The Trustworthy Promises of God

Acts 27:25 – “For take heart, men, for I have faith in God that it will be exactly as I have been told.” 

In today’s day and age, promises don’t mean as much as they used to.  In the past, a person would strike a business deal simply by saying that a deal had been struck and shaking hands; from that point forward, it was assured that what was promised would be delivered.  Today, we need to sign sheet after sheet in contracts, only to find out that a tiny loophole somewhere still allows another to get away without having to complete his end of the bargain.  We see this in marriages where two people commit to sharing their lives together till death do they part, only to find divorce rates at their highest.  We see this at homes where kids promise their parents that they will do something only to forget and not do it.  We see this on TV where ads promise satisfaction but only deliver shoddy results.  It is a sad but true commentary on society today.  Because many of us have either grown up in this culture where integrity is considered a thing of the past or have seen the culture degrade to this point, it is easy to become callous and start to believe that no promise will ever be kept or come true.  But there are a set of promises that we can trust.  There is a Person who when He says something will deliver it.  That person is God.  He has always shown Himself to be honest and true, and we can trust in His promises.  Our verse today in Acts 27:25 shows the faith Paul had in God’s faithfulness to His Word.  Paul was in the midst of a storm in a ship ready to be destroyed by the waves at any moment, yet he trusted God to be faithful to His promise of protection and life and was delivered with all the men on the ship.  Paul trusted God, and we can too.  Let’s think on some of the promises God has laid out in His Word and how He has delivered on it or will deliver on it in the future to encourage our hearts to trust in Him at all times.

The first thing to meditate upon is on the multiple promises that God has already fulfilled, for when we see His track record, we can understand why we can trust God to keep all the promises that have yet to be fulfilled.  One of the first and most well-known promises God has made in the Bible was to Abraham in the book of Genesis.  He promised Abraham that he would make of him a great nation and that that nation would one day conquer and possess the land of Canaan.  Although it took almost four hundred years for the latter part of the promise to be fulfilled, eventually, the people of Israel, the descendants of Abraham, crossed the wilderness and conquered the Promised Land.  The first part of the promise of course was only partially fulfilled at that time and found its full fulfillment when Christ opened up the door for all Gentiles to become children of Abraham through faith in Christ as well.  Another promise God made in the Old Testament was to Noah, when He established the covenant of the rainbow, in which, He promised to never utilize a world-wide flood to eliminate all mankind again (Genesis 9:11-17).  Have you experienced a world-wide flood lately?  I don’t think so.  God even made a covenant with David that there would always be a person from his lineage ruling in Israel, which found its fulfilment in Christ, the eternal Lord, Savior, and King (Jeremiah 33:14-18).  And there are multiple other passages in which God kept His Word even if the word promise was never used, for when God said something it was a guarantee.  Examples include Solomon and his granting of wisdom (1 Kings 3), Joshua and the assurance that God would never forsake him (Joshua 1:5), and even Saul and his certain loss of crown and eventual death (1 Samuel 13:14, 28:19).  Most importantly, God fulfilled His promise to Adam and Eve to send to us a Savior, who is Christ the Lord, a fact imparted in the Gospels.  In addition, He had His Son fulfill all the 1st coming prophecies made in the Old Testament about the Messiah, such as, riding into Jerusalem on the horseback of a colt (Zechariah 9:9); healing the sick, the blind, and the lame (Isaiah 35:5-6); and being born in Bethlehem (Micah 5:2).  Just to fulfill one of these prophecies is quite the task, but to fulfill all of them is impossible.  Some preachers have described it in this way – It is like taking enough quarters to cover all of Texas, marking one quarter, and asking a blindfolded person to find that one marked quarter.  Christ fulfilled every prophecy made of Him and every promise made by the Father.  God has always kept His promises and will continue to do so.

Knowing that God has kept His promises in the past, we can certainly trust Him to keep all His promises to us in the present, and there are multiples ones at that.  For example, there are the salvation promises throughout the Scripture, such as, Romans 10:13 – “For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved” and John 3:16 – “…That whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”  When you ask Christ to save you, He does it.  There are promises about His presence in our lives like in Hebrews 13:5, “… I will never leave you nor forsake you” or Matthew 28:20, “…And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”  There are the promises on forgiveness for sins like 1 John 1:9, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness”; promises on prayers being answered like John 14:13, “And whatever you ask in My name, that I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son”; and of course, the promise of the Holy Spirit in John 15:26, “But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father…”  These are only seven of the hundreds of promises in the Scriptures that still apply to us today and will be kept by the Father. God has not changed from the past, He will still be faithful in keeping His promises, and many people can attest to at least one of these seven being fulfilled at one point in their lives.  Can you trust Christ to save you like He said He would?  Most certainly!  All Christians can tell you this as fact and can even share a personal story of how that came to be.  Can you trust Him to always be with you, even in your darkest times?  For certain!  For in the darkness, the Light shines even greater as long as you look to Him.  Can you trust Him to give you the Holy Spirit?  No doubt! He has equipped every single person who has given his life to Him the gift of the Holy Spirit to guide, correct, and lead.  The promises listed are some of the ones that the Lord keeps instantly like salvation, forgiveness of sin, hearing one’s prayer, His presence, and the Holy Ghost.

God has kept His promises in the past and certainly fulfills some of them in the present, but there are a ton of promises in the Scripture that will not have their fulfillment until the future – much later in our lives, in our deaths, or even in His Second Coming.  Two major promises that many Christians hold dear are recorded by John.  The first is in John 14:2, where Christ tells His disciples that He is going to prepare a place for us in the mansions of God.  This promise brings us hope and joy knowing that although we may suffer here on earth with loss of earthly goods or persecution, Christ loves us and has prepared for us a place of eternal reward.  This promise can be linked to Matthew 6:19-21, where we are told to lay up treasures in heaven not on earth.  These treasures are assured to us as disciples of His but cannot be seen or held until we get there.  The second promise is right in the next verse of John 14, vs. 3, “And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.”  He promised that He would return again.  Christ prophesied His Second Coming, something of course, we cannot experience until it actually happens.  There are plenty of other promises that are not so far out in the future but require waiting though.  For example, God promises those who seek His kingdom and His righteousness first will have food, drink, and clothing provided for them in Matthew 6:33 – “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.”  This provision may not always come right away, but it will come.  There is a story about George Muller, a Christian who ran an orphanage in England in the 19^th century, who continually trusted the Lord to provide for the orphanage.  One time, the orphanage was completely bare of food – nothing at all in the cupboards – yet they still needed to feed all the kids at the orphanage that morning.  Muller and his staff then began to pray, yet the food that morning was still not on the table.  Places were set, boys were in their seats, but there was still no food.  Muller once again prayed giving thanks for the provision of food that had yet to come.  Right that instant, a baker and a milkman came and offered them bread and milk (http://www.stand4kids.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/ChildrenPrayerModels_George_Blanche.pdf).  Although God’s provision for food did not come in the form of a consistent bank account or funds to the orphanage, because Muller always sought God first, God always provided.  Another example of a promise is that God will never give you a trial/temptation more than you can handle – 1 Corinthians 10:13 – “There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man:  but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.”  The first promise here is that God will not let you be tempted above what you are able, which happens right when the trial begins, because it will never get worse than you can handle.  The second promise is that He will provide a way of escape, which may not happen right away but may come in time – once again something you need to wait for in the future.  The last example I will present here is from Romans 8:28, probably the most quoted verse of the Bible after John 3:16 – “And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose.”  This verse is constantly used as a feel-good passage when things go wrong or unexpectedly, for it is quoted, “All things work together for good…”  Often, the verse isn’t finished and just left there, but the passage clearly adds a stipulation to this promise, “…to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose.”  One must love God or the promise cannot be fulfilled, and even then the promise may not be filled right that instant.  There are tons of promises in the Bible that have yet to find their fulfillment like the promise of heaven, the promise of Christ’s return, and the promise of provisions and deliverance.  But even though they have not yet come, you can trust the Lord to keep His promises from His proven track record.

Like Paul on that ship in the storm, we can trust our God to be faithful.  God will always keep His Word.  He has done it in the past and will continue to do it in the future.  There are only three things we need to remember.  First, God’s timing is not our timing, so it may not come at the time we think.  Second, God’s ways are not our ways, so it may not come in the way we think.  Third, some promises come with a stipulation and if so, the promise will only be fulfilled when that stipulation is fulfilled (This is true for many of the promises in the Bible.  If you just look carefully, you will find that many follow this formula of promise + requirement).  No matter how it comes or when it comes, you can trust God to do what He says, so have faith.

*Some thoughts were obtained from Pastor Charles Stanley’s Sermon on God’s Precious Promises – http://www.intouch.org/you/sermon-outlines/content?topic=god_s_precious_promises_sermon_outline

Bethlehem – A Little Town but an Important One

Micah 5:2 – “But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, who are too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to be ruler in Israel, whose coming forth is from of old, from ancient days.”
Matthew 1:23 – “‘Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call His name Immanuel’ (which means, God with us).”

Christmas is definitely one of my favorite times of the year. When I was a child, I looked forward to getting things that I had wanted months in advance as presents under the tree. When I was a teenager, I looked forward to the days I would have off from school, not worrying about homework or finals or any of those things. When I got into college, I looked forward to just being able to take a load off of the burden of the college quarter system (10 week classes, whose scheduled looked like this: 3rd week – 1st midterm, 7th week – 2nd midterm, 10th week – Papers due, 11th week – finals). But now that I am working, I just look forward to have a few days off from work to spend some quality time with family. But in addition, to just these things, I have always looked forward to the Christmas music that is playing on the radio and the Christmas movies on TV. These last two months, I have been loading up on more Christmas movies than I can count. I watched part of It’s a Wonderful Life, the Frank Capra classic where a down on his luck fella learns about the value of his life and family during Christmas time. I watched maybe 5-10 Hallmark movies which have ranged from Christmas romances to Christmas family movies. I have also seen a few Lifetime Christmas movies about Christmas dances or Christmas parties. In many of these movies, a busy high-profile professional gets stuck in some little town, where he/she relearns the “meaning of Christmas” or brings Christmas spirit back to the town. It is the typical story that uplifts the heart, where the town and the professional both thank each other for helping the other relearn the meaning of Christmas. Interestingly enough, that plot line is very similar to what actually happened on that first Christmas eve (although not necessarily in December), when Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Holy of Holies, the Prince of Peace, was born in the little town of Bethlehem. But instead of the town transforming the individual, the individual transformed the town, as well as, the whole earth.

Bethlehem was a small town located just five miles south of Jerusalem.1 It was a town in which very few people originally resided, to the point, where it was not even counted among the possessions of Judah, when Joshua was dividing out the land.2 This town definitely deserved the description given to it in Micah 5:2 – “who are too little to be among the clans of Judah.” The town was insignificant though its name would have argued otherwise – “house of bread.” Fortunately, it had at least a few things associated with its name, like the birthplace of King David, the home of Ruth and Naomi, and the burial place of Rachel, the wife whom Jacob loved.1 But even in towns with big names associated with it, eventually the town becomes of no consequence unless something in it causes history to change dramatically. For example, who can name the town where Abraham Lincoln was born? I can’t. Do you know the island of Guernsey and which famous author lived there? Bet you didn’t know that Victor Hugo, the author of Les Miserables and The Hunchback of Notre Dame lived there. What about Key West, Florida? Did you know that Ernest Hemmingway lived there? No matter who was born or lived in a town, the town is still of no consequence lest something dramatic happens in it, which is what happened on that Christmas eve. Bethlehem went from a town so lowly to a town that will never be forgotten.

What happened in Bethlehem that night that caused it to be immortalized in song, movies, and books can be found in the end of Micah 5:2, “from you shall come, forth for me one who is to be ruler in Israel, whose coming forth is from of old, from ancient days,” as well as, in our second passage, Matthew 1:23 – “‘Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call His name Immanuel’ (which means, God with us).” Bethlehem became the city in which Jesus Christ the Savior of the world would be born. Bethlehem became the location where the Ruler of all nature, the Lord of all Creation, would first take His breath on this earth. Bethlehem became the location where the name Immanuel became a reality – where God would physically dwell with us. But Bethlehem is not renowned for the miraculous Virgin birth or the angelic choirs that announced it, but for the person who was born – Jesus Christ. It was the presence of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, in that town that evening that has caused all of us to remember this town as one of the most important locations on earth throughout history. Jesus Christ transformed something lowly into something incredible. This is the story of Christmas; this is the purpose of His coming; this is what we all celebrated.

Christ’s presence will radically transform anything into something new just as He did that night in Bethlehem. Jesus Christ’s being carried by Mary turned a young virgin who would never have been noticed by anyone into a girl who ranks as one of the most influential women in history. Jesus Christ’s death on Calvary turned a dark horrid place of bloodshed into a place where eternal life would be bought and the penalty of death would be paid in full. Jesus Christ’s resurrection at the garden tomb would transform tears of sorrow accompanied with the death of a loved one to shouts of joy and anticipation of the resurrection. Christ’s transforming presence has also changed my half-hearted religious business contract with God into a personal, loving friendship with Him. God took a heart full of doubt and fear and made it a heart that will firmly place its faith on the Rock of Ages. God with us, Immanuel, is the great gift that was given to each of us that night in Bethlehem that not only transformed Bethlehem but continues to transform lives of people today.

We can learn three things from what happened in Bethlehem that night. First, we can learn of God’s steadfast, unbounding, uncomprehendable love for us. Jesus Christ gave up His glory in heaven to be born not as a king in a palace in Jerusalem but in a humble stable cave in a town whose name was not even put in the record of possessions. He loved us so much that He willingly went to the cross to die for our sins, while we were still His enemies, sinners rejecting His love for us. Second, we can learn that Christ is willing to come into and transform any life no matter how lowly. No matter how sinful you are, no matter how little or inconsequential or unimportant you feel – Christ came and died for you. John 3:16 says that “God so loved the world…” not just a few people in it, but the whole world including you. If you were the only person that needed saving, He still would have came for you. He loves you that much. Christ came to save the most righteous as well as the chiefest of sinners and He certainly came for you. Lastly, we can learn that Christ’s in one’s life should transform it completely. Though you may be lowly, Christ’s presence in your life once you accept Him as Lord and Savior should transform you into a person of significance in His eyes. But even more, Christ’s presence should turn your life of sin and degradation into a life of joy and obedience. I can attest that this does not happen quickly or easily and takes a deliberate choice of will, but it is worth it. Just four to five days ago, I made the decision to take the business contract of “I’m saved so I need to do this for God” into a willing obedience to Him, and I will tell you that that has turned everything around. It has given me a renewed joy, a renewed faith, and a renewed peace. The Bible says that if we are in Christ, we are a new creation, old things have passed behold all things are new – in other words, we are transformed. So we need to live that way.

As Bethlehem was transformed that night by the greatest gift the world has ever seen – God’s presence in it. Let Christ change your life today and let the name Immanuel – God with us – be true with you by allowing Him to live and reign in your heart daily, living your life for Him. May those outside see Christ living through us so much that they testify that God is with us.

Merry Christmas!
1. Youngblood, Ronald F. Nelson’s New Illustrated Bible Dictionary. Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1995.
2. Barnes’ Notes on the Bible. http://bible.cc/micah/5-2.htm.