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00:00:02 so good morning everybody I'm actually not meant to be here and what you call a backup file so uh William was supposed to be preaching but as Yulan mentioned his wife fell quite ill had to go to hospital we all prayed I called Peter on Wednesday I said you know you need help on Sunday I will take over and so I'm here at the backup file okay so uh I want to do something which is on Christmas let me get my slides going older people know this and this is going to be an an advent sermon but we're not following
00:00:45 the zah text now of course this is very famous if you follow Mr Bean uh young people don't know who Mr Bean is do young people know Mr Bean any young people know Mr be see all don't know right young people know Mr be do most people don't know all the all the all the Baby Boomers know Mr Bean now this is a very famous uh uh clip where he attends church I read this not just as a comedy session but it's actually a social commentary on going to church now on Wednesday this church is going to be packed and there will be many Mr
00:01:26 Beans it's true and what the commentary is saying is that you go to church for a ritual and nobody listens to the sermon you just have to listen to it because it's Christmas let me give you a clue and I spoke to a brother about this this is not meant to be critical uh he's not here so I can today I spoke to Brother Richard about it I think went back right can I ging Richard I can G Richard he not around so he told me look there 52 weeks in a year so all of you listen to 52 sermons a year correct every preacher has got three
00:02:09 points which means in one year there's 156 sermon points now tell me how many Ser point do you remember this year that came of Richard now is not meant to judge he's making a point his point is this a lot of us are more of this than we care to admit and so today I want to pick up something which is one of the best Psalms ever but it's about God's word and as we come in this last sermon for the Advent I hope this uh this makes sense especially as we prepare our hearts to listen to God's word on Wednesday let let's come before the Lord
00:02:54 in prayer Lord um I humbly come before you we ask that the word goes out doesn't come back empty and that we don't come every Sunday just to ritualistically listen to a sermon but we understand it's difficult we cannot remember 156 sermon points in a year so we ask ourselves a question even right now why do we listen to sermons in Jesus name we say this the psalm 19 is considered one the most uh encouraging Psalms ever is CS Lewis favorite Psalms is divided into three sections and you'll be surprised how much this
00:03:40 actually speaks of the Advent let me read it to you the first six verses is one section the heavens declare the glory of God the skies proclaim the work of his hands day after day they PA forth speech night after night they reveal knowledge they have no speech they use no words no sound is heard from them yet their voice goes out into all the Earth their words to the end of the world in the heavens God has pitched a tent for the sun it is like a bridegroom coming out of his chamber Like A Champion rejoicing to run
00:04:17 his course he rises as one end of the heavens and makes his circuit to the other nothing is deprived of his warm so the first six verses is about creation once you hear verse 7 David who wrote this shifts from creation to something else you got to pick this up he shifts suddenly nothing about creation he says the law of the Lord is perfect refeshing the soul this is a very famous Psalm people write songs on this the statutes of the Lord are trustworthy making wise the simple the precept of the Lords are right giving
00:04:58 Joy to the heart the commands of the Lord are radiant giving light to the eyes the fear of the Lord is pure enduring forever the decrees of the Lord are firm and all of them are righteous so 7 to9 he declares praises to this and then in two verses he gives you this value verse 10 they are more precious than gold than much pure gold they are sweeter than honey then honey from the honeycomb so there are two values in it it's more precious than gold they're sweeter than honey by them your sermon is warn in keeping them
00:05:44 there's great reward now that closes a section and verses 12 to13 gives the function of all the verses before this from verse one to verse 11 from verse one but who can discern their own errors forgive my hidden faults that's one here's the second one keep your servant also from willful sins be not may they not rule over me that's the second one you got to see the difference between 12 and 13 then I will be blameless innocent of great transgression and he closes this may these words of my mouth and this
00:06:32 meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight Lord my rock and My Redeemer in verse 14 is such a encouraging verse so we'll look at three sections and Three Points God's word in creation God's word in the Bible and a not to Mr Bean God's word in the Sunday morning sermon now now let me just give you the first part right and we read it just now there are two sections to it the first he looks at the heavens but in particular when you look at verses end of verses 4-6 he's looking at Sunrise to send
00:07:17 down now there's a brother in the second service called Joseph young I just got to know him last week two weeks ago after my last sermon he sent me a WhatsApp message he's a fantastic photographer raer he shot this in Morp you know this is sunrise in Morp this is sunset in Mor I heard Donald wants to do an Arts Festival I know where Donald is I think it's a great idea we got so much talent in IBC here's another one he shot over the city I tell you that takes your breath away man so much talent H sunrise
00:08:00 nice here's another one beautiful H Sunset now there's something about nature isn't it when we look at nature it calms us down when you get stressed uh you don't go and sit in the room and look at Four Walls you go out and look at nature you go for walk you breathe you look at trees you look at the sky you have to ask yourself why instinctively human beings do that and the first six verses tells you he tells you this in the heavens God has pitched a t for the sun like a bridegroom climing out a chamber Like A
00:08:50 Champion rejoicing to run his C he rises in one hand so the heaven makx the circuit nothing is deprived of you can't miss it and the overarching thing is this is the word of God the heavens declar the glory of God the skies proclaim the work of his hands now verse 2 and interesting because there's an oxymoron here you know day after day they pour forth speech night after night they reveal knowledge creation speaks yet verse three they have no speech they use no words no sound is heard from them it's a contradiction
00:09:30 yet their voice goes out into all the Earth their words to the ends of the world and everyone at one point all of us here look at creation and we say what is going on they say a picture is worth a thousand words if I ask you okay um I want to tie I want to I want to tie I want to make a knot in a tie and I write it down for you you won't understand it I send you a few photos you get it so sometimes a picture says a lot of things and the first six verses are saying something let me show you a photo and
00:10:10 you tell me what this photo says this is a photo that's been making around is saying without saying he's saying a lot right but I don't need to say anything right it's saying a lot cu very careful of this being recorded H but he saying a lot in the current climate where uh people are taking down sign boards which don't have the Mele words and all these sensitivities the king invites the prime minister to eat at the Chinese coffee shop he's saying a lot he doesn't need to tell you to you in exact words but he's saying something
00:10:55 to you and what's interesting of the day the king doesn't say anything meaning there's something here he's saying something and he wants the authorities to take it from there I want you to pick this up but here's the problem we saying with words this is very clear sometimes you have no idea what they're saying this is this was out also I don't know how much how much million did they pay for this H anybody remember I can't remember it was a lot of money after that the guy added so we don't get it now when you look at creation and you
00:11:39 say I see the hand of God another guy looks at creation he sees stus this is taken from the website of the American Alliance of atheists we are stas made from the generousity of the universe so long ago and when we die back into the Stars you go you look at Joseph's photos of sunrise and sunset and you see ah there is a God an atheist looks at it and he says I see flaming balls of gases that's the point now actually of the psalmist you know someone else says well yes I I see I see creation but maybe the planet was made
00:12:24 by aliens this is called the Clockwork Universe something popular by Isaac Newton he concluded after he discovered uh uh uh gravity that there was a God who created the universe and then it goes into autopilot mode you know bit like the alien movie Romus and all of that right where you have this Engineers that come design the world like a big experiment all that song From a Distance God is watching you he doesn't care about you he created the world like AI he left you on your own then of course
00:13:03 some people said no I look at creation and I am concluded that is a God I look at the biology of man if you look at scientists scientists are divided 5050 on whether it's Evolution or is what you call intelligent design Albert Einstein believed in a god Carl Yu one the best psychologist believes in the god Jordan Peterson Andrew huberman this Simon cynic if you know your your Millennial thing tanks these are the greatest names of today all believe there's a God so you have one problem wish God wish God and so people say well all
00:13:47 gods lead to the same doesn't matter whether it's Islam or Christianity or thaism or they're all abstracted all religions teach you to do good now you can't say that because fundamentally the description of the character of God differs and this is what the psalmist is getting at you cannot say all religions lead to the same truth because if there is a Creator and we call that Creator God he has a character and the characters of these Gods as described in all the religions of the world are not the same and in the biblical account is
00:14:30 very very distinct let me pick this up in the first six verses David uses a Hebrew word called Elohim for the word God I I that's highlighted it Elohim is a generic Hebrew word mean Spiritual Beings there is a spiritual world out there the correct Hebrew word is called there is a Divine counsel there are the aim there are the Elohim there are the Angels there's a whole dimension of created beings in the image of God which are not mortal you can do a whole summon on that but notice once he goes past
00:15:19 verse 6 and he goes to verse 7 he doesn't use the word Elohim now whenever the Bible uses the word Lord and they all in capitals those of you who are Bible scholars what is the name here Yahweh it is God's personal name given to his people if you don't know me you call me Mr annor you know me well you say hey bro or whatever but it is a personal name it is a name given to family now David is making a very important distinction creation tells you God generally and that's all it doesn't tell you God specifically and the purpose of
00:16:18 the word of God is that you must know God personally that's what all Scholars who have read Psalm 19 has said it's a very powerful way of connecting the first six verses to the rest number one observing God's creation is not enough for you to conclude if there's a God who created the world but every human being looks at creation and every human being will ask this question is there a god that's what the first six verses are saying and if there's a God wish God and if you don't believe in God this is what the Bible is saying you
00:16:59 can't prove it and then you will say well you can't prove that's a God either correct that's the point the first six verses is saying that you don't know and Paul picks this up in Romans one all right the purpose of reflecting of creation is to reveal if the heart is sincerely Wan thing to seek out who is God now here is what Psalm 19 is saying assuming you go on a journey and and you are sitting here right now and you don't know God you're not sure you're agnostic about it you look out there maybe
00:17:38 there's a God I don't know which God maybe it's a Christian God I've been in church for 20 years I'm really not sure what is the difference between the Christian God and every other religion that says I am the one true God is this and it's the story of the Bible the character of God as described in Psalm 19 is love and no other religion describes God in such intimate terms and what is the single most important commodity every human being looks out for love love between a couple love betweenin family members and you
00:18:26 see that in the Garden of Eden it is where man and woman are in a relationship with Yahweh and it is where Heaven meets Earth and the other is for the dimensions of the Heavenly Realms the Elohim the Divine counsel means man made in flesh and actually you think about it very profound now Paul picks it up on another way in Romans 1 he say the WTH of God is being revealed from Heaven against all the godliness and wickedness of people who suppress the truth by the wickedness since what may be known about God is
00:19:11 plain to them because God has made it plain to them and here Psalm 19 for since the creation of the world God's invisible quality his eternal power and divine nature have been clearly seen being understood for what has been made so that people are with without excuse now you must understand about context Romans is written the first few chapters about Gentiles Jews Gentile Jews then he goes about engrafted branches and there all the theology that goes justification by faith imputed righteousness blah blah
00:19:44 blah blah blah but he's talking about Gentiles non Jews now you must understand something about culture at that time during that time there was no Richard Hawkins you know they were no atheist people didn't understand gravity they didn't understand the world was r they believe the world was a spherical Dome everybody believed there was a God or Gods out there that's the context that's the immediate context here please don't take this and hijack it to modern day a80s arguments it's in the culture where science has not gotten
00:20:17 the point where you can objectively assess many things they didn't understand Evolution they didn't understand gravity everybody believed there was a God or gods and you had to choose that's the context and so Paul says although they knew God they neither glorify him as God nor gave thanks to him but their thinking became futile their foolish house were darkens although they claimed to be wise they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images to make like a mortal human being and birds and animals
00:20:56 and reptiles what's interesting the first image is man you know what Paul is saying he's saying guess what what makes more sense you believe that there is somebody created the heavens right he's having conversation with a with a Greek philosopher the guy say yeah now tell me what makes more sense that that God is Zeus who sits up there and goes Dr and likes to have sex a human with with women or is is one of your Gods with wings or there's actually a god out there and this is what the Greek philosopher will say you may be right
00:21:28 but I choose to believe in Zeus that's what he's saying I choose because I prefer Zeus and so he say therefore God gave them over to the sinful desires of Hearts of sexual priority The Exchange the truth of God for lie worship and serve creative things rather than the Creator uh Tim Keller tells a story about some young people who came to see him and says you know what I'm struggling with the Bible I don't quite understand this of the Bible I I I struggle with my faith and they go into a long tet about how
00:22:01 the Bible is unfair and doesn't seem right and Tim Keller looks them the eye and says who are you sleeping with you see that's a connection you know why is it people don't want to be Christians it's not because intellectually it doesn't make sense because they don't want to put themselves under the authority of a king the real truth is we all want to be Kings of Our Lives it's not that people can't believe in God it's more that they're not interested in puring a personal relationship with God or put it
00:22:41 this way I want God in my life he can be any God he can be Zeus he can be Hercules he can be tall he can be whatever he can be God is in the tree God is a spirit whatever whatever makes you fanciful choose your religion choose whatever religion you want shop for your God either there there is a God out there and he is King and he rules over us and that's very frightening and so we choose what Romans is saying not the one to have God I want you to pick this up because he's building on this as he goes to verse
00:23:20 seven so God's word in creation is meant to lead you to God's word in the Bible so now let's look at the seven the 11 verses and these are verses everybody likes to read the law the law is perfect refreshing the soul the sexual of trustworthy making want the simple there's a song on this giving Joy to the heart giving light to the eyes andur Hallelujah I love this oh tell me one verse that gives you that oh John 3:16 God so loved the world he gave his only son for me oh Hallelujah give me another verse Oh I
00:23:58 have plans to to prosper you and large your territory Hallelujah you see here's a common mistake when you look at verses 7 to9 and and here's another sermon I read people think this is about the Bible as a whole so I read one commentary on this once one person wrote a long tiate you know people preaching nowadays we must be Bible based churches you cannot have the word of God at add pop psychology you cannot have the word of God and add all these things people don't preach the pure word of God they would to add a lot
00:24:36 of things so people listen to the sermons he's not wrong but he preach it from this text and the assumption is David is talking about during that time will be the tanak the tanak is the first five books of the Bible or what you call the Kim the Kim is the book of wisdom or maybe the old test let me pick up one word and highlight it for you he's taking one word and he's shifting it again laws statutes percept commands I love this one fear decree is he talking about the Bible he's talking about a very particular subset of the
00:25:10 Bible what is it the law that's very different you know in Frank if you go to Strong's commentary which is the definite commentary on Hebrew verse seven is Torah the Torah of the Lord God Thou shalt not kill wow I read it I got joy to my heart are you sure or not let me see Lou wrote though he say you know you tell me to read the law I say yeah I have to read it is the Bible because I have to read it don't tell me it's going to give me joy don't tell me it's going to refresh the soul I read it I feel
00:25:59 guilty St Louis wrote a great commentary about Psalm 19 let me give you two of the Torah just an example two if a man commits adultery another man's wife with the wife of his neighbor both the adulter and the adulteress are to be put to death wow that's sweeten and honey that's exactly what the Sab say do not accept a ransom for the life of murderer who deserves to die they be put to death wow verse 8 that gives such Joy to the heart Hallelujah Lord you're not going to say that if you're honest but here's where it's even more
00:26:44 personal there are two laws here one is adultery one is murder do the names bashah and Uzziah mean anything to David So when David reads this what do you think he's saying he's saying what we read on Psalm 40 my sins are more than the hair of my head I don't have much hair so maybe not very good example David is not keeping the law opens the whole can of world because why wasn't David it put to death correct smack right up there Scholars have read about this two count he's a murderer and an adulterer
00:27:40 according to the Torah he's supposed to be put to death why didn't why wasn't he put to death only that he read it he says I got joy he what's wrong with you be sadistic now let me let me double down on this Romans Paul says this so then the law is Holy the Commandments holy righteous and good well that's Psalm 19 look at that right we have righteousness versus 8 and N we have Holiness that's verse 9 and radiant is basically is good gives you Direction it's true so Romans 7 is agreeing with Psalm
00:28:26 19 but do you know the context of Romans 7 let me give you the context what shall we say then is the law sinful certainly not I would not have known what sin was had it not been for the law for I wouldn't have known what coverting really was if the law has said You shall not covert but sin seizing the opportunity afforded by the Commandment produced in me every kind of cover thing parents all know this you tell a kid don't do this what would the kid do I will do so they do reverse psychology go
00:29:03 watch watch watch more watch more keep watching watching then hopefully the kid doesn't watch what the Lord does it shows we are by Nature rebellious and at the end of Romans 7 are very famous depressing words the things I should do I do not the things I don't do I do what a Wretched Man I am and we are saying these are more precious than gold they're more pure gold they're sweeter than honey than honey from the honeycomb how do you read these verses in context and the key is found in the last verse he says this at the end of it may
00:29:57 these words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight Lord my rock My Redeemer and the Hebrew word for pleasing is sacrifice I want you to think something about David when David read this he thinks of sacrifice he thinks of rock he thinks of redemption David is a sinner he cannot keep the law but the son of David who was the sacrifice who was pleasing to the Father the Son of David who is The Rock and the son of David who redeemed us for our sins kept the law in Perfection and one way of looking at
00:30:52 these verses is to take all these words and to change it with Christ and the moment you put Christ to replace the verses everything makes sense the love for Christ is perfect refreshing the soul only Christ kept the law in Perfection the love of Christ is trustworthy making wise is simple and so the foolishness of Christ is the bth and wisdom of the world the love of Christ is right giving Joy to the heart love of Christ is radiant giving light to the eyes the love of Christ is pure uring forever and this just so makes sense the
00:31:41 love of Christ is more precious than go the much pure goal is sweetner than honey than from the honeycomb now you say hey an know how can you do this we can because the psalm 19 is about word words and in three days time the word became flesh as we remember this and dwelt among us as we prepare our hearts for Christmas the word of creation the word in scripture became flesh and he took my sins and he took your sins and when we read these words we are not condemned and so Paul ends Romans 7 Things I don't do I do things I do I do
00:32:34 not what a Wretched Man I am who then shall save me thanks be to Christ Jesus our lord and therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus I'm going to pick up a little bit uh how this works as we go on yeah now I want to pick this up a little bit as we see how it goes and what God's word in the Bible those verses shows you a god of Grace a god of love because he knows you and I will sin and so Christ stands there and puts us in that space and tells us I love you my grace is on
00:33:17 you and David being a murderer and adulterer understood one thing because David repented he understood forgiveness because d repentant if you know the story he told naan I am that man and you know what Nan told him you will not die the prophet negates the law that's quite important H and so David Grieves but there's restoration so that's important now let's look at the Sunday morning servant and see how this picks up now I want to ask you what would you consider a good sermon I want you to think this
00:33:54 true someone told me know I find it hard to listen to to you I say why I don't like your voice I find it very greting I mean it's being honest with me another person say you're very CH some other person told me you know you like to score people I try to score people less nowadays you very longwinded but what we consider good sermon and you ask 10 people you get 10 different answers I want you take that the back of your head and ask what's a good sermon but here he's telling you what the function of teaching God's word is you
00:34:34 know he just gives it to you so you want to know what a good servant is he tells you in verses 12 and 13 there two things one who can discern their own errors forgive my hidden faults you know what he's talking about he's talking to those here who are blind to their sins that's very clear who can discern their own errors forgive my hidden faults that's one very clear verse 13 is another type of sins keeps a servants also so we know it's separate from willful sins may they not rule over me and these are people
00:35:11 who sin and they feel they cannot break that sinful habit so there's two categories here you're blind to your sin you are in bondage to your sin and if I throw a stone everybody here is in either one of these categories or you're in both that's his point and we just established before that David is as guilty as hell he's as guilty as hell and he needs God's love and grace to break him out of this so when you pick this up okay as we develop the the text now when you look at the sermon right remember we looking at the law and
00:35:53 he he has to study the law read very carefully there are two ways of assessing a servant so I ask you what is a good sermon I want to suggest you there two things you have to hold in Balance the first one FBC is bit better at doing compared to many churches out there the second one I think humbly tell you very bad at doing you tell me whether right WR the first one which we are quite good at doing comparatively is this you examine the sermon against what scripture says that's what Psalm 19 is study the law find out whether it's a
00:36:26 sin so if someone teaches you this the idea is not for me to stand here and throw stones and judge people the question is is this what the Bible says does the bible tells you you are to have plenty of money you have to tell yourself that why do you need to do this because who doesn't want to have a lot of money I do you see here some people tell you this no he was a great sermon I say why very uplifting I left it fling wow God spoke to me what did he tell you then he tells you something the Bible didn't teach that I
00:37:10 I I remember this very clearly someone sent me a sermon right by a very famous Malaysian preacher the church is in thousands on I say Anna listen to this a fantastic sermon very uplifting so I send him back a text I I I will admit my sin now I have this combative nature I say there's no mention of Jesus in the sermon so he reacted towards me oh you don't need to mention Jesus I said well you listen to the verses that's not what that's not what Matthew is saying they he tells me you know who are you to say that you are
00:37:39 just an architect preaching FBC you know this guy is a PhD yeah and his church got 5,000 people you tell me that his sermon is wrong I say yes because that's not what the verse is saying then I calm down a bit I say look I I tell you what the verse is saying you tell me when I'm wrong after that he don't talk to me you don't care whether the guy is a PhD and he runs a big church where he went to Seminary or whether he's an architect trying to party as a preacher you don't care you look at the verses and that's what Psalm 19 is
00:38:15 saying so that's one the word is something which I think a lot of churches unfortunately have which is a disease you know it's called being gulli wow I really felt that's what I was so uplifted yeah of course I'll tell you as the preacher you want to know how to keep the congregation preach an uplifting sermon give you three points put in a few jokes speak to your heart wow we pack the place man but did I preach the word of God there one that AB see quite good in this here's the one I think we are quite
00:38:52 bad at and you tell me we a wrong this one I think we struggle let me give you example h two sin here you ask yourself which one you have all right now this is what I think conservative Evangelical churches like to do we often like to judge the sermon is good or not so after sermon people ask hey what do you think the preacher yeah delivery very bad he very boring you know ah he didn't speak to my heart I think he was very nervous the introduction very long I don't understand what the illustration
00:39:30 was bought he very Chong hey Peter why you preach like that you think we Seminary Peter so much Greek and Hebrew we don't understand La you know when it we got checklist you know take off you know now I'm not saying that's wrong there's a place to do all of that you know why I'm guilty of this I've been preaching for a very long time I say this in humility so every time a new preacher speak go h I think look very nervous this guy H this sermon very dry H this sermon not bad preach more W power thrill I tell you what I struggle to do
00:40:11 and I want to put it to you all of us have this problem we don't do is we don't let the sermon sit in judgment over us that's our problem I'm going to give you one example that happened recently and then you understand why David when he looks at Psalm 19 he can say it is honey which it tastes good is better than gold recently this guy came to Malaysia so I'm in a chat group with Christians from other churches we spend some time to Goring the guy you Goring right all evangelicals reform gospel centered what's our favorite hobby
00:40:54 criticize people firstly he call Apostle Apostle whack the guy already Apostle number two where's Syra and mo we have to apologize to you for racism he's African South African he's not white so I watched the video w g guy what is this South African guy coming and it was a healing service there were people vomiting all over the place so I wrote long session about this reminds me of John Wimber you know holy laughter people were wrestling about the gospel was not preached uh you know there was nothing what if there was so much
00:41:39 healing ask him to go to SRA hospital and heal people there I love to write this kind of things long p labor aay to G the fellow Cowa a BOS somewh as go back to South Africa of course once you do that and because you listen to YouTube YouTube will send you more of his videos so so this came up so after dinner I said a yeah nothing to do let's go watch La have some fun now he probably going to talk rubbish again law he's going to tell you about Prosperity signs and wonders he's not going to mention about Jesus a South
00:42:14 African open the video the church look even poorer than your church here all the chairs are you know South Africa churches not like this one quite poor no so I say oh let's have some fun and he he preached from Ephesians 4 this Apostle David and you know what he say about how not to grief the Holy Spirit he said there's only one way you know if you don't grieve the holy spirit is when you sin how got very uncomfortable hey why you seeing this kind of things going talk about signs and wers so G you B talk more about holy
00:42:53 laughter come on come on no then he gave an example he said you know he was talking to somebody in church and he had an argument with that person he say he went back he told himself he had to grief over that conversation because he wanted to know if that grief the Lord what made me even more uncomfortable I wanted to switch off the sermon already and he said you really want not to grieve the Holy Spirit the holy spirit is a reflection of the father you learn to fight sin with the power of God and that's the
00:43:29 gospel now you tell me where is he wrong in the Bible nothing I had to repent on my Prejudice I'm not saying that what he did here I agree you know but strictly from his exes of Ephesians 4 about bitterness I could not disagree with him and I learned to talk about my conversation with people if I have a disagreement with you what's my first thing I think you are wrong I'm right I rarely will go back and grief and say you know did I do anything wrong to cause the breakdown in my relationship you and here as a South African man
00:44:12 going home and getting on the knees and weeping and by the way everybody in church takes notes just some just some side side bar to all you guys and then he said something that really cut me he said we often grief over money we s grief over our sins and that cut me to my heart and I told myself strictly from a reading of the word the Lord used him to speak to me and I discovered my hidden sin the sin of Pride and judgmentalism I discovered my willful sin worrying that God will not provide and God used a
00:45:07 man whom I will not up to now invite to FBC I'll be honest because I don't agree with certain things what am I trying to say A good sermon convict you of your sins and comforts you God's love and grace it doesn't matter whether it's boring exciting uplifting you went back feeling wow whether it's Chong whether you don't like the sound of the guy's voice whether he's irritating to you it could be the most boring sermon and you could be like Mr Bean you want to fall asleep but if your heart is open and you hear God speak of your sin
00:45:49 and because we struggle with sins he comforts you that so long you repent he loves you he's your rock he is your Redeemer you will read the word listen to the word and it will be sweeter than honey let me just end with this there's a story in the Bible about a donkey you know and a prophet called balam it's a strange story because the donkey talks this is not shrager by the way and you always ask what's the purpose of the story now the context is balam's a prophet and he was a prophet revealed by
00:46:37 people unfortunately more by those who are enemies of Israel by the moabites and by certain King called balak he's got a respect of everyone he knows his word you you read numbers 20 what's a donkey a donkey is a stupid animal it looks stupid correct do you know what's the story of the donkey talking to balam you see if you follow the story he's on a road and the angel appears before Bala he's so full him doesn't see it so the donkey had to stop him and talk to him until he said oh you're right I am
00:47:21 sinning so God used the donkey to preach to about his sins what's the moral of the story don't focus on the jackass Focus to discern if God is speaking through the jackass correct now jackasses can come in many forms they can also look like this true Lord and what end with this with you every preacher should be a jackass for God why then you don't look at me I'm just a donkey you will hear the word of God Amen the word became flesh and dwelt Among Us let us prepare for Christmas Day and ask you worship him to come out
00:48:30 Lord God we thank you for this for this Psalm this great Psalm it teaches us two twin truths it teaches us that you are a god of Grace and Love Therefore David when he read that that he was an adulterer and he was a murderer but you redeemed him you were his Rock and his life he endeared to be a man after God's heart because you oh Lord the word became flesh died for our sins and because you died for our sins show us our sins one show us our hidden sins and we take that before you and maybe we be encouraged by a god
00:49:24 of love a god of Grace that that we see to not sin so much with the power of the Holy Spirit and for sins that keep us in bondage we take our hands we take our hearts we take our life and we see Lord we bring them before you and may that be pleasing to you as you sing this closing song that we take our life before God and prepare our heart for Christmas May our life be pleasing to God oh Lord our Rock and Redeemer and we say this in Jesus name amen thank you shall We All Rise thank you very much H Pastor
00:50:14 arold donkey [Music] donkey take my life and let it be consecrated Lord to thee take my moments and my days let them flow in ceaseless praise let them flow in ceaseless praise [Music] take my hands and let them move and the impulse of thy love take my feet and let them be Swift and Beau for thee Swift and Beau for the take my voice and let me sing only for my take my lips and let me fild with messes [Music] the F with messes from [Music] the take my will and make it thine it shall be no longer mine take my heart it is th
00:52:28 all it shall be thy Royal it shall be thy roal take my love my Lord I BN and thy fi is Str St take myself and I will be ever only all for thee only all [Music] [Applause] [Music] for let us pray Lord May the law of Christ be written on our foreheads and be close to our hearts give us not a Heart of Stone but a heart Close to You may the law of Christ that gives love and grace and Redemption be sweeter than any honey that we taste may we me may we see it as more valuable than all the possessions we
00:54:04 hold may it give joy to our heart and may we leave here today after listening to your word knowing our sins and here we ask for a short moment for you to reflect what is a particular sin you want to repent of it may be a hidden sin where you are too proud and judgmental maybe you had a conflict with people recently and all you're saying is the other person did wrong and right now in the quietness the Lord is trying to reveal that quiet that that hidden sin to you it may be a sin you're struggling
00:54:46 with and you're in shame and and you feel you cannot break out of [Music] it and right now the Lord is saying come to my word the word became flesh there is redemption there is hope if you just put adhere to the word Lord prepare our hearts to receive the word for Christmas day that whoever speaks even though it's a great sermon boring sermon long sermon we open our hearts to receive it to hear your love your grace that Comforts and to expose our sins that we walk closer to you and we say it in Jesus name amen God bless you
00:55:42 the servant service is over and we are here as usual to stay back to talk to anybody who just wants to be prayed over and chat God bless you we see you guys on Christmas Day [Music] y you're all Jack I've been exercising too much Alix [Music] canot what's your name sorry can someone switch off the Mike she came from Philippines uh she's my best friend I'm tell you that from Caribbean h [Music]
