Do Not Be? For God Is With You! Series

Do not be? For God is with you.

Please be warned this is a Salvation Message and there will be an opportunity for response at the end of it.

Have you ever forsaken something? What? Forsaken is to leave, to be renounce, to give up altogether…My first car was a red Ford Anglia 105e that I forsook for my second car, a rather sad karitane yellow coloured Renault T12 Station Wagon, looking back I’m not really sure what I was thinking . Occasionally forced forsakenness comes upon us. One of my sons went to an Intermediate School in Upper Hutt when we lived there that had a cage for locking bikes in during the school day, he would leave his new bike in the cage where it was locked during the day, one day he walked home only to remember around dinner time that he had left his bike in the cage, the cage being now unlocked, we shot down to the school only to find that someone had stolen the bike. We looked all over the neighbourhood to see if it was dumped somewhere…we contacted the Police, but sometime later we realised that it was gone never to be seen again. We forsook ever seeing it again and I brought the boy another bike with some of his pocket money going towards the insurance excess and the understanding that it was never to happen again. You might think that’s a bit mean, but they call that bit tough love.

Last week I started into a small series concerning advice King David gave his Lad Solomon about building the Temple in Jerusalem. This can be found in 1 Chronicles 28:20 and 21. This is the advice. ”David also said to Solomon his son, “Be strong and courageous, and do the work. Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord God, my God, is with you. He will not fail you or forsake you until all the work for the service of the temple of the Lord is finished. The divisions of the priests and Levites are ready for all the work on the temple of God, and every willing person skilled in any craft will help you in all the work…..”

Today I’m going to address one of these statements from this piece of advice Funnily enough it’s got a bit to do with God not failing us or forsaking us.

Have you ever heard someone say I feel distant from God? I just thought I’d put that out there. Show of hands?

This seems to be a common happening.

Been there yourself?

1) Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord God, my God, is with you. He will not fail you or forsake you until all the work for the service of the temple of the Lord is finished.

Well that should cheer everyone up. If you can just get your head around that it should all be just tickityboo!

A simple solution to all of life’s problems. I’m going to go out on a slight limb here and ask is it that easy? I’m also going to answer that it might be.

Now if we look at David and Solomon it was. Back in the day God would get a certain person and fill them to the brim with his Holy Spirit. When the tabernacle was built at the time of Moses, God said this, “I have chosen Bezalel …..and have filled him with the Spirit of God, with skill, ability and knowledge in all kinds of crafts -.” (Exodus 31:1-3 ) Why did God do that? The answer is so that this bloke could do the work required on his tabernacle, the pre-runner of the Temple. Gosd was alos with Solomon by his Holy Spirit.

Then there is this from 2 Chronicles 15:1-2 “The Spirit of God came upon Azariah son of Oded. He went out to meet Asa (King of Judah) and said to him listen to me, Asa and all Judah and Benjamin (tribes x 2). The Lord is with you when you are with him. If you seek him he will be found in you, but if you forsake him, he will forsake you.” The Hebrew meaning for forsakes most common meaning is to ‘leave’.

May be sometimes we feel distant from God because we choose to leave him.

2) Interestingly there is a shift in who the Holy Spirit enters into when Jesus is risen from the dead, in that the Holy Spirit is since then poured out on many, God no longer just resides in a few special people, so that they can do great things but in many. What is it that Peter says at Pentecost? He uses the words of the prophet Joel and says : ““‘In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people, Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams. Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days, and they will prophesy.”