And take your Bible and turn with me this evening to the 31st Psalm, Psalm 31. Our reading will begin in verse 1, Psalm 31. In verse 1, let's listen to the infallible inspired word of the living God. In Thee, O Lord, do I put my trust. Let me never be ashamed. Deliver me in thy righteousness. Bow down thine ear to me, deliver me speedily. Be thou my strong rock, for in house of defense to save me. For thou art my rock and my fortress, therefore for thy name's sake lead me and guide me. Pull me out of the net that they have laid privily for me, for thou art my strength. Into thine hand I commit my spirit. Thou hast redeemed me, O Lord God of truth. I have hated them that regard lying vanities, but I trust in the Lord. I will be glad and rejoice in thy mercy, for thou hast considered my trouble. Thou hast known my soul in adversities, and hast not shut me up into the hand of the enemy. Thou hast set my feet in a large room. Have mercy upon me, O Lord, for I am in trouble. Mine eye is consumed with grief, yea, my soul and my belly. For my life is spent with grief, and my years with sighing. My strength faileth because of mine iniquity, and my bones are consumed. I was a reproach among all mine enemies, but especially among my neighbors, and a fear to mine acquaintance. They that did see me without fled from me. I am forgotten as a dead man out of mind. I am like a broken vessel. For I have heard the slander of many. Fear was on every side. While they took counsel together against me, they devised to take away my life. But I trusted in Thee, O Lord. I said, Thou art my God. My times are in thy hand. Deliver me from the hand of mine enemies and from them that persecute me. Make thy face to shine upon thy servants. Save me for thy mercy's sake. Let me not be ashamed, O Lord, for I have called upon Thee. Let the wicked be ashamed. Let them be silent in the grave. Let the lying lips be put to silence, which speak grievous things proudly and contemptuously against the righteous. O how great is thy goodness which thou hast laid up for them that fear thee, which thou hast wrought for them that trust in thee before the sons of men! Thou shalt hide them in the secret of thy presence from the pride of man. Thou shalt keep them secretly in a pavilion from the strife of tongues. Blessed be the Lord, for he hath showed me his marvelous kindness in a strong city. For I said in my haste, I am cut off from before thine eyes. Nevertheless, thou heardest the voice of my supplications when I cried unto thee. O love the Lord, all ye his saints, for the Lord preserveth the faithful and plentifully rewardeth the proud doer. Be of good courage, and He shall strengthen your heart, all ye that hope in the Lord." And God will add His blessing to that reading from His Word for His own namesake. Now, would you bow your head for a moment with me around the throne of grace? Let's seek the Lord together. Our gracious God and loving Father in Heaven, we call upon Thee again For we realize the weakness of the flesh, at least to some degree. We have a little understanding, Lord, of how useless it is to try to do something spiritual under the energy of human power. We ask Thee now that the Holy Ghost will come. He will tonight take us higher He will deliver us from wrong thinking, which has always led us to wrong acting. And we pray that the old truths we hear this evening will be precious truths, truths that we perhaps have forgotten in the midst of life. We pray, O Holy Ghost, that Thou wilt come, therefore, and shine Thine own light upon our souls, upon the Word, and let there be a meeting tonight with the truth of the Lord and our faith. May there be an embracing this evening afresh of these precious truths about our God and His people. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen and Amen. The trial of Abraham's faith, much like the trial of David's faith, was the climax of many, many years of testing and trials. In Abraham's life, it was the trial of having to offer up his son Isaac as a burnt offering to God. You'll find in Genesis 22 that God came to try Abraham. He came to test his faith after these things. After these things he came. What things? Well, he came to test the faith of Abraham after a lifelong series of trials. Nine of them to be exact. Whether it was through the call of God to leave Haran, to go to a land he had no idea where he was going. Whether it was the famine that God sent, or having to send Hagar and Ishmael from his home, or war with an army that far outnumbered him. Abraham had already passed through some very rough waters. But although that was the fact, through it all, his faith in God grew stronger. And his life as a result grew holier. That's what happens when faith grows. With faith growing, holiness is growing. God wasn't through testing Abraham yet. He still had to endure a test more severe than all the rest put together, even though he had been through so many things. Learn a valuable lesson from Abraham's life. God doesn't put heavy burdens on his people when they're not able to bear them. He doesn't put heavy burdens on weak backs. In His wise and compassionate and sovereign mercy, God brings our little faith into a school, and we enter it as kindergartners. We only have a little bit of it. It's not great. And in kindergarten he puts us through tests that are just suitable for kindergartners. He doesn't bring us into kindergarten and puts before us a test that is on a PhD level. We couldn't handle it. It's only for kindergartners. Then we graduate and we go to first grade in the school of faith. The trials become a little more difficult, a little more trying. And so it goes on throughout our entire life to one day we graduate and faith gives way to praise. Little by little he tests us all in order to increase our faith. Trials to increase our faith in order to increase our holiness. The Lord does not expect a new believer to act and to respond like an old believer when it comes to heavy trials. Therefore, I don't think that I am off the mark when I say and can testify that we can expect our trials to increase, to become heavier, the more mature we become and the closer we get to heaven. Deep trials will often prepare the way for deeper trials. Deep trials will prepare the way for deeper trials. Job went through some deep trials when he lost his children and he lost his wealth. But that was all in preparation for him to go through something far worse in his own physical life as Satan struck him with boils all over his body. It was a deeper trial. Never think for a moment that the road to heaven is going to get easier the closer you get to it. It is true. And as a brother prayed tonight in the time before the service, the distance, the older you get, the distance, the journey is getting closer to being over. All things being equal. Well, I realize that people, Christians, die young. But all things being equal, Brother Ernie is closer to his journey being done than I am. It's only a little while to go, and it's over. The journey's done. That's reality. That's true, but let's not think that because we're getting closer to heaven that the trials get easier. They don't. The fact is, the more experienced, and this is what we often fail to forget, the more experienced a Christian soldier becomes, the more frequently the Lord will send him into battles. The more skilled he is in war, the more he's on the front lines where it's hot and heavy. David put his best men in the front lines, his most skilled men. So the Lord does in this bottle. The more your faith is tested and proven to be genuine faith in the Lord, the more your life will glorify the Lord. That's what it's about. That's why we're here. It's the whole point. As much as you and I want to run from the testings of our faith, The fact of the matter remains, God says, I'm going to be the most glorified as you depend, as you trust in me in the trial. When faith grows, every other grace grows as well. Mark that. When faith grows, every other grace grows as well in our lives. Since the grace of faith is the foundation of every other grace in your life and mine. Everything is built upon that. The just shall live by faith. The life is by faith. Brothers and sisters, we need to take it to heart. The great need is for this faith to develop, the faith to blossom, the faith to grow, to increase, and that's only going to come through the testing, it's only going to come through the trial, through the difficulty, through the battle, through the setbacks, everything that we want so much to have nothing to do with. God says, that's how your faith is going to grow, and when your faith grows, the other graces are going to grow, and those graces are going to mark you as being holier and holier, and that brings glory to me. And that's why I made you in the first place. God says, I didn't make you for yourself, I made you for me. I made you to live for me. Because your life is all about me. It's all about my glory. It's not about your comfort. It's about my glory. I'll bless you, I'll give you comforts. The greatest comfort being salvation. But I will test you. This is the way that God has chosen sovereignly to develop grace in our lives. It's what Peter said in his second epistle, first chapter, we add to our faith virtue. And to virtue we add knowledge, and to knowledge we add temperance, and to temperance we add patience, and to patience brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness we add charity or we add love. And Peter says that if we do these things, remember it all starts with his faith, If we do these things, for if these things be in you and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. And we will make our calling and election sure. We'll have a confidence about it. And others will be confident. Because our faith in God has grown through the testing. In the psalm before us tonight, David is a case in point. As a young teenager, as a teenager, his faith in God had been proven on that battlefield when he slew the giant with a slingshot. We know the story so well, but do we? We can tell it to our children and our grandchildren off by heart. But do we really know the story? Do we know the story in the story? With a slingshot, he walks out onto a battlefield as a teenager and defies the armies of the Philistines. He's fearless and knows full well that giant, his head is going to roll that day. That was faith. A team. a teenager, consumed with the glory of God, could not understand why the Israelites were afraid. This was an uncircumcised Philistine who was defying the God of Israel, and to not go into battle with him was to dishonor his God. That's a teenager talking and a teenager acting. Indeed, David had already faced, as he said, a bear who tried to take one of the sheep. He knocked the bear aside the head and delivered that sheep out of his mouth. A lion came along and tried to do the same thing. He knocked the lion inside the head and killed it and took the sheep out of its mouth. He kills a nine-foot giant. He comes out victorious in every case. But it is in his later years that David is called upon to endure a trial that was, I imagine, the greatest of all of his trials. Interestingly enough, it too, like Abraham's, involved his son. I say that because most commentators believe the event that God used to move David to pen this particular psalm that we read this evening was the attempt of Absalom to overthrow his father's throne. If you'll read that with that backdrop, a lot of things will lighten up for you in your understanding. Few things are more trying and heart-wrenching than those things that have to do with our children. It had to have been a great grief to David's heart, and it certainly was a great test of his faith in God. He was being chased from his own home, he was being slandered, he was being persecuted, his own neighbors and friends and trusted Advisors had turned against him and were plotting his death. And heading that pack was his own son Absalom. The one he would later weep over and say, Oh, Absalom, my son, my son Absalom, would I had died for thee? I loved him, but he was the one that was out to put his father to death. In the mind of David, it had been touch and go about how that would turn out for a while. Matter of fact, he says, does he not, in verse 22, I said, in my haste I am cut off from before thine eyes. It's over! In my haste, I said, I was, I just was too quick to speak, but I did feel that way. It was touch and go with David. How is this going to turn out? But David ends this song on a very positive note. Be of good courage, and he shall strengthen your heart, all ye that hope in the Lord. How did he get there, I want to know. How did he get there? How did he get to that place where, in the midst of awful trouble, His fears vanquished. The broad answer to that question is found in the opening verse. In thee, O Lord, do I put my trust. That's the broad answer. It was trust in God. That's how he got there. It's always the same way, folks. It's always going to be the same way that you and I will get to that place, and whatever the testing is for us, it will be as we trust in God that the fears will be vanquished. And we will grow, and the fruit will be seen by others, and we'll give glory to God. And we'll be able to tell others, as He did, be of good courage. And it won't be just a verse we just cavalierly utter from our lips. We'll be able to say it from our own experience. I can tell you, be of good courage and he shall strengthen your heart. But there were numerous things about the Lord which David thrusted in. He believed, which calmed his fears, which restored his hope. As to one of those truths about God that I draw your attention this evening, found in the opening words of verse 15, my times are in thy hands. On that text, I want to say a few things tonight before you begin a new week at work, a new week at home with the children, a new week where there's going to be testing. I want to preach on living and dying in the hand of God. Living and dying in the hand of God. It's obvious that that was one of the things he knew about God, he believed about God, that just brought him back to this hope, this calmness, and he wasn't flustered anymore. He got to the place where he said, it's alright, all is well. My times are in thy hands. First of all, our entire life is in the hand of God. The word times means seasons. It means circumstances. It means events. It covers everything that concerns us from the moment we're conceived in our mother's womb to our death, to our entrance into God's eternity where we shall forever be with the Lord. Everything. It refers to all of the issues of our life. Our physical issues, our mental issues, our spiritual issues. and everything else that revolves around them. It includes both our health and our wealth, our disappointments and our encouragements, our losses, our defeats, and our victories. Our past, our present, our future, in the word, everything. The Septuagint, while it's not inspired, it does give us insights into how we can interpret and understand scripture. The Septuagint translates this word with the Greek word for lot. My lots, it says, are in thy hands. My lots. Solomon states in Proverbs 16 that the lot is cast into the lap. The lot. Nice Old Testament imagery there. Actually, New Testament for a time anyway. When Israel was to decide, make those decisions about choosing officers, both civil and ecclesiastical, who would rule, they would cast lots. When they came to dividing up inheritances, they would cast lots. When there was a settling of disputes, they would cast lots. How the lots fell was a matter of determining the will of God. When it came to Acts chapter 1, you find that actually the apostles cast lots to decide who was going to replace Judas. It was part and parcel to life, casting lots. But Solomon goes on to say, while the lot is cast into the lab, the whole disposing thereof is of the Lord. Yes, men cast these lots to make certain judgments about things, but God is so directing matters in the casting of the lots that it is His will that gets done. We all have a lot that's been cast into our lap. We would say our lot in life. There is a portion of God's eternal plan that has been assigned to us. Here's your lot. Here's God's plan for you. Here's God's plan for me, and that plan encompasses everything. The writer of Hebrews in chapter 11, chapter 12, puts it like this when he tells us to run the race that is set before us. The word set means fixed or appointed. Life is a race and that track that you have to run down in life. From birth to death to eternity, it's all been fixed. It's been appointed. It's a good fixing. You know, there are races that you don't want to see fixed at all, but this is one race you want fixed. You want the racetrack fixed. And although you have no idea what is going to be ahead of you, you know one thing, God has appointed it. Everything in life is in His hands. everything. Men speak of taking their lives into their own hands but their whole life and all the circumstances around their life are entirely in the hand of God. No man can take his times into his own hand. Man proposes, it's been said, but God disposes. How many of us have seen things happen that even the past year, even the past week, we never expected that to happen. We didn't see that coming. That caught us off guard. Whether what we didn't see happening, what we didn't see coming, was to our joy or to our sorrow, it's an admission, is it not, that we don't know, but God has everything in His hand. Our times, our circumstances, our events. They're not in our hands, because this is the prerogative of God. But this truth has a special application to not just mankind in general, but to every child of God in a very special sense. Believers are in the hand of God like no one else. Christ stresses this in John chapter 10, My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me, and I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of My hand. One of the verses that many years ago the Lord used to assure me of my own salvation. I'm in the hand of God and no one is able to pluck me out of his hand. Christ went on to say, my father which gave them me is greater than all and no man is able to pluck them out of my father's hand. They're in my hand and they're in my father's hand and Jesus said I and my father are one. So Christ is distinguishing in John chapter 10, is he not, between those who are his sheep and those who are not, so therefore, in a way that's altogether different, he is holding our times, the life and the death and the destiny of our eternity as his people in his hand. Everything? Sadly, this undeniable and universal truth is one that people forget, even God's people. Yes, I mean you, and I mean me. Because you think differently when you believe, when you believe that your times are in His hand. And when you think differently, you act differently. When you think according to truth, you live according to truth. There was a time, you know, even in the good old U.S. of A. You have to go back to read some old books to find it. There was a time when even the ungodly would look upon rain as something that God sent. or didn't send. Ungodly people. They saw it was in His hand. And God was thanked when He sent the rain. So they could gather in the harvest. In a former generation in this land, men would talk about God doing this and God doing that. But now it's not God. God has been replaced with Mother Nature. That's the talk. Evolution pretty much took care of that. Mother Nature. The laws of nature. Men talk as if this universe as if this world is running itself. All of our learning has shut out this eternal God out of man's thinking. And we find that even Christians would lead you to suppose, at least by their language, that they believe in good luck and bad luck. I've never allowed my children to use that word in the home, and they will tell you that. Don't talk about luck. There's no such thing as luck. There's this God in heaven who does as He wills. Providence is ruling this world. I mentioned this in passing in Balamina, one of the services, and one of the elders came up to me just grinning. He said, and his polster broke, my mom and dad didn't allow us to use that word either. In our home, as I was being raised, he was a fellow probably about 65, 70 now. They couldn't use the word luck either in our home. And as the service over with, he was going away, he looked at me and said, good luck. And grinned. Christians. luck. And all because we have forgotten what David was remembering. My times are in thy hands. The outcome of everything is in the hand of God. Whatever the outcome is, it's not luck, good or bad. It's God doing what God's planned to do. We must by God's grace, make the lost see and to feel that we have a God with us, a God who is our constant companion, our constant friend. A God who we believe is King. And it's not just one that we sing about, but our actions, our behavior, our response as to what goes on in this world, what goes on in this country, on whatever level you want to look at. They need to see Christians who show by their behavior that they believe in a God who is on the throne and is ruling and reigning supremely. And He does as He wills in heaven and in earth. That's what they need to see. The last thing the world needs to see is Christians acting as if, oh, there is no God in heaven, that my life is not in his hands. Would you take that with you throughout the week, wherever you go? Lord, help me to live this week as one who is conscious that my times are in your hands. Secondly, we are completely, completely dependent upon this hand of God for everything. And by everything, I mean everything. Obviously, our physical life is in the hand of God entirely. The soul of every living thing and the breath of all mankind is in God's hand. And the problem is we don't let those words sink down into our ears to borrow the words of Christ. Like Lucifer of old, man has attempted to ascend to the throne of the Most High God and thinks that really He is God, that He holds life and death in His hands. Medical science has made great strides. Since God made man in His own image, Man has come to know a lot about the human body and I'm very thankful for what he's come to know about the human body. I'm very glad for those strides, but instead of looking at this pinnacle of God's creation, and bowing in adoration at the feet of God who made him, man has used this knowledge that God has given him, by the way, to ascribe to himself this power of life. Did you not find it amusing when the blurb came out in the news, man has created artificial life? That was just the last couple of weeks. Can you believe they actually put stuff out like that? Pray tell, what's artificial life? You see, it's either life or it's not life. It's life or it's death. Artificially. flowing from that, it doesn't take man long to come to this notion that he holds the key of life and death and so therefore euthanasia becomes law. Move to a state, you want to take your own life? You want to commit suicide? If you're suffering from some terminal illness, move to Oregon or wherever the states are. Thirteen of them, I understand, in this country you can move to and kill yourself. Amazing. Amazing. But there will never, ever, ever be a man that has either the power to give life, to sustain life, or to end life. Never. Never has been. Never will be. A baby is conceived. That's the giving of life. And that happens at the decree of the God of heaven. He opens wombs and he shuts them at his will. Spot on, right? A life is delivered from the jaws of death. And although a man, a doctor, may be instrumental in that saving of that life, it is the God of heaven working through that instrument that saved the life. And even though it is a man who pulls the trigger that ends the in the death of a man or a woman or a boy or a girl. It is the God of heaven who is simply carrying out his plan for that individual's appointment with death. It was God who sent his death angel and said, it's time. God planned it. You're going to die on this day and in this place and in this fashion. I am God. I hold life and death in my hand. You are dependent upon me for every breath, for every heartbeat. Why? Because He's the Creator. See, it all begins with Genesis 1-1. You get the theology of Genesis 1-1 down, everything else falls into place. In the beginning, God created. the Creator. He has given life to all, man and animal alike, and it is therefore His own divine prerogative to end life when He sees fit to end life. Recall in 1 Samuel, chapter 2, in verse 6, Hannah is in her song of thanksgiving that God gave her the boy she had so longed for. In Samuel, she says this to the Lord, the Lord killeth and maketh alive, He bringeth down to the grave and bringeth up. Acts 17 verse 28, in him we live and move and have our being, said Paul. Or Psalm 66 verses 8 and 9, oh bless our God, which holdeth our soul in life. Here we are, sitting here this night, and we're breathing whatever aches and pains we have, and we all have them. It didn't strike me until a moment ago in the time of prayers. One brother was praying. He said, we've all had surgery this year, Lord. I haven't had surgery this year, brother, yet. I've had a lot of them, but I haven't had this one yet. But there were surely three of us in there that had surgery this year. Amazing that. Our physical life is held in the hand of God. Everything about it. All that needs to happen is for God to close his hand and it's over. We breathe our last in life because in His hand is the breath of all mankind. But you know what is even more wonderful to me? That's comforting in itself to know that I can't die. I am invincible until my time comes. I'm invincible. You can't kill me. Nobody can. Nobody can kill me. It's not because I'm Superman. But God holds my life in his hand. I can't die until he says I'm to die. And when he says it, no one's going to stop it. That brings a lot of, I'll talk about the effects of this in a moment, but that brings a lot of comfort to my soul, but there's something that brings even more comfort, not only is our spiritual life in His hand, our physical life, but our spiritual life is in His hand. We're dependent upon Him. He holds that life in His hand. Where did that life come from? Who created that life? God. We didn't create spiritual life with it. We were dead in sin, but one day He breathed the Holy Ghost upon us. One day He brought us out of the grave. And He said to us what He said to Lazarus in a spiritual sense, Lazarus, come forth! And we came forth alive from the dead. To take the words of Scripture, we were born again. Made new creatures in Christ. Born, Paul said, not of blood, nor of John, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. Our spiritual life comes from God. We didn't begin it. We cannot sustain it. Nor, thank God, does anyone have the power to end it. Isn't that great? Now you sit here looking at me like, what's the matter with you? No one can end your spiritual life. It's in the hand of God! You're not going to lose it. You're not going to fall at the last. You're not going to apostatize. It's not going to happen. My spiritual life is in the hand of God. What are you worrying about? Why do you lack that assurance? Why are you afraid? Why are you afraid of dying? Why? What if I hear the voice, what if? Your spiritual life is in the hand of God. You are entirely dependent upon Him for that life to be sustained. He gave it, He must sustain it. I know I preach a lot to you about the need for prayer, right? And I speak a lot to you about the need to read the Word, to make use of the means of grace. It does so affect our spiritual life. It does. But I want to tell you, It's not your making use of the means of grace that keeps your spiritual life alive. It is God. It will not perish. It will not die out. Oh, lo it may get, but He will sustain it. We are dependent upon Him to sustain our spiritual life. Because our spiritual life is in his hand. Did you read Spurgeon, if you read Morning and Evening? He was taking a text, I forget the text, but God is the great winter king. He has all the seasons, the spring, the summer, the winter, fall. He's the king of everything, all the seasons. And so it is spiritually. He's the king when it's winter in our lives and it seems like there's nothing on the tree. He's still working. Like the trees out there, the leaves are all from the ground. They seem so barren. But there's a work going on that we can't see. And God is doing a work that we can't see even when we feel we're so barren. Remember, it's his life. It's his spiritual life. It's in his hand and he will sustain it. He's the king of the summertime and the king of the spring. All of it is his. So it is continued in God's hand. No one of our Christian graces is of our own making. It's the fruit of the Spirit. Okay, now, love, that love, it's a fruit of the Spirit. That loving God, and loving your husbands, ladies, and loving your wives, husbands, Scott, loving them with all of their faults. All the things that just get under your skin. Now don't look so stoic at me. Do you think you do things that get under your spouse's skin? You know it's true. You're told to love them. Love them, love them, love them. It's fruit of the Spirit. You can't produce it. You can pray for it, but you can't produce it. Joy? You know, we talked about sour grapes this morning. There's a bunch of Christians in the church in this day and age that eat a bunch of sour grapes all the time. They're just plain old sour pusses. I don't want to be like that. Well, that joy is part of that spiritual life that's produced by God. You just go on right down the list, folks. You just take them down the list. Look at all of the things. It's peace, you know, apprehension, anxiety. Our life, our spiritual life, is hid with Christ and God. You see, you believe these things, you believe that, yes, preacher, I believe that my life is hid in the hand of God, it's there in His hand, my spiritual life, well, and if you believe that, then it has certain ramifications to your thinking. You may have felt lifting up your heart in praise to the Lord around the table this morning. But you need to know that the reason for that was God moved you to do that. You may feel a deep stirring in your heart for Christ, but if the Lord does not sustain that, it'll disappear in a moment. Indeed, if God were to lock up the riches of His grace, if He were ever just to stop up a pipeline of His love, I'll tell you one thing, the godliest of Christians would become the worst reprobates overnight. We just can't live without Him. My final thought That's the effect of this truth of living and dying in the hand of God. You've often heard me say that God's truth, when believed and received, always changes our thinking, and therefore our living. So what effect would that have upon us if we think like as David said, remember I said there's several things here about God that brought him to that place where he could say to others, be of good courage. In the first place, it will produce within us this sense of nearness to God. Nearness to God. I'm living a life in awareness that my times are in his hand. How close do you get? There we are in his hand. Nearness. If my times are in his hand, everything is in the hand of God, nothing has been left to chance, the smallest event. He's near me. My times are in His hand that assures us that fate is not driving everything. My times are in Thy hand that assures us that the Lord is going to condescend to us. He has put us in His hand. Every little detail of our lives, He's concerned with everything. You know, someone in your hand like this, just—would you just picture yourself tonight I am in the hand of God. He looks at me. He sees everything. He looks closely. Every detail. Past, present, and the future. He's looking. Isn't it amazing that God would condescend to do that for you and me? Who are we? The psalmist said, What is man that thou art mindful of him, and the son of man that thou visitest him? What are we that God would hold us with such care in his hand? It will also, living like this, deepen our fear of God. I'm not talking about slavish fear, but a holy fear, a fear of grieving the Lord, who has shown you such mercy and such love. That fear is found in the heart of a Christian who is in awe of God's greatness and of God's goodness. My times, everything about me, my life, my physical life, my spiritual life, my ups, my downs, my falls, everything, it's in the hand of God, it's there. And this God is great, and this God is good. And I fear Him. I fear Him. Do you fear the Lord? Do you fear the Lord? Do you fear acting and responding in such a way that would declare to everybody else that you are not really believing that your times are in his hands. Not only will it deepen our fear of the Lord, but it will diminish our fear of man. What can man do to us? What can he? Well, he can hurt us, I understand. But can he hurt us without God? Can anyone lay a finger upon us? We who are in God, our times, our life is in the hand of God. Can any man do anything to us apart from God? Could God do anything? Could Satan do anything to Job apart from God permitting that to be done? You think it's any different with you and me? What's the worst he can do? Kill us? Well, if it's a trigger that's pulled, if it's a knife that's plunged into our hearts, whatever it is, if it's a drunk driver we meet in the road and our life is taken, It didn't happen apart from the Almighty. We don't die until He says we die. And how we die and where we die, because our times are in His hands. Does that mean I go out and tempt God to take the words of Scripture? Not on your life. Faith in God does not lead me to tempt God. It leads me to act wisely, not foolishly. But it sure doesn't lead me to live in the fear of man. What did David say? I will not be afraid of ten thousands of people that have set themselves against me round about. Psalm 3. Ten thousands! It will also allay our fears about the future. The future's in his hand. I don't know what the future holds. Don't have a crystal ball? I don't want one. Don't know what it is for you, don't know what it is for me. Well, I know one part about it all. I know I'm going to be in glory. That's the one piece about the future that I need to know and that you need to know for beyond all shadow of a doubt. And when your heart stops, whenever that time or point comes, you are instantly in glory. But the other things, right folks? Don't know. But if I believe that my times are in His hands, the future is not going to be so disconcerting to me. Because my future is there in His hands. Whatever it is, it's there. The future of this country is in the hands of God. Not politicians. It's not in the hands of the church. It's not in the hands of ISIL. It's not. God holds all life in his hand. See, how that just takes care of the worry and the fear about the future. One final thought. It will produce a spirit of submission. This God holds my life in his hand. This God is my creator. I am entirely dependent upon him for my physical life, for my spiritual life, for everything. Then it is in my best interest to submit to Him, to His plan, to His will, or whatever it might be. No. Brothers and sisters, that is living and dying in the hand of God, and if you and I will just live by that, it sure will make life different for us. Don't you think? You think this is all theory? No, it's not. Number one, I've got a Bible that tells me otherwise. There is a hall of saints, faith, who have gone before us and proved it. And you have proved it. You have found yourself the most joyful and peaceful, when whether you realize it or not, you've come back to this reality, my times are in His hands. and therefore everything is alright. God write that word on our hearts for his namesake. Let's all bow in prayer, let's seek the Lord together. Father in heaven, we know beyond all doubt that there is an adversary who hates what's just been said from thy word tonight and will seek to snatch it away. We know, Lord, that the testing will come, whereby we are tried to prove these things, to put them to work. Lord, we pray for the grace that we need, not only to profess our adherence to this truth, but to live upon it, to lean upon it. We do want to show to this world the greatness of our God. So, Father, come to thy children here, we pray. Help them to live as a people who have the wonderful privilege of being held in thy hand, whether in life or in death. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen and amen.