₦Sermon 41
WILL YOU BE FAITHFUL AT A TIME OF TROUBLES?
Indeed, the Lord will not always reject us. Though he causes grief, his compassion abounds according to his gracious love — Lam. 3:32
Scriptures – Psalm 77, Lam. 3:32, Isaiah 50:10
Praise God, Almighty father who gives victory over tragedies that befall on man. Shall we sing this hymn together?
When peace, like a river, attendeth my way
When sorrows like sea billows roll;
Whatever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say
It is well; it is well with my soul
Refrain:
It is well; it is well, with my soul, with my soul,
It is well; it is well with my soul.
Brethren, we should not forget one important thing in life. Any man born of a woman is full of troubles and sorrows. It is a normal thing that at times happens to a man. Believers of God should always expect both good and bad which may at any time befall on a man on earth any time. They ought to anticipate or envision trials and temptations for the reason that when such variables are anticipated beforehand, it will amply help to curb them and escape from the dreadful trap of Satan. Though Satan may rejoice that he has done a great mishap on you, but as a Christian, such temptations or trials you pass through have positive effects as they enhance and strengthen your faith in God.
It has been discovered under a sun that it is very easy to preach about this but when troubles come into our ways — when sorrows like sea billows roll, we feel that God has abandoned us and then look for an alternative means to solve our problems. Look, God really wants us to trust him especially, when there are tempest, sorrows, grief and all sorts of tragedies. The fact is that, can we be trusted at a time of troubles?
I remember the wife of a Priest who for so many years of their marital lives could not have an issue. This became a trial in the life of the woman to the extent that a pagan woman who was grieved and pitied for such pathetic situation came to her — the priest’s wife suggesting that she would like to take her to a native doctor for the cure of barrenness. However, after some lengthy debate whether to go or not, the priest’s wife consented to the demands of the fellow woman. They went to see the native doctor and the man was surprised to see a priest’s wife coming to his shrine for the cure of barrenness. He asked her: “Woman, are you tired of praying without any answer from your God? You have made all my spirit gods to run away because of your Holy Ghost fire! Now to help you out of your predicament and quandary, go to your house or so called temple and bring your bible, the native doctor yelled. The woman ran and brought her bible. The native doctor took the bible and laid it down on the ground. As he was invoking his spirit gods, he at the same time placed his left leg on the bible on the bare land. However, this woman did not know that her prayers have been answered by God. She was pregnant without noticing it. God allowed the blood to flush away through bleeding because the woman would take His glory to something else (gods).
You see that the priest’s wife forgot what God has promised His children: “There will be no miscarriage or infertility in your land”— Exodus 23:26. Why should we allow people to make nasty suggestions that are capable of destroying our lives? If we critically look at the circumstances that Job passed through, it is very conspicuous to say he is a man of faith who did not quit his belief as trials besieged him and his entire household. He suffers from a terrible skin disease. He loses his children, and his friends run away because of his stenching and rotten body and consequently his wife challenges him and makes a silly proposition that he should curse his God and die.
I want to tell you this very moment that a faithful servant of God usually regains everything he loses. Because when God has found Job as a man of faith and integrity, he richly blessed him by giving him other children, restoring his health, property and even prolonging his life. Bear it in mind that as Job is in this chronic mess, his friends try to tell him that it is his sin that is causing his problem. Temptation comes to anyone either righteous or unrighteous.
Also in view of the challenges that Asaph (a Levite, one of the leaders of King David’s choir and a seer — 1 Chronicle 6:39, 29:30) passed through when the sea billows roll in his household in particular and in the entire city of Israel in general, the Psalmist’s predicament in the scripture — Psalm 77, really exemplifies how we as Christians should solely depend on God for help at a time of troubles. Asaph acknowledges that God the Creator of the whole universe answers prayers.
At times, one would clandestinely or secretly go to the House of God and tender his or her prayers but the trouble that Asaph is passing through seems that he is about to be drowned in it. Consequently, it makes him sorrowful and his prayers are not given immediate answers. Then he begins to yell out piteous cries in a loud voice. Asaph begins to meditate and think of God’s mercy. He moans and becomes overwhelmed with longing for help. He sobs with tears and sorrows. Every night he comes to God in prayer. Probably he reduces to his knees and raises his hands toward heaven, the city of God. He prays in the midnight, a time he deems fit that the glory of God rests on the earth to watch over his sleeping children, a time men of faith ought to stay awake and pray against every power of darkness militating against them. As his midnight prayers continue for some days, it seems to him that no immediate responses are coming from heaven and it behooves him to ask some rhetorical questions, though the answers are known by God only. Hear him: Has the Lord rejected me forever? Will he never again be kind to me? Is his unfailing love gone forever? Have his promises permanently failed? Has God forgotten to be gracious? Has he slammed the door on his compassion? – Psalm 77: 7 – 9 NLT.
Asaph’s rhetorical questions come out from his inner disquieting soul that roams from the imagination of sorrows. The sorrow at heart equips him enormously to ask logical but emotional questions. One thing we credit Asaph with is that when it apparently dawned on him, that his prayers are not yet answered, he forgets about his personal worries and comes to resolution that it’s his fate. No one or a powerful prayer warrior could pray like him with faith and God does nothing to show his gracious mercy to him. He really fathoms out that the hand of God is against him, a presumption people usually conceive when their prayers are not answered. They often condemn themselves as the worst sinners making endless confession believing that through their confession, God will have answers to their prayers. Thus, Asaph diversifies his method of prayer to ensure his prayer is answered. If it were some Africans, they would have said their enemies are bringing hindrance to them, but Asaph acknowledges that there is no one keeping his prayers unanswered than the hand of God that is against him. This presumption did not stop him from believing God and his glorious power. It rather makes him to cast his mind back in remembrance of glorious deeds of God in the ages past, his wondrous deeds to rescue Israelites from the enslavement of Pharaoh and how the Red Sea saw him, its waters trembled and the Sea quaked to its very depths and made a victorious pathway for his children to cross over to their promised land.
Thus, Asaph’s power of using flash-back as a good element of prayer heightens and reinforces his faith that if the unchangeable God, the ark of salvation would deliver the Israelites from the Red Sea, he will surely deliver him out of his problems.
The message Asaph conveys here is when troubles strike and blow, we ought to run to God for solutions. When we ask and receive no immediate answers, we should look unto God steadfastly and should not turn away from him. As a merciful and unchangeable God, we should retract his merciful deeds unto us from ages past and bring them forward and anchor our faith in him. Surely, he will put to an end the trouble lurking against the desires of our souls. Let us not have a diversified mind which may be distorted by Satan to turn away from God. More importantly, we should not forget the days of God’s favour in the ages past when we are pouring out our sorrows unto God. This is what Asaph did. He prays earnestly and could not get speedy replies from God. He then casts his mind back in remembrance of how God through Moses and Aaron delivered the Israelites from a big mess of Red Sea. Such remembrance becomes a powerful tool for reinforcement of his faith. Thus, we ought not to forget what God has done for us because of seeming troubles we’re passing through. There is God who works in our infirmities and when this is considerably put in place, it will help to suppress the spirit of unbelief in us.
Some hideous circumstances may rise against us and cause us to call upon God in a crying mood. Barrenness may be one of them. Hannah with her seeming barrenness is taunted by Peninnah. This makes her to sob with tears for God’s help. The derision weakens her heart from saying her prayers out because she has a contrite spirit and is crushed at heart.
Now the question is — have you been lashed with a verbal abuse and provoked by anyone because of your social, health and or marital challenges? As Hannah is so faithful and God answers her, the same God will also have answers to your petitions.
What is troubling you? What is causing you to weep day and night? If we could learn from the manner of approach which the Psalmist Asaph adopted, God who is so faithful in everything will hear our cries. He says we should make thankfulness our sacrifice to Him and keep the vows we made to the Most High, and then when we call on Him at a time of our troubles, he will answer and rescue us —Psalm 50: 14 – 15.
Brethren let us learn how to be faithful at a time of our trials and God will show us a way of escape. May God see you through and speak to your situation! Before I leave, let us meditate on this Hymn what a friend we have in Jesus in stanza two.
Have we trials and temptations?
Is there trouble anywhere?
We should never be discouraged
Take it to the Lord in prayer.
Can we find a friend so faithful?
Who will all our sorrows share?
Jesus knows our every weakness
Take it to the Lord in prayer.
In the lyrics of Nathaniel Bassey, he has this to offer to the community of believers –
I may not know what you are going through today,
The sorrows, the hardship, the pain
But though the mountains crumble
And the oceans rage
And war against my soul, the devil may wage
Though the tempest has turned my smile upside down
And my life a river of sorrows in which I drown
Yet will I stand
Unshaken, for as long as it lasts
Faithful is He that promised and it shall come to pass
If God be for us
Then who can stand against
The God who spoke all the earth into form
He said let there be light
Let it be bright
Let there be day
Let there be night
Out of the sound of his voice
Birds, fish and trees did come
The mountains be melt like wax The hills skip like young cows
At the sound of the voice of God
That we serve
Our help in ages past
Our hope for years to come
Besides thee Oh Lord, we have
No other God.
Our prayer is that let us continue to be faithful and may the very good God illumine us at all time. God bless you.
—————Meditation Point———————
LORD may I remain faithful unto you so that it may be said to me blessed is he that endureth trials and temptation and let the crown of eternal life be given to me through the name of Jesus Christ, amen!
WILL YOU BE FAITHFUL AT A TIME OF TROUBLES?
Indeed, the Lord will not always reject us. Though he causes grief, his compassion abounds according to his gracious love — Lam. 3:32
Scriptures – Psalm 77, Lam. 3:32, Isaiah 50:10
Praise God, Almighty father who gives victory over tragedies that befall on man. Shall we sing this hymn together?
When peace, like a river, attendeth my way
When sorrows like sea billows roll;
Whatever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say
It is well; it is well with my soul
Refrain:
It is well; it is well, with my soul, with my soul,
It is well; it is well with my soul.
Brethren, we should not forget one important thing in life. Any man born of a woman is full of troubles and sorrows. It is a normal thing that at times happens to a man. Believers of God should always expect both good and bad which may at any time befall on a man on earth any time. They ought to anticipate or envision trials and temptations for the reason that when such variables are anticipated beforehand, it will amply help to curb them and escape from the dreadful trap of Satan. Though Satan may rejoice that he has done a great mishap on you, but as a Christian, such temptations or trials you pass through have positive effects as they enhance and strengthen your faith in God.
It has been discovered under a sun that it is very easy to preach about this but when troubles come into our ways — when sorrows like sea billows roll, we feel that God has abandoned us and then look for an alternative means to solve our problems. Look, God really wants us to trust him especially, when there are tempest, sorrows, grief and all sorts of tragedies. The fact is that, can we be trusted at a time of troubles?
I remember the wife of a Priest who for so many years of their marital lives could not have an issue. This became a trial in the life of the woman to the extent that a pagan woman who was grieved and pitied for such pathetic situation came to her — the priest’s wife suggesting that she would like to take her to a native doctor for the cure of barrenness. However, after some lengthy debate whether to go or not, the priest’s wife consented to the demands of the fellow woman. They went to see the native doctor and the man was surprised to see a priest’s wife coming to his shrine for the cure of barrenness. He asked her: “Woman, are you tired of praying without any answer from your God? You have made all my spirit gods to run away because of your Holy Ghost fire! Now to help you out of your predicament and quandary, go to your house or so called temple and bring your bible, the native doctor yelled. The woman ran and brought her bible. The native doctor took the bible and laid it down on the ground. As he was invoking his spirit gods, he at the same time placed his left leg on the bible on the bare land. However, this woman did not know that her prayers have been answered by God. She was pregnant without noticing it. God allowed the blood to flush away through bleeding because the woman would take His glory to something else (gods).
You see that the priest’s wife forgot what God has promised His children: “There will be no miscarriage or infertility in your land”— Exodus 23:26. Why should we allow people to make nasty suggestions that are capable of destroying our lives? If we critically look at the circumstances that Job passed through, it is very conspicuous to say he is a man of faith who did not quit his belief as trials besieged him and his entire household. He suffers from a terrible skin disease. He loses his children, and his friends run away because of his stenching and rotten body and consequently his wife challenges him and makes a silly proposition that he should curse his God and die.
I want to tell you this very moment that a faithful servant of God usually regains everything he loses. Because when God has found Job as a man of faith and integrity, he richly blessed him by giving him other children, restoring his health, property and even prolonging his life. Bear it in mind that as Job is in this chronic mess, his friends try to tell him that it is his sin that is causing his problem. Temptation comes to anyone either righteous or unrighteous.
Also in view of the challenges that Asaph (a Levite, one of the leaders of King David’s choir and a seer — 1 Chronicle 6:39, 29:30) passed through when the sea billows roll in his household in particular and in the entire city of Israel in general, the Psalmist’s predicament in the scripture — Psalm 77, really exemplifies how we as Christians should solely depend on God for help at a time of troubles. Asaph acknowledges that God the Creator of the whole universe answers prayers.
At times, one would clandestinely or secretly go to the House of God and tender his or her prayers but the trouble that Asaph is passing through seems that he is about to be drowned in it. Consequently, it makes him sorrowful and his prayers are not given immediate answers. Then he begins to yell out piteous cries in a loud voice. Asaph begins to meditate and think of God’s mercy. He moans and becomes overwhelmed with longing for help. He sobs with tears and sorrows. Every night he comes to God in prayer. Probably he reduces to his knees and raises his hands toward heaven, the city of God. He prays in the midnight, a time he deems fit that the glory of God rests on the earth to watch over his sleeping children, a time men of faith ought to stay awake and pray against every power of darkness militating against them. As his midnight prayers continue for some days, it seems to him that no immediate responses are coming from heaven and it behooves him to ask some rhetorical questions, though the answers are known by God only. Hear him: Has the Lord rejected me forever? Will he never again be kind to me? Is his unfailing love gone forever? Have his promises permanently failed? Has God forgotten to be gracious? Has he slammed the door on his compassion? – Psalm 77: 7 – 9 NLT.
Asaph’s rhetorical questions come out from his inner disquieting soul that roams from the imagination of sorrows. The sorrow at heart equips him enormously to ask logical but emotional questions. One thing we credit Asaph with is that when it apparently dawned on him, that his prayers are not yet answered, he forgets about his personal worries and comes to resolution that it’s his fate. No one or a powerful prayer warrior could pray like him with faith and God does nothing to show his gracious mercy to him. He really fathoms out that the hand of God is against him, a presumption people usually conceive when their prayers are not answered. They often condemn themselves as the worst sinners making endless confession believing that through their confession, God will have answers to their prayers. Thus, Asaph diversifies his method of prayer to ensure his prayer is answered. If it were some Africans, they would have said their enemies are bringing hindrance to them, but Asaph acknowledges that there is no one keeping his prayers unanswered than the hand of God that is against him. This presumption did not stop him from believing God and his glorious power. It rather makes him to cast his mind back in remembrance of glorious deeds of God in the ages past, his wondrous deeds to rescue Israelites from the enslavement of Pharaoh and how the Red Sea saw him, its waters trembled and the Sea quaked to its very depths and made a victorious pathway for his children to cross over to their promised land.
Thus, Asaph’s power of using flash-back as a good element of prayer heightens and reinforces his faith that if the unchangeable God, the ark of salvation would deliver the Israelites from the Red Sea, he will surely deliver him out of his problems.
The message Asaph conveys here is when troubles strike and blow, we ought to run to God for solutions. When we ask and receive no immediate answers, we should look unto God steadfastly and should not turn away from him. As a merciful and unchangeable God, we should retract his merciful deeds unto us from ages past and bring them forward and anchor our faith in him. Surely, he will put to an end the trouble lurking against the desires of our souls. Let us not have a diversified mind which may be distorted by Satan to turn away from God. More importantly, we should not forget the days of God’s favour in the ages past when we are pouring out our sorrows unto God. This is what Asaph did. He prays earnestly and could not get speedy replies from God. He then casts his mind back in remembrance of how God through Moses and Aaron delivered the Israelites from a big mess of Red Sea. Such remembrance becomes a powerful tool for reinforcement of his faith. Thus, we ought not to forget what God has done for us because of seeming troubles we’re passing through. There is God who works in our infirmities and when this is considerably put in place, it will help to suppress the spirit of unbelief in us.
Some hideous circumstances may rise against us and cause us to call upon God in a crying mood. Barrenness may be one of them. Hannah with her seeming barrenness is taunted by Peninnah. This makes her to sob with tears for God’s help. The derision weakens her heart from saying her prayers out because she has a contrite spirit and is crushed at heart.
Now the question is — have you been lashed with a verbal abuse and provoked by anyone because of your social, health and or marital challenges? As Hannah is so faithful and God answers her, the same God will also have answers to your petitions.
What is troubling you? What is causing you to weep day and night? If we could learn from the manner of approach which the Psalmist Asaph adopted, God who is so faithful in everything will hear our cries. He says we should make thankfulness our sacrifice to Him and keep the vows we made to the Most High, and then when we call on Him at a time of our troubles, he will answer and rescue us —Psalm 50: 14 – 15.
Brethren let us learn how to be faithful at a time of our trials and God will show us a way of escape. May God see you through and speak to your situation! Before I leave, let us meditate on this Hymn what a friend we have in Jesus in stanza two.
Have we trials and temptations?
Is there trouble anywhere?
We should never be discouraged
Take it to the Lord in prayer.
Can we find a friend so faithful?
Who will all our sorrows share?
Jesus knows our every weakness
Take it to the Lord in prayer.
In the lyrics of Nathaniel Bassey, he has this to offer to the community of believers –
I may not know what you are going through today,
The sorrows, the hardship, the pain
But though the mountains crumble
And the oceans rage
And war against my soul, the devil may wage
Though the tempest has turned my smile upside down
And my life a river of sorrows in which I drown
Yet will I stand
Unshaken, for as long as it lasts
Faithful is He that promised and it shall come to pass
If God be for us
Then who can stand against
The God who spoke all the earth into form
He said let there be light
Let it be bright
Let there be day
Let there be night
Out of the sound of his voice
Birds, fish and trees did come
The mountains be melt like wax The hills skip like young cows
At the sound of the voice of God
That we serve
Our help in ages past
Our hope for years to come
Besides thee Oh Lord, we have
No other God.
Our prayer is that let us continue to be faithful and may the very good God illumine us at all time. God bless you.
—————Meditation Point———————
LORD may I remain faithful unto you so that it may be said to me blessed is he that endureth trials and temptation and let the crown of eternal life be given to me through the name of Jesus Christ, amen!
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