God’s Wonderful Purpose R1354

I can now stand up and give thanks, and there's one thing that stands above all else.

I give thanks to God for Jesus Christ, who came into my life and who changed my life and gave me meaning and gave me purpose. Whether on the fields of my athletic ability or whether it was in the mountains and the rivers, if it was on surfboards, if it was out fishing, God gave to me something far more than I could ever have given to him, and that was that he stamped on my life his wonderful purpose for me. I can now say to you that I really believe that God has a purpose for me. He always had a purpose for me, and God's got a purpose for you. Don't wake up too late to recognize the fact that when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, that he came to this earth to bring purpose into the lives of all who would believe in his name. God has an encouraging word for you and me today, through the Bible-based preaching of Dr. Don Wilton and a message on God's wonderful purpose.

What a wonderful day to study God's Word. And as we study the Word together, Dr. Wilton wants you to know we are here for you. It's our great joy to encourage you in a number of ways, putting free resources in your hands, like the Daily Encouraging Word Bible Guide and more, but also just to pray with you and for you. Our phone number is 866-899-WORD. That's 866-899-9673. And though we consider it a little old school to have a conversation, sometimes that's just what we need to hear someone praying with you and for you.

866-899-9673, or meet us online at TEWOnline.org. And now today's message, God's Wonderful Purpose with Dr. Don Wilton. The Encouraging Word And I want to talk to you today for just a few moments about something incredibly deep. I want to speak to you about God's purpose. Because God has a wonderful purpose for every single person. And that purpose was expressed.

It found its significance. Right there when Jesus was born. So let's begin in the Bible and I want you to turn with me to Luke's Gospel, chapter 1 and verse 67. And if you don't have a copy of the Bible with you or you don't have one of your gadgets where you can look it up on an iPad or an iPhone or something, and turn there with me to Luke chapter 1. Because in Luke chapter 1 and verse 67, Zachariah prayed a benediction before Jesus was even born.

So now watch this, what does that mean? Zachariah, who was the husband of Elizabeth who bore John the Baptist, who came to tell everybody about Jesus, prayed a prayer or gave a benediction concerning the coming birth of the Lord Jesus even before he was actually born. This is what he said about Jesus. Verse 67, and his father Zachariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and said, Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for he has visited and redeemed his people. He has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David, as he spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets from old, that we should be saved from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us to show the mercy promised to our fathers and to remember his holy covenant. Remember, Jesus had not yet been born. The oath that he swore to our father Abraham to grant us that we being delivered from the hand of our enemies might serve him without fear, in holiness and righteousness before him all our days. And you child will be called the prophet of the most high, for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways and to give knowledge of salvation to his people in the forgiveness of their sins because of the tender mercy of our God, whereby the sunrise shall visit us from on high to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death to guide our feet into the way of peace.

Here's Zachariah speaking about Christmastime as we now call it. You know, there's some things that I wish that I knew when I was growing up in Africa. I grew up in Africa, by the way, for those of you that may not know that. But all those years ago, when I look back and I look back on my life and I remember all those wonderful days in Africa, I remember the Indian Ocean, the great white sharks. I remember the beaches and the mountains. I remember the animals of Africa, the plains. I remember the wide open spaces. I remember riding horses in the kingdom of Basutu land, which is now known as Lesotho, and Swaziland.

I remember the deserts of the Kalahari and the Nama deserts of southwest Africa known as Namibia today. I remember faces that grow more and more dim by the years. I remember the rugby matches and the cricket matches. I remember the struggles.

I remember the questions. I remember trying to find meaning and peace and joy in life. I wish if I could wind the clock back that I could know what I know now because once now, like Derek Henry, having received, I can now stand up and give thanks.

And there's one thing that stands above all else. I give thanks to God for Jesus Christ, who came into my life and who changed my life and gave me meaning and gave me purpose. Whether on the fields of my athletic ability or whether it was in the mountains and the rivers, if it was on surfboards, if it was out fishing, God gave to me something far more than I could ever have given to him, and that was that he stamped on my life his wonderful purpose for me. I can now say to you that I really believe that God has a purpose for me. He always had a purpose for me, and God's got a purpose for you. Don't wake up too late to recognize the fact that when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, that he came to this earth to bring purpose into the lives of all who would believe in his name.

You're listening to Dr. Don Wilton. He's our teacher here on The Encouraging Word, and we'll be back with the conclusion of today's message, God's Wonderful Purpose in just a moment. Dr. Wilton insists I interrupt to let you know that we're here for you. Whether it's keyboard to keyboard, email-a-phonically, or whatever your preference is on our website, tewonline.org, that's tewonline.org, or perhaps you'd like to speak with someone, have us pray with you and for you, connect with great resources. We do that 24 hours a day at 866-899-WORD.

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If you're looking for a book from Dr. Wilton or maybe a CD or DVD, we have resources ready to send to you at the click of a button. No matter what the reason, we hope you'll connect with us today online at theencouragingword.org. Now back to today's message, God's Wonderful Purpose with Dr. Don Wilton. So what was Zachariah saying in this incredible prophetic benediction? I've just kind of isolated six elements of God's purpose. I'm going to just give them to you quickly.

What are they? Why was Jesus born? Number one, to redeem his people. That's what verse 68 tells us, to redeem his people. By the way, that's a big word, you know, to redeem. It comes from the word redemption. It's like a football team that all year goes through all kinds of injuries and struggles and everything you can imagine. And finally, they get to the championship game and they get their day of redemption and they win.

And it all comes together. The word redemption there literally means to be saved from something, to redeem something from nothing. And what Zachariah was saying here is let there be no mistake about this baby Jesus. His primary purpose, the reason why Jesus is coming is because God so loves the world. That's the reason that he would give his only son, that whosoever believes in him will not die but will have eternal life because God didn't send his son into the world to condemn the world but that the world through him might be saved.

There it is right there. So purpose number one is to redeem his people, to rescue them, to save us from drowning. By the way, I did grow up in Africa and I remember Operation Noah in the 60s. I wish I had time to tell you about Operation Noah. You know, Noah was the guy that built the ark and all the animals two by two got on and God saved all the animals and the folks that were on the boat with Noah and he destroyed everything else. Well, Operation Noah took place in Zambia and Zimbabwe and Rhodesia back in those days when the great Zambezi River and the Kariba Dam was built. And when the Kariba Dam was built in the 60s, panic broke out across the world because of the giraffe and the zebras and the lion and the big five and all these incredible animals that you find in our part of the world overseas and so they began a rescue operation. You can probably find movies that have been made and go to special showings of it even to this day and I'll never forget as a teenager watching in awe as they began to rescue these animals in the Kariba district of southern Africa.

They began to put up nets to try and capture them and then they would tie them up and they would shoot tranquilizers into them and I can still remember them rescuing elephant and lion and hippopotami and all of the different animals that existed around us and they would get these animals and they carried them to safe land because the flood waters were coming and had they not saved the wild game, people say even to this day that millions of prized animals would have perished in those flood waters. That's what Zachariah is talking about. Let there be no mistake. If Jesus had not come, you and I would have had no means by which we could have been rescued from drowning. To redeem his people, number two, to raise up the horn of salvation.

That's what he says in verse 69. By the way, that word the horn of salvation is a very common phrase in the Bible. Very often when they went into battle, they would raise what was called the shofar.

They would raise an animal horn from a huge ram and they would blow the trumpet and it was a sign or a symbol of strength. It's what I love about watching football games. I love it when the head coach gets out there and the team is playing their heart out and things are not going so well and all of a sudden he's, time out, time out, time out, get over here boys, get over here. Some of them get a little animated. I know there are no coaches like that here.

Just a little fired up every now and again. You know the coach gets them over there and all of a sudden that one leader in the pack, that quarterback, that running back, that linebacker begins to stand up and he begins to take the lead and he rallies everybody around and he raises up the horn of salvation. He blows the trumpet.

By the way, which one of you is that man? I'll guarantee you right now, every one of you know exactly who those leaders are and here's what God did for us in Christ Jesus. When he sent Jesus, Zechariah was telling us that Jesus came with a specific purpose to raise up the horn of our salvation, to blow the trumpet concerning our rescue operation and when you read through the Old Testament one battle after another, the Israelites would find themselves facing an uncommon enemy, imminent defeat and the horn of salvation would be raised up and they would rally together around God Jehovah. Number three, to show mercy to our fathers. That's a wonderful phrase there in verse 72. By the way, the word to show mercy as a purpose for which Jesus came literally means to perform mercy. The word to show mercy means that God in Christ Jesus was demonstrably going to demonstrate and show acts of mercy. By the way, the word mercy there means unmerited. It means that the purpose for which Jesus was born was to show to us in a demonstrated way that he was going to love us even though we don't deserve it, even though we don't deserve it.

It's an incredible purpose. When I look back at my own life and I see the numbers of times that I have let God down and yet he has shown mercy to me and contextually Zechariah speaking to the Jewish people was saying, it is amazing how this Jesus who was to come in fulfillment of all the prophecies of the Old Testament, a time during which all the law of Moses became unattainable. They could not keep it up. They couldn't do it. They couldn't keep the commandments. They couldn't stop themselves from sinning. And yet Jesus came to demonstrate mercy to the fathers, the God of their fathers, the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob. Number four, his fourth wonderful purpose was to remember his covenant. It's what he tells us there in verse 72, the second part of verse 72. He says to show mercy promised to our fathers and to remember his holy covenant.

Well, that's quite simple. God made a covenant with these people. He said, you know what? I'm going to be with you.

Remember all the way back in Genesis chapter 12, he began with Abram and he said to Abram, Abram, I want you to get up from the Ur of the Chaldeans and I want you to go to the land of Canaan. And he said, here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to be with you. I'm going to guard your heart. I'm going to protect you. I'm going to watch over you. I'm going to curse those who curse you.

And I'm going to bless those who bless you. When you get into Genesis chapter 17, he gave them the signs of the covenant. And he said, also, I'm going to give you this land and nobody's going to take it away from you. God made a statement concerning standing on his promise. By the way, have you ever broken a promise to a friend? Have you ever said you're going to do something and then you actually don't do it?

We all struggle with that, don't we? And it's an amazing thing. God sent the Lord Jesus Christ to remember his covenant. Number five, to rescue us from enemies. Look at verse 74, it's an amazing verse here. He says that we being delivered from the hand of our enemies. Listen to what happened to Samuel.

I'm going to read to you from 2 Samuel 2 and verse 23. The Lord is my rock. He's my fortress. He's my deliverer. He's my rock in whom I take refuge. God is my shield. He's the horn of my salvation. He's my stronghold. He's my refuge. He's my savior.

Now watch this. From violent men, God saves me. I call to the Lord who is worthy of praise and I'm saved from my enemies. That's what Zachariah was saying. You want to talk about God's wonderful purpose? God came to rescue those who belong to him from their enemies. Now folks, let there be no mistake. You give your life to Christ, you're going to experience a pressure like you've never had before. You're going to discover enemies that you never had. Many people will leave you alone until you stand up for your faith in Jesus Christ.

That's the line of distinction. And God gives us a promise. God says, I send Jesus Christ with a specific purpose of rescuing you from your enemies.

But there's one more. God's wonderful purpose in sending Jesus Christ according to the prophecy of Zachariah is to enable us to serve. Now I want you to just think about this, to enable us to serve. Do you know Jesus? I hope that you've given your life to him. You know, when the Lord Jesus comes into your heart and into your life, he takes a people like you and me and he does things for us that we cannot do for ourselves.

That's how much he loves you. Sometimes it's the simple truths that are the most mind blowing. God came down to earth for Dr. Don, for me and for you.

And you know what? God is continuing not just pursuing in that historical event, but God is pursuing you here right now during this broadcast to let you know that he loves you and has a plan for your life, a wonderful plan for your life. We would love to talk with you and pray with you about how God's going to take you to the next step, about how you're going to grow in your faith and deepen the roots of your faith and then stretch your branches to produce fruit for Jesus Christ. Our phone number is 866-899-Worry. It will connect you with us 24 hours a day, happy to pray with you and for you.

That's 866-899-9673 or meet us online at www.tewonline.org. And before we get away, perhaps the most important thoughts for our pastor are next. God has spoken to you, hasn't he? And you ready to give your heart to Jesus?

I'd love to help you right now. Would you pray this prayer with me and accept Jesus into your heart and life? Dear God, I know that I'm a sinner.

I know that Jesus loves me and died for me on the cross. Right now, I repent of myself and I confess my sin to the Lord Jesus Christ. Come into my heart and save me today and forgive me for myself. In Jesus' name, I pray.

Amen. If you've prayed that prayer, we'd love to get alongside of you and celebrate with you and send you some literature and help you as you begin to grow. And I want you to know that I love you very, very much. And by the way, don't leave.

Don't go away, whatever you do, because I'll be right back. God stirred your heart. Let us talk about it. Let's pray with you.

Let us put some resources in your hands that'll help you grow. Our number again is 866-899-WORD. That's 866-899-9673. And we're connecting online as well at TEWOnline.

That's TEWOnline.org. Oh, and one more thing. Thank you so much for the friends that are joining us prayerfully and financially and becoming what we call encouragers. Hello, my friends. I want to speak to you personally today from my heart to yours. I don't think there is ever a better or more important time for us to respond to our world by standing up for righteousness. Now, with this in mind, I would like to invite you to become an encourager ministry partner. You see, together, we can impact lives both now and for all time and all eternity. The encouraging word is a viewer and listener-supported ministry. And to know that you are standing with me financially enables me to move forward with confidence to do the work God has called me to do. So please call the number on your screen and just simply say I want to become an encourager.

Thank you so much for helping me. Greetings to you in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Brother Don, I'm a prisoner here in North Carolina, and I've been listening to your preaching on the radio broadcasts each morning for quite some time now.

I really wanted to write you to let you know what a blessing you have been to me. Hearing you preach the Word of God and how you love the Lord Jesus Christ has just truly touched my heart more than I could ever express. I'm 42 years old, and I was brought up in church and have always had a deep love for Jesus Christ. I was saved at a young age but got on the wrong path that caused me such heartache and sorrow. I've been through pancreatic cancer and a lot of health issues, but the Lord has blessed me to live and to be healed. I know in my heart He has called me for a purpose to serve Him, and I will be getting released in just a few more years.

And my dream is to get into the ministry for Jesus Christ and to live for Him the rest of my life. When I hear you preach and teach, it just touches my heart so deeply, and I want to be able to meet you in person one day. And I look forward to hearing you on the radio each and every day. Well, here I am again.

What a day this has been. You know, one of the things I want to say to you is let's stay connected. You know, we've got so many means to be able to do that.

You can write to us, email us. You've got all the details right there in front of us. We are, we're a family together. We stay connected in so many ways, and your life is very important to me. I see you there, and God shows me, and I want to be able to pray with you and connect with you and be a vital part of your relationship, your growth. Your needs are maintained. I'm walking in your shoes, and I want to pray for you.

Please don't stop. Call us, write us, keep praying, keep giving, keep connecting, keep rejoicing, keep celebrating, keep striving. God is on his throne. This is the encouraging word, and now you know why. In America today, more and more people are starving for the good news of the gospel. Can you for just a moment imagine this world without the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ? Can you imagine this country without the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ?

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The book of James tells us to be doers of the word and not hearers only, and I believe that for too long we've heard without action. Thank you for your support for our social media platforms in sharing truth with the searching world. Our time is gone for now, but we're connecting 24 hours a day online at tewonline.org and this phone number, jot it down, store it in your cell. It's 866-899-WORD. That's 866-899-9673. Until next time, take care and God bless. The encouraging word