God’s Word is Settled - Part 2 of 2

Oh, for a thousand tongues to sing, my great Redeemer's praise, Thou the praise of my God and King, Thou triumphs of His grace.

This is L. S. Bradley, Jr. welcoming you to another broadcast of the Baptist Bible Hour. More love to Thee, O Christ, more love to Thee, Without love where I lay, unbending me, This is my earnest plea, More love, O Christ, to Thee, More love to Thee, More love to Thee, Then shall my latest prayer whisper thy praise, This be the parting cry, my heart shall raise, This still His prayer shall be, More love, O Christ, to Thee, More love to Thee, More love to Thee. As we continue our study in Psalm 119, this section we've entitled, God's Word is Settled, and what a wonderful truth that is. The opinions of men, their philosophies are always undergoing change, but God's Word is settled and we can depend on it.

I hope you'll take time to write and let us know that you've listened. Our address is Baptist Bible Hour, Box 17037, Cincinnati, Ohio 45217. The Gospel is the message that lifts up Jesus Christ. In the third chapter of the Gospel of John, verse 14, it says, And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have eternal life.

As Moses lifted up that serpent, Jesus Christ was lifted up on the cross, and the purpose of that sacrificial death was that these guilty, lost, ruined, condemned sinners might be redeemed. So His Gospel doesn't change. Opinions change, attitudes change.

See such a change in this country today. I think back in my early ministry, when it was not uncommon for churches to hold a series of meetings and met every night for two to three weeks. Now people are so busy they could hardly clear up a night or two for a meeting. Talk to somebody about coming to hear the Gospel. That doesn't seem very exciting. On the other hand, you talk about coming to hear a concert, coming to hear a lecture on a particular topic that somebody might find appealing, but say, come to church with me to hear the Gospel.

And it's like, oh hum, who would want to block out time for that? But it just, again, reveals the change that we see in our culture, and also makes us keenly aware of the fact that God must touch the heart as He did for Lydia. The Lord opened her heart so that she attended under the things that were spoken of Paul. The third thing we would observe here is that God's prophecies and decrees are fulfilled. Thy word is settled in heaven. So what God decrees, what God orders, what He has spoken through the prophets of old is to be fulfilled. It either has been or yet will be.

It's something that you can count on. Isaiah chapter 46 verse 9, remember the former things of old, for I am God and there is none else. I am God and there is none like unto me, declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times, the things that are not yet done, saying, my counsel shall stand.

I will do all my pleasure. My counsel will stand. His word is settled. When he says, this is my purpose, this is my counsel, this is my word, this is my promise, this is what I'm going to do, you can rely on it. It's as good as done.

It's not up in the air as to wait and see what the outcome may be. There is nothing that can defeat it. Nothing that can change or alter that which God has decreed. Psalm 135 verse 5 says, for I know that the Lord is great and that our Lord is above all gods. Whatsoever the Lord pleased, that did He in heaven and in earth, in the seas and in all deep places. Whatever God pleased, if it pleased God to do it, He did it. He did it in heaven, He did it in the seas, He did it on the earth, He did it in the deep places.

He wasn't limited. Whatever He pleased, He has done it. Now that's really reassuring, is it not? In a world that is constantly changing, with so much instability about us, to know that God does what He pleases. And then we think about His prophecies. That's one of the reassuring things as we study the Scriptures, to see how the things that God spoke long before the fulfillment came to pass explicitly as He said that it would. For example, Isaiah chapter 7 verse 14, Therefore the Lord Himself shall give you a sign. Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. A virgin is going to conceive, going to bring forth a child.

What a startling thing. And his name shall be called Immanuel. This spoken many years before its fulfillment. But turn to Matthew chapter 1 and we see the fulfillment. Verse 21, And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shall call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins. Now all this was done, that it might be fulfilled, which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet saying. This was done to fulfill exactly what we just read. Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel, which being interpreted is God with us.

Then Joseph, being raised from sleep, did as the angel of the Lord, had bidden him, and took unto him his wife, and he knew her not till she had brought forth her firstborn son, and he called his name Jesus. Fulfilled. God ordered it. God declared it. God prophesied it.

It came to pass. Thy word is settled in heaven. When God speaks it, when God decrees it, when God declares it's going to come to pass, it's going to happen. He said, God is going to come to earth.

That's what the name Immanuel means. Jesus Christ was God, the second person of the Godhead. Jesus Christ, God in the flesh, came here at the appointed time.

The very place, the very day that God had foreordained He should come. And then we read those words in the 53rd chapter of the book of Isaiah, words that many who studied the Old Testament scripture obviously did not comprehend. Verse 4 says, Surely he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities. The chastisement of our peace was upon him, and with his stripes we are healed. There was word then that there would come the suffering Savior.

Not just as a king to deliver the people from the bondage that they detested, from the yoke of the Romans that overpowered them, but one who would go to the cross and suffer, suffer and die to redeem a people. This was the purpose of his coming. Romans chapter 4 verse 25, Who was delivered for our offenses, and was raised again for our justification. Raised for our justification, delivered for our offenses in harmony with what the prophet had said long ago.

The book of Galatians chapter 4 verse 4, But when the fullness of time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons. And then in the 24th chapter of the Gospel of Luke we find the conversation that Jesus had with the disciples when he was on the road to Emmaus. They were walking along with heavy hearts, saddened by the events that had transpired. He comes and walks along, has conversation with them, but they did not recognize who he was.

Their eyes were holding. But notice at last in the 25th verse, He said unto them, O fools and slow of heart, to believe all that the prophets have spoken, Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into his glory? And beginning at Moses and all the prophets expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself. Jesus said, How slow you are to get the message. Why is it you're walking here with this great sadness of heart? Ought not Christ have suffered?

Was it not the right thing? Is it not in harmony with what had been prophesied? And so he goes back to the words of Moses and to the prophets and begins to open unto them the very things that were spoken concerning him.

And let's look at just one of them. Go into the book of Deuteronomy chapter 18. We find the words of Moses that no doubt Jesus had in mind. As he says in the 15th verse, The Lord thy God will raise up unto thee a prophet from the midst of thee, of thy brethren like unto me, unto him ye shall hearken. God is going to raise up that special unique prophet, a prophet above every other prophet, and you are to hearken unto him. And you remember that God spoke from heaven.

Three different occasions when Jesus was here on the earth. One being at his baptism and he said, This is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased, hear ye him. Hearken to him as Moses had said. And then God's covenants and promises are kept because thy word is settled in heaven. God is a faithful God. He makes a covenant, he keeps it. He makes a promise, not like some human beings that are very quick to break a promise or even forget that they made one. But God keeps his promise. And so it is that we can rely upon him who is faithful to us. In the book of 2 Samuel, we turn to the 23rd chapter and read a statement by David concerning the covenant. It says in the 5th verse, Although my house be not so with God, yet he hath made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure, for this is all my salvation and all my desire, although he make it not to grow. That's a wonderful expression of the truth concerning God being a covenant keeping God. He's made an everlasting covenant with me. It's ordered in all things and sure, it's settled in heaven.

And he makes it not to grow. That is, it's not going to be expanded, it's not going to be changed in any respect. God made the covenant and he keeps it. We find in this portion of Psalm 119 that the writer says, Had it not been for relying upon your word, I would have been swallowed up in my days of trouble, in my affliction.

I could not have been able to get through. So this is one of the things that gives us that assurance. You come to a time in your life where everything seems to be out of kilter. Nothing is certain, everything is in a state of change and they appear to be chaotic. But you come back to the covenant of God, ordered in all things and sure, it's still in place. God's agreement, God's covenant, God's promise, still exactly what it's always been.

And that gives you assurance because your confidence is not in yourself nor in your present circumstances, but in God. Isaiah chapter 54 verse 9, For this is as the waters of Noah unto me. For I have sworn that the waters of Noah would no more go over the earth. So have I sworn that I would not be wrought with thee nor rebuke thee. And then this verse we looked at the other night.

For the mountains shall depart and the hills be removed, but my kindness shall not depart from thee. Neither shall the covenant of my peace be removed, saith the Lord that hath mercy upon thee. What about the covenant that God made with Noah?

What was the basis of it? Did God say, Noah, as long as you walk this narrow way, I will never again destroy the earth by water? If it had been depending on Noah's conduct, there would have been another flood soon thereafter because Noah failed. But the covenant was on the basis of a blood sacrifice that was made, depicting the perfect sacrifice that would be made by Jesus Christ. God said, I'm going to put my bow in the sky, and when there comes a great rainstorm, the rain falls in great abundance, and you may become a little concerned, are we about to have another flood like that big one? And you look up into the heaven, and you see that bow, and it's a reminder to you, I'm a covenant-keeping God. And I'll be looking at it from heaven, and it's a reminder to me of the covenant that's been made. So he said, as long as the earth remains, and we seed time and harvest summer and winter, day and night, these things shall not cease. Why do they remain the same? Because God is a covenant-keeping God.

Let's just look at one more in that respect. Jeremiah chapter 33. All of these things point to the fact that our confidence and our trust has to be in God Himself, and that God is a great, unchanging God because He is perfect in every category. Jeremiah 33 verse 20, Thus saith the Lord, If ye can break my covenant of the day and my covenant of the night, and that there should not be day and night in their season, then may also my covenant be broken with David my servant, that he should not have a son to reign upon his throne, and with the Levites the priests and my ministers. God said, if you can break the covenant with day and night, things don't continue as I have set them in motion, then you can become concerned about the covenant that I made with David. But you know, every time you see the sun sink into the western sky, and you have the assurance it's going to be viewed again the next morning, and you see that sun rise, it's just a reminder.

God is a covenant-keeping God. Why do these heavenly bodies function as they do? Why do they keep on course? Why do they stay in their place? Why is it down to such intricate detail that those who observe these things can tell you the exact minute the sun is going to rise in the morning?

It's not late. Have you ever heard them come on the news and say, we have startling news this morning, we expected the sun to arrive over an hour ago and we haven't seen it, we don't know what's happened. If that ever happens, you've got reason to be alarmed, friends, but God says, you can't break my covenant with day and night, I'm holding it together, I'm the one that makes it operate. And therefore you cannot break my covenant with David that I will have one to occupy his throne. And what did Peter preach on the day of Pentecost? He says that this is the fulfillment of that covenant that God spake of the resurrection of his son Jesus Christ. God fulfilled the promise. Jesus Christ is today King of kings, Lord of lords, and occupies the throne. He's a covenant-keeping God. He keeps his promises to his people.

Thy word is established in heaven. I'm always amused at some of these products you'll buy, and in big letters it says, lifetime warranty. And you're never sure. Does that mean it's the lifetime of the company until it goes bankrupt? Or it's the lifetime of the product that when it's gone, the warranty's gone with it, and you come back and say, well, you didn't unpackage it properly or you misused it or something.

So the warranty's no good. You know, really, what does it mean? And in many cases it doesn't mean much or anything. But when God makes a promise, that's real. You can count on that. Genesis chapter 28, verse 15, And behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land. For I will not leave thee until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of. I will not leave thee.

Those words sound familiar? Those words brought comfort to you at various times along the way? Quoted again in Hebrews chapter 13, verses 3 to 5, how blessed they are. I will never leave thee nor forsake thee that we may boldly say the Lord is my helper. You may say, well, I've heard that preached, I've heard that quoted so many times, I know all about that. Now wait a minute.

Have you taken a good look at it? This is God in heaven saying, I will never leave thee. Have you had some times where you began to feel that nobody really cared?

You were kind of left on your own? God says, I will never leave thee. I will never forsake thee.

Therefore you can be bold and you don't have to fear man if you're trusting God. His word is settled in heaven. He's going to keep it.

He's going to remember it. So he said in that 92nd verse of Psalm 119, unless thy law had been my delight, I should then have perished in my affliction. And surely that's been our experience. God keeps His promise. God has promised to hear us.

That's a remarkable thing in itself. Have you ever thought about that? The God who is the creator of heaven and earth has promised to hear you. You know, you would think if somebody's going to get in to see the president, if he's going to hear somebody, that's somebody with some clout and some prestige and some influence. But the God of heaven says, I will hear you.

You feel insignificant, unworthy, undeserving? He says, I will hear you. Jeremiah 33, call unto me and I will answer thee and show thee great and mighty things which thou knowest not. Call, I will answer thee. Doesn't mean that he's going to speak in an honorable voice, but he assures you he will answer in his way. So you may say, well I called on him but I didn't feel like he heard me.

This has nothing to do with how you feel. This is believing his word is settled in heaven. So if he says he'll do it, you trust him. Psalm 50 and verse 15, God says, and call upon me in the day of trouble, I will deliver thee and thou shalt glorify me. What do you do in the day of trouble? Some people fall apart. Some people give up.

Some people become depressed. He says, in the day of trouble, call upon me and I will deliver thee. And the result will be you'll glorify me. Because rather than trying to take credit to yourself that you pulled yourself up by your own bootstraps, you knew you were down and out. You needed help. You needed God. You called on him.

He heard you. Now you're going to glorify him. You're going to praise him and recognize what he has done for you. Thy word is settled in heaven.

That gives us some assurance then when we think about the coming of Jesus Christ while there are those that scoff and say things continue as they have from the beginning and he's not coming back. Jesus said to his disciples in John 14, the first three verses, let not your heart be troubled, you believe in God. Believe also in me, in my Father's house, in many mansions. I'm going to prepare a place for you that where I am, there you may be also. And when they went out on the mountain and saw him begin to ascend up in the air through the clouds and finally out of sight but they're still gazing up into heaven, the angel comes and says, this same Jesus that you saw go away, he's coming back.

That's reassuring. Thy word is settled in heaven. You can count on it, he's coming back. Don't know when. When I hear people start trying to pin it down as though they've got some special insight as just where it's going to be, I pretty well conclude they're in the dark because God's word says nobody knows the day or the hour. But should we be expecting him?

Yes. That's before us in scripture. We anticipate it. We look for it. We rejoice in the thought of it.

He's coming back. God's covenants, God's promises are kept. Jesus said in John 6 37, all that the Father giveth me shall come to me and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. You may feel very unworthy. See, I can't imagine that he would receive me but it says, him that cometh I will not cast out. Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest. The weary soul says, how can I believe that? I just can't imagine that he would care for me.

I can't imagine that he would receive me. Thy word is settled in heaven. I'm going to rest upon what he says. Come unto me. Well, I'm glad you've been with us today.

Hope you'll come back at the same time tomorrow. If you can help with the support, you can make a donation by going to our website at BaptistBibleHour.org. Till we greet you next time, this is LaSara Bradley, Jr. bidding you goodbye and may God bless you. It is my story, this is my song, praising my Savior all the day long. This is my story, this is my song, praising my Savior, praising my Savior, praising my Savior all the day long.