From Greenville, South Carolina, we present Let the Bible Speak. Let the Bible Speak is the radio ministry of the Free Presbyterian Church of North America, preaching Christ in all His fullness. This is Alan Kern saying hello to you and welcome to this Let the Bible Speak broadcast. It's good to have you listening today. We don't take that for granted, but we sincerely appreciate your interest in this ministry and in our preaching of the Word of God. To show that appreciation, we seek to make available to you a variety of resources that we believe you'll find helpful. Currently, we're offering Dr. Ed Pinozian's message on Islam. He brought this message to our congregation here in Greenville, South Carolina, soon after the horrendous attacks on New York and Washington by Al-Qaeda terrorists. Dr. Pinozian is of Armenian ancestry and is one of America's best church historians. You should make sure to get a cassette or CD copy of his message on Islam. It will certainly do you good. To get your copy, write or call us. Our mailing address is Let the Bible Speak, 1207 Haywood Road, Greenville, SC 29615 And our toll free telephone number is 866-877-LTBS 866-877-5827 Remember also our website, take time to browse it at ltbsradio.com letthebiblespeakradio.com or simply ltbsradio.com. There you'll find our web store containing various items, books, etc., that will be of interest to you and a blessing to your soul. We look forward to hearing from you by mail, by telephone, or even by your visit to our website. When I survey the wondrous cross On which the Prince of Glory died My richest grain I count but one For content on all my pride. Forbid it, Lord, that I should boast, Shaking the death of Christ my God, For love in vain that shall be lost. I sacrifice them to His blood. Still on his bed, his hands his feet, sorrow and love all mingled down. There is a snow and sun, ♪ For thorns crumble so rich a crown ♪ ♪ For the whole realm of ancient minds ♪ ♪ That were afraid and far too small ♪ ♪ But so amazing, so divine ♪ We hear quite frequently that Islamic terrorists launched their attack on America because of the policies of our government, especially the support of Israel. We are told really that Muslim terrorists have a little alternative but to rise up against Jews and Christians. In other words, we brought it on ourselves. We forced an otherwise peaceful people to do desperate things while all the time all they really wanted was to live in peace. The facts hardly support the notion that Islam is fundamentally a religion of peace, whose devotees can coexist peacefully with people of another religion. Look at Europe, where Germany, Britain and France all have ominous Muslim minorities making a push to do more than make their presence felt. They give every evidence of an intention to dominate. Political commentators have placed Islam in the forefront of the forces currently at work to reshape Europe. Then take what's happening in Asia. Muslim atrocities in Indonesia are legion. Suicide bombers, hatchet-wielding fanatics who hack young girls to pieces. These are peaceful pictures. that have come from Indonesia recently. Then look at Thailand, where a couple of million Muslims live among some 66 million Buddhists. Currently, the Muslims are conducting a violent campaign of murder and mayhem that some Al-Qaeda experts believe is the most significant conflict in the region. Such is the level of Muslim violence that across the world There is a fear of saying anything that may awaken the violent attention of Islamic killers. Now a professedly Christian television network has joined the ranks of the silenced. Trinity Broadcasting Network has taken internationally known preacher and author Hal Lindsay off the air, at least in part to avoid offending Muslims. Lindsay has long been a favorite prophetic guru for the network, and his books on the subject have sold in the tens of millions. Now, let me say at once that I find most of Hal Lindsay's prophetic prognostications far off the mark. But that's not what got him kicked off Trinity Broadcasting Network. What raised the ire, or the fear, of the network was that his international intelligence briefing was deemed too pro-Israel and anti-Muslim. After mendaciously denying that the Muslim issue was any part of the decision to can Lindsay's program, TBN admitted it. Their excuse was that they had to evangelize Muslims in the Arab world. Quote, We are trying to reach the Islamic world and open a dialogue with them regarding Christ and Christianity. The message seems to be that to evangelize you must make sure not to expose the awful evil of worldwide Islamic terrorism. Interestingly, the Scotsman, Scotland's leading newspaper, reported in November 2005 that in Scotland prominent Muslim clerics were calling on the National Church of Scotland to teach more Christianity in public schools. The Muslim leaders believed that a more strident exposition of Christianity would give young people a moral defense against the secularism with which they were being constantly bombarded. And equally interestingly, the moderator of the Church of Scotland rejected the Muslim call for this more strident presentation of Christianity, insisting that multiculturalism had led more people in Scotland to drop their hostilities to one another. My point in referring to this Scottish report, after what I've been saying about Islamic terrorism, is that a strident presentation of the Gospel, by that I mean one that meets the followers of Islam and of other religions head on, with a gracious presentation of the truth is not only the best way of confronting Islamic jihadists, but the best and only way to win them for Christ. We must never forget that behind the headlines screaming of the latest Muslim atrocities here or there in the world, there are real Christian brethren and sisters who are seeking to live for Christ in the face of this awful eruption of terror tactics. If we in the West cower in fear and try to escape Islamic wrath by pandering to its push for domination, we will condemn our brethren in the Muslim-controlled countries of the world to unspeakable horrors, and we will condemn Muslims to the unrelieved darkness of a Christless religion that has not one ray of hope for its followers, either in this world or in the world to come. I know a fount where things are washed away. I know a place where light is turned to day. Land and life lifted My eyes make to see that all wonder were devoured in the blood of Calvary. Say, are you weary? Are you heavy laden? Are you in bondage? Do you want deliverance? Come beg with me, there is refuge. I know a place where shins are washed away. I know a place where night is turned to day. And as I lived then, my eyes made to see There's a wonder-working power in the blood of Calvary. God's mercy never sinned, tender of heart, God's willing friend and guide. No one has ever trusted on a building. No one has claimed on His law. I know a fountain in the rush of rain. I know a place where my tears turn to rain. Bright eyes wait to see. There's a wonder working in the blood of Calvary. There's a wonder working in the blood of Calvary. In the blood of Calvary. And now let's return to our study of Psalm 138, verse 8, which says, The Lord will perfect that which concerneth me. We have a saying that all's well that ends well. And that's precisely what was filling the heart of David at that time. He was looking at the full picture, thrilled at the thought of what the Lord would do for him. This morning we read in Romans 8, because I think that we may look in this text as the Old Testament equivalent of those words of Romans 8, verse 28, We know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose. That's Paul's way of putting it. David's way of putting it was simply, the Lord will perfect that which concerneth me. Let me remark that what concerns us concerns the Lord. What concerns us concerns the Lord. By concern, of course, when I say concerns us, that may mean it is our business, it has to do with us, it also may mean it worries us. I do not mean that it worries God, for there are no creases on the brow of the eternal, there are no wrinkles of worry on the eternal countenance. God knows what he's doing, he knows why he's doing it, and he's working on time and on plan. Never forget it. When I say what concerns us concerns God, I mean that it is not only our business, but it is His business. And He makes our business His business. You remember that when Saul of Tarsus set out to persecute the Christians in Damascus? He'd already wrought terrible depredations among the believers in and around Jerusalem and Judea. Now he was setting out to do even further damage to the people of God. He had murder in his heart. He had viciousness in his soul. He had intentions to destroy left, right and center. He was going to bring men bound to Jerusalem. He had particular people in view, and He knew what He was going to do to them. But as He was on His way to Damascus, the Lord Jesus stopped Him, and He asked Him a question, Saul, why persecutest thou Me? Now, the people whom Saul had personally afflicted, the people upon whom he had visited terrible pain and punishment, were just ordinary flesh-and-blood individuals. But the Lord Jesus said, Saul, in killing Stephen, You were persecuting not just Stephen, but me. Now in hunting down my people, you are not simply persecuting them. You are persecuting me, because their business is my business. You remember that in the Old Testament, 1 Chronicles 16, 22, The Lord says, touch not mine anointed, and do my prophets no harm. So closely does the Lord identify with His people indeed, that He not only calls them His people, but He actually calls their work His work. In Psalm 57, the psalmist said in the second verse, I'll cry unto God Most High, unto God that performeth all things for me. Isaiah the prophet tells us in chapter 26, 12, Thou also hast wrought all our works in us. That's easy to read those things without really, simply, fully grasping what the Word of God is saying. The Lord is working in our affairs. Sometimes it's hard for us to see. Sometimes it's harder indeed for us to feel. But the Lord is working in all our affairs. He is making it His business. Now when you realize that it's His business, you will realize some things come as a necessary consequence. Number one, their outcome is going to display His total sovereignty. Because if He's working in all our affairs, and if He can guarantee, as He does here, that He will perfect that which belongs to every Christian, every believer, You see, the outcome of that is God is absolutely in control of everything that is happening in this world, no matter who the human actor is. Our God is the sovereign controller of it all, and He is making it His business to perfect the things concerning His people. So, the outcome is not in doubt. The result is absolutely assured. Our business is His business, and He'll display His sovereignty over all heaven, earth, and hell as He perfects that business. It also tells you, of course, how foolish and futile it is for us to let what concerns us concern us. In other words, to let our business worry us. Now, we have all much to do, and it's very, very easy to get down under it. There's nobody more prone to do that than I am. Sometimes I put on such dark glasses that I think I have no sight left at all. That's when my wife usually comes to the rescue and preaches a strong, personalized sermon. Every husband knows how good wives are at that kind of preaching. And I'd be the first to confess that I have needed it. So we're all in the same boat here. We allow our business to worry us. But listen, at the end of the day, what concerns you concerns the Lord. What do you do with it therefore? Instead of worrying about it, You bring it to the Lord. Now, I'm not giving you some little mantra that you say, Oh Lord, I give this over to you and you like some charismatic nutcase and you forget immediately about your problems and your troubles and they're all gone. That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying when the truth of this really reigns in the heart, And you can come to the Lord and not simply utter the words, but get before Him. Say, Lord, this business of mine is Your business. You've promised to bring it to perfection. You've promised to bring perfection out of this. Now that opens up a whole big avenue of thought that I really don't have time to go down this morning. The Lord Jesus was made perfect through suffering. He was not made morally perfect, for He was that already. But He became the fully, if I could use the word, the fully equipped Savior through suffering. In other words, He couldn't save without suffering. He couldn't be fully equipped for the work to which God had set His hand without suffering. You know, there's a very real sense in which that's true in every one of us. No man has ever amounted to anything in the work of God without going through the dark valley of suffering and proving God. It is there, it is there and only there, that we are cut adrift from our pride, our arrogance, our self-reliance, and our self-promotion, and we're brought to the dust before God to glorify Him whatever the outcome of our daily sufferings, whatever the depth of our daily affliction. It is in that place where God will prove us, and we will prove Him. And He will perfect that which concerns us. We bring it to Him with that assurance. This is what He said He'll do. Do you realize this? And again, it's easy to say, there is a purpose, therefore, in what you're enduring. Not some mere fate. You've been listening to Let the Bible Speak, the radio ministry of the Free Presbyterian Church of North America. I hope that you found today's broadcasting a blessing to your heart. If you'd like to email us, our email address is ltbs at freepres.org or if you'd prefer you may write us at LetTheBibleSpeak 1207 Haywood Road, Greenville, South Carolina, 29615. We would love to hear from you. If you'd like to know how to be saved and how to be sure you're saved, we'd like to send you my booklet, A New Beginning, and I think that you'll find it very helpful. Each quarter we publish a free full-color magazine, Let the Bible Speak Quarterly, with a good variety of Bible teaching and testimony. It's available to all who request it. If you'd like to receive more information about the Free Presbyterian Church of North America and its ministry, we'd like to send you our booklet, Separated Unto the Gospel. Or if you'd like to have tape or CD copies of the messages to hear in Let the Bible Speak, you may have them by contacting us. Or you may visit us on the web at letthebiblespeakradio.com. Now that's a lot of information to digest all at once, But you can find it all on our website, LetTheBibleSpeakRadio.com. There you'll be able to listen to and download our programs, visit our online bookstore, and read a text version of each day's commentary. So visit us today at LetTheBibleSpeakRadio.com. This is Alan Kern saying, thank you for listening. I trust that you'll join us each day at this time, Monday through Friday, as we let the Bible speak.