
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goodness or his own merit. He's coming at the righteous
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loving invitation of God. He knows God loves him and he
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loves God says God, I'm not going to neglect your
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invitation. I'm not going to not text back.
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I'm not going to not return your phone call.
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God, I'm coming RSVP me, I'm coming to worship.
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And he says here when he's in the presence of God, he says,
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lead me in your way. Lead me in your way.
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This is so key for our spiritual survival every day.
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Can I just kind of stop here and say, if you don't somehow,
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someway ask God to lead you in his way every day, You ought to.
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You ought to, because if not, you're making the assumption
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that you're going to walk in God's way without his help.
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And that's a dangerous assumption.
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David cries out, God, lead me in your way.
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The deal is, David has set aside some time to worship God, and
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while he's worshiping God in the presence of God, he's asking for
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the guidance of God. That's where we ask God for his
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guidance is when we're in his presence worshiping him.
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David knows that duty is going to call, right?
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David's got to get up and go be king.
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David's got to get up and go to school students.
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David's got to get up and go go to work adults.
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David's got to get up and go be a husband and a father.
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David's got to go get up and go slay his enemies.
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David's got to go do it, get up and go do life before he gets up
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and does life. He sat in the presence of God
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and asked for God to lead him according to not his way, but
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God's way. And why is that?
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Because you know what? There's opposition in our lives
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to walking in the ways of God the way David opposes, the way
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David names his opposition. He said, God, I've got enemies
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because of my enemies. Lead me in your way.
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Now we sometimes have enemies the way David has enemies, but
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maybe not quite the exact same. But we've got enemies like our
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sin nature. We've got enemies like
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temptation, like the world that we live in.
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We've got enemies like people who might oppose us or stand in
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the way, or make life hard for us, especially living life for
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the glory of God. We've all got things in our way
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that oppose us, and we ought to ask in light, just like David,
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God, in light of the things that make living for you hard.
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Lead me please, in your way. Let me do life in a way that
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would honor you. This too we must ask, are you
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starting your days in worship before God and asking God to
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lead you in his ways? Listen to verse 9 and 10.
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For there is no truth in their mouth.
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Their inmost self is destruction.
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Their throat isn't open grade. They flatter with their tongue.
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Make them bear their guilt. Oh God let them fall by their
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own counsels because of the abundance of their
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transgressions. Cast them out for they have
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rebelled against you. 4th survival tactic is give God your
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problems. Give God your problems.
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What's happening here is David is being incredibly detailed and
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specific about his primary problem, which was enemy, which
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were enemies standing against him.
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Now, partly you might read what David writes here about his
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enemies and the way he's talking to God about them.
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And you're like, wow, that's pretty bold.
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That's pretty graphic. David, you're pretty, you're
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being pretty, you know, pretty forthright about what you're
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asking God to do about these people.
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Like, can I talk to God about my enemies the way David talks to
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God about his enemies? Sometimes we might ask that
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question. The answer is honestly, not to
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oversimplify, but the answer is yes.
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The the problem is we tend in our anger and frustration in
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response to talk to other people about problem people and not to
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God about our problems or problem people.
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And even worse, what we then do is not only talk to other
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people, but we try to take our problems and problem people into
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our own hands and we make it even bigger, an even bigger
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mess, rather than giving those problems, giving those people to
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God, no matter what type of problem they may be, a human
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being or something else or a situation or an obstacle.
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We're learning here, David's instructing us here to give our
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problems to God. And when they're people, not to
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retaliate, not to attack, not to seek vengeance on our own or
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repay evil for evil, not to hate or withhold forgiveness, but to
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turn to God and give him our problems.
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This is an incredibly, incredibly critical survival
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tactic. There's a lie that is in
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churches and in our culture that goes something like this.
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God will never give you more than you can.
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You heard that? That's a lie.
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That's a lie. God's in the business of giving
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you more than you can handle. In fact, that's just how he
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rolls. I mean, like, think about Paul
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when Paul had a thorn in the flesh.
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So he speaks of and he cries out to God.
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God, would you remove it from me?
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Go. What does God say?
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Hey, Paul, you got this man. I'll never give you more than
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you can't handle. What does God say?
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My grace is sufficient for Paul. You're not sufficient for Paul,
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but I'm sufficient for Paul. When Paul got stoned and got
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back up alive and walked right back to the people who threw
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rocks at him to preach the gospel to him again, is that
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because Paul can handle being stoned without a trip to the ER?
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I mean, just just just think about it, right?
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Just be logical. Did Paul handle that himself or
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did God on his behalf miraculously handle that when he
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was shipwrecked and flogged and put in prison and beaten with
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rods and on and on it went. Paul was constantly following
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God's way and was out of his league.
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God wants you to walk out of your league every day.
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God wants you to walk by His, by confidence in Him and things
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beyond you every day. But if you're not in the habit
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of giving your problems to God, you're not going to spiritually
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thrive. In fact, what you'll do is
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instead of giving God your problems, you'll give God the
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blame. You'll give.
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You'll be angry at God. You'll get bitter, insecure,
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weaken your faith rather than saying God, I can't fix this, I
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can't do this. I can't walk through this on my
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own. But God, you've put it in my
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path and I believe your grace is sufficient.
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So I'm going to trust you. You've got I've got we've got to
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learn to give our problems to God.
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It's a spiritual survival necessity.
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Verses 1112 But let all who take refuge and you rejoice.
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Let them ever sing for joy and and spread your protection over
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them, that those who love your name may exalt in you for you.
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Bless the righteous, O Lord, you cover him with favor as with the
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Shields spiritual survival tactic #5 is remember God's
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favor for the righteous. What I mean by the righteous
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there is I'm not talking about a certain class of super Christian
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who everybody thinks right has got it all figured out.
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The righteous or the people that have trusted in the
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righteousness of Christ and been made alive, when they realized
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they in their sin were separated from God and they realized that
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by the love of God, He sent the Son of God to live a sinless
29:59
life for them. And they, realizing the sinless
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Savior died on the cross to pay for their sin, called out on
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Christ to save them, making a decision by faith to trust Jesus
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and to receive His righteousness.
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Now they're clothed in that righteousness.
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The Bible calls you as a Christian a St. not because
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you're perfect, but because a perfect Savior has washed your
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sin with His blood, and the Father sees you as righteous in
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His sight. That's what the righteous,
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that's who the righteous are. Is that you?
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Not a perfect person, but a saved person.
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Shields of old were typically made large enough to almost
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cover from head to toe. David would have the righteous
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know that the favor of God is like such a shield for the body
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and soul and the life and the living for the believer in him
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that that favor of God surrounds us.
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In fact, Psalm 30 verse 5 says God's favor last A you know, all
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kind of people want to sell you something with a lifetime
30:59
guarantee. Most of the time it ain't true.
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God's favor, last day, lifetime. Never forget.
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God loves, God defends God protects his own.
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Christ, even now as I speak, is at the right hand of the Father,
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advocating and defending for you if you belong to him.
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Even when you sin and you stumble and the devil wants to
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accuse you to the Father Jesus claims you as when covered by
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his blood, God defends his own. Remember God's favor for the
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righteous. Remember God's favor for you.
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Now you say Pastor Kyle, those 5 survival things sound wonderful
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man. Kyle I would.
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I'd really love to start today, but I don't feel like I can
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because Pastor Kyle, if I was being honest, I feel like I'm
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that missionary kid, John Ritchie, in the mouth of a hippo
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at the bottom of a lake in West Africa being held.
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I feel like sin has tipped my boat over.
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I'm in the jaws of what seems like death, or at least to
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living for the glory of God anymore that God could use me or
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that I would have hope or that I would sense that I was in the
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will of God, living for the ways of God and spiritually thriving.
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Kyle I feel a long way from that.
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I got to get to the surface where I can do anything to
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survive and put into practice anything you've preached.
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If that's you, I want to tell you a little story, guys, if you
32:38
get the Better Man emails. This was included in Chris
32:41
Harper's week in Review. It was about a man that I've
32:44
heard about personally, but I learned some new things about
32:46
him. It's a man by the name of Robert
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Robinson. He was a Baptist pastor in
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London, not in London, but in Cambridge for about 30 years in
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the 1700s. This is a long time ago, all
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right, but the backup Robert story begins unusual.
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He He lost his father when he was only a teenager.
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His mother, because he was so hard to handle, sent him off to
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live with relatives in London. And when in London in the big
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city, he soon joined a street gang and they were doing all
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sorts of wicked and ungodly things together.
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In fact, one day they had a plan to show up at a meeting where
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the famous revival and evangelist George Whitfield was
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planning to preach. If you know George Whitfield, he
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traversed the Atlantic back and forth, preaching in multiple
33:34
places around the world. Thousands were led to Christ
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through his preaching. The Great Awakenings were
33:39
associated with George Whitfield and others and so Robert
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Robinson and his buddies are going to show up and Heckle this
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preacher and disrupt the crowd and cause a riot and break up
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the preaching of George Whitfield.
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Only problem was the Holy Spirit did something Robert Robinson
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didn't see coming and Robert Robinson heard the gospel and
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got got saved. I love you just I mean look at
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God right At 22 years of age, Robert Robinson writes the words
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of the hymn. Come thou fount 22 years old.
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Come thou fount of every blessing tune my heart to sing
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thy grace. Streams of mercy never ceasing
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call for songs of loudest praise.
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He was 22. But then Robert strayed from the
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Lord. He fell into some sin that
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entangled him deeply. His boat flipped over, found
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himself entangled, pulled to the bottom by temptation and
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seemingly held there and really giving up all hope that God
34:48
would continue to use him or have hope for his life.
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So one day Robert gets in a carriage to take a ride to
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somewhere he had to go. He was downtrodden, he was
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depressed. He says he was at the bottom of
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the barrel and there was an older lady in that carriage that
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he sat by and at first she was just humming and then she
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started to softly sing the words to a hymn he had written many
35:13
years ago. Come thou fount.
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He was so physically disturbed and moved that the older lady
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looked at him and said, young man, are you are you OK?
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He said, no ma'am, I'm not. He said, in fact, Madam, I'm the
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poor unhappy man who wrote that hymn many years ago, and I would
35:39
give 1000 worlds if I had them to enjoy the feelings I had.
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Then the lady looked at Robert Robinson when he felt like he
35:50
was at the bottom of the lake and tangled in sin and put her
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hand on his knee and said, Robert, the streams of mercy are
35:57
still flowing. And Robert Robinson in that
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instant made a decision to run to God and repent and say, God,
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if you've saved me from my sin, you can rescue me from this.
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And he went on to faithfully preach and pastor for the rest
36:18
of his life. What's fascinating to me, if you
36:21
listen to stories of survival, you'll hear this certain theme
36:25
over and over again. John Ritchie puts it this way.
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He says when that hippo clamped onto me and drugged me to the
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bottom of the lake and held me there, at first I just basically
36:36
embraced it. My body.
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I just went limp. I didn't try to even fight.
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I knew death was imminent. I might as well not even resist.
36:45
Basically, he gave up. This is what happens to a lot of
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people when all of a sudden something overwhelms them and
36:50
they seem it so. It seems so strong and so
36:51
powerful, they can do nothing about it.
36:53
But almost always, those that survive say that in that moment,
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there's this switch that flips and all of a sudden their drive
37:00
to survive kicks in and it's almost like a fire is emblazoned
37:05
in them and they're going to do everything within their power to
37:08
fight, to live. In fact, for John Ritchie, I
37:11
meant kicking that hippo in the mouth and pushing off the nose
37:16
of it for the surface once his foot was free from its jaws,
37:21
fighting for his life. You know, you may be what you
37:24
feel like is it's no hope. It's at the end.
37:26
You're entangled in sin. You've been down the road so
37:28
far, so long, you feel like God's forgotten about you.
37:30
You may be saved, but just on without hope that God could ever
37:33
use you or work through you again.
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And maybe what God's waiting for you is to see if just by faith
37:39
you're willing to just flip that switch and say, you know what,
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God, if you've saved me from my sin, you can pick me up when
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I've stumbled and fell, even to the depths that I've fallen.
37:50
If I trusted you, then why can't I trust you now?
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That's what Robert Robinson did. God used him mightily the rest
37:57
of his life. I don't know how you need to
38:00
respond. John and Praise team are about
38:02
to come out. I don't know if one of these
38:03
practices or more need to be implemented in your daily
38:06
routine. Maybe you just want to come and
38:09
ask God. God give me help to do these
38:11
things, to put these. These are not the only spiritual
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survival practices, but they are five key ones.
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Maybe they say, Kyle, I can't do those until I trust Christ as my
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Lord and Savior need you to come talk to me and slip out from
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where you are and say I need to trust Jesus today.
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I need to be saved. I'd love to talk to you or maybe
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maybe you just want to come and kneel at this altar and just let
38:35
that switch flip to say, you know what?
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I've just been passively sitting and where I've been living.
38:42
I know God saved me, but I've been acting like I don't have
38:45
any hope and I'm just going to trust God today.
38:48
I want to repent of where I am. I'm going to place my faith in
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Him to pick me up and to use me in ways that I thought maybe
38:54
we're too late. I'd love to pray with you.
38:57
This altar is open. Our encouragers will be close.
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I'm going to pray. Then we're going to stand and
39:00
respond. Heavenly Father, I want to, and
39:02
I pray right now that You would help each one of us hear from
39:06
You. God, I pray, Lord, that You
39:08
would allow our hearts to know that it's not.
39:13
It's not ever, as long as there's breath in our lungs.
39:17
Too late to say yes to Jesus and let You pick us up by Your
39:21
power, set us and our feet on the rock and trust You to walk
39:27
in the ways Your Word has instructed us for our good and
39:30
Your glory. God make adjustments in our
39:33
lives to let it be and use us, Father, not just to survive, but
39:38
to thrive and make an impact for the Kingdom of God.
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We pray in Jesus name, Amen. Would you stand with me?
39:45
We're going to sing. We're going to wait for you.
39:47
You come, pray, you respond as the Lord leads you this morning.