the red that will form, suggest to us a theme that I'd like to share with you this afternoon. So in Acts 17, once again, beginning at verse 24 and concluding at verse 28. God that made the world and all things therein, seeing that he is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands. Neither is worship with men's hands, as though he needed anything. See, he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things, and hath made of one blood all nations of men, for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed. that they should seek the Lord, if happily they may feel after him and find him, though he be not far from every one of us. For in him we live and move and have our being, as certain also of your own poets have said, for we also are his offspring. Finding God again, and that word again is going to allude or suggest to us a theme which should be a recurring theme in the life of a Christian. And that is this ongoing pursuit that renews itself daily, an ongoing pursuit to find the Lord, finding Him for purposes and closeness, and simply because He is the one who we love. The allusion is to the Shunammite in the Song of Solomon, who had languished for a bit in her walk with her husband, and she went out at night, stopping to watch him, and asked him, have you seen the one who my soul loves? She was on this pursuit to find Him and this mirrors the relationship that the believer has with Christ. The believer rejoices in the fact that he or she was found initially by the Lord. There are many parables, many phrases, many scriptures that talk about God finding us, the lost sheep. lost son. Isaiah sums it up when he says, as God is speaking, I am sought of them that ask not for me. I am found of them that sought me not. So I'd like to spend just some minutes this afternoon and as our brother prayed and emphasized it a little bit, where the phrase says that we would feel after him and find him, go. The Savior was given over to idolatry, unbelievers, but including himself in the us. God is not far from every one of us. Let me give you an alternate scripture that Pastor Job mentioned in his prayer. In Job 23, where Job said, Oh, that I might know where I could find him. that I might even come to His seat. Behold, I go forward, but He is not there. I go backward, but I cannot perceive Him. The Puritans used to talk about the felt sense of Christ's presence. They were not looking for signs and wonders, but they knew that the Holy Spirit real presence in their life. And this, I believe, is what Job was seeking after. Think of it. Job lost his family. Job lost his health. He lost his wealth. And he's not pining away for those things. He wants to find God himself. If I were to ask What is it that a person could find God? You might say very quickly, very glibly, the Word of God. You could find Him in the Word of God and that is true. But the true believer who is struggling to accept a flash card answer. He really wants to There is a puzzle. There is something that doesn't line up. I don't know if you caught it. Here we have Job asking, where could I find him? We have Paul saying, he's not far. Paul is talking to the city of Athens that was wholly given over to idolatry, carnality, unbelief. They were hedonistic. They were spiritually ignorant. They were carnal. And Paul tells them, God is close. God is near. Then you have Job, who is a spiritual giant. Job, who the scripture says was upright and eschewed evil. God even commends this man to Satan. Have you considered my servant Job? A spiritual giant. And for him, God does not seem to be close. Where can I find him? He says later, in another chapter, the very same thing. He's struggling after this presence, this felt sense of Christ's presence in his life, and he just cannot apprehend it. An unbelieving city, given over to idolatry. Paul says, he's close. Job, God seems to be a million miles away. I think this paradox, obviously, Job was in a very special spot of trial and testing. There are many, many facets and many reasons of why he went through what he went through. But I bring those two together just to emphasize this theme, or ask you, do you ever have any trouble finding the Lord? Do you have this heart-burning desire that will seek Him and go out after Him? My purpose to share with you this word this afternoon is by way of encouragement that though there are many perceived difficulties in the way, spiritual tiredness, sin and temptation, bad past history, lack of faith, weak faith, There are many perceived difficulties in the way of meeting with God. The encouragement is, that I'm going to share with you, is that it might be easier than you may think. And in fact, I believe what the scripture says, God is not far from every one of us. So I'm just going to be speaking to this theme. I'm not going to be giving an exposition of Acts 17. As Walter said, there have been several excellent expositions of this passage that you can Well, that's easy. Wherever two or three are gathered together, there He is in the midst. That's easy. James says, draw near unto God, and He will draw near unto you. The writer to Hebrews says, well, you have to have faith. Without faith, it's impossible to please God. You must have faith, for he that cometh to God, implied finding Him, must believe that He is, and He's a rewarder. He's a giver back, if you will, of those that diligently seek Him. Someone else says, well, you have to have humility. Doesn't the psalmist say that the Lord is nigh unto those who are of a broken heart and of a contrite spirit? Jeremiah says, well, you have to be single-minded. You shall seek me and you shall find me when you shall search for me with all of your heart. All of those answers are biblical. They are correct. But have you noticed a common denominator in those thoughts? There's a common denominator in all of them. They come down to man's ability. You must gather together. You must have humility. You must be single-minded. Again, all of those are true. All of those are biblical. All of those are accurate. But let's think about this afternoon the other side of the coin. Let's look at another aspect of this. The fact is that sometimes, many times, often, I don't want to put a time limit on it. But we find God because God is the one who takes the initiative. God wants you close to himself. He wants to have fellowship with you. He wants your nearness to him. He sent his son to die for you. And he's not willing that that communion, that fellowship, that closeness will occur in the sweet by and by, 70 years from the day that you're born. He wants to invade your life now. He wants to draw you close. And sometimes, we actually meet God, I'm gonna say stumble upon God, we find Him, simply because He is looking for you. He is finding you for these very purposes. from every one of us. You know, even in a general sense, when we think about human responsibility, our devotions, our reading, our meditation, our prayer to find God and have fellowship with Him, did you ever stop to think that you have to ascribe that stirring up to God also? God stirs us up to go on this great quest. seek ye my face, then my heart said, thy face, O God, will I see. You can trace that river back to the source, God himself. The prophet Isaiah says, saying what God is saying, I have not spoken in secret in a dark place of the earth. I did not say to the seed of Jacob, seek me in vain. I, the Lord, speak righteousness. I declare things that are right. God told his people to seek him, not in vain, because he wants them, he wants you to find him. Or again, Paul in Athens here in Acts 17, they can find God because God is the one who sent Paul there with the message. And even though the language speaks about the groping after him as a blind man in the dark, yet he's not far from every one of us. So my premise or my theme for this exhortation this afternoon is simply that God himself takes the initiative very often to meet with his people, regardless of your weak faith, your failing faith, the things that are against us, sometimes God Himself will draw you close to Him. So we're looking out at the first points. Number one, sometimes we meet with God in events or places where we have no thought at all of meeting Him or of finding Him. Sometimes in places or in circumstances Maybe we are in poor spiritual condition. Maybe we're taken up with the affairs of life, whatever. But God meets with us because he takes the initiative for his people. I'll illustrate this in a minute from a few of the individuals in the scripture. But let me remind you that God is not bound by the limitations that we put on him. God will not just meet with you when you perceive that you are spiritually correct, or you're in a perfect situation to find Him, or maybe you have a felt need so God has to hear you, or you're in a religious surrounding. We sometimes compartmentalize our Christian life and our perception is that we will only We are praying with the Spirit and with understanding, or we're examining ourself to see if there be any wicked way in us. I've talked with people who have a sense that they can only meet with God if, as they judge, their walk is pleasing enough to the Lord so they can merit His favor to meet with them. They have this expectation that they have to perform, they have to meet some standard that they have concocted in their mind. And that's their only opportunity to meet with the Lord. But remember, every minute of your life is in God's hands. We mentioned that a sparrow doesn't fall to the ground without your Heavenly Father. If you were to see a sparrow fall to the ground, God is in the midst of that seemingly inconsequential event. of your head are numbered. God has performed a census on them. He planted them there. The smallest one He knows about. The smallest situation is under the hands, under the eye, under the perception of God. And sometimes we can meet with the Lord in situations and circumstances in God's providence that we're not aware of that we could. This is an encouragement to me that it's not all human effort based. Let me give you a couple examples from the scripture. I'll just allude to these and mention, you need not turn to the scripture, but the first one is in Exodus chapter three, verse two and following. When Moses was going to work, his daily routine, he worked for his father-in-law keeping sheep. Scripture says he led the sheep to the far side of the desert, Mount Horeb. Perhaps he said his devotions in the morning. He went to work, planned the day, assuming after a day's work he would go home, have dinner, talk with the family. fashion in the burning bush, giving Moses a revelation of who he was and a task, and the sufficient presence of God to complete that task. A very traumatic situation, a very traumatic occurrence. And I doubt that when Moses went to work that day, the God of Israel. Moses at least had the discernment to turn aside to see this great sight, a bush on fire. I would guess that a bush on fire in the desert might not be so out of the ordinary. Lightning strikes, people leave campfires going, whatever. But the fact that it continued to burn and was not consumed had to alert Moses, as small as that little sign was, had to alert Moses that something is here. And he went to go pull on that thread to see what was on the other side. God chose to meet with Moses there and then. How about Elijah? After the contest on Mount Carmel, that tremendous spiritual victory. And as you know, after that victory, and as Jezebel promises to kill him, he runs away. So now, here is Elijah, at the point of failure, perhaps dishonoring God, running away, goes to sit under the juniper tree. If I was Elijah, I never would have thought, after running away, that God now is going to meet me here. I might believe I'm a Christian, I might believe I've done some great things for the Lord in my past history, but it stops here, at least for the next duration of time. How about Elijah again, when he goes to Mount Horeb? God sends him there, and Elijah witnesses a fire, and earthquake, a tremendous wind. If I was Elijah, I would look for the Lord there. Well, that's where God's going to be. He's going to be manifesting His power, His sovereignty, and He'll talk to me there. But as you know the story, God was not in those. Do you suppose in your Christian experience that you might have missed God because he was in that still small voice? And he was not in the big, the thing of notoriety, but he was in that other place. What about Gideon threshing wheat in Judges 6? Gideon was hiding from the enemy. Have you ever hid or flew under the radar? At work, for example, or in school? Because there's enemies of the Lord, and you just didn't want to get into it, and you knew it would be an argument, and so you would avoid and hide from them. And yet God came to him. Oh, thou mighty man of valor. Who, me? What do you think it says? How about Manoah and his wife in the book of Judges? We looked at that a few years ago. Jacob and Esau. Jacob being reconciled to his brother when his brother and he meet. And Jacob says this, I have seen your face and through it I have seen the face of God. God was in the midst of this reconciliation with the brother who I thought at one time, and he did say, I'm gonna kill him. I'm gonna murder him because he stole the birthright and he stole the blessing. And then, of course, the other situation where Jacob wrestled with God at Nile. All these situations where these granted great men of faith, patriarchs, met God. They found God in situations, in places, through relationships that they never thought they would find God. I think God is so much greater than how we fashion him. I think we unknowingly fashion him and expect and assume certain things about God. And we don't understand the import of statements like, he is not far from every one of us. The greatest example I can think of, Tracy Bible Study knows what I'm going to say, is Adam. Clearly Adam and the woman were not seeking Elohim, Jehovah, the Lord God. If I could put myself in Adam's shoes as I'm running away, as I'm hiding, I hear the voice of the Lord in the garden, I was afraid, I was naked, I hid myself. If I could put myself in Adam's shoes for a minute and I'm thinking I'm afraid because I'm sinning, I'm afraid of physical death. I'm afraid of spiritual death. I'm afraid of Eve, my wife. Bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh. She's a sinner too. God's going to smite her. I'm afraid I'll be separated from her. I'm afraid of myself. If I can do this sin, what other sins or terrible evil things can I do? And if I'm Adam, you know what I'm thinking while I'm running away to hide? I'm thinking, God used to walk with me in the garden. I used to know the love of God in an unmitigated way. God entrusted me as a steward of His work, His creation. I was His friend. He loved me. I loved Him. I wanted to be in His presence. He obviously wanted to be with me. And all of that is hopelessly ruined. It's gone. It's over. It's done away with. And I would never expect that God would come looking for me then and then. Yet God initiates this meeting with Adam and the woman. Yes, there will be consequences for their sin. God does not curse them. God curses Satan, but He does not curse Adam and Eve. He clothes them and He protects them by guarding the tree of life so that in their sinful condition they do not eat from that tree and live forever. God's care, His protection, His love. Coming at a time and a place, there's no way Adam and the woman would have thought God would come to them in any other way except wrath, judgment for their sin, displeasure, white hot anger. all things, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen. Think about this. Think about what if you lived 2,000 years ago and you passed by a hill called Calvary. And there were three individuals undergoing capital punishment on a cross. And you ask somebody, who is that one individual? They call him a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief. We hide from him because he's religious. They say he's a prophet, but really he's despised and rejected by everybody. He's being put to death with these other two notorious criminals. He's powerless. Even God himself has forsaken him because we heard him say, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? If you had witnessed that 2,000 years ago, you probably would have gone your way and said, God has nothing for me here in this event. so that you could meet with God. That was the very epicenter. That was ground zero. That was the place where He gave you an open door to heaven whereby you can meet with God every day. The very door whereby you are going to be ushered into the presence of Christ for all of eternity with boldness. to enter by the blood of Christ. My premise is, you can find God in places you were not expecting to find Him, simply because He is looking for you. He wants your nearness, your fellowship, your communion. Maybe He wants to infuse some spiritual grace into your life because He knows tomorrow you're going to need this. There's so many stories from Christian history as well, of God meeting peoples or individuals, whether for salvation, whether for encouragement, in places or ways they never anticipated. He has one of the most, I believe, one of the most remarkable tombstones. The tombstone says this of him, Here lay the earthly remains of John Berridge, the vicar of Edmonton, and an itinerant servant of Jesus Christ, who loved his master and his work, and after running on his errands for many years, was called up to wait upon the Lord on high. Reader, art thou born again? No salvation without a new birth. I was born in sin, February 1716, and I remained ignorant of my fallen state until 1730. I was living proudly on faith and works for salvation, until 1754, admitted to Everton Vicarage, fled to Jesus alone, 1756, fell asleep in Christ, 1793. If you follow the dates, he didn't become a Christian until after he had been vicar, pastor, ministering to that little flock, that congregation. He became converted under his own ministry. Think about meeting God. The last place I think a professional pastor or someone as a vicar, the last place you would think that you would meet, not an orthodox, not a religious figment or idea, but meet the living Christ under your own ministry as you're trying to minister to others, yet that's what God did. And he, if you know anything about his life, he was a choice servant of Jesus Christ. You can get his sermons and read them, they're just remarkable. Sometimes, God meets with his people, though we have no thoughts of finding him. Obviously, this is not an excuse to just go through life and not seek the Lord, but it's encouragement that sometimes He will find you. He will bring together His providence. You might be reading His Word out of duty and He'll just shine a flash lamp on it and it will become that living and abiding Word. closeness. These are cases in the scripture where they do not know God is there, but then they realize He is there, and it does something special to their walk. It changes them. They realize that the monumental thing that God has done, and it makes them even more hungry, more thirsty after that rich relationship with A prime example is Jacob. Jacob in Genesis 28. Scripture says in verse 16 and 17, Jacob awakened out of his sleep and he said, surely the Lord is in this place, and note, I knew it not. And he was afraid and said, how dreadful is this place. This is none other but the house of God and this, the very gate of heaven. You know the account. Jacob is on his way to Pandanaram for a wife. He stops to sleep for the night. He dreams a dream. He sees a ladder set between earth and heaven. The angels of God going up and down this ladder. God comes to him and gives him 10 covenant promises. This monumental meeting of major proportions, a very big deal. God's presence is so powerful. Jacob's filled with dread, he's filled with awe, and he says, I didn't know that God was in this place. I had no idea that God was in this place. This rock that I used for a pillow now becomes a memorial stone to Jehovah God. This land that I laid on, God said, this very land, I'm going to give it to you and to your posterity. I did not know that the covenant-keeping Jehovah of God was in this place. Paul would have told Jacob, it's not very far from every one of us. Is there any possibility that in your life, even now, today, let's say, as you go through the grind of everyday life, as you endeavor to live the Christian life, is there any possibility, and maybe you're right in the center of God's will, is there any possibility that you could say with Jacob, I did not I was unaware that He was orchestrating by His sovereign will these events. I didn't see Him yesterday. Today. We would expect that of unbelievers, would we not? Should we expect that of believers? Jacob on another account, and this ties in with your personal testimony according to the Word of God. Speaking of Jacob in Deuteronomy 32, he, that is God, found him, Jacob, in a desert land and in a wasteland wilderness and led him about. He instructed him. He kept him as the apple of his eye. As an eagle stirreth up her nest, fluttereth over her young, spreadeth abroad her wings, taketh them, beareth them on her wings. So the Lord alone did lead him, and there was no strange God with him. As it considers Jacob, the passage speaks of discriminating grace. The starting place of Jacob's pilgrimage, a wasteland wilderness, Providential care and guidance. He was the apple of God's eye. That's a phrase that signifies the pupil. That is, he was in the very center of God's eyesight. The keeping power of God, the love of God, and the result in Jacob's life. There were no strange gods anymore in Jacob's life. This is exactly what God has done with you, discriminating grace while you were lost. The starting place for your pilgrimage was a waste, howling wilderness, spiritually speaking. Ephesians 2 and verse 12. Providential care and guidance. You were the apple of God's eye. That phrase is used speaking about God's perception of his own. of God, the love of God. And the result? You're not perfect. Progress in time seems to be slow. There could be more knowledge, more truth in the inward parts, better experience. But despite the shortcomings you may have, there are no strange gods among you. You have one God, the Triune God, Jehovah God, the God of the Bible. place and I did not know it. He is a very present help in time of trouble. He said he would never leave us nor forsake us. But we're speaking about that special sense of his presence. Your mind probably also goes to that New Testament example of the disciples on the road to Emmaus. walking with the Lord just a couple days away from the crucifixion, Christ joining them, opening up the scriptures, speaking of those things concerning Himself in the Law, in the Prophets, in the Psalms, expanding it, and there is something clicking within them, And they seem to, because their hearts burn within them, they seem to catch on to the Scriptures, to the truth. And yet, miss Christ. The Bible does say their eyes were with Helden, so that they did not see Him. But again, here we have this case where Christ Himself is on this mission. Putting Himself in their midst so they will find Him. That should be an encouragement to you. It's not only up to your efforts. It's not only up to how well you can walk before Him, however well that may be. He too has a desire for you. He too wants you to be near Him. Job just has tremendous searching of this patriarch, knowing that being in God's presence was, that was his daily portion, his meal. He needed that. And Job says in and goes by me, I see him not, he passes on also, I do not perceive him. God speaketh, he says again, God speaketh once, he twice, yet man does not perceive it. But at the end of it, he finally says, the Lord knows, I may not know. that Christ, that God, that the Holy Spirit does not just leave you on your own, yes, with the help of the Holy Spirit, yes, with the help of His Word and the gift of prayer and all these things, and just leave you there to find Him. Sometimes He will invade our lives so that we can find Him, so that it will be unmistakable. And that should be a tremendous encouragement. But second thing, by way of application, what happens when we in fact don't have that sense of His special presence? And maybe that's a season where God has not chosen to invade our life or to find us so that we can find Him. Isaiah had this same experience and he is speaking He was able to call Him, my God, my God. He was able to say, my Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit. But he asks the question, the Prophet does, who is the one among you that fears the Lord, that obeys the voice, but that walks in darkness and has no light? It's unrealistic to think that we can know His felt presence 24-7 for all of our life. That's unrealistic. Maybe that's the goal. Maybe that's the desire. But it's unrealistic. Isaiah says, what do we do? We're walking in darkness and we do not have light. He gives us the answer. Let him trust in the name of the Lord and stay upon his God. trust in the Lord, the name of the Lord, and stay upon his God. As Peter told Christ, where can we go? What can we do? There's only one that has the words of eternal life. That's what I wanted to share with you this afternoon, dear friends. Be encouraged that very often God is looking for you. He wants your fellowship. He's not very far from every one of us. Yes, we should use the means of grace. but to be there as your God. Let us pray. Father, we thank you for the tremendous blessings that your word holds out for us. And we confess that so many times we are weak. We do not stir ourselves up as we ought to. And sometimes we in our lives that not only would we increasingly exercise ourselves in that spiritual realm to find the one whom our soul loves, but also we would have the discernment to look for you, perhaps in places where we never thought we would meet with you. Father, even this coming week, we pray that you would in some special way meet with your people to encourage them, to give them assurance, to grant grace, to set before them once again the blessed hope that we will be with you for all of eternity. Do this for the good of thy people and for your glory, we ask in Jesus' name, amen.