In his fourth chapter of the Epistles of
Echolation said the Apostle Paul, in the fullness
of time God sent his Son, born of
a woman, to redeem them that were under
the law.
The psalmist, he satisfied the longing soul and
he filleth the hungry soul with goodness.
He brought them out of darkness and the
shadow of death.
He broke their bands in thunder.
He sent his word and healed them and
delivered them from their destructions.
He sent his word.
Or let's put it another way, God gave
us his word.
The biggest thing God ever said, Jesus Christ,
his incarnate Son and our Saviour and our
Lord.
And when God wanted to say the biggest
thing he ever said, his eyes ran to
and fro throughout the whole earth looking for
a young lady hardly more than a teenager
whose heart was perfect toward him.
For the eyes of the Lord run to
and fro throughout the whole earth looking for
the man, the woman, the boy or girl
whose heart being perfect toward him he may
show himself strong on their behalf.
So if at the outset of this introductory
evening session tonight you turn with me just
for a first chapter of Luke's gospel, Luke
and chapter one.
God sent his angel to this young lady,
this virgin girl.
And through the lips of his servant, the
angel Gabriel, God said, Fear not Mary, verse
30, thou hast found favor with God.
Now when did Mary find favor with God?
Humanly speaking this is our first introduction to
the young lady.
We have the foreshadowing of course as all
of us know in the Old Testament.
That foreshadowing that God gave us in the
third chapter of the First Book in the
Bible, Genesis 3, 15, God rebuking Satan, I
will put enmity between you and the woman,
between your seat and her seat, it the
seat of that woman.
Jesus to be born of Mary shall bruise
your head.
In the process you will bruise his heel.
In the seventh of Isaiah, God said, I
will give you a sign.
A virgin shall conceive and bear a son.
Thou shall call his name God with us,
Emmanuel.
The word incarnate, the word made flesh, the
word who was in the beginning with God
was God and by whom all things were
made.
In the ninth chapter, unto us a son
is given.
His name, Everlasting Father, Mighty God, Wonderful Counselor,
Prince of Peace.
And the zeal of the Lord of Hosts
will do this, something inexplicable apart from a
divine intervention, without human explanation.
So the foreshadowing is there in the Old
Testament that this is our first personal encounter
with Mary.
And to this young lady, little more than
a teenager, God says you have found favor.
When did she find favor?
We know nothing about her educational background.
We don't suppose that she ever went to
Bible school.
She never hit the headlights.
But you see, God had been watching a
little girl grow up.
For the eyes of the Lord run to
and fro throughout the whole earth looking, looking
simply for any boy, any girl, any man,
any woman, anywhere, who will let God, as
God, be strong on their behalf.
And in all kinds of little ways in
which we are totally unaware, this young girl
in her early childhood and in her early
teenage years had learned to reckon with God
on the assumption that as God he was
big enough for the job.
Nothing more complicated than that.
Nothing that was recorded for your information or
mine till now unnamed, unsung, unknown, unrecognized.
But that's exactly where God chooses.
Those through whom he's going to accomplish his
timeless end.
Every now and again, of course, that choice
based upon their disposition surfaces and the world
becomes aware of their availability and the things
that God is pleased to accomplish through them.
Not always, always at once, but long ever
before any boy, girl, man or woman comes
out into the limelight, recognized to be the
human vehicle of the divine end, God's been
watching.
That's where he selects each one of us
in the little nitty-gritty things that are
unknown, unsung, unadvertised.
But where he sees us demonstrating a certain
disposition toward God that allows him to move
magnificently in full of power and dynamic of
deity into our human circumstances, allowed by us
in his faithfulness, responding to our faith to
demonstrate his integrity.
Thou hast found favor.
That's why God didn't expect her to be
shocked, overwhelmed, incredulous or cynical when he made
a fantastic proposition.
Fear not, Mary, thou hast found favor with
God.
Behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb and
bring forth a son, and thou shalt call
his name Jesus.
He shall be great, he shall be called
the son of the highest, and the Lord
God shall give unto him the throne of
his father David, and he shall reign over
the house of Jacob forever and of his
kingdom of which he will be king.
There shall be no end.
And not in cynicism, not in incredulity, but
with wide-eyed wonder, says she to him,
God's messenger, how?
Shall this thing be seen?
I know not a man.
The physical premise, absent.
Betrothed, yes indeed, to a man called Joseph,
but the marriage not yet consummate.
The answer was very simple.
God's answer always to the question in our
hearts as to how some divine end is
to be accomplished.
God, the holy girl, shall come upon thee,
and the power of the highest shall overshadow
thee, therefore also that holy thing that shall
be born of thee shall be called the
son of God.
Absolutely no explanation, but God himself, the zeal
of the Lord of hosts, will do this.
And by the way, Mary, just for your
encouragement, it may interest you to know that
your cousin is in the sixth month, and
in three months time another little baby boy
is going to be born, John the Baptist,
of whom it was said of her, Elizabeth,
that she was barren, infertile, physically incapable of
bearing.
So for your encouragement with Elizabeth, Mary, it
was too late, and with you it's going
to be too early, because you see, with
God, nothing shall be impossible.
What was her reaction?
Well, the reaction of Mary, presented with this
fantastic proposition, was precisely that, that God anticipates
of any boy, girl, man, or woman whose
heart is perfect towards him.
And you cannot find anywhere in the Bible
a more magnificent, nor simpler illustration of the
true substance of faith.
Behold, said she, the handmaid of the Lord
available.
Be it unto me, according to your word.
That's all.
In all its sublime simplicity.
In other words, said she to God's servant,
the angel Gabriel, God said it, let him
do it.
What do you think God does when he
has any boy, girl, man, or woman in
his presence for whom he has some delightful
plan, part of his timeless strategy, and who,
preventing the proposition, simply looks into God's face
and says, you said it, you do it.
He does it.
And that boy, girl, man, or woman has
learned the secret of living miraculously.
A quality of life that has no possible
explanation, but God himself in action.
Every great missionary enterprise has been established on
that simple basis, where some boy, girl, man,
or woman, finally in the presence of God,
presented with the proposition, faced with incredible odds,
humanly speaking, everything impossible, simply said, God, you
said it, you do it, and he did
it.
And of course, in that simple way, we
discover why it is that God chooses this
one and that one, and ignores so many
others who to us might seem highly commendable
and highly qualified.
You remember how in the fifth chapter, the
first of Paul's two epistles to the Thessalonians,
faithful is he that calls you, who will
also do it.
In other words, everything to which God calls
you or me, he himself as God is
prepared to do.
So what would be illogical about anything to
which God calls us?
Absolutely nothing.
Reiterated, of course, in the second chapter of
Paul's epistle to the Philippians, where he says,
more in my absence than in my presence,
work out your own salvation with free and
friendly, because everything that God ever gave me
when I was converted, God gave you.
For it is not Paul the apostle, it
is God who works in you both to
will and do of his good pleasure.
Well, what would be illogical about anything that
God wills for you and for me, if
he as God, having willed it, has prepared
himself as God to do it?
Nothing.
And this is the sheer simplicity of the
Christian faith, so long as you and I
are prepared to settle for God's terms, and
that is that he as God just happens
to be big enough for the job and
created you and me so engineered that the
presence of the Creator in all the fullness
and dynamic and illimitable resources that are inherently
his as God, so created, so engineered man,
that the presence of that Creator within the
creature is indispensable to his humanity.
And so all he asks of you and
me is that disposition, which the Bible calls
faith, that lets God do it.
But you know, the Lord Jesus said in
the 22nd chapter of the Gospel of Matthew,
Many are called, but few are chosen.
Why do you imagine of the many who
are called so few are chosen?
Well, I trust that by now the answer
is demonstrably obvious.
Faithful is he that calleth you, who will
also do it.
And of the many who are called, so
few will let him do it.
So few will adopt that childlike, simple relationship
to God that actually lets all God loose,
releases the divine energy, and allows him to
flesh out in your humanity and mine those
eternal purposes that are quite beyond our human
reach, but gloriously possible to the God of
the impossible.
Of the many who are called, so few
will let him do it.
But Mary, you see, was chosen because she
was prepared to let God do it, and
God knew it.
That's why he chose her, because he had
been watching.
Watching.
In all those years of insignificant little things
in which she demonstrated a disposition, a very
simple disposition, she didn't tell God that she
would take on the job and roll up
her sleeves and clench her fists and grit
her teeth and say, Leave it to me.
She fully was cognizant of the fact that
it was beyond her reach, and so her
disposition in saying, You said it, you do
it, was simply, I can't.
You never said I could.
You remember?
But you can, and always said you would.
She'd learned that as a child.
And we've discussed this on many occasions when
it's been my joy to minister to some
of you folks here.
I can't.
God never said I could.
He can, always said he would.
Now if you can't and God can, what's
the smartest thing to do?
Let him.
And the moment you've learned that, you've learned
what it means, first, to become a Christian,
and secondly, how to be the Christian you've
become.
How did you become a Christian?
What did you have to do to redeem
your soul?
How much did you have to pay?
What examination did you have to sit and
pass?
What long list of good works or self
-improvement did you have to present to God
in order to know that you were redeemed?
Well, you say there was nothing of that.
He said, Whosoever cometh unto me, I will
in no wise cast out.
He said, My sheep hear my voice, I
know them, and they follow me, and I
give to them eternal life.
And there came a day in my life
when my soul awakened to a sense of
need.
I recognized what he said.
And in that moment of true repentance toward
God and simple faith in Jesus Christ, I
said, You said it, you do it.
And he did it.
And you're redeemed.
And you wouldn't claim one iota of credit
for the fact, because you simply took, though
you didn't deserve it, what God delights to
give who don't deserve what he's waiting to
give, for the wages of sin is death,
but the gift of God's eternal life.
And all you did was say, You said
it, you do it.
And he did it.
Well, as you have received Christ Jesus, the
Lord, so walk in him.
In other words, enjoy his life in you
now as you once enjoyed his death for
you then and reckon with the fact that
the one who gave himself for you rose
again from the dead to give himself to
you so that you can step out into
the dawn of every new day, marvelously energized
and furnished unto every good work by the
divine presence of one who close his activity
with your redeemed humanity.
And every new situation arises, no matter whether
it be threat or promise, opportunity or responsibility,
you bow yourself out, you bow him in
and say, Lord Jesus, you so engineered me
as my creator, God and redeemer, that your
presence within me is indispensable to my humanity.
And I want to know that I'm counting
on the fact that in this particular situation,
at this particular moment, you're big enough for
the job.
Thanks.
You're in business.
Now, isn't that simple?
Now, this is a principle to live by,
and it's a principle that we're going to
talk about this week.
You see, when David looked at that lion,
that lion looked so big.
Then David looked at God.
And that lion, he says, looks so small.
So I slew him.
Isn't that simple?
You see, when he looked at the lion,
it looked so big and he felt so
small.
But when he looked at God, God looked
so big and the lion looked so small.
So he did a very sensible thing.
He slew him.
What a complicated way of living.
And David would go on to tell you,
he said, when I looked at that bear,
that bear looked so big.
I felt so small.
But then I looked at God, and God
looked so big and the bear looked so
small.
So I took him by the beard and
slew him.
Did anybody notice?
Well, nobody on earth, because the record isn't
preserved for us until after the event.
And that's simply by his own testimony.
But God was watching.
And when you see, God saw that little
shepherd boy deal with bears and deal with
lions on God's terms of reference.
By that disposition within his heart that reckoned
with the fact that the God in whom
he trusted was big enough for bears and
lions, God said, I got a king.
I got a king.
Turn to it.
It's in the first book of Samuel, chapter
16.
One Samuel and chapter 16.
And God said to Samuel, stop sobbing over
King Saul.
Don't waste your sympathy and your pity.
How long wilt thou mourn for Saul, seeing
I have rejected him from reigning over Israel?
God said to Samuel, Samuel, he's a writer,
fill mine horn with oil and go, I
will send thee to Jesse, the Bethlehemite, for
I have provided me a king among his
sons.
He said, I got a king.
Now Samuel didn't know who it was, didn't
even know how many sons Jesse had, but
God did.
And he knew precisely which of those eight
sons would replace Saul as king of Israel.
Just a little ruddy faced shepherd boy who
had learned how to deal with lions and
had learned how to deal with bears on
the simple basis that God just happens to
be big enough to be God, if only
we'll let him loose and handle those situations
with which we are confronted.
You see why so few of us enjoy
the fantastic excitement of this miraculous quality of
living that has no explanation but God himself,
is that we've seldom learned to let God
be as big as God is.
We're always trying to be man-sized for
God instead of allowing God to be God
-sized in the man.
Now David as a little boy had learned
to let God be God-sized.
So God said, thou shalt anoint unto me
him whom, verse 3, I name unto thee.
God wasn't in any doubt as to who
was going to be king of Israel.
Because you see the eyes of the Lord
run to and fro throughout the whole earth
looking for any little boy, any little girl,
any man, any woman, anywhere, who'll let God
be God.
And in response to what the Bible calls
a heart that is perfect toward God, show
himself strong in their behalf.
Isn't it interesting to think that God's accumulating
names right now?
You've got a little family back home.
Has God got a king or a little
queen among your kids?
You teach a Sunday school class, Bible class,
preach in some pulpits.
When you look at those faces in front
of you, some looking sleepy, others looking unpromising,
some looking unintelligent, every now and again one
who appears to be alert.
Well, don't be deceived.
Somebody beautifully dressed and somebody a little shabby,
somebody obviously the byproduct of an affluent society,
somebody only just making the grade.
Just get excited about what you don't know.
Because you see, tucked away within the heart
of some boy, girl, man or woman in
that congregation, God's got a king.
And he knows because he's been watching.
That bunch of rascals you teach on Sunday
morning, chewing gum, looking out of the window,
sticking pins in the one in front, God's
got a king in that bunch.
Because all kinds of things are going on
in the hearts of those kids that you
don't know about in ways that are unsung
and unseen.
But one day it's going to surface.
Always have an unshatterable confidence in the Word
of God and the power of God, the
Holy Ghost, to take that truth that you
present in general and make it the truth
in particular to most unlikely people.
And in their own hearts, maybe too timid,
too shy, too reserved to admit it, they're
beginning to experiment in the silence of their
heart in those little things of life that
are immensely important and meaningful to them and
mean absolutely nothing to anybody else.
But in those areas of experiment, they're letting
God be God.
They're growing in a way that you would
never dream until the day one day God
says, I've got a king.
Samuel did, verse 4, that which the Lord
spoke.
He came to Bethlehem and they were somewhat
alarmed at his presence.
Comest thou said they peaceably?
He said, yes, peaceably.
I'm going to church.
Why don't you sanctify yourself and come to
church with me?
And it came to pass, verse 6, when
they were come that Samuel looked upon Eliab
and from the sheer physique of the man,
fine, magnificent, perfect specimen of humanity, he said
to himself, surely the Lord's anointed is the
force.
But God said, uh-uh.
The Lord said to Samuel, look not on
his countenance or on the height of his
stature, because I have refused him.
Don't be impressed by his physique.
Man looketh on the outward appearance, Samuel, but
the Lord looketh on the heart.
I'm not looking for muscle.
I haven't counted the hairs on his chest.
I've been looking at his heart.
What concerns me, Samuel, is a man's disposition.
Not an impression he can make on his
fellow human beings, his heart.
So if you're thinking about Eliab, said God
to Samuel, forget him.
I have refused him.
Then Jesse called Abinadab and made him pass
before Samuel, and God said again, uh-uh.
So Jesse made Shammah to pass by, and
God said, uh-uh.
And so Jesse brought four other sons, and
God said, uh-uh, uh-uh, uh-uh,
uh-uh.
Seven times God said, uh-uh.
And when God says, uh-uh, he means,
uh-uh.
So finally, you see, Samuel said, you got
any more sons?
We're running out, running out of sons.
I hear, said he to Jesse, verse 11,
I hear all thy children.
And he said, there remaineth yet the youngest,
and behold he keepeth the sheep.
Just a kid in the hillside.
And Samuel said unto him, send and fetch
him, and we will not sit down till
he come hither.
And he sent, and he brought him in.
He was running, and with all of a
beautiful countenance, and goodly to look on.
And the Lord said, Arise, anoint him.
This is he.
I've got a king.
Then Samuel took the horn of oil, and
he anointed him in the midst of his
brethren, and the Spirit of the Lord came
upon David from that day forward.
So Samuel rose up, and he went to
Ramah.
Tucked away in that family, the little boy.
He had learned to deal with lions, and
learned to deal with bears, on God's terms
of reference.
You'll remember that King Saul himself, whom God
rejected, as a young man, was of no
mean stature, the son of a Benjamite, whose
name was Kish.
You needn't turn to this.
I'm citing from the ninth chapter.
You're familiar with the fact.
He had a son whose name was Saul,
a choice young man, and a goodly.
There was not among the children of Israel
a goodly, a person than he.
On his shoulders and upward, he was higher
than any of the people.
And he was rejected, because he was a
moral coward.
Because he played to the gallery.
He wanted to be popular, and for the
moral coward he was, he always blamed the
people.
They did it.
And God said, I've rejected him.
No matter how impressive he may have been
as a young man, he ended up by
his own testimony, a man who played the
fool.
Now we're told in the 17th chapter, this
first book of Samuel, and the third verse,
that the Philistines stood on a mountain on
the one side, and Israel stood on the
mountain on the other side.
And there was a valley between them, and
there went out a champion out of a
camp of the Philistines, named Goliath, of Gath,
whose height was six cubits in a span.
And he had a helmet of brass upon
his head, and he was armed with a
coat of mail, and the weight of the
coat was five thousand shekels of brass.
And the Philistines said, verse 10, I defy
the armies of Israel this day.
Give me a man, that we may fight
together.
And when Saul and all Israel heard these
words of the Philistines, they were dismayed, and
greatly afraid.
Who do you think they were looking at?
Well the giant.
You see they hadn't learned the principle that
a little shepherd boy come to know healing
his sheep on the hillside.
And these, you see, the king and his
men, when they looked at the giant, felt
so small.
But David came around, because he'd been sent,
if you remember, by his dad to bring
some packed lunch for all the brothers, and
a few cheeses for the captain.
And all the men of Israel, verse 24
of that chapter, when they saw the man
fled from him, and was so afraid, and
the men of Israel said, have you seen
this man that has come up surely to
defy Israel?
If he come up, it shall be that
the man who kills him, the king will
enrich him with great riches, and will give
him his daughter, and make his father's house
free to realize in Israel.
And David, you know, sort of talking to
his older brothers and taking the cheeses, listened
to their conversation, so finally he muscled up
somebody and said, verse 26, what shall be
done to the man that kills this Philistine,
and take it away the reproach from Israel?
And by this time, David was getting quite
quite indignant.
Who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should
defy the armies of the living God?
And finally, you see, he'd become the sort
of talk of the town.
This was the whippersnapper, and they brought him
to David, but they brought him to Saul.
And in verse 32, David said to Saul,
let no man's heart fail because of him,
thy servant will go and fight with this
Philistine.
And Saul, needless to say, said to him,
now I'm not able to go against this
Philistine to fight with him, but a youth,
you're only a kid.
He's a man of war from his youth.
And then David told a story.
He said, thy servant, verse 34, kept his
father's sheep, and there came a lion and
a bear, and took a lamb out of
the flock.
And I went out after him, and I
smote him.
Mind you, he said to the king, when
he looked, when I looked at the lion,
he looked so big.
But when I looked at God, he looked
so small.
So I killed him.
And then that bear came, and that bear
learned nothing from the lion.
And when that bear came, he looked so
big.
And I felt so small.
But then I looked at God, and God
looked so big.
And the bear looked so small.
And I flew into him.
Thy servant, verse 36, flew both the lion
and the bear, and this uncircumcised Philistine shall
be as one of them, seeing he hath
defied the armies of the living God.
The Lord that delivered me out of the
port of the lion, and the Lord that
delivered me out of the port of the
bear, he, that God, will deliver me out
of the hand of this Philistine.
Not much point in arguing with David.
And Saul said, go, and the Lord be
with thee.
Very pious thought.
He'd much rather David go than go himself.
And David, we're told in verse 40, took
his staff in his hand, chose him five
smooth stones out of the book, and his
sling in his hand.
Of course, when the Philistine came, he mocked
him and said, you think I'm a dog
that you come out against me with a
stick?
And the Philistine cursed David by his God.
Then said David, verse 45, said the Philistine,
thou comest to me with a sword and
with a spear and with a shield.
I come to thee in the name of
the Lord of hosts, the God of the
armies of Israel, whom thou hast defied.
You haven't defied me.
You haven't defied King Saul.
You haven't defied this army of men.
You've defied the living God.
This day will the Lord deliver thee into
my hand, and I will smite thee, and
I'll take thine head from thee, and I'll
give thee the carcasses of the host of
the Philistines this day unto the fowls of
the air and to the wild beasts of
the earth, that all the earth may know
that there is a champion to maintain the
cause of Israel.
And David is his name.
Then he said, that all the earth may
know that there is a God in Israel,
a living, a real one, a living one,
not a rubber dummy, not just a name,
not a stained glass window, not a melancholy
history of somebody who lived long ago, but
a God who's alive and well, and very
much in business.
That all the earth may know that there
is a God in Israel, and all this
assembly shall know that the Lord's fate is
not with sword and spear, for the battle
is the Lord's, and he will give you
into our hand.
And God said, I've got a king, I've
got a king.
You know, this is the supreme privilege that
God has given to you and to me,
to demonstrate precisely now, today, in the nitty
-gritty of living on earth.
He's given to you and to me the
privilege of demonstrating in no matter what walk
of life we may be in, no matter
what our human circumstance, that there does just
happen to be in heaven a God who's
big enough for the job.
Have your family found that out?
I mean, you mums and dads, by the
way you confront your problems, do your children
know there's a God in the land, who's
alive and well, and with whom you enjoy
a living, intimate, dynamic, robust, adventurous relationship?
Are you a pastor of a church?
Is your prime occupation to make quite sure
that everybody knows there's a pastor in that
particular church?
Or are you particularly concerned that everybody, pastor
or no pastor, knows there's a God in
that particular church, who's alive and well?
Teaching in a school?
Running a business downtown?
Pioneering some financial empire?
What's your prime preoccupation?
What are you primarily concerned about?
That everybody recognizes just how smart you are
in business?
Or how fine you are a coach because
your team always wins?
What's your supreme preoccupation?
God has entrusted to you and to me
one supreme priority, and that is no matter
whether it's in the home, or in the
business, or whether it's in school, or whether
it's in church, whether it's on vacation, in
every area of life you and I are
to demonstrate indisputably by the quality of lives
that we live, and the way we handle
our problems, that there's a God in the
land.
And he was.
And David, verse 49, put his hand in
his bag, and he took and sent a
stone in his pocket, and he smote the
Philistine in his forehead, that the stone sunk
into his forehead, and he fell upon his
face to the earth.
So David prevailed over the Philistine with a
sling and with a stone, and smote the
Philistine and slew him, but there was no
sword in the hand of David, no sword
in his hand, but faith in his heart.
In a God whose eyes run to and
fro throughout the whole earth, not looking for
a fat bank balance, not looking for a
three and a half cent, not looking for
a whole string of academic degrees, not looking
for some built-in inherent native talents and
gifts, all of which are perfectly legitimate, and
all of which, if God so pleases, he
can use at his pleasure.
That's not what he's looking for.
He's just looking for any little girl, any
little boy, any man or woman, totally unknown,
unsung, unreadable, who's learned a principle to live
by, no sword in his hand, but faith
in his heart.
In a God whose eyes run to and
fro throughout the whole earth, looking for any
boy, girl, man or woman, whose heart, being
perfect toward him, are such that he, God,
being who he is, can show himself strong
on their behalf.
And then there's only one person to be
congratulated, God himself.
What a delightful thing it is that we
have been redeemed in the precious blood of
God's dear Son, that we might be healed
by the Holy Ghost, so that the Lord
Jesus on earth today may close himself with
our humanity, and others, looking into our face,
will say, isn't Jesus Christ marvellous?
Because we've learned to live to the praise
of his glory, reflecting like a mirror the
glory of the Lord.
And it's also the same thing, so long
as we're prepared to let him do it.
Of course, if you don't, you'll fight your
own bears, you'll fight your own lions, you'll
fight your own giants.
And do you know what you'll find out?
That the bears and lions and giants that
you meet are just as big as you
think they are, when you look at yourself,
instead of looking at God.
But he's called us to reign in life
by one Christ Jesus, and be more than
conquerors through him that loves us, and to
embark upon that incredible adventure whereby as every
new day dawns, making ourselves available to the
living Christ, who's promised to close himself with
our humanity, in all his divine activity, we
look into his face and say, be steady,
be different.
I can't, but you can.
And that's all I need to know.
Let's go.