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WEEKLY
Volume 1 Number 41
11 March 2007
Wait Upon the LORD
(Message delivered by Pr Hien Nguyen at the Sunday
Worship Service, 2 pm, Mar 4, 2007)
Text:
Isaiah 40:27-31
Have you ever fainted or been
weary? Looking at a marathon, we see that all the participants can run
very well at the beginning, but later we can see some are weary, some
just walk and some fainted and drop out. You and I sometimes feel very
tired or weary after having worked very hard. We feel like we have no
more strength to stand up but just to lie down and rest. Sometimes we
suffer from stress, oppressions, afflictions, persecutions or trials and
wait for the deliverance from the Lord day by day while we expect Him to
intervene and help us and deliver us right away. Such a long wait also
makes us feel frustrated, weary, or hopeless. It is not easy to wait
upon the Lord while we urgently need His help, His guidance, His
protection, provision or deliverance. Then how can we wait upon the LORD
in all situations and experience this precious promise from Him: “But
they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall
mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and
they shall walk, and not faint” (v 31). Surely, you and I can
hardly wait upon the LORD if we lack our knowledge of Him and trust in
Him.
Know the LORD and Trust in
Him
We cannot fully trust someone
we do not know well. The more we know the Lord, the more we can trust in
Him and wait upon Him. God’s people, the Jews, were chastised due to
their sins, transgressions, iniquities, unfaithfulness, disobedience,
and idolatry (Isa 40:2; 42:24; 43:24). While they were in captivity or
exile in Babylon, they wept and missed their blessed days of worshiping
the Lord their God in Jerusalem and waited for His deliverance and
restoration of their nation as He promised (Ps 137; Isa 51:11, 14;
56:8). This long wait made them weary and almost hopeless. God used the
prophet Isaiah to speak to these captive people (Isa 40 to the end) to
comfort them and manifest Himself to them and encourage them to wait
upon Him.
The Living, True,
Sovereign, and Covenant God, the Mighty Creator.
Under the oppression of Babylonian Empire for a long time, they might
have been tempted to compare the LORD with the Babylonians’ gods and
acknowledge the power of Babylonian Empire. The LORD challenged them,
asking “To whom then will ye liken God? or what likeness will ye
compare unto him?” (v 18), and “To whom then will ye liken
me, or shall I be equal? saith the Holy One” (v 25). It seems that
they did not know the LORD properly, and He asked them, “Have ye not
known? have ye not heard?” (v 21), and “Hast thou not known? has
thou not heard?” (v 28). The Lord wanted to remind them that He is
their living, true and covenant God, the Creator, all wise, all knowing,
all powerful and mighty, “Lift up your eyes on high, and behold
who hath created these things, that bringeth out their host
by number: he calleth them all by names by the greatness of his
might, for that he is strong in power; not one faileth” (v 26)
and “the everlasting God, the LORD, the Creator of the ends of the
earth, fainteth not, neither is weary? there is no searching of his
understanding” (v 28). He is sovereign over all, “It is he
that sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants
thereof are as grasshoppers; that stretcheth out the heavens as a
curtain, and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in: That bringeth the
princes to nothing; he maketh the judges of the earth as vanity” (vv
22-23), while the heathen gods or idols are only the products of the
workman (vv 19-20), and while “the nations are as a drop of a bucket,
and are counted as the small dust of the balance: behold, he taketh up
the isles as a very little thing” (v 15) and “All nations
before him
are as nothing;
and they are counted to him less than nothing, and vanity”
(v 17). My dear friends, in our troubles, difficulties and trials, it is
always wise to look unto the Lord and know that He is our faithful and
mighty God and then trust in His sovereignty, “Be still, and know
that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be
exalted in the earth” (Ps 46:10).
The Faithful and Caring
LORD. When they
were being chastised in Babylon, the Jews might have thought that God
had forgotten them, forsaken them, ignored them or been too weary to
deliver them. The LORD reproved them for their lack of trust in Him by
asking, “Why sayest thou, O Jacob, and speakest, O
Israel, My way is hid from the
LORD, and my judgment is passed over from my God?”
(v 27). “My way” denotes the captives’ way of life in Babylon which is
full of tribulations, oppressions and afflictions. My way “is hidden”
means being not noticed, being ignored. “My judgment” means my cause, my
right. My judgement is “passed over from my God” means being disregarded
by my God. They might have complained why God did not regard them nor
care for them as His own people while they were oppressed by the wicked
and ungodly Babylonians. My dear friends, complaints or murmurings only
show our lack of faith and trust in the Lord and our submission to His
sovereignty! Does God ignore or disregard our troubles, afflictions or
trials? Absolutely not! When God’s people were afflicted in Egypt, He
appeared to Moses and said, “I have surely seen the affliction of
my people which are in Egypt, and have heard their cry by
reason of their taskmasters; for I know their sorrows; And I
am come down to deliver them out of the hand of the
Egyptians, and to bring them
up out of that land unto a good land and a large, unto a land flowing
with milk and honey”
(Exo 3:7-8). The LORD never forgets His covenant with His people,
“And God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant
with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. And God looked upon the
children of
Israel,
and God had respect unto them”
(Exo 2:24-25). God confirms
His loving care for His people in captivity in Babylon through Isaiah,
“He shall feed his flock like a shepherd: he shall gather the
lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom, and shall gently lead
those that are with young” (v 11) and “Can a woman forget
her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the
son of her womb? yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee”
(Isa 49:15). My dear friends, in all situations, may God help us trust
in His loving care and His faithful guidance, provision and protection
as our Divine Shepherd, “Casting all your care upon him; for he
careth for you” (1 Peter 5:7) as well as trust in His Word,
“The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: but the word of our God
shall stand for ever” (v 8; 1 Peter 1:24-25).
Wait upon the LORD
It is a great testing to wait
upon the LORD while we are in great need of His help, guidance,
protection, provision, or deliverance. King Saul failed to wait upon the
Lord when he saw the enemies gathering and his people scattered and then
foolishly offered a burnt offering, which is of the task of a priest or
a prophet and he was not allowed to do that; as a result, his
“kingdom shall not continue: the LORD hath sought him a man after his
own heart” (1 Sam 13:5-14). Then what does it mean to wait upon the
LORD? It means to wait for the Lord with our trust in Him, dependence on
Him, and full submission to Him, His will, and His good timing no matter
what may happen to us, even death. A person who fears death and wants to
save his life cannot wait upon the LORD until the end. When he
encounters dangers or threats that may damage his health, his job, his
reputation or wealth, he wants God to help and save him right way. After
a while, he does not want to wait for the Lord any longer, and will run
here and there, turn to someone else, or try his best to save his life
like King Saul. Our Lord Jesus Christ is the perfect example of waiting
upon God, His Father, with trust, dependence and submission until death,
“I can of mine own self do nothing: as I hear, I judge: and my
judgment is just; because I seek not mine own will, but the will of
the Father which hath sent me” (John 5:30), praying to His
Father, “thy will be done” (Matt 26:42).
It is good to acknowledge our
weakness and helplessness, as “Even the youths shall faint and be
weary, and the young men shall utterly fall:” (v 30), then humbly
turn to the Lord and wait upon Him, knowing that “He giveth power
to the faint; and to them that have no might he increaseth
strength” (v 29). Exactly, the Lord Jesus said to Paul, “My
grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in
weakness” (2 Cor 12:9). Then are you and I willing to wait upon
the LORD, not only acknowledging our weakness but also knowing that
God’s will, His way, His timing are the best and His guidance,
provision, protection, help and deliverance surely come in His good
timing? While waiting upon the LORD, God will give us new strength to do
His will, fulfil our duties, and endure our trials. It does not mean we
are lazy, doing nothing, but with the wings of trust and obedience, we
shall fly over our trials and difficulties unto the throne of grace, the
presence of God, “that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help
in time of need” (Heb 4:16), then with God’s strength and help,
we shall “run with patience the race that is set before us” (Heb
12:1), doing God’s will, redeeming the time, and serving the Lord, and
we shall not be weary. Even when we walk in His narrow way, taking our
cross, denying ourselves, following the Lord, walking through the valley
of the shadow of death, and doing our humble duties or lowly tasks, we
shall not faint. Surely when we patiently wait upon the LORD (Ps 37:7)
“until that he have mercy upon us” (Ps 123:2), we shall not be
ashamed or disappointed (Ps 25:3), but shall be glad and rejoice in His
salvation, “And it shall be said in that day, Lo, this is our God;
we have waited for him, and he will save us: this is the LORD; we have
waited for him, we will be glad and rejoice in his
salvation”
(Isa 25:9).
Conclusion
My dear friends, we cannot
follow the Lord and do His will by our own strength nor endure the
afflictions or trials by our own resource. Without the Lord, we are
surely weary or faint while walking in His narrow way. “But they
that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up
with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall
walk, and not faint.” It is always wise to seek the Lord first,
trust in Him, and patiently wait upon Him with our humble dependence and
submission. He is our wise, mighty, faithful, and caring God, who is
sovereign and able to make all things work together for our good when we
love Him and obey Him (Rom 8:28). His will, way and timing are always
the best. All glory and thanks be unto Him alone. Amen.
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