Wonderful

We are considering in these Sunday evenings the marvelous names of our Lord in Isaiah chapter 9, verse 6, a verse familiar to us that applies to the coming millennial kingdom when our Lord Jesus shall reign, for unto us a child is born, that speaks of his humanity, unto us a son is given, that speaks of his deity, and the government shall be upon his shoulder. And we're suggesting that when the government of our lives is on his shoulder, then what he is becomes very real to us.

And the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. His name shall be called Wonderful, that takes care of the dullness of life. He brings wonder and beauty and amazement to life.

His name shall be called Counselor, that takes care of the decisions of life, the Mighty God, the Demands of Life, the Everlasting Father, or the Father of Eternity, the Dimensions of Life, the Prince of Peace, the Disturbances of Life. And tonight we discover that his name is called Counselor. Every one of us at some time or another needs guidance and counsel.

Many years ago a book was written called Where People Take Their Troubles, and a research team studied to find out where people did take their troubles. It's amazing where they go, it's amazing how many people in the city of Chicago, when they have problems, go to a local bar, talk over their troubles with their drinking buddies or with a bartender. Many, you'd be surprised to discover, go to a fortune teller or a palm reader.

There are some who go to one kind of quack or another. There are some who would go to a pastor or a doctor or a lawyer or a trained counselor or psychologist or possibly a psychiatrist. In the state of Illinois you have to have credentials before you can hang out a shingle that says, I will counsel you, and this is probably a good thing.

For the believer, Jesus Christ is the Counselor. The disciples said to him, To whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life, and we believe and are sure that thou art that Christ, the Son of the Living God. You and I, as believers in Jesus Christ, can go to him for counsel.

I trust that this statement will not be misunderstood, but far too many Christians do not avail themselves of Jesus Christ, the Counselor. When some difficulty comes or some problem comes along, our first inclination is to reach for the telephone and call a friend or make an appointment with a pastor. Of course, pastors are available and friends are accessible, but I want you to know that you will never grow in your Christian life if constantly you have to lean on the Lord's instruments instead of on the Lord's.

I don't want to be misunderstood as I say that. I'm glad when people avail themselves of spiritual counsel, but you know, I have come to the conclusion that many people who seek counseling don't really want counseling, they want consoling. They want to be told that what they're doing is fine and go right ahead.

If you tell them otherwise, they get a little disturbed. I have a friend who is now a professional marriage counselor. I mean by that he has earned a doctor's degree in the field.

He's also a very capable preacher and teacher of the Word of God, a very gifted man. He told me an interesting thing. He said, you know, when I was a pastor and I was dispensing spiritual knowledge and counsel with people, they didn't do what I said, because I found out why, it was free.

So when I became a marriage counselor and I started charging $25 for a 40-minute session, people started doing what I told them to do. I said, of course, that's part of the therapy, and it is. It's rather interesting that you and I will try to avail ourselves of free advice, free counsel, and so often we don't do what's told.

Jesus Christ is the only counselor who really can help us. When you come to your pastor for help, all I can do is turn you over to Jesus Christ. I can try to help to remove some of the obstacles that stand between you and the Lord, but ultimately it's Jesus Christ who has to do the counseling.

Isn't that true? And the sooner you and I learn that he is the counselor, the better off we're going to be as Christians. Now the fact that Jesus Christ is called the counselor indicates several very important truths to us, otherwise he would not have this name. It indicates, first of all, that you and I need counsel.

Jesus Christ was given to meet our needs. I'm a sinner, he's my Savior. I'm a man, he's my counselor.

Jesus Christ is called the counselor because he knows that you and I need counsel. Now why do you and I need counsel? Well, it's because it's just not possible for you and me to direct our lives the way we ought to direct our lives. The psalmist wrote, the Lord is my shepherd, which means we're sheep.

You can meditate on that a long time. Why does the Lord call us sheep? Well, of course, a sheep is a clean animal and we're saved people. We're not unclean.

A sheep is a useful animal. You can fleece sheep and sometimes we do that. A sheep is prone to wander.

Jeremiah hit the nail on the head over in Jeremiah chapter 10, verse 23. He said this, Oh Lord, I know that the way of man is not in himself. It is not in man that walketh to direct his steps.

And so you and I need a counselor. The fact that he is called the counselor indicates that you and I need counsel. Why? Because we can't direct our own way.

It is not in man that walketh to direct his steps. Now if that offends somebody, you'd better examine your heart. Because the more we walk with the Lord, the more we discover how easy it is not to walk with the Lord.

For example, your heart and my heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Who can know it? You follow the inclinations of your own heart and you may end up out in the wilderness someplace. The heart is selfish.

We have mixed motives. I don't care who we are. When we make decisions, we have mixed motives.

Whenever I hear that phrase, mixed motives, I remember the story the fella told me about the man whose mother-in-law drove his new Cadillac over the cliff. Mixed emotions. Well, we have mixed motives.

Now we like to think that we're doing what we're doing for the glory of God, are we? What we're doing, we're doing because we love the Moody Church. We're doing what we're doing because this is what the Bible says, right? Let's face it, folks. We have mixed motives that we don't always understand ourselves.

There are deep recesses to the human heart that we have never explored. But God knows the heart. He's the one who searches the mind and the heart, and therefore we need counsel.

Something else is true about you and me. Our minds are very limited. Now I know there are those of you who feel omniscient, and I admire you.

I saw a cartoon recently that showed a man lying on the psychiatrist's couch, and the psychiatrist was sitting there with his pad, writing down, and the man was saying, quote, the man on the couch was saying, quote, and on the seventh day I rested. Well, it's possible that there are people who think that they're God, but we aren't. Our minds are limited.

We don't know all that there is to know about ourselves, let alone about this great big complicated world. And certainly none of us here can see the future. Now, there are those who think they can see the future.

I have my doubts about it. You and I have a heart that is deceitful and a mind that doesn't have all the wisdom. Something else is true.

We're living in a world that puts pressure against us. Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly. And I'm telling you, folks, it's getting harder and harder to determine the counsel of God and the counsel of the ungodly.

Oh, I'm not talking about should I get drunk or stay sober. That's obvious. You take the kind of thinking that's abroad in the world today.

I tell you, it is so subtle. And apart from the direction of God, you and I are going to go off in the wrong direction. Of course, on top of that, there's the deception of Satan.

Oh, what a deceiver he is. Oh, you say he can't deceive me. Well, he did a good job with some people in the Bible.

David was no second-rate saint when it came to knowing the will of God, and Satan certainly deceived him. You and I desperately need guidance. Now, that's not the only reason why we should get counsel from the Lord.

Because we need it. There's another reason. The only way we can grow is by getting counsel from the Lord.

Now, I want to repeat that. The only way we can really grow is by getting counsel from the Lord. Let me tell you what many saints want.

They want God or the church or the preacher to hand them a book of rules, to hand them a road map. You know, if you belong to Chicago Motor Club and you call them up and say, I'm driving to New Orleans and I'd like to have a guide, well, it's marvelous what they'll give you. They give you these flip-over maps.

They'll have little sections, and some dear soul down there has taken a yellow pen and drawn. And here's the whole thing. You know, and it even says at this point there'll be a stop sign.

The whole thing is right there. I followed one of those once from Cincinnati way up to Canadian Keds. It's a good thing I had it.

I would have ended up in the middle of Mississippi someplace. You say, well, why would you go out and do that to me? You know, I want to know who I'm supposed to marry and when I'm supposed to get married and what kind of flowers they're supposed to carry and what songs are supposed to be sung and how much the wedding should cost. I want to know all these things.

I got news for you, friend. You ain't going to get it. You know why? You'd never grow that way.

You see, God doesn't give you a road map. He gives you a compass. Now, there are some road maps in the Bible.

Don't go this way and don't go that way. They're pretty obvious. There are some red lights that flash.

There are some caution lights that flash. The Word of God is filled with positive and negative admonition. But you're not going to find a verse in there that says, Thou shalt marry Murgatroyd.

You know why? You'd never grow that way. When you were born into this world, you were born with all the faculties you needed to get along. And then you grew.

And you grew by eating and by exercising and by keeping clean. And a little baby turns over and Mother gets the phone, calls up Daddy and says, Today he turned over. I found him in the aquarium.

He turned over. Daddy says, There's something fishy going on there, huh? And then she calls him up and says, Hey, he got up. He's crawling.

Nail everything down. He's crawling. This is the way you grow.

Now, suppose Mother carried that baby around all the time. What does the little one want? Here's a 14-year-old kid sitting in the high chair being fed. He'd never grow this way.

You know, sometimes God makes it very difficult for us to know the next step because it's the only way we can grow. And he's called a counselor because you and I need counsel. It's the only way we can grow.

And this is what glorifies God. You know, and the unsaved watch us who are Christians and they see we're making decisions and we seek the mind of God and God shows us his will and we do his will. This glorifies God.

It really does. I feel so sorry for the dear unsaved people out there who just their minds are blinded. They don't know which way they're going.

They don't know what they're living for. It's tragic. And they get into some of these awful, awful, awful messes.

Sometimes the saints do too for the same reason. Disobeying God. Jesus Christ is called the counselor and that teaches me this truth that you and I need counsel.

Now, there's a second truth that comes from this name and it's this. That Jesus Christ is qualified to counsel us. He wouldn't be called the counselor if he weren't qualified.

Now, I cannot hang out a shingle that says certified counselor. I do give spiritual counsel. But if I were to become a certified marriage counselor or a psychologist, I'd have to go back to school.

And this is fine. There's nothing wrong with this because it's good just to keep these professions under control. Jesus Christ is qualified to counsel you.

Now, we could go through the word of God and find dozens and dozens of illustrations of this, but I'm going to take only one section of it. To me, one of the most beautiful counseling sessions anywhere in the Bible is in the Gospel of John, chapters 13, 14, 15, 16, and 17. We call it the upper room discourse where the Lord Jesus sits down with his disciples and counsels them.

He's the counselor. Now, you can find Jesus counseling sinners. In John chapter 3, he counsels Nicodemus, a brilliant religious man, and beautifully shows him he has to be born again.

In John chapter 4, he counsels a wicked Samaritan woman and beautifully leads her into salvation. It's marvelous to see how Jesus talks to sinners and leads them into the salvation experience. But we're talking tonight about the Lord Jesus Christ counseling believers.

Now, just think about John chapters 13 through 17, and you'll see how beautifully qualified Jesus is to counsel. First of all, he's God. He's God.

It says in John 13, 1, knowing that he came from God and that he went to God. He's God. In other words, we have a counselor who is omniscient.

We come to one who can look right into the very depths of my heart, into the depths of my mind, and know what I'm thinking about. He knows me. How many times I've counseled people, and after the session has been over and I've been thinking about it, I've thought to myself, I sure don't know that person very well.

There was something there I just couldn't put my finger on. But Jesus Christ is eternal God. Did you ever stop to think that he was the counselor way back in eternity before anything began? God the Father and God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, took counsel together, and they decreed that they would create, that they would make man.

That beautiful passage there in Genesis where it says, let us make man. They took counsel together and made man. Of course, back before any of this was done, they took counsel together and decreed that man could be saved.

Back in the counsels of eternity, Jesus was the counselor. He's God. Marvelous to have a counselor you can come to who is sinless, holy, harmless, undefiled.

He's God. Has perfect wisdom and perfect knowledge. This explains why many people don't want to talk to him.

I know some Christians who won't come and talk to him because he knows too much. I know there's something else in John chapter 13, that Jesus Christ is not only the eternal God, he's also man, and he has entered into my experience. I have talked with people who had no idea what I was going through.

They just had no idea. They'd never been through it. They might be professionals.

They might be trained, but you're talking to them, and you might just be talking about Jupiter or Saturn or the moon. They just had no concept of it. In John chapter 13, the Lord Jesus got down and washed their feet.

Remember that? In an act of humility, he really shamed their pride. It was just a picture to me of what he did. He came down to this earth.

He wants to be my counselor, and so much so, he came down and entered into the experiences of life that I go through. Everybody here at some time or another has said defensively, nobody knows how I feel. You know, when you were a teenager, you said that to your parents.

Nobody in this house understands me. Or you. That's a defense mechanism.

They understand us too well sometimes. You can never say, that's Jesus. He came as a baby.

He knew what it was to be a child. He knew what it was to be an adolescent. He knew what it was to be a carpenter, a worker.

He knew what it was to be born in a minority race. He knew what it was to be born poor. You can't come to him and say, Lord, you don't know what I'm going through.

He has entered into every experience of life, apart from sin. And then on the cross, he bore the full brunt of the judgment of our sin. He's God, but he's man.

And because he is God, he understands all. Because he's man, he has experienced this. And you get that knowledge and that experience together, you have a mighty wonderful counselor.

I know I have prayed with some of you and tried to counsel some of you, and I'm sure you've gone away and said, well, the pastor just didn't quite understand. And I probably didn't. I just haven't been through that.

But Jesus never says to you, I don't understand. He's God and he's perfect man. There's a third qualification of my Lord.

He loves us. He loves us. In John 13, it says, having loved his own, he loved them to the uttermost.

He loved us. And he loves us still. Now, because the Lord Jesus Christ loves you, he wants the very best for you.

I'm sure you've talked to counselors. Perhaps I've been among them. And you felt, well, this is very cold and cut and dried, very professional.

He could hardly wait till I got out, you know. Can you imagine a fellow coming and talking to a counselor and the counselor's reading the comics while the fellow's talking? Our Lord's not like this. He loves us.

And because he does love us, he accepts us. You can never come to him and say, oh, I'm afraid to tell you this. Even though we aren't acceptable, we are always accepted.

Even though he may not love what we do, he loves us. And we can always come to him because he loves us. Now, because he loves us, he always tells the truth.

Sometimes when you and I are looking for counsel, we look for somebody who won't tell us the truth. I've noticed that there are some Christians who run from one person to another just looking for the one who will tell them what they want to hear. So often people stop me.

Total strangers will stop me. And I say, I want to ask you a question about, oh, maybe marriage and divorce or maybe alcohol or maybe... And I say, now, wait just a minute. If you go to 10 different preachers, you'll get 10 different answers to this question because not all men agree on some of these things.

Are you looking for help or looking for support? There's a difference. Now, the Lord Jesus Christ always tells us the truth. And when he tells us the truth, he tells us the truth in love.

Now, here we are in the opera room and there's Peter. And Peter says, though everybody else is going to betray you and everything, I'll never do it. I'll go to prison with you.

Oh, he says, Peter, before this night is through, you're going to deny me. He tells the truth, but he tells the truth in love. Now, there are those people who are brutal when they tell you the truth.

I'm going to tell you this if it hurts. Oh, you don't want that. Nobody wants that.

All of us want the truth, so we want the truth in love. And Jesus is the perfect counselor because he speaks the truth in love. Something else I notice about the qualifications of my Lord to counsel is he's always encouraging.

You'll never find Jesus discouraging his disciples. Never. He said, I'm telling you these things so that when it happens, you'll know I'm telling you the truth.

He looked at their faces after he had announced that Peter would deny him and he just saw that their faces fell. He said, let not your hearts be troubled. Don't put a break between the end of chapter 13 and the beginning of chapter 14.

You know why their hearts were troubled? He was leaving them. But he had just said, one of you is going to deny me. He said, don't let your hearts be troubled.

Our Lord was always an encouragement. That's the kind of counselor I like. Someone who will take the pieces and put them together and encourage me.

I notice there's patience. It takes a lot of patience to counsel. There are times you'd like to take people and just shake them and say, look, get with it.

You can't do that. It's illegal to begin with. It's very spiritual.

Our Lord says a very interesting thing over in John chapter 16. Verse four. But these things have I told you that when the time shall come you may remember that I told you of them.

And these things I said not unto you at the beginning because I was with you. And down in verse 12. I have yet many things to say unto you which ye cannot bear them now.

That's patience. He says, now you are at this point spiritually so I'll tell you this. And then he says when you get to this point I'll tell you some more.

That's good counseling. A good counselor doesn't jam everything down your throat at one time. He gives you a chance to grow and to develop.

He says, okay, now you're ready for this. If I had told you this a year ago you couldn't have taken it. Our Lord Jesus Christ is the perfect counselor.

He's patient. I noticed something else about his counseling. Whenever the Lord Jesus Christ counsels he helps you understand your own heart.

He did this with the disciples. As he talked with them that evening hour in the upper room he opened up their own hearts and they saw their own hearts. Back in Proverbs chapter 20 Solomon, wise Solomon makes an interesting statement.

All you psychology students ought to mark this. Proverbs chapter 20 verse 5 Counsel in the heart of man is like deep water but a man of understanding will draw it out. You see, counseling doesn't mean giving advice.

The fellow who pumps the gas can do that. Counseling means drawing out those deep waters that are in your heart that maybe always you don't understand but the man of understanding draws them out. And Jesus Christ was able to open their hearts and draw out what was in it.

But the most beautiful thing about the Lord Jesus Christ as the counselor is seen when you get to chapter 17. He prays for the people that he counsels. He opened up the word to them.

He patiently shared with them. And then when it was all over he said now I'm going to pray for you. I pray for many people that I counsel.

I have names written down in my little prayer diary that I keep. And there are some times when I see a name and I just wrestle with God and say oh God I want to help this woman. I want to help this person.

I'm not sure I know how. Now give them direction and give me wisdom and we pray. But I can't pray the way Jesus prays.

Isn't it marvelous that we have interceding for us right now the heavenly counselor. And so Jesus Christ is qualified to be the counselor. There's a third truth that comes from this name.

Because he is called the counselor it means that you and I need counsel. If you resist that statement watch out. We all need counsel.

Because he's called the counselor it means that he's qualified to counsel. Thirdly because he's called the counselor it means that we can receive his counsel. It's possible for us as God's people to have Jesus Christ counsel us.

Now I see a bit of suspicion a bit of doubt on some faces. You say yes but he's not here on earth like he was before. No and it's a good thing he isn't.

Because then if he were talking to me he couldn't be talking to Johnny Washington. Or if he were ministering to somebody in San Francisco he couldn't be helping people in Chicago. Now they may need it more in San Francisco.

I don't know. But I'm glad that my Savior is not in his physical limited body on this earth. Because having gone back to heaven and having sent the Holy Spirit he is always with his people.

Now this leads us to the important question. If counsel is available to me how does he do it? What are the tools that Jesus Christ uses to counsel you? Well let's find them. Chapter 11 of Isaiah.

Verse 2. Isaiah 11-2. And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him. Meaning the Lord Jesus.

The Spirit of wisdom and understanding. The Spirit of counsel and might. The Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord.

The Holy Spirit of God works with the Holy Son of God to impart wisdom and counsel and might. Notice this. This is beautiful.

The Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him. The Spirit of wisdom and understanding. Now you try to solve your problems without understanding them you're in trouble.

You try to make a step without knowing what step you're making you'll make a worse step. The Holy Spirit gives us wisdom and understanding. He gives us counsel and might.

That means the strength to do what he tells us to do. So the first tool, if I may use that phrase, that the Lord Jesus uses to counsel you and me is the Holy Spirit. This is why you and I don't get the kind of guidance we ought to have.

We're not on good terms with the Holy Spirit. I just wish that all the people who were excited about the gifts of the Spirit would be excited about the guidance of the Spirit and the graces of the Spirit. Now if you're saved tonight, the Holy Spirit lives within you and he can guide you.

Paul wrote to the Colossians and said, Let the peace of God rule in your heart. As you know, that word rule is be the umpire. Let the peace of God be the umpire in your heart.

And when you hear that whistle blow, when you see that flag go down, boy, you better stop. When you lose that peace of God in your heart, you can rest assured that somewhere, someplace, we've made a wrong decision. Better stop, find out what's going on.

He gives us counsel through the Holy Spirit. Now that opens up a whole area of discussion that we won't go into now. Think of the Holy Spirit as your resident counselor.

And the next time something comes up and you're ready to fall apart, don't reach for the phone. Don't let your fingers do the walking. Just say, Holy Spirit of God, you're inside of me, you know all about me, now I need your counsel.

You have living within you the greatest counselor alive. And up in heaven praying for you is Jesus Christ the counselor. And our heavenly intercessor talks to our earthly intercessor for the Holy Spirit of God makes intercession for us with groanings that cannot be uttered.

And you have an unbroken fellowship, I trust, between the Holy Spirit in your heart and the Lord Jesus up in heaven, and they can give you counsel if you want it. Now if we grieve the Spirit or quench the Spirit or lie to the Spirit or resist the Spirit, we don't get much help. If the patient walks into the psychiatrist's office and begins to fight with the psychiatrist, he won't get much help.

Psalm 119, verse 24. Here's the second tool that our Lord uses to counsel us. The Spirit of God, Psalm 119, verse 24.

The Word of God. Thy testimonies also are my delight and my counselors. Now the Hebrew there says, Thy testimonies also are my delight and the men of my counsel.

He said I have the Word of God and the Word of God is to me like a group of men who counsel me. Are you fighting a battle? David fought battles. Get some counsel from David.

Are you carrying some burdens? Abraham carried some burdens. Get some counsel from him. Moses carried burdens.

Get some counsel from him. Are you taking steps of faith? Paul took steps of faith. Get some counsel from him.

Going through persecution? John went through persecution. Get some counsel from him. I tell you, my friends, here is the greatest guidebook, the greatest compass that ever you could have.

It's all here. And not only does the Word of God counsel us, but the Word of God transforms our minds so that we develop a spiritual radar and we can sense the way God is directing us. I recommend, again, before you reach for the phone, before you fall to pieces, talk to the Holy Spirit and open the Word of God.

Now, if you're the kind of a person who just opens the Word at random, God will never counsel you. You've got to read through the whole thing. And then when you get finished, go back and read it again and read it again and read it again and read it again.

Because as you saturate yourself with the Word of God, it becomes the men of your counsel. Now, Psalm 32 is the third tool that the Lord uses to counsel us. Psalm 32, verse 8, is the verse many of you have memorized.

I will instruct thee and teach thee in the way which thou shalt go. I will guide thee with mine eye. We sing a hymn that is based upon that.

All the way from earth to heaven I will guide thee with mine eye. What he's saying here is I will guide thee with mine eye upon thee. I'm going to keep my eyes on you.

Now, no counselor on earth can do that. You walk in, and I'm not criticizing them, it's just that they are limited. You go in and you see your counselor and you talk for 45 or 50 minutes and you pay your fee and you go out and that's the last he sees of you until next week.

Now, how would you feel if you turned around and there he was watching you? But God says, look, I want to make sure that you walk in the right direction. I'm going to guide you with my eye. Circumstances.

I'm going to make sure that circumstances are there to direct you. His eye is upon us. And he uses circumstances.

He watches to see which way I'm going to go and if he sees I'm going to go the wrong way. Circumstances start to show me which way to go in the right way. They're like those retro rockets that shove the rocket back into place again.

Now, circumstances apart from the word of God and apart from the spirit of God can be deceptive. But you take circumstances plus the word of God plus the spirit of God and it works together. He guides us with his eye.

He watches us. Circumstances. Proverbs chapter 27, we have a fourth tool the Lord uses to give us counsel.

Proverbs chapter 27 and verse 9. Ointment and perfume rejoice the heart. You'd much rather smell beautiful ointment and perfume than the city dump. So does the sweetness of a man's friend by hearty counsel.

God uses Christian people to give us counsel. I hear you've got to be careful. Somebody you may think is really spiritual may be very carnal.

You remember Rehoboam when he became king he went and asked the old man what should he do? They said, look, lower the taxes, be kind to the people, show them love. He went to the young man he'd gone to college with and said, what should I do? Oh, they said, you tell them that your little finger is fatter than your father's loin. Let them know you're really going to lay it on.

He listened to the wrong counselor. And as a consequence he got into trouble. But when you have the word of God and the spirit of God and the eye of God in circumstances oftentimes the counsel of a friend who knows the Lord can be very, very helpful.

These are the tools that God uses to counsel us. You see, Jesus Christ is not going to come down and sit in your dormitory room and say, hey, here's what I want you to do. But the Holy Spirit is there and the word is there and they work in your mind and your heart and he gives us counsel.

We close by asking this question then. If this counsel is available to me what must I do to get it? You and I need counsel. Jesus Christ is the qualified counselor.

What do you and I do to get this counsel? It's available to us through the word, through the spirit, through circumstances, through friends. What must we do? This is the hard part. It'd be much easier to put 50 cents in a slot and push a button and have it come out.

But you wouldn't grow very fast. I suggest to you that there are five conditions we must meet. I won't preach this.

I'll just drop it into your heart. You think about it. Number one, we must sincerely and honestly desire counsel.

We can never come to him and say, Oh Lord, I want you to show me what to do and if I like it, I'll do it. Many people have this attitude. They think the will of God is a la carte and it's not a la carte.

You take the whole thing. We must sincerely desire his counsel. You'd be amazed at how many people have come to see pastors who don't really want counsel.

They want ammunition. Go back home and say to their unsaved husband, I went to see the preacher today and he told me about you. One of the nice things about the judgment seat of Christ is that the Lord's going to straighten out all the things that we're supposed to have said that we didn't say.

We must sincerely desire counsel. Jesus says in John 7, 17, If any man is willing to do his will, he'll know the doctrine. Secondly, we must seek it.

We must seek it. The book of Proverbs makes this pretty clear. It compares seeking the will of God to mining for gold or precious stones.

My son, if thou wilt receive my word, Proverbs 2, lay up my commandments with thee, so that thou incline thine ear unto wisdom, apply thine heart to understanding. Yea, if thou cryest after knowledge, if thou liftest up thy voice for understanding, if thou seekest her as silver and searchest for her as for hidden treasures. He's saying it's work.

He's saying that the counselor's supposed to do the work, not in the Christian life. This is how you grow. Now, if I told you that in your backyard there was a silver mine, man, you'd go get shovels and picks and dynamite and whatever else you could get, and you'd start mining for silver.

If you discovered that there was a gold mine, you'd do the same thing. Now, here's the word of God. This is our silver mine, our gold mine.

This is our treasure house. And the Lord says, if you really want counsel and wisdom and guidance, then seek it. These people who get in their comfortable lounge chairs and drift off and expect God by some sort of evangelical osmosis to penetrate their sick skulls, and then they wonder why they don't know the will of God.

You know, sitting there with an empty mind, which is not too hard for some people, sitting there with an empty mind is a good way for the devil to work. He says, seek it. Throw some energy.

Do something. Sincerely desire it. Seek it.

The third step is to wait for it. Wait for it. Over in Psalm 106, verse 11, it talks about the Jewish nation.

They soon forgot his works. They waited not for his counsel. They waited not for his counsel.

Listen, if you don't know what to do, do nothing. Wait. Now, I don't know why the Lord keeps me waiting sometimes.

Sometimes it's because there's something in my life that needs to be cleaned up. Sometimes it's because he's got something better for me. I've noticed in my Bible, whenever the Lord delayed, he always gave them something better, always.

I don't know why God waits. People come and say, I've been praying, preacher, for six months about this and praying for a year. I don't know.

You don't know, but he knows, so we just wait. Wait. Wait on the Lord.

Be of good courage. He shall strengthen thine heart. Wait on the Lord.

I think the fourth thing is this. Accept it when it comes. Sincerely desire it.

Seek for it. Wait for it. And accept it when it comes.

Don't argue with it. Don't say, well, I want something better. The Lord knows what he wants to give to us and when he wants to give it and how he wants to give it.

Accept it. Don't bargain. Don't argue.

Accept it. And then obey it. When God says, here's my counsel, accept it and obey it.

You say, well, it doesn't make sense. That's all right. It doesn't make sense to God.

I might want to point out to some of our young theologians tonight a verse that will save you a lot of trouble. Even if you're not a young theologian, it may save you some trouble. Romans chapter 11, verse 33 and 34.

Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God. How unsearchable are his judgments and his ways past finding out. For who hath known the mind of the Lord or who hath been his counselor? I've got some very humbling news for all of us.

God does not need our advice. He didn't need it when he made the universe. He didn't need it when he created man.

He didn't need it when he planned salvation. God doesn't need my counsel. I need his.

And this stupid business of arguing with God when he says this is the way, walk ye in it, accept it, and do it. And an amazing thing happens. That counsel becomes very sweet to you.

You enjoy it. You appreciate it. And it opens the way for you to get more counsel.

It's in obeying that we learn. It's in doing that we grow. And thus Jesus Christ is the counselor.

Should someone be here tonight who has never been born again, the Lord Jesus would counsel you to trust him and be saved. That's the first step. Otherwise you go through life with your mind darkened, your heart deceived, your life under the control of the world and the flesh and the devil.

And so his counsel to you tonight would be trust Christ and be saved. If I speak to a disobedient, backslidden, rebellious Christian, his counsel would be repent. Get right with God.

If I speak tonight to a believer who is perplexed, his counsel would be trust and wait. Trust and wait. I know what I'm doing, says the Lord.

Just trust and wait. He is the counselor. His counsel is available to us.

The big question is are we available to do what he tells us to do? We give thanks, Father. We give thanks that heavenly counsel is available to us. Without money, without price.

Without appointment. Without delay. We can come, present our needs.

I pray, Father, that you'll help us sincerely to want counsel. Help us to seek after it. Lord, deliver us from being lazy.

Help us, oh God, to have a sincere desire to seek and to know your counsel. Now, Father, some here tonight are perplexed and some are discouraged. Some are wondering why you are waiting, and we don't know why.

We're praying that you will give wisdom and counsel by your word, through your spirit. And, Father, please keep your eye upon us. We're glad you've promised to do this.

Keep your eye upon us. We're so prone to wander. Direct us.

For that one who needs the Savior, I pray that tonight you might come and trust. In Jesus' name we pray.