Good morning, church family. I hope you are well. I’ve been praying for you, and I hope you are keeping the church in your prayers as well. And so for a second time, we’re going to look at the Word of God this way. So I encourage you, if you have your Bible, turn with me to 1 Kings chapter 17. 1 Kings chapter 17. You know, it’s interesting how, you know, the virus and everything that’s going on has kind of reshaped life momentarily, and I’ve been faced with concerns, fears I’ve never had before in my entire life. I’ve never driven to the grocery store, not sure at all whether or not I’m going to find something. I’ve never been able to find what I’m looking for or having to jump around to multiple grocery stores to find what I want. So a concern about supply chains and supply and demand, that has become a real reality for us as it never has, at least in my lifetime. But I want us to look at ancient Israel and see a chapter in their history where they have a great supply chain. They have a great supply chain. They have a great supply chain. They have a supply problem. They have not. They’re in a very severe drought. But the interesting thing about their drought, their famine, is it is self-induced. What they need is readily available to them. The problem is their famine, their drought is great because they don’t want to receive it the way they ought to receive it. They’re in a physical famine, but also a spiritual famine. They refuse to receive God’s provision, God’s supply, the way that he expects them to. I mean, I want us to kind of let that question hang over us this morning. Are our hands, is our heart in the correct posture to receive what God wants for us, what God has for us in life, as it concerns practical day-to-day life, but also what God has for us as we follow Jesus? God’s great supply is the posture of our hearts and lives correct to receive it in the way he desires us to receive it. In 1 Kings chapter 17, it says, Now Elijah the Tishbite of Tishbe in Gilead said to Ahab, As the Lord, the God of Israel, lives before whom I stand, there shall be neither dew nor rain these years, except by my word. So recall for a minute with me, Israel has split into two kingdoms since King Solomon has passed away, the northern kingdom of Israel and the southern kingdom of Judah. And Judah has its own fair share of evil kings, but Israel, the northern kingdom, much more so. Both kingdoms are on a perpetual spiral downward into exile due to their wickedness. And here in this passage this morning, we get a glimpse of Israel at its very lowest. Ahab has become king in place of his father, Omri. And Ahab is evil in the eyes of the Lord, as Omri, his father, was. But the scripture actually goes further and said he did more to provoke the Lord, the God of Israel, to anger God more than all the other kings of Israel who went before him. So Ahab, what he did was he encouraged the worship of the false god Baal, as his father did. But he went further by marrying a non-Jew, Jezebel, the daughter of the king of Sidon. And under her wiles, they together forbade Israel from worshiping Yahweh altogether. They could only worship Baal. Even to the point, the scripture tells us that Jezebel hunted down the prophets of God to execute them. So kind of in the midst of this, darkness of this rampant idolatry, this worship of Baal, God raises up the man, Elijah. And Elijah goes and he prophesies before King Ahab that for three and a half years, there would be no rain until Elijah came back and gave the word, there would be a severe drought. And that drought would stay until the word of the Lord lifted it. But I want you to understand the great significance of Elijah bringing a drought at this time. And I want you to understand the great significance of Elijah bringing a drought at this point in time. Baal, that false god in the mind of pagan nations and these defecting Israelites, he was believed to be the god of rain and fertility. One Bible dictionary says, as the storm god and bringer of rain, Baal was recognized as sustaining the fertility of crops, animals, and people. His followers often believed that sexual acts performed in his temple would boost Baal’s sexual prowess. Thus contributing to his increasing fertility. So what they did was they worshipped Baal and they did it in a way that would have been gross sins in the eyes of Yahweh, in the eyes of the one true God, expecting Baal to provide something that truly he couldn’t provide. Only the one true God could. And God shuts up the heavens for this. But it’s not as though, I want you to see, God hadn’t forewarned them. God says, way back in Deuteronomy 11, before they go into the land, if indeed you obey my commandment that I command you today to love the Lord your God and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul, he will give rain for your land in its season, the early rain, the later rain, that you may gather in your grain and your wine and your oil, and he will give grass in your fields for your livestock, and you shall eat and be full. Take care, lest your heart be deceived and you turn aside and subdued. Serve other gods and worship them. Then the anger of the Lord will be kindled against you, and he will shut up the heavens so that there will be no rain. So understand, God is not withholding the supply of rain they need because he wants to, because he’s indifferent to their need. He’s withholding his good supply for his people simply because they do not want it from him.

So if we’re going to receive God’s great supply, I want us to learn from the mistakes of Ahab, Jezebel, these defecting Israelites, how not to live as they did, and rather learn from the prophet Elijah and a poor widow’s example. If you go back to 1 Kings, chapter 17, in verse 2, it goes on to say this, And the word of the Lord came to him, that’s to Elijah, depart from here and turn eastward and hide yourself by the brook Cherith, which is east of the Jordan. And you shall drink from the brook, and I have commanded the ravens to feed you there. So he went and did according to the word of the Lord. He went and lived by the brook Cherith, that is east of the Jordan, and the ravens brought him bread and meat in the morning, and bread and meat in the evening, and he drank from the brook. And after a while the brook dried up because there was no rain in the land. Then the word of the Lord came to him, arise, go to Zarephath, which belongs to Sidon, and dwell there. Behold, I have commanded a widow there to feed you. So he arose and went to Zarephath. And when he came to the gate of the city, behold, a widow was there gathering sticks. And he called to her and said, bring me a little water and a vessel that I may drink. And as she was going to bring it, he called to her and said, bring me a morsel of bread in your hand. And she said, as the Lord your God lives, I have nothing baked, only a handful of flour in a jar and a little oil in a jug. And now I am gathering a couple of sticks that I may go in and prepare it for myself and my son that we may eat it and die. And Elijah said to her, do not forget fear. Go and do as you have said, but first make me a little cake of it and bring it to me. And afterward, make something for yourself and your son. For thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, the jar of flour shall not be spent and the jug of oil shall not be empty until the day that the Lord sends rain upon the earth. And she went and did as Elijah said, and she, and he and her household ate for many days. The jar of flour was not spent. Neither did the jug of oil become empty, according to the word of the Lord that he spoke by Elijah. So Elijah is sent away by God’s care and protection, away from King Ahab, away from Jezebel, them trying to get at him, to kill him. And God sends Elijah to this, and from this brook, he’ll drink water. And strangely, God had commanded ravens to bring him food to sustain him in hiding. But in times, what’s thought to be a year, the brook dries up because the famine, the drought becomes more severe. And this was a strange provision God gave by the brook and the ravens, but it gets more strange. God commands Elijah to travel to Zarephath. Zarephath belongs to Jezebel’s father, who was king of Sidon. So he’s got to go into enemy territory. So now understand this, going to Zarephath to a widow there in ancient times, there was no welfare system as we know it. Now to be a widow in the ancient world was to be financially destitute. There weren’t many economic ladders to climb in the ancient world. And really that’s true for women up until the modern era today, in which womanhood is not at all defined by marriage or dependence on a husband. So without your husband, you were quite poor. God in his perfect wisdom and charity now in Israel gave laws that protected widows. In Deuteronomy 14, we find that God commands a tithe that is specifically for orphans and widows so that they can be taken care of. So what is Elijah to do but to go to the enemy’s territory in Zarephath? And ask not just any Jewish person, it’s not a Jewish person, but to ask a Gentile widow, one of the poorest people of the land, not to just give him some water, which would have been slightly absurd given that they’re in a severe drought, but more than that, Elijah asked this poor Gentile widow for some bread, which was the staple food of poor people in the ancient world. And she responds, I have only enough flour, enough oil to make just a little bit of bread for me and my son. And once we eat this little bit of bread, we’ll die, we’ll perish. So how strange is this? This is an odd, this is an unreasonable request, it seems, that God’s making on Elijah and really on this woman, as man sees it anyways. Elijah must go from, the brook and birds, to a poor widow for the supply. She does not have the resources for Elijah. She doesn’t have the resources for herself. Yet, Elijah, full of faith, says to her, don’t fear. He says, you cook me bread. What does he say? First. Second, you feed your son and yourself. And if you do this, God is going to supernaturally turn your little into very much. And if you do this, God is going to supernaturally turn your little into very much. Here is the promise that if you do what God’s calling you to do here, you’re going to have an ample supply throughout this famine, throughout the drought. And this is the amazing thing. She does it. She trusted what she had in her hands to the Lord, literally. And so also trust what he has in his hands, his whole life. So both of them in their own way, they’re open-handed in obedience and giving to God. And so they’re open-handed in their own way. And so they’re what he asks of them, what he’s calling them to do. They’re trusting God to be the supplier of all their needs. Can we say this morning, the same thing about ourselves in our hardest, driest, bleakest seasons of life? The truth is this, and we see it so often in scripture, unreasonable requests made by the Lord expose who we really believe. to be our supplier. They do. It’s a test without error. It was unreasonable for God to ask Abraham to offer up his one and only son. It was unreasonable to ask 500-year-old Noah to spend decades building a boat in the middle of nowhere. It was unreasonable for the Lord to tell Gideon to send home his thousands and only keep 300 men. It was unreasonable for the widow in Jesus’s time to send home his thousands and only keep 300 men. It was unreasonable for the to put her two last copper coins in the offering box. But each of these, by grace, saw the supplier behind the supply. Because who is wise to supply what we need when we need it? Who is good to supply what we need when we need it? Only God, the one who has his eye on the sparrow, sees our every need and is ready to supply when we need. God is not as Baal. Grab this. Who must be coerced, who must be cajoled into giving us what we need. He is an infinitely benevolent father, an unwavering shepherd, an ever-present help and aid. The pagan says we must satisfy the deity to get our supply, but God says be satisfied in my ample supply. So our great error so often is to look at our hands and our hands and our hands and our hands that receive from the Lord and make the terrible mistake of thinking that those same hands provide it. One wise pastor has said it like this. Because of our proneness to look at the bucket and forget the fountain, God has frequently to change his means of supply to keep our eyes fixed on the source. Our hands receive because God is a great supplier. He alone can fill them. He fills them in. We live in normal seasons when by hard work and labor, both of which please the Lord and he expects of us, God provides our needs through that. But God’s not bound to the normal or how we would always like to see his provision for life be given. We cannot put demands on God as if he was a faulty governor. He’s not. He’s a perfect overseer down to the what, the when, and the how. His what, his when, and his how are sublime. His what, his when, and his how are superlative. His supply chain, flawless. So we need not attempt to shape God into the form we think preferable, but ask that he reshape our hearts and minds to worship the God that we cannot control or understand, always believing he is in control and he always understands. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything.

Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything.

Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, in his hand is the life of everything. Job says in Job chapter 12, more dear to our hearts. Friends, we would be the poorest, sorriest people on the face of the earth. Ahab was deprived of rain and crop and cattle, not so he would desire these things all the more. He was deprived of these things that he would desire God all the more. So don’t make the error of separating physical from spiritual. The allegiance of your soul is exposed by the handling of the wallet. If God is our God, then he is singularly Lord of both of our souls and our bodies. He is keeper of them. We are his servants with both. And, you know, if we’re tempted, and certainly we are, we’re tempted at times to distrust the Lord’s supply, you know what we only need to do is this. We need to look at Calvary. We need to look at the cross, and there we need to see God’s ultimate supply, God’s ultimate provision. The cross of Christ is the provision for a new heart, a new soul free from sin, free from self-preserving pride, to know that Jesus’ blood is the precious cost to renew our soul, to love and obey, to trust God perfectly. The broken body of Jesus raised up new from the grave is the undeniable proof that God has a way to save us. And, you know, if we’re a perfect supply for our bodies that need and have wants in a new heaven and a new earth to come, so Jesus is God’s proof of supply. Can we always open our hands to give and to obey because we know that in the cross it is God’s hard proof that he loves us and he’s always meeting our needs as we have them? You know, watching the news right now is, I think, a dangerous thing to do. I saw something today that they’re going to start offering free counseling for people who are just dealing with the stress of all this. I think the news though is part of the problem because when you turn the news on, you hear about this and that economic, you know, advisor who knows this or that about this or that, and they know what’s going on. And one guy says, oh no, the economy will be fine. And the next guy says, oh no, the economy is not going to bounce back. And it’s just an endless flurry of opinions. That I think leaves most people pretty stressed out and clenching hard to what they have, doesn’t it? But I want to say this to you, okay? I want to say this plainly to you.

Don’t worry about money and food. Why? Because Jesus literally said that verbatim. Do not worry about your life, what you will eat, what you will drink, what you will wear. Do not the pagans run after all these things, just like Aha, Jezebel, just like Aha, Ahab. Friends, we are called to take Jesus at his plain word, especially when it seems unreasonable. And I know I say things sometimes, and I say them not because I can’t find new things to say, but because I think the most precious things in life are the slipperiest things. And our sinful hands have a hard time, you know, holding on to them. But you know, the end of our worship sets, before I usually get up to bring the word, I pray something like this. Lord, we want to give you our time, our talent, our treasure. And I pray that because if we truly are in Christ, if we truly believe that God is our supplier, then we understand every second we have, every gift we have, all the money we have in the bank, friends, these are wonderful gifts, tools to steward, that God would use them in our lives to bring himself greater glory, that God would use us in the local church to bring him greater glory, that we would live as generous unto the calls of God, as God has loved us in sending his son Jesus to bleed and die for us. So you cannot be, and maybe this is a growth area for you. We all have growth areas. We all need to grow in this. You cannot be governed by fear. You cannot be. I think about Paul talking to the Corinthians and saying the churches of Macedonia, they gave with joy out of the abundance of not their riches and wealth, but out of their poverty, extremely impoverished, they gave to the cause of the church. So you have got to decide this because it may be coronavirus today. It may be something different next year. Who is your provider? Who is your provider? Who is your provider? Is your provider, your employer, the person you show up to work for? Well, maybe God uses that as a means sometimes, but you have got to believe that if God is your God, he alone is your supplier and you can freely let go of what he tells you to let go of. You can freely live generous in Christ as the spirit leads you to, because you know all your needs are met in Christ Jesus and God loves you more than you can know. And you don’t need to live like that. You don’t need to live like that. The pagans live. People are ripping toilet paper off the shelves and stacking it up for the next five years to come. You can know that your God is going to take care of you. There is a rush of peace. There is a spring of just water for you if you can grab hold of that wonderful truth by faith. God is our supplier. Do you really believe it?

Why don’t you believe it? to look back with me in first kings chapter 17 there in verse 17 and it says after this the son of the woman the mistress of the house became ill and his illness was so severe there was no breath left in him and she said to elijah what have you against me oh man of god you have come to me to bring my sin to remembrance and to cause the death of my son and he said to her give me your son and he took him from her arms and carried him up into the upper chamber where he lodged and laid him on his own bed and he cried to the lord oh lord my god have you brought calamity even upon the widow with whom i sojourned by killing her son then he stretched himself upon the child three times and cried to the lord oh lord my god let this child’s life come into him again and the lord listened to the voice of elijah and the life of the child came to him again and he revived and elijah took the child and brought him down from the upper chamber and to the house and delivered him to his mother and elijah said see your son lives and the woman said to elijah now i know that you are a man of god and that the

mouth is true so god’s supply was great for the water the food that the widow and her son and elijah needed for all this time during the famine but then this terrible unforeseen thing happens the widow the widow’s son becomes sick so sick that he dies you can imagine the distress of any mother that would have to deal with something like that but it’s heightened isn’t it by the fact that he was her only relative and at that he’s the only son of his father her husband and he alone would have carried on the family name to another generation now it’s cut off her hope of having a loving son take care of her when she’s older that’s gone so what in the end is going to happen to her when she’s older that’s gone so what in the end is going to end is so good about a never-ending supply of bread and water if there’s no one to eat it with she is alone and bereft of her precious son’s life and presence and her analysis of the situation i think we have to conclude is both accurate and inaccurate at the same time she assumes you know elijah the the man of god has brought this thing to pass for her sin or some sin she’s committed which of course is not the case at all because elijah he’s equally shocked when he discovers this tragedy but it is true isn’t it that she has sinned and i think we have to ask well in what way well was this gentile woman a devout convert to judaism before elijah came worshiping the one true god or was she a pagan worshiper of baal who was introduced to him by his father and he was a Gentile woman and he was a Gentile woman since elijah’s arrival it’s nearly impossible to say and you can only speculate either way the woman has sinned whether it be unfaithfulness to the law of moses that she would have known to be the standard of righteousness as one who had converted to judaism or certainly she’s sinful if she was altogether a pagan worshiper of baal so so she’s not arguing whether or not she has sinned or ever done wrong or she only despairs that the effects of the sin have come to visit her now and truly i think you and i have to identify with her in that way and it is this her plight is our plight because we have all in our own way sinned against god and because we are all guilty of not having kept a perfect record every person is liable to experience the effects of participating as we all do don’t we in sinful humanity

let’s see what elijah does and truly it’s the only thing he knows to do as a man of god it’s the only thing he knows to do as a prophet and i think there’s there’s great wisdom here if we grab kind of his disposition here’s what here’s what he does elijah prays he implores fiercely to god to have mercy on him and to have mercy on him and to have mercy on him and to have mercy on him mercy not mercy deserved there’s no such thing as mercy deserved mercy deserved is just a person’s rights but the widow has none she’s sinned you and i have sinned we have none but elijah appeals to the god who is there and elijah knows that the god who is there is a god of mercy the psalmist says the lord is merciful and gracious slow to anger and abounding and steadfast love elijah does what perhaps seems to be an odd thing he lays upon the boy three times as he prays and i believe he’s laying on the boy to identify with the plight of the woman and even his own plight and this tragedy he’s he is placing his life against this boys and pleading oh god see what has happened here oh god help this boy bring him back be gracious be merciful to his mother and the lord does what he does not have to do but the lord hears elijah and the lord is merciful to the widow he’s kind to his servant he’s kind to this grieved woman and it ends in the glory and praise of god for being a god of mercy when he did not have to be that and so god’s glory is made known to this woman and how he’s been merciful and how he’s loved her and i think it’s it’s this for us to grab just as much we have to trust the lord we have to know he is our supplier not just when he asks for things from our hands but when god takes things out of our hands and he does the painful experience that you and i so often know intimately from the loss of loved ones financial uncertainty adverse circumstances by the dozen never point to a god who is merciless or cold only to a world and humanity that are these things often i think we’re pushed by our own sorrows to believe god cannot be a good god if he would allow this or that to come to pass in my life you’ve heard someone say i’m not a good god i’m not a good god i’m not a good god say that maybe you’ve thought it before god can’t be good if he’s allowed x y and z to happen in my life but that is please hear me say this that is an altogether cracked lens through which to look at light the very fact that you have breath in your lungs despite the hardships you endure i endure is the first of many evidences that god loves you and i and he cares for us deeply the presence of any good in your life through thefunded you shall surely die yet he did not god let man live another day and god let man live another day and god let man live another day so god did not eternally condemn him Adam mercilessly as he could have done in that moment and cast him into hell forever? No, he didn’t do that at all, though he deserved it. So you see, from the breath you breathe, to food you eat, to a roof over your head, to the glimpse of a beautiful countryside in the morning, God is good to us in the midst of our brokenness, in the midst of our mess that we created. He and whether he restores or doesn’t restore things that we want in the moment, it doesn’t change the fact that he is still good and he is still worth our trust. Job says, though you slay me, I hope in you. Church, life may be adverse at many points, but we have yet to experience a merciless God who punishes us irreversibly, gives us what we deserve. We have not experienced that. And let me say to you, by grace, if you place faith in Jesus, the pinnacle of God’s mercy, you won’t experience that. You won’t know the wrath of God. Because let’s look at the cross and see that Jesus drank the full cup of God’s wrath. Jesus drank it undiluted. He drank it full. He drank it to the bottom so that you and I would know mercy and love. Both now, while we’re in this life, God is merciful and kind and caring to us. There’s so much more when eternity comes. And so we will sing now and we will forever sing of a God who is merciful. So see, God is always our rich supply when we need him. When you see him through the lens of Calvary, that place where justice and mercy meet, where Christ received the wrath of God for our sins, and we received mercy. In a merciless world, oh, let faith compel you to praise God. A God who is not distant. A God who is not far off. A God who cares for your hurts, who loves you. God does not point the finger and say, it’s your own fault. No, what does he give us abundantly in his spirit? He gives us his peace. He gives us his strength. He gives us his mercy. He gives us his mercy. He gives us his joy. He comforts us in all our afflictions, the apostle Paul says. And he loves us and we know it. Why do we know it? Because he sent his son, Jesus, to lift us above the fall of man and sin and death and sadness and hell and his ancient foe. Jesus is God’s mercy to us and for us. The glory and praise of the father is seen in what Christ did to the glory and praise of the father, that we would glory and praise the father for his great mercy. Do you believe God is your supply, even when he takes? It’s a hard thing to do, but it’s a thing we must do. We must leave it to God’s good wisdom as to why he responds to our pleas for mercy the way we want sometimes, and sometimes he doesn’t. But, you know, it’s not our business to play with God. It’s not our business to play with God. It’s not our business to play with God. It’s our business to trust him. But never fail. And I want to say this to you. I think when we’re in those moments where we feel like something valuable has been taken, what we want to do is go inside. We want to cut everything off. We want to blame. That’s really not the reaction of someone who trusts in Jesus. Here’s what we should never fail to do when we experience things taken from us. We should fly to Jesus. Fly to God. Fly to God in our hour of need. Whether or not he restores what he has taken, he will not take himself away. His presence and his spirit will always abide. And there in our despair, there in our loneliness, there in our hope, Jesus will identify, and Jesus will comfort, and Jesus will heal, and Jesus will keep us until the end. The enemy would have us curse God and die, but the spirit draws us to the Lord. To bless his name forever. And when forever comes, we shall see clearly and know well the abundant riches of God’s mercy. It’s always a wonderful story to share, especially at funerals. I’ve shared it, you know, at a funeral before. And it’s the story of Horatio Spafford, who wrote that wonderful hymn, It Is Well.

I may have shared it before on a Sunday. I don’t know, but if you don’t know, Horatio Spafford in the great Chicago fire in the 1800s, he lost everything, lost his fortune. His wife and daughters went ahead of him on a ship to England, and the ship went down, and both of his daughters drowned in a shipwreck, and only his wife survived. And on that ship ride over to mourn with his wife in the bottom of a boat, he wrote that wonderful hymn, It Is Well.

And he says in that hymn, one line that just sticks out to me, Christ has regarded my helpless estate. Now, how do you say Christ has regarded my helpless estate when your estate has just literally been burned up with fire and drowned in the ocean? Well, you do it when you believe that God is kind and God is merciful beyond what you can see, beyond what you can experience, when you have a real taste of the ply of the blood of Christ that flowed from Calvary’s hill to know that all things are working for the good of those who love him. That’s how you sing something like that. That’s how you worship God when he takes. I want to encourage you in our strange time, hold on to what you have, and let me tell you what you have. You have a father. You have a shepherd. You have a comforter. You have a merciful God. Run to the Lord in your afflictions. Run to the written word and be reminded of his endless, limitless mercy that’s new every morning, the scripture tells us. Trust his perfect way. And can I say, once you’ve washed and bathed in that mercy and you’ve been made new, be a comfort, be a light. What is it to experience mercy and not also be a mercy, a vessel of mercy yourself that others would see and know though things are bad, though God takes, he ultimately has given. And so we can have peace and we can have trust and we can hope in our darkest, deepest valley. And let me say this last, never stop praising God in every season, especially, and this is where it counts, especially in the hardest ones. My pastor growing up would always say that. Your worship on the mountain is no good if you cannot do it in a valley. And there’s so much spiritual wisdom and truth in that, friends. Grab Jesus in these dark times and know in him the mercy and the care of God. He is your great supply. I want you to just look at a passage with me in the Gospel of John real quick here. In John chapter 7, verse 37, Jesus says this. It says, on the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and he cried out,

if anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. If anyone thirsts, he says, whoever,

whoever, whoever believes in me as the out of his heart will flow rivers of living water. Church, I want you to know and I want you to smile this morning in this truth. God’s great supply is freely given to those who will freely receive it. God is not trying to keep himself back. He is offering his love, his care, his protection, his provision, his knowledge, his wisdom, his love, his care, his protection, his wisdom to those who would open their hands and receive it in the now. And so much more when we trust and believe in his son, he is supplying us with the riches in the heavenly places when we’re seated with Christ for an eternity to come. He desires to give it to you. Will you let go of selfish pride that says, no, I must have it my way? Will you let go of fear that says, no, what if God doesn’t provide the way he ought? Friends, these things are from the devil. These things are from our flesh. But we must ascend to the place of where Christ is by faith and say, no, Christ is enough and Christ is good. And Jesus is the shepherd who will lead us beside the still water and he will meet our every need. And he loves me more than I could ever realize he loves me. Friend, we have a choice to make. And it’s a choice between grabbing at what God has created or grabbing at and holding on and being in touch with God. And we have a choice to make. And it’s a choice between grabbing at what God has made. And it’s a choice between grabbing at what God has made and holding on and being in touch with He is highly satisfied in the creator himself. It’s what you have been made for. It’s what I have been made for. It’s what God is calling us to. Oh, church, that we would open up our hands and in these difficult times, prove our faith by saying, Lord, I’m not going to fear. I’m not going to fret. I’m not going to doubt you. I’m going to receive from you. And I’m going to give to you what you call me to give. Because at the end of it all, it’s not about me. It’s about you receiving glory through showing your strength. It’s about you receiving glory through showing self to be good and holy and right in my life, though it may be a mess at times, though the world is a mess. God, I want your glory to fall down in my life, and you have your way for your name’s sake, for my good, that I would be satisfied in who you are. And friends, that’s why you’ve been created. That’s why I’ve been created, to be satisfied in a God who’s a perfect supplier of all of our needs. Friends, that’s just a wonderful truth for you just to rest in. I want you to have a wonderful night’s sleep. I want you to breathe unlike vast millions and billions across the globe are doing right now. And I want you to do it, and I say you must do it, because by faith we have Jesus.

And Jesus is our supply. Jesus loves us. Jesus is going to do it. Let us be by grace and the working of the Spirit shaped into those who have open hands to receive Christ, to become like Christ, to the glory and praise of the Father.

Well, again, I love you. Let’s continue to pray for one another. I’ll be communicating with you soon about what the next couple weeks look like, and so I’ll get with you soon on that. I love you. Have a wonderful day. Have a wonderful day of rest on this Sunday with your family, and I’ll talk to you soon, all right? I love you. God bless you.