Brother Gary Rowlette brought the revival message.
“Seems” is never “seems” when the Lord is near. No one knows you better than God. No one knows what you deal with day by day. God is not far away, it just seems as if he is.
Psalm 139:23 “Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts:
24 and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.”
God knows us. In verse 1 David declares “LORD, thou hast searched me, and known me.” Verses 2- 3 say “Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising, thou understandest my thought afar off. Thou compassest my path and my lying down, and art acquainted with all my ways.” Better than we know ourselves, better than our mother knows us—God knows us. This is almost more than we can comprehend. In Psalm 8 David says “When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; what is man, that thou art mindful of him?” David was overwhelmed. He looked around at the universe knowing God made it and knew God made him too. It makes you sleep better knowing this same God is in control of it all. No wonder he asked why God was mindful of him. Scientists say the moon is 240 million miles away. We stand and look at it. In perspective, the earth is like a basket ball and the moon like a tennis ball. It is 2,160 miles wide. The sun is 93 million miles away from the earth. It is 109 times larger than the earth and the temperature is 27 million degrees. It would burn us, but God made it all with the work of his fingers and set it into the firmament.
Hebrews says God is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of our heart. Look at verse 4 in Psalm 139. “For there is not a word in my tongue, but, lo, O LORD, thou knowest it altogether.” There are 5,000 languages and dialects. We certainly don’t know them all, but God does. He hears us when we cry; he knows all our situations. He who knows the most loves the most. Every word we speak is known to him. In verse 5 he says “Thou hast beset me behind and before, and laid thine hand upon me.” Satan tries to get the upper hand on us. God has limitations on him. He knows what we need before we even ask him. When thinking of it all, David said “such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain unto it.”
God is not far away. In our troubles we may think he is. Satan takes advantage of it. Remember the Lord said he’d never leave us or forsake us. He is our helper. Verse 7 says “Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence?” We are never out of his presence, for he is everywhere. Cain tried to flee the presence of God. He found out that he couldn’t out run the Lord. It can’t be done. He’s never far away. David said “If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me.” There, even there, we find the Lord, and he will lead us. God doesn’t send us out; he goes with us.
In our temptations and trials he is with us. Notice what the Lord said to Noah in Genesis 7:1. “And the LORD said unto Noah, Come thou and all thy house into the ark.” He didn’t say “go” into thet ark. He said “come.” He’s goes before us and with us. The king threw three men into the furnace, but saw four in there.
Elijah wanted to die in the wilderness. The Lord wasn’t finished with him. Times get can dark for us. David said “Surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me. Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to thee.” In all our experiences and phases we can trust the Lord. Darkness and light are the same to him, and he sees it all.
The Lord knew us at conception. David said he covers us in the womb. Parents get their first look at a baby with a sonogram. They have to wait a certain amount of weeks. God knew us at the beginning. He was not far away even there. No wonder David said we are fearfully and wonderfully made. We are not hid from him.
In John chapter 1 we find Nathaniel under a tree. Philip told him to come see the Messiah; he was from Nazareth. Nathaniel said can anything good come from Nazareth? John says “Jesus saw Nathanael coming to him, and saith of him, Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile! Nathanael saith unto him, Whence knowest thou me? Jesus answered and said unto him, Before that Philip called thee, when thou wast under the fig tree, I saw thee.”
God knows us. He is not far away.
Adwolfe Freewill Baptist Church 