From Greenville, South Carolina, we present Let the Bible Speak. Let the Bible Speak is the radio ministry of Faith Free Presbyterian Church, preaching Christ in all His fullness. Welcome to this broadcast of Let the Bible Speak. In just a few minutes you'll hear a message from God's Word brought by Dr. Alan Cairns, the Minister Emeritus of Faith Free Presbyterian Church in Greenville, South Carolina. Continuing his studies on the subject of prayer, Dr. Cairns is examining the third petition of the Lord's Prayer, Thy Will Be Done. Here the believer is submitting himself to God's sovereign purpose. Admittedly, this is an area that tries the faith of God's people, for circumstances often tell us that God is dealing harshly with us. Yet it is here that we must remind ourselves that our Heavenly Father loves us and is working all things for our good. However, as Dr. Cairns will point out today, it is possible to say, Thy will be done, in such a way as to manifest bitterness and unbelief. Dr. Cairns will continue the message shortly. First, we invite your attention to Words from Faith's Checkbook, a devotional collection from the pen of the great 19th century preacher C. H. Spurgeon. Today's selection is entitled, The Life-Giving Stream. The text is found in Ezekiel, chapter 47 and verse 9. And it shall come to pass that everything that liveth, which moveth, with us wherever the river shall come, shall live. The living waters in the prophet's vision flowed into the Dead Sea, and carried life with them, even into that stagnant lake. Where grace goes, spiritual life is the immediate and the everlasting consequence. Grace proceeds sovereignly according to the will of God, even as a river in all its windings follows its own sweet will. And wherever it comes, it does not wait for life to come to it. but it creates life by its own quickening flow. Oh, that it would pour along our streets and flood our slums! Oh, that it would now come into my house and rise till every chamber were made to swim with it! Lord, let the living water flow to my family and my friends, and let it not pass me by. I hope I have drunk of it already, but I desire to bathe in it, yea, to swim in it. Oh my Savior, I need life more abundantly. Come to me, I pray Thee, till every part of my nature is vividly energetic and intensely active. Living God, I pray Thee, fill me with Thine own life. I am a poor dry stick. Come and make me so to live that, like Aaron's rod, I may bud and blossom and bring forth fruit unto Thy glory. Quicken me for the sake of my Lord Jesus. Amen. In lowly paths of service free, Tell me thy secret, help me bear, Tells me the soul of God to you. And guide them in the right way. In hope that sends us far You're listening to Let the Bible Speak, the radio ministry of the Free Presbyterian Church of North America. We're delighted that you've tuned in today, and we're especially grateful for those of you who make this program a regular part of your day. We'd like to encourage you to take advantage of some of the free literature we offer on the program. We're pleased to announce that the newest edition of Let the Bible Speak quarterly magazine is now available. The theme of the current issue is the subject of temptation. In five articles, various ministers of the Free Presbyterian Church discuss such issues as how to recognize the temptation to sin, the temptation of Christ, and overcoming temptation. Among other articles of interest in this issue, you'll find a focus on the land of Macedonia, as well as the inspiring testimony of a young man born with cerebral palsy who is a glowing witness for Christ. A copy is available simply for the asking, and we promise that there will be no follow-up letters soliciting funds. For your free copy, just write to us at Let the Bible Speak, 1207 Haywood Road, Greenville, SC 29615. That's Let the Bible Speak, 1207 Haywood Road, Greenville, SC 29615. You may email us at ltbs at freeprez.org. That's ltbs at freeprez.org. Or you may telephone us toll free at 866-877-ltbs. That's 866-877-5827. Also, if you enjoy the broadcasts, you may like to visit us on our website, LetTheBibleSpeakRadio or ltbsradio.com. Don't forget that word radio, ltbsradio.com. We hope to hear from you soon. you. you. We must remember that we see only a little fragment of reality. The Lord sees it all. We are bound by time and by sense, while He is not. Faith will say that when we are able to view things from the perspective of eternity, then we will view them differently. We will evaluate them differently. Meanwhile, we may simply cry, Thy will be done. Submission to God's will as the wise and loving purpose of our Father in heaven. and especially when we don't understand what He is doing or why He's doing it. It's one of the ironies of studying the Sermon on the Mount and the Lord's Prayer, especially this portion of the Lord's Prayer. It's one of the ironies in studying it and looking up what various other commentators and preachers have had to say that some of the most useful treatments come from some of the most unexpected places. For example, of the modern treatments of this portion, I must confess I have been surprised to find that some of the deepest and best insights come from a man whom I don't even mention by name for the simple reason that I would not encourage people, unless they're very capable of discerning, I would not encourage people to read him because he's very suspect in many, many of his theological views. A modern Scottish preacher, suspect in many ways, but who especially in this passage I believe, has penetrated to things that Christians need to think about. And in a very simple way, he draws attention to this, that when you say, Thy will be done, to put it colloquially, a lot depends on the tone of voice in which you say it. There are various ways in which you may say that. You may say to God, Thy will be done, and say it in bitter resentment. How often that happens, that there is building up in the life even of a professing Christian a bitter resentment at what he looks upon as an imposition of the Lord upon him. Very often young people reach this stage. in their folly. And it's a good thing that God, knowing their freedom, deals kindly and graciously and long-sufferingly with them. But very often young people are reacting to the impetus or the stimulus of the moment. They're held back by the law of God or by the profession of their faith. They feel a great resentment as if they were missing something. And they may say with words, Thy will be done, but there is a build-up of this bitterness in their heart. The preacher to whom I refer gives the classic example of the great composer Beethoven. When you think of a musician, a man whose life was music, is there anything that would be more trying than the affliction of deafness? It was said that when Beethoven was found dead, his fists were clenched as if he would strike God and his lips were drawn back in a snarl as if he would spit defiance, the defiance of his bitterness to God. We cannot read the thoughts of the man in death. Those were just impressions of those who saw the corpse. But certainly there are many who say the words, Thy will be done. And what they mean is really, I would that your will was changed, because behind the words there is a bitterness of soul. You may say, thy will be done in hopeless defeat. There is a man in history known as Julian the Apostate, because having professed Christianity, He apostatized and went back to paganism. And when he became emperor of the Roman Empire, he sought to reverse the decisions of Constantine and bring the empire back to paganism. When Julian the Apostate lay dying, bleeding to death on the battlefield, it is said that he reached into a pool of his own blood and tossed it to heaven. and said, You have conquered, O man of Galilee. Oh, he accepted the inevitable. There was nothing else he could do. But that's not the spirit of the Lord's Prayer when Jesus said, Pray, thy will be done. This mere hopeless defeat, this acceptance of the inevitable, is something cold and lifeless. It is a hopeless, joyless surrender. And it leaves your life pointless and aimless and useless. When you say, Thy will be done, you may say it in the tone of loveless acquiescence. We have all known cases where people go along with the will of another just because they felt they couldn't fight it. There's the story of a famous philosopher who decided it was time to go for A walk. The weather was right, the temperature was right, the countryside looked good. He wanted to take a walk and so he wanted his young daughter to go with him. But she really had no interest in going for a walk. And he kept on shivvying her and giving her reasons and all the rest of it until finally she went. And he felt they had a very enjoyable time and so when they arrived back home he said to her, now aren't you glad you decided to come? She said, I didn't decide. You were just bigger. And I feel, you know, that that's all too often the way professing Christians react to the sovereign dispositions of God in their lives and in their affairs. The idea, well, I have to acquiesce because God is God. God is bigger. God is all-powerful. I have to accept it. What else can I do? And it's just loveless acquiescence. But that's not what the Lord Jesus had in mind when He said, Pray, thy will be done. No, the proper way to pray this prayer is entrusting submission. And that's why we read in the book of Job, was any man more tried, more afflicted than Job? We read in chapter 1 of Job of the tremendous catalogue of disasters that befell him one after another. Can you imagine? Try to put this beyond the page of Scripture. Lift it beyond the realm of literature. Bring it into your own life and experience. Try to put yourself in Job's shoes. He's a real flesh and blood character. And he finds first that all his possessions are destroyed. Then he finds all his children are wiped out in a single day. From being one of the richest men, he becomes one of the poorest. From being the father of a united and happy family, he now finds himself bereft of all his children. heartbroken, wearied in mind and body, and under the attack of the devil, not knowing what is happening, why God is allowing these things. He said, naked came I out of my mother's womb, naked shall I return thither. The Lord gave, the Lord hath taken away, blessed be the name of the Lord. We have read in chapter 2 how when his own body became the target of satanic attack, when he was losing health and he was living in great pain. I don't know if you pay attention, but from head to toe he was afflicted with boils. It's easy to read that. The nearest I came to seeing that was in my younger brother when he was just Just a very young fellow, not even a fellow, just a hand higher than a grasshopper. As children do, they get into all sorts of altercations. And he and a little girl had an argument. And she decided to fight. And being, obviously as my brother, a young gentleman, he wouldn't fight her. You don't fight girls. They would beat you. He didn't fight. But she did. And she had been in all sorts of mess and muck and her fingernails were in all sorts. I don't know what they'd been doing, digging in the dirt beforehand. But she just swept at him and her long nails just gouged a deep wound right around his neck. And for the next few months, right around that wound. I think it came to seventeen boils. And if ever you saw a young fellow suffer, you saw it in Burt. What must it have been for Job to be afflicted from head to toe? He was in utter physical agony. He was in utter misery. And with all that, he had Satan pounding away in his mind. And then, to make matters even worse, he had his wife come along and say, curse God, or literally say goodbye to God and lie down and die. Job answered, Thou speakest as one of the foolish women speak. What, shall we not receive good at the hand of the Lord? And shall we not receive evil? Evil meaning calamity here. Can we not take it when things are going bad? Then the Lord adds something very, very significant In all this, Job did not sin with his lips." When you think of what David said in Psalm 116, I believed, therefore have I spoken. There's the testimony of faith. It's lovely when a Christian gives the testimony of faith, when what you believe comes bubbling out of your mouth. But then he went on to say, I was greatly afflicted, and I said in my haste." My, that's not the testimony of faith. Now we come to the testimony of frustration. And David, mighty man of God, though he was, said, when I was afflicted, I was guilty, not of speaking in faith, but speaking in frustration. Job afflicted much more, did not sin with his lips. Why, from his heart, in a trusting submission he was honestly saying, Thy will be done. You've been listening to Let the Bible Speak, the radio ministry of the Free Presbyterian Church of North America. We hope that you've enjoyed and benefited from today's program. We are here as your servants for Christ's sake. If we can be of any further help to you in the things of God, we invite you to contact us. If you would like to receive our booklet, A New Beginning, a booklet that sets forth God's way of salvation in clear, concise, and biblical ways, you may have it free of charge simply for the asking. Our mailing address is Let the Bible Speak, 1207 Haywood Road, Greenville, SC 29615. That's Let the Bible Speak. 1207 Haywood Road, Greenville, SC 29615. If you wish, you may call us toll-free at 1-866-877-LTBS. That's 1-866-877-5827. You may email us at faithfpc at freepress.org. That's faithfpc at f-r-e-e-p-r-e-s dot o-r-g. Also, we invite you to visit our website at www.freepres.org. If you would be interested in considering the establishment of a Free Presbyterian Church in your area, by all means let us know. Once again, you may call us toll free 1-866-877-5827. On behalf of Dr. Alan Cairns, this is Charles Kelch saying thank you for listening and inviting you to join us once again as we let the Bible speak.