Because God is True...

Hey Everyone! Thanks for joining us for our last episode in our Shelter in Peace Series as we look at our last attribute of God, that God is true.

In this series, we have looked at attributes or parts of the character of God so that we might know Him better especially in hard times where we find refuge in Him. In our first week we looked at God’s sovereignty, then His wisdom, and last week His goodness.

So let’s jump in today and take a look at God’s truthfulness, or how God is true.

If you have Bibles I would turn them over to Psalm 12.

Let’s take a look at the first 4 verses where we see our first point.

1) Lies and the Heart of Mankind (v. 1-4)

Psalm 12:1-4

Psalm 12:1–4 CSB

Help, Lord, for no faithful one remains; the loyal have disappeared from the human race. They lie to one another; they speak with flattering lips and deceptive hearts. May the Lord cut off all flattering lips and the tongue that speaks boastfully. They say, “Through our tongues we have power; our lips are our own—who can be our master?”

So we see here the Psalmist is in a place that I think most of us have all been. A place where we feel there is no one who is loyal, no one who has our backs, no one who is faithful or truthful.

This is unfortunately the world that we all live in....a place where people lie to one another, use flattery and deceit to get their way and their leg up in this world. Notice how the Psalmist rightly notices that it doesn’t stop with lies…but that it moves from lies to deceit to wielding the power of speech to gain power.

This is the product of all of us. No matter who you are we have all been this person.

We have all at some point or another, even if we were at one point a victim, we have also been the one using the power of speech to get our leg up, to get ourselves a more advantageous position.

This is the case with all of us because we speak “from an overflow of the heart” - Luke 6:45

2) The Consequences That Follow (v. 5a)

Psalm 12:5

Psalm 12:5 CSB

“Because of the devastation of the needy and the groaning of the poor, I will now rise up,” says the Lord. “I will provide safety for the one who longs for it.”

In this second point we see the natural consequence of the first

Lies, flattery, and deception for the sake of getting your leg up in the world or for the sake of power or “self-mastery” - those things do not exist in a vacuum and they will have consequences

The LORD here, speaking through the Psalmist, says that He will rise up “because of the devastation of the needy and the groaning of the poor”

It should not be a surprise and yet, it often is....that focusing on one’s self for the sake of self-exaltation will always lead to people around you being broken

Staring at yourself for your own sake will never you live a life for the sake of others.

And yet in hard seasons, we find ourselves also in the place of the Psalmist, where it seems everyone is deceptive and for only themselves leaving us to cry out to the LORD for help

Which leads us into our third and final point....

3) Truth and the Heart of God (v.5b-6)

Psalm 12:5-6

Psalm 12:5–6 CSB

“Because of the devastation of the needy and the groaning of the poor, I will now rise up,” says the Lord. “I will provide safety for the one who longs for it.” The words of the Lord are pure words, like silver refined in an earthen furnace, purified seven times.

It is here that we see an instant contrast to our first point and verses. First we say the lies of us and our hearts and here we have this divine contrast where we see the point that this video is built around.....That God’s words are true

Now I want to throw a few other verses on the screen just to supplement these…because it isn’t just that God’s words are true…

But God’s Words are true because He is true.

John 14:6 CSB

Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

John 17:17 CSB

Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth.

And just like we noticed how our lies and our hearts lead to devastation in others, we see the opposite in God.

We see that God Himself is true, and that He rises up and provides safety, provides a refuge for those who long for it.

What a perfect passage to end this series on.

We began with our theme verse, Psalm 142:4-5

Psalm 142:4–5 CSB

Look to the right and see: no one stands up for me; there is no refuge for me; no one cares about me. I cry to you, Lord; I say, “You are my shelter, my portion in the land of the living.”

This is the verse that drove me to create this series. Seeing that God is our Shelter, but in order to truly take Shelter in God we have to know Him, know what He is like and the things that He is about.

And as a result, we began walking through a small series on the character of God and now, ending on God as being true....we see that God’s words are pure and true words in the midst of a world of lies and deceit.

We see God rising up to provide safety and shelter for those broken by those who rise up for their own sakes and for their own power.

In this series we look at the fact that God is in Control, that God knows what He is doing, that God is good in what He does. And finally we see that God speaks truth because He is truth.