The Thrill of Trusting God

Welcome to the In Touch Podcast with Charles Stanley for Tuesday, June twenty-fifth.

When you can't understand how a particular situation will work out, it's easy to be worried. Today's podcast teaches how to step back and see with eyes of faith. Faith is at the heart of everything we believe in the Christian life. In fact, the truth is our life's all about faith.

Think about it. We have faith to believe that God is our Creator and the sovereign of this universe. We believe that Jesus Christ, His only begotten, sinless Son, came into this world for the primary purpose of dying on the cross, shedding His blood, paying our sin debt in full, and making it possible for every single one who believes places their trust in Him to be saved. We believe that if we confess our sins to Him, that He's willing to forgive us. We believe that our name is written in the Lamb's Book of Life.

We believe that one day Jesus Christ is coming back to receive His own. We believe with all of our heart that absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. We live by faith. We die in faith. It's all about faith.

And yet there are many people who have a real struggle with it. And if you think about, many times people think about God being up yonder somewhere and out yonder. The truth is the wonderful, thrilling thing about being a Christian is this. It is not just knowing that God is our Savior, Lord, Master, and the sovereign of the universe.

The thrilling thing about it is this. You and I can have a personal, intimate relationship with God through His Son, Jesus Christ, so that we can approach Him, holy God. We can approach Him and He will hear us. He will answer our prayer. He will grant us the needs of our life, many of the desires of our heart.

He's always there. Whatever the need is, whatever the desire is, as long as we ask within His will, He is more than happy to meet the needs and desires of our heart. And yet for some people, they never get there.

They just sort of pray around hoping that God will do something. Well, in this passage of Scripture that I want to use in this message, it's a very familiar passage, one that you've heard about many times. And remember, Paul said those things that God has given to us in the Old Testament for the purpose of teaching us some principles, some lessons that we need to learn. So, I want us to look at this event in the Old Testament, an event that is exciting really. It's one of the most exciting events in the Old Testament. And I want you to turn, if you will, to First Samuel.

And if you will turn to the seventeenth chapter. So, I want us to begin reading for a few moments in this twentieth verse of the seventeenth chapter. And what's happening here is that David, who was a shepherd boy, you know him as a shepherd boy, his father had some food for him to send and to take to his brothers who were in the army under Saul who was the king. So, the Scripture says on verse twenty, So David arose early in the morning, and left the flock with a keeper, and took the supplies, and when his Jesse had commanded him, and he came to the circle of the camp, while the army was going out in battle array, shouting the war cry. Israel and the Philistines drew up in battle array against, each army against each other, and then David left his baggage in the care of the baggage keeper, and ran to the battle line and entered in order to greet his brothers. And as he was talking with them, behold, the champion of the Philistines from Gath, named Goliath, was coming up from the army of the Philistines, and he spoke these same words, and David heard them. When all the men of Israel saw this man, they fled from him and were greatly afraid. So, the whole army of Israel was scared to death. And the men of Israel said, Have you seen this man who's coming up? Surely he's coming up to defy Israel, and it will be that the king will enrich the man who kills him with great riches and will give him his daughter and make his father's house free in Israel.

Now, watch that. Then David spoke to the men who were standing by him saying, Now, let me get this straight. What will be done for the man who kills this Philistine and takes away the reproach of Israel? For who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should taunt the armies of the living God? Hear these two armies facing each other, and even Saul, who's the king, is afraid, and all his armies are afraid. Forty days this guy's come out.

Now, what's the issue here? The issue here is that Goliath is not just another soldier, but the Scripture describes how he's dressed. He has on a bronze helmet. He has on a hundred and twenty-five pounds of bronze leaf, layers of leaf bronze to protect his body. And not only that, he has this long lance over his shoulder.

The end of it where the point is is fifteen pounds in weight. Goliath is over nine feet tall. So, if you look at him, who would want to face him?

Because he looks like a walking tank. That is, the only thing that's not covered is his face. Everything else, his helmet covers everything.

All this metal, bronze metal, I mean leaf on top of leaf on top of leaf. All his whole body's covered. Not only that, he has a shield-bearer who's walking in front of him.

He also has a sword. And so, he's coming out and chatting the people of Israel and chatting their God. Well, why don't you come out and fight for your God if your God is God? And so, all this is going on when David arrives on the scene and he listens to him and he hears him. And this is why he asks this question, well, who is this uncircumcised Philistine who's taunting the armies of the living God?

So, David says, I'll take him on. So, he walks out a little ways, enough for Goliath to see him. And Goliath says, what's this?

And he says, am I a dog? And the Philistine cursed. Listen, he cursed David by his gods.

Now, when people curse by their God, I don't have to tell you how that sounds and what it says. But the Philistine also said to David, you come to me and I will give you a flesh to the birds of the sky and the beast of the field. So, what does David, this shepherd boy who totally looks unarmed, how does he respond?

Here's what he says. David said to this Philistine, you come to me with a sword, a spear, and a javelin. I come to you in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel whom you've taunted.

You're depending on your armor, I'm depending on God. So, he says to him, and he says, this day the Lord will deliver you up into my hands. And I will strike you down and remove your head from you. And I will give the dead bodies of the army of the Philistines this day to the birds of the sky and the wild beasts of the earth, that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel. And that all this assembly may know that the Lord does not deliver by sword or by spear, for the battle is the Lord's, and He will give you into our hands. And so the Scripture says, then it happened, the Philistine rose and came and drew near to meet David.

And then what happened? So, David ran quickly toward the battle line to meet the Philistine. Now, it probably threw him off guard a little bit because he would have thought when he approached David, David would hightail it out of there. Instead, David comes running toward him. And in the process of doing so, he got to a certain point.

Now, remember this. He got to a certain point. Here's this full-clad armored giant and his shield-bearer in front of him. And here's David. Stick in one hand, he probably drops the stick. And then he takes this sling and puts this stone in it. He winds it up and Goliath is coming. And he just stands still and he figures out exactly where he is and he lets go. That stone hit him right in the forehead. He was a dead man before he ever hit the ground. He didn't just hit him somewhere. He hit him in the one spot he had to hit him in and the one spot that would kill him immediately. And I'm sure by this time his armor-bearer drops that shield and takes off running and David walks over, pulls his sword out of the shield and cuts off his head.

Holds it up. See, how do you know that? Because that's, they always did that. And he wanted the Philistines to know this war is over. And naturally they start fleeing and the Israeli army takes off after them and wipes them out one by one and defeats Goliath and the whole army. Now, you say, well, you know, I've read that story many times and I do understand that. But the question is, what is the key to David's victory?

Now, there's some things that are essential and some things that are required. And the first thing is this, and that is a clean heart. You're not going to be able to fully trust God without a clean heart. It's not going to happen. That's the nature of sin.

It's not going to happen. Listen, if there is sin in your life, you cannot fully trust Him. There'll always be a little static there. And you can look around and say, well, this is right and this is right and this is right and this is right and this is right. But over here there's a little bit of bitterness. Over here there's a little bit of unforgiveness. Over here there's a little dishonesty. Over here there's a little bit of deceit.

And on and on you could go, little things that you've just said, well, you know, those things are not really important. I'm praying about something truly big over here. To fully trust God. Listen, what you're doing is you are asking God to give you a glimpse of the finished product. He's not going to do it as long as there's sin in your life. You can't fully trust Him as long as that's there. A second thing is a clear mind. Because here's what happens. When your mind, listen, when your heart is clear and there's no sin there, your mind becomes very clear.

You begin to see things that you could not see before. And it's amazing what Christians put up with. We put up a little sin here, a little sin there, a little sin here.

And we think because we didn't kill anybody and commit adultery, then we must be okay. No, it's those little things that wipe us out. It's those little things that wipe us out. It's those little things that wipe us out. It's those little things that wipe us out. The heart's got to be clean.

And the mind's got to be clean. Listen, if David had not had a clean heart and a clear mind, he would not have been able to see what God showed him. And that is, what he saw with his naked eye is this giant coming at him. What he saw with the eye of God, the eye of his heart, was a dead giant. It was a dead giant. It was a dead giant. It was a dead giant. It was a dead giant. It was a dead giant. It was a dead giant. It was a dead giant.

But his motive was pure. He's taunting the armies of the living God. The name Jehovah is being disgraced.

It is a pagan God versus the one true God. And he said, listen, this day I'm going to kill you, cut off your head, that all of this assembly may know there is no God. And he says, I've got to be pure. I've got to be pure. I've got to be able to see God. His motivation was right. The heart's got to be clean.

The motive's got to be pure. I've got to be able and ready to listen to Him. And then watch this, if you'll think about what David was thinking, he heard what his brother said. He heard what Saul said. And listen, he probably heard the mumbling of the soldiers The shepherd boy, with a stick in hand, going to meet Goliath. Here's the difference, Saul and the soldiers had their focus on what? Goliath.

How big he was, how armed he was, how skilled he was, all of his experience. Here's David, he's got his eye on one thing. He is focused on God. God is his deliverer.

That's what he said. God will deliver you. His focus was on God and his focus, listen, all that armor didn't even faze him. His other tiny focus was a face and a bull's eye on his forehead. His focus was on God. If his focus had been any other, he'd have listened to the soldiers, listened to Saul, listened to his brothers, listened to this, listened to that.

If his focus had been anywhere else, he'd have thought, well, he'd have stopped and think, oh my goodness, I don't know what I'm going to do with this. I don't have my own Futures, I don't have my own secret. I don't have my own secret. I don't have any kind of secret. I don't have anything but a good, but a good, but a good, but a good, but a good, I don't have any kind of good, I don't have a sword, I don't have anything but a slingshot.

This is ridiculous. Focus was on God. And one of the reasons when we come to God in prayer and we're making requests, our focus isn't on Him.

And I want to say this, because I think it's important to understand that if you go by what you see and you go by what you hear, you're not going to get anything. It's your focus on, listen, it's Jehovah God that you're talking to. It is the sovereign of the universe you're talking to. It's this unconditional loving God that you're bringing your request before. Does He not have a right to demand a clean heart and a clear and a clear mind, and a pure motive, and all the rest. And so, when David faces Him, his focus is strictly on God. Now watch this. Now, the world sometimes takes words that we use and they twist them all around, so then when we use them, the people say, Well, you're using the world's words.

No, I'm not. Listen, if you'll think about this, when you think about the goal of what you're asking God for, and you see it as done, God has enabled you in that moment to visualize with your heart, mind, and soul a done deal. Now, let me give you an example. And I've never told this, I don't believe, to anybody. When I was associate pastor here, and some people wanted me and some people did not, and I would walk out on Sunday morning and see all these folks, somehow the devil raised, in other words, you'd have thought that's the only folks out there the folks who didn't want me. But the devil just raised up all these people and I'd see them out there and just like the devil would say, See, you're not going to be the pastor of this church.

Because all the offices in the church are against you, all the Sunday school workers, in other words, all the deacons, there's sixty of them, in other words, they're all opposed to you. But I remembered something. In West Palm Beach, Florida, four o'clock in the afternoon, I was preaching a revival down there at that time. And I was down by the bed praying.

I remember exactly where I was. And I was asking God to show me His will that I'd do whatever He said do, no matter what it was. God said, I'm going to make you the pastor of the First Methodist Church of Atlanta.

So crystal clear was that in my mind. I said, God, I'm going to take Your Word for it. You say, but now can God act in my life that way? And He said, yes, He's going to act in my life that way. And I said, yes, He's going to act in my life that way. Yes, God isn't prejudiced. He doesn't just, listen to this, God doesn't have favorites. He has intimates, those who are willing to walk in His will and walk in His way. And I want to say it again.

Here's what happens. When that faith is, when that, your trust in Him is full, when that trust is full, when that trust is full, when that trust is full, when that trust is full, you know it's a done deal because God has made it so. Then what are we to do? We're to walk, listen, we're to walk in the light of the finished product, but your heart's got to be clean. Your motive's got to be right. You've got to be surrendered to Him. You've got to be willing to wait for His time.

And God, however you want to do it, you'll have this awesome sense of peace and contentment that the battle is over. Will He do that for you? Yes. Yes, He will. Listen, if you know that you're asking God about something that you know is His will, then God, give me the capacity, Lord, to trust you fully. Will He?

Yes. It will transform your praying. It'll transform your whole faith. In other words, once you see it as a done deal, listen, not done by you, done by God.

For example, let's say that, and I could give you a lot of examples, but let's just say something. Let's say that you needed an automobile and you had one in mind and you'd prayed about it and you believe that's the will of God. Now, I don't mean that you've gotten by the most expensive, but you've prayed and you've asked God to show you and God has shown you, you're crystal clear in your mind about it. So, when you are willing to accept it as done, thank you, Father, then listen, in your mind, you start driving it. In your mind, you can travel in it because you know at God's perfect timing, you will travel in it. You will be filling it up with gasoline. You will have somebody riding with you.

In other words, it's a done deal. All you have done is fully trusted God for His will in your life. Thank you for listening to The Thrill of Trusting God. If you'd like to know more about Charles Stanley or In Touch Ministries, stop by intouch.org. This podcast is a presentation of In Touch Ministries, Atlanta, Georgia.