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The secret of the Lord is with them that fear him; Fearing Him doesn’t mean that I’m going to run and hide from Him. Fearing Him is that I must do and not be in rebellion to what He wants done. If you are not in rebellion then you are not in a place of being driven to accomplish it and God will show the covenant of promise that you’re going to receive. I know that serving the Lord and letting Him use me as He will, no matter what happens in between there, I’m trusting in God, and as I trust Him and do His will, I can go about not worrying what’s coming. In the Old Testament they didn’t use the word faith very much but they used words that mean faith. Today I’m hoping to help open up some more foundational things that ushered in faith when Jesus came on the earth. In the Old Testament it was hope and waiting on the Lord and things like that, where now, faith is an action. It’s a now thing. Let’s start out in Jeremiah 14:13, Then said I, Ah, Lord God! Behold, they say unto them, Ye shall not see the sword, neither shall ye have famine; but I will give you assured peace in this place. Then the Lord said unto me, The prophets prophesy lies in my name: I sent them not, neither have I commanded them, neither spake unto them: they prophesy unto you a false vision and divination, and a thing of naught, and the deceit of their heart. Therefore thus saith the Lord concerning the prophets that prophesy in my name, and I sent them not, yet they say, Sword and famine shall not be in this land; By sword and famine shall those prophets be consumed. For probably all except the last ten years, and I’ve been teaching for 35 + years, I always said “this is what I feel the Lord saying.” That disconnects me. One time I said, “This is what the Lord told me” and the person I spoke that to said, well if the Lord told you, I don’t have anything to say about it. I realized that I was making an absolute. But until you are mature, you’re going to make mistakes. Every child that grows up makes many mistakes that the parents have to deal with but they don’t throw them in the trash. And God doesn’t do that with you or me. But He expects us to learn from those mistakes so that the next time we will do it right. It’s a dangerous thing to say the Lord spoke to me when it may have been your flesh that spoke to you. God spoke to Jeremiah and said, yes, that’s what those prophets say, but I never said it. And because they put Me in a place that I never was, they’re going to die the same way they said would not happen. When I read that years ago, that put the fear in me. There were a few times as I grew that I realized what I had said was not right. I’ve read all the books that I’ve written and there’s only one thing that I would have changed in the very first book. I made a statement about a verse in Matthew and I took it the wrong way. God didn’t throw me out in the trash, but eventually He showed me that it was the opposite of what I thought it was. We need to be careful what we say. Verse 20, We acknowledge, O Lord, our wickedness, and the iniquity of our fathers: for we have sinned against thee. Do not abhor us, for thy name’s sake, do not disgrace the throne of thy glory: remember, break not thy covenant with us. The children of Israel, by faith in God, probably had the longest hope of receiving of anything as anyone after the flood. From Abraham on, the promises that Abraham had would usher in salvation at the end. Christ was coming and in the end, God is going to restore all things as we enter into the thousand year reign. That’s what we’re doing now. God is in a place that He wants to restore all things, but that doesn’t mean that everyone is going to be saved. We must seek the Lord while He may be found. Right now, God is doing a very gracious thing and is drawing His people, as many as want Him. So Jeremiah said, break not Thy covenant with us. The covenant was that which Abraham had, and the sacrifices and everything that was there. The reason the children of Israel couldn’t have total salvation but had to hope for it was because flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God. Even though Jesus was flesh and blood, He was also the Son of God that had no sin. He was very different. He was a perfect sacrifice because He pulled Himself from the world. He said I’m no longer in the world, but you are in the world. Jesus was preparing Himself to die on the cross. He was willing to do it but when the time came, it was extremely difficult to give Himself up and die. As we know, Jesus said, isn’t there another way? And after the third time, He said, not My will but Yours be done. It could have been the generations of the flesh that He came through to be on the earth, through Abraham’s promise. It was very important for Matthew to start his writings with the generations of Jesus. That’s why we focus on the generations as well, because if the generations are not dealt with they can very easily keep us from entering into the kingdom of God. It’s not easy to get rid of the generations of sin that are in the blood. Verse 22, Are there any among the vanities of the Gentiles that can cause rain? Or can the heavens give showers? Art not thou he, O Lord our God? Therefore we will wait upon thee: for thou hast made all these things. God was the hope of their salvation to be restored and Abraham was the one God chose. So the children of Israel were operating under the covenant of promise that He gave Abraham. That’s why they call Abraham their father, even to this day. David is also their father, the one that brought kingship and authority upon the earth. So they said, we’re going to wait for God. What does it mean to wait upon the Lord in the New Testament? We will look at it more as we go along. God almost destroyed the whole earth and none of us would have been here today if it wouldn’t have been for Noah. But He saw Noah and he found favor with God. He didn’t have favor with man, because only 8, and it was all family, believed what Noah was doing was from God. God said He would tarry with them for 120 years, so He had to be laboring to find someone prior to the 100 years of laboring to build the ark, and Noah was that man. He was a preacher of righteousness but nobody believed him except for those that were directly laboring with him. I believe Noah’s father and grandfather gave the substance to him to help finance the building of the ark. Both of them believed Noah was the one that was going to deliver them from the hard labor they had. There was a lot of bitterness even after the flood. Nimrod was one of them that hated God because God destroyed a lot of the pleasures that mankind had. Just imagine our country here. If we had no electricity and no communications, it would take years and years to reinvent and come back to how we make things and how we can make things easier for our labor. That’s one of the things most people don’t even think about. They say just let the liberals go ahead and find out what it’s going to be like. Well by the time they find out what it’s going to be like, it would be totally destroyed and have to be rebuilt. Just drive through St Louis and see all the roads that have bridges and they are going every which way and you don’t have to stop at a stop sign in the middle of that. It would be billions of dollars today to rebuild what they built 50 years ago. Psalm 25:1, Unto thee, O Lord, do I lift up my soul. O my God, I trust in thee: let me not be ashamed, let not mine enemies triumph over me. That trust is, I have faith in You, God. Verse 3, Yea, let none that wait on thee be ashamed: Here we come across the word wait again. …let them be ashamed which transgress without cause. Shew me thy ways, O Lord; teach me thy paths. Lead me in thy truth, and teach me: for thou art the God of my salvation; on thee do I wait all the day. David says, Every day I wait for Your salvation; that is, deliverance from the enemy. Verse 6, Remember, O Lord, thy tender mercies and thy lovingkindnesses; for they have been ever of old. Remember not the sins of my youth, nor my transgressions: according to thy mercy remember thou me for thy goodness’ sake, O Lord. David might have been a little bit ornery when he was a boy. Just a possibility. Verse 8, Good and upright is the Lord: therefore will he teach sinners in the way. That way is the way to God and His presence. The early church was named the way. Jesus now is the way, the truth and the life. Verse 9, The meek will he guide in judgment: and the meek will he teach his way. All the paths of the Lord are mercy and truth unto such as keep his covenant and his testimonies. For thy name’s sake, O Lord, pardon mine iniquity; for it is great. God has given us power to remove the iniquity in us because of the cross, but David had to beg God to turn His face from his iniquities. A lot of that iniquity is from generation to generation. Verse 12, What man is he that feareth the Lord? Him shall he teach in the way that he shall choose. His soul shall dwell at ease; and his seed shall inherit the earth. The seed of Abraham was very important. That’s why Jesus said I’ve come to save the lost sheep of Israel. The seed are the ones that carried promise. Jesus even said the rest of you are dogs. Verse 14, The secret of the Lord is with them that fear him; and he will shew them his covenant. God will show His covenant to those close to Him so they will walk in the hope and be patient to receive it. Verse 15, Mine eyes are ever toward the Lord; for he shall pluck my feet out of the net. Turn thee unto me, and have mercy upon me; for I am desolate and afflicted. The troubles of my heart are enlarged: O bring thou me out of my distresses. Look upon mine affliction and my pain; and forgive all my sins. Consider mine enemies; for they are many; and they hate me with cruel hatred. That’s not the nations around him; that’s the people that are in Israel. David was not loved by everybody. In fact, he probably had more enemies than he had people that loved him because he didn’t allow them to please their flesh. If you teach not to please the flesh, you’re not going to have a lot of people. The big churches are those that come and want to go to heaven but in many of those churches they can do what they want to when they leave. You can leave here and do what you want to too, but there is an accountability here that wouldn’t be in a big church. We are to pray and help each other to be accountable unto God. In a big church that doesn’t happen unless they have small groups or programs that do that. I’m not saying that every church in the country that’s big is going to hell but you have a better chance of accountability in a smaller setting. Let’s go back to verse 9, The meek will he guide in judgment: and the meek will he teach his way. That way is to inherit the earth. So as we look at David, David understood that the meek shall inherit the earth. And who copied what David said in the scriptures? Jesus did in Matthew 5:5: Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. A meek person is one that knows that without God, the things God is hoping for you to be and do are impossible. You need His word in you, and in that word is all the tools and power you need to accomplish it. It’s also vision, eyes to see, and all things you need to inherit the earth. Verse 13 here says, His soul shall dwell at ease; and his seed shall inherit the earth. Without God’s word in me I cannot accomplish it, so I wait upon God. The seed of promise from Abraham is that we are going to have New Jerusalem come down out of heaven. The seed that Abraham had was that salvation was to come through those promises. If you have the seed of Abraham in you, as it grows you will come into a place of inheriting the earth with all those that have the same seed. So it was very important that in their generations that seed of promise would be passed on. Ruth received that seed because she said, Naomi, I want the God you serve. Because she did that, God put her in the lineage of seeds of Abraham, and she was not an Israelite. For those that want the seed that God gave Abraham, you can be in the lineage of God. But you have to want it. And to be meek is to wait upon the Lord because your trust is only in Him. When He moves you, then you will come forth with salvation because the promise is, if you want Him, the day is coming that He’s going to bring you forth into salvation and restore all things. Verse 14 again, The secret of the Lord is with them that fear him; Fearing Him doesn’t mean that I’m going to run and hide from Him. Fearing Him is that I must do and not be in rebellion to what He wants done. If you are not in rebellion then you are not in a place of being driven to accomplish it and God will show the covenant of promise that you’re going to receive. I know that serving the Lord and letting Him use me as He will, no matter what happens in between there, I’m trusting in God, and as I trust Him and do His will, I can go about not worrying what’s coming. Psalm 27:13, I had fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. To say it in our understanding is, if it wouldn’t have been that I saw the land of the living, I would have fainted a long time ago. Fainting means that I would have disappeared in wanting to serve God. I can name several places where God showed me the land of the living and it kept me in the right path. When I make mistakes I go back and correct them and the Holy Spirit teaches me how to stay away from that trap. Verse 14, Wait on the Lord: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the Lord. When you see wait, wait, you better pay attention because someone is trying to tell you something that is extremely important. David learns here in the early stages of his life that it is important to wait on Him. He was one of those go getters, but as He grew in the Lord he learned to wait upon the Lord and then He would strengthen him. In Nahum it says strengthen yourself because the god of force is getting ready to pounce. Get yourself fortified. How do you fortify? You come to a place that you say, God, without You I am done, but with You all things are possible, and whether it’s a little or a lot it doesn’t matter. You’re not afraid of any of that. God says He’s going to remove some of those things that aren’t right and you say good, finally it’s time to get rid of that particular thing. Those that are afraid are going to run away but those that want God are happy to receive correction. So David said, Wait on the Lord, be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the Lord. So if you want your heart fortified, wait for Him to come and to remove those things that will hinder what He’s called you to do. Psalm 28:8, The Lord is their strength, and he is the saving strength of his anointed. Save thy people, and bless thine inheritance: feed them also, and lift them up for ever. As you begin to understand this, and this eye of waiting begins to open up to you in the scriptures, you will see that it’s throughout the Bible. It may be in different wording, but wait means, I have faith in You no matter what You ask me to do. I don’t have any idea how it will take place, but I’m waiting on You. There was a vision the Lord gave to me back in ’93 or ’94 and I have brought it before the Lord through the years and I would say, is this the time Lord? And He didn’t speak, so I waited. But now God is beginning to move on that thing that I’ve waited for for 30 years. And that is nothing compared to what those in the Old Testament had to wait, and are still waiting. Meek means to wait, to bind together, to collect, to patiently wait upon the Lord. In Genesis 49:16-18 Jacob prophesies over the tribe of Dan and the last verse of the prophecy says, I have waited for thy salvation, O Lord. And the tribe of Dan is still not collected. If you ask anybody they tell you we don’t know where the tribe of Dan is because they are the lost tribe. They aren’t lost; you just don’t know where they are at. Psalm 37:7, Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for him: fret not thyself because of him who prospereth in his way, because of the man who bringeth wicked devices to pass. Don’t fret. Don’t be afraid, worry, get upset. Wait patiently for the Lord. Verse 8, Cease from anger, and forsake wrath: fret not thyself in any wise to do evil. For evildoers shall be cut off: but those that wait upon the Lord, they shall inherit the earth. The promise that Jesus speaks of in Matthew comes directly from the promises of Abraham. Psalm 130:1, Out of the depths have I cried unto thee, O Lord. Lord, hear my voice: let thine ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications. If thou, Lord, shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand? David says, hear my voice and don’t hold my iniquities against me; I don’t want them. That puts the iniquities of David in solitary confinement. Verse 4, But there is forgiveness with thee, that thou mayest be feared. David said, I know that You take away my iniquities so they don’t come on me anymore because You are a God that forgives. He said, if You keep track of iniquities, who would stand? We have all sinned and come short of the glory of God. Verse 5, I wait for the Lord, my soul doth wait, and in his word do I hope. It’s very important that your soul waits on the Lord. Why is that? Because it’s the soul that is saved. If your soul is not saved, you aren’t saved. The mercies of God are that He cleanses the soul so the soul isn’t pushing you to do wickedness like it did before. If the soul is promoting God in you, then you can see the works of the devil in you, and be able to get rid of them and not just push or throw them off. That may be God showing you the wickedness of who you are and because God saved your soul, it’s your responsibility then to remove what opposes your soul. Verse 6, My soul waiteth for the Lord more than they that watch for the morning: I say, more than they that watch for the morning. Let Israel hope in the Lord: for with the Lord there is mercy, and with him is plenteous redemption. And he shall redeem Israel from all his iniquities. He shall – it doesn’t mean that it’s now. It means that sometime in the future He’s going to wipe away those iniquities. When that takes place, the Lord is going to redeem you and bring you back to the original hunger for God that was in Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Isaiah 40:25, To whom then will ye liken me, or shall I be equal? Saith the Holy One. Lift up your eyes on high, and behold who hath created these things, that bringeth out their host by number: he calleth them all by names by the greatness of his might, for that he is strong in power; not one faileth. Why sayest thou, O Jacob, and speakest, O Israel, My way is hid from the Lord, and my judgment is passed over from my God? He’s saying, I’ve done some pretty rotten things and God never did anything to me, so I guess I got by with it. The judgments have passed over me and God moved on and doesn’t even remember that. Verse 28, Hast thou not known? Hast thou not heard, that the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary? There is no searching of his understanding. He giveth power to the faint; and to them that have no might he increaseth strength. Now we know how He does that: wait upon Him. Verse 30, Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall. Why is that? Because they think they’re strong, that their muscles will take care of everything. Verse 31, But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint. Isaiah 41:1, Keep silence before me, O islands; and let the people renew their strength: let them come near; then let them speak: let us come near together to judgment. Verse 8, But thou, Israel, art my servant, Jacob whom I have chosen, the seed of Abraham my friend. Jacob is Israel. We know that Jacob is the unrefined but when he was about to meet his brother, he stayed back and fought with God overnight and he won. Before he would let God go, He said to Jacob, you’re no longer Jacob, but Israel, having to do with I’m your God and you’re My son. …Abraham my friend. Wow. Wouldn’t that be an incredible thing if God would speak to you and say, you’re My friend? Verse 9, Thou whom I have taken from the ends of the earth, and called thee from the chief men thereof, and said unto thee, Thou art my servant; I have chosen thee, and not cast thee away. Verse 13, For I the Lord thy God will hold thy right hand, saying unto thee, Fear not; I will help thee. Fear not, thou worm Jacob, and ye men of Israel; I will help thee, saith the Lord, and thy redeemer, the Holy One of Israel. He didn’t call Israel a worm, but He called Jacob a worm. How many have ever gone out in the night and tried to catch a night crawler? You have to be fast. They have the end of their tail in the hole and as soon as you put a light on it they’re right back there in that hole. Oh Jacob. You’re a worm. Zoom. Back in the hole. But He didn’t say Israel was a worm. The refined are not worms but are mighty in power that comes from God. Isaiah 49:1, Listen, O isles, unto me; and hearken, ye people, from far; The Lord hath called me from the womb; from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name. And he hath made my mouth like a sharp sword; in the shadow of his hand hath he hid me, and made me a polished shaft; in his quiver hath he hid me; Verse 4, Then I said, I have labored in vain, I have spent my strength for naught, and in vain: yet surely my judgment is with the Lord, and my work with my God. Isaiah labored to bring the children of Israel into God and they wouldn’t come. He said, they haven’t responded but my work is in God’s hand and He’s going to use the labor that I had. It’s in His hands and He will bring it to pass. Verse 5, And now, saith the Lord that formed me from the womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob again to him, Though Israel be not gathered, yet shall I be glorious in the eyes of the Lord, and my God shall be my strength. And he said, It is a light thing that thou shouldest be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel: I will also give thee for a light to the Gentiles, that thou mayest be my salvation unto the end of the earth. Here in verses 5 & 6 it is a light thing for God to raise up the tribes of Jacob and restore Israel that was refined. The Holy Spirit can put a hunger in those that are attending church. If we let our labor go, God can take the labor we have done and cause those things we have been laboring for to not go to nothing, but to come and to fulfill the labor of the Spirit. Verse 21, Then shalt thou say in thine heart, Who hath begotten me these, seeing I have lost my children, and am desolate, a captive, and removing to and fro? And who hath brought up these? Behold, I was left alone; these, where had they been? The things that Israel had when they were dispersed, they lost. Their children became captive, and they were removed from place to place. Verse 22, Thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I will lift up mine hand to the Gentiles, and set up my standard to the people: The standard we have been raising is for the Gentiles to come to know our God. …and they shall bring thy sons in their arms, and thy daughters shall be carried upon their shoulders. And kings shall be thy nursing fathers, and their queens thy nursing mothers: they shall bow down to thee with their face toward the earth. They’re going to be a servant to those that walk in the promise of Abraham’s seed. …and lick up the dust of thy feet; and thou shalt know that I am the Lord: for they shall not be ashamed that wait for me. Shall the prey be taken from the mighty, or the lawful captive delivered? But thus saith the Lord, Even the captives of the mighty shall be taken away, and the prey of the terrible shall be delivered: for I will contend with him that contendeth with thee, and I will save thy children. And I will feed them that oppress thee with their own flesh; and they shall be drunken with their own blood, as with sweet wine: and all flesh shall know that I the Lord am thy Savior and thy Redeemer, the mighty One of Jacob. God is going to take the labor of the seed of Abraham and He’s going to use that labor because Jesus came to save our soul. That’s what Isaiah 49 is all about. So we wait on the One that has saved our soul that He would lead us into what God wants to do next to save millions and millions of souls. Matthew 12:40, For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale’s belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. Here we see that when Jesus died, He went three days into the heart of the earth. He didn’t say what He was doing there but then in 1 Peter 3:18, For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit: In order to walk in everything God gives you that you did not labor for, such as Jesus dying to save your soul, you have to die to your will just like He had to die to His will. The same thing with Abraham. Abraham was told to take Isaac up on Mount Moriah and sacrifice his only son of promise. When he did that, God said, now I know that you will be the correct one to carry the seed of promise because the seed that I am placing in you must wait upon the Lord. Verse 19, By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison; Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the Days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water. It appears that there were souls saved when the waters started to rise; they wanted the God of Noah because what Noah spoke of came to pass, but they were not allowed to go into the boat. So it says here, verse 20 again, Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water. So those that didn’t know God all of a sudden were faced with the circumstances and they wanted God. Only 8 souls were saved alive, but there were souls that went into a waiting place where all of those that wanted God from the time of Adam and Eve to the time of Christ’s salvation were held. God went down and preached to them and Christ was then able to bring salvation because He died to break the curse of Adam and Eve’s sin. He wouldn’t have gone down to preach to anybody had they not been saved. God asked me to go all the way back to Abraham to break off the sins of my generation so I could receive the promises of Abraham, because that’s when my generations started, from the seed of Abraham. And all those before the flood and those after the flood until Jesus’ time were under this covenant of promise. Those that were meek that wanted God and waited upon Him will be saved. The meek shall inherit the earth, and it takes a meek person for God to move upon them. Those that didn’t want Him have no chance of salvation. Therefore, in the Bible in different places it says the strong should pray and help the weak that they can come to salvation; they can break the chains and open the prison doors for them to come out. I’ve had many people say you’re not saving anybody. But they don’t have any idea what they are talking about. Millions of souls are waiting to be delivered and they have to be delivered by those that are flesh. So Christ came down to be flesh and blood, but it was the purity of His Spirit that saved us. He was without sin so therefore the spirit was pure. If you read Ezekiel after studying what I’m saying today, Ezekiel was prophesying at the very end that God is going to restore the twelve tribes of Israel and each tribe has a door to New Jerusalem. So God is going to restore all of Israel. And that’s what He’s in the process of doing. Each of the twelve tribes has a job to do to bring in the souls that at some time were disobedient. Revelation 21:1, And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea. And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. Verse 12, And had a wall great and high, and had twelve gates, and at the gates twelve angels, and names written thereon, which are the names of the twelve tribes of the children of Israel: On the east three gates; on the north three gates; on the south three gates; and on the west three gates. And the wall of the city had twelve foundations, and in them the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb. The foundations of this whole thing were the twelve apostles. Verse 15, And he that talked with me had a golden reed to measure the city, and the gates thereof, and the wall thereof. The east gate has three tribes: Dan, Joseph, and Benjamin. If I would go on and read, the twelve tribes will be fully restored. God is going to restore all things. At some point in Jesus preaching to the rebellious they became meek. Whether their souls were saved then or now, I don’t know, but the things that I saw were souls being saved. As they came down the river of life and passed the house of God, they received salvation. God is very gracious to the human race. 
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AuthorLarry Troyer |
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