INTRO.- Always in his presence, always in God’s presence. Does this remind you of anyone?
Genesis 5:21-24 “When Enoch had lived 65 years, he became the father of Methuselah. And after he became the father of Methuselah, Enoch walked with God 300 years and had other sons and daughters. Altogether, Enoch lived 365 years. Enoch walked with God; then he was no more, because God took him away.”
Enoch walked with God. We assume he walked with God every hour of the day or 24/7. That would mean he was always with God. After Enoch was 65 years old he became a father and walked with God. Did Enoch walk with God before he became a father? We don’t know but we would think so. However, many men don’t think seriously about God until they become a father.
ILL.- In one church where I served we had a man who was raised by Catholic parents. His wife was raised as a Baptist. When they got married she went to her church and he went to his church, but when they had children they decided they had better go to the same church and they ended up compromising and attending the Christian Church. He was serious about his faith and eventually became a deacon and then an elder.
Having children makes you think about many things in life and one of them is your faith or lack of it. Many men started to church and came to Christ as a result of becoming a father. It may not have happened overnight, but it made many fathers get serious about life and death and the example they set for their children.
Ephesians 6:4 “Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.”
How can a father bring up his children in the Lord if he himself doesn’t walk with the Lord? Enoch walked with God and maybe only after he became a father. But more than likely, he walked with God before he became a father and that’s the wisest thing to do.
How did he walk with God? I guess he walked with God by continually talking to Him throughout the day.
I Thessalonians 5:17 “Pray continually.” Do you talk to God continually? Or as often as you can?
I wake in the mornings, talking to God. I say, “Good morning, Father” and take off from there. I talk to Him about anything and everything. There is nothing that I consider to be “off limits” with God and nothing is “off limits” with Him! I think this is what Enoch did. God was always in Enoch’s presence because Enoch invited God to be with him and we must do the same thing. We should invite God into every day we live and make Him a part of our lives 24/7.
PROP.- The Psalmist tells us what it means to always be with God.
1- We are held by God’s hand
2- We are guided by God’s counsel
3- We are taken into God’s glory
I. WE ARE HELD BY GOD’S HAND
23 Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand.
ILL.- When a woman discovered that she was pregnant, her four-year-old son overheard his parents’ conversation. He didn’t say anything until a week later when a family friend asked him if he was excited about the prospect of a new brother or sister.
"Yes," said the boy, "and I know what we’re going to name it. If it’s a girl, we’re going to call her Emily, and if it’s another boy we’re going to call it Quits."
When I read this text I couldn’t help but think of a parent holding their baby or toddler in their arms. What a protective and special thing that is.
ILL.- Just after grandbaby Sophia Grace Shepherd was born she was in the neo-natal unit at the St. Francis Medical Center in Cape Girardeau. Son Shane took me in their a couple of times and I was able to put my hand through the side hole in that incubator. As I put my finger up to Sophia’s little hand she grabbed on to my finger and held on tightly.
That made me feel good but I wonder how it made her feel? Do you think she automatically sensed that protection and love from holding on? Surely, she did as all babies would. When they are held and cuddled next to mommy or daddy they feel loved, protected and secure.
Can this happen to us as adult in regard to our heavenly Father? It could be.
Romans 8:15-16 “For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.” The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.”
When we recognize that God holds us closely we cry out, “Abba, Father,” which means, “Father, Father.” Just like a child might exclaim, “Oh mama, mama!” or “Oh daddy, daddy!”
ILL.- I remember one time when my daughter Holly first started to school. Our reunion times were especially joyful and loving. She got off the bus one day and I standing there, waiting for her. She came to running me, saying, “Oh, daddy, daddy, I’ve missed you! I love you!” She melted my heart and still does.
Don’t you think God our Father would like to hear similar words from us? “Father, Father, thank you for being my father. I love you. Stay with me. Love me. Hold me. I love you.” Could our expressions of love melt His heart?
23 Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand.
Psalm 139:9-10 “If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.”
Thank you, Lord, for holding us fast. Thank you for holding us and protecting us from evil and the evil one.
II. WE ARE GUIDED BY GOD’S COUNSEL
24 You guide me with your counsel.
ILL.- A driver pulled up beside a rundown farmhouse. He got out and knocked at the door. A very old woman answered the door, and he asked her for directions to Des Moines. “Don’t know,” the woman said. He got back in his car and pulled away. Then he heard voices. He looked in his rear view mirror and saw the woman and an equally old man waving for him to come back. So he made a U-turn and drove up to them. “This is my husband,” the old woman said. “He doesn’t know how to get to Des Moines either.”
We all need some guidance and direction in life, do we not?
ILL.- Preacher Roy Weece, age 74, passed away in April of 2007. Roy used to preach for the 9th Street Christian Church in Eldon, MO, and was the campus minister at the University of MO in Columbia for 39 years. He said one evening that a man knocked on his door. Roy opened the door and the man said, “I’m lost.” Roy gave him directions and then said, “There is more than one way to be lost.” He proceeded to witness to the man about Christ.
All people are lost unless they find the Lord. Being found in Christ doesn’t always guarantee that we won’t get lost occasionally in life.
However, once we are in Christ we shouldn’t lost in regard to life’s matters. Why? Because He gives us guidance with His counsel. 24 You guide me with your counsel.
Psalm 23:3 “He guides me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.” Does He? Does we want Him to guide or lead us?
Psalm 25:4-5 “Show me your ways, O Lord, teach me your paths; guide me in your truth and teach me, for you are God my Savior, and my hope is in you all day long.”
Psalm 43:3 “Send forth your light and your truth, let them guide me; let them bring me to your holy mountain, to the place where you dwell.”
How does God guide us? With His counsel, with His truth. And what is His counsel, His truth? I think it’s His Word.
Psalm 1:1-2 “Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked or stand in the way of sinners or sit in the seat of mockers. But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night.”
What is that keeps us from going with the way of sinners, the wicked and the mockers? It’s God Word. We know better and do better in life because we try as best we can to live by God’s counsel as given in His Word. As someone said, “It is always right to go by the Bible.” (or to live by it)
Psalm 119:9-11 “How can a young man keep his way pure? By living according to your word. I seek you with all my heart; do not let me stray from your commands. I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you.”
Psalm 16:7 “I will praise the LORD, who counsels me; even at night my heart instructs me.”
How could God instruct us and give us counsel at night? I think it’s when we have allowed His Word to dominate our thinking. It is possible that if we studied and read scripture enough that it would automatically come to our minds and guide in life? I think so.
Psalm 119:24 “Your statutes are my delight; they are my counselors.” So be it.
III. WE ARE TAKEN INTO GOD’S GLORY
24 You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will take me into glory. 25 Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you. 26 My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.
No Disappointment In Heaven
There’s no disappointment in Heaven,
No weariness, sorrow or pain;
No hearts that are bleeding and broken.
No song with a minor refrain.
The clouds of our earthly horizon
Will never appear in the sky,
For all will be sunshine and gladness,
With never a sob nor a sigh.
We’ll never pay rent for our mansion,
The taxes will never come due;
Our garments will never grow threadbare,
But always be fadeless and new.
We’ll never be hungry nor thirsty,
Nor languish in poverty there,
For all the rich bounties of Heaven
His sanctified children will share.
There’ll never be crepe on the door-knob,
No funeral train in the sky;
No graves on the hillside of Glory,
For there we shall never more die.
The old will be young there forever,
Transformed in a moment of time;
Immortal, we’ll stand in His likeness,
The stars and the sun to outshine.
I’m bound for that beautiful city
My Lord has prepared for His own;
Where all the redeemed of all ages
Sing "Glory!" around the white throne;
Sometimes I grow homesick for Heaven,
And the glories I there shall behold:
What a joy that will be when my Saviour I see,
In that beautiful City of gold!
I want to go to glory, don’t you? I want to go to heaven! No place on earth sounds as good as heaven as described in scripture and in this poem.
Revelation 21:3-4 3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. 4 He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”
Philippians 3:20-21 “But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body.”
When the human body starts to decay and give us trouble a new body sounds mighty good.
Romans 8:17 “Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.” Share in His glory?
2 Corinthians 4:17 For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.” Heaven’s glory will far outweigh anything bad that we experience in this life.
Romans 8:18 “I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.”
Colossians 1:27 “To them God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.” Come on, glory land!
CONCLUSION-------------------
ILL.- A man found himself in the midst of a giant earthquake. He prayed, “Good Lord, come and help us. Come now, come yourself, because this ain’t no time for boys.”
The times in which we are living are difficult and they may get even tougher. This is not a time for boys or kids. We need big help to make it in life. WE NEED GOD HIMSELF. And the only way for Him to come to us is for us to walk with Him.
If we want God to guide us and protect us and take us to glory then we need to live and walk with Him right now, every day! We all need to make that our decision and commitment. We walk Him and He will walk with us.
Steve Shepherd, Jonesboro Christian Church, AR
jonesborochristianchurch@suddenlink.net
