Introduction
A. Well, a lot has happened in each of our lives in the last three weeks, and even more so in the world.
1. Last Sunday when we met together, a major hurricane named Katrina was aiming its furry at New Orleans and the neighboring cities and states.
2. As you know so well, it came ashore on Monday morning and its devastation and resulting complications, continue to become evident.
3. At first it looked like New Orleans had been spared the worst, but then the levies broke and the city is completely flooded.
4. We’ve all, no doubt, been saddened and horrified to see the devastation of Bilouxi, Mississippi, and to see death tolls and helplessness of the people continue to rise.
5. We want to encourage everyone of us to do all that we can to help those who are in such need at this time.
6. Many of the hurting are our brothers and sisters in Christ, and all of them are our neighbors, as described by Jesus in his teachings.
7. This nightmare for them and for the nation will not soon be over.
8. We will all be effected by this in many ways for some time.
9. We’ve already seen how this crisis has brought out the best and the worst in some, and I pray that as it brings out the best in us, we might lift up our God, and many might put their trust in God through this painful trial.
B. In many respects, the events of this week segue nicely into our message for today.
1. Today’s sermon marks the beginning of a Sermon Series I’m calling “God’s Faithfulness and Ours.”
2. This summer, we elders, have been praying and planning about our focus for this fall and this year.
3. God has directed our hearts toward the subject of faithfulness and its importance.
4. Later in the series, we will direct our attention to the need for our own personal faithfulness to God, but for now we will direct our attention to the faithfulness of God.
C. Brothers, sisters and friends, God’s faithfulness is something that we can celebrate.
1. We live in a literal sewer of unfaithfulness.
2. There is so little that we can trust in anymore.
3. Parents can’t trust their children, and children can’t trust their parents.
4. There is a distrust among husbands and wives.
5. Politicians make all kinds of promises and follow through on few of them.
6. Companies are far less faithful than they used to be to their employees and the communities they come from.
7. I like the story of the college student who walked into a photography studio with a framed picture of his girlfriend.
a. He wanted the picture duplicated.
b. This involved removing it from the frame.
c. In doing this, the studio owner noticed the inscription on the back of the photograph: "My dearest Tom, I love you with all my heart. I love you more and more each day. I will love you forever and ever. I am yours for all eternity."
d. It was signed "Diane," and it contained a P.S.: "If we ever break up, I want this picture back."
8. In contrast to all this unfaithfulness and distrust is our God who is so faithful.
D. It is this reality that I want us to celebrate and embrace over then next few sermons.
1. This is not a truth to be heard and forgotten, but one that we need to be reminded of constantly.
2. Our God is a faithful God. We can trust him.
3. I want to tell you, on a personal level, that I don’t believe that God has ever let me down.
4. I cannot think of a time when God has not been there for me.
5. He has always given me exactly what I needed, when I needed it. Whether it was provision or correction.
6. I especially see his hand as he has carried me through my 21 years of full-time ministry.
7. He has been by my side, day in and day out.
8. There have certainly been high points and low points, successes and failures, but either way, God has been faithful.
E. Perhaps I’m getting a little ahead of myself. Let’s take a minute to define what faithfulness is.
I. WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO BE FAITHFUL?
A. When you think about being faithful what comes to your mind?
1. You probably think of things like: being steadfast, dedicated, dependable, and worthy of trust.
2. If you think those things, then you are on the right track.
3. The Hebrew root from which the words translated "faithful" and "faithfulness" in the Old Testament are derived, means to prop or stay or support.
4. When applied to individuals it means someone a person can safely lean upon.
5. The Greek word used in the New Testament means trustworthy or to be relied upon, and this Greek word is the same used in the Septuagint for the Hebrew word mentioned above.
6. So, faithfulness has to do with being trustworthy and loyal.
7. The faithful person is steadfast, unchanging, and thoroughly grounded in relation to the other.
8. This sort of fidelity, or faithfulness, is used in both the Old Testament and the New Testament to describe God’s relation to the world and to describe the quality of relationship that Israel and Christians are called upon to have with God and with one another.
II. HOW DO WE KNOW THAT GOD IS FAITHFUL?
A. First of all, the Bible tells us that He is.
1. The Old Testament certainly says this clearly:
a. Deuteronomy 7:9, “Know therefore that the Lord your God is God; he is the faithful God, keeping his covenant of love to a thousand generations of those who love him and keep his commands.”
b. Psalm 36:5, “Your love, O LORD, reaches to the heavens, your faithfulness to the skies.”
c. Psalm 89:5, “The heavens praise your wonders, O LORD, yourfaithfulness too…”
d. These three are but a small sample of the many OT texts about God’s faithfulness.
2. We see the same thing stated in the New Testament:
a. 1 Corinthians 1:9, “God, who has called you into fellowship with his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, is faithful.”
b. 1 Thessalonians 5:24, “The one who calls you is faithful and he will do it.”
c. Hebrews 10:23, “Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful.”
d. The proclamation of this truth is designed to give the people God hope and comfort.
e. Is it working this morning?
B. So, we know that God is faithful because the Bible says so, but we also know that He is faithful because that is His track record.
1. God has made many promises, and he has kept every single one of them.
2. More than 4000 years ago, God promised in Genesis 8:21-22, “Never again will I curse the ground because of man, even though every inclination of his heart is evil from childhood. And never again will I destroy all living creatures, as I have done. As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night will never cease.”
a. Every year that comes furnishes a fresh witness to God’s fulfillment of this promise.
3. In Genesis 15:13-16, God promised Abraham, “Know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own, and they will be enslaved and mistreated four hundred years. But I will punish the nation they serve as slaves and afterward they will come out with great possessions.”
a. As you know, the centuries ran their weary course and Abraham’s descendants groaned amid the brick kilns of Egypt.
b. Had God forgotten His promise? Had God forgotten them? By no means.
c. Exodus 12 tells us the rest of the story, beginning in verse 31, “During the night Pharoah summoned Moses and Aaron and said, ‘Up! Leave my people, you and the Israelites! Go…And also bless me.”
d. Verse 33, “The Egyptians urged the people to hurry and leave the country…vs. 35, The Israelites did as Moses instructed and asked the Egyptians for articles of silver and gold and clothing. The Lord had made the Egyptians favorably disposed toward the people, and they gave them what they asked for; so they plundered the Egyptians.”
e. Verse 40, “Now the length of time the Israelite people lived in Egypt was 430 years. At the end of 430 years, to the very day, all the Lord’s divisions left Egypt.”
4. As you know, they miraculously crossed the Red Sea and then because of their distrust and disobedience found themselves wandering in the desert for 40 years.
5. Keep in mind that this was no small group of people. We are told that 600,000 men, besides women and children came out of Egypt.
6. A conservative estimate might be around 3 million people.
7. Where were 3 million people going to get what they needed to survive in the desert? Wallmart?
8. That’s where I see a powerful comparison between what is happening in New Orleans and what happened in the desert of Sinai.
9. So, many people without necessary food and drink. A truly desperate situation.
10. But you know what God did for the Israelites. He faithfully provided for them.
11. Deut. 8:2-4 says it like this: “Remember how the LORD your God led you all the way in the desert these forty years, to humble you and to test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands. He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your fathers had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD. Your clothes did not wear out and your feet did not swell during these forty years.”
12. God faithfully provided for them. Not for days, weeks or months, but for 40 years.
C. After that, as you remember, God brought them into the land of promise. Established them as a nation, and then because of their continual disobedience, allowed another nation to destroy them.
1. And it is in that context that we find our Scripture reading for today from Lamentations 3.
2. The book of Lamentations is not a happy book.
3. The nation of Israel has been invaded and is now controlled by a foreign power.
4. Jerusalem, as chapter 1 and verse 1 says, “How deserted lies the city, once so full of people! How like a widow is she, who once was great among the nations! She who was queen among the provinces has now become a slave. “
5. A pretty bleak scene, isn’t it? Here we have the picture of God’s people who are in real trouble and yet we are also give the picture of a God who, though He disciplines, still has a great love for his people.
6. But as Jeremiah laments what has happened to the Israelites and he also encourages them to lament, “The hearts of the people cry out to the Lord. O wall of the Daughter of Zion, let your tears flow like a river day and night; give yourself no relief, your eyes no rest.”(2:18)
7. In fact, as we read in the beginning of chapter 3, Jeremiah is black with depression and gloom, “I am the man who has seen affliction by the rod of his wrath.”
8. And he continues that lament until we get to verse 21, “Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope: Because of the LORD’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.”
9. In Jeremiah’s mind, there was still a ray of hope! And this ray of hope was in the Lord! It was in His unfailing love and His mercies!
10. This is what Jeremiah embraced in those dark days. This is what He remembered when all seemed lost and hopeless. He remembered the unfailing love of God! He remembered that “great is his faithfulness!”
Conclusion
A. It is this faithfulness of God that I want us to celebrate and embrace this morning and as we continue in this series of lessons.
B. Are you going through any situation as dark as Jeremiah and the Israelites? Got any rivers you think are impossible to cross, or mountains to difficult to climb?
C. Don’t worry, God specializes in impossible situations.
D. God will faithfully carry us through. We can count on it, but we must not give up on Him.
E. Acts 27, Paul and a boatload of people found themselves in a terrible storm. Received a message from the Lord that all would be safe if they stayed with the boat.
F. God will surely carry us through the storms, but we must not abandon ship.
G. God is faithful. If we haven’t learned it as of yet, then it is one we need to learn.
H. But it is one thing to accept the faithfulness of God as a divine truth, and it is another thing to act on it. I hope and pray that we can find the faith and courage to place our trust in a trustworthy God.
