(1986 Prairie Series) 9 - David Forgot to Remember — Major Ian Thomas

Well, thank you so much. I'd like to say how very thankful I am for the very real privilege that has been mine each morning in this way to share with you the good things of our Lord Jesus and as This is the concluding session of this particular series each morning.

I just like to Thank you for the privilege of talking to you For the courteous way in which you've listened and trust that beyond your wildest dreams. You'll continue to prove the adequacy of the one who is God in the man is never ever less than big enough because That's the truth That is the truth.

The Christian Life as a Miracle Through Christ

I can do all things That would sound like the boast of a braggart if it went for the fact that the Apostle then went on to say Through Christ Who is my strength? In other words, all I got to do is let him demonstrate how big God is and Prepared to be in a man who knows he's that small that apart from who he is He is nothing has nothing and can do nothing but because of who he is living where he does all that he is.

I've got I Can't have more and never in never need to enjoy less. That's the sublime simplicity of the gospel. The Christian life is a miracle. Because a Christian is somebody who cannot possibly happen Apart from Jesus Christ God looked into the heart of a small young Teenager boy with a bunch of sheep on a hillside and God said I've got a king.

I've got a king. Because you see as he looked into the heart of that boy he knew that there was a boy who knew that God was bigger than bears bigger than lions bigger than Giants and Was prepared by disposition of heart called the perfect heart to let God prove it and he did.

I Got a king for the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth looking for any boy girl man a woman anywhere. Whose heart being perfect toward him is prepared to allow God to show himself strong on his or her behalf.

In other words David had learned a principle to live by. A Principle that was shared by his great great great grandson Who learned from the first ways of his father Asa and from his father David a principle to live by.

David’s Testimony in Psalm 116

And in the 116th Psalm to which we'll turn this morning David bears his testimony. If I may just mention to the folks back there on my left in the corner. Those folks coming in who don't know where to sit tell them to come straight down here.

There's some very very comfortable seats here in the corner just as hard as the ones you're sitting on so Don't let them wander embarrassed at the back. Just push them forward. There are some more here, too in this 116th Psalm David bears his testimony.

This is what he says. He says I love the Lord because he hath heard my voice and my supplications. Because he hath inclined his ear unto me therefore while I call upon him Invoke his divine activity reckon with who he is and let him loose as long as I live.

I've learned a principle to live by. I've discovered that God cares enough to listen and I've discovered that he's big enough to do something about it. It's a principle to live by. It's the principle that he learned as a kid on the hillside when he knew that God was bigger than bears and bigger than lions and bigger than Giants.

But then surprisingly enough then in his testimony he goes on to say in verse 3 the sorrows a Death compass me and the pains of hell got hold upon me. I found trouble and sorrow. That's the cry of a man in distress At the end of his rope on his back.

What he's saying is that I was afraid to die and I wasn't even fit to live. Because you see David Too was numbered amongst those of whom we read in God's Word who forgot To remember how kind God is to remind us of these things.

That our noblest and our very best Even Though numbered amongst God's friends and those whom he could choose. We're but an earthen vessel that which simply contains the treasure. That always and at all times the excellency of the power may be of God a God who knows the worst about us and incredibly loves us just the same and there's only one who loves like that and Jesus is his name.

He forgot to remember. And there came a day when committing murder by proxy Sending a man to the forefront of the battle knowing that he would die so that he could steal his wife David. David Forgot To remember.

David’s Repentance and the Simplicity of Faith

And as we sit here this morning you can allow the Holy Spirit who searches the hearts To remind us of those occasions when we have forgotten To remember the sorrows of death compass me the pains of hell gat hold upon me.

I found trouble and sorrow. But then in my extremity then called I upon the name of the Lord. Oh Lord I beseech thee deliver my soul. Gracious is the Lord and righteous. Yeah our God. Our God is merciful.

The Lord preserveth is simple. When I got back to the basic simplicity of my relationship to God He had mercy. He preserves the simple. I Was simple enough to realize that I was nothing that God is everything.

That I'm only at home base when I'm prepared to be who he bit prepared to let him be who he is the Creator and I just the imperfect creature. I Was brought low he says in verse 6 I was on my back and he helped me.

Of course his confession as all of us know is found recorded for us in the 51st Psalm against thee. The only have I sinned and done this evil in my sight. Renew renew a right spirit restore to me that true disposition that lets you be who you are.

Regnant within every area of my being resident and president within my soul in the totality of my humanity. I want you to be God again. Restore a right spirit within me. Give me a clean heart what I don't have and then again sinners will be converted because a broken heart and a contrite spirit you will not despise.

And David together with Jehoshaphat was one of those who unlike Asa forgot to remember But not too proud To be reminded. So where did David rediscover the principle he had known as a teenage kid on the hillside in the moment of despair?

The sad thing is this that You and I normally either have to discover the principle that we never knew or be reminded of a principle that once we knew But then forgot. When we're on our bags. When we're reminded of our own inherent bankruptcy.

We are nothing have nothing and can do nothing all that the Lord Jesus was prepared though the creative Deity the God who threw the universe's into space when he came to assume your humanity and mine.

Humbled himself emptied himself made himself all that he knew man to be apart from God nothing incredible and born a human being. So that for every moment of his days he refused to allow there to be any possible Explanation for anything that he did or said or was.

But the father is God In his incarnate son as man without my father. I am nothing I can do nothing. I Have nothing even the words that I speak unto. I speak not of myself. They don't have their origin in me my father who dwells in me.

He does the work. We've reminded ourselves of this his disposition. Not a one who needed to repent but that disposition that cannot but be evident in those who've learned to repent. My doctrine isn't mine.

He that believeth on me said the Lord Jesus Doesn't believe on me. Extraordinary thing for the Lord Jesus to say. John Chapter 12 and verse 44. Jesus cried and said he that believes on me believeth not on me.

But on him that sent me all I'm doing in the discharge of my office as man is to allow my father to make Articulate upon my lips those things he wants to say. So when you listen to me speak you hear what God says.

Incredible that's why he went on to say he that has seen me has seen him that sent me because my office in the sinlessness Of my humanity is to be it's my father's office as God to act. That's why you see he saying to us as my father sent me I send you the Spirituality of what you're doing is never ever ever to be determined by the nature of the act only by its origin.

He never to be the object of your activity because then you become the origin of that Activity of which he is the object at all times the Lord Jesus and exclusively must be the object not of our activity doing your best for Jesus he's got to be the object of our faith that invokes his activity and Then he being the object of our faith becomes the origin of activity and the world doesn't see what we are doing for him.

The world Sees at last what he can do through us. And that's the Christian life. That's why it's a miracle, but it's so difficult to learn. And we're so slow to be reminded. But what a wonderful thing it is when it happens what release of his divine energy what emancipation?

Abiding in Christ’s Word and the Truth That Sets Free

Said he if only you'll abide in my word. You'll discover at last the truth. That's the divine principle it recognized it represents the divine logic and that truth the divine logic will set you free that I am through my indwelling Holy Spirit as Indispensable to you in your humanity as my father was then by the Holy Spirit Indispensable to my humanity that truth will set you free.

Because you'll then learn to look to me one step at a time as I so gladly looked to my father. One step at a time. I suppose it must be 15 20 years ago and a pastor went into despair in his backyard. He sat under a tree with his head in his hands and sobbed.

Like a child he was broken. He was not an insincere sincere man. He was he was a good man. He loved Jesus Christ. He believed the Bible he sought to minister to his people week by week. But he felt inside bankrupt burned out despairing.

Discouraged fit to quit and did and then he stumbled With tear-filled eyes back into the home and on a table in the sitting room. He saw a little paperback it was one of the many books that people in their goodness had offered him so that he might be Encouraged in his ministry for they recognized that he was discouraged, but he hadn't read it.

He was sick and tired of reading books. But for some strange reason on this particular occasion he picked it up and began to read it. It was a very excellent book. I wrote it. It was called the saving life of Christ mind you it isn't very smart because It took me 12 chapters to explain what God explains in one verse.

It can't be all that smart Romans 15 10 if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his son. There's the redemptive act that Peter had to discover. But that verse goes on to say if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his son much more a million times much more than knowing that your sins have been given that your Destination has been changed that you're going to heaven instead of hell much much more than that being reconciled.

We shall be saved by his life. The salvation comprehends not only the precious blood of the Lamb without blemish Verily foreordained before ever the world was but that we are born again by his resurrection From the dead because the life the only man that then had that life on earth for which man was made since Adam fell.

That life God's life that he laid down restored to him now by him is restored to us. For the Christian life is the life that he lived then in his own body lived now by him in yours and mine. That's why we can say to me to live is Christ.

I'm a Christian. For Christianity is Christ in you it in Every moment of every day. He made the great discovery That though he had thanked the Lord Jesus for his death for him and with no little zeal and no little skill and no little Sincerity he was doing his best for him.

He had never come to understand That the one who died for him was one who rose again to live in him and he discovered the truth that sets men free and it was Not he then that went into the pulpit the following Sunday.

It was Jesus Christ at last clothed with the redeemed humanity of a forgiven sinner who had discovered the substance of his faith Christ Himself not his gifts not his blessings not his ministry Himself.

Because that's what it takes to be a Christian. No, I didn't know anything about this. It was several years later that I got on a plane from New York via Atlanta Heading for somewhere else and There was a couple Who got on that plane in Atlanta and sat Alongside and we got into conversation and I discovered to my delight that they too were Christians and we had a time of rich fellowship together.

Ross and of Ella Arnott and I discovered they lived at Morristown said that in September. I was going to be in Knoxville for a conference there. They were very delighted because it's only 30 miles away.

They said we'll be there and they were on the Sunday morning. But you know in Morristown there lived that man who had gone out to his yard and wept under the tree in despair and they knew him and When he from their lips heard that I was going to be in Knoxville with some delight.

He said I'll Come to. Well, he wasn't there on the Sunday. But you know just towards the end of the message on Wednesday evening I could see through a sort of glass screen at the back of the church the silhouette of a couple of policemen and one of them came in and had a Conversation with one of the officers of the church he was trying to persuade him that there was a real emergency and that he should come forward and interrupt What was going on and and make the announcement?

He was trying to persuade him that I was nearly at the end of my message, which was a very optimistic view of the situation but finally anyway the policeman prevailed and this man came forward had a little conversation with the pastor and And I could see all this going on it was a little distracting so finally I said maybe somebody ought to make an announcement and with some relief the pastor got up and said is there a Bob Snyder here that was the name of that pastor.

He said there's a message. Would you please go to the back and he went? And when he went to the back the policeman said there's been an accident. Called the hospital. It's your teenage boy. And when he did he learned that on his motorcycle.

He'd been involved in a wreck. And his back was broken. His spinal cord was severed and he had never Walk again, and I was told later that that face of that man just lit up and his first reaction Lord Jesus Thank you.

You're big enough even for this. He was. They hadn't told the boy they left it to be the unhappy Responsibility of his dad to tell him when he went to see him in the hospital. I didn't speak to him that night I didn't know what had happened.

He was lying paralyzed totally from the neck down and Dan with somewhat of a smile in his face said dad. I'm gonna sell that motorbike. Which was a pretty good idea. I'd say not that there was much left I understand to sell but he said with what I get I'm gonna get one of those little motorbikes just for track stuff, you know in the hills.

And his dad said Dan You won't need that motorcycle or any other you see son. Your back is broken. Your spine is severed. You'll never walk again. He said you're kidding. No son. He said I'm not that's true.

I'm sorry but it's true. The kid thought for a bit and Then his face lit up. He said dad If that's what the Lord Jesus wants for my life That's okay. That's okay. Dan has never walked again. He's in a wheelchair.

But I'll tell you something it's okay. I'm glad that a man wept beneath the tree in his backyard so that out of despair from a little paperback He could discover that there is no situation in life that can ever arise at any time for which Jesus Christ can be less than big enough and That it could so demonstrate the truth of it in a man's life that his son Would discover the same principle from his dad.

That truth could rub off in the reality of Christ divine indwelling clobed with the humanity of a man out of despair discovered The substance of his faith. Now, that's what's so exciting about preaching Christ not Christianity.

Not The needs of the world just Christ if there's anybody who's fully aware and conscious of the needs of this world. It's our Lord Jesus. Give him the right to be God who came into this world to seek and save that which is love that which is lost.

Christ’s Indwelling Life in Human Weakness

Let our humanity be available to him to let all God loosen. What do you think he will do in our humanity made available to him who came to seek and save that which is lost? He'll be on the job. You don't have to twist his arm.

He's just on tiptoe to show himself strong at the behalf of any boy go man a woman anywhere. We'll let him show himself strong his strength make perfect. In our weakness, I got a call a phone call from Sebastopol in Northern, California on one occasion.

It was from the pastor of a church wondered whether I'd have lunch with him and one of his church members. I was in Los Altos at the time and he came down and we lunched together and it was an invitation to visit his church.

And he introduced me to the man who came with him. He said it's this man that's persuaded me to come and invite you. His name was Fred gentler at that time United Airlines as the other airlines needed navigators and he was one of them.

They don't need them now. Because you see the pilots don't fly the planes electronic devices do but the pilots still get paid anyway. You see it was by the persuasion of this particular gentleman that I was invited to that church and About two and a half years later.

I was there and I had a young fellow traveling with me as I do have now. Hope some you've met him Rick school. He's the son of our director in Sweden and This boy I had the job leading to Christ when he's a kid at 12 also in Florida.

He was in st. Petersburg and My watch didn't work and so I Asked him I could borrow his and he said yes on one condition. You don't wear it. Because there's a link in the chain that's weak and you get excited when you speak and you begin to wave your arms around and I know what's going to happen to my watch.

So I promised faithfully that I wouldn't wear it, but I have to admit on the Monday morning. I forgot to remember. And I wore it and sure enough I got excited my arms began to spin and up went the watch bounced off the ceiling landed on the floor.

And now neither of us had a watch that went The Next morning Fred Gentner the one-time navigator pilot of the United Airlines Who's a very dear friend of mine saw him again last fall though. He's now retired, but fantastically in business and Primarily amongst young people sharing the good news that he had to discover at infinite cost.

For he came the following morning to me with this watch the one I'm wearing right now. He said my wife asked me whether you'd receive it as our gift. Well, I said as a matter of fact it meets a very very real need at this particular moment of time.

And I'm so glad that I accepted the offer and received it. It's a good watch. That afternoon. He took me down to San Francisco where I had to British to visit British Airways to get a ticket that needed some Amendment and on the way he told me the story of this watch.

He said you see I only got converted fairly late in life. And I had a singularly unhappy marriage until finally my wife died in a mental institution. And we were childless. But I married again. I married a widow she had three sons and Her marriage to had been singularly unhappy.

For her husband was a brutal man. He was always involved in fights and brawls. Hostile he died and We married and I had Three step-sons, he said the younger of those boys was a very sweet sort of gentle-hearted boy very tender and a little nervous Self-conscious, but he was drafted into the United States services and sent to Germany and because of his tenderness and Sensitivity he had a very rough time his Commander gave him a very bad time until finally he became totally depressed and easy prey for those miserable wicked Individuals who push drugs got him first hooked on marijuana and then on the hard stuff until he shot His brain he was discharged from the United States services on medical grounds could hardly find his way home and one night His mother disarmed him took the gun out of his hand.

But during the night he left the home broke into his older brother's home took a gun from his gun case. And they found his body. The next day in the woods he killed himself. He said my oldest son stepson.

He inherited the violent traits of his dad. He too would be involved constantly in fights and brawls, but during his university career studying to become an architect He got over that disability and finally one day sitting in a restaurant discussing with the owner certain things that needed to be done.

A Long-haired greasy hippie type came in and was extremely vulgar to a girl and my older boy Rebuked him and this creature went out got a gun waited for him and shot him dead on the restaurant steps.

Within a few months I lost two boys. Happy to tell you that my middle boy is a fine Christian at that time. He was in Bible school. But he said it was then that I had to go on assignment to Okinawa in Japan.

And the bottom had fallen out of life, but I bumped into an American serviceman. He was a Christian and I for no one better to Tell the story. I unloaded my knee in my despair. And that young man said Why don't you go to the missionary bookshop and find a little paperback?

It's called The saving life of Christ. Well he did you know and there was just one copy and I believe if I remember rightly it was secondhand. He took it to the hotel and read it all night and made a great discovery.

That the Lord Jesus whom several years before he had received late in life as his Redeemer Was not only the one who had changed his destination and get him out of hell and into heaven. But the one who being risen from the dead came by the Holy Spirit to indwell his humanity and be in him at all times one who's never ever less than beginner and he found that release.

Of which Jesus said when you abide in my word, you'll know the truth and the truth will set you free. But he said you know though I came back and I Went and shared all this with the pastor and gave him one of those books poor man.

And he had to read it and that's why you're here now my wife Never recovered four years the room where my son Slept is today exactly as it was four years ago. Nothing's been touched. I gave him this watch when he was a kid and it's been in my wife's handbag for four years the symbol of her despair.

But last night when she came back from the meeting She took it out of her handbag and said would you give that to Major Thomas and he won't take it throw it in the river. And I realized that the clouds had begun to open and the Sun had begun to shine.

She too had discovered that Jesus is alive the message of the early church. This Jesus whom they crucify God raised from the dead and Of this we're witnesses not we only but by the one Through whom we share his life on earth the Holy Spirit.

He too bears witness that Jesus is alive. He came to raise the dead. That's why I'm so glad I took this watch and I've worn it much ever since to remind me of a boy with a broken heart who killed himself and I wish only I'd had maybe the opportunity long before it happened to introduce him to somebody who would have been big enough even For those circumstances that then seemed so heavy that they could not but crushed.

What a wonderful gospel. What good news God is entrusted to you and to me? But it's sad, isn't it that whether it to receive him as Redeemer or to enter into the good of his resurrection. We so often have to be on our back Scraping at the barrel at the end of our rope.

Walking Before the Lord in the Land of the Living

I was brought low and he helped me return return. Now he said with some joy in his heart return unto thy rest. Oh my soul. The Psalmist has discovered that rest is the natural habitat of the soul. That's united Under the sovereignty of a living God mind emotion and with restored to harmony recognizing his headship.

The Lord hath dealt bountifully with me. This is how he puts it Thou hast delivered my soul from death mine eyes from tears and my feet from falling. I'll walk. Now I'm gonna walk before the Lord. In the land of the living, isn't that a lovely expression.

He said I'm going to be numbered now amongst those who have been raised from the dead. I've discovered a principle to live by. I'm gonna walk before the Lord ever conscious Cognizant that he's there Caring enough to listen and always big enough to do something about it.

I'm gonna walk before the Lord. Do you remember that verse that I quoted the other evening from the Amplified New Testament in the Third chapter of Paul's epistle to the Philippians. This is what he meant.

Only that I might know him this my determined purpose that I may progressively one step at a time Walking become more deeply and intimately acquainted with him perceiving recognizing Understanding the wonders of his person more strongly and more clearly that I may in that same way come to know the power outflowing from his resurrection that which it exerts over believers that if possible I may attain to the spiritual and moral resurrection that lifts me out from among the dead even while still in the body.

I'm going to be numbered amongst those who by the indwelling presence of Christ have been lifted out of that state of death in which I in common with all mankind since Adam fell were born. For he came to give us life.

Walking before the Lord in the land of the living lifted out from among the dead even while still in the body. I know how to be abased and live humbly in straightened circumstances. I know also how to enjoy plenty and live in abundance to me.

Now. It's a matter of total irrelevance. I've learned in any in all circumstances the secret of facing every situation whether well-fed or going hungry. Having a sufficiency and despair or going without being one.

So what? If only I'm in the place where God put me strength for all things in Christ who empowers me. I'm ready for anything equal to anything through him who infuses inner strength into me. He is my life.

That is I'm self-sufficient in Christ's sufficiency. Because in him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. And I'm complete in him in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and of knowledge.

In whom I've been blessed with every spiritual blessing in heavenly things. The one in whom I can reign in life by one Christ Jesus not just get by but be more than conqueror. Through him that loved me.

I'll walk before the Lord in the land of the living. Is that where you're walking today? Walking before the Lord not in self-opinion. Not in bravado, but in a consciousness of your need. Having graduated out of despair recognizing your bankruptcy.

That you were so engineered by God that the presence of the Creator within the creature is at all times indispensable to his humanity. That man in normality is to be distinguished from the animal kingdom by a quality of life that cannot possibly be Explained apart from God in the man because the Christian life is a miracle.

It's not sensational or spectacular, but it must be miraculous in the nitty-gritty. The little things that nobody else notices. Those things that God looked at in the heart of a teenage girl and said to Gabriel.

She has found favor. Those things that God looked at in the heart of a little boy when there was nobody around. Save a lion and a bear and they didn't live to tell the story. But God's eyes. God's eyes were watching watching watching.

He wasn't looking for anything spectacular in the presence of the crowd who could applaud and glorify the man. Only Jesus looking unto him. I'll walk before the Lord in the land of the living. I Believe therefore have I spoken because out of my experience of his adequacy I've got something to say.

Thanksgiving as Dependence on Divine Activity

What he says. Verse 12. Shall I render unto the Lord for all his benefits toward me? What can I give to God that would requite his kindness and his mercy? How can I reward him. And. The service finds himself in a great dilemma because he discovers that God is too rich.

And he's too poor. What can I give. And he comes to the conclusion that he has nothing to give? That isn't already by right. God's so says he. In order to requite his mercy that he might know my gratitude.

Verse 13. I will take the cup of salvation and. And Invoke his divine activity knowing that only that which has its origin in him can ever be eternally legitimate. I'll take. I'll take the cup of salvation and drink deep.

I'll recognize all that God had in mind in sending his son not to get me out of hell and into heaven. But to get him back out of heaven into me. And all I can do now is take. Take and say thank you for said he.

Verse 17. I'll offer to give the sacrifice of Thanksgiving and I'll call upon the name of the Lord. You understand what that means in every step. He takes no matter what the situation he calls upon the name of the Lord.

He invokes his divine activity. He bows himself out and bows got in marvelous walking before the Lord in the land of the living. Take and say thank you. Rejoice evermore pray without ceasing. In everything give thanks not for everything.

For there are many things in life for which we could not possibly thank him, but in the midst no matter how threatening how dark how dangerous. In everything give thanks because he's never big enough never less than big enough.

And if he's never less than big enough and you're prepared to let him loose in the world in which you live you're left with. No option, but to do what God's Word says. The 19th verse 5th chapter last of the first epistle to the Thessalonians.

Don't quench the spirit. Don't quench the spirit in everything give thanks. This is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you. Don't believe that you can because you can't but know that He can and he will if you let him if you let him marvelous.

Missionary Fruit Through Christ’s Sovereign Work

You know, it's my privilege some years ago to be in Aden in the South Arabian Peninsula the invitation of the Sudan interior mission. People in whom I've learned much to love in many parts of the world.

I Was there just for three days for a mission, which was not only the Sudan interior mission. It was a sort of intermission sparked by SIM. We had to meet in the barracks because of the terrorist activity.

We had barbed wire all around us and Some netting so that nobody put a hand grenade in the offering. It was quite exciting. I Was staying with a very delightful man called bud a cord whom some of you might know.

He's now the representative for the Western States lives near, Colorado rather near Denver Colorado Springs and He hadn't a clue what I was talking about not a clue When I was talking about the life of Christ the sole source of anything legitimate.

That anything that we may do no matter how skilled no matter how devotedly With the best will in the world can be of any ultimate intrinsic value. If it doesn't have its origin in Jesus Christ. He'd been sweating it out for God for so long that to comprehend the rest that is theirs whose hearts have been united in that recognition of his soul and Exclusive lordship of our lives.

It just was so hard to penetrate but you know on the last afternoon we had some prayer together with one or two others in the team before the evening meeting and I just turned to this 116th Psalm take And say thank you.

I didn't know because you seldom do That then the Holy Spirit had taken the truth in general and applied it to his heart and made it the truth in particular. That's his business you and I can't do that.

That's why you can't legislate righteousness and you can't twist people's arms to make decisions for Jesus if you do. You won't accomplish anything save the wood the hay and the stubble of a wasted life that they'll go out in flames and leave you standing in a heap of ashes.