It's a real blessing to see all of you today, and happy Thanksgiving. Greetings to all of you for this week. O give thanks unto the Lord, for he is good, for his mercy endureth forever. Let the redeemed of the Lord say so. Turn to page 148 in your hymnal. Let's sing together. Great is thy faithfulness. Page 148. Let's all stand together as we sing. Praise the Lord. are in my mourning, new curses I see. All I have needed I have had from my debt. Great is thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me. To thy faithfulness, mercy and love. Great is thy faithfulness. for us to be. For a poor sinner, he's dead and gone, my own dear friend. Great is thy faithfulness. Great is thy faithfulness. Morning by morning new mercies I see. While I am here, thy hand hath provided. Please remain standing for prayer. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you once again. We can be in your house to worship and adore thee in spirit and truth. Now, Father, I pray that you'll bless every aspect of our service this morning. I pray that you'll lead and direct and guide us. You'll fill us with the outpouring of your spirit and prepare us for the week that you have ahead for us. Lead and direct and guide us now. We ask for your presence and blessing. And we ask all these things in Jesus' name, amen. Amen, and you may be seated. Very wonderful, wonderful times of fellowship are coming up together this week. I have, by way of announcement, I have one quick announcement that will recognize our visitors. Today is the final day to sign up for Thanksgiving dinner. If you're planning to come on Thursday, we need to know today. If you think you're coming, we need to know today. If you're bringing friends and family and loved ones, we need to know for those preparing so that they know how much to prepare for. So please use the registration card to let us know. if you're coming, and if you are, how many people you're bringing with you. I remember my wife and I hosted the Thanksgiving dinner one year, and some dear precious soul came in at two o'clock, two hours after we started, and wondered why there was no food left. So please make sure if you're coming to Thanksgiving dinner, Brother Mel Casildo is heading that up. He needs to know how many of you are coming and any guests that you're bringing. We need a final headcount today. So if you could help us with that, we'd appreciate that so very, very, very much. At this time, we'll have our ushers come. We'd like to recognize those that are guests in our morning worship service this morning. So we'll have the ushers come at this time. If you're visiting with us for the first time, or the first time in a long time, or a guest in one of our worship services, if you could raise your hand as the ushers pass, we have a welcome packet. Yes, make sure each one of them get that. It's a welcome packet. If you could raise your hand, the ushers will give you a welcome packet. In that packet is a CD of a message by our pastor. There's also a little visitor's card attached with the little red rosebud, our little gift to you. If you could put that little red rosebud on your shirt blaster lapel, we'd like to recognize you with special greetings in just a few moments during our time of greeting. Anybody else visiting for the first time or first time in a long time? All right, we want you to know you are a very honored guest. It's wonderful to have friends and family in town for the holidays, and it's wonderful to have you with us here in our morning worship service. Now, announcements. In the foyer, you have this dull-colored invitation. It's so dull, so sad. We have these invitations in the front for our Christmas program on the back. It's got all the information for the Christmas program that's coming up December 14th, the Candlelight Sing-Along that's on Sunday, December 1st. Please take as many as you can use to pass out to friends, loved ones, co-workers, neighbors, and invite them to the Christmas program. The choir has been working very, very hard. The people in the drama are working hard. So we hope to be able to present the gospel through this year's Christmas program. We're going to rerun an older one that we've done before entitled Love Transcending. And it's a clear presentation of the Lord's birth and the Gospels in it. So take as many of these invitations out in the foyer that you can use to pass out to friends, neighbors, and loved ones and invite those to come. In your bulletin is also a love offering envelope. The love offering envelope, all monies that come in designated in this love offering envelope are for the Bob Jones University team that's visiting with us this morning. They're going to minister to us. and music and testimonies and preaching the word here in just a few moments. So any offerings you'd like to designate to them, please put it in the love offering envelope. Also write your name very legibly. We cannot read all sorts of different characters. We only read like regular characters. So please print your name and your information on the envelope and the ladies that count the offerings would appreciate it so much. Also again, the Thanksgiving dinner is gonna be Thursday at two o'clock. Please sign up, it's $5 per person. And we need to know if you have any guests, any visitors, anybody coming with you, please let us know. Today there's a flyer with the ministry team from Bob Jones. Their information is in the bulletin as well, so you can review that. Married couples, families, if you're planning to come to the couple's Christmas brunch and gift exchange, the invitation is here in the bulletin, it's Saturday. December 6th at 10 a.m. at the Marie Callender's at Ceremonte Mall. This is the providential Christmas brunch. Last year, I got a panicky call around nine o'clock, right before we were all going to leave to go to Marie Callender's, and they said, we have no water. Our water's been cut off with a plumbing problem. Do you still want to come? I was like, sure, we'll still come. We can survive. And we get there. And probably 10 minutes after they got there, the plumbing was fixed. But because we had to wait 10 minutes, they gave us half off the total tab. So this is the providential breakfast. I've been praying, Lord, please let their plumbing break again. Not really, not really, because we'll get a half off. It's $13.95, wonderful buffet. $13.95, all you can eat. Please bring a gift. That is in three Saturdays from now. So couples, take note of that. There'll be a Christmas book table, Christmas cards, CDs, books, and more, Sunday, November 23rd through December 21st. Brother Bill Hughes heads that up in the Browning Hall in the rear of the auditorium. We'll be selling Christmas cards, CDs, books, Bible study tools, and more. That'll be November 23rd through December 21st. Brother Bill's heading that up. I believe those are the main announcements we needed to get across. We're trying to reserve as much time for the team as we have. So Thanksgiving dinner is this Thursday at 2. This Wednesday night we'll have our annual Thanksgiving and praise service at 7 p.m. Pray for Pastor Ennis. He's away from us. He is in Japan preaching for Dr. Peter Moriyama. And they loaded him up with messages. He's preaching six or seven or eight times this week for their 45th anniversary. Various and sundry topics, wonderful messages he prepared. So please be much in prayer for him. He's got the jet lag issue coming and going that he potentially faces. So pray for Pastor as he's away from us. He should be back next Sunday, I believe. So be much in prayer for that. Those are all of our announcements that we're trying to get through to save time for our team. We'll have the ushers come at this time. We'll receive our morning offering, giving back to the Lord a portion of what he so richly blessed us with this week. How's everyone doing? I need to ask the pastoral shepherding question. How's everyone doing this morning? How many of you had that glorious mountaintop week? Lord, may all my weeks be this way. Raise your hand. One usher, amen. Two people, three people. Oh, the choir's in trouble. Three people. How many of you had one of those weeks? Oh Lord, I hope it never happens like this again. I never want another week like that. Raise your hand. Nobody. Oh, two people. Oh, three people. Three. So we're three for three. Three mountain top, three valleys. Oh, my. And everybody else, we're just somewhere in the middle. So I'll give that report to our pastor. When he calls me, he always asks, how are the sheep? So I have to give him that report. We're three for three, and everybody else is just hanging on for the holidays. All right, let's bow for a word of prayer, and then we will receive our offering this morning. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your goodness to us, your manifold blessings. Lord, we thank you for the song, Great is Thy Faithfulness, O Lord, to me, as it expresses our hearts' praise this morning. I pray that you'll bless this offering. I pray that you'll bless each gift, each giver. Lord, use the money to further your ministry here in San Francisco and for missionaries around the world. And we thank you and praise you for your goodness to us, your exceedingly and abundant provision for us. And Father, we ask all these things in Jesus' name. Amen. Sing out with splendor to God our Creator. We are the instruments, He is the song. He fills each heart with the joy of salvation. Sing out with joy, with praise loud and strong. Sing out with splendor, with great exultation, Shout unto God all his praises proclaim. Let now the songs of the ones he created Sound forth in splendor, rejoice in his name. Alleluia, praise the Lord with thanksgiving. Alleluia, praise the Lord and rejoice. Alleluia, praise the Lord with thanksgiving. Let the people rejoice and sing Alleluia! Singing with one mighty voice, mighty voice, Sing out with splendor to God our Creator, We are the instruments, He is the song, He fills each heart with a joy of salvation. Sing out with joy, with praise loud and strong. Sing out with joy, with praise loud and strong. Alleluia, alleluia. Sing with splendor to God. Amen. Good morning. Our scripture reading this morning is taken from the book of Psalms, Psalm 34, and we will read responsibly. So please take your Bible and open to the book of Psalms, Psalm 34. There's Bible available in front of you, so help yourself and open to the book of Psalm 34. When you find your place, please stand. Psalm 34. I will bless the Lord at all times. His praise shall continually be in my mouth. My soul shall make a proposal to the Lord. The humble shall give their love and be glad. O magnify the Lord with me, and let us exalt His name together. I saw the Lord, and He heard me, and delivered me from all my fears. They looked unto him and were enlightened, and their faces were not ashamed. The vicious poor man cried, and the Lord heard him, and saved him out of all his troubles. The angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear him, and delivereth them. O taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man that trusteth in him. O fear the Lord, ye his saints, for there is no want to them that fear him. The young blinds do lack and suffer hunger, but they that seek the Lord shall not want any good thing. Come, ye children. Hearken unto me. I will teach you the fear of the Lord. What man seeketh desire of life, and love of many days, if any man is good? Keep thy tongue from evil, and thy lips from guile. Speaking, Guile. If thou art from evil and do good, seek peace. The eyes of the Lord are upon the righteous, and his ears are open unto their cry. The face of the Lord is against them that do evil, to cut off the remembrance of them from the earth. The righteous cry, and the Lord heareth, and delivereth them out of all their troubles. The Lord is kind to them that are of a broken heart, and sages such as heal the contrite spirit. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivered him out of them all. Evil shall slay the wicked, and they that hate the righteous shall be desolate. CONGREGANTS The Lord redeemeth the soul of his servants, and none of them that trust in him shall be desolate. Let us pray. Lord, once again we come to your house, and we want to express our thanksgiving for your faithfulness. Lord, this coming week, as the whole nation celebrates this Thanksgiving Day, Lord, we want to be reminded, Lord, without you, we are nothing. Lord, we are your creation, and we want to worship you and recognize that you are our creator and our savior and our redeemer. Lord, especially this week, we want a focus of your goodness to us. Lord, also we want to focus on our neighbors and our coworkers and the people around us that we get in touch with, that we would share your gospel. Lord, give us a sensitive and give us the guidance so that when we had a chance and the opportunity, Lord, help us to share your gospel. Lord, as we continue our service, Lord, everything that we should do and we should say and when we have fellowship, Lord, may this thing be an opportunity that we would glorify. This we pray in the name of Jesus. Amen. So please be seated. For the beauty of the earth, for the glory of the skies, for the love which from our birth over and around us lies. Lord of all, to thee we raise this our hymn of grateful praise. For the joy of human love, brother, sister, generation. Friends on earth and friends above, for all gentle thoughts and minds. Lord of all, to thee we raise this our hymn of grateful praise. Blessed Jehovah, our Creator. Blessed Jehovah, praise our King. Blessed Jehovah, God who reigns in heaven above. Thank the Father for His mercy. Thank the Father for His grace. Thank the Father for His faithfulness and love. For thy selfless gift divine, to our race so freely give. For that great, great love of thine, peace on earth and joy in heaven. Lord of all, to thee we raise this our hymn of grateful praise. Lord of all, to thee we raise this our hymn of grateful praise. Will you stand for a moment, please, and greet those around you? In a moment, we'll sing another hymn. Remain standing, if you would, please, and find your hymnal one more time. Turn to page 509. Let's sing together. Come, ye thankful people, come. 509. the only one. Praise the sound of our best song, all who sleep in heav'nly peace. Let all their dreams soon begin. Honor, hatred, and goodbye. Honor, All the world is but a dream. Who will do this great dream? We don't need to ever show, or to try. First to reign in heavenly heat, Then the cocoon shall appear, For the morn has come again, O supreme and worthy King. For the Lord our God shall reign, All the places where Joe went, In his angels short and fast, In the firmament he shall rest, On the firmament he shall stop, ♪ She was so warm when we met ♪ ♪ To her kindled heart and song ♪ ♪ Tell her how kind we will be ♪ ♪ Free from sorrow, free from sin ♪ ♪ There forever you and I will be ♪ Thank you so much. Please be seated. Well, it's such a blessing to have a musical team from Bob Jones University with us this morning. You are always a blessing and encouragement to our folks. We appreciate the messages that are preached and the music that's always presented. So at this time, we'll have them come and they're going to present in song and testimony and music and introduce themselves, I assume, and then preach God's word. So brother, please come on and preach to us. How marvelous are the works of the Lord! How excellent are His ways! How wonderful is His glory and fame, Ever the same great is the name of the Lord! How marvelous are the works of the Lord! How excellent are His ways! How wonderful is His glory and fame! Ever the same, great is the name of the Lord! Great is the God of Israel, and great are the works of His hands. He alone is the King of kings. Creation bows at His command. How marvelous are the works of the Lord! How excellent are His ways! How wonderful is His glory and fame ever! The same great is the name of the Lord! Great is the God of Abraham, and perfect is His law. In majesty and in holiness, He rules Lord of all. How marvelous are the works of the Lord! How excellent are His ways! How wonderful is His glory and fame! Ever the same, great is the name of the Lord! She alone is the King of Kings. She alone is the King of Kings. He rules Lord of Lords. Marvelous words of the Lord, excellent are His ways. Wonderful glory and fame, ever the same, great is the name of the Lord. His glory and fame, ever the same, great is the name of the Lord. Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. Good morning, we are the Bob Jones University music ministry team and we are very glad to be here with you today. We are enjoying San Francisco first time for most of us, if not for all of us, so we are glad to be here with you. And we hope that the ministry of the team will be a blessing to each one of you. My name is Matias Espinel, and I am from Uruguay, South America. In the year 2000, I went to Bob Jones University to study business. After I finished my undergrad in business, I went to seminary for four years. And this past May, I just finished a Master of Divinity degree. And this is my wife here. Hi, my name is Christine, and I grew up in New Jersey. And when I studied at Bob Jones, I majored in Spanish and then stayed for two years as a graduate assistant and got a master's in Bible in 2003. And since then, I've been teaching Spanish. And Matias and I are planning to go back to Uruguay in a few years to serve the Lord there. I'd like you to meet the rest of our team. Susana Lovely is our pianist, and Amy Baus is our violinist. And Susana's a junior church music major from Danielsville, Georgia, where her dad passes a church. And Amy grew up in Schaumburg, Illinois, and she is a senior string pedagogy major. Jonathan Wooster is a junior Bible major from Greenville, South Carolina, and his dad teaches there at Bob Jones in the computer science department. And this is my bodyguard. Phil Peck is a senior this year, studying pastoral studies, and he's from Waterford, Michigan. As children of God, we constantly experience God's grace. Not only we know that we are saved by grace alone, there is nothing we can do to earn salvation. Christ did everything for us and we are thankful for that. But every single day we experience His grace in our lives. And that outpouring of His grace on our lives compels us to do one thing. and that is to share His grace with others. And that's what we want to do today. We want to share what God has done in our lives with you through the testimonies that you will hear and the music that you will hear. So let's start listening and seeing how God demonstrated His grace in the life of Amy. Imagine with me having a two-year-old little girl. Just a couple hours ago, she was just the typical energetic toddler. But now, several hours later, she is now lying almost lifeless in your arms. You rush her to the emergency room, and after a blood test, the doctors have a diagnosis for your little girl. Your little girl has been diagnosed with leukemia, a type of cancer. I was that little girl. During my two-year treatment with chemotherapy, my parents went through so many trials. Every time it came down with what on any normal trial would just be a common cold, on me, because I was on the chemo, it would be so much worse. I came down with pneumonia four times just in those two years. I was hospitalized with chicken pox. And every time I came down with a fever, it would be dangerously high. So every time I came down with one of these illnesses, my parents had to come to the realization that there was a good chance I wouldn't even make it through my treatments. They had to put their faith in Christ that no matter what trial they were going through, and no matter how hard their trial seemed, God would still give them the grace that they needed to get through anything they were faced with. Now, several years later, the Lord's allowing me to learn a similar lesson that my parents learned when I was little. My sophomore year of high school, my mom was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. MS is a disease that affects the brain's ability to send brain signals to different parts of the body. So because of the nature of the disease, she's fine now, but she can wake up tomorrow morning even and not be able to walk or see or speak to me anymore. But I know that just as God showed my parents the grace that they needed to get through their trials when I was little, he'll also show me the grace that I need to get through anything I'm faced with, no matter how hard they seem. Second Corinthians 12.9 says, my grace is sufficient for thee, for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly, therefore, will I rather glory in my infirmities that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Both with my cancer when I was little and now with my mom's MS, my family's been able to learn of the type of grace that God offers us when we're going through our trials. I'd like to play a song for you entitled Grace. It reminds us of God's promises that his will cannot lead us where his grace isn't sufficient to keep us. I know many of you don't know the words to that, but the middle phrase says, each new day's design is charted by your hand and graciously revealed as I seek your master plan. It's a wonderful thing to know that God plans out each day. He knows what's going to happen. He designs it. Just like someone designs a building, God designs what's going to happen. We serve a wonderful God, and I'm excited to be here with you today and to share what the Lord's done in my life, and just to sing praises to Him, as we've already done this morning. We praised Him for His great faithfulness. God is a faithful God. He's always there for us. On the end of the song that Amy just played, the word says, And when I'm faltering, I still will find you there. Even when we make mistakes, even when we mess up, the Lord's still there. Even when we're going through trials, the Lord's still there. We serve a wonderful God. We already sing a song, How Marvelous Are the Works of the Lord. He's done many wonderful things. He created us. He created this world. I don't know if you looked up in the sky this morning, but you saw the sun beaming. Beautiful. The Lord made that. He made that for you. He made that for me. And he made it for himself, for his glory. I know many times as Christians, and in my own life I've found this true, we forget to tell others. We experience it for ourselves. We experience God's grace in our life, and we're thankful for that. And at this time of the year, we express that thankfulness to God, but many times we forget to share that with others. We're so focused on ourselves and what God's done for us, we don't tell other people about it. And we miss the point. The point of our life is not to receive all the glory for ourselves, to receive all of God's grace for ourselves, but to share it with other people. The greatest commandment is to love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and the second is liken it to share that, to show to love your neighbor as yourself. And many times we miss that. The Lord reminded me of that, though, when I was in high school. I had the opportunity to go to a rescue mission where I live, Greenville, South Carolina. And I was able to share God's grace with the men there at the rescue mission. And one night, the Lord allowed me to lead one of them to the Lord. His name was Jeff. He'd come from a miserable background. He'd been in prison. He'd been involved with drugs, alcohol. His life was a mess. I was nervous to talk with him, but the Lord used me. The Lord was able to use me to lead him to Christ. And that night, Jeff saw that he needed Christ as his personal Savior, and he asked the Lord to forgive him of his sins. And I was so thankful for that. And I was reminded that that was what my life is about. My life is about sharing God's grace with other people. It's not about receiving it all for myself and glorifying myself and making people think that I'm good, but that people would see Christ and see that He has done a work in my life, and that they would be turned to Him and glorify Him for who He is. At this time, we're going to sing another song for you. It's entitled, Thyself and Me, with that same message that we're supposed to live our lives as a reflection of Christ, showing people what he's done and how great he is. Take, O Lord, this heart of mine, Consecrate and seal me thine. Let me nearer come to thee, O reflect thyself in me. Seal me thine, forever thine, Through thy precious blood divine, This my constant prayer shall be. O reflect thyself in me. Let my life and all my ways show thy love and speak thy praise. What soe'er my trials be, O reflect thyself in me. Seal me thine, forever thine, through thy precious blood divine. This my constant prayer shall be, O reflect thyself in me. Trusting on through good and ill, By thy grace defended still, Let me not impatient be, O reflect thyself in me. Still me thine, forever thine, Through thy precious blood divine, This my constant prayer shall be, O reflect thyself, O reflect thyself, O reflect thyself in me. And I hope that's your desire this morning, that you will be praying, really, telling God, I want to reflect you before others, and that people will see you, not me. But that's really hard, especially when you're going through a hard time. But God's grace is efficient, and He can help us do that. Let me just share with you a little bit about the university. Bob Jones University is a Christian liberal arts university in Greenville, South Carolina. And let me ask you, how many of you have ever visited this school? Raise your hand. OK. A few of you. Good. That's great. We are celebrating our 82nd anniversary. And with more than 100 majors, definitely there is an opportunity for any young person that wants to go and study at Bob Jones. Bob Jones is not a perfect place, because there is nothing like that in this world. But it is a place that is trying constantly to honor our Lord and to do things that please Him. So I'm very thankful for the university. And we are just encouraging young people to consider, first of all, Christian education. We see the need for Christian education in the universities these days more than ever. And we're just encouraging people to consider Bob Jones. We don't say this is the only school you should go to. If you go somewhere else, you're in outside God's will. That's not true. We are encouraging people to consider schools. And one of the schools that you should consider definitely is Bob Jones. So we have more information back there. Any young person, especially, stop by. We have information for you. We might give you a card so you fill it out so you give us your information so we can send you more by mail. We also have some CDs and DVDs if you would like to purchase some good music and have those for this Christmas season or whatever. We have some Christmas music. There's a great Christmas gift. Go ahead and buy some of those if you want to give some to your neighbors, whatever. That's a great gift. So we'll be back there after the service. We'll be glad to talk to you, to get to know you more. So just stop by the table after the service. Well, this morning we've been sharing about God's grace, not only the strength that he gives day to day, but also the grace that he gives to salvation. And I am so thankful for what a wonderful Savior we have. He truly is an amazing Savior. a Savior that is willing and waiting for just one person to come to Him. This morning I would like to play a song for you entitled, The Savior is Waiting, and I would encourage you to follow along. You can find it in your hymnal. It's number 308. The last song we're going to sing for you this morning is entitled, Softly and Tenderly, Jesus is Calling. And for those of us who can call ourselves Christians, For those who have truly placed our faith and our trust in Jesus Christ, we have experienced that calling. Even when we were against God, we were His enemies. He was still offering us salvation, wasn't He? He was offering us His love and His grace because of what His Son, Jesus Christ, did for us. So I encourage you to listen as we sing this last song and realize that God loves each one of us. And because of that love, because He is a merciful, gracious God, He is offering to do something for us that we could have never done for ourselves, and that's offer us salvation, take away our sins. So we'll sing softly and tenderly, and then the Word of God will be open to us this morning. Softly and tenderly Jesus is calling, calling for you and for me. See on the portals he's waiting and watching, watching for you and for me. come home. Ye who are weary, come home. Earnestly, tenderly, Jesus is calling, calling, O sinner, come home. Why should we tarry when Jesus is pleading, pleading for you and for me? Time is now fleeting, moments are passing, passing from you and from me. No love he has promised, promised for you and for me. Though we have sinned, he has mercy and pardon, pardon for you and for me. Come home, earnestly, tenderly, Jesus is calling, calling. And we do have a wonderful Savior who is tenderly calling people. So don't reject Him. He's tenderly calling us unbelievers that are rejecting Him. And believers, sometimes we reject Christ, even though we know all that He has done for us. I would like to share with you a passage from Psalms. And it's the Psalm that we read this morning, Psalm 34. Psalm 34 is a psalm of David. Like many others, in this situation, David, as the title explains here in the psalm, maybe you have something like this in your Bible. It says, the psalm of David, when he changed his behavior before Abimelech, who drove him away and he departed. And David is fleeing in this situation, in this moment of his life, because somebody is trying to kill him. You remember who was that person? Saul, his own father-in-law, is trying to kill him. So David is fleeing for his own life. So he goes to this nation, this country, where King Achish is the king. And David, again, is afraid of that king killing him. So he starts doing what? You remember the story? He starts acting like a crazy man. He starts drawing, writing on the wall, and doing all this crazy stuff. And the king says, what is this guy doing? This guy is crazy. I don't need more crazy people in my land. Take him away. And God delivered David from that situation. But we need to recognize that this is a hard time in the life of David. Hopefully, you are not going through anything like this, that you have a family member trying to kill you. I don't know. Maybe. But thankfully, I never had that situation. But David is going through a hard time. He's in big trouble. He has a big difficulty in his life. Like maybe you are going through something right now. And if you're like most people, all of us, we struggle with different trials in our lives, in different situations. Some of you are going through some kind of financial trial right now that you really don't know what you're going to do. Or you're going through a physical trial that the doctors told you there is nothing we can do to help you. Or there is a family problem with your husband, with your wife, with your children, with your parents. And that's keeping you awake all night because you don't know how to resolve that problem. We all have different situations, different trials. David was going through a big one. Somebody trying to kill him, even his father-in-law. I am thankful for my father-in-law that he's not like this. Can you imagine? As far as I know, he's not trying to kill me. But, David, in the midst of trial, you know what he did? Probably something that you do. He wrote a psalm. Is that what you do when you're going through trials? You write a psalm of praise? to God for the situation you're going through? Maybe you write another kind of psalm of complaint, of doubts. If God is out there still looking at my life, is God still in control? Is He seeing what I'm going through and He's allowing this in my life? And then He says that He loves me? Is that the kind of psalm that you write? Let's see if we can see the example of David, how we need to react, to respond to trials. Because we all have trials. It just makes a difference the way you respond to those trials. And there is a biblical way to respond to trials and a non-biblical way to respond to trials. So we want to do the biblical way. So let's see if we can learn from David, see if we can apply it to our lives. And let's start with verses 1 to 3. It says, I will bless the Lord at all times. Yes, even when my father-in-law is somewhere there, back there in Israel, trying to kill me. I'm here hiding in all these caves because my father-in-law is trying to cut my head off. I will still bless the Lord. What else? His praise shall continually be in my mouth. What is coming out of your mouth when you're going through trials? My soul shall make her boast in the Lord. The humble shall heather off and be glad. O magnify the Lord with me, and let us exalt his name together. You know, when you're going through trials, the first thing you need to do is something really hard. But you need to stop and praise God. Exalt Him. Magnify His name. And you're saying, what? You must be crazy. The first thing I want to do is start complaining. That's all. I don't deserve this kind of trial, God. I'm a good person. I'm trying to serve you, and this is the way you're paying me? God knows what you're going through. He's allowing it. He's looking at you and saying, I know. I'm your father, and I love you. And I know exactly what you're going through. Even more, I'm allowing this because I know this for your own good. You don't understand yet, but you will. You will see. David, in the midst of trial, he's exalting God. Magnifying God. I can picture David calling his men, the men that were following him, and saying, man, come here. Let's do this. Verse 3, O magnify the Lord with me, and let us exalt His name together. This is what you guys should be doing Sunday morning. When you get together to worship God, to exalt His name. That's what should be going on here every week. saying to each other come on let's exalt his name let's make him big so people can see that in the midst of trial David exalted God because what David knew one thing that life wasn't about him life was about God and God being exalted isn't it true that you think and I think many times that we are more important than what we are isn't that true that we think that we deserve more than what we have And that's not fair. Why is this happening to me? I don't deserve that. That's what we do. That's what I do. When somebody hurts me, I say, well, that's not fair. David knew, life is not about you. Life is not about me. Life is about him. And it's really hard to think like this when TV and the media and the internet is calling you, is telling you constantly that life is about you. You know, they build this car for you. You deserve this house because you're a good person. You deserve this vacation and all those stuff, all that stuff, because what? You're a good person. So you deserve it. Sorry, the media is wrong. Life is not about you. Life is about God. That's why He created you. God gave you life so you can exalt Him, glorify His name. You know, when I was growing up in Uruguay, we had a Christmas dinner in my church. So pastor asked my mom if we could have the whole church coming over to our house for the Christmas dinner. And my mom said, yeah, sure. Let's have the whole church in our house so we can have a great time together. So pastor asked me and my brother and my sister to help him. during the whole week to get things ready for the dinner. So we got the chairs, the tables, the food, the drinks, everything. It took a lot of work. We went through all the city getting good prices, different things. Well, we got, we had the dinner on Friday night, I think. And in the middle of the dinner, pastor gets up, and he says, I want to thank Teresa for opening your house so the whole church can be here tonight. And you might be saying, oh, that's great. That's a good thing to do, to thank people. But I was sitting there in my chair saying, that's not right. I've been working all week, and my mom gets thanked? What's going on here? Pastor, are you going to thank me in public so people come after the dinner and comes to me and thank me and praises me for what I have done. You know what? I just wanted the praise of people. I just wanted people to come to me and say, man, you're such a great guy. I can't believe you did all that work. Man, you're such a good person. I would be like, stop it, you know. Because what? I just wanted the praise. And if we're not careful, We can have that attitude even in church. We just want people to thank us and praise us. And we forget that life is not about us. Life is about Him. David knew that. When you're going through trials, even through trials, God needs to be exalted, magnified. What is the second thing that David is doing? Verse 4, he says, I sought the Lord and He heard me and delivered me from all my fears. They looked unto Him and were enlightened and their faces were not ashamed. This poor man cried and the Lord heard him and saved him out of all his troubles. You know what? Second thing that you have to do, first you exalt God and magnify His name. But the second thing, you seek God and He will answer your prayers. Because God is the only one that can help you. Don't waste your time trying to resolve your problems somewhere else. You seek God and He will answer your prayers. You might be saying, that's not true. I asked God to heal my mother when she was in the hospital and He didn't answer my prayer. I asked God to give me that job, and He didn't answer my prayer. I asked God to protect my son when he was in Iraq or wherever else, and God did not answer my prayer. And that's wrong. You're thinking wrong, because God always answers your prayers. God is so good that sometimes He says yes to your prayers. And He says, yes, I'd be glad to do it. But he's as good and as gracious when he says no. I'm not going to do that to you. I'm not going to give that to you because that's not the best thing that can happen. So you better trust me that whatever answer I give you is the best thing that can happen to you. God always answers your prayers. He's a faithful God that He always answers your prayers. But you have to come to God as a poor man, like verse 6 says. You come to God because you don't have anywhere else to go. And you come to Him as a humble, poor man. and he will answer your prayers. He's a good father, always answers your prayers. And what is the third thing that David knew? Verse 7. The angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear him and delivereth them. O taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man that trusteth in him. O fear the Lord, ye his saints, for there is no want to them that fear Him. You exalt God, you magnify God in your trials. In your trials you seek God because there is nowhere else that you can go for help. But thirdly, you fear God in the sense of trusting God because God is your Father. And this fear is the fear that hopefully you have for your parents. If you have good parents, you will fear them. You will trust them because you know them, that they will never do anything that will hurt you. And you trust them completely. This is the same trust you need to have with God. Complete trust, knowing the kind of father that you have. David knew that. And even though he was going through trials, he could say, God, I trust you. I don't understand what's going on, but I trust you, and I depend on you completely. I know you're a good father, that you would never do anything that would hurt me. So I'm trusting you completely with all my life." So David knew that he had to, in the midst of trials, exalt God. Remember, life is not about you. Life is about Him. So you exalt God. Magnify His name. Secondly, you seek God. Come to Him as a desperate man. As a poor man that needs God. And thirdly, you fear Him. You trust Him with all your heart. Because He's a good Father. And when you don't do all these things, you can tell other people, your neighbors, your friends, as verse 8 says, O taste and see that my Father is good. The Lord is good. Trust Him. Try God. You will see that He's a good God. And then you can say, blessed, happy is the man. that trusteth Him. You'd be happy, you're miserable if you don't trust God. But if you trust Him, you're the happiest person in the world. This is the kind of God that you serve, I hope. And you might be saying, man, that's really hard. When I'm going through trials, the last thing I want to do is to thank God for what I'm going through. But you know what, I encourage you, maybe this week, even today, you might get this, some kind of phone call or any news that will bring another trial to your life, another difficulty. And you're gonna have an option to respond biblically or respond not biblically. I encourage you to pray and ask God to help you respond in a biblical way. So you can say, when you get this phone call, you just hang up the phone and you say, God, I don't know what's going on. I don't know why you're allowing this in my life, but I know you. I know you're a good God, and I just want to exalt your name and magnify your name, because I know you're good. And Father, I'm coming to you seeking your face, because you are the only one that can help me in this situation. Father, please help me. I pray that You will be done in this situation. And Father, I'm trusting You completely. I'm fearing You. I'm trusting You with all my heart that You will help me in this situation, that You will give me the grace to go through this trial. And guess what? He will give you the grace. He will help you. He's a good father. He's a faithful father. And you have the opportunity of serving this amazing God. So I encourage you that you, when you're going through trials, meditate in this psalm again. Spend more time here meditating in these words, in these verses, and apply those to your life. Amen, let's stand and we'll find our place in our hymnals for our closing hymn. We have number 62 down, one we're very familiar with. Number 62, just as I am, just as our brother has preached. That's how we have to come to the Lord, just as we are amidst all of our struggles, all the trials and storms of life. And we'll sing hymn number 62. It stands as one, two, and five. As we bring our service to a close, if there's anybody that has never received the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, we'd love to have you come and we'll have a personal worker meet with you and show you from God's Word how you can know for sure that you have eternal life, to know for sure that your sins are forgiven and heaven will be your home when you pass from this life. Maybe you're interested in uniting with the membership of our church or any other need, we'd love to have you come. We'll have a personal worker sit down with the Word of God and help you and encourage you from God's Word. So we're all together, we'll sing stanzas one, two, and five of number 62, Just As I Am. and that the winds be calm to thee, O Lamb of God, I come, I come. God, like God, I love. Your steps, I have not failed to receive, I'm going to ask the team to come up to us first. We're going to be on a toilet. He had six or seven times he was preaching on things of faithfulness and God's blessing and God's help, all those type of things. at the 45th anniversary of Dr. Brown and his church, and there she will have his church. Be much in prayer for him, for his traveling mercies, for blessing, for strength and encouragement, and encourage one another. As we head out here, we'll close in a word of prayer and be dismissed. Heavenly Father, we thank you for this day and this time together we have around your word. Father, we thank you that the words of the psalm, the psalm that was preached, tells us that you're nigh to us when we have a broken heart and you save us such as to be of the contrite spirit. You're following how you want to be near and dear in directing our lives. Oh, Father, we thank you for the wonderful promises of your word there in Psalm 34. I pray that you'll help us to apply it to our hearts to walk with you this week in the confidence and safety of knowing you were there. Now bless us as we depart from your presence. Lead and direct and guide us. Bring us back safely to your home or to your house this evening for the evening service. And Father, we ask all these things in Jesus' name. Amen. See you tonight, 7 o'clock. Six o'clock.