The God Who Is There

We open the word of God to the last chapter of the prophecy of Ezekiel, Ezekiel chapter 48. In the closing verses of this chapter, the prophet has been, is describing the city, the restored, glorified, millennial city.

He's talking about the gates and the size of the city. We're going to focus on the last verse, one of the great names of God in the Old Testament, Jehovah Shammach. And the name of the city from that day shall be, the Lord is there.

Jehovah Shammach. The Lord is there. In the year 606 B.C., would you bow to pray for just a moment, please? Heavenly Father, I pray in Jesus' name that your Holy Spirit will grant to us tonight the power that we need, the strength that we need, and the grace that we need to exalt Jesus Christ.

I pray that this little Old Testament text might become radiant and alive and vibrant to us. I pray, Lord, for someone here. Lord, my heart is burdened for someone here who needs the message.

And I ask in Jesus' name, speak to that heart. And may this be a night of tremendous victory in that life. Lord, you know the heart, you know the need, and I pray that you might work in wonderful power.

Lord, don't let me get in the way. May the Spirit of God have great liberty through the word, I pray in Jesus' name. Amen.

In the year 606 B.C., the Babylonians began to deport people from the city of Jerusalem. Among them was Daniel, a young man who had to leave his home and go off to Babylon. When Daniel packed, he packed the book of Jeremiah with him.

And when you read the book of Daniel, you'll find that he was reading Jeremiah, and God gave him the answers to his needs. Then in 597, another group was deported, and in that group was young Ezekiel. Ezekiel was apparently a married man.

We read about his wife in this book. Ezekiel was a priest. He was 25 years old when he was deported, and for five years he lived in Babylon.

Of course, he couldn't minister. A priest can't minister without a temple. A priest can't minister without an altar.

A priest can't minister without all the paraphernalia needed. And the Babylonians were taking over Jerusalem. The Babylonians were going to destroy the temple.

And so Ezekiel was a deported priest who was without a job. After he'd been in Babylon for five years, Ezekiel received a call from God to be a prophet. He couldn't be a priest, and so God called him to be a prophet.

And he wrote this marvelous book. The only thing most people know about Ezekiel is he saw the wheels way up in the middle of the air, and he did. This book opens with the glory of God.

Here is the prophet, and he's by one of the canals in Babylon, and God reveals to him his glory. He sees the wheels within the wheels. He sees the firmament.

He sees a great, glorious chariot with God enthroned and God accomplishing His purposes in history. In the first three chapters of this book, we have his call to the ministry. And then in chapters 4 through 24, his message is, God will judge Jerusalem.

In 25 through 32, his message is, God will judge the nations around Jerusalem. When you get to chapter 33, you find a whole new message. From Ezekiel 33 through the end of the chapter, his message is, there is a future glory for Israel.

The first part of his book, he wrote before Jerusalem fell. The second part, he wrote during the siege. And the third part, when everything was at its worst, that's when he wrote it.

Now, I would have reversed that. When things are looking good, I can write something very optimistic, but he got the message that Jerusalem had fallen, the people were in exile, God had brought judgment, and it's at this point Ezekiel the prophet looks up and says, there's going to be a future for Israel. Now, I must confess to you, when in my devotional reading I get to these latter chapters of Ezekiel where he talks about how big the stairs are and how big the walls are and how big the porches are, I read kind of quickly, but it's important because God wrote it.

In these latter chapters, we find him describing what God's going to do in the future. The climax of his book is a new name for God, Jehovah Shammach, the Lord is there. I want to take that name, the Lord is there, and make four applications of it.

First of all, the Lord is there is a tremendous promise to Israel. You see, the presence of God was the unique thing about Israel. If you and I were a group of tourists going down to the Holy Land back in Moses' day, well, he wasn't there, but in the day of the tabernacle, or in David's day, or Solomon's day in the day of the temple, and the tour guide would drive us past Jerusalem and say, oh, there is Jerusalem, we'd say, well, it looks like any other city.

It's not as pretty as Athens, it's not as imposing as Rome, but the tour guide would say there's something different about Jerusalem. God lives there. You could go down to the great cities of Egypt and see statues and pyramids and wealth, some of that wealth we've imported now to Chicago temporarily, but God wasn't living there.

Go to Rome and see majestic buildings and theaters and great monuments, but God wasn't living there. Go off even to Greece and see these monumental structures, which now I understand are starting to fall apart because of pollution, but God wasn't there. And there in the city of Jerusalem, God dwelt.

This was the unique thing about the Jews. The Jews could not brag about wisdom, they couldn't brag about warfare, they couldn't brag about wealth, but they could brag about one thing, God dwells with us. When Paul lists in Romans chapter 9 all the blessings of Israel, he says, to whom pertains the glory, what glory? The glory that dwelt with Israel.

You see, in the book of Genesis, God walked with men, and Noah walked with God, and Abraham walked with God, Enoch walked with God. You get to the book of Exodus, God says, I want to dwell with you, I've been walking with you all these years, I want to dwell with you, make me a tabernacle, so they did. They made this tent and they made in the tent a holy of holies, and God moved in.

When they dedicated the tabernacle in Exodus chapter 40, God moved into the tabernacle, but alas, Israel sinned, and God had to write above the tabernacle, Ichabod, the glory has departed. Then they built a temple, and Solomon dedicated the temple, and 1 Kings chapter 8 tells us how that God's glory came down and dwelt in the temple. The glory was so great the priests could not even minister, but alas, the temple was desecrated, the people sinned against God, and while Ezekiel was writing his book, the city was being taken and the temple destroyed.

It's interesting to notice that Ezekiel, in a vision, saw God's glory depart. Turn to Ezekiel chapter 8. Here is the prophet in faraway Babylon, and God gives him a vision of the departing of the glory. Chapter 8 of Ezekiel came to pass in the sixth year, in the sixth month, in the first day of the month.

He had been a prophet now for about a year and a half. As I sat in my house, and the elders of Judah sat before me, that the hand of the Lord God fell there upon me. And God picks him up by a lock of his hair and takes him off to see a vision in Jerusalem.

It's a good thing Ezekiel wasn't bald. He could never have made that trip. And look at verse 4. And behold, the glory of the God of Israel was there in the temple.

But you turn the page to chapter 9 and verse 3. As he watches, and the glory of the God of Israel was gone up from the chariot to the threshold of the house. It's moved now. The glory of God moved out of the holy of holies to the threshold of the house.

Look at chapter 10, verse 4. Then the glory of the Lord went up from the cherub and stood over the threshold of the house. Look at chapter 10, verse 18. Then the glory of the Lord departed from off the threshold of the house.

Look at chapter 11, verse 22, verse 23. And the glory of the Lord went up from the midst of the city and stood upon the mountain which is on the east side of the city. That's the Mount of Olives.

Ezekiel not only saw the wheels, but Ezekiel saw the glory of God move from the holy of holies to the threshold, to over the threshold, out to the Mount of Olives. He watched God's glory depart from the temple. Did you know, my friends, that when God's glory departs, it doesn't depart suddenly? Always departs gradually.

It happens in our lives. A little bit of sin, a little bit of condoning of disobedience, a little bit of cutting of corners, and little by little the glory begins to depart. It can happen to a church, to a ministry.

Just gradually the glory departs. Now, when the glory departed from the temple, the temple was destroyed. Why keep a temple when God's not living there? And the next time God's glory came to Israel, it was in the body of Jesus Christ.

And the Word was made flesh and tabernacled among us, and we beheld His glory. And Jesus Christ, God's Son, came to Israel with the glory of God. And He came unto His own, and His own received Him not.

When you turn to the Gospel of Matthew, and you can study this at your leisure, you'll find that Jesus Christ goes into the temple, teaches, heals, then He leaves the temple, and He says, Your house is left unto you desolate. Not my house. He had said, My house shall be called a house of prayer, but now it's not my house, it's your house.

Your house is left unto you desolate. Why? The glory was departing. And the interesting thing is that when Jesus left the temple in the Gospel of Matthew, you know where He went? Out on the Mount of Olives on the east of the city, just the way Ezekiel saw the glory leave.

And they crucified Him. And their temple was destroyed. Since that day, Israel has not had a temple, a priesthood, a sacrifice.

Since that day, Israel has been without a king, without an altar, without blood, living on substitutes. Now, Ezekiel tells us the day is going to come when God is going to restore the nation of Israel, and the glory is going to come back. Look at Ezekiel chapter 43.

Ezekiel has been describing this marvelous temple. There are those who spiritualize these chapters. They tell us that this is not really a literal temple, but, you know, it seems so very literal to me.

It's awfully hard to have all these measurements for something that is abstract and symbolic. I think he's talking here about a literal temple on literal land down in the land of Israel. I really do.

Verse 1 of chapter 43, Afterward he brought me to the gate, even the gate that looketh toward the east. And behold, the glory of the God of Israel came from the way of the east. You see, it had left and gone out to the Mount of Olives.

Now it's coming back. And his voice was like a noise of many waters. That's Jesus.

Revelation tells us that. And the earth shined with his glory. And it was according to the appearance of the vision which I saw, even according to the vision that I saw when I came to destroy the city.

And the visions were like the vision that I saw by the river Kibar. And I fell on my face. And the glory of the Lord came into the house by way of the gate whose prospect is toward the east.

So the Spirit took me up and brought me into the inner court. And behold, the glory of the Lord filled the house. My friends, that's going to happen one day.

Israel is going to receive the right to rebuild a temple. That temple will not have the glory of God in it. But when Jesus Christ returns to this earth to establish his kingdom, there will be a restored temple and the glory of God will be there.

This is a great encouragement. Here was Ezekiel the prophet seeing everything fall apart, the city destroyed, the people taken captive, the temple destroyed. And God says, just a minute, Ezekiel, don't quit.

Don't give up. You won't see it. The next generation won't see it.

But one generation will one day see the glory of the Lord. And the name of Jerusalem will no longer be the city of peace or the city of war. Jerusalem will be called Jehovah Shammach.

The Lord is there. A great promise to Israel. Now, this name Jehovah Shammach is also a great assurance to believers today.

Let's turn to the very first book in the New Testament, the Gospel of Matthew. Matthew begins with a long list of names, the genealogy of our Lord Jesus, the first seventeen verses. And then we have a description of how our Lord was born.

He was born different from other people, and that's why it's described here. Verse 22 of Matthew 1, Now all this was done that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord through the prophets, saying, Behold, the virgin. Now whatever you want to do with Isaiah 9.6, you can't do anything with the word parthenos, the Greek word here in verse 23.

It always means a virgin. Behold the virgin shall be with child. Now that's a miracle.

And shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel. Which, being interpreted, is God with us. You see, my friend, when you trust Jesus Christ as your Savior, you get to know Him who is Immanuel, God with us.

That is the equivalent of Jehovah Shammach, the Lord is there. Where? In our lives. When you come to trust Christ as your Savior, then Jesus Christ is there.

The unsaved person doesn't have Jesus Christ living within. The difference between a saved person and an unsaved person is not morality. Abraham was a saved man, and he told a couple of lies.

David was a saved man, he committed adultery. They shouldn't have lied, they shouldn't have committed adultery, but they did. The difference between a saved man and an unsaved man is not morality, or outward religion, or education, or success.

The difference is this. When you look at an unsaved person, you say the Lord is not there, because the unsaved person is without God, without Christ, without hope in this world. But no matter how poor a Christian may be, no matter how he may fail, no matter how he may limp and even fall, you can look at a believer and say Jehovah Shammach, the Lord is there, because when you trust Christ as your Savior, you have Immanuel, God with us.

Now because He is Jehovah Shammach, He's always with us. For example, Jesus said, where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst. When we gather together for prayer and for worship, we could put up a sign that says Jehovah Shammach, the Lord is there.

As we go out to serve Him, I can't get away from the last thing that Matthew says. In his first chapter, he says He is Immanuel, the Lord with us. In his last chapter, he says the same thing.

Go ye therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you, and lo, I am with you. How long? Always. How long is always? Even unto the end of the age.

And so as you and I walk forth in this hostile world, we can say Jehovah Shammach, the Lord is there as we serve Him, as we suffer for Him. When those Hebrew children went into that fiery furnace, they said to the king, we're not going to bow down and worship your idol. Our Lord is able to deliver us, but even if He doesn't, we aren't going to worship your idol.

And boom, into the furnace they went. And when they turned on the monitors to discover what was going on, lo and behold, there were four people going through the fire, and one of them like unto the Son of God. He promised, you know, over in Isaiah in chapter 43 and verse 2 and chapter 41, verse 10, when you go through the waters, I'll be with you.

When you go through the fire, I'll be with you. It'll not burn you. You see, when you go through the difficulties of life, no matter what they may be, you can say Jehovah Shammach, the Lord is there.

He never forsakes His children. Even when you go through the valley of the shadow of death, a great deal is being printed these days about this matter of death. For the first time in, well, really modern history, science is looking into what does it mean to die.

And books like Life After Life and other books of that nature, Kubler-Ross and her materials are trying to bring forth what happens when a person dies. I remember when I read Kenneth Moody's book, Life After Life, I was quite stirred by it. I thought, now, what does the Bible say about this? It talked about people who were hovering in their hospital rooms and looking down upon their own bodies and listening to the doctors talk, then coming back into their bodies.

What's this all about? Then I remembered Psalm 23, verse 4, Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me. My friend, when your time comes to go through that valley, you can say Jehovah Shammach, the Lord is there. He went through the valley before you.

He goes through the valley beside you. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life. I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

In my Father's house are many mansions. That's why it's so marvelous to be a Christian. Not to build your life on philosophy, because philosophies contradict each other.

Not to build your life on wealth, because wealth has a way of fading and you can't take it with you. Not to build your life on people, because people come and go. To build your life on God, the one true God revealed in Jesus Christ who is God, the God who never fails, the God who says, I will never leave you nor forsake you.

That's what he said to Abraham, I'm going to be with you, Abraham. Isaac, I'll be with you. Jacob, I'll not leave you until I've finished my work.

He said to Moses, I'm going to be with you. He said to Joshua, as I was with Moses, I'm going to be with you. And he says to you tonight, if you're a Christian, I am Jehovah Shammach, the Lord is there.

I don't know what you're going through or what you contemplate going through. Someone here tonight may be apprehensively anticipating surgery, or you're waiting for tests to come back and you aren't quite sure what they'll be like. I want you to know when the doctor hands you the x-rays, Jehovah Shammach, the Lord is there.

And when you go through that valley, the Lord is there. I will fear no evil, for thou art with me. Paul wrote a beautiful piece of autobiography in 2 Timothy chapter 4. What a man of God he was.

Inspired by the Holy Spirit, he says, at my first defense, no man stood with me. Here's the great apostle Paul in the city of Rome, and there were hundreds of Christians in the city of Rome, and Paul is standing before Caesar's court defending the gospel. And you would think that there would have been row after row of believers standing there saying, we're with you, Paul.

He was all alone, all alone. Some of those people Paul had won to Christ, they forsook him. But he goes on to say, nevertheless, the Lord stood with me.

Paul says, Jehovah Shammach, the Lord was there. Have you ever gone into a difficult experience of life, apprehensive, concerned, worried, fearful? And then you've come out the other end, and you've looked back and said, you know, this has been an amazing experience. The Lord was there.

I've had that experience. I think you have, too. At the time, we said, Lord, where are you? Don't you care? Lord, don't you know what I'm going through? But as we look back, we hear him simply say, Jehovah Shammach, the Lord is there.

It's a tremendous assurance to believers today. In fact, my friends, that's what's going to make heaven so wonderful. Now if you're a jeweler, the golden streets and all the jewels probably excite you.

If you're in the anti-pollution business, the fact that there will be pure, wonderful, clean atmosphere and environment may excite you. If you hate the nighttime, if you've been working nights all your life, you'll be glad to know there'll be no night there, no night shift. But you know the thing that really excites me about the heavenly city? Revelation 21, verse 3. Oh, I've got to start with verse 1. This is my favorite passage to read at the graveside when we're having a committal service.

And I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away. And I, John, saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them.

The heavenly city, you can write over it in every language, but let's put it in the Hebrew tongue. Jehovah Shemach, the Lord is there. That's what makes heaven so wonderful.

And because the Lord is there, they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them and be their God. And because the Lord is there, God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes. And because the Lord is there, there shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying.

And because the Lord is there, neither shall there be any more pain, for the former things are passed away. Over in chapter 22, he describes that beautiful, pure river proceeding from the throne of God. He describes the glorious garden that lines the street of the city.

And verse 3, And there shall be no more curse, but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it. And they shall see his face, Jehovah Shemach, the Lord is there. That's what's going to make heaven so wonderful.

A promise to Israel, an assurance to believers, there's a third application of this name, and I just drop it here for your consideration. It is a test for the church. Jesus said, Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst.

That's his presence. But I'm not satisfied just with the presence of the Lord. I want the power of the Lord.

I enjoy reading biography. I enjoy reading the great eras of church history. I've been reading some of Wesley lately.

When John Wesley preached, people were stirred. Whitfield would preach, and people would fall on their faces and cry out to God. During the great Welsh revival, nobody had to preach.

All they did was sing and pray at times, and the Spirit of God moved in. You know what the test of a ministry is? Not that many people are there, and we all wish we had more, not that a great budget is there. We wouldn't criticize that.

The test of a ministry is this, is the Lord there? I have a friend. We have been in many meetings together in different countries, and I love him. And he has an interesting way of coming to you.

When he hears you preach, he'll come up to you afterward and say, Well, was God in the meeting? That's a good question. Was the Lord in the meeting? Remember when Mr. Moody was preaching in London, someone came to him rather perturbed and said, Mr. Moody, so-and-so is going to be here tonight, and they named a great high person of dignity and stature. And Mr. Moody said, I trust he'll be blessed.

Didn't frighten Mr. Moody that some noble, some duke was going to be there. He was concerned about one thing, is God going to be here? That should be true of our Sunday school classes. The big test of a Sunday school class is not how many outlines did we get.

The big test is, was God there? That should be true of our worship service. It should be true of my preaching. It should be true of our music.

It should be true of committee meetings and business meetings. It should be true in our homes. Can we really say, is God there? Paul wrote to the Thessalonian church, and he said something like this, for our message came unto you not in word only, but in the demonstration and the power of the Holy Spirit.

When he was in Thessalonica, it was Jehovah Shemach, the Lord was there. Oh, do you ever go away from a meeting crying out and saying, dear God, why weren't you there in power? Was it my sin? Was it my coldness of heart? Was it my critical spirit? Was it my disobedience that kept you from working? When I read the book of Acts, I find the church prayed, and the place was shaken. The Holy Spirit would have to get permission from a committee to do that today.

I was preaching at a convention, at a conference, and a friend of mine was in charge of the prayer ministry at this conference. And after one of the services, when a preacher preached with great power, my friend stood to his feet and said, those of you who want to have a prayer meeting, follow me, let's meet to pray. And about 35 or 40 of the people went, and they had a great and glorious time praying.

Would you believe the next day, an officer of that conference came to my friend and said, anytime you want to schedule a special meeting, you check with us first. Do we wonder why ministries die? You've got to check with the committee to have a prayer meeting. The Holy Spirit moves in power.

God is there. In the book of Acts, when they prayed, the Holy Spirit moved in. It thrills my heart to see the growth of prayer ministry here at Moody Church.

To me, it's the cloud the size of a man's hand. To me, it's the blowing of the wind in the mulberry trees. God is wanting to do something great for us, because people are praying, and I thank God we don't have to call a business meeting to open a room for people to pray.

Jehovah Shammach, the Lord is there. That's the test for the Church. The test is not how beautiful was the sermon or how gorgeous was the accoutrements in the building or how lovely was the music.

The test is, in all of these things, was God there? There's a fourth application of this name, and I cannot close without mentioning this. I would be unfaithful to my calling. Jehovah Shammach is a wonderful promise to Israel, a wonderful assurance to believers.

He is with us, and thank God we'll be with Him forever. A great test for the Church, and finally, a great warning to the lost. Now God is everywhere.

In Psalm 139, the psalmist was checking up on his theology, and he said, Lord, You're everywhere. If I take the wings of the morning, You're there. If I go to the uttermost parts of the sea, You're there.

If I go to the highest heaven, if I go down to the deepest hell, You're there. God is omnipresent. He's everywhere, but He's not everywhere to bless.

Hell is the absence of the blessing of God, for everything that God's presence in heaven gives the believer, reverse it, and God's absence from hell denies to the unbeliever. Heaven is a place of light. There's no night there.

There's no need for the sun, because God is the glory of that city. But there's no light in hell. Our Lord Jesus, who was the greatest preacher on hell in the Bible, and I'm sure He always preached it with a break in His voice and a cheer in His eye, our Lord Jesus described hell as outer darkness, darkness, darkness so thick it can be felt.

Heaven is a great place of fellowship, where we're going to meet the saints of all ages, the spirits of just men made perfect. Oh, what a place of fellowship. Hell is a place of loneliness.

You have heard me say this before. I repeat it for your edification. I have met many people who have the idea that hell is something like Weld Street or Madison Avenue or, well, where all the gamblers will be over here having a great time gambling, and all the lustful people will be over here involved in lust, and all the drunkards.

There's not going to be any partying in hell. I've heard people say, well, I remember a man I witnessed who said, well, I'll have lots of company in hell. You won't.

I don't know of one verse in the Bible that tells me you're going to have any company in hell, because, you see, the source of all friendship is love, and God is love, and if God's not there, there won't be any love. Do you have the idea, my friend, that you're going to go out into eternity and spend all eternity satisfying your cravings? Oh, no. You know what hell is? Hell is a place where you have the cravings, but there's no satisfaction.

In heaven, we're going to have great and holy desires, and God will enable us to satisfy those desires. I'm going to be able to sing on pitch in heaven. I will be able to praise God without any weakness.

So will you. Heaven is a place of satisfaction and fulfillment. Hell is a place of eternal dissatisfaction and unfulfillment, eternal cravings that cannot be satisfied.

Jesus compared heaven to a temple. The whole city is a temple. There's no need for a temple up there.

When Jesus gave His revelation to John, He said, John, tell those people there'll be no church buildings in heaven, no temples in heaven. The whole city is a temple. Jesus compared heaven to a temple.

You know what He compared hell to? A trash heap, a garbage dump. He used the word Gehenna. And if you and I were back in Jerusalem in Jesus' day and we said, where is Gehenna? Well, they'd say, outside the city.

There's a valley there. We throw our garbage there. The worms are eating it, and the fire is devouring it.

Our Lord Jesus compared hell to a garbage dump. What do you throw in a garbage dump? All the useless things. What makes a man useful? Jehovah Shemach, God is there.

The unsaved person who did not bring glory to God, the unsaved person who rejected the Lord, went all through life without the Savior, would not believe, would not receive, would not bow down. Where does he end up? In an eternal garbage dump. I didn't say that.

Jesus did. And He died to make it possible for you not to go to that garbage dump. Heaven is a place of perpetual, eternal joy.

You know, so many of the joys we have in this life, we have because they're going to end. Did you know that? We value things because we're going to lose them. We parents look at our children and say, well, they're growing up.

They'll be gone one of these days. We look at our parents. We say, well, they're getting older.

They'll be gone one of these days. And we love them and value them because they're going to leave us. In heaven, we're going to love and value and rejoice in things that will never leave us.

But people in hell will not have any of these things. Our Lord told a story about a man who died and went to hell and didn't even have a drop of water for his lips. Oh, my friend, Jehovah Shemach, the Lord is there.

What a warning to the lost. What does Jesus say to the people who rejected me? Depart from me, ye that work iniquity. I never knew you.

In 2 Thessalonians chapter 1, the Apostle Paul says that they shall be judged away from the presence of the Lord. Oh, could I say it tonight in words that would somehow penetrate your heart. It's an awful thing to go out into eternity away from God.

The believer goes out into eternity and he says, Jehovah Shemach, the Lord is there. The unbeliever wakes up in hell and he says, the Lord is not there and it's my fault. I had the opportunity to believe and be saved and I turned it down.

I rejected and now I am rejected. The most important being in all the universe is God. The most important experience in all of life is to know God through faith in Jesus Christ.

The greatest tragedy in all of life is not to know God. The greatest comfort and assurance and confidence in all of life is to be able to look at any circumstance of life—sickness and sorrow and heartbreak and disappointment—and say, Jehovah Shemach, the Lord is there. Fear thou not, for I am with thee.

Be not dismayed, for I am thy God. I will never leave thee nor forsake thee. If you know Jesus Christ, then you know the Lord who is there.

You know Emmanuel. God is with us. If you don't know Jesus Christ, my friend, why don't you come and trust him? Let him save you tonight.

And you can walk out of this building and you can look down into your heart and say, Jehovah Shemach, the Lord is there. You can look up to the starry heavens and know that God is preparing a home for you up there. And you can say, Jehovah Shemach, the Lord is there.

And thank God someday I'll be there because Jesus said, where I am, there ye may be also. Let's pray together. Father, we marvel that you would want to be with us.

You are pure, eternal spirit. We are clay. And yet you want to dwell with us.

Your word says, I will dwell with them and I will walk with them. And they shall be my people and I shall be their God. You are holy and we are sinful.

Thank you that Jesus died that you might be able to move into our lives, turn our lives into temples, deliver us from that eternal, dark trash heap. Oh, I pray for that one here tonight, Lord, speak to his heart, speak to her heart. Cause that one to come to know Christ tonight.

I pray in Jesus' name, amen.