If It Had Not Been the Lord

[00:00:00] Speaker A: Father God in heaven, we ask and pray, lord, that you'd bless the remainder of this service. We thank you so much, dear Lord, for everyone who's here. We thank you most of all for Jesus. Hallelujah. Thank you, dear God, for your amazing grace. Thank you, dear God, for being so good to us. Thank you to God for the blessings for 51 years, Lord, for this congregation, for this church, for this lighthouse to be in this part of the world, shining all around the globe. Pray, dear God, that we would be faithful, dear God, to the calling that you've given to us, dear Lord, and that, Lord, that we would keep our eyes riveted, dear God, on you. In Jesus name I pray. Amen. Psalms 124. A song of decrees of David. It's literally a psalm for praise, for deliverance from his enemies. You know, whenever you read through the book of psalms, man, sometimes it's like you're thinking, wow, is this some sort of song or chant that you would do in your worship? Or. Obviously, this is a prayer, and so there's a multitude of different things when you read through the book of Psalms, and they're not all the same. That's why it's so important when you read them, that you read them, and you're reading them and say, God. All right, I want you to speak to my heart, but also give me some understanding. When I read this, I like what it says in verse number one. If it had not been the Lord who is on our side now, we could stop right there. If it had not been for the Lord who was on our side, 51 years would not have transpired for choice Hills Baptist church. If it had not been for the Lord who was on our side individually here, man, where would we be right now? Man, we look at our life and we stop and think about all of the benefits that God has graciously given to each and every one of us. And yet, David, no doubt, has some things in mind that he's thinking about. And I've said on many occasions, when you're preaching through the book of Psalms, it would be a wonderful thing if somehow or another, you were giving some insight. What was it that inspired David for you to say these words? Or what was it that you were actually going through when you spoke these things? You know, we don't always know what those exact moments were that prompted David to write these words down. But I like to say that when he said, if it had not been the Lord who was on our side, and I want to say this, that first of all, I see David giving all glory and honor to the Lord for everything that is done in his life. And I want to talk for a few moments this afternoon about the benefits and blessings of remembering all the great things that God has done. When I got saved in 1982 out of the United States Air Force and came back here to Greenville, South Carolina, of course, my mom was already coming to choice Hills Baptist church. And immediately I was wanting to find a good church that I could get plugged into, that I could serve in, that I could be a part of. And I just remember coming here, and Pastor Craig was my kind of preacher boy. I mean, he just kind of put it out there plain. He put it out there where everybody could get something out of that cookie jar. And he was crazy, and I liked that, you know, and it appealed to me, and. [00:03:25] Speaker B: But I wasn't really sure that Choice. [00:03:27] Speaker A: Hills was the church where I was supposed to be at. And so I went around and visited a few other churches. And after visiting a few other churches, I really found out that choice Hills was the very place that God wanted me to be at. And so it was, I think, probably sometime in July or maybe August that I became a member here at Choice Hills Baptist church. And I normally would be either seated right down there on that front row or right over here. I was always on that front row there because I was wanting to glean everything that the preacher was going to have to say. Man, I just wanted to soak it up like a sponge because I knew the hell that God had saved me from. I knew that. [00:04:05] Speaker B: How? [00:04:06] Speaker A: That I was so lost and undone in my life that I was searching for everything that the world had to offer. But I was just coming up empty in my life. And I want to tell you something right now. If you're a saved child of God here today, there is really no peace. There's no contentment. There's no happiness in the things of the world until you and I do something. And that is until you and I come and surrender our hearts and lives to the Lord. And let's just be honest about it. It's not a one time surrenderance that needs to take place in our life, but it's a daily surrenderance to God. Think about the last time that you said this to God. I love you, Lord. When's the last time that you just said that? I was praying last night as I was thinking about this message. And, you know, I try to encourage people everywhere we go and minister to say, you know what? Don't let a day go by without saying to God, I love you. And yet, can I be a little transparent with you today? Whenever I say, God, I love you, I feel like that my love for the Lord is somewhat shallow. I feel like whenever Jesus looked at Peter and says, peter, lovest thou me more than these. And Peter says, yea, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee. And yet Jesus, when he was saying that to Peter, he just wasn't simply throwing out a word, saying, peter, do you really love me with that agape type of love, that self sacrificing type of love? He says, peter, do you love me with that agape love? And Peter says, lord, you know that I only love you with a filio type of love. I love you like somebody would love a friend. Rob, sometimes when I say, God, I love you, I know that God can see my heart. And I know that in reality, my love for Jesus is like I have for some friend, like it should be. Do you love me, Peter? Do you even love me? Jesus said, even as a friend. And Peter said, lord, thou knowest that I'm a fond of you, that I like you. What would Jesus say to us this afternoon? Do you have that self sacrificing love for him? I do nothing. I need to dedicate my heart and life every day to the Lord. There are so many things in this life that will compete for that love. And I will say that if Jesus said that to Peter, don't you think he might even say that to you and I today? Do you really love me? Believers at Choice Hills Baptist Church. David said in psalms 124, if it hadn't been for the fact that the Lord, he's the one that's on our side. Notice what he says now. May Israel say. I want to say it's easy to remember all the bad things in life, but the path of success and victory is to dwell on the good God. You are with us, every one of you here today. God is with you. Benjamin, God's with you, man. [00:08:58] Speaker B: Joseph, God's with you. He's with every one of us here. There's not a one of you here. [00:09:03] Speaker A: Today that you're just simply making it on your own, and you're just simply by yourself. God, in his mercy and his grace, he seeks to wrap his arms about us and draw us ever so closer to him. And I think that David is wanting to, not only to remind himself, but. [00:09:21] Speaker B: He'S also wanting to remind the people of Israel of the goodness and greatness of God in their life and in their past. [00:09:33] Speaker A: First thing that I see that he's wanting to give, first of all, all glory and honor to God. And second of all, he's wanting to remind them that God is full of you today in verse number one when he says that now, if it had not been the Lord who was on our side, notice this now may Israel say, a person of faith will be a person who looks at life and believes that regardless of the circumstances, praise God. God's going to see us through, not just when things are good, but in. [00:10:15] Speaker B: All things, in trials and tests. It is God who is for us. You know, God nowhere promises in his word that if you and I will dedicate our hearts and lives to him, that life is going to be free from obstacles and trials and difficulties. Matter of fact, everybody that I read about in the Bible, they all go through obstacles and trials and difficulties of life. [00:10:39] Speaker A: You know, those are those experiences. And, you know, and as a preacher, a minister, I find myself continually going. [00:10:47] Speaker B: Back and rehearsing the fact of God's. [00:10:50] Speaker A: Goodness in my life because of my. [00:10:52] Speaker B: Daily walk and experiences with him. [00:10:55] Speaker A: Now, every year, my brother in law and I, we try to get together and do something special. And. And Brenda's brother, Mike, he's got a motorcycle and I have a scooter. And, you know, it's. I know you gotta be a real man to drive a scooter because, you know, it just looks, step through frame and stuff. You just sit on it and twist it and go. And it has no clutch on it and stuff like that. And so that's what I drive. I drive a scooter. And so anyhow, we were planning on this trip. He lives down in Iva, South Carolina. And so he came up and we met down in Pickens, where highway eleven intersects right down below table rock. And you take that thing up and you drive it up north going to Rosman, North Carolina. And boy, we left out of there at this little four way stop there on highway eleven. Drove up the mountain, drove there. Oh, it's a beautiful drive going up there. And we got up to Roslyn, North Carolina, and we got on 64 and we hit it out towards, I believe, Franklin. I think it takes you out to Franklin, North Carolina. We did about 275 miles that day. I mean, riding all through the mountains, going up through Waynesville, going down to the Blue Ridge parkway, running out past Asheville, picking up 74, going down towards Lake lure. And then finally down highway nine back into Bowling Springs. Man had a great ride. Beautiful, beautiful scenery. And the weather was just right. We got into bowling springs and Mike pulled up behind me and said, james, he said, man, your bike is smoking. I said, what? My bike is smoking. And I looked down and that thing was just dripping oil everywhere. [00:12:44] Speaker B: I said, oh, my goodness. I can't believe this. [00:12:46] Speaker A: Praise the Lord. Here we were at a red light, and there was a gas station just right over there. It's where number nine and 292 intersect at. And, man, I turned to go over there, and there's so much oil that was on my back tire. My back tire started spinning out. And so. And I, you know, frantically I'm looking, it's like, what in the world could have happened to cause this catastrophe? I looked up underneath my bike, and there was a hole about the size of a dime in the case of my motor. [00:13:20] Speaker B: It's like, what could I have hit that cause a hole to get in my motor and leak out all the oil and stuff, you know, it's like, ugh. [00:13:28] Speaker A: Couldn't figure it out. But it's amazing that when you're going through things like that, you can't figure it out. That if you give yourself some time, if finally some things finally come back to you. About a week and a half prior to that ride, I went out to get some gas, and our driveway, we have these kind of concrete little things on the side of the road. They kind of slope up like that before they go in your driveway. And instead of going off at an angle, I went straight off. And that one day, I went straight off. I heard a, you know, like, what in the world? [00:13:59] Speaker B: What had a hit? [00:13:59] Speaker A: You know what? And I went out and looked up underneath the bike. I couldn't see anything. And I said, well, forget it. You know, I don't know what it was, but what it was. The bike had bottomed out on the concrete, and it must have been a little rock or something just right there where that case of the motor was. And it fractured the engine case. And you know what I thought about after that ride? That bike's motor could have given out anywhere on that trip. [00:14:31] Speaker B: All through all those mountain turns where we're going, all up on the Blue Ridge parkway, where there was no cell reception, where there was nobody that you could get in contact with, all of those very remote areas that we were riding, and there was nobody out there that could have happened there. But no God allowed it to happen. After 275 miles of riding, God allowed me to get back in Boiling Springs, South Carolina, where I live, while I'm sitting at a red light. And he allowed the engine just to blow out the oil right there. So what do I do? [00:15:06] Speaker A: I'm raising my hand today to give all glory and honor to God for his divine protection in my life. [00:15:15] Speaker B: And I said, God, you are so good. He's worthy to be praised every day of our life. Then, Ari, I was worried about, how in the world am I going to. [00:15:25] Speaker A: Fix this crazy thing? [00:15:26] Speaker B: I got a hole in a cast aluminum engine case. What am I going to do? [00:15:34] Speaker A: And then I had a light bulb moment that came on. JB weld to the rescue. I got 50 miles on it, and she's still holding strong. Amen. So if you guys want to fix something, get you a tube of JB weld. That stuff works great. That wasn't part of the message. I just wanted to share that with you guys. If it had not been for the Lord, David, first of all, wanted to give all glory and honor to God, for all great things that had been done in his life, he wanted to remind the people of that day that God is for us. And thirdly, we need to remind ourselves of all that God has done for us. In verses two through seven, he said, if it had not been for the Lord who was on our side when men rose up against us, then they had swallowed us up quickly. When their wrath was kindled against us, when the waters had overwhelmed us, the streams had gone over our soul, then the proud waters had gone over our soul. I think when he's talking about the waters there, he's just simply talking about the masses of people that were against him. [00:16:43] Speaker B: He's describing it like a river, like an overflowing river, like a tsunami that is coming to wash you away. He said, if it had not been for the Lord, those opposing armies would have wiped us out a long time ago. [00:16:56] Speaker A: But you know what? [00:16:58] Speaker B: God is for me and God is for you. And you need to remind yourself about that. As a matter of fact, I was. [00:17:04] Speaker A: Reading this morning in my devotions in Exodus. Exodus, I think it is. Chapter 33. Let me get there. Chapter 32. Moses goes up on the mountain, received the commandments of God. He comes down, finds out that they have polluted themselves by making idols, bowing down to them, worshiping them. God saying, leave me alone, that I might destroy these people. Moses intercedes for them and saying, o God, please, Lord, be merciful to these people. And God, if you still want to wipe these people out, he hesitates and he says, God, instead of wiping them out, wipe me out. Blot me out of your book. And I said, wow. I said, boy, Moses was truly a merciful man. Chapter 33, verse one. And the Lord said unto Moses, depart and go up thence, thou and the people, which thou has brought up out of the land of Egypt, unto the land which I swear unto Abraham, to Isaac, to Jacob, saying, unto thy seed will I give it. And I'll send an angel before thee. And I'll drive out the Canaanite, the amorite, the Hittite, the perizzite, the Hivite, the Jebusites, unto a land flowing with milk and honey. For I will not. For I will not go up in the midst of thee, for thou art a stiff necked people, lest I consume thee in the way. And when the people heard these evil tidings, they mourned. And no man put on him his ornaments. For the Lord had said unto Moses, say unto the children of Israel, you are stiff necked people. And I will not come up into the midst of thee in a moment and consume thee. Therefore, put off thine ornaments from thee, that I may know what to do unto thee. And the children of Israel strip themselves of their own ornaments by Mount Horeb. And Moses took the tabernacle and pitched it without the camp, afar off from the camp of the congregation. And it came to pass that everyone which sought the Lord went out into the tabernacle of the congregation, which was without the camp. And it came to pass. When Moses went out into the tabernacle, then all the people rose up and stood, every man at his tent's door and looked after Moses until he was gone into the tabernacle. And it came to pass that as Moses entered into the tabernacle, that the cloudy pillar descended and stood at the door of the tabernacle. And the Lord, Hallelujah. I like this. And the Lord talked with Moses. And all the people saw the cloudy pillar stand at the tabernacle door. And all the people rose up and worshiped every man in his tent door. And the Lord spake unto Moses, whew. This is what we should want, Benjamin, face to face as a man speaketh unto his friend. And he turned again into the camp. But his servant, Joshua, the son of nun, a young man, departed not out of the tabernacle. We need to remind ourselves of all that God has done. You know, if you don't remind yourself of all that God has done, you will soon forget and be overwhelmed by the present circumstances. We should always be looking for opportunities to praise God lest we forget. Man, I love taking opportunities, especially whenever you go out to eat somewhere. Or, man, if you're at a doctor's office somewhere, especially with Samuel, the doctor will always normally say this before they leave. [00:20:56] Speaker B: Is there anything else you want to ask me? And Samuel will say, yes. If you were to die today, do you know for sure where you're gonna spend eternity? And man alive? You ought to see the expression on that doctor's face. He wasn't gonna be expecting that. [00:21:09] Speaker A: Hey, Samuel just unloads on him right then and there. [00:21:14] Speaker B: Is there anything that you wanna ask me? Yeah. Do you have Jesus in your heart? Have you been born again? Men, you go at a restaurant somewhere and they said, how are you doing today? And I would say, well, I wanna tell you how I'm doing today. I am blessed of the Lord because I got Jesus in my heart. Amen. You know why I like doing that? [00:21:35] Speaker A: Because I'm living in a very dark spiritual world that is without Christ and the demonic activity that's in our world today. It wants you and I just to keep quiet, don't say anything. That's why we have the problems in. [00:21:49] Speaker B: Our world today is because christians will not rise up and speak forth the truth. And I want to tell you something. I am saved by God's marvelous grace. And I know that there's only one way that you and I are going to get to heaven is through the blood of Jesus Christ. Amen. I was talking to a man the other day and I said, hey. I said, do you know that you're saved? He said, yeah, I'm saved. I said, do you have Jesus in your heart? He said, yeah, I got Jesus in my heart. I said, are you washed in the blood of the lamb? Amen. He said, yes, I am. I said, well, glory to God. Hallelujah. Amen. I wanted to nail down all the bases, man. [00:22:19] Speaker A: I didn't want that guy just to think, yeah, yeah, I'm saved. Because some people might think being saved is just being a good person or whatever. Mandev, you gotta be born again. [00:22:28] Speaker B: You gotta give forth the good news. I wanna tell you what the history. [00:22:32] Speaker A: Of Choice Hills has always been about a church going and spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ everywhere you go. Adam, I don't know. You had the opportunity of riding with Pastor Craig in his car. He'd give you about a heart attack at the way that guy would drive. [00:22:48] Speaker B: But, man, we'd be going down the road and you know what he would do? We'd be going down the road and we'd be singing this song. What can wash away my sins? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. But you know what he be doing? He'd be playing it on his car. [00:23:00] Speaker A: Horn and people be driving down the. [00:23:04] Speaker B: Road thinking, what is this guy doing, man? We're singing glory to God. Glory, glory. Amen. Hey, we all ought to be a little bit excited about Jesus. Amen. I praise God. He's our savior. He's the savior of the world. And guess what? He's coming again, and we should want to tell everybody about him. Do you want people wanting to see. [00:23:26] Speaker A: They're wanting to see the reality of Christ in you. They're wanting to see that if you believe in Jesus enough that you're willing to speak his name, if you truly believe in the Lord enough that you're. [00:23:38] Speaker B: Willing to witness and tell somebody, your coworker about him, you're willing to say that I believe that Jesus Christ is the savior of the world, man, that's the message of choice Hills Baptist church. When I came here, that's what captivated me. That's what got ahold of me, that man. You know that this church stood on the gospel of Jesus Christ. It proclaimed the gospel of Jesus Christ. It promoted the gospel of Jesus Christ. And everything about this church has always been about Jesus. [00:24:11] Speaker A: We need to remind ourselves of all that God has done. You ought to go back there and look at some of those pictures on that back wall there. A little bit of history about choice Hills Baptist church. We've experienced it here. We've experiences the highs, and we've experienced some lows and everything else in between. But that's with everything in life, you know, nothing is just always like this. You got highs and lows, and just like in marriage, you got sometimes good days. Some days are not as better, but, you know, it could be better. But, you know, rob, you know, we have those days, and the same thing is true in church and in our relationship with the Lord. But if I'm only focused on the bad things, then guess what? It ain't gonna be too good, because I'm always dredging and thinking about the bad things. Look, I don't have time to just be thinking about the bad things. David didn't have time to think about the bad things. You know what David was talking about? [00:25:16] Speaker B: Not the bad things. [00:25:16] Speaker A: He's talking about the good things. [00:25:18] Speaker B: What was the good thing? That the Lord is with us. Amen. That the Lord has sustained us. That the Lord has taken care of us through all this time. And guess what? I think David was probably going back doing some history, too, thinking about how that God delivered the children of Israel from the land of Egypt, how that God took care of them for those 40 years. How that God brought them into the promised land, how that God defeated all their enemies, how that God gave them the land with homes and houses that they had not built and vineyards and everything that was set up there. God says, I'll give this to you if you'll just. But follow me. [00:25:56] Speaker A: We need to remind ourselves all that God has done for us, and we need to remind ourselves of God's greatness. Verse number eight. Who help. Our help is in the name of the Lord who made heaven and earth. We need to remind ourselves of the greatness of our Lord. He's not the God of the rivers or the mountains or the seas, but our God is the divine creator of all. He's not the God of gold. He's not that golden statue in Spartanburg, South Carolina. You drive by the buddhist temple and they have a large gold image of Buddha that they. I don't know if they worship or what do they do. I don't know what Buddhists do with that. That's not our God. He is the great I am. Have you experienced God's power in your life? Have you experienced God answering prayer in your life and seeing you through those tough situations? Judy, I tell you what, you could go and write a book about everything that God has done for you and for me. Why don't you stop and think about the greatness of God? It's like, no wonder the songwriter wrote that song, o Lord, my God, I in awesome wonder, consider all the worlds thy hands have made. And what is the song called? How great thou art. And yet you know what God wants to be. God wants to be great in your life and in my life today. You know what my prayer is for choice Hills Baptist Church, the God that you continue to bless this ministry and help this ministry to continue going on. But let me just say this. It takes us all as a family of faith, coming together, working together, laboring together. When I was at Tabernacle and I was getting ridiculed by those students about going to a southern baptist church and choice hills not being independent, there were times that I felt like, hmm, I'll just leave choice hills and I'll go join some other church. And you know what the spirit of almighty God said to me? Yeah. Is that the way you're going to be in your ministry, that whenever you're faced with difficult times, that you're just going to just up and quit and go somewhere else? He said, if that's the way you're going to be, then that's where your ministry is. Going to be. He said, if you want this church to be the kind of church it needs to be, he said, you gotta be a part of it. You gotta stick with it. It's none of this stuff. Well, I'll be here for maybe a couple years, and I'll just. I'll cut after a while. No, no, no. You know what? In my mind, in my heart, I'm gonna be here until Jesus calls me home. The only way that brother Burgess and his family's ever gonna leave this church, you're gonna have to vote me out of this church. That's the only way you ever get rid of me. My mama's buried right outside by that fellowship hall. And you know what? Whenever it's Brenda's and my time to go, pastor, we gotta get something set up here that someone's gonna have a hole digger, and they'll dig that hole, and they'll place our remains in that hole. And if anybody wants to see the Burgess family, you know where they're going to have to come to? They're going to have to come to a place called Choice Hills Baptist Church. And they're going to be reminded of all the great things that God has done in a family's life because of this ministry. What will be your testimony? That was David's testimony. He was just bragging on the Lord, talking about how great God is. Don't lose sight of that, because I can promise you this. There will be difficulties that will come. And there was difficulties in David's day. But if you keep your eyes on the Lord, he's going to see you through. He always will.