'FINDING THE GOD WHO IS'

Rev. Brent Russett

By Rev. Brent Russett

Pastor of Sunnyside Wesleyan Church in Ottawa:

http://www.sunnysidechurchottawa.com/   

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PODCAST LINK to CFRA broadcast - Sunday, April 23^rd, 2017:

http://proxy.autopod.ca/podcasts/chum/6/52823/good_news_257_apr23.mp3

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Broadcast Notes: ******************************

Finding the God who is

Good morning. And welcome to good news in the morning. It is the first Sunday of the Easter Season.

 My name is Brent Russett. I am the Senior Pastor at Sunnyside Wesleyan Church. I have been pastoring there for 27 years. One thing that becomes apparent when you have spent that much time in one place is that what you do with Jesus matters. Who you think God is matters.

            This morning we are going to look at, seeing the God who is.

This morning’s program sponsor is Bruce Newman. He wants to give a shout out to Jericho Road Christian Ministries. Jericho Road is a local registered charity that exists to serve the poor, the addicted and the mental ill. They do an outstanding service for our community. Thanks Bruce for recognizing them.

            Today I want to take you to the first part of John 14. I want to direct your attention to John 14:8. Jesus is with his disciples at the last supper.

I want to direct your attention to Philip`s request in verse 8

John 14:8 (NLT)

8 Philip said, “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.”

            What follows from verses 9-21 is Jesus` response to that request.

            Philip’s request in some ways articulates the request of all of humanity.

            It is the request of the agnostic – show us God and we will believe.

            It is the request of the seeker – God, show up, so I can believe.

            It is the request of the new believer, God, I need to see you.

            It is the request of those who are in pain. God show up, I need to know that you are there.

            It is one of the deepest requests of my own heart, and it probably is for many of you as well. Lord, I want to know you. Lord, I want a fresh revelation of who you are. Lord what I  need is your presence in my life. Lord what I need is your wisdom in my life. Lord what I need is for you to show yourself to us.

            For I know that when God shows up that many of the challenges that are going on in our lives, cease to be challenges. If you look throughout scripture, when God revealed his person and his name, he did so in a way that gave them what they needed.

            Here of some of the ways that God revealed himself.

El Shaddai – the Lord Almighty

Adonai – the lord most high

Jehovah – Raah The Lord My Shepherd

Jehovah Rapha – The Lord that heals

Jehovah Shammah The Lord that is there

Jehovah Shalom The Lord is peace

            And the list could go on. But what we know is that when God reveals himself – we have all we need.

            So I am with Philip. Show us the Father.

John 14:8 (NLT)

8 Philip said, “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.”

Part of the grand adventure of walking with Jesus, is that you being to see more and more of who God is, and you start to see his goodness and his grace, the more you will love him.

           

            If you have ever been there, If you have every wanted God to show up, then you need to hear the words of Jesus today. 

John 14:9–11 (NLT)

9 Jesus replied, “Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and yet you still don’t know who I am? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father! So why are you asking me to show him to you? 10 Don’t you believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words I speak are not my own, but my Father who lives in me does his work through me. 11 Just believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me. Or at least believe because of the work you have seen me do.

            Jesus says, it is the last night of my life, and you still don’t quite get it. Ok – one more time from the top.

            If you have seen me you have seen the father. I am in the father and the father is in me. The words I have spoken are the Fathers words. The works I have done are the father’s works.

            The take home point for us is, if you want to know what God is like, look at Jesus. If you want to see who God is look at Jesus. For some of you this is really basic. But for others you need to hear this. Some people don’t like the God of the Old Testament but they like Jesus. Jesus is saying, if you like me, you will like the Father. What you see in me, the kindness the compassion, that is what God is like.

            But he also points to a second thing that you are going to need if you are going to have a revelation of who God is. You are going to need faith. He asked Philip, “Don’t you believe that I am in the Father and Father is in me?”

Then he goes on, if nothing else believe because of the miracles. Here is what you need to know. It is going to take faith for you to see the face God in in the person of Jesus.

            I have a lot of commentary sets on the Bible. Many of these are written by people of faith. Some are written by people of academia but without faith. My conclusion is that study without faith tends to lead people into discussions on the level of “how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.” It may be interesting, but not fruitful. Study with faith can lead to a deeper revelation of who God is.

            When you go to the word, go in faith. When you look at the life of Jesus, look in faith. When you do, God will reveal himself to you.

           

            Then Jesus goes on. And as you are reading through this passage and you come upon these verses, it seems like a complete non- sequitur. But it is not. He is still talking about seeing the father. He is still talking about how God reveals himself.

John 14:12–14 (NLT)

12 “I tell you the truth, anyone who believes in me will do the same works I have done, and even greater works, because I am going to be with the Father. 13 You can ask for anything in my name, and I will do it, so that the Son can bring glory to the Father. 14 Yes, ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it!

            It is like if you believe in me, you have seen who God is, and by the way, if you believe in me – you are going to see your prayers answered and you are going to greater works than me.

            Let me put in a disclaimer. I don’t understand these verses fully. Some of my hyper faith friends say, “it says we can do greater works than Jesus – so we should see the dead raised and the lame walk and the sick healed.” Some of the traditional friends would say, there are no greater works than what Jesus has done – after all he turned water into wine and it doesn’t get any better than that. – So he must mean that the greater works are people coming to the Lord. A soul saved – that is the greater work.

            I am not satisfied with either of those answers. I will tell you this, that the word “you” in these verses are plural. And this answer comes in the context of Philips request to show us the father.

I think he is saying that you church are going to greater works than I have been able to accomplish in my 3 years of ministry here on the earth. You plural are going to see your prayers answered and miracles done. You are going to do the things that I have done and more of them.

            When you see those things happen, that will be a revelation of who God. God will be showing himself through those things.

            Just an observation: While I hear of miracles happening around us I don’t see enough of them

            While I see answers to prayer, I don’t see enough of them. Now when I talk with people from the church in Africa and Asia they report amazing miracles and a lot of them.

In places like that, the spiritual world, of both good and evil, is self-evident. And when they pray they expect the spiritual world to make a difference in our world - and God moves. Here we are so skeptical that I think we prevent God from doing all that he wants to do.

            I believe that God wants to do a lot more than he does, but he is hindered by our skeptic’s stance.

            But the point of the verses here, is that when you do see God answer prayer – that is part of the way that God reveals himself.

I know people say that you should not develop theology from experience. There is danger in doing that for sure. But it is also dangerous to see God do something and not contemplate what God might be saying.

            So God reveals himself in the person of Jesus. God also reveals himself through the supernatural.

MUSIC-  Knowing You Jesus – Graham Kendrick 4:38

Hear the words of Jesus

John 14:15–19 (NLT)

5 “If you love me, obey* my commandments. 16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate,* who will never leave you. 17 He is the Holy Spirit, who leads into all truth. The world cannot receive him, because it isn’t looking for him and doesn’t recognize him. But you know him, because he lives with you now and later will be in you.* 18 No, I will not abandon you as orphans—I will come to you. 19 Soon the world will no longer see me, but you will see me. Since I live, you also will live.

            There are so many things that Jesus is saying here. But sticking to the question of how God reveals himself – Jesus says I am going to leave this earth. But I am going to send the Holy Spirit. I am going to come to you through Him. The world will no longer see me, but you will see me

            In other words. We see Jesus through the revelation of the Holy Spirit. In fact

John 14:26 (NLT)

26 But when the Father sends the Advocate as my representative—that is, the Holy Spirit—he will teach you everything and will remind you of everything I have told you.

            The Holy Spirit is going to remind you of what I have already taught you and he is going to teach you everything you need to know.

            How is God going to show himself. He is going to do that by the power of the Holy Spirit. How does that happen.

            Lets go back to verse 15.

John 14:15–17 (NLT)

15 “If you love me, obey* my commandments. 16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate,* who will never leave you. 17 He is the Holy Spirit, who leads into all truth.

            He says to his disciples if you love me, do what I have told you to do. The you here, continues to plural. And you church if you love me do what I have told you to do, and the Holy Spirit will lead you into all truth.

            Part of the out-working of what Jesus is saying here, is the creation of the New Testament. It was written by apostles or their disciples and we believe it was the Holy Spirit leading the church into all truth.

            Part of the working out of this is believing that God worked through the church councils as they looked at who Jesus is – so we get the apostles creed and the Nicene creed. Part of what the church councils decided was when the cannon of scripture was closed. We do not believe that there is another book of scripture yet to be written or yet to be found.

            But I will say this, it seems that the revelation of the Spirit comes to those who obey the commands of Jesus. If you read church history, you will find that while God has always had his faithful followers, the church was not always faithful. The revelations coming out of the church at those times are often more suspect.

            So God reveals himself first and foremost through Jesus, through the supernatural, through the church by His Holy Spirit – especially through the scriptures.

           

            The Holy Spirit is still in the business of revealing God is to his people. He is still leading his church into truth. It will not contradict the truth that he has stated in his word. But we need his revelations more and more.

            Jesus goes on and tells his disciples this

John 14:20 (NLT)

20 When I am raised to life again, you will know that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you.

            I love the picture of this. Jesus has already told us in verse 10 that he is in the father and the father is in him. But now he goes a step further and say you are in me and I am in you.

            The idea that Jesus is in us, is not a foreign idea. Again the you here is plural. He is in his church and we are a part of his church. We know from other places in scripture that he is in us as individuals. In fact that is what he is say in verse 18. The Spirit of God has been with you, but now he is going to be in you.

            Picture it this way. Jesus is in you. That is not a new revelation. You invite Jesus into your life. He takes up resident in your spirit by his Spirit. But he is also saying you are in him.

            Jesus is part of the Trinity. God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit. They are three yet one. They are in constant communication and conversation with each other. This is a mystical union. We don’t really understand how three can be one and one can be three. They are of one essence, yet different.

            But Jesus says, He is in us and we are him, and he is in the Trinity. He takes us into the midst of the Godhead. We are not God, but we are located in God, and we have communion with God, and we are friends of God, all because of what Jesus has done by his spirit.

            When I meditate on that it just blows my mind and it fills my heart.

            But I need to push on.

John 14:21 (NLT)

21 Those who accept my commandments and obey them are the ones who love me. And because they love me, my Father will love them. And I will love them and reveal myself to each of them.”

            I have been telling you that the word you, is plural all the way through this passage. But here the word “you” changes to singular.

            Jesus gets really personal. If you want to have a fresh revelation of Jesus, then love Jesus and do what he says.

            What this verse is not saying is that if you don’t obey God’s commands God doesn’t love you. God loves the whole world. We know from the rest of scripture that God’s love is not dependent on our behaviors.

            But this verse does seem to make it clear that there is a correlation between our obedience to Christ and the revelation of Christ.

            There does seem to be a correlation between showing our love for God by what we do, and our ability to see who God is.

            Philip starts off by saying “Show us the father and we will be satisfied.”

            Jesus says, if you get to know me, if you have seen me, you have seen the father. He goes on to say, you are going to see who God is through answered prayers and miracles. Not only that by I am going to send the Holy Spirit and he is going to lead you into all truth.

            Not only that I am going to take you into deep fellowship with me. I am going to take you right into the middle of the conversation of the trinity so that you can have fellowship with the God of the universe. You are me and I am in the father. You are going to see who God is because of your fellowship with him.

            I am going to do all that with your brothers and sisters in Christ. But if you really want a personal revelation of who I am; If you want me to speak into your deepest needs; If you want to really know me; then love me by obeying what I have told you – and when you do that I am going to reveal myself to you in deeper and deeper ways.

            There are a number of you who have a hunger to know God better. You want to see him more clearly. As I have been talking you can see what you need to do next.

            For some of you, it has been a while since you spent some time looking into Jesus life. I would encourage you to read the gospels, the first four books of the New Testament again and again, to see who Jesus really is. Read it through eyes of faith and it will make all the difference in your life.

            For others of you, I am hoping that God will show up through miracles, so that you can see part of who he is that way.

            For those of you who have trusted in Jesus, God has given you his Holy Spirit. Part of the revelation of God, is how God has shown himself to his people throughout history. Part of the work of the Holy Spirit is to lead you into all truth. Listen to him.

            But more than anything I would urge you to have fellowship with God. You are in Christ and Christ is in God and from there, let yourself be enveloped by his presence and his love. Walk into the position you already hold as a child of God, as one who is in Christ.

            And lastly, for some of you, you know there are some things in your life that keep God from revealing himself to you the way he wants to. You know what God is calling you to do, but you are not doing it. Obey what he commands and Jesus’ promise is that he will show up.

PRAYER

Lord, I ask this for each and every person, that they would know you, to whom to know right is life eternal.

“ If Good News in the Morning has been a factor in your journey of faith, we would love to hear your story. Nothing could encourage us more in this work.  Contact us by e-mail or Twitter via the web site –goodnewsinthemorning.ca

            And Thank you for listening this morning.

            This program is on the air by the grace of God and donations of many faithful people. A special thanks to Bruce Newman, who gave a shout out to Jericho Road Christian ministries.

            If you can help financially we would appreciate it. You can give by going to the website. Goodnewsinthemorning.ca

  If you can help financially we would really appreciate it. You can make a cheque payable to Good News Christian Ministries,  and send it to Box 184 , Rideau Ferry , On. K0G  1W0.

May you know   Jesus Christ personally and profoundly.  May the Holy Spirit reside deep within your heart .  And may the heavenly Father surround you with His constant and abiding and accompanying love

MUSIC – Be Thou My Vision – Selah 3:17

By Rev. Brent Russett

Pastor of Sunnyside Wesleyan Church in Ottawa:

http://www.sunnysidechurchottawa.com/   

_______________________________________________________ 

PODCAST LINK to the CFRA broadcast:

http://proxy.autopod.ca/podcasts/chum/6/52823/good_news_257_apr23.mp3

'TESTIFY TO THE GLORY OF GOD'

'DECLARING GOD'S GLORY

Rev. Brian Wilkie

By Rev. Brian Wilkie                                                                                    

Pastor of St. Andrew's Christian Community

Rockland, Ontario

http://www.rocklandchurch.ca/

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PODCAST LINK to CFRA broadcast - Sunday, February 12^th, 2017:

http://accm.ncf.ca/images/17.02.12.mp3

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Broadcast Notes:

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Welcome to Good News In the Morning a program of words and music bringing a Christian message of hope and encouragement to those who are looking for intelligent meaningful and spirited approach to faith and to life.

This program is sponsored by Good News Christian Ministries PO Box 184 Rideau Ferry, Ontario K0G 1W0. I'm your host today, Rev. Brian Wilkie of St. Andrew's Christian church in Rockland. As always I want to start by thanking you our listeners. We are so grateful for your encouragement and support. Please remember that you can always visit our website for materials to encourage and support you in your Christian walk.

If you miss an episode of the show you can go to our website and download the podcast or the MP3 of our broadcast. Details can be found on our website. www.GNCM.ca

Testify to the Glory of God

In my previous program I spoke about the Scriptures declaring the glory of God, and I want to focus today on the idea of 'Testimony;' the idea that we can testify to the glory of God and to see that as it has a central act that we as Christians can do.

The Bible is a collection of testimonies. In fact all history is a collection of testimonies about this, that and the other thing. The Bible collects the testimonies of prophets and kings and apostles to the greatness of God. I want to start by sharing a scripture about one of the most faithful witnesses, one who was called to announce the coming of God's Messiah, Jesus Christ.

This is the testimony concerning John the Baptist, who testified concerning the Son.

John 1:6–29 There came a man who was sent from God; his name was John. He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all men might believe. He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light. The true light that gives light to every man was coming into the world.

He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.

The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.

John testifies concerning him. He cries out, saying, “This was he of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.’ ” From the fullness of his grace we have all received one blessing after another. For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only,  who is at the Father’s side, has made him known.

Now this was John’s testimony when the Jews of Jerusalem sent priests and Levites to ask him who he was. He did not fail to confess, but confessed freely, “I am not the Christ.”

They asked him, “Then who are you? Are you Elijah?”

He said, “I am not.”

“Are you the Prophet?”

He answered, “No.”

Finally they said, “Who are you? Give us an answer to take back to those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?”

John replied in the words of Isaiah the prophet, “I am the voice of one calling in the desert, ‘Make straight the way for the Lord.’ ”

Now some Pharisees who had been sent questioned him, “Why then do you baptize if you are not the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet?”

“I baptize with water,” John replied, “but among you stands one you do not know. He is the one who comes after me, the thongs of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie.”

This all happened at Bethany on the other side of the Jordan, where John was baptizing.

The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, “Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!"

There we have the testimony of John. I'm going to explore the theme of testimony in a few moments but let's listen to a testimony of Praise with the song "Lord I Lift Your Name on High" sung by the Maranthan Praise Band from "WOW: A Decade of Worship".

1) Marantha Praise Band, Lord I lift your name on High, Decade of Worship, 2.24

We have just listened to the song, 'Lord I Lift Your Name on High' and the name of the Lord is lifted on high in scripture written as a record of God's words and deeds. Testimony is how we gain evidence in almost every endeavor of life. We learn mostly from the testimony of others even in fields such as science, where we can do experiments and so on, yet we still depend on other people telling us what experiments they've done and what conclusions they have come to.  We rely on learning from others, from their experiences and, yes, in many cases we test those testimonies. We check to see whether the people are actually telling us the facts or whether the  facts are distorted in some way. In fact one of the great issues in civil society is the issue with false testimony. In Moses' law, in the Ten Commandments we have this command. "you shall not bear false witness." That phrase has been taken to be a general term prohibition on lying. It probably meant, more narrowly, that when you are giving testimony in a court, or  in some kind of a case, that you shouldn't lie about the events that are bringing a judgement on somebody else. It does apply far more generally to the idea that we shouldn't say something that is not true; something that is not in our experience.

People can bear false witness and do great damage to others by that false witness, either by leading people to put their hope in something that really can give no hope, or by accusing others and making them subject to investigation and  prosecution because they've said something false about them. Even the taunting of bullies and brutes can be, and is most often false testimony, where they highlight a supposed character flaw of somebody and make it into a false description of that person's value.

False witness does a lot of damage but true witness does a lot of healing and a lot of repair.

True Witnesses is how we come to know how the world around us works. I remember being in science class when we had the opportunity to test the theory of gravity. We would have a timer that would mark a strip of paper and we'd drop a weight attached to the paper. You'd see that the object kept going faster and faster as the dots on the paper grew father apart. Well, we were able to test the testimony of the scientists who told us that, "Acceleration happens at 9.8 meters per second squared."

But most of the things that I learned in science I couldn't test myself:  I didn't have the equipment or the opportunity. I can't, like one of the Astronauts, like Neil Armstrong, who back in the day who could look back at the at the beautiful globe of Earth from space and tell us and show us by photographic evidence what he had seen. His testimony was confirmed by that evidence and we were able to see something about the world that we couldn't have seen ourselves. I'm afraid it would just be too expensive for all of us to go up in a space ship and get that same view, so we rely on the testimony of others.

This is even more true about relationship with God, because we learned about God not only from how he works in our life but how he has worked in the lives of others.

Sometimes we wish we lived other people's lives that we saw the things that that the people of Israel saw when they were in the desert; we wish that we had were there when Jesus healed the sick. Jesus came in a particular time and place. One of the limits of God becoming flesh was it instead of being everywhere all at once the evidence of his presence was there in the land of Judea, at particular times and places and the witnesses that saw it there were privileged to have have a special access to see the deeds of God.

But they testified! and they testified truly. They testify all about the way he healed the sick they recalled his teachings and passed them on to us. They described to us through the gospels, they describe to us the wonder of who Jesus was. So that we too can recognize Jesus -  not recognizing facial features or style of hair but by recognizing the character and person of God through the testimony of others.

We are indeed greatly blessed to have the testimony of scriptures, the testimony of Believers, people who became Believers because of what they saw - and then told the story of what had changed their life. Was Matthew a believer when he sat at the tax collector's table and worked as a flunky for Rome, against his own people? No, no. Matthew was just an outcast Jew going his own way through life, trying to make meaning out of money. But he met Jesus. Jesus called him and Jesus changed his life. Matthew then shares his testimony as he not only shares his own story, but all the testimony he gathered from the other disciples and from searching the scriptures to confirm the prophecies about Jesus. He shares this testimony in The Gospel according to Matthew. Likewise with Mark, Luke and John and in the book of Acts, as Luke shares about what God did through the people of the church, the Believers, all those days. When God reached people he didn't reach them just for their own sake. When God healed people, he did heal them because of his love for them as individuals, but he also healed them so the testimony of that healing would give hope to those of us who suffer today and through all the generations. Jesus was not being playing favorites when he came in the year that we now call year 30 or 33 AD when he was doing his ministry. He wasn't playing favourites with that time and place. Instead what he did there was for all people, for all time. and we have that testimony that communicates his blessing to us in the present day.

We're going to look at even more of this and talk about our own testimony in a few moments but I do want, again, to hear the praise of others as they do declare how praising God is the theme of their life, and how it blesses their life. So this is the band FFH singing "When I Praise" from WOW Worship album, 2001.

 Now the Scriptures tell us so many different testimonies: the testimonies of Apostles and Prophets and Kings and regular people in the land of Israel, in various times and through the Roman Empire as the Gospel Spreads. But maybe some people think they don't have a testimony. Maybe you think you don't have a testimony. It's possible that at this point in your journey, in this story of your life, you may not have recognized God's hand in your life yet. I want to assure you that God is at work. The testimony of the Scriptures and the testimony of people through the ages tells us that God loves all people. There is not one person who has fallen out of his sight. Jesus, himself, whose testimony about God is confirmed by his resurrection from the dead and the wonderful works that God did through him, he testifies concerning his Father saying, "Take a look at the birds of the air, They don't sew and they don't reap, but the Father provides for each one of them." He says, "Isn't a sparrow is worth a tiny amount of money, but not one of them falls to the ground without the Father noticing. And be assured of this," Jesus says. "You are worth more than many sparrows."

You may not recognize your testimony yet, as you go through some difficulties in life, but as you allow God to work in your life; even after crying out and you haven't felt any different; even after long trials you will find That God is faithful and he will be with you.

There was a woman who was in need of healing and the scriptures tell us that she had been sick for 18 years. She was afraid that Jesus wouldn't want to heal her; that she was somehow outcast from God and she'd have to steal that healing from Jesus, so she snuck up and touched just the hem of his robe. Jesus knew that she had done that and turned to her. Instead of accusing her and taking back what she had received - for she had received healing at that time - he said, "Your many sins are forgiven." He wanted her to know that she didn't need to steal healing from Jesus that even after all those years of suffering, God had not abandoned her.

I know how many testimonies come through a millstone, come through a grinding and a very difficult period of life, and I pray that you will have the patience and endurance to find the way the story of your life leads to God's help and God's salvation.

Other people may bear false testimony. They may in fact have been helped by God in many ways, but they forgot in all the goodness of God towards them. They've kept a hold on all the grievances and bitterness and they only tell how terrible things have been. Let's not be that kind of person. Let's be like the singer says, the people who count our blessings instead of sheep. That we would be able to recognize the truth that God has been with us; that even though we have suffered; even as the Jesus, himself, quoted Psalm 22 when he said, "My God my God why have you forsaken me?" He quotes a Psalm which then goes on to talk about the difficulties and sufferings the Psalmist experienced and then how God finally lifted up the Psalmist. Jesus in quoting that Psalm not the only points to the prophecy of that Psalm concerning his own suffering but he also points to the faithfulness of God in the midst of suffering.

So you have a testimony and you will have a testimony when you see your life from the Divine perspective. Paul, himself, describes his life in these ways as he speaks to the Christians at Corinth, in his second letter.

(2 Co 4:7–15). But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that his life may be revealed in our mortal body. So then, death is at work in us, but life is at work in you.

It is written: “I believed; therefore I have spoken.” With that same spirit of faith we also believe and therefore speak, because we know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus from the dead will also raise us with Jesus and present us with you in his presence. All this is for your benefit, so that the grace that is reaching more and more people may cause thanksgiving to overflow to the glory of God.

Do you hear what Paul speaks about his testimony? Crushed, pressed, persecuted and struck down. That his testimony, he realizes that the difficulties he's going through will be an encouragement to the other Christians, the people that he's ministering to, because they will see the God sustains him even through these difficulties and be strengthened to face the difficulties of their own lives. God's glorious working can be found even in our hardships as he sustains us in the midst of our trials.

Let's pray and ask God to help us see our testimony and to share our testimony with others.

Almighty God, help us to see your hand. If we have seen you, if we have noticed your work then we have a testimony. We're able to say that the Lord is with us; the Lord has helped us! The Lord has sustained us!

Help us to see your glory and to be able to declare your glory to others. We pray this in Jesus' name, Amen.

Once again I want to thank you our listeners for your encouragement and support. We do thank you because you keep us on the air week by week. We want to encourage you to support our ministry financially if you can.  Our Broadcast is reaching over 7,000 listeners week by week and on the web we are able to reach people throughout the globe. So if you can make a cheque to Good News Christian Ministries and send it to P.O. Box 184 Rideau Ferry, Ontario K0G 1W0  we will be able to continue and bless others with his ministry. You'll be a partner in our ministry in this way. I also want to encourage you to tell others about this program so they can hear the good news the comes on Sunday mornings in the show.

Be sure to worship in a church where the gospel is soundly proclaimed and lived out with compassion, integrity and resolve. Now to conclude our program I'd like to have you listen to a song called Indescribable, speaking about the Indescribable glory of God, sung by Avalon from the WOW Worship Aqua album.

I do pray that the Lord will hold your heart and you would know Jesus personally and profoundly. May the Holy Spirit reside deep within your heart, may the heavenly Father surround you with his constant and abiding and accompanying love.

Good News In The Morning is produced in the Studios of News Talk Radio 580 CFRA.

Rev. Brian Wilkie

St. Andrew's Christian Community, Rockland, Ontario

http://www.rocklandchurch.ca

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To listen to the above broadcast, click on the following link:

http://accm.ncf.ca/images/17.02.12.mp3