Who answers the why... (3)

God’s word will not fail...

You’ve most likely heard the saying,

“If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.”

It can be so hard to believe promises. Politically, so many times, promises are made that more than likely can’t be kept or so far in the distance that the one making the promise doesn’t have to worry about making it happen.

Maybe you’ve been promised something at work, and it seemed like only empty words to try to keep you happy.

If we aren’t careful, we can become really sceptical when a promise is made. I believe that most people are trustworthy, but sometimes circumstances beyond one’s control can prevent a promise that is made to come true.

God has not only made promises, but He has the ability to keep His word because His ability has no limit.

Let’s look at our Scripture this morning,

Habakkuk 2:2–5 NLT

Then the Lord said to me, “Write my answer plainly on tablets, so that a runner can carry the correct message to others. This vision is for a future time. It describes the end, and it will be fulfilled. If it seems slow in coming, wait patiently, for it will surely take place. It will not be delayed. “Look at the proud! They trust in themselves, and their lives are crooked. But the righteous will live by their faithfulness to God. Wealth is treacherous, and the arrogant are never at rest. They open their mouths as wide as the grave, and like death, they are never satisfied. In their greed they have gathered up many nations and swallowed many peoples.

God will answer you...

God has an answer for Habakkuk. When we come to the LORD, we can expect that he will answer.

Jeremiah 33:3 NKJV

‘Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know.’

When we come to God, He is faithful to His word. We can expect that He won’t be silent forever.

We don’t always get the answers the way that we want or expect.

But we need to pray:

Matthew 6:10 NIV

your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.

Too often when people pray, they pray to God, “Not your will, but mine be done.” Our will needs to line up with our Father who is in Heaven.

Romans 12:2 NIV

Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.

How do we renew our minds? By hiding God’s word in our hearts.

Write the answer down...

God gave Habakkuk a vision. In the vision, God revealed that Babylon would be destroyed, but this doesn’t just look to the Babylon that was destroyed when Daniel read the hand writing that was on the wall, it refers to the end times that we look forward to.

Habakkuk was told to

Habakkuk 2:2 (NLT)

...“Write my answer plainly on tablets, so that a runner can carry the correct message to others.

2 Peter 1:20–21 NLT

Above all, you must realize that no prophecy in Scripture ever came from the prophet’s own understanding, or from human initiative. No, those prophets were moved by the Holy Spirit, and they spoke from God.

We as Pentecostals believe this: This is what our Statement of Essential truths say about the Bible.

The Bible, both Old and New Testaments, is the written revelation of God’s character and saving purposes for humanity and for all creation.

As God’s revelation, the entire Bible is true and trustworthy, and is the final and absolute authority for belief and conduct.

The Holy Spirit who inspired the Bible enables its interpretation and application.

2 Timothy 3:16–17 NIV

All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.

Journals

Some of you might journal what you believe God is saying to you. You write it down and visit it and revisit it. It can give you confidence that you are hearing God’s voice as it comes to pass.

Others have prayer journals. Here you write your requests to God, and expect that He will answer. When He does, it increases you faith to believe God to continue to answer.

Today, we have the Bible, because God spoke to people and they wrote down what the Holy Spirit inspired them to write.

Not every book that has an apostle’s name on it made it into Scripture. Only those believed to be inspired made it into the Old and New Testaments.

Why write it down?

Habakkuk 2:2 (NLT)

...so that a runner can carry the correct message to others.

Let’s pay close attention to this. The prophets or those who God used to write the Bible, wrote it down so that runners, heralds, evangelist, disciple makers could go and carry the correct message to others.

Romans 10:13–17 NLT

For “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” But how can they call on him to save them unless they believe in him? And how can they believe in him if they have never heard about him? And how can they hear about him unless someone tells them? And how will anyone go and tell them without being sent? That is why the Scriptures say, “How beautiful are the feet of messengers who bring good news!” But not everyone welcomes the Good News, for Isaiah the prophet said, “Lord, who has believed our message?” So faith comes from hearing, that is, hearing the Good News about Christ.

How can someone hear the gospel about Jesus?

How can someone go unless they are sent?

How can anybody believe in Jesus, if nobody tells them?

I’ve got good news for you today...

Matthew 28:19 NIV

Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,

Mark 16:15–16 NIV

He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.

Mark 16:20 NIV

Then the disciples went out and preached everywhere, and the Lord worked with them and confirmed his word by the signs that accompanied it.

We know these verses as the Great Commission.

This is what commission means according to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary

1. An authorization or command to act in a prescribed manner or to perform prescribed acts.

2. Authority to act for, in behalf of, or in place of another.

Because we go in the name of Jesus, we have been given power and authority to carry out the command to preach the Gospel, the Good news that Jesus died for our sins, and rose from the dead. When we believe He gives us relationship with the Father. We have been promised that instead of judgment, we will have eternal life with Him. That’s forever and ever.

Habakkuk’s vision is for a future time...

This is two-fold. God was talking about the Babylonian empire that was about to conquer Judah and also a future day.

Babylon

Babylon fell to the Medes and the Persians in 539 BC. This was about 65 years after this was spoken. For us, we would think that a promise isn’t coming true if it takes 65 years to come to true.

Since God is from everlasting to everlasting, time isn’t the same to Him.

2 Peter 3:8 NIV

But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.

God created our 24 hour day. He is not bound to it or limited by it. He promised that the Babylonians would be destroyed.

Future Babylon

Revelation 18:1–2 (NLT)

After all this I saw another angel come down from heaven with great authority, and the earth grew bright with his splendor.

He gave a mighty shout: “Babylon is fallen—that great city is fallen! ...

This takes place during the Great Tribulation. This is the seven years period that takes place just before the Millennium, which is the 1000 year reign of Christ.

This is what Jesus said about these days,

Matthew 24:21–22 NLT

For there will be greater anguish than at any time since the world began. And it will never be so great again. In fact, unless that time of calamity is shortened, not a single person will survive. But it will be shortened for the sake of God’s chosen ones.

What does Babylon represent?

Babylon the Great represents the evil world system of the Antichrist. When you hear of a one world government. One world ruler, even groups like the World economic forum. This should cause our ears to perk up. This should cause alarm. Let’s not be deceived. The day is closer than when we first believed.

Many may think that it’s impossible. When our economic system collapses, when people get so tired of the turmoil in our world, many will long for peace, they will want an end to all of the conflict. Then they will gladly receive a mark which brings security.

Babylon the great will fall...

We know the end of the story. Jesus will come again. He will rule as King of kings and Lord of lords.

Where does this leave us as we wait His coming?

Habakkuk 2:4 NLT

“Look at the proud! They trust in themselves, and their lives are crooked. But the righteous will live by their faithfulness to God.

Here’s how the New King James puts it,

Habakkuk 2:4 NKJV

“Behold the proud, His soul is not upright in him; But the just shall live by his faith.

Faith and faithfulness cannot and must not be separated.

James 2:14–17 NLT

What good is it, dear brothers and sisters, if you say you have faith but don’t show it by your actions? Can that kind of faith save anyone? Suppose you see a brother or sister who has no food or clothing, and you say, “Good-bye and have a good day; stay warm and eat well”—but then you don’t give that person any food or clothing. What good does that do? So you see, faith by itself isn’t enough. Unless it produces good deeds, it is dead and useless.

I want to make it clear, we are saved by faith. Works don’t save us from God’s anger, otherwise, we could earn it.

Without faith… it is impossible to please God.

Without faithfulness our faith is dead. It doesn’t exist.

Ephesians 2:10 NCV

God has made us what we are. In Christ Jesus, God made us to do good works, which God planned in advance for us to live our lives doing.

This morning, I’d like to spend a few minutes talking about

Mission

Vision is what want to become in the future. It’s our preferred future. This might be where we see ourselves in a year. It could be where we see ourselves in three years or even ten years.

But we can’t fulfill our vision unless we are about the mission of God.

2 Corinthians 5:17–21 NLT

This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun! And all of this is a gift from God, who brought us back to himself through Christ. And God has given us this task of reconciling people to him. For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, no longer counting people’s sins against them. And he gave us this wonderful message of reconciliation. So we are Christ’s ambassadors; God is making his appeal through us. We speak for Christ when we plead, “Come back to God!” For God made Christ, who never sinned, to be the offering for our sin, so that we could be made right with God through Christ.

Here’s our vision statement:

We desire to see LifePoint, The Town of Lanigan and the surrounding communities:

believing, growing and maturing in Christ so that people may be commissioned in the Holy Spirit

to reveal and celebrate the truth of Jesus Christ to the world.

To accomplish the vision, we must be about the Mission of God.

I’m not saying this to be rude or obnoxious.

Here’s the definition of insanity, “Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.”

My uncle used to say, “If you keep banging your head against the wall, one side is eventually going to get flat.”

God has a mission for us. That is bringing people to Jesus. Reconciling people to God, discipling them and seeing them come to maturity.

How do we do this? We don’t want to be the best kept secret in Lanigan, LeRoy and the surrounding communities.

Sometimes change is required. If we want to reach a certain type of people, what do we need to do to make that happen.

We might need to do things that we don’t prefer. If our focus is young families, what do we need to do to reach young families?

If our focus is broken people, how do we reach out to broken people?

We know that our ministry volunteers are only so deep and can only do so much, so we need to have focus to the vision God has given us.

Let’s ask ourselves a couple of questions?

What would it take for me to ask someone to come to church?

That could mean one of our ministries or Sunday service.

Why don’t I ask people to come to church?

This is not meant to be in any way demeaning, but sometimes we need to ask ourselves the hard questions.

If I don’t ask, who will?

To close,

This week we had a Bishop of the church in Zimbabwe share a devotional.

He used the illustration from John 4.

Jesus came to Jacob’s well and then sent His disciples to go and get food in the city of Sychar.

While they were gone a woman from the city came to draw water. He asked her for some and then offered her eternal life.

When the disciples came back, they were surprised that He would talk to a woman. When they offered Him food this is what He said.

John 4:34 NIV

“My food,” said Jesus, “is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work.

What’s our food?

The disciples were looking for bread when there was a whole community of souls waiting to be fed.

This Samaritan woman brought out many to meet Jesus.

Here’s what John wrote,

John 4:39–41 NLT

Many Samaritans from the village believed in Jesus because the woman had said, “He told me everything I ever did!” When they came out to see him, they begged him to stay in their village. So he stayed for two days, long enough for many more to hear his message and believe.

My challenge today is, will you go? Will I go and be about the mission of God?

If we want pastors, we need to speak calling into peoples lives. If we want to see people saved, we need to pray and go. If we want to see people healed, we need to pray for healing.

I believe that as we preach, as we live God’s word, He will confirm His word with signs that follow.

Let’s pray!

This morning, I want to open the altars up so that we can pray.

Pray that the Lord of the harvest would send out workers.

Let’s pray that the Holy Spirit would draw people.

Let’s believe that God will do the impossible.

Ephesians 3:20–21 NIV

Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.