Sermon(Ps 43): God who visits me

The original Korean text: https://blog.naver.com/stevision/50025286761

 

 

Scripture reading: Ps 43

 

>> 1 Vindicate me, O God, and defend my cause against an ungodly people; from deceitful and unjust men deliver me! 2 For thou art the God in whom I take refuge; why hast thou cast me off? Why go I mourning because of the oppression of the enemy? 3 Oh send out thy light and thy truth; let them bring me to thy holy hill and to thy dwelling! 4 Then I will go to the altar of God, to God my exceeding joy; and I will praise thee with the lyre, O God, my God. 5 Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my help and my God. <<

 

It's a story from my college days. I sat deeply discouraged and absent-minded in my room where I lived as a student and where I prepared food for myself because I lived away from home. I had been suffering from illness for a long time then. I couldn't get better although I took medicine. I had lost my hopes for the future long before. one day, I ran out of banchan(반찬, the basic supplemental food of Korea), however I felt so exhausted that it wasn't regarded as another problem. I was just sitting absent-mindedly there, but heard a voice of someone outside. It was my mother! My mother brought banchan. Usually I brought banchan from home. At that time I ran out of banchan before I was to go home. Mother said that I had come to her mind suddenly, and that thus she had had a mind to bring banchan to me. Remembering the episode, I realize that God touched another's heart to help a poor man like me then. How grateful I was to my mother then! My brethren, do you suddenly feel pity for another believer in church and feel disposed to help him? Isn’t it perhaps an inspiration of the Holy Spirit? ‘He is in trouble now. He needs your help!’ My mother was not a Christian, but the God moved her loving heart to go to her son to help him. If you are people who believe in God, how much more will God touch (or influence) your heart at a proper time? Some thoughts that come to your mind once in a while such as thought of loving others, of having pity on others, and of helping others are not useless idle thoughts.

 

Today's Scripture says of the wicked. My brethren, why didn't God destroy the wicked as soon as they committed sins? It is because the wicked are of use. There are many wicked people in this world. And there are many works to be done by them. To serve in the army to protect the country, to construct roads, to produce cars, to mine minerals, etc. - there are so many things the wicked do all over the society and world. If they were all killed, who would do the work? Some of the children of the wicked are good Christians, but if God kills the wicked, who is going to support them? Above all, many wicked people may be customers of your store or company, and if they are killed, your loss will be very serious. And if all the wicked are killed, we as Christians will have no work to do. Don't you think that, if we preach the gospel to the wicked and make them a new creature, we live a fruitful life worthy to be rewarded with prize later in the heaven? And if all the wicked are to be killed, are you certain to survive? Is there a man who hasn't sinned? Therefore, a personal prayer 'Lord, please get rid of that wicked man!' seems to be no problem, but if God answers such prayer of all Christians, it will cause disaster. Now do you understand why the villain next door is alive so long? In fact you may not know that there are quite a lot of wicked people among the customers of your store. There are some customers who commit adultery or cheat. If you do not think it bad that the wicked come to your store to buy goods, it is unfair for you to want that all of the wicked in the world be killed at once. There are quite a few products made by the wicked in your house. If you do not have time to make them or if you do not have the talent to make them, you'd better not wish the wicked who have made them to die early. (In addition, large population of old people is greater glory to God than small population of old people, even if human beings are wicked.  If there are few senior citizens in the world, it covers up the good nature of God such as his rich grace, forgiveness, love, forbearance, etc. Therefore, the old man is the glory of God. God speaks to a young man who looks down on an old man. "Do you speak so impudently because you can live longer than the man?" Therefore, you young people, be humble before the old people!)

 

“For thou art the God in whom I take refuge; why hast thou cast me off? Why go I mourning because of the oppression of the enemy? (v. 2)” My brethren, even if your present situation is so difficult that such a sigh spontaneously comes out of your mouth, it's but a somatic thought and but a judgment of a man with eyes of Gehazi, the prophet Elisha's servant. God permits the wicked to live for they do some useful works in the world while he visits the righteous who are afflicted by the wicked to protect them. My brethren, do you love God? Do you love our Saviour Jesus Christ? Then never make a confession of disbelief like 'I am forsaken by God!' "I am with you always, to the close of the age (Mt 28:20)," the Savior promised. So we must believe that our Savior is with us in the place where you and I are suffering. We seem as if we fell, but we won't fall at all. The reason is that the Lord holds us. Jesus stretched out his hand to Peter who sank into the water, and drew him from the water. Why do you bear a grudge against the Lord and sigh over your one failure as if you had chances no more? Having fallen seven times, nevertheless a righteous man makes the 8th attempt and stands up and goes his way. The righteous are those who live by faith, and those who have faith do not regard the one fall as the eternal failure or defeat. A man of faith does not tremble at or surrender to a wicked person stronger than himself.

 

We have a powerful weapon. It is our prayer. “Oh send out thy light and thy truth; let them bring me to thy holy hill and to thy dwelling! (v. 3)” God is at the very place where you are in trouble. If you have faith and pray on the spot, God will help you. He will open the way of your life. God permits us to suffer only the adversity that we can bear, so he gives us strength to overcome all hardship and opens the way to escape from the snare and oppression of the wicked. Sometimes he gives you wisdom that is much better than the wicked men's, and gives you victory. My brethren, long for the wisdom of God. Businessmen, scholars, sportsmen, pastors, high-school seniors, please pray to God for the divine wisdom. God will give the wisdom to you generously and will never rebuke. In particular, the discovery deserving the Nobel Prize in Physics is one that is unpredictable. As you develope existing theories logically, you bump into a wall sometimes. Overcoming that wall requires inspiration. A brilliant unexpected idea comes to your mind suddenly. Isn't it Lord's light and truth? God used his wisdom when he created the world. The novel laws of nature have been in the mind of God since the creation, and the world has been working according to them until now. When our prayers ascend to God's presence, that is >to God's holy hill and his dwelling<, when our religious life catches the eye of God, at last when our life and our future attract God's attention, >God's light and truth< comes upon us. People call it the inspiration, and this inspiration makes us heads in various fields. This inspiration is the deep wisdom God gives you. A common man can never approach this profound wisdom. Sometimes this kind of wisdom can reverse the situations of the war by one attack, deliver you from a deep pit, make you a billionaire or a pioneer in a new learning. We need to know that this inspiration is never obtained by prayer alone. Pray for inspiration for a hundred years in your secluded room. That is a waste of time indeed. My brethren, do not be prodigal while you are young, but devote your body, time and soul to the kingdom of God. God grants >his light and truth< to him who has worked hard, shed tears, and suffered much loss for the kingdom of God since his youth. Therefore, even when you pray in your private room, it may be a better way for receiving great inspiration, for you to pray for the kingdom of God rather than to pray for inspiration for yourself. “Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things shall be yours as well. (Mt 6:33)” Of course, if we seek >the deep wisdom< in God when we are surrounded and attacked by evil men, he will give us a good wisdom to overcome the adversity. He surely will! There are many >deceitful and unjust men (v. 1)< in the world. You need the wisdom from God to beat them. Pray to God for this wisdom.

 

I hope that God will be your joy. “Then I will go to the altar of God, to God my exceeding joy. (v. 4)” The wicked flee from God and fear to see God. The God confessed by the psalmist is >the God who is my strength (v. 2) (in Korean version of the text)< and >the God who is my exceeding joy (v. 4)<. God is my strength because he is my help (v. 5). God is my joy. When we have a talk with non-Christians on the Internet, they are very nervous about our belief in God. They raise an objection to our worship of God who, they think, does not exist nor whose existence can be proved. They say, "If there is a god, let him appear to us. Then we might believe in him!" You can't meet even a president of a nation as you want. If so, will the highest God who created the heaven and earth appear to the wicked when they say to him, "Come and show yourself to us once"? Far from it! The wicked do not know the joy of meeting God. They can not understand our joy. When I was in trouble, my mother came and gave me what I needed. And how happy I was then! Brethren, when will God be your joy? The happiest occasion is that you receive enormous help from God unexpectedly, the next happiest occasion is that God satisfies your needs when you pray. When are we happy? We are happiest when we realize and feel that God loves us most. I'm happy if I win first place at the game in the church. I'm happy because God helped me most in the game. We taste a calm delight when we realize that we live in the special concern of God. Hearing God's word, not through the Bible nor through the sermon but directly from him, gives us infinite delight. This is the joy that enables us to overcome all the hardships and tribulations of the world. The joy of hearing God's word directly makes you want other better things no more. By the way Jesus' disciples were greatly pleased when they were persecuted while preaching the gospel of Jesus. It was a great pleasure for the disciples to be qualified to suffer for Jesus. This is a high-level joy. My brethren, who can stop my pleasure if I have and feel pleasure myself? How dare fear and anxiety settle in a place full of joy? Brethren, let the God be in your heart. Then fear and anxiety will disappear naturally. If water continues to gush from the spring, all dog's dung that has fallen into it will be carried away by water. If the water of joy springs from us, our worries and concerns run away from us automatically. God is the fountain of joy in me.

 

All psalmists praised God in suffering. Because they saw, with the eyes of faith, the God who had come personally to them who had been in distress. Now they are giving praise to God who has come to them to comfort and help them. They see God's special concern and love for them, so they are giving thanks and praises to him. If God has forsaken you, you may well despair, but if God has come to you to deliver you, what you must do now is to praise him (with joy). It is a good courtesy to come near and listen carefully when others talk to me. God shows such a good courtesy that he comes to us and listens to our praises when we give praises to him. Father also shows at least minimal respect for his son. How can we trust in the holy person of God if the Holy Spirit is not present at the place where we are giving praises to God but hears them in a distance of a thousand kilometers? God is holy and merciful, so he surely comes where praises are sung to him. Therefore praise removes the distance between God and me. When I offer holy praises to God, he surely comes to me and accepts them. If we sing praises to God when we pray to God for our personal, family and church affairs, he will accept the praises and answer the prayer gladly.

 

 

May God accept your beautiful praises and grant your earnest wishes.

 

Chong Tack Kim

 

                              - Dongtoma Sunshine Church -