God With Us

Fear fades when we believe we’re not alone. Across Scripture, God’s promise—“I am with you”—brings courage in every season. He doesn’t wait for perfection; His presence is the strength we need to keep moving forward.

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Transcript

Why “I Am With You” Matters

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All right, now let's look into the word of the Lord today. They say that in the Bible, I don't really know how to count also or what to even consider as a promise. We're gonna talk about a specific promise of God. They say in the word of the Lord, there are 7,487 promises that God gave. That is, let's say, almost 7,500 promises from the Lord. And at least 365 of those promises are the times when God said, Do not be afraid or fear not. But most of the time, whenever God said fear not or do not be afraid, it is a continuation. It is just the first part of it. The continuation of it is do not be afraid, for I am with you. I have never left you nor forsaken you. Because I am with you, do not get scared. Do not be afraid. But these are the times when Jesus said, normally Christians interpret it as in an year we have 365 days. So 365 days, God is telling, don't get scared because I am with, I am with you. And out of the 7,500 promises that we have in the Bible, at least my favorite promises among them are the times when God said, I am with you. There are many times God said, I will bless you, I will multiply you. Some of us like those verses. I mean, but like you know, I like the promises where God said, I am with, I am with you. Let me give you this illustration. I mean, in a Sunday school, there was a small girl, and this small girl is very introvert, she's not extrovert in the sense some of us we love to talk. We meet strangers, we meet people for the first time, and we can talk with them for hours together. Not all of us, right? I have I am an introvert rather, but then through the years I have learned how to manage, manage my introvert nature. But like, you know, back in the day in my Sunday school and all, I mean, I hardly used to talk to people. But that's me. Some of us are like that, some of our children are also like like that. God made us that way. We are more thinkers than talkers. So this small girl also was very introvert. And the school, uh, the Sunday school teacher said, next week, everybody memorize Psalm 23 and come. And there's going to be a test. And the week passed, these girls got scared. Number one, because she will have to stand and recite Psalm 23, mean from her memory before every one of us. That's a scary thing, right? Standing in front of everybody and telling, you know, whatever we have to, whatever we have to say. But this girl, because she loved God and all, she memorized, she spent the whole night memorizing. You know, some of us have this habit. Like, you know, we can memorize, not that we don't put in the hard work and all, but suddenly when we stand on the stage, everything goes boom. Right? Everything goes blank. Somebody stood in front of the class or in front of your assembly, and you know what happened, right? Suddenly the principal called or the teacher said, I mean, explain this and everything. It's not that you didn't study, but just that, you know, that nervousness just takes over. So one after the other, every child in that Sunday school started reciting that Psalm 23. Some more eloquently than others, some more louder than the other, some were melodious than the other. But when it came to that charm, the time of this little girl, when it came to her turn, she stood up in the crowd in front of the crowd, she looked at the faces, everybody was focusing on her, and she just started off. The Lord is my shepherd, and she froze. She was not able to say anything. Not that she didn't memorize, not that she doesn't know, but sometimes the looks of the people scare you a little bit, right? Sometimes I also get scared looking at you. Yes, she got scared, and for a minute or so she struggled, struggled and all, and then she said, That is all I know, and she ran off the stage. But then, in a manner of saying, what she said is so true. The Lord is my shepherd, that is all I know. Sometimes the only thing that we need to know is that God is in control of our life. All that details, sometimes I also feel, you know, I mean, that all that theology, all that, you know, I mean, knowing the nitty-gritties, the trivia, and all sometimes it just doesn't matter because all I need to know is that God is with me. For me, my favorite promises are the times where God said, I am with you. That's enough for me. That's enough for me.

Psalm 23 And Stage Fright

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I don't need to see a solution, I don't need to see a supernatural thing, I don't need to see a breakthrough. All I need is one word from the Lord telling, I am with, I am with you. You know, in a way, the Bible talks about the presence of God, and if you dig a little bit into the Bible, you will find out the Bible says that God is present everywhere. You know, the theological term that we use is omnipresence, meaning he is present everywhere. You go to any nook and corner of the world, God is there. You go to the moon. Recently, they went to the dark side of the moon, you get go to the North Pole, South Pole, you go to Mars, you go to any place, any place where there's any sort of existence, God is there. Because by nature, he is an omnipresent God. And a good understanding of omnipresence says that he is present everywhere in his full power, meaning there is no place anywhere where God's presence is diluted, in the sense God is less in that corner, more in that corner. There's nothing like that. He is fully present, full throttle, full power everywhere. That's how the Bible talks about the presence of God. But there are also instances in the word of the Lord where it says that I mean the technical term, you will not find the term in the Bible itself, but the rabbis would coin a term called as the Shekinah glory of God. What is the Shakaina glory of God? The word Shekinah literally means the manifest glory of God, or sometimes we call it the manifest presence of the presence of the Lord. The Bible talks about instances where it happened, and there are multiple numbers of them, you know, like when the Israelites came out of the land of Egypt, the glory of the Lord was leading them in form of a fire or in form of the cloud. Or when they built the tabernacle, the glory of the Lord came over the tabernacle, or when Solomon built the temple, and when Solomon dedicated the temple, the glory of the Lord came upon that temple. And it says that people were not able to stand in the presence of the Lord because that's how heavy the glory of the Lord was there. Or we can use words

Omnipresence And Shekinah Glory

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like it is the localized presence of God, where the presence of God is heavy. They say it happens when people together worship the Lord, you can feel the presence of God in a worship service, or in a prayer meeting, when everybody is praying in one accord, you can feel the presence of the presence of God, or when his word is preached, you can feel the presence of presence of God, or in some cases, when Christians, like-minded Christians gather together and just have a conversation, the presence of God is made manifest. Either way, it is the presence of the Lord that makes the difference. And you will find instance after instance from the book of Genesis through the book of Revelation where the presence of God made the difference. Today we will just look at a few of them, and that way I picked them from only from the old testament. Sometime else we will look at the at the New Testament. New testament is even more powerful than the old covenant because in the old covenant God gave a glimpse of his presence. In the New Testament, he literally walked amongst us. He literally walked among, walked amongst us, and in this covenant, in this covenant, in our times, he lives amongst us. The Holy Spirit is upon us and among us. That's even more powerful. We'll look at them a little later, but today we will look at the Old Testament. We'll look at, let's say, four or four instances, and then we will respond to respond to

Jacob’s Escape And God’s Promise

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this message. Let's turn our Bibles to Genesis chapter 28, verse 15 onwards. Now let me give you the context to this. God gave a promise to Abraham, and Abraham died even before he saw the fulfillment of the promise. But that promise was renewed to Isaac, and Isaac spoke that same promise as if it's an inheritance over to Jacob. Now the thing happened in a little weird way, if I can use that word, in the sense Isaac had two sons, Jacob and Esau. Now, Jacob, the word Jacob means a supplanter or his conman. To be very frank, you know, that's the better word, conman. He deceived his own brother and he went in the guise of his brother and he stole the birthright that belonged to Esau. But nevertheless, even after Jacob did something like this, the birthright went to him because Isaac blessed him with the same blessing he has received from Abraham. So the blessing is continuing from Abraham to Isaac and from Isaac to Jacob. You know, mean mean after that, every time after that, God is called as the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. And even the promise. God said, The promise I gave to Abraham, to Isaac, and to and to Jacob. Now, what is the complication with this? Isav is angry, he wants to kill Jacob. And the mother says, Run away. Run away to my brother Laban and get married to his daughter. Because one of the conditions was he should marry only from their family. So he runs. There is no guarantee how Laban will treat him because he himself is a crooked man. Read the Bible, you'll know about it. And there is no point going back because Isa is ready with a sword. So Jacob is scared. Jacob is confused. Jacob already made a mistake. You know, whenever you do something wrong, you kind of feel that God is gone far away from you. Whenever we do some sin, commitment, some sin, we feel that punishment will automatically come to us. That's what we feel. Jacob ran and ran. He got exhausted, he just slept on the ground. He was just looking at the stars, and through that, God intervenes. Suddenly he has a vision. And in the vision, he says, the heavens are open, there are stairways that come down from heaven, angels are coming, coming down, and they are going up. And through that vision, God speaks to him. And this is what the Lord speaks. Genesis chapter 28, verse 15. God says, I am with you, and I will watch over you wherever you go. I will bring you back to this land. Remember, Jacob is running away. He's scared of Esau. He has no direction. He is confused. He did something wrong. He unjustly stole the birthright of his brother. But even then, the Lord is telling, I am with you, I will watch over you wherever you go. I will bring you back to this land. And look at the second part of it. This is very important. It says, I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you. What did God promise Jacob? Telling that this land will be yours. And the Lord says, I will not leave you until I have promised what I have, what I have promised, until I have done what I have promised you. Just because of this, Jacob was able to face all the difficulties that he faced in his life. Nothing really good happens after that. He goes through struggle after struggle, years of struggle. But what kept him going was this promise telling God is with you till he achieves the promise that he has spoken over? Spoken over you. That's why I love the promises of God. Because when God promises something, he will not leave us in between. He will be with us, he will work in and through our life till whatever he has promised comes to fulfillment in our fulfillment in our life. Now, when we look at this, is Jacob a great guy? Is there anything that I can learn from him? Absolutely nothing. He stole from his brother. I cannot teach our children to do like that. There's nothing good about him. No, I mean these guys are sometimes called as the heroes of faith. But look at the Bible very carefully. Whether it is Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, or any other person, read their stories. The main character may be them. Or the story might be talking about them. But one thing we really need to understand is they are not the heroes, or they're not the heroines of the story. The hero of any story in the Bible is God. Jacob is a deceiver. Whatever Jacob became in his life is because of because of God. Joseph also was not really great. But whatever happened to Joseph just because of God, as if Abraham was a great person, you know what he did? He wasn't great. The story of our Abraham is the story of the faithfulness of God, story of the provisions, of the promise-keeping nature of nature of God. In any story of the Bible, the hero is God. All the others are the recipients of the grace of God, of the mercies and the goodness of goodness of God. Jacob is a deceiver. But the Lord nevertheless spoke a promise on them. Is it fair? I don't know. But God speaks promises over our lives too, right? And is there anybody perfect among us? You lift your hand, I'll pray for you. If you say that you are perfect, you know that you are the number one imperfect person here if you lift your hand. None of us are perfect. But even then, God calls us our child, right? His child, right? Even then God says, I will lead you. Some of us stagger, you know, I mean we shiver and shake in our faith walk. We doubt God every now and then, and so close we are to temptation. Often we fall into temptation, even though our hearts are loving the Lord, but our walk falters. But even then, God speaks promises over our lives, right? Same thing with Jacob. Jacob ain't a perfect person, but God still spoke a promise over his life, just like how we're speaking over our life. You know, one thing I really like God is he uses us in spite of our shortcomings, in spite of the weaknesses that we are. Sometimes, you know, I mean, I just give glory to God because you know I wonder, God, why do you use a person like me? I'm struggling in my life. But then I'm grateful to God because he picks people, broken people like us, so that his name would be, his name would be glorified. Out of Jacob, his name is changed to Israel. Out of him comes the powerful nation of nation of Israel, powerful, and the promise of God is so strong, so strong, there can be millions of people, a dozen nations around Israel, who are hostile to Israel. They're doing everything they can to destroy Israel, nothing they're able to do. Even now, open the newspaper, open the TV channels and see. They're able to do nothing to Israel, but a small nation stands still as a very strong country in spite of all the hostilities around them. I don't think it is because of their strength, because far more greater nations became nothing. Israel survives because of the presence of God. Israel survives because of the promise of God. We continue to flourish because of the promises of God. Amen. Look at our lives, you know, the roads, the way they are, and the heat that is uh that's falling on us every day. We would have been dead and gone, one heat stroke, and like but then God is still keeping us, still keeping us safe. All glory to all glory to God. To Jacob, the Lord says, Jacob, I know you're not a perfect person, you did something wrong in your life, but nevertheless, he's a God of grace and a God of mercy. He looked at Jacob and he said, I am with you. I am with you. I will never leave you till I have accomplished whatever I have spoken of, spoken over your life. So if God gave you a promise, he is working it out in your life. Just be faithful to the Lord and you will see that fruit

Moses’ Dry Season And Calling

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in your life. The second one, you'll find it in Exodus chapter 3, verse 12. This is again a very powerful one. They say Moses, for 40 long years, he was the prince of Egypt. He studied in the best universities of Egypt. He was eloquent in the way he speaks. Read Hebrews, it talks about it. He was eloquent in the way he spoke, he was a great engineer, and then secular history tells that he even conquered Cush, or let's say Ethiopia, when he was the prince. He was a mighty warrior, he was good-looking, he was eloquent, everything properly arranged for him. He lived in luxury, meaning he studied in luxury and he knows how to manage a kingdom. But then after he runs away from Egypt, goes and lives in the Vidian in the wilderness of Midian, for 40 long years, something goes on. It is a process of breaking down that goes on in the life of Moses. Because after 40 years in Midian, this same Moses who enjoyed the luxuries in Egypt is now taking care of sheep and shepherds somewhere around Mount Sinai. And not just that, the Bible says that he starts to stammer. In the sense, his eloquence is gone. He's no longer able to speak that fluently. He's stammering. And you will also read, you know, that way he speaks with God, you will get an idea that his self-confidence also has come down. He is very low on his self-confidence. Why? Because when God says, Go and talk to Pharaoh, Moses was telling God, not me, send Aaron, send that person or send this person. He was coming excuse after excuse. He was making excuses. Why? Because there is something in him that is really broken, something in him that brought in a feeling of inadequacy in his life. Forty years of living in the wilderness of Midian, it tore him down. Believe me, if you are going through a dry season in life, sometimes you know we feel that you know we are spiritually high, very close in the presence of the Lord, enjoying the goodness of the Lord. But not all times, right? We go through a season of dryness, right? Where even though you are praying, you don't feel the presence of God. Anybody? I think it's only me who go through that. If you're laughing, means you are also going through that. Yeah. Yeah, we go through that. We go through seasons where we feel God is far from us, even though we read the Bible, even though we worship the Lord, something feels that not everything is okay. Not everything is okay. Moses was going through a period like that. At that time, he climbs up the mountain and he sees a bush that is on fire. Through that bush speaks the word of the Lord. And God says, Go and talk to Pharaoh. And God gives him an assurance like this. Let me read it for you, chapter 3, verse 12. And God said, I will be with you, and this will be the sign to you that it is I who have sent you. When you have bought The people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this on this mountain. Later on, God says, Go now, I'm sending you to Pharaoh to get my people Israelites out. The one confidence with which Moses went into the land of Egypt or into the courts of Pharaoh was this promise from the Lord, I will be with you. Man, 40 years he's a broken down man, stammering, covered, low self-confidence. But then he walks into Pharaoh's courts and he says, The God of Israel says, Let my people, let my people go. Pharaoh says, No. Then he says, You will see what our God will do. The only weapon, that too, if it is a weapon, was the stick that he carried. That too, Aaron carried for him. Plague after plague, ten plagues. One more severe than the other would fall upon the nation of Egypt. A mighty nation is brought to his knees. All begins with one word. I am with you. I am with you. A great deliverance, a mighty deliverance took place. Four hundred years of slavery. Four hundred years they were in bondage. And when the Lord said, I am with you, all that bondage comes to an end. All the arrogance of the Egyptians come to an end. Remember, all of their chariots, all of their horses, they just drown in the Red Sea. Exodus chapter 19. As the Lord has promised, they come to Mount Sinai and they worship the Lord. That is where the Lord gives them the commandments or the covenant is given to them. The Lord said, I will be with you. You will know that I am with you when you come back to this mountain and when you worship me. In Exodus 19, in that 19 chapters, they come there and they start worshipping their God. He's so true to his promises. Telling it is God who led them out of Egypt, God who delivered them from Egypt. All of them started with one promise. I am with you. Spoken to a person who ran away, spoken to a person who is living in the wilderness, spoken to a person who is very lowly motivated, spoken to a discouraged person. When the Lord speaks over our life, when the Lord accompanies us, we will do exploit for our God. We will do things beyond our ability. We will do things beyond our capacity.

Courage For The Next Generation

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The next one, Deuteronomy, chapter 31, verse 6. Now, these are one of the last speeches of Moses. 120 years, that's the age of Moses when he spoke these words. And uh Moses by this time figured out that you know he has bought them out of the land of Egypt. Forty long years he roamed around with them in the wilderness. And in the wilderness he wrote the law, he wrote the book of Genesis, etc., Selevaticus, Numbers, and finally he's sitting down to write Deuteronomy. And as a father figure, everybody in that camp are much younger than younger than Moses. And he writes down to them, expanding to them, encouraging them to listen to the voice of the Lord. Moses also figured out that he himself is not going to go into the promised land. Remember, he strikes a stone when God says, speak to the stone, and God gets angry and he says, You're not going to come into the promised land. At least in that instance, Moses never gets goes into the promised land. Centuries later, in the when if you uh remember the event of the transfiguration, that's when Moses enters the promise, promised land. Before that, he never entered the promised promised land. But then he comes to a point, he stands on the other side of River Jordan on a Mount Nebo. He sits down there, he writes, he has his own thoughts, and is talking to the Israelites, and this is what he says. He says, Be strong and courageous, do not be afraid or terrified because of everybody who's on the other side of Jordan. For the Lord your God goes with, goes with you. He will never leave you, nor will he forsake you. Well, the problem with this is for 40 long years the Israelites had their great leader Moses lead them. They went through battles, they have seen just the presence of Moses. Remember the time when they were losing a battle, Moses would just lift his two hands. And as long as Moses would lift his two hands, they were winning the battle. There were times when they didn't have like good water, it was bitter waters. Moses would do something, mean like miracle after miracle. But Moses knows he's not going into that land. But then Moses says, It's okay if I don't go, but one greater than me is going with you. God himself is going with you into the into the promised land. He will take care of you there. He will go before you. So Israel understood it. It is not really about Moses. They respect Moses a lot, but ultimately success just comes from the from the Lord. Ultimately, they if they're going to enter the land, inherit that land, it will be just because of just because of God. Let's come to the next book, the book of Joshua. Chapter 1, verse 5, and chapter 1, verse 9.

Joshua’s Fear And God’s Command

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Joshua also went through a crisis. In fact, many people would say that Joshua is a much greater leader than Moses because Moses only got them out of Egypt. Who got them into the land? Joshua. We call that the Joshua generation. The generation that came along with Moses, they died in the wilderness. Remember? They died in the wilderness. It is their children. The Joshua generation that went into the went into the promised land. And Joshua also was a very scared person. Not that he was not capable, but he was very scared. Why? Because Moses was born in a palace. Joshua was born in a slum in Goshen. Moses was a ruler, Moses was an administrator. Joshua was making bricks to build the cities for Pharaoh. Moses lived like the prince of Egypt. Joshua is a slave, an Israelite slave. That's his background. But nevertheless, God chose Joshua. The only thing with Joshua, you know, the Bible says that when both of them went into the tent to pray, Moses would pray and come back. But Joshua would still linger in the presence of the Lord, still spend time in the presence of the Lord. You know, there is a there is a difference. There is a difference. People who pray are different from people who do not pray. Check it out. Or else you only check it in your own life. Pray a little bit more and see if it makes uh makes any difference in your life. You are better off spending more time in prayer than watching Netflix. Okay, keep quiet. You're better off praying than doing anything, than doing anything else. So Joshua chapter 1, verse 5. No one will be able to stand against you all the days of your life. As I was with Moses, so I will be with you. I will never leave you nor forsake you. A slave born in slavery, making bricks, goes into the promised land, conquers out of all of it. What is his confidence? I am with you. I am with you. As I was with Moses, so I will be with you. But sometimes, even when the Lord speaks, we find it hard to believe. Joshua is just like one of us. So the Lord reminds us again. In chapter, in chapter 1, verse 9, he says, Have I not commanded you? Why are you forgetting, man? Have I not told you, be strong and courageous, do not be afraid, do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you wherever you go. You know, this one mistake I did multiple times in my life. I regret, I repented for it. In spite of God speaking his word on over my life, I did not believe his word. You know, I mean, let's say when I was when I was very young in my teenage years, when God said that you will be you will talk on my behalf, you will preach the word of the Lord, I never believed because I told you I'm an introvert. I never believed. But then the Lord had to continually remind and say, See, have I not spoken to you? Have I not gave you my promise? Time and again. And I'm sure God spoke to each and every one of us. And he gave you a dream much bigger than your ability. Normally I have seen God does that. You know, it is not humanly possible for Moses to do whatever he did, it's not humanly possible for Gideon to do whatever he did, not humanly possible for a low-time shepherd, David, to do whatever he did. Not possible with anybody in the in the Bible or any one of us. God often gives us a task which is beyond our ability to achieve. Why? Because when the task really happens, when you see the fulfillment of it, you know you didn't achieve, but it is God who made it achieve. Because it is because of God that you achieved it in your life. So I can stand here and say, if I'm preaching, it is absolutely not because of me. I know it is God, because I know deep down in my heart what I go through if I have to stand in front of people. Some of you know the struggle that you face in your life. But nevertheless, God uses us in spite of, in spite of us, the promise that God gave Joshua is you will conquer it, man, you will enter it, man. I will be with you. I will be with you. And what did Joshua achieve? Read the end of the book. They entered the land, forget anything, the distribute of the land, telling that tribe will take this, this tribe will take this. They are organizing themselves in the in the land. That's what the presence of God does. That's how the presence of God does. God doesn't care about our backgrounds, God doesn't care about our qualifications, He's a slave who's illiterate, but nevertheless, the greatest military leader that Israel ever saw. The next and the final one.

Isaiah’s Hope In Exile

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Isaiah chapter 41, verse 10. They say Isaiah can be divided into three books. Chapter 1 to chapter 40 is one section, and it is mostly warning, telling if you don't behave properly, Israel, I will send Assyria to capture you. So they were living in some fear. God is warning the nation of Israel. And chapter, let's say, chapter 41 to chapter 55 is as if they are in already in the Babylonian captivity. They are in chains because God has already punished them. Nebuchadnezzar came, conquered, took them into captivity, and they are in bondage. Chapter 56 to 66 is God giving them hope, telling, I will restore you back. But in the middle of gloom, chapter 41, that section, that section is supposedly the most gloomy section of the book of Isaiah. But somewhere in between that comes the promise of the presence of, comes the promise of the presence of the Lord. You know, the only other book that is parallel that goes along with this event or this context is the book of Ezekiel. Ezekiel says God is sending you to exile, but Ezekiel says, even God is coming with you into the exile. Meaning, even though I'm punishing you because of your idolatry, even there I'm not abandoning you. Even there I'm coming along with you because I'm not leaving you, I'm not forsaking you. It's like basically telling, like, you know, when me, I it's my bad habit. Whenever I do something wrong, I avoid the presence of God. Now I don't do it because, like, I'm a pastor, I work in a church, so I go to church every Sunday. But there were times I was just a member of a church. If I did something wrong, that Sunday I'm not there in the church. Now that doesn't mean anybody who doesn't come to church did something wrong. That doesn't mean like that. But then my experience, if I do something wrong, I will avoid the presence of God. Or even if I come to church, I'll sit in the last row. Again, nothing wrong with people sitting in the last row. But then I would sit in the last row, I'll I'll just come outside, greet people, and go off. That is my typical, typical behavior. I would avoid the presence of presence of God. But you know what God says, even when we do something wrong, God's presence doesn't leave us. He doesn't leave us. He pleads with us, telling, repent and come back. The Spirit of the Lord convicts us of the sins that we sins that we do. I like the presence of God because it doesn't leave us when we do something wrong. Let me tell you this. Um I don't really share this, but let me tell. I mean, when I was in uh let's say in my teenage years and all, this all the theater was a bad theater. It's a bad theater, actually. All mean all kinds of things, uh, movies used to run there. And some of our friends, you know, we had the habit of like bunking school or college and going to that theater. But just that, like, you know, we went to a church, and in the church, the pastor gave us a promise card. And one of my friends got this one promise telling, My presence will go with you wherever you go. So he went to that, went to that movie hall and he was like, No, no, no, no, I can't really go because how can I take my guard inside? From that time, he started avoiding all of those, all of those places. I think the presence of God is powerful, right? It makes us like you know avoid certain bad things in our in our life. Not to put anyone on on a guilt trip, but let me tell you one lesson that I learned how to behave well is because of a Sunday school song. When I was in my Sunday school, my teacher taught me, again, I'm recommending VBS. Why? Because my spiritual foundation happened in Sunday school, and I know the value of just attending a Sunday school. Okay, so my uh Sunday school teacher taught me this song, and this song really stuck with me. And the song goes something like this it says, Be careful, little eyes, what you? Anybody who knows this song? Be careful, little eyes, what you see. For the father of Baba is looking down in love. Be careful, little eyes, what you? Yeah, so I got scared. Why? Because I don't want to see anything bad, because who is watching what I'm watching? God. Be careful, little eye, yes, what you here. So I don't even want to listen to any of those bad things and all. Why? Because whatever I hear, God also hears that. Not on a guilt trip and all, but it's so true, right? God is always with us, God is always with us. That's why, that's why I get the confidence to live a to live a right life. Other, I mean, or sometimes I get scared to do something wrong because God is with me. I cannot dishonor his, dishonor his presence. Isaiah chapter 41. This is what the Lord says do not fear, for I am with you. Do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. Do not fear. When the Israelites were in the bondage of Babylon, God speaks life over them and he says, Don't get scared, man. Read a little more further. I'm reading from the message version, and it reads something like this verse 8 to 10. It says, But you, Israel, are my servant. Jacob, you're my first choice descendants, or my firstborn of my good friend Abraham. I pulled you out from all of the world, called you from every dark corner of the earth, telling you you're my servant, serving on my side. And then it says, I picked you, I haven't dropped you. Don't panic, I am with you. There is no need to fear, for I am your God, I'll give you strength, I will help you, I'll hold you steady, keep a firm grip on you. For us, it just might be a scripture. But to those people who are under the enemy, getting tortured day in, day out, for those people who are living in a foreign land, having no rights, no income, no human value, when the Lord says, You are the children of my servant, my best friend Abraham, I have chosen you, I will strengthen you, my grip on you is firm, I will never let go of you. Every word is powerful, every word is a blessing to them, every word is an assurance that they can go through a bad time, but God never abandons. These are just the few Old Testament promises that we have seen.

Jesus Emmanuel And Final Encouragement

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But you dig more further into the word of the Lord, remember the time, the very last verse of the Gospel of Matthew. Jesus says, Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the age. Remember the times when Jesus said, I will never leave you, never will I forsake you. Or look at how Matthew introduces Jesus, and his name will be called Emmanuel. That means God with us. He is with us, never left us, never really forsaken, forsaken us. That's who our God is. For some of us, we just need to recognize that God is with us, God is leading us. For those of us who are facing struggles in our life, who are going through a crisis in our life, may the Spirit of the Lord minister to you today. Because God is telling, I have never left you. That day when you cried, God, I'm so lonely, God was right there next to you. That day when you felt that nobody understands you, nobody cares for you. Jesus said, I know every tear that is dropping out of your eye. I feel your pain, I know your sorrow, I know your brokenness. And he says, I am with you, I am with you. Never I have abandoned you, never has my grip loosened over your life. I am with you. You think you go through a nightmare, but even there, I am with you. You will go through your crisis because the presence of the Lord will lift you. You will face those giants in your life because God Almighty will be your strength. We will get over to the other side. This season of dryness will come to an end. This season of trouble and pain and problems will come to an end. There will be a change in season. Good times will be back. Not many days we will linger around in the wilderness, not many days we will stay in the darkest valleys, we will walk, we will walk, and we will climb up the mountain. The Lord will lead, the Lord will guide, because He is with us, we will make it through in this life. Because God watches over us, everything will go well in our life. Bless you, Jesus. Bless you, Jesus.