Well, it is a great honor to be here with you this morning. And before we come to look at God's word together, shall we pray together again? Loving Heavenly Father, we thank you that you are the eternal God, the sovereign Lord, the creator and sustainer of all things. We thank you that you have created each one of us in your image, male and female, in your goodness and wisdom. We thank you that although we're fallen sinful creatures who rebel against your goodness by choosing our own way instead of yours, you sent your son Jesus into the world to live the life that we could never have lived and to die that death that we all deserved and to rise again to put us right with you if we will only put our hope and our trust in Christ and his finished work on the cross. We thank you that although this world is a dark place, Jesus is the light of the world and whoever follows him will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life. We thank you that he is with all his believing people and he gives us strength when we are weak. If only we will look to him And we pray now that as we consider together some of the dark things in our world, some of the things that threaten to bring real adversity, real hardship, real difficulty for Christians, we pray that we will know your light and your strength so that we will know how to live as your people, as Christ's witnesses holding out the word of life and shining as lights in the world in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation. We want to pray in particular for the children of this generation, whether from Christian families or not, that you will protect them from the many harmful ideas that they are being taught in school. We thank you for the school that this church has set up. We pray, Lord, for your blessing on it. We pray that it will be of incredible help to all the children within it, that they will grow up to be able to stand for the Lord Jesus stand for all that is good and right and true just as Daniel and Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego did in times past. How we need our children to know the Lord and to be unashamed of him and so we pray for your blessing on the new school. We pray that for parents who are in the state schools Lord that they would have the courage to speak to teachers about what is being taught there. And we pray, Lord, that in your mercy, you would convict hearts and indeed bring a great change about. We pray that your good design for our world would once again be valued by everyone and that your ways might be known in all the earth and your salvation among all nations. Because we ask it in Jesus' precious name. Amen. Well, we're going to be looking this morning at Proverbs chapter 24. If you want to look that up in your Bibles, Proverbs 24, and just three verses, verses 10 to 12. This is God's word. Proverbs 24, verses 10 to 12. If you faint in the day of adversity, your strength is small. Rescue those who are being taken away to death. Hold back those who are stumbling toward the slaughter. If you say, behold, we did not know this, does not he who weighs the heart perceive it? Does not he who keeps watch over your soul know it? And will he not repay man? according to his work. Amen, and may God add his blessing to this reading from his holy word. Well, we've all experienced our own fair share of adversity and trouble, haven't we, over these past five years? It's incredible to think that COVID and lockdown is almost coming up to its fifth anniversary when the whole world, it seems, shut down in March 2020. And of course, we all remember our churches being closed against the law. And we can give thanks to God for Lord Braid in the Court of Session, that just judge who declared that act of the Scottish Government completely illegal, and of course your own pastor was one of those courageous 27 church leaders that took that action to the Court of Session. And we've seen those that were in authority At that time, the Lord has removed from those positions. God is still at work in the corridors of power in our nation. And of course, as well as our church buildings being closed, no doubt as with ourselves in Glasgow, we would have members who were seriously ill with COVID. Indeed, some of them may have succumbed to it. or indeed passed away from other illnesses in these last few years. Maybe like many churches, you've struggled to encourage folk to come back to in-person services and indeed some of your people may have left for other churches or indeed left the faith altogether. All these things are troubling and discouraging, aren't they? And as you look around to the world around us, just as was shared earlier, we're living in days of increased hostility against the Gospel and against the Lord and everything that is good and right and true. There has been spiritual adversity for us. We're living in a culture, indeed a world, that increasingly sees God as irrelevant and Christian beliefs on marriage, on identity, on sexual behaviour as toxic, even harmful. How do we reach a world that has no awareness of God and his standards, far less fear of him? Indeed far less fear of death and the coming judgement that is there for every single human being. It can be so easy to give in to temptation, can't it? To lose whatever little strength we have and succumb to weakness. This passage written by King Solomon in the Book of Proverbs has a message of hope hidden within it. We see first of all in these verses the need for spiritual strength in verse 10. If you faint in the day of adversity, your strength is small. This isn't just a truism, is it? There's a hint of rebuke that Solomon brings. Indeed, it's inferred surely that weakness and fainting weren't inevitable because real strength was actually available all along for the day of adversity. Of course, we all need to acknowledge our weakness before God. I wonder how does this put it, the arm of flesh will fail you, you dare not trust your own. Even though people around us are obsessed with self-sufficiency, we even find that governments, we found that during lockdown, didn't we? That governments felt that just if they did X, Y, and Z, everything would be okay. There was, I can't remember a single national leader globally that were calling their people to turn to God in prayer and turn and go up to God in repentance. That would have happened a generation or two ago, but not this time. And we need to acknowledge our own personal weakness, don't we, that we cannot live up to God's standards, we cannot live the Christian life in our own strength. But sometimes when I go around the country and hear people praying, I sometimes feel that we can treat this acknowledgement of weakness almost as an excuse to do nothing at all and not to depend on God. for strength, but instead to adopt a kind of pious fatalism, a wrong understanding of God's sovereignty and God's providence over all things, as if somehow we shouldn't be praying or working for righteousness in the nation, because while God has sovereignly decreed all things, so we just have to put up with the way things are. That's not how God's people acted in the scripture time of the Bible. That's not how they have acted down through the centuries. They've taken seriously what we read in Proverbs, that righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is an approach to any people. And that when there is wickedness in positions of the corridors of power and authority, then it behoves the church, it behoves individual Christians as we have opportunity to speak truth to those in power, to take that opportunity to do so, to warn them. of the consequences of what they are doing both in time and eternity. But we do tend to wallow sometimes in that pious fatalism, wallowing in our own weakness. But if you look back a few verses, we see not only that strength is available, but also the source of that spiritual strength. If you look back a few verses in chapter 24 of Proverbs to verses 5 and 6, we see where we can find that spiritual strength. A wise man is full of strength, and a man of knowledge enhances his mind. For by wise guidance you can wage your war, and in the abundance of counselors there is victory. There is a secret to possessing true spiritual strength in the day of adversity. Wisdom, knowledge, wise guidance and good advice from others. Ultimately, we know only that the greatest source of wisdom and knowledge is the Lord Jesus Christ himself. Paul says this in Colossians 2 verse 3 where he says all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hidden in Christ. So in order to have spiritual strength and so that we're able to wage, really, we can see this as spiritual warfare. How providential was it that you were reading from Ephesians 6 earlier? It's wonderful when these things happen, where the one chair in the service doesn't know what the preacher is going to say, nor vice versa, and yet parallel scriptures are brought to bear. Lovely when that happens. So that's spiritual warfare that we are called to engage in. We need to know Christ. We need to have an experiential knowledge of Christ in order that we might be able to stand in the day of evil. All these aspects of the armour of God are all related to salvation, aren't they? breastplate of righteousness, not our own righteousness, the imputed righteousness of Christ, the helmet of salvation, the shield of faith, the belt of truth, all these aspects of the whole armour of God, all related to Christ and his gospel. So we ought to know, we need to know Christ in order to know that wisdom and strength. Maybe you don't know Christ today, maybe you know about him, but you haven't put your faith in him yet. It's a bit like if you're not well, and the doctor gives you a prescription of medicine, and you know that medicine's going to make you better, but you're a bit worried it's going to taste bad, it's maybe going to have some side effects, but you're thankful it's there in your bathroom, and you know that it's going to make you well. And you somehow give yourself comfort that you've got the medicine. But unless you take the medicine, You're not going to get well. You're going to get more sick. You might even die. And indeed, you will die in your sins if you don't take the medicine of Christ himself that God offers in the gospel. You need to take. You need to receive him. That's how John describes what faith is. It's receiving Christ into our lives. He stands outside. all of our lives, beckoning us to invite him into our lives. And when we put our faith in him, that is what happens. Christ himself is off the throne, and Christ comes into the throne of our lives. It's often said that every life has a cross or a throne. Self is on the cross and Christ is on the throne, or Christ is on the cross, because we're holding on to our sin, we're rejecting him, and self is on the throne. We need to have Christ on the throne of all of our lives, and through that, we receive all the wisdom and strength that we need. to live for him and indeed to endure and indeed gain victory in that spiritual warfare that you heard about, we all heard about earlier, that each one of us, if we're Christians, is engaged in. One of my favorite verses from the Old Testament is from Daniel chapter 11 at the end of verse 32, where we read, the people who know their God shall stand firmer or be strong and take action. There's such a need to take action in all sorts of ways in our own day and generation. But there's so much timidity within the church, so much we'll leave it for someone else to do it, so much fear of man. And the reason for this ultimately is that people are weak. And why are they weak? It's because they don't know God. They don't know Christ. So we need to take seriously growing in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ, if we are Christians. And if you're not a Christian, you need to be right with God. You need to put your faith in Christ today. Don't leave it a day longer. But if you are a Christian today, you need to grow in that grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus. You need to be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might, as we were hearing earlier. But as well as that wisdom and knowledge, we need wise guidance too, don't we? Verse 6, for by wise guidance you can wage your war. Well, where do we find? that wise guidance. Is there somewhere we can look to receive it? Yes, there is. We have the Bible. We have the word of God. 2 Timothy 3, verse 15, Paul says that the scriptures are able to make us wise unto salvation. Indeed, there is all the wisdom that we need from Genesis to Revelation. God's revealed word, wholly sufficient Just a couple of verses later, Paul says that everything in Scripture makes us thoroughly equipped for every good work. Not partially equipped, not some good work, but thoroughly equipped for every good work. That is the key verse, I believe, in the whole of the Bible for the sufficiency of Scripture It's tragic to see some Christians looking elsewhere outside of scripture for guidance and for insight into various things. No, no. God has given us all that we need in his inerrant, infallible word. But notice, lastly, that we need many good advisors too. In the multitude of counsellors, there is victory. And it's so interesting, if we look back at church history, even to the time of the New Testament, collective wisdom has often been the way of spiritual victory. In church history, let's think of Acts 15, where at the Council of Jerusalem, that there was a real possibility there was going to be a Gentile church and there was going to be a Jewish church. We don't have that conflict in our own day and generation, but it was really a huge, huge problem in the early church. And when the church leaders and the apostles gathered together at Jerusalem in Acts 15, God blessed that meeting. Jew and Gentile together were part of that one church that Paul speaks about in Ephesians 2 where God through Christ has removed the dividing wall of hostility so that Jewish believer and Gentile believer are brothers and sisters in Christ, one together, no longer that partition wall of division. We think ahead to the heresies, the Arian heresy, the anti-Trinity heresy that was around just a few centuries later, and the councils of the early church at Nicaea and Chalcedon that settled key theological debates over the Trinity and the person of Christ that have stood the test of the centuries. When we think of the great reformation and the great confessions and catechisms that came out of that time, it's fantastic to hear that not only are the children being catechised, but you as the adults in the congregation are memorizing the catechism that so helpfully summarizes the key doctrines of the Christian faith. We can give thanks to God for the godly men of the past that did all the hard work in putting these together. And we have the benefit of that some centuries later, the helpful, succinct summary of gospel truth. All of these have displayed the collective wisdom of godly church leaders, helpful not only for the church in their own day, but indeed for generations and centuries since then, even to the present day. And for our own day, the huge challenges it seems, certainly from the culture, are with the Bible's teaching on key moral and ethical issues. And sadly, we do see many churches actually compromising on these issues and they are losing their saltiness, they are losing their distinctiveness, they are losing the blessing of God on their work because they are compromising on these issues. That's why the Christian Institute exists, to help Christians to hold fast to the truth of God's word on all these hugely important issues that are threatening us in this day and generation. The godless culture that is seeking to impose its godlessness on every single family, including, and in particular, Christian families, seeking to lead children away from the things of God into sin and unrighteousness and all sorts of pain and suffering. So it's crucially important that we get to grips with these issues, that we're able to think biblically about all of them. so that we can have that strength in the day of adversity. For the sake of our own spiritual health. the integrity of our witness, and indeed the blessing of the whole nation, because we know that when a nation follows God's ways, it experiences his blessing. And as we know, sin is a reproach to any people. So we must not lose our saltiness and become lukewarm. So it's our hope that the literature which I'll be producing at the end, and I'm just thinking that maybe you could leave it there for your afternoon service as well, and perhaps collect it later on this evening. Please do take as much as you like, as you have opportunity to do so. It's all free. And we hope that all these materials will be some of the many advisors that you need to get to grips with all these important issues that we look at, that we all have to face in our own day and generation. But then thirdly, we see here the fruit of spiritual strength, because once we know where to find that spiritual strength, of course we need to put it to good use. An athlete trains to get fit and strong for a race, but that fitness, that strength is pointless unless they actually run the race. Similarly, if we know how to make ourselves strong, we need to put that strength to good use. So in verse 11 here, that we read earlier, we see the fruit of spiritual strength. Now all Christians have a responsibility as salt and light to address the evils of society alongside proclaiming the gospel. Something I discovered just a couple of years ago, that C.H. Spurgeon was very good friends with George Muller. And because of that friendship, not only did George Muller set up orphanages, so did Spurgeon. Spurgeon, one of the greatest preachers of the Gospel, but he had a care for people, and he saw that there were children, that there were orphans, and were treated terribly, and needed to have dry, safe, clean places to live, so he set up many orphanages himself, and we have different social evils in our day, gambling, prostitution, pornography. horrific evils in our society. Organisations like the Christian Institute seek to speak out and indeed encourage government to change the laws so that that evil is at the very least restrained, which of course is one of the important purposes of every government, to restrain evil. Galatians 6 verse 10 tells us that as we have opportunity, let us do good to all men. and Proverbs 3.27 says we are not to withhold good from those to whom it is due when it is in our power to act. The example of how we can express our strength that Solomon gives here is to rescue those who are being taken away to death, hold back those stumbling toward the slaughter. Now, Solomon's reign was a reign generally of peace, so it's unlikely that he's referring to warfare here. Perhaps there was a pandemic in his time. We don't know. But let's think how we could apply this truth to ourselves. The exhortations of scripture, while they're set in time and place, they're not purely of historic interest. They are, for us, to think through how they apply in our own day and generation. Well, surely this makes us think of the horror of abortion, surely, quite possibly, the greatest social evil of our lifetimes. In the UK alone, 10 million lives snuffed out since the Abortion Act 1967 came into force. utterly, utterly shocking. And as I was saying earlier, we now face the possibility of assisted suicide becoming law both in Westminster and in Holyrood. The weak, the elderly, the infirm, the terminally ill facing pressure to be taken away to death, which would be facilitated by this legislation. In the case you think, well, it's only going to be a few people. Well, the statistics are, unless the Lord tarries, or if the Lord tarries, and his return is not for some years, half of us will die from a childhood illness. So if it's not you, it's likely to be your spouse, or a parent, and both my parents died of terminal cancer, maybe even a sibling, maybe even a child. Every single one of us, our lives will be affected by people, including ourselves, in all likelihood, with a terminal illness. And if this law is passed, the hospitals will have to offer assisted suicide as an option. And if there's anything like Canada, they'll offer it again and again and again. Truly shocking. Our hospitals, our NHS should be there. Indeed, it presently does exist to help people live. But if this law comes, it'll transform the relationship between the NHS and the public. And if you're diagnosed with a terminal illness, then it'll be a place where you're encouraged to take your life into your own hands and to die sooner. You're taking up a valuable bed, you're costing the NHS a fortune. Those in care homes, They'll be offering assisted suicide as well. It costs an absolute fortune to keep these care homes running. Don't think for a minute that there aren't sinister motives behind bringing this legislation to deal with the massive, massive economic burden that the elderly and the terminally ill have on the NHS. Did you know that half the NHS budget is spent on only 2.5% of the population. Savings need to be made, but this is not the way for them to be done. Treating life as cheap and those who are weak and in need of help are simply nothing other than a burden on the NHS and a burden on society. What a horrific society that would be. So we do need to think of those, not only in our own families and not only Christians, but indeed everyone. love our neighbour, then surely we should not want legislation that puts them under pressure to take their own lives, which is a great, great wrong for that to happen. The Lord is sovereign over every life. None of us has the right to end our lives prematurely. A great, great evil. So that is one way I believe that we can seek to rescue those who are being taken away to death by speaking to our MSPs, get in touch with them, urge them to vote against this insidious legislation. Now of course in an ultimate sense we can apply this verse Spiritually, it wasn't Spurgeon who said, if sinners be damned, at least let them leap to hell over our dead bodies, and if they perish, let them perish with our arms wrapped about their knees, imploring them to stay. Well, of course, we do need to make every effort to persuade people to trust Christ. But as Spurgeon's contemporary, J.C. Ryle, used to say, for certain this is true, but all I will say is it is not the truth of this text. Because surely what Solomon had in mind here was physical death and slaughter. So yes, good to think of people stumbling towards eternal death and the need for evangelism. Absolutely. And that's why the Christian Institute's Legal Defense Fund exists to preserve the freedoms that street preachers and others who share the gospel have. And we have helped many over the years But let's realise as well that the present attitude that prevails in Parliament, that doesn't see death as the last enemy, that doesn't see it as a curse, a curse on the wickedness of mankind, and sees it as something to be embraced to end suffering. What a horrific lie. What a horrific lie. We ought to be seeking to help those who need that help in those dying days. And indeed, who knows how many might come to true saving faith when that opportunity would be denied them if they were put under pressure to take their own lives. We can also extend this injunction, can't we, to young people who are destroying their bodies and their lives with either illegal drugs or indeed as we were just thinking earlier with the conversion practices ban that's proposed with puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones which ruin people's lives and indeed destroy their souls with this false LGBT ideology that is leading so many away from all that is good and right and true We surely cannot be silent on these issues, but speak out and point them to Christ and indeed point them to the better way that God's word provides in terms of acknowledging, indeed accepting, indeed rejoicing in the fact that God makes us male and female in his image. That is something that is a good and wise thing that God has done. And of course we find nowadays that no, no, so many people want to just reject that and create their own false identity. We need to celebrate the institution of marriage and the family that God has created for the flourishing of humanity. And this brings me to my fourth and final point from verse 12, the folly of of excusing spiritual weakness. Now Solomon gives a chilling warning here, doesn't he? He addresses the excuse that many try to make of not knowing what is happening, when in fact they really do. Verse 12, if you say, behold, we did not know this, does not he who weighs the heart perceive it? Does not he who keeps watch over your soul know it? And will he not repay man according to his work? As Solomon would later say in Ecclesiastes, there's truly nothing new under the sun. People were saying it back in his day, and they're saying it now. Don't blame me. I didn't know anything about this. Not my issue, not my problem. But the inference in this verse is that God knows whether we really can plead ignorance. And the thing is, even if the people hearing Solomon's words didn't know before, well, they know now that there are those who need to be rescued from death, those who need to be held back, who are stumbling to the slaughter. And that knowledge brings responsibility with it, doesn't it? Responsibility to act when the opportunity arises. And the end of the verse shows that there will be accountability as well for what we have done with the opportunities that present themselves. And that last phrase there about God will reward each one, every man according to his work, is both a warning to us and an incentive. The three parables in Matthew 25, the wise and the foolish virgins, the talents and the sheep and the goats, all teach really the same principle. They show the utter folly of failing to make use of both the knowledge and the opportunities that we all have. This to me seems to be an area that's been greatly neglected in evangelical, even reformed churches in our own day. but it's unmistakably a key focus of the Bible's message in general and in the teaching of the Lord Jesus. In particular, think of Matthew 16, 27, where he speaks of returning with his holy angels to give to everyone according to what they have done. Think at the end of Revelation, Revelation 22, verse 12, where Jesus says, behold, I'm coming soon, and he's bringing his recompense with him. to give reward to his faithful people for what they have done in their lives. So let's think of that positively. It's not just a warning for those who neglect and show themselves never truly to have been the sheep, but instead the goats. They were indifferent to the needs of God's people, indifferent to all that was going on around them. But there is the other side of that, that for God's people who hear Christ's call and out of love for Him and love for their brothers and sisters in Christ, indeed love for their neighbors, there are glorious promises and eternal rewards for them. We will see the need that is there, take the opportunity to do good to those not only Christians, but indeed as an opportunity to do good to wider society, making the most of those opportunities, then we know that God will take note of that work and there will be an eternal, gracious reward for us. It's my hope and prayer that we will all take the opportunities that present us, not only to share the gospel, but indeed to be that godly influence on those whom God has placed over us in authority. We have that opportunity that our brothers and sisters centuries ago never had. We have the opportunity now. Let's make sure that we make use of it to do good to all. Let's pray together. Heavenly Father, we are challenged by your word. We know that you're the one that perceives our thoughts. You're the one that guards our souls. You're the one that knows all those thoughts. You're the one that knows everything that takes place in our hearts and our minds. And we are amazed, Lord, that you love us still. We also acknowledge, Lord, that there will be that day of reckoning when we will all need to appear before the judgment seat of Christ. And we pray, Lord, that we would take that seriously, that we would each day seek to follow Christ, seek to serve him, seek to make the most of the opportunities that present themselves to us, to live for him, to be that salt and light that he has made us to be if we are in Christ. And again, Lord, if there are any this morning who as yet are strangers to your grace, we pray that perhaps even these thoughts about Judgment Day that we've shared earlier, thought about, might indeed awaken their consciences and help them to realise that today is the day of salvation. Now is the acceptable time. So we pray that by your saving grace you might draw them to faith in Christ, turning from their sins and embracing him as their saviour and lord. May it be so, for Christ's glory's sake we ask it in his precious name. Amen.