Our Blessed and Sovereign God, that's the title of our sermon today from 1 Timothy chapter 6 and verse 15. The verse reads, actually beginning in verse 13, Timothy, Paul is writing to, Paul says, I charge you in the presence of God who gives life to all things and of Christ Jesus, who in his testimony before Pontius Pilate made the good confession to keep the commandment unstained and free from reproach until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ. which He will display at the proper time, He who is the blessed and only Sovereign, King of kings and Lord of lords, who alone has immortality, who dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see, to Him be honor and eternal dominion. Amen. Two questions as we begin today. First, are you a happy person? And secondly, over how much do you really have control? What does God's joy and sovereignty have to do with you, Christian? And so I begin with Jonathan Edwards' story of how he struggled spiritually during his years at Yale when he was studying. And this is what he wrote. My convictions wore off, and I returned like a dog to his vomit, and went on in the ways of sin. Indeed, I was at times very uneasy, especially toward the latter part of my time at college, when it pleased God to seize me with pleurisy, in which He brought me nigh or near to the grave. and shook me over the pit of hell. And yet it was not long after my recovery before I fell again into my old ways of sin. But then the turning point came for Edwards while he was reading 1 Timothy 1.17, which reads, Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen. And here's how he describes it. As I read the words, there came into my soul a sense of the glory of the divine being, quite different from anything I ever experienced before. Never any words of scripture seemed to me as these did. And I thought to myself how excellent a being that was and how happy I should be if I might enjoy that God and be wrapped up to him in heaven and be as it were swallowed up in him forever. And I kept saying and singing over these words of scripture to myself and went to pray to God that I might enjoy Him and be prayed in a manner quite, I prayed in a manner quite different from what I used to do. But about that time I began to have a new idea of Christ and the work of redemption and the glorious ways of salvation by Him. And then after sharing his experience with his father, Edwards walked alone in a solitary place in his father's pasture for contemplation. And he goes on to say this, as I was looking up on the sky and clouds, there came into my mind so sweet a sense of the glorious majesty and grace of God that I do not know how to express. And Edwards, after that, spent the rest of his life trying to express it. And his sermons sparked the greatest revival in American history, known as the Great Awakening. Well, question comes as we read that story, which was true, by the way, are we to chase after Edwards' experience? And the answer is no. And yet we can learn a valuable lesson from it. which is this, the Spirit of God used the Word of God to revive Jonathan Edwards. And Edwards had his own great awakening before God used him in our country's greatest awakening. So personal revival then precedes public revival. And believe it or not, revival often starts with someone other than the pastor. I know some of you might not like that, or you may think, well, not me, maybe someone else, but it's often true in history. Well, here's the main truth from our text today, 1 Timothy 6 and verse 15. There is not a more transforming truth than God's glorious being as seen in the face of Christ. We need the Spirit of God to use the Word of God to show us the glory of God in the face of Christ. And we read that in 2 Corinthians 3 verses 16 all the way to chapter 4 and verse 6. Well, in this last chapter of 1st Timothy, Paul tells Timothy and us to flee from the love of money and then to follow after righteousness and fight the good fight of faith. And again, Timothy is charged to keep the commandment without stain or reproach until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ, which he will bring about at the proper time. And then Paul breaks into this doxology as it were, doxa meaning glory and logos meaning word. And so this doxology isn't for us merely to sing or just to discuss. These truths were meant to encourage Timothy and us in the good fight of faith. And so we need to know how great our God is so that we worship and serve him with total devotion. And so I'm praying that God may open our eyes, the eyes of our heart, to see that He is worthy of all we are and all we have. So two truths today. First, our blessed or happy God, and then secondly, our only sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords. First then, our blessed God. J.B. Phillips paraphrased this, Who is the blessed controller of all things? Well, to the degree that we really believe that truth, we won't be afraid or anxious, regardless of our circumstances. God is blessed, which describes the absolute happiness or bliss God has in Himself. and so this what Paul is telling Timothy is the perfection of God's attributes makes him infinitely happy you can see it places like Isaiah 65 19 in Jeremiah 13 11 Jeremiah 33 verse 9 Zephaniah 3 verse 17 we could go on to more but it's God's holiness and his goodness and his power and wisdom to name just a few of his attributes that make him happy. God doesn't need anyone or anything outside of himself to make him happy. Here's a question. Do you think God yearns or even craves to be your friend? Well, that's the way some people view God. But the Bible tells us that God needs nothing. Acts 17 verse 25. God is not threatened. He's not a pacing deity starving for our attention. He's not easily angered. touchy or out of sorts on bad days. In fact, God never has a bad hair day. God never gets disappointed or discouraged or depressed. He's not biting his nails or blowing his stack when the world goes awry. Rather, he is the exultant and rapturously happy God. Why is the good news of the gospel so great? We're told 1 Timothy 1.11, because it is the gospel of the glory of the blessed or happy God. And so the word translated blessed, makarios, tells us that God possesses all that is necessary for true happiness or beatitude, as we would put it. And this enriches our appreciation of the gospel. For example, Fred Sanders writes, for Paul to call God blessed in the context of the gospel is to point to the sheer gratuity or grace of his self-giving. Moved by neither need nor greed, lacking nothing and improvably happy, God gives graciously from his abundance, end quote. Well, we ask the question, why is God so happy? Well, He is the blessed and only sovereign, Paul says to Timothy, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who alone has immortality, who dwells in unapproachable light. Well, first, God is happy because He's sovereign. He is the sovereign King and Supreme Lord, whose will cannot be frustrated. We read it in places like Deuteronomy 10, 17, Daniel 4, verse 35, so that God never fears the future. No evil can come that He has not ordained for His good purposes. That's why He can work all things for our good. That's why he works all things according to the counsel of his will. Romans 8.28, Ephesians 1.11, and we could go on more. But second, God is also invulnerable. Paul tells Timothy that God alone has immortality, that is, debtlessness. We get the word athanasia is the Greek word so that angels and men live forever by God's power, but God alone is indestructible by nature and so The word corruption, pathrora, brings sorrow into the world, and we see that in Romans 8, 21 and 22. But God is incorruptible, which is the word atharthas, in 1 Timothy 1, 17. He's not subject to decay, or damage, or anything else. And so first, God is happy because He's sovereign. Second, he's invulnerable. And third, God is happy because he's glorious. He dwells in unapproachable light, such majesty that even the angels cannot gaze directly upon his holiness. You remember in Isaiah 6, the angels had to cover, the cherubim had to cover their eyes with their wings. And so to God belongs an infinite wealth of glory. power, majesty, goodness, life, and strength. In fact, if anyone has any of those things, it is derived from God as his gift. So God has those things inherently in himself. In His presence, we're told, are fullness of joy and pleasures forevermore. Psalm 16.11. One pastor said it this way, God has no need of anything. No one can add to or subtract from anything from His being. Neither can anyone increase or decrease his felicity, his faithfulness, his truthfulness, what he is in himself is his point. In other words, we can't make God more glorious than he already is. We can make him more glorious in the eyes of others, but we cannot increase his inherent glory that's there in his being. We still might think that God's happiness changes based on whether people love him or not. But the scriptures say that God does not gain from our righteousness. You can read it in Job 22, verses 2 and 3. And our sin does not hurt God, nor does our righteousness give him anything. Elihu writes this, and he says in Job 35, verses 5 through 7, he says, look at the heavens and see, and behold the clouds which are higher than you. If you have sinned, what do you accomplish against him? In other words, against God. And if you transgress, Your transgressions are multiplied, he says. What do you do to him?" In other words, to God. If you are righteous, what do you give to him? Or what does he receive from your hand? End quote. God does have pleasure in his people. and their good works, but he is pleased with what he works in them by his grace, the grace of Christ. We see that in Hebrews 13, verses 20 through 21. In other words, God's pleasure in us does not come from anything we add to Him. but from what He adds to us by His grace. And therefore, God dwells in perfect happiness. He's the fountain of living waters, Jeremiah 2.13. And dwelling in His love, faithfulness, and righteousness, and justice beyond measure, God is a feast of life and a river of joy, Psalm 36. Hugh Martin put it like this, the blessedness of God It is a great deep, it is a dazzling bright abyss. We can look into it only with shaded eyes. The blessedness of God, it is the result of His possession of all perfections, inviolable repose, absolutely secure rest and unhindered activity. In Him is no dark, no gloom, no shadow." End quote. How does all that relate to us, you might ask? Well, when we're in trouble, we don't go to someone who's also in trouble. No, when we're miserable, it wouldn't do us any good to go to someone who's miserable. People in deep distress need a strong and secure and happy anchor. And so God is a joyful fountain, a blissful rock, a happy fortress. And when we stumble into sin, or we willfully transgress in stubborn disobedience, it doesn't disturb the blessedness of God. In other words, it doesn't interrupt His joy that He has in Himself. Now, that does not mean that God approves of our sin. Yet it does mean that when we come in humble confession and godly repentance, we will always find God full of compassion and tender mercies toward us. Question, have you been striving in your attempt to bring a smile to God's face? Christian, does it seem like no matter what you do, you cannot please God? Are you plagued by memories of responsibilities you've neglected, or promptings you've disobeyed, or beckonings you've ignored? Are you ashamed of your past? Are you tired of failure? What we really need is God's smile on us. We need His favor, His grace, which He freely gives to those who trust in His Son. That's our greatest need. We need that blessedness of realizing our spiritual poverty so that we mourn over our sins, and then we humbly hunger and thirst for righteousness, and then we'll be satisfied by God's glory in Christ, and we'll be merciful to others, and God will make us pure in heart and even cause us to be peacemakers, and then, of course, will be persecuted for the sake of righteousness, but great will be our reward in heaven, says Jesus. We are most like God when we are full of joy, godly joy that overflows from meekness, humility, and spiritual poverty, that is, a deep awareness of our desperate need of Christ. God is the blessed God. He is the source of all true joy. And the glorious truth of this text is that He shares His joy with those whom He saves. And so the joy is the fruit of His Holy Spirit, Galatians 5.22. And it's also our spiritual strength, Nehemiah 8.10. How is God glorified by a miserable, gloomy Christian? Well, He's not! Here's the question, what are we telling the watching world when we look like people from the first church of the deep freeze, pastored by Jack Frost, where the life verse is, many are cold, but few are frozen? And in that local church, they say, if you must talk, whisper, and if you do whisper, whisper a prayer. And nobody talks, or laughs, or enjoys the Lord. How different from God, who sent His Son to save us, which is good news of a great joy. Luke 2, I think it's verse 14. I ask myself, am I really a joyful person? Shouldn't Christians be the most joyful people on earth? And Jesus lived and died and rose from the dead so that his joy would be in me and that my joy might be full. What a wonderful privilege we have to show people that God enables us to overcome this world and even rejoice in the midst of tribulation. There's no natural explanation for our joy. And so God's power in the gospel is honored by our joy. And when we rejoice, we reflect his joy to others. And if ever the world needed to see that a joyful life is possible in spite of circumstances, it is now. The gospel is the only answer for the misery of mankind, because it comes from the blessed God. But how will they know about our blessed God's grace in the gospel unless they see and hear what He does in and through us? And so we have the blessed God. But God is not only blessed or blissful, secondly, He's also the only sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords. That is, He is the supreme, unrivaled ruler of all He created. No wonder He's happy. The word sovereign, or potentate, comes from the Greek word that means power. Just how much power does God have? All power. He omnipotently rules over everyone, everything, everywhere. But we don't see everyone submitting to Him, as the writer of Hebrews tells us in chapter 2. And the psalmist tells us the kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against His anointed, Psalm 2. But He, God, who sits in the heavens, laughs. The Lord scoffs at them. And then He will speak to them in His anger and terrify them in His fury. And how will He defeat those who rebel against His righteous rule through His Son? He already has defeated them by installing His King, His Son, upon Zion. He sent His only begotten Son and gave Him, Jesus, the nations as His inheritance and the very ends of the earth as His possession. And those who refuse to worship God's Son Christ Jesus, He will break with a rod of iron and scatter them like a potter's vessel." Where are the kingdoms that opposed God? Where is Assyria, or Babylon, or Medo-Persia, or Greece, or Rome? All the pharaohs, kings, caesars, prime ministers, fuhrers, tsars, presidents, and governors of the world have eventually turned to dust, Christ still on his throne ruling over all. He even accomplishes his purposes through his enemies. But some folks want to limit God's sovereignty when it comes to man's salvation. And they teach us that God sovereignly leaves the choice up to man's free will. But the Bible says that God works all things after the counsel of His will, Ephesians 1.11. God also declares in Romans 9, verses 16 and 17, He says, through Apostle Paul, I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion. So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy. Two questions to ponder from these texts. First, why does God, why would God, I should say, leave the most important decision in life up to man? And secondly, how will totally depraved man ever choose God unless God first gives him a new heart? A. W. Tozer wrote this, To think of creature and creator as alike in essential being is to rob God of most of his attributes and reduce him to the status of a creature. And Tozer goes on, there cannot be two unlimited substances in the universe. It is to take away God's sovereignty. There cannot be two absolute free beings in the universe, for sooner or later two completely free wills must collide, end quote. But God's sovereign rule also extends to the smallest details of your life. He even knows the number of hairs on your head. And yes, He's also in control of the painful events of your life. Many people will thank God when He gives, but Job blessed God when He took away. Job acknowledged the hand of God in all things. When his wife told him, curse God and die, Job said, shall we accept good from God and not accept adversity? And what we find in our world today is some teachers are trying to make it easier for people to believe and love God by exempting God from anything that appears to be bad and crediting Him with everything that appears to be good. But in reality, these false teachers are laying the groundwork for despair and unbelief. They're unwisely moving God right out of the picture where the hurting person needs the assurance of God's sovereign control the most. And when we don't get what our selfish hearts want, then we either condemn ourselves for our lack of faith, or we lose confidence in God's promises or what we falsely believed were his promises of a healthy, wealthy, or trouble-free life. One pastor even told a lady who lost her husband and children in a jet crash that God must have had his head turned the other way and didn't see the plane crash. Interesting. A sparrow can fall to the ground apart from your Heavenly Father. No, it cannot. And yet a 747 can? That pastor robbed that poor lady of God's comfort. Here's a question. Do we really believe God is sovereignly controlling all things? The real test of our faith in a sovereign God is how we act when we don't get our way. And yet You do have control over a few things, and let me just name four of them. We have control over our thoughts, secondly, our attitudes, thirdly, our words, and fourthly, our actions. But beyond those four things, you and I are limited human beings. The question is, will I give up the myth of my own sovereignty? And all of us then strive for control. Think of the things that you don't have control over. Think of your body. It has been given to you by God to glorify Him, but we cross over the line into unhealthy control when we move from stewardship into idolatry. In that way, instead of being a good steward of your body and taking care of it, you focus and become obsessed with how much you weigh, what you look, what you're going to wear, what you're going to eat, etc., etc. Secondly, what about our possessions? It's not wrong to have stuff, it's just wrong to worship stuff. And when we cross the line into unhealthy control, we develop obsessive concern with acquiring, multiplying, maintaining, even storing what we have. It's said now that more storage units are being built than even apartments and condos. Thirdly, what about relationships? They are ordained by God as an opportunity for us to show preferential love to another person made in God's image. But a desire for unhealthy control leads us to conflict and can manifest itself in intimidation or manipulation, which are two hallmarks of abuse. Lastly, what about our circumstances and environments? Do we have control over them? No, life is uncertain. We're finding that out. Only God knows the future. But those who try to control circumstances attempt to account for every contingency. They habitually over-plan, turning the simplest task into major undertakings. And the less control they perceive themselves to have, the more controlling behavior they demonstrate. Sometimes we hear, everything has a place and every place has a thing. And so they develop rituals and routines upon which they depend for their peace of mind. Well, you don't have to be diagnosed with OCD, obsessive-compulsory disorder, to have control issues with your circumstances or environments. You just have to be a limited human being. But Christ is ruling. Paul tells Timothy and us, as the King of kings and Lord of lords, because he defeated all his foes at the cross. And he went to the lowest place, Christians, so that you and I might have fellowship with God. And therefore, God, highly exalted his son and gave him a name that is above every name and at the name of Jesus every knee will bow and every tongue confess that he is Lord to the glory of God the Father Philippians 2 verses 9 to 11 we read this in Revelation 19 Jesus has this name written on his robe and on his thigh. Interestingly, his robe is dipped in blood, which speaks of his kingship based on his atonement for his bride, the church. He died to pay the penalty for our sins, to appease the Father's wrath. And now he is our high priest who bore all our sins on the cross. And so his robe that he's wearing is dipped in his blood, his infinite blood. But what about his thigh? The thigh is a symbol of power. It's the strongest place in the human body where the muscles congregate. And the angel of the Lord, interestingly, touched Jacob on the thigh and sent him limping all the way through life to humble him and to remind him how weak he was in the strongest part of his body. And thus, the name on Christ's thigh of which speaks of the power of his kingship. And those who won't yield willingly, willing submission to his authority and claims of his love will be made to yield unwilling submission to his retributive justice. If the kingship of his robe dipped in his blood doesn't conquer you, then he must turn on you the kingship of his thigh, his power. If the revelation of Christ's mercy and love fail to allure you to His heart, He must, by a revelation of His power, break what refused to bend. We all must be the subjects of either the kingship of His robe or the kingship of His thigh. Christ is the King of kings, but is He your king, or will you choose in His place some vile or worthless tyranny, some slavish and besetting sin. No power on earth has ever been able to resist Him. And if you try to, then you will also fall as they did. My prayers, may the spirit of God enable you and I to open the doors of our heart, that the King of glory may come in and take his rightful place on the throne of our hearts. Psalm 24, verses seven through 10. And Christ is not only King of kings, he is Lord of lords, but is he your Lord? Or is there some area of your life that you are reserving just for you? Perhaps your devotion to Christ has waned because you've become distracted by someone or even something. Let me give you an example. A lady was taking a photography class, and for one assignment, she chose her six-year-old daughter as her subject, and she asked her daughter to sit on a serene hillside. Close by was an apple tree in full bloom. And she just couldn't resist. She gave the tree a prominent place in the picture. But she was surprised when her instructor of the class pointed out a problem with her photo. The apple tree distracted from her primary focus, which was the little girl. See how the tree catches the eye, the instructor said? It competes with your subject. You need to choose one subject and leave the other out. The same principle applies to following Christ. Like amateur photographers, we can get attracted to the apple trees in full bloom. We pay more attention to our hobbies, or friends, or families, or work, or even current situations than we do to Christ. But He commands our full and focused attention. And why? Because He is the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. And if something or someone else is distracting our focus from Christ, we must relegate it to the background or crop it out of the picture completely. Why? As the preeminent one, Christ must be the single focus of our lives. Jesus bore the cross before He could wear the crown. And Paul says that if we endure suffering as good soldiers of Jesus Christ, we will also reign with Him. 2 Timothy 2, verses 3 and verse 12. To be a part of Jesus' blood-brought bride to be called his name which shall be called by his name which shall endure forever means that all his conquest Christian are your conquests think about that he is still going forth by the gospel conquering and to conquer revelation 6 verse 2 he is conquering one sinner's heart to conquer another sinner's heart from conquering that corruption of the old Adam nature of the child of God to conquer the next that rises and struggles within him or her. He will go on conquering and to conquer until he has conquered every chosen vessel of mercy and conformed them to the image or likeness of his son. Question, are you hesitant to fully engage in the war for truth because the battle in our days is fierce? Maybe you are overwhelmed by the immensity of your calling. But if you trust in Jesus Christ, then you are in the Lord's army. He is the captain of your salvation. And since he is the only sovereign, we have nothing to fear. Why? The final victory is certain. But we are not home yet. We must still actively fight the good fight of faith. Somebody said, God is not looking for volunteers. In fact, if you're in the Lord's army, he's already enlisted you. The question is not, shall I become a soldier, but rather, will I be a loyal soldier? As the hymn writer says, am I a soldier of the cross, a follower of the lamb? And shall I fear to own his cause or blush to speak his name? Must I be carried to the skies on flowery beds of ease while others fought to win the prize and sailed through bloody seas? He's speaking about the martyrs, of course. And so, Christian, will you, will I put on the whole armor of God? Will you, will I pick up the sword of the Spirit? And will you, will I pray for more of God's grace to be able to skillfully wield the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God? Our sovereign Lord is more than willing to give us the courage and strength we need to face and fight the foe, for he himself has fought and already won the war. For the joy that was set before him, our blessed sovereign endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. And He did it by dying on a cross for sinners like you and me. And now He calls us to deny ourselves, pick up our cross daily, and follow in His steps as His good soldiers. May none of us then be found AWOL. Amen.