God Is... Trustworthy

God Is… Trustworthy

Living without Worry.

Good morning and welcome to worship. It was so good to see the kiddoes’ come in and to have a chance to pray over the children and you teachers, staff, and administrators today. It is hard to believe that school starts this week! If there is one constant in life – besides change and of course GOD! It is that time marches on. Regardless of what is going on in our lives, in the world around us, in our church whether it’s planning for Church Conferences like ours on the 22nd or whatever… regardless of all that is happening, life continues… time marches on.

And, in thinking about all that, let me ask you something?

What keeps you awake at night? I had someone come in to talk to me this week and they told me how upset something had made them… and they laid in bed all night worrying about it.

I have to admit, I have had numerous nights over the past 6 months where I laid in bed awake, worrying about the decisions before us.

I’ve laid in bed before, worried about my kids.

I’ve laid in bed before, worried about my parents.

And if I may be so bold as to guess about you… I bet you have had some sleepless nights worrying about something.

So, what is it that keeps you up at night? What is your biggest worry?

Maybe it’s the News – War – Political Unrest – the Economy – an Illness – A sick child or Grandchild – an aging parent – debt – will I lose my job – will I find a new job… and the list can go on and on… Maybe some of you are sitting there thinking, “Well, thanks Pastor Jay, I didn’t have any worries before today, now I do.” Right.

You know, somehow, worry seems of finding us doesn’t it.

Here’s the thing. All those things that I lay in bed worrying about when I should be sleeping… all those things that occupy your mind and distract you from what you need to be doing…

What we worry about the most often reveals where we trust God the least.

That’s why I want us to take some time to talk about how we can live without worry.

Turn with me in Matthew’s Gospel to chapter 6. These are a part of Jesus’ words in the Sermon on the Mount.

Matthew 6:25-27, 33-34

“That is why I tell you not to worry about everyday life—whether you have enough food and drink, or enough clothes to wear. Isn’t life more than food, and your body more than clothing? Look at the birds. They don’t plant or harvest or store food in barns, for your heavenly Father feeds them. And aren’t you far more valuable to him than they are? Can all your worries add a single moment to your life?

Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need.

“So don’t worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today’s trouble is enough for today.

Prayer

Corrie Ten Boom once said, “Worrying doesn’t empty tomorrow of its sorrow; it empties today of its strength.”

I think we all know how true that statement is don’t we. Worry doesn’t do anything to fix the problem, it just robs us of the strength, the power, the will to do anything about what we are worried about.

To live without worry sounds so good… it sounds like what we want doesn’t it?

But to get there, we have to answer one of the most foundational questions of all humanity. It is a question that goes back to the earliest story of our faith, all the way back in Genesis. God created all that was and is and placed Adam in the garden with one rule… “Eat whatever you want, eat of any tree you want, except the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.” Then Adam names the animals and nothing is pleasing to him, so God creates Eve and together they are the first of humanity. The creation is complete. With Adam and Eve – with Man and Woman – we have the ability to create life – to multiply and fill the earth. We are in the image of God!

But, apparently, Eve didn’t learn about the Tree directly from God, Adam told her about it. And then what happens? She's in the garden one day, and a serpent begins to talk to Eve. And here's what the serpent says. The serpent says, "Did God really say? Did God really say you couldn't eat from any tree?" So yeah, the serpent twisted the truth, but what the serpent did is the serpent introduced a question to Eve. Did God really say? Can you trust God? Is God really trustworthy?

A few verses later Eve's in the garden, and it says that, "She looked at the tree and she saw that it was good to eat, that it was pleasing to the eye and it was desirable for gaining wisdom." And she had a choice to make, just like we have a choice to make when we make one of our 35,000 decisions a day,

Am I gonna trust God or am I gonna trust what I can see?

Am I gonna trust God, am I gonna trust what I can touch?

Am I gonna trust God or am I gonna trust what I desire?

Am I gonna trust God or am I gonna trust what I can control?

Every single one of us has to answer that question, is God trustworthy?

So, Is God trustworthy?

Scripture tells us that God is trustworthy.

Psalm 62:7-8

My victory and honor come from God alone.

He is my refuge, a rock where no enemy can reach me.

O my people, trust in him at all times.

Pour out your heart to him,

for God is our refuge.

The psalmist understands the truth, and the truth that the psalmist understands is this, that God is trustworthy, God is trustworthy. It's not what He does, it's who He is. God deserving of our confidence.

Now, how do we know that God is trustworthy?

I don’t usually have 3 distinguishable points in my messages, but Today we're gonna talk about three reasons why we can know that God is trustworthy. It isn’t every reason, we don't have time to hit every reason, but at least here are three reasons,

how do we know that God is trustworthy?

1) God has been faithful before

I just had the opportunity to visit Egypt… to walk around Cairo, to eat breakfast looking at the Pyramids of Giza. To walk around the Sphinx. To see the tombs of Pharaohs. I walked where Moses and others may have walked. And in Exodus 13:3 what does Moses say to the people?

Exodus 13:3

So Moses said to the people, “This is a day to remember forever—the day you left Egypt, the place of your slavery. Today the Lord has brought you out by the power of his mighty hand.

God heard the cry of His people and led them out of slavery into a new land. After all the Pharoah had done to them, after all the plagues, crossing the Red Sea, stopping the Egyptian Army - the most powerful army of their time that belonged to the most advanced civilization of their time. During all that, God led them by fire and smoke through the wilderness.

As you read through the story and as things happen the people do something unique. When they crossed the Jordan River, what did they do… they stopped and piled up stones, they built a monument to remind them if they ever passed that way again, that God was faithful, that God could be trusted. Later in the story, when Jacob wrestled with God what did he do? He built a monument. They wanted to be reminded that if God was trustworthy before, God will be trustworthy again! I’ll say it another way, “If God has done it before, God can do it again.”

What is your monument? What do you hold on to that reminds you of God’s faithfulness, of God’s trustworthiness?

Is it a necklace that reminds you of a particular time that you saw God move?

Is it a Bible that you have had for decades that was with you when God changed your life?

Maybe it’s a letter you receive, or a card, or a memory.

What is your monument, that when you look at it you are reminded that God was trustworthy before?

Not only was God faithful in the past… not only was God once trustworthy, but I want you to remember that

2) God is faithful today. You can trust God today.

Last week I talked about the fact that Emmanuel is not a word for December and Christmas. It is a word for every month, every week, and every day of our life. God is with us now and forevermore.

Jesus told us so! Just look to the Great Commission…

Matthew 28:20

Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age.

God is with us today. God is trustworthy today. But you say, What about the war in Ukraine? What about all this angst about the Methodist Church? What about the fires… and the drought… and the tropical waves developing and heading our way… what about the illness of my daughter… the injury of my son… the cancer of my parents…

God never promised life would be easy and any preacher that tells you otherwise is trying to get something from you. Jesus never promised there would be no pain, But Jesus did promised he would be with us through the pain.

God is trustworthy today, not because of the absence of problems, but because of the presence of God in spite of those problems.

Jesus is not how we avoid the trials of life… Jesus is our way through the trials in life.

Let me try to explain it a different way.

How many of you have ever had a child afraid of the dark, afraid to go to bed because it’s dark?

What do we do when that happens? As a parent, often we will tuck them in tight, and then crawl on the bed and lay there with them until they fall asleep. Here’s the thing. We didn’t get rid of the dark, the darkness was still there. It was our presence that brought them peace. It was that we were with them that calmed their fears. It was the fact that they felt our love that they were able to go to sleep.

God does the same with us! God is trustworthy today… God has been trustworthy in the past and God is trustworthy today. God is faithful and trustworthy!

3) And finally, God will be faithful tomorrow.

How do we know? Because God already wrote the ending! Amen!

Turn with me to Revelations 21. I mentioned it last week… Remember – so many of us think our story and the story of God ends with the judgement and the Lake of Fire… but that isn’t the end of God’s story and it isn’t the end of our story.

These aren’t just comforting words to read at a funeral, this is the promise of God.

Revelation 21:3-5

I heard a loud shout from the throne, saying, “Look, God’s home is now among his people! He will live with them, and they will be his people. God himself will be with them. He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain. All these things are gone forever.”

And the one sitting on the throne said, “Look, I am making everything new!” And then he said to me, “Write this down, for what I tell you is trustworthy and true.”

Our God is trustworthy and true. Our God is making all things new.

If you hear nothing else today, hear and remember these four words… God is with us.

That is how we live without worry, because God is trustworthy, because God is making all things new… because God is with us.

God is with us through this process about the earthly issues of denominational politics.

God is with us through the division in our country.

God is with us through the wars that rage in the world around us.

God is with us as we look for new ways to be in mission and ministry in the community

God is with us as we plan to go to Jamaica to minister to the deaf community there

God is with us as we plan to go to Mexico to work with Shaefer in his mission at Potrero Chico

God is with us as we pray over students and teachers and staff and administrators.

God is with us as we work at Good Samaritan

God is with us as we feed the hungry and clothe the naked and visit the lonely.

We know that God is trustworthy, not because of the absence of problems but because of the presence of God.

That is the good news today. That is the message you need to walk out of here with and enter a new school year with… We know God is faithful because God is with us.

That is how we live our life with out fear… because we know God is faithful and God is with us.