The Presence of God

[00:00:00] This audio sermon is provided by AnabaptistSermons.com and may be freely copied and distributed. You may not sell or edit this sermon. Our prayer is that you would be blessed by this ministry. All of you that was praying for Jim this week, you were praying for me and you didn't even know it. So, thanks for your prayers. We should probably make an announcement next time and let you all know about the switcheroo. [00:00:37] Next weekend we're going to a wedding in South Carolina for one of the girls that was down in Jamaica. I get the privilege of leading two songs down there. So we'll be leaving Friday night and then coming back Monday probably sometime. I've really been blessed by the songs. It's so easy for me to sit there and... [00:01:11] I'm so tired this morning, it's unbelievable. So easy for me to sit there and just... By the way, welcome to our visitors. It's so easy to sit there and sing these songs that we know almost by heart and we forget what we're saying. And I know you're probably tired of hearing me say that. But is he really leading us? He leadeth me. By his own hand he leadeth me, his faithful follower I would be. [00:01:47] for by his hand he leadeth me and then stepping in the light how beautiful it is to walk in the steps of our Savior. I would like to stand and sing one more song. Song number 144 in the praises to God. And as we sing, let's think about what we're singing. [00:02:20] Like the woman at the well I was seeking For things that could not satisfy And then I heard my Savior speaking Draw from my well that never shall run dry Fill my cup, Lord, I lift it up, Lord Come and quench this thirsting of my soul [00:02:53] Bread of heaven, feed me till I want no more Fill my cup, fill it up and make me whole There are millions in this world who are craving The pleasure earthly things afford But none can match the wondrous treasure That I find in Jesus Christ my Lord [00:03:30] Fill my cup, Lord, I lift it up, Lord Come and quench this thirsting of my soul Bread of heaven, feed me till I want no more Fill my cup, fill it up and make me whole So my brother, if the things this world gave you [00:04:00] Leaves hunger that won't pass away My blessed Lord will come and save you If you kneel to Him and humbly pray Fill my cup, Lord, I lift it up, Lord Come and quench this thirsting of my soul Bread of heaven, feed me till I want no more [00:04:36] Fill my cup, fill it up and make me whole Let's pray. Lord, we thank you for all that you have done for us. And Lord, a lot of times we take your physical blessings for granted, and we also take your spiritual blessings for granted. But this morning, Lord, we ask that you would be with us here. Your presence would be here, your Holy Spirit would be here, and you would be speaking to us. [00:05:13] And I pray that our hearts would be unguarded, but open. to receive your word, your truth. In Jesus' name, Amen. Just to be a little honest, a little, isn't that crazy? [00:05:45] Um, I'm kind of fearful this morning. Um, I'm afraid that it's a simple message. Isn't that? Yeah, I know, Dustin. Uh, but it's been so good for me to study this. I wanted to talk a little bit from my limited knowledge of the presence of God. [00:06:22] The subject is huge and it would probably, you know, could be preached on Sunday after Sunday after Sunday after Sunday. At the little church down at the corner at 13 and kind of road 4, there's a saying that says, In the presence of God, there is no time. What's ruling your life, His presence or your time? And that's, I don't know how long it's been there, maybe a month or so, maybe three weeks, I don't know. [00:06:56] And it's really been heavy on my mind. You know, what is the presence of God? How do we get it? I think there's a lot of you who have been seeking that and wondering the same thing. And I think this morning we'll start by reading Matthew 14. I think it's all something that we long for in our lives. [00:07:42] And sometimes we wonder if we have the presence of God. Maybe some of it is we want it so bad, but we kind of doubt that we have it. Is God really with us? Are we in His presence? And I really appreciate the devotions this morning on the emphasis on, and it's kind of what I wanted to bring out, you know, God desires to be in us and with us all the time, not just in the morning, [00:08:15] or just in the afternoon when you read, or just in the evening before you go to bed. No, He wants us to walk with Him and He wants to abide in us constantly. And I wanted to read the story of Jesus walking on the water and share a few thoughts from it. Immediately Jesus made his disciples, or he invited them or strongly urged them to get into the boat and go before him to the other side while he sent the multitudes away. [00:08:59] And when he had sent the multitudes away, he went up on the mountain by himself to pray. Now an evening came, he was alone there, but the boat was now in the middle of the sea, tossed by the waves, for the wind was contrary. Now in the fourth watch of the night, which is, I think, from 3 a.m. to 6 a.m., Jesus went to them walking on the sea. And when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were troubled, saying, It is a ghost. [00:09:33] And they cried out for fear. But immediately Jesus spoke to them, saying, Be of good cheer, it is I. Do not be afraid. And Peter answered him and said, Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water. So he said, Come. And when Peter had come down out of the boat, he walked on the water to go to Jesus. But when he saw that the wind was boisterous, he was afraid, and beginning to sink, he cried out, saying, Lord, save me. And immediately Jesus stretched out his hand and caught him and said to him, O you of little faith, why do you doubt? [00:10:10] And when they got into the boat, the wind ceased. Then those who were in the boat came and worshipped him, saying, Truly you are the Son of God. First of all, we know that the Holy Spirit comes from Christ. He sends the Spirit to us in John 15, verse 26. [00:10:47] But when the Helper comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, The Spirit of Truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify in me. So the Spirit is coming to us and the Spirit brings us to Christ. And we all know that in our lives the one need that we have, if you were to say, no matter where you are spiritually, what's the one need that you need in your life? [00:11:20] Not food or clothing or shelter. What's the one main need? What is it day after day and hour after hour? Moment by moment. That's the presence of Jesus Christ. God is our salvation. Right? Amen somebody. If we have Christ with us and Christ in us, we have full salvation. Christ's with us. Christ's in us. We're abiding in Christ. We have full salvation. [00:12:05] You know, we know all about the life of failure. At least, I think we all do. Living in the flesh, we talked about it in Sunday school a little bit, that I was in there. and our lives of unbelief and disobedience and, you know, our ups and downs. And there's been some talk around here about being in the wilderness and roaming around and continual sadness and sorrow. [00:12:40] And, you know, we can get all caught up in the bad circumstances of life. But we also know and believe that there is deliverance and he has brought us out of Egypt into Canaan, so to speak. We know that God is peace and joy. We know all this. Do we know the presence of Jesus Christ? Do we know what that is? [00:13:13] Do we, can we feel Him? Do we know it? Hour after hour, moment after moment. Keith Daniels, I remember him preaching, talking about Andrew Murray, I think, being in the presence of God and Andrew Murray knowing and feeling that. And when he didn't feel it, he fell to the ground. I think everybody may know that story. [00:13:44] What is that like? And if Andrew Murray had it, back in the early 1900s, surely we can have it. We can know what that is. With the presence of Christ, there's victory over sin. There's, for anything we want to do, there is strength for duty or for works, for doing works. [00:14:18] For loving your neighbor, even when he comes to take more wood than what you thought that he would. Or there's love for the driver that cuts you off. Or love for the driver that doesn't go when the light's green and you're in a hurry. You know, he's just sitting there, come on. and there's unbroken fellowship. So as we look at this story, [00:14:51] I think that the disciples, you know, back in chapter 8, I think it was chapter 8, Jesus was with them in a boat. A storm came up and they were afraid, but Jesus was with them. And he said, peace be still. But now they're in a boat. This never happened before. At least not that we know of. They're in a boat and there's a storm and Jesus isn't with them. His presence is not there. And they realize it. [00:15:23] And I'm wondering if too often I think when I'm struggling in life and you notice that they were rowing, working hard, Trying to get a cross, and the wind was contrary, it says. Too often in life, we don't realize that we're not in the presence of God. You know, it's cloudy, it's dark, it's in the middle of the night, after midnight, 2, 3, 4 o'clock, [00:15:58] and life is just dark and lonesome. And we finally realize, hey, I'm without God. God is not around. I think Jesus felt that. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? And I think that's totally different than maybe another sermon. But his presence was, I want to say, his presence was lost. They were lost out there. [00:16:34] They were making no progress. They were not growing. You know, it doesn't say here in Scripture, but I'm sure they were thinking if only Jesus was here, because, you know, they remember back to chapter 8. If Jesus would be here, he would stop the winds and the waves. But they were in a lot of trouble. So, maybe in my darkness in my life, you know, the darkness is caused by my sin. [00:17:09] You know, and there's a cloud over me. My sin is standing between me and God. And I work and I worry and I toil. What I really need to do is notice that, you know, I think back to my life earlier on and all the years of running up and down and trying to be good [00:17:41] and ignoring the fact that there's this dark cloud over me, day after day after day after day. Why do I still struggle? Why am I still having to try so hard? Why can't I gain complete victory? Why is it? On and on the sun isn't shining. I don't know if you all get the winter blues, but sometimes I just want to see the sun. But here is this sin hanging over me. [00:18:11] But yet, it seems like there's a longing for Christ, but the problem is, I don't want to give up. And you'll notice how when Christ appeared to them on the water, they were afraid. They thought it was a ghost. They didn't even recognize Him. So, you know, sometimes, you know, in my sin, why do I fear God? [00:18:48] Why did they fear Him? And I looked up the word fear and the word dread came up. They dreaded seeing Him. They were scared. Because they didn't realize it was Him. And sometimes in our life, in my life, I dread seeing God. Even though I long for Him. The reason I dread is because He's bringing sin and He's showing me my sin. And I know what it's going to take for me to get rid of that sin. [00:19:19] I've got to humble myself and I've got to tell everybody. Confess my sin one to another. That takes a whole lot of humility for somebody to get up and to say, Hey, I've got a problem. I've got sin in my life. But sometimes we realize that as a follower of Jesus Christ, if I'm going to walk with Christ, I'm going to have to suffer some affliction. [00:19:50] Whether it's persecution or whether it's health reasons. You know, even ungodly people have to suffer affliction, you know, health. I'm talking health wise. But maybe it's through persecution. Maybe it's standing alone. It's really tough for young people. I don't know if you all remember being young. To stand alone and to say, I'm not going through this. I'm not going to give in to this. [00:20:22] And then we... You know, God is calling us and we fear, we are afraid to stand alone. Or we're afraid We're afraid to confess our sins, or we're afraid that if I give up everything, then I'm going to be called out of my comfort zone. I'm going to have to go talk to my neighbor. I'm going to have to move to a foreign country. I'm going to have to give up my lifestyle that I feel so comfortable in. [00:21:02] I'm definitely not following my notes. I don't know what's going to happen here. Is there ever a time, I was trying to think of a time when, when is there a time that Christ is drawn near to me and I don't notice Him? And why is it that we don't notice? Here He's trying to speak to me. [00:21:34] He's trying to speak truth. Hey, you need to stop eating so much. You are a glutton. Or, it could be anything. Look at your own life. And how is God trying? What's the next grade that He's trying to take you to? Thanks, Dustin. What's the next grade? What's the next step? What's the next level that He is trying to get you to? He's trying to teach you. He's trying to bring you to that. [00:22:06] and we fail, and we fail, and we fail. Why is it? We don't realize what God's trying to do. We don't realize. We see this thing over there and we're like freaking out to spirit when actually it's God trying to speak to us. All we can see is this brother who's trying to put me to shame and show me my wrong. Or my children. That's all we can see. We're afraid. I think a lot of times, by saying maybe it's our children, Christ comes to us in a way we're not expecting. [00:22:45] See, the disciples were not expecting Christ to be walking on the water. That's supernatural and powerful. Wow! How did you do that? That's why they thought it was a ghost. Sometimes our children come to us, or sometimes we see something in our children. Why don't you just listen to me? When really, that's our own need. Because you know how it is, you see a little speck in your brother's eye when really you've got a big... [00:23:17] A lot of times I feel like, I get on, I said it before, I get on Jamie's case for being so critical of his brothers when actually I'm more critical of him. And we don't expect God to speak to us in that way, so we don't see it. We don't realize He's speaking to us when really my children, God's trying to use them. He's coming to me through my children or my brother. We're not looking for Him in that way. [00:23:47] We're looking for Him to write it on the page of the Bible and give me this revelation when I'm all in my quiet time so nobody knows. So I don't have to be humiliated in front of my children and I have to say, sorry, children, I was wrong. We're afraid of His teaching when actually God is calling us to the next level. And we think sometimes that the presence of Christ, being in His presence, His presence with us is way too high, unobtainable. [00:24:29] There's no way. So what do we say? Ah, forget it. I can never get there. His teaching is too hard, too difficult. When really all He's doing is He's chasing us, drawing us out of His love, or out of His anger. It's not out of His anger, out of His love. He's trying to draw us in. And that, so sometimes I think that we dread His presence because He is showing us our sin. [00:25:11] Maybe it's our bad temper, our unlovingness, unforgiveness, worldliness. Maybe we're compromising in some way, just in a little bit. Maybe we still want the fellowship with the world, love of men, or even, I wrote down, the honor of men. I really like the honor of men. But then in verse 27, [00:25:53] We see that He reveals Himself. And I want to say, praise the Lord, no matter how hard it may be, when He reveals Himself and He shows us Himself, it is I. Be not afraid. I think God longs to reveal Himself. He wants to show more of Himself to us so that we can grow in Him. All we need to do is listen. All we need to do is listen. [00:26:27] All we need to do is obey when He reveals Himself. Jesus said, Be of good cheer. He wants us to be in His presence every moment. He wants to be our joy every hour. Another thing I was thinking about is in the morning if I want to see the sun, [00:27:12] maybe it's dawn, the sun's not quite up, but the light's coming up, getting daylight. And I want to see the sun. I cannot do anything to make the sun shine. You know, and Jim cannot reveal God to you. God reveals himself. The sun reveals itself. Shines through the clouds or peeks through and squeaks through and reveals himself. And that's been, I know Jim had a sermon on God showing himself, calling us. [00:27:45] God calls us. So nobody can reveal God to you. God reveals Himself to you. And that's what He did here. And I go back to the cloud, but God can't reveal Himself because there's that cloud. And I'm allowing this cloud to hide Him. Then after Jesus reveals himself to Peter in verse 28, [00:28:36] and Peter answered him and said, Lord, if it is you, command me to go to you on the water. Remember, Peter had this great desire to go to Christ. I don't think he was saying, Whoa, that's cool, I want to do that. Lord, make me walk on the water, I want to run around. No, he just wanted to go on the water to be with Christ. And he wanted to walk like Christ. [00:29:10] And I go back to 1 John chapter 2 verse 6. He who says that he abides in him ought himself also to walk just as he walked. And I think that Peter, well, I don't know, I like to think that Peter saw that this was supernatural. Oh, that's Christ. He's walking on the water. You know, it was a new manifestation. That's a big word for me. He was showing himself in a different way. [00:29:43] And I think that, you know, okay, God calls us to do a certain thing. Whether it's to love my neighbor and to give him more wood, even though he's stealing wood. Or whatever he's calling you to, to the next grade. And you say to yourself, no way. There's no way I could sell everything I have and go on the mission field. How would I ever survive? There's no way. So here you see this thing that God is calling you to some supernatural power, [00:30:14] some supernatural love, some uncommon unforgiveness. You're so forgiven, He's calling you to forgive this brother and he doesn't even know it. But He's calling you to forgiveness. You say, there's no way I can forgive this guy. There's no way. And God calls you to that. And then you have to look at Christ and say, whoa, Christ walked that way. And then you say, because Christ walked like that, I'm going to walk like that. [00:30:53] Even living the Sermon on the Mount, imagine people listening to the Sermon on the Mount. and I can't imagine what they were thinking back then when Jesus was preaching and they were saying, no way, can you imagine living like that? I'm supposed to turn the other cheek and go right down all the lists. Or maybe we say, there's no way that I can walk like Christ. You don't know the circumstances that I'm living under. You don't know the pain that I've been through. [00:31:29] You don't know any of that. But I think that God is calling us out of the boat. Our desire to be in His presence is calling us out of that boat of those bad circumstances, maybe, or that pain, you know, leave that pain behind and walk supernaturally in His power. We have to realize it's so easy here in this life and in this flesh, here we are, to get all wrapped up and get all worried about things. [00:32:01] I mean, I do. Surely you all do if you're the same. I think we have the same flesh. Why is it so hard just to put all of our trust in Him? So Peter did. I don't even know. It doesn't really say, but I like to think he just... Hey, Lord, make me come out there. Okay, come. Steps out of the boat and goes. No, think it. Now, wait a minute. Is this really? Can he really do this, you know? [00:32:35] So when God calls us to the next level, are we going to obey? Do we really want to walk like Christ walked? You know, I don't, you may think that you're the weakest brother, the weakest Christian, or the weakest person. I'm always failing. But, you know, God promises we walk like Him. [00:33:15] We trust in Him. He will be with us. Always. Do we trust in Him? Or do we trust in our own strength and our own power? Do we try to defy the laws of nature ourselves? I'm just going to have this discipline and I'm going to do it. Does it work? Uh-uh. It is impossible to walk by faith and not by sight without... [00:33:48] You know, I also had to think, is it our faith that saves us? Or is it the power of God that saves us? Sometimes we think it's my faith that saves me. But it's really the power of God. The Christian life is impossible without Christ, and I think that we all know that already. And we need Him to hold our hand, to walk with us every minute of the day. Lord, I trust You and I need You. [00:34:23] But then we notice that when He stepped out, had His eyes fixed on Him, He forgot. And He failed. He started sinking. and too often in our sinking we condemn ourselves and we say a word of reproach to ourselves and we're really down on ourselves. When all Peter did, what did he do? Lord, save me. Right away. Not days of fussing and I'll never forget it. This Bible reading don't work no more. [00:34:54] I'll just forget it and you give in and you just live how you want to live. That doesn't work either. God doesn't want us to condemn ourselves. He just wants us to cry out to Him and say, Lord, save me. We can use our failures rightly or wrongly. I think that the biggest need is for us, [00:35:26] as we seek God, to pray to Him, have communion. We have to pray. And there's been a lot of emphasis on prayer here already in church and through different men. But acknowledging that we can't do it on our own. And I don't think that can be stressed enough. A couple more verses in Jeremiah and Ezekiel. [00:36:00] Here in closing, Jeremiah 32, 38 and 40. They shall be my people, and I will be their God. And I will make an everlasting covenant with them, that I will not turn away from doing them good, But I will put my fear in their hearts so that they will not depart from me [00:36:31] And then to Ezekiel 36, 26 and 27 I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes and you will keep my judgments and do them. And in chapter 37 verse 26, Moreover, I will make a covenant of peace with them [00:37:03] and it will be an everlasting covenant with them. I know there's a lot in there to be shared. I'm not going to go there. And also in Romans chapter 8, And I wanted to change a couple words, if I may. I want to put, it says, Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Or who shall separate us from the presence of Christ? [00:37:35] Shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or sword? I have written in my Bible, no. And if I'm out of order by changing that word around, somebody can let me know, please. As it is written, for your sake we are killed all day long, we are counted as sheep for the slaughter. Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, [00:38:08] nor height nor depth nor any other created thing shall be able to separate us from the love of God even the presence of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. May God bless you.