Into His Hand
Scripture Reading: Psalm 31
1 In You, O LORD, I put my trust;
Let me never be ashamed;
Deliver me in Your righteousness.
2 Bow down Your ear to me,
Deliver me speedily;
Be my rock of refuge,
A fortress of defense to save me.
3 For You are my rock and my fortress;
Therefore, for Your name’s sake,
Lead me and guide me.
4 Pull me out of the net which they have secretly laid for me,
For You are my strength.
5 Into Your hand I commit my spirit;
You have redeemed me, O LORD God of truth.
6 I have hated those who regard useless idols;
But I trust in the LORD.
7 I will be glad and rejoice in Your mercy,
For You have considered my trouble;
You have known my soul in adversities,
8 And have not shut me up into the hand of the enemy;
You have set my feet in a wide place.
9 Have mercy on me, O LORD, for I am in trouble;
My eye wastes away with grief,
Yes, my soul and my body!
10 For my life is spent with grief,
And my years with sighing;
My strength fails because of my iniquity,
And my bones waste away.
11 I am a reproach among all my enemies,
But especially among my neighbors,
And am repulsive to my acquaintances;
Those who see me outside flee from me.
12 I am forgotten like a dead man, out of mind;
I am like a broken vessel.
13 For I hear the slander of many;
Fear is on every side;
While they take counsel together against me,
They scheme to take away my life.
14 But as for me, I trust in You, O LORD;
I say, “You are my God.”
15 My times are in Your hand;
Deliver me from the hand of my enemies,
And from those who persecute me.
16 Make Your face shine upon Your servant;
Save me for Your mercies’ sake.
17 Do not let me be ashamed, O LORD, for I have called upon You;
Let the wicked be ashamed;
Let them be silent in the grave.
18 Let the lying lips be put to silence,
Which speak insolent things proudly and contemptuously against the righteous.
19 Oh, how great is Your goodness,
Which You have laid up for those who fear You,
Which You have prepared for those who trust in You
In the presence of the sons of men!
20 You shall hide them in the secret place of Your presence
From the plots of man;
You shall keep them secretly in a pavilion
From the strife of tongues.
21 Blessed be the LORD,
For He has shown me His marvelous kindness in a strong city!
22 For I said in my haste,
“I am cut off from before Your eyes”;
Nevertheless You heard the voice of my supplications
When I cried out to You.
23 Oh, love the LORD, all you His saints!
For the LORD preserves the faithful,
And fully repays the proud person.
24 Be of good courage,
And He shall strengthen your heart,
All you who hope in the LORD.
Today we're going to be finishing up our series of lessons on the words Messiah gave
us from the cross. This is the sixth in the series that was initially going to be seven
weeks but God had a different plan. I came in for Sabbath service this week and
found that He'd led my mother had done number six for me. It was called 'Finishing'
and you guessed it, one of it's feature scriptures was Yeshua's words from the cross -
"It is finished". Ironically, I had been thinking about doing the sixth and the seventh
saying in the same week, so this kind of took care of that decision for me. If you
missed being here, it will be available online by Tuesday and the audio should be
available in about a week or so. It actually worked out very well since God has
already given me some direction for our next series of lessons. You'll find out about
that next. So, let's get into this lesson.
Our scripture reading is the entire 31st psalm. I couldn't pull out any verses; I had to
use the whole chapter because it was like every verse was absolutely necessary for
you to hear. The writer gets right to the may point that I want to focus on. "In you, O
LORD, I put my trust in You." That's the message of the whole psalm. But the thing
that seems clear is that the author's life doesn't automatically get perfect because
Yahweh is his God. He speaks of his trouble, his adversity, his iniquity, his enemies,
his grief. Yet in the midst of all this, he keeps his trust in God. Not because his life is
perfect, but because his God is perfect. So many people come to the altar expecting
God to fix all the problems in their life. They come looking to get everything from Him
without giving anything of themselves. But that was never what was offered.
Matthew 7:24-27
24 “Therefore whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise
man who built his house on the rock: 25 and the rain descended, the floods came, and the
winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock.
26 “But everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish
man who built his house on the sand: 27 and the rain descended, the floods came, and the
winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell. And great was its fall.”
Jesus makes it abundantly clear that the rain and the floods and the wind are going to
come whether we are wise and listen, or if we are foolish and don't. God being God
does not change the nature of man. We spoke about that two weeks ago when we
discussed why there is so much pain and suffering in the world. It's not because God
is God; it is because man is man. Jeremiah 17:9 - “The heart is deceitful above all
things, And desperately wicked; Who can know it? You know that's hard to hear.
Our heart is wicked; our flesh is corrupt.
Last night I was listening to the radio and something caught me completely off guard.
Natalie Grant, a Christian recording artist, told the story about how she found out
about the reality of human trafficking. She was watching an episode of 'Law & Order'
where they were showing kids 10, 11, 12 years old being sold as slaves to perverts.
She was so appalled at what she saw but she couldn't imagine that it could really be
happening the way it was portrayed. So, she got on the internet and what she found
was that it was much, much worse than she could have even imagined. She says that
God gave her a divine appointment that night. She woke up the next morning and
contacted an organization devoted to rescuing children from this life of prostitution to
offer her support. A few months later, she and her husband went to India to see the
face of human trafficking up close. What she saw there in the red light district blew
her mind. There were people, children, in cages, in full view of those walking up and
down the streets. She says she looked up to one of the balconies and locked eyes
with a little girl, maybe 6 or 7 years old, locked in one of these cages.
It was at this point that I lost it. Really lost it. I mean, my six year old was sitting just a
few inches away in the back seat. She touched my arm though I don't think she could
really hear me as I wept for this little unknown child that just happens to be one of the
more than 600,000 people bought and sold each year. I started talking to God but it
wasn't about what many would have been talking to Him about. I didn't ask Him why,
because I absolutely know why. Because the pervert heart of man is a slave to the
desires of his flesh. No, there was no need to ask why someone would do that to
another human being. What I wanted to know was how He could stand the hurt. I
knew that the reason I was cry wasn't that this thing had just started happening.
Quite obviously, in my lifetime there would have been millions of people bought and
sold. No, it was because I had just found out about it. But this is what I realized in the
car last night. God already knew, because He knows everything. If my heart felt like it
was breaking inside because I had heard of this one thing, how must my Lord grieve
to know everything? All the evil things; every wicked thought or act devised by the
heart of man.
We know that Jesus showed emotions. He got angry in the temple that they were
making His Father's house a den of thieves. He wept at the tomb of Lazarus,
agonized in the garden of Gethsemane. I had always thought that the agony Yeshua
went through in that garden was because He knew the harsh way in which He would
die, but after the glimpse He revealed of Himself last night I think there was a lot more
than that.
Luke 22:41-44
41 And He was withdrawn from them about a stone’s throw, and He knelt down and prayed, 42
saying, “Father, if it is Your will, take this cup away from Me; nevertheless not My will, but
Yours, be done.” 43 Then an angel appeared to Him from heaven, strengthening Him. 44 And
being in agony, He prayed more earnestly. Then His sweat became like great drops of blood
falling down to the ground.
You see, Yeshua did not agonize until the angel came to strengthen Him. I always
wondered what that meant that the angel 'strengthened' Him. Did He get a spiritual
Red Bull or something? And looking at the passage again, why would He agonize and
sweat drops of blood after the angel came? Then I thought about that little girl from
Natalie Grant's story and how I felt after I found out about her. I believe the
strengthening was by showing Him a glimpse of all of us. All those whose souls would
be saved by this selfless cup that He must drink. If you've ever seen the movie
'Independence Day', there's a scene near the end where Randy Quaid's character
has to do something really selfless that will save many lives. Right before he does
what he has to do, he looks at a picture of his children then gets a look of resolve on
his face and does the thing that will take his life but save others. I believe it was like
that with Yeshua, times a billion. He saw us all and He agonized for us. We know that
there were things that only the Father knew so I think God, through this angels,
revealed us all to Him so He would have the strength to go through what He had to do.
How would any human have been able to bear the weight of knowing of all the evil
acts and desires within mankind? We have only gotten a taste of it. Think of what the
tree in the garden was called; the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Somehow
knowing about evil changes things. Just think about how you felt when I told you
about the little girl in the cage. Now, think about our heavenly Father and how He
must grieve knowing every victim but name.
Genesis 6:5-6
5 Then the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent
of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. 6 And the LORD was sorry that He had
made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart.
We have grieved God's heart, but He still loves us. As I drove the car talking with
Him about the grief in my heart and wondering about how much grief must be in His
heart, a question came to my mind. Why? Why does God contend with us? Then I
remember a time not to long ago when Kimberly had to have a very painful
procedure. I had to help hold her down but she was so strong that didn't work so the
dentist called her assistant who brought in this board where we had to bind her arms
and legs and head down to the board. I stood there and locked eyes with her and
just knew she must be wondering how her mommy could let this happen. Maybe even
wondering why I was doing this to her. But I knew that the procedure had to be done
and that as bad as it was, the alternative was worse. That must be how our Father
feels. I was wondering why He doesn't just end it. Yeshua can come back, and just
forget about all the prophecy so the world could just and all the pain and evil would
have to stop, right? Then I realized that if the world would end right now, then the
person that would have accepted Him and been saved five minutes from now, would
still be lost. How about those who have not yet been born that are destined for the
kingdom? God is allowing the world to continue for the sake of those destined for the
kingdom.
Ephesians 1:7-10
7 In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches
of His grace 8 which He made to abound toward us in all wisdom and prudence, 9 having made
known to us the mystery of His will, according to His good pleasure which He purposed in
Himself, 10 that in the dispensation of the fullness of the times He might gather together in one
all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on earth—in Him.
God knows the end before the beginning. He knows who will be the last one to come
into the kingdom and He will not close the door until that one has come in. All the
grief that is in His heart would stop if He just ended it but He won't because He knows
the names of those who have not yet come. He could have ended it all 2000 years
ago, or 500 years ago or 50 years ago, but He knew if He had, I wouldn't have been
included in that fullness. He love me so much that He endured thousands of years of
heartache, for me! Heartache much more magnified than anything I could even
imagine. How much He must love us! Jesus tells us that we should follow Him. Well,
the last words He gives us from the cross are these.
Luke 23:44-46
44 Now it was about the sixth hour, and there was darkness over all the earth until the ninth
hour. 45 Then the sun was darkened, and the veil of the temple was torn in two. 46 And when
Jesus had cried out with a loud voice, He said, “Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit.”
Having said this, He breathed His last.
In His darkest hour, He knew who had His back. He knew that God was in control. He
gave His all to God and trusted that God, in His infinite wisdom, knew what was best.
We must commit everything we are, everything we have to Him. For those of you that
know Kent Hovind, you may or may not know that he's in prison. He stood up for a
cause He believes in and received a ten year sentence late last year. It's not a cause
that I would fight for but that's not the issue. Anyway, there are many believers
praying that he and his wife be released, but since he's been in prison he has started
a ministry to the prisoners that is absolutely awesome. There are men that have
come to Christ that may never have done so if he had not gone to jail. It is not
important for us to understand each and every thing that happens to us. What is
important is that we completely trust God, no matter what. As the psalmist writes, love
the LORD you His saints. No matter what! We have to trust that His heart is to bring
in the fullness of the kingdom. Don't stress on the whys and hows of it all. Remember
that He is the Parent, not us. He knows what's best for us.
Since those who don't know Him are slaves to their sin, I imagine that He saw us all as
children locked in our cage of sin. He knew that He was the only One with the key.
We should not be surprised that He will take the fullness of time to make sure that
every possible cage will be opened. Isn't that what we would expect the hero in some
Hollywood movie to do? Why would we expect anything less than that from our
heavenly Hero? So when our heart gets broken by some evil thing we see, let us
remember that He who sees it all is grieving as well. But because He loves all of
those meant for the kingdom, He allows His own grief to be prolonged until the
fullness of us all comes in.
Sermon by: Denise Baxley
Date: April 29, 2007
Scripture Reading: Psalm 31
1 In You, O LORD, I put my trust;
Let me never be ashamed;
Deliver me in Your righteousness.
2 Bow down Your ear to me,
Deliver me speedily;
Be my rock of refuge,
A fortress of defense to save me.
3 For You are my rock and my fortress;
Therefore, for Your name’s sake,
Lead me and guide me.
4 Pull me out of the net which they have secretly laid for me,
For You are my strength.
5 Into Your hand I commit my spirit;
You have redeemed me, O LORD God of truth.
6 I have hated those who regard useless idols;
But I trust in the LORD.
7 I will be glad and rejoice in Your mercy,
For You have considered my trouble;
You have known my soul in adversities,
8 And have not shut me up into the hand of the enemy;
You have set my feet in a wide place.
9 Have mercy on me, O LORD, for I am in trouble;
My eye wastes away with grief,
Yes, my soul and my body!
10 For my life is spent with grief,
And my years with sighing;
My strength fails because of my iniquity,
And my bones waste away.
11 I am a reproach among all my enemies,
But especially among my neighbors,
And am repulsive to my acquaintances;
Those who see me outside flee from me.
12 I am forgotten like a dead man, out of mind;
I am like a broken vessel.
13 For I hear the slander of many;
Fear is on every side;
While they take counsel together against me,
They scheme to take away my life.
14 But as for me, I trust in You, O LORD;
I say, “You are my God.”
15 My times are in Your hand;
Deliver me from the hand of my enemies,
And from those who persecute me.
16 Make Your face shine upon Your servant;
Save me for Your mercies’ sake.
17 Do not let me be ashamed, O LORD, for I have called upon You;
Let the wicked be ashamed;
Let them be silent in the grave.
18 Let the lying lips be put to silence,
Which speak insolent things proudly and contemptuously against the righteous.
19 Oh, how great is Your goodness,
Which You have laid up for those who fear You,
Which You have prepared for those who trust in You
In the presence of the sons of men!
20 You shall hide them in the secret place of Your presence
From the plots of man;
You shall keep them secretly in a pavilion
From the strife of tongues.
21 Blessed be the LORD,
For He has shown me His marvelous kindness in a strong city!
22 For I said in my haste,
“I am cut off from before Your eyes”;
Nevertheless You heard the voice of my supplications
When I cried out to You.
23 Oh, love the LORD, all you His saints!
For the LORD preserves the faithful,
And fully repays the proud person.
24 Be of good courage,
And He shall strengthen your heart,
All you who hope in the LORD.
Today we're going to be finishing up our series of lessons on the words Messiah gave
us from the cross. This is the sixth in the series that was initially going to be seven
weeks but God had a different plan. I came in for Sabbath service this week and
found that He'd led my mother had done number six for me. It was called 'Finishing'
and you guessed it, one of it's feature scriptures was Yeshua's words from the cross -
"It is finished". Ironically, I had been thinking about doing the sixth and the seventh
saying in the same week, so this kind of took care of that decision for me. If you
missed being here, it will be available online by Tuesday and the audio should be
available in about a week or so. It actually worked out very well since God has
already given me some direction for our next series of lessons. You'll find out about
that next. So, let's get into this lesson.
Our scripture reading is the entire 31st psalm. I couldn't pull out any verses; I had to
use the whole chapter because it was like every verse was absolutely necessary for
you to hear. The writer gets right to the may point that I want to focus on. "In you, O
LORD, I put my trust in You." That's the message of the whole psalm. But the thing
that seems clear is that the author's life doesn't automatically get perfect because
Yahweh is his God. He speaks of his trouble, his adversity, his iniquity, his enemies,
his grief. Yet in the midst of all this, he keeps his trust in God. Not because his life is
perfect, but because his God is perfect. So many people come to the altar expecting
God to fix all the problems in their life. They come looking to get everything from Him
without giving anything of themselves. But that was never what was offered.
Matthew 7:24-27
24 “Therefore whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise
man who built his house on the rock: 25 and the rain descended, the floods came, and the
winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock.
26 “But everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish
man who built his house on the sand: 27 and the rain descended, the floods came, and the
winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell. And great was its fall.”
Jesus makes it abundantly clear that the rain and the floods and the wind are going to
come whether we are wise and listen, or if we are foolish and don't. God being God
does not change the nature of man. We spoke about that two weeks ago when we
discussed why there is so much pain and suffering in the world. It's not because God
is God; it is because man is man. Jeremiah 17:9 - “The heart is deceitful above all
things, And desperately wicked; Who can know it? You know that's hard to hear.
Our heart is wicked; our flesh is corrupt.
Last night I was listening to the radio and something caught me completely off guard.
Natalie Grant, a Christian recording artist, told the story about how she found out
about the reality of human trafficking. She was watching an episode of 'Law & Order'
where they were showing kids 10, 11, 12 years old being sold as slaves to perverts.
She was so appalled at what she saw but she couldn't imagine that it could really be
happening the way it was portrayed. So, she got on the internet and what she found
was that it was much, much worse than she could have even imagined. She says that
God gave her a divine appointment that night. She woke up the next morning and
contacted an organization devoted to rescuing children from this life of prostitution to
offer her support. A few months later, she and her husband went to India to see the
face of human trafficking up close. What she saw there in the red light district blew
her mind. There were people, children, in cages, in full view of those walking up and
down the streets. She says she looked up to one of the balconies and locked eyes
with a little girl, maybe 6 or 7 years old, locked in one of these cages.
It was at this point that I lost it. Really lost it. I mean, my six year old was sitting just a
few inches away in the back seat. She touched my arm though I don't think she could
really hear me as I wept for this little unknown child that just happens to be one of the
more than 600,000 people bought and sold each year. I started talking to God but it
wasn't about what many would have been talking to Him about. I didn't ask Him why,
because I absolutely know why. Because the pervert heart of man is a slave to the
desires of his flesh. No, there was no need to ask why someone would do that to
another human being. What I wanted to know was how He could stand the hurt. I
knew that the reason I was cry wasn't that this thing had just started happening.
Quite obviously, in my lifetime there would have been millions of people bought and
sold. No, it was because I had just found out about it. But this is what I realized in the
car last night. God already knew, because He knows everything. If my heart felt like it
was breaking inside because I had heard of this one thing, how must my Lord grieve
to know everything? All the evil things; every wicked thought or act devised by the
heart of man.
We know that Jesus showed emotions. He got angry in the temple that they were
making His Father's house a den of thieves. He wept at the tomb of Lazarus,
agonized in the garden of Gethsemane. I had always thought that the agony Yeshua
went through in that garden was because He knew the harsh way in which He would
die, but after the glimpse He revealed of Himself last night I think there was a lot more
than that.
Luke 22:41-44
41 And He was withdrawn from them about a stone’s throw, and He knelt down and prayed, 42
saying, “Father, if it is Your will, take this cup away from Me; nevertheless not My will, but
Yours, be done.” 43 Then an angel appeared to Him from heaven, strengthening Him. 44 And
being in agony, He prayed more earnestly. Then His sweat became like great drops of blood
falling down to the ground.
You see, Yeshua did not agonize until the angel came to strengthen Him. I always
wondered what that meant that the angel 'strengthened' Him. Did He get a spiritual
Red Bull or something? And looking at the passage again, why would He agonize and
sweat drops of blood after the angel came? Then I thought about that little girl from
Natalie Grant's story and how I felt after I found out about her. I believe the
strengthening was by showing Him a glimpse of all of us. All those whose souls would
be saved by this selfless cup that He must drink. If you've ever seen the movie
'Independence Day', there's a scene near the end where Randy Quaid's character
has to do something really selfless that will save many lives. Right before he does
what he has to do, he looks at a picture of his children then gets a look of resolve on
his face and does the thing that will take his life but save others. I believe it was like
that with Yeshua, times a billion. He saw us all and He agonized for us. We know that
there were things that only the Father knew so I think God, through this angels,
revealed us all to Him so He would have the strength to go through what He had to do.
How would any human have been able to bear the weight of knowing of all the evil
acts and desires within mankind? We have only gotten a taste of it. Think of what the
tree in the garden was called; the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Somehow
knowing about evil changes things. Just think about how you felt when I told you
about the little girl in the cage. Now, think about our heavenly Father and how He
must grieve knowing every victim but name.
Genesis 6:5-6
5 Then the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent
of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. 6 And the LORD was sorry that He had
made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart.
We have grieved God's heart, but He still loves us. As I drove the car talking with
Him about the grief in my heart and wondering about how much grief must be in His
heart, a question came to my mind. Why? Why does God contend with us? Then I
remember a time not to long ago when Kimberly had to have a very painful
procedure. I had to help hold her down but she was so strong that didn't work so the
dentist called her assistant who brought in this board where we had to bind her arms
and legs and head down to the board. I stood there and locked eyes with her and
just knew she must be wondering how her mommy could let this happen. Maybe even
wondering why I was doing this to her. But I knew that the procedure had to be done
and that as bad as it was, the alternative was worse. That must be how our Father
feels. I was wondering why He doesn't just end it. Yeshua can come back, and just
forget about all the prophecy so the world could just and all the pain and evil would
have to stop, right? Then I realized that if the world would end right now, then the
person that would have accepted Him and been saved five minutes from now, would
still be lost. How about those who have not yet been born that are destined for the
kingdom? God is allowing the world to continue for the sake of those destined for the
kingdom.
Ephesians 1:7-10
7 In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches
of His grace 8 which He made to abound toward us in all wisdom and prudence, 9 having made
known to us the mystery of His will, according to His good pleasure which He purposed in
Himself, 10 that in the dispensation of the fullness of the times He might gather together in one
all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on earth—in Him.
God knows the end before the beginning. He knows who will be the last one to come
into the kingdom and He will not close the door until that one has come in. All the
grief that is in His heart would stop if He just ended it but He won't because He knows
the names of those who have not yet come. He could have ended it all 2000 years
ago, or 500 years ago or 50 years ago, but He knew if He had, I wouldn't have been
included in that fullness. He love me so much that He endured thousands of years of
heartache, for me! Heartache much more magnified than anything I could even
imagine. How much He must love us! Jesus tells us that we should follow Him. Well,
the last words He gives us from the cross are these.
Luke 23:44-46
44 Now it was about the sixth hour, and there was darkness over all the earth until the ninth
hour. 45 Then the sun was darkened, and the veil of the temple was torn in two. 46 And when
Jesus had cried out with a loud voice, He said, “Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit.”
Having said this, He breathed His last.
In His darkest hour, He knew who had His back. He knew that God was in control. He
gave His all to God and trusted that God, in His infinite wisdom, knew what was best.
We must commit everything we are, everything we have to Him. For those of you that
know Kent Hovind, you may or may not know that he's in prison. He stood up for a
cause He believes in and received a ten year sentence late last year. It's not a cause
that I would fight for but that's not the issue. Anyway, there are many believers
praying that he and his wife be released, but since he's been in prison he has started
a ministry to the prisoners that is absolutely awesome. There are men that have
come to Christ that may never have done so if he had not gone to jail. It is not
important for us to understand each and every thing that happens to us. What is
important is that we completely trust God, no matter what. As the psalmist writes, love
the LORD you His saints. No matter what! We have to trust that His heart is to bring
in the fullness of the kingdom. Don't stress on the whys and hows of it all. Remember
that He is the Parent, not us. He knows what's best for us.
Since those who don't know Him are slaves to their sin, I imagine that He saw us all as
children locked in our cage of sin. He knew that He was the only One with the key.
We should not be surprised that He will take the fullness of time to make sure that
every possible cage will be opened. Isn't that what we would expect the hero in some
Hollywood movie to do? Why would we expect anything less than that from our
heavenly Hero? So when our heart gets broken by some evil thing we see, let us
remember that He who sees it all is grieving as well. But because He loves all of
those meant for the kingdom, He allows His own grief to be prolonged until the
fullness of us all comes in.
Sermon by: Denise Baxley
Date: April 29, 2007
