Isaiah 46:5 - To whom will you liken me and make me equal, and compare me, that we may be alike?
- God is Incomparably Awesome... (Is 40:9-26)
- Awesome in Compassion . (Is 40:9-11)
- Awesome in Wisdom. (Is 40:12-17)
- Awesome over Idols. (Is 40:18-20)
- Awesome over Rulers. (Is 40:21-26)
- ...so He can take Care of me. (Is 40:27-31)
He is:
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
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Open up your Bibles with me please to Isaiah chapter 40.
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Isaiah chapter 40.
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Did you notice - I don't know when this started - did you notice how hyperbolic, how exaggerated we've gotten in our language?
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Have you noticed that?
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I was thinking about this week, and the more I thought about it, I realized, you know, the way we speak now, we don't start our communication at one.
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Our communication starts at a ten every time.
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You know what I'm talking about?
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Let me give you some examples.
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I was watching the hockey game yesterday.
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Carl Hagelin from the Penguins took a really nasty hit, and Erin didn't see it, and I was telling her about it.
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And I saw Hagelin got annihilated.
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And I thought about that.
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He didn't literally get annihilated.
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It wasn't like he got checked and then he turned into dust.
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Like vanished from existence.
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Why didn't I just say he took a really hard hit?
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It's almost like she wouldn't believe me.
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Like yeah, Hagelin got hit, he got hit really hard.
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Like oh, okay.
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What's the big deal there?
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Why do we ratchet it up as high as it goes immediately?
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I'm more guilty of this than anyone.
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If somebody tells me a story and I'm relating it to somebody else and I wish to communicate the humor that I found in the story, I don't say, "Paul was telling me this story and I found it to be quite a humorous tale that he wove." What do I say?
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I say, "Paul told me this story and I was dying." No, I wasn't literally dying.
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They weren't literally calling the EMTs because Paul told a story and they had to defibrillate Pastor Jeff.
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I wasn't literally dying.
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But do you see what I mean?
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We just automatically go as high as we can.
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Here's a word that a lot of people use that we never use properly, and it's the word "unbelievable." I went to the store to buy Pop-Tarts, and they didn't have the kind that I like.
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Isn't that unbelievable?
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Like, yeah, I just-- wow, wow.
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Tell me more about this, because I can't believe this story.
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I can't believe it.
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In fact, you're going to have to take me and show me.
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I can't believe, I just cannot believe what you're trying to tell me.
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We say that all the time.
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It's unbelievable. It's snowing again. That's unbelievable.
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You know, it's winter in Pennsylvania.
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It's pretty believable.
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All right, I'll stop there.
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But we're using a word in this series to describe God.
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And when I was putting this series together, There's really only one word I could think of to describe God, because it's a word that God Himself uses.
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And the word is incomparable.
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Meaning nothing is like the Lord.
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We've seen that God said that He is holy.
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We've seen in Isaiah 6, "He is holy, holy, holy." Which means nothing and no one is like the Lord.
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Last week we saw that God is just.
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He is incomparably just, righteous in all His judgments.
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we're going to look at a word that is misused and overused, and a word that really only applies to God.
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And the word is "awesome." Every single time we use that word, much like "unbelievable," every time we use that word, it's hyperbolic.
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That cheeseburger you had the other day was good, but it wasn't awesome.
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I don't believe for a second a bite of that burger and fell to your knees and just basked in the glory of that burger.
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I don't believe that.
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It was good, but it wasn't awesome.
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That movie that you saw was entertaining, but it wasn't awesome.
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The worship today was not awesome, but it brought my heart and mind before the presence of the Lord.
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He is awesome.
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This sermon I'm about to give you will not be awesome.
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It will be describing the God Who Is.
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If you're taking notes on your outline, number one, God is incomparably awesome.
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Incomparably awesome.
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We're in Isaiah 40.
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We're going to be picking up in verse 9 today, but first of all, jot this down.
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is awesome in compassion.
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Awesome in compassion.
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Verse 9 says, "Get you up to a high mountain, O Zion, herald of good news.
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Lift up your voice with strength, O Jerusalem, herald of good news.
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Lift it up and fear not.
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Say to the cities of Judah, 'Behold your God!' Behold, the Lord comes with might and His arm rules for Him.
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Behold, His reward is with Him and recompense before Him.
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He will tend His flock like a shepherd.
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He will gather His lambs in His arms.
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He will carry them in His bosom and gently lead those that are with young.
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God is awesome in compassion.
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You know, when I look at the universe - we're going to be talking about some of these things here in a minute - when I look at how majestic and vast and intricate and complicated this universe is, I have no problem believing that this universe was created by an awesome God.
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I have no problem believing that.
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It is much harder for me to believe that that God who created all of this cares at all about me.
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I have a much harder time believing that.
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That's something truly awesome.
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This God who spoke the world into existence Would have any regard for me at all let alone The depths of the love that he does have You know, it's like It's like ants. I was reading this week the largest ant super colony They found was in Japan and And they said there were 306 million worker ants and 1 million queen ants.
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How many of you were thinking about ants at all this morning?
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None of us, right?
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But in this supercolony, they found... how many was it?
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307 million ants total.
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Now imagine if you had 24 of these supercolonies all together.
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What you would have is 7.3 billion ants.
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And you wouldn't give a thought to all of them.
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You wouldn't give a thought to any of them.
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There's not a chance in the world you would give a regard for just one of those ants.
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Yet the greatness between God and us, between us and an ant is infinite.
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And He cares, personally, about every single one of us.
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He cares not just in word, not just in sentiment, but in action.
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Did you see that in the text?
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He cares in action.
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He tends His flock.
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He gathers His lambs.
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He carries. He gently leads.
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God is a God of loving in action, And that was ultimately demonstrated at the cross of Jesus Christ.
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He's described as a gentle shepherd.
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God is awesome because He's awesome in compassion.
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Letter B, He's awesome in wisdom.
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He's awesome in wisdom.
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Look at verse 12. It says, "Who has measured the waters and the hollow of His hand?" You know what the hollow of your hand is?
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You know what that is?
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That's like if somebody offers you M&Ms.
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You don't reach in and take them like this, right?
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You get a cup, right?
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Because you want to get as many M&Ms as you can, right?
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Is it just me?
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Okay, thank you.
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All right.
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You cup your hand.
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Okay, well, that little bowl that you make is called the hollow of your hand.
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How much water can you fit in the hollow of your hand?
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How much do you think?
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This is how much water, Barely a mouthful that I can fit in the hollow of my hand.
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Here it says in your Bible that God has measured the waters, meaning the waters of the world, in the hollow of His hand.
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Do you know how much water there is in the world?
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Do you have any idea?
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There are 326 million trillion gallons of water in the world.
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326 million trillion gallons!
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And God's like, "Yeah, I got it all right here." When He created the world, He was just like, "There it is." 326 million trillion gallons.
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Look at the next phrase, it says, verse 12, and He marked off the heavens with a span.
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You know what a span is, right?
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That's the distance from your thumb to your pinky.
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That's a span.
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God has marked off the heavens with a distance from your thumb to your pinky.
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How far is that? I'm going to tell you here in a second.
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He goes on, He says, "enclosed the dust of the earth in a measure, and weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills and a balance.
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God's taking all the dust of the world.
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It's a picture like somebody in the kitchen with measuring cups.
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That's the kind of language that's being used here.
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God's in His kitchen.
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I'm going to create the world.
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Okay, I've got my measuring cup here.
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Here's all the dirt that goes on planet Earth.
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And make sure we add the water from the hollow of My hand.
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Awesome.
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Verse 13 says, "Who has measured the Spirit of the Lord.
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Or what man shows Him His counsel?
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So with God doing all of this measuring - showing His awesomeness - the question is can you measure God?
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Can you measure God?
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How much do you think God weighs?
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How tall do you think God is?
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How much room do you think God takes up?
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We can't measure God.
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Verse 14 says, "Whom did he consult, and who made him understand?" Okay, these are questions here.
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So let's answer them.
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So, "Whom did God consult?" Answer me. Who does God consult?
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When God has a problem, who does He talk to?
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Shout it out.
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No one. Okay.
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Who made Him understand?
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Who sat God down and taught Him about the ways of life?
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Shout it out.
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No one.
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Who taught him the path of justice?
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We talked about this last week.
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Who sat down and said, God, this is right.
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God, this is wrong.
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Who taught God the path of justice?
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Shout it out.
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And taught Him knowledge.
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Who taught God knowledge?
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No one.
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No one.
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It says, "And showed Him the way of understanding." Who showed God the way of understanding?
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It's like a parent teaching their child the ways of life.
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Who taught God?
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Who raised God?
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No one has doubted out.
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No one!
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God has never been informed about anything.
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Do you know that?
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God has never thought, "Hmm, that's interesting.
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I never heard that before.
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Please tell me more about this." God has never said any of those things.
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Verse 15 says, "Behold, the nations are like a drop from a bucket and are counted as dust on the scales.
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"Nor are its beasts enough for a burnt offering.
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All the nations are as nothing before Him.
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They are accounted by Him as less than nothing and emptiness." Especially those last phrases, talking about, what's he saying, all the beasts in the world wouldn't be enough for a burnt offering for God.
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All the nations are nothing before Him.
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What's his point?
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The point is the same thing, we don't influence God.
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He's awesome in wisdom.
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We don't influence God.
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We don't do anything that gets God's attention.
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God is never impressed by us.
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The truth is God loves us and He gives us His wisdom simply for one reason, and the reason is this, He chooses to.
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God simply chooses to love us and to be good to us.
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He's awesome in wisdom.
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Let her see He's awesome over idols.
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Awesome over idols.
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Look at verse 18.
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"To whom then will you liken God or what likeness compare with Him?" There's that incomparable thing again.
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An idol.
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A craftsman casts it and a goldsmith overlays it with gold Doesn't that sound luxurious?
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This is like the Cadillac of Idols here.
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He who is too impoverished for an offering chooses wood that will not rot.
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Okay, so I can't quite afford the Cadillac of Idols, but I'm going to...
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My idol, he's made out of wood that doesn't rot.
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I got that good wood, that yellow lumber wood.
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My idol ain't going to rot.
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He seeks out a skilled craftsman to set up an idol that will not move.
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Yeah, I'm going to put this in the living room.
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Can you build me one that ain't going to fall down?
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It seems so silly, doesn't it?
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It seems so silly, but, church, it's real.
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When I was in Thailand back in November, I saw everywhere Buddha statues.
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You can see Buddha statues literally for miles and miles away up on a mountain.
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You can see a gold Buddha statue.
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Just looking at that, realizing it would take me hours and hours and hours to get there and I can see it from everywhere.
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They're worshiping that hunk of gold.
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And then when you get into the villages in Thailand where they're not Buddhists, what they have is spirit altars.
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They have these shelves on their living room walls, and they have these little things, these little trinkets that they burn to appease the gods that live in the trees and the rocks and the water.
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It's idolatry.
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And when we look at it the way it's described in God's Word, it seems so silly.
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And as sophisticated Americans, we say, well, yeah, we don't do things like that, do we?
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Actually, America, we make our own gods too.
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Money, stuff, success, our plans - those things become gods to us.
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Or, another way that we make our own god is we try to make the real god out to what we want Him to be.
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He's the God of health and wealth.
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He's the God who's sort of detached and not involved in human affairs.
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He's the God who really doesn't care and we try to craft God into what we want Him to be.
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Isaiah's point here is God is bigger and more awesome than anything that we try to use to fill that God-shaped void in our lives.
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And I think we can always acknowledge that.
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God is so much greater than these things that we try to substitute for Him.
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Why do we try?
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Has anyone in the course of human history, Has anyone discovered something that made them say, "This is better than God!
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This thing will satisfy the deepest longing of my soul." God is awesome over idols.
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Letter D, write this down.
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He's awesome over rulers.
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He's awesome over rulers.
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Do you not know?
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Do you not hear?
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Has it not been told you from the beginning?
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You're not understood from the foundations of the earth.
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It is He who sits above the circle of the earth.
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You need the word "circle" in your Bible.
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2,200 years before Christopher Columbus discovered that the world was round.
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Much controversy in that day.
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Well, the world is flat. You'll sell right off the edge.
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2,200 years before Columbus as he who sits above the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers, who stretches out the heavens like a curtain and spreads them like a tent to dwell in.
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The known universe.
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You know how big the known universe is?
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I had to look this up.
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I'm going to give you some numbers here.
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It is estimated that the diameter of the universe of the observable universe is about 28.5 gigaparsecs.
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How many people know what a gigaparsec is?
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Anyone?
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93 billion light years.
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Or 5.5 times 10 to the 23rd power miles.
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That's how big our universe is.
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I was studying this stuff, and I'm just going to be honest with you, I don't understand it. I'll just shoot straight with you.
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I do not understand it. I don't.
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I can barely fathom how big the earth is, let alone the known universe. I don't understand it.
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Do you know what I understand even less than that?
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Even less than that, I don't understand the awesomeness of a God who stretched this out like a curtain.
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We just moved this past week, and one of the things Aaron was doing in our new house, she was hanging the shower curtain in the bathroom, and she was just like, put the hooks on, and there you go.
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That was a five-second job.
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That's what God did with the universe.
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He's just like, ok, going to create - boom! - stretched it out.
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It's awesome.
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Verse 23 says, "Who brings princes to nothing and makes the rulers of the earth as emptiness?
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Scarcely are they planted, scarcely sown, scarcely has their stem taken root in the earth when he blows on them and they wither." The tempest carries them off like stubble.
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every godless ruler that exalts himself, God brings to nothing.
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You can just run down the list, whether it's Alexander the Great or Napoleon or Hitler or Saddam Hussein or whatever, just make your list of all of the rulers that thought they were something in their day, and every single one of them has come and gone.
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God - His rule and His influence has never gone away.
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Do you realize that?
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You know what they were doing thousands of years ago?
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They were getting together and they were singing praises to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
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And do you know what we were doing just like a half hour ago?
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We were still standing here today singing praises to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
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God is still ruling.
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God is still in control.
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And God still has passionate followers.
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While these people, these so-called mighty world leaders, God is awesome.
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He's awesome in compassion and wisdom.
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He's awesome over idols.
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He's awesome over rulers.
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God is incomparably awesome.
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And here's the point.
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We didn't gather today to just get some factoids about how much water is in the world or whatever.
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Here's the point of all of that.
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God is incomparably awesome.
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So He can take care of me.
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He can take care of me.
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You know, I was really meditating on this this week.
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All through Isaiah there's all this comparing language, right?
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That's our theme, incomparable God.
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And I was thinking, why does God keep going back to that?
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You know, our theme verse is Isaiah 46.5, "What will you liken me to? What will you compare me?" Twice in this passage, Isaiah 40.18, "To whom then will you liken God, or what likeness compare with Him?" Look at verse 25.
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"To whom then will you compare Me, that I should be like Him?" Says the Holy One.
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"Lift up your eyes and see who created these, who bring out their host by number, calling them all by name, by the greatness of His might, because He is strong in power, not one is missing." Twice in this passage we see God saying, What are you going to compare me to?
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What are you going to liken me to?
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Why does he keep going back to this comparing question?
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Well, the answer is right here in the text.
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Because, church, we face trials.
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We face trials.
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We face financial trials that just overwhelm us.
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There's just too much month at the end of the money.
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And I know there's some people in this room I can't get ahead.
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I can't get ahead.
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And the problem seems so huge.
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It just seems like such a huge problem.
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We face relational trials.
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Maybe there's a fallout with a family member.
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That thing just weighs on you.
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And that's all you can think about is just the hurt and the anger and the unforgiveness.
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And it's a huge thing in your life.
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For some people it's a health issue.
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you know dealing with sicknesses and cancers and and it's a huge thing some it's job security or it's work-related it's it looks like the company's downsizing and I'm gonna I'm gonna lose my job and then how how are we gonna make things go in the family what are we gonna have to do are we gonna have to move or am I gonna be able to find another job and it's this it's this huge There's a huge thing looming ahead of you.
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And in our hearts, we echo verse 27.
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Look at verse 27.
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It says, "Why do you say, 'O Jacob,' and speak, 'O Israel'?" God's people.
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"Why do you say these things?" We echo this.
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Look at this statement.
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"My way is hidden from the Lord.
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My right is disregarded by my God.
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We feel the sting of that sometimes, don't we?
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My way is hidden from the Lord.
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In other words, God doesn't know.
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Haven't you ever felt like that was the conclusion?
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God must not know what's going on in my life.
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You know, I've been struggling for so hard so long and God must not know. My way is hidden from the Lord. He must not be aware. You know, I thought I had this idea that God was aware, but He must not be really aware of what I'm going through. My way must be hidden from the Lord.
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I look at this next statement, "My right is disregarded by my God." That's even worse.
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means God doesn't care. Maybe God does know, but you know what? Maybe He just doesn't care. You know I've been dealing with this thing for 11 years now. I know He knows. Maybe He doesn't care. Church, we felt that. You see here the Lord, With the backdrop of this picture of His splendor and His majesty, He turns and He says, "So why do you say this?
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Why do you say, 'My way is hidden from the Lord and my right is disregarded by my God?' Why would you say, 'God doesn't know and God doesn't care?'" You see, this is a tough passage to sell on a Sunday morning, because everybody sitting here, I'm sure, agrees with these concepts.
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Yes, God is awesome. Yes, God is big. Yes, God is huge. Yes, God has all power.
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We agree with these concepts, but we have a really hard time personally appropriating them.
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Meaning, we nod on Sunday morning.
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"Yes, that's what the Bible says. Yes, that's what I agree with. Yes." we don't act like we really believe it.
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I'll just be honest with you, you guys know the struggles we've had in our own home, praying for our son with some very severe developmental issues.
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Do I believe that God can heal my son?
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I believe that.
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I believe that God has the power.
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I'll be honest with you, eleven years into it, sometimes it gets hard to keep praying that.
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Sometimes I say, you know, I just don't know how I'm going to go another day.
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How do we do it?
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How do we get from this objective truth, "I know that you can, God," and how do we make it subjective?
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How do we go from intellectual agreement to active faith?
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Well, yeah, this stuff is true.
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Why do we have a hard time believing that God's power, God's presence, God's majesty is true, and it's active, and it's real in my life?
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That is God's whole point here.
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Why do you say that I don't know and I don't care?
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God's saying if all of this is true about me, what makes you think that I can't handle the mess that you are in?
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Or verse 28, "Have you not known?
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Have you not heard?
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The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth.
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He does not faint or grow weary." Pastor Jeff, I hear what you're saying, and I do believe, but I'm just going to be honest with you, I'm worn out right now.
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I've been struggling with this financial thing this relational thing, this health thing, this job thing, whatever this thing is, I've been struggling so long, and I do believe, but I'm just going to be honest with you, I'm just a little worn out.
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And the Lord's reply is, "I'm not worn out." God says, "I'm not tired. I don't get tired." God doesn't get tired answering prayer.
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God doesn't get tired meeting needs.
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God doesn't get tired comforting you.
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God is managing 7.3 billion people in the world right now, He doesn't even break a sweat.
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You're like, "Okay, I understand what you're saying, Pastor Jeff.
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Yeah, the power's available, but why hasn't God done something yet about my situation?
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Why would God wait?
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If He's going to resolve this, if He's going to fix it, if He's going to do something, why would He wait?" Look at the next phrase.
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"His understanding is unsearchable." We don't know what God's doing.
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And listen, we don't know what God's doing, and we don't need to.
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We don't know what God's doing.
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And we don't need to.
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You know, the Bible never says that we are to explain God.
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Did you know that?
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The Bible doesn't say go out and explain God.
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The Bible doesn't say go out and understand how God works.
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Over and over and over and over, the Bible says, trust God.
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Trust God.
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Not just for the outcome.
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Not just for the finish line.
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Not just for the...
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We're not just trusting God for the resolution of this thing that is burdening me.
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But it's trusting Him for the power to get to the finish line.
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So church, for everyone who's ever said, "I just can't.
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I can't take anymore.
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I can't keep doing this.
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I can't handle one more day.
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I can't take one more step.
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Good news, yes you can, because you can't.
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What?
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Wait a minute, we're paying you to preach this?
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Yes, you can because you can't, because you see, it's not in your own strength.
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The glorious promise is this awesome God who manages the universe from a seated position, supplies the strength that you need.
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Look at verse 29.
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Here it is.
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Don't miss this.
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He gives power to the faint.
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And to him who has no might, he increases strength.
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Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted.
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Pause there.
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through today, this is something I need to be reminded of often, whatever you're going through today, God may not take away your trial and it is never promised that He will. There's not one promise in the Bible that God is going to remove your trial. He might. He might choose to let you go through it.
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You see the promise, the sure promise is that He's going to give you the power to get through it.
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Sign me up for that, how do I get that power?
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Look at verse 31, "But they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength." That's how you get the power.
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You see, it's not about striving harder, it's not about, "Hey, man up!" It's not about trying to do it your own way.
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It's about trusting the Lord through it.
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It's about waiting on Him and on His power.
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To fall down before God and say, "God, I can't take another step, but You promised to supply The last phrase is pretty familiar, isn't it?
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"They shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint." So when God supplies the power, you're either going to fly, or you're going to run, or you're going to walk.
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In other words, whatever it takes, whatever it takes to get you from where you are or where God has taken you, He's going to get you there.
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Let me ask you, who needs the power today?
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Is there somebody that's here today that needs God to show up and supply the strength that you don't have?
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The strength that only He can provide?
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Will you let the Lord renew your strength as only He can?
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Father in Heaven, we thank You for the promises of Your Word.
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And Father, let us never presume on promises that You never made.
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Somehow we think that we are sometimes entitled to a trial-free, pain-free, obstacle-free life, and You have never promised that.
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But You have very clearly and often made this glorious promise that we've studied today that you are going to supply the power to get us through whatever trial we are going through today.
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And we can wonder, how does that happen?
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How in the world can that happen?
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And the answer is, you are the God who stretched out the universe like a curtain.
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You are the God who measured the dirt and the water.
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You are the God that puts the mountains and the hills in a balance.
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You are the God is high and exalted above all things.
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Your bank account never gets low.
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Your strength never wears out.
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Your mind never gets tired.
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You are infinite.
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You are awesome.
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Father, I pray for the people in this room right now I need a fresh experience of Your awesomeness.
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A fresh encounter with You are the God who loves them, and You are the God who's going to supply the strength that they need to get through this trial.
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I pray that this would be a time of seeking You.
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A time of strength being renewed.
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of Your name being glorified.
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We pray in Jesus' name, Amen.
Small Group Questions (Whole Group):
Read Isaiah 40:9-31
Why does God use this "comparison” language in Isaiah? (Is 46:5, Is 40:18, 25). What’s His point in repeatedly asking “to what will you liken me”?
In what areas do you feel weak right now (Is 40:29-31)? For what do you need God’s strength?
If people believe God is awesome, why do we so often settle for empty religion instead of trusting His power? (Is 40:18-20, 27)
Breakout Questions:
Pray for one another.