I’ll Never, No, Never, No, Never Forsake! — James Jennings

We'll turn to Hebrews 13. I'm going to speak this morning on our triune God's promise to us that He will never leave you. Never, no, never forsake you. And one place we see this type of language used is in Hebrews 13.

God's Promise to Joshua, Solomon, and the Christian

If you remember Old Testament, we see it in Joshua 1. It's all over the Bible. But here, Moses has died and Joshua is going to take over. And in Joshua 1, the Lord says, just as I was with Moses, so I will be with you.

And then He says, I will not leave you or forsake you. What a comfort for Joshua. Taking over. Lord, are You going to be with me as You were with Moses? I am. Same thing happens later on. David is passing on.

Solomon is to rule. Is God the same? Is God going to forsake Solomon? And David said to Solomon his son, be strong and courageous and do it. Do not be afraid and do not be dismayed. For, so why should I not be afraid?

The Lord your God, even my God is with you. He will not leave you or forsake you until all the work for the service of the house of the Lord is finished. We have it other places in the Old Testament, but we get to Hebrews 13.

Here the writer is talking to the brethren. He's not speaking to some king. He's speaking to us who are priests of God. He's speaking to the Christian. He's telling them to let brotherly love continue in verse 1.

And then here He says in verse 5, keep your life free from love of money and be content with what you have because for God has said, I will never leave you nor forsake you. In view of this, we should confidently say, verse 6, the Lord is my Helper.

I will not fear. What can man do to me? You know, this is one example of many in the Scriptures where we get to comfort and reality that all the promises of God find their yes and amen in the Lord Jesus Christ.

And that these things said to kings and rulers are said to us. Promises to us, the Christian. And what a promise it is. You think about the word never. He says right here, I will never leave you nor forsake you.

Never! You know one thing that makes you think about it is eternal security. It makes you think about security. Never! The only one who can make the promise and has the resources and ability to keep it makes the promise to us, and He says never!

No time in the past, future, never! Leave. What's leave mean? It means to desert. It means to give up on. It means to let sink down. I will not let you sink down. I will not desert you. Others will. The Lord will not.

I will never leave you. And who's the you? We're going to see. It doesn't mean everyone. It doesn't mean all of humanity without an exception. It ultimately means the true believer. And Jons literal, you really get the idea of how strong the emphasis is in this verse.

Jons renders it this way. He has said, no, I will not leave. No, nor forsake thee. No, I will not leave. No, nor forsake thee. And that's kind of the language the hymn writer used when he wrote how firm a foundation.

It says, the soul that on Jesus hath leaned for repose, I will not, I will not desert to His foes. You catch that? I will not, I will not. That soul though all hell should endeavor to shake, I'll never, no never, never, no never forsake.

What a promise! We've seen that song all the time. I hope this morning that we'll be reminded of this reality. Hebrews 13, 5, and 6. And I hope that we can grasp more of the magnitude of this promise.

So often, our issue is grasping what God has said to us. We can read it. We can think about it. But are we fully grasping the promises that God has given to us? In one way, the Lord is saying to us all throughout the Bible, wherever I lead you, I will not leave you.

And there's great comfort for the Christian. Wherever he leads, he will not leave. Wherever he guides, he will not forsake. He's with us. He promises this to His children. He will not abandon us. He will not let us sink in the midst of the trials.

Now, I was thinking about how do I really bring out this idea? And I want to look at what the writer in Hebrews 13 is doing when he mentions four he has said, and so we can confidently say, well, look at that.

The Pain of Being Abandoned

But first, I want to think about this. I want to think about the pain that people experience when others leave them. Because the more we see the pain that you experience when people abandon you, all the more I think you appreciate the reality you're never going to experience that with the Lord if you're a Christian.

You're never going to experience that pain of God abandoning you even though others abandon. And there are different degrees to which this pain is felt. Someone leaves you. They abandon you. You've lost contact with them through death, through something else.

There's different degrees of pain. Now, think about family relationships. We'll kind of go from the hurt is a little to the hurt is a whole lot. Alright? The hurt is little to the hurt is a whole lot.

So, family relationships. You know, this is someone leaving. A child leaves to college. It can kind of hurt. You go in their room. They used to be there. They're no longer there. But do you still have communication with your child at college?

You do. So it's not a total abandonment. What about this? The child leaves by running away in rebellion. Does that hurt more than the child going to college? It is. Now when you call them, guess what?

The kid, they don't answer. They're rebelling. They ignore your phone calls. Think about death of a spouse. You have the husband. He leaves his wife through death in his 90's. Okay, that hurts, but it's not as much as the husband who dies suddenly in his 20's.

Right? The one was more expected. It's later on. The other was more unexpected. It was in young age. Or you think about this. The father of eight, he abandons his wife for another woman. You could say that's more painful than if my husband died because he actually did forsake me.

He didn't just leave through death, he left through abandoning me. Or you think about this. Imagine you're a parent. And you have a child. You love this child. You've even made him a garment specifically fit for him.

And then this child, you believe he's dead. Now his brothers actually sold him into slavery. You could say in some way this is like a child being kidnapped. And I'm talking about Joseph. And if you remember when Joseph revealed himself to his brothers, or before he revealed, he demanded that they bring the youngest sibling to him.

And what was his brothers' response? You want to think about emotional pain of losing someone? Genesis 44, verse 22, we said to my Lord, the boy cannot leave his father. You can't take him. For if he should leave his father, his father would die.

They believed their dad would die if they took the youngest brother. Because here he'd already lost Joseph. Now you take him. They just thought, he's going to die. He's not going to make it. People abandoning you, it hurts.

It hurts. There's other types of leaving. You think about Acts 15 .39. Paul and Barnabas had a sharp disagreement and there was a separation. That hurts. There's some pain there. Think about John 10. The hireling.

The wolves come and what's the hireling do? He's out the door. If you're in the church and the hireling leaves, it hurts. There's pain there. Think about Paul in Acts 20. He was talking all night. They had tears.

They wouldn't see him again. This is their last time to see Paul and it hurt. He could not stay with them. He had to leave. And then eventually, he left them in death. You see, Paul couldn't last with the believers forever.

He eventually had to leave. Our Lord God Almighty is the only one who will never ultimately leave us, forsake us, abandon us. Think about the Apostle Paul, 2 Timothy 4. All those in Rome deserted him.

I mean, you're going before Nero. You're facing what might in some ways be the biggest trial you could face. And all desert you in Rome. No one comes to stand by you. But what's the rest of the verse say?

But the Lord stood by me and strengthened me. You see, that's the reality. The Lord is the only one who can make this promise. He's the only one who can keep this promise. I can't tell my wife I'll never leave her or forsake her.

I might leave her in death. Who knows when? And sin, being as deceitful as it is, you can't say like Peter, I'll never deny you, Lord. You can only say, Lord, by your grace, I will remain faithful to the end.

We are cast upon the Lord. You know, you think about the Bible. Talks about leaving, abandoning, forsaking. In one way, in Isaiah, he kind of paints this picture. He shows us a relationship in which you would think the person would never, ever forget that certain individual and they do.

And that's the mother with a newborn. You know, we've got our two week old baby Caleb. My wife does not forget little Caleb. His scream, his cry. Even if he wasn't crying, she would not forget to feed him, to care for him.

Isaiah 49 says this in verse 14. Zion said, the Lord has forsaken me. The Lord has forgotten me. Verse 15, can a woman forget her nursing child? That she should have no compassion on the son of her womb?

Even these may forget. Even that is possible. And yet, our God says, yet I will not forget you. Behold, I have engraved you on the palms of My hands. Your walls are continually before Me. So even a situation where you think there's no way.

There's no way that mother will forget her child. Stuff like that happens. It was even found on the news. Sadly, a four month old baby boy, he was left in an indoor swing for more than a week. Four months.

He weighed seven pounds. He died of malnutrition, dehydration, and his diaper was not changed. An infection happened. E. coli. And he died. He was being eaten by maggots. The deputy said this when he got there, the facts of this case go far beyond neglect and show circumstances manifesting an extreme indifference to human life.

That happens. There is indifference. People forsaking people. People forgetting their nursing babes. Yet here, we are the few who have someone make a promise to us who absolutely will keep it. And he says, I will never leave you.

There's a great comfort there. We all are going to suffer the loss of our loved ones. Hurts happen. Life is unstable, but God remains. And let's secondly think about this. Who is making this promise? If you look at Hebrews 13, here in v. 4, it just talks about God will judge.

The Triune God Who Can Keep His Promise

And then he says, keep your life free from the love of money and be content with what you have for He. Is that God? The Father? I would lean towards that. For He has said, I will never leave you nor forsake you.

Yet ultimately, whether we ask, is it the Father? Is it the Son? Is it the Holy Spirit? I would say it's our triune God. He's given us the Spirit, as we're going to see, to be with us forever. And yet the Son has said, I'm with you always even to the end of the age.

So, my most comforting thing to think about when I think, for He has said, you think, our triune God. It's not just one person of the Trinity, but our God has said He will not leave us. He will not forsake us.

And again, this is the only one who can make this promise. There's no one else who can promise you I will never leave you. Parents cannot say that to their kids. Because you might leave in death. You might leave in the hardness of sin that you don't even expect would happen, and it does.

There's only one who can make such a promise and fulfill it, and He makes that promise for us. Think about it. Our God has the guaranteed longevity to make this promise. He never dies. I don't have the guaranteed longevity to make the promise and keep it.

God does. Our God is unchangeably consistent. So He can make a promise, and since He's unchangeable, He's going to make sure and keep it. He never lies. That's not true of us. Think about it. Do I have the unlimited resources and sovereign power to make that promise and make certain it never happens?

I don't. But God does. He owns the cattle on a thousand hills. You think about Philippians 4 .19 when we're going through chapter 4. My God will supply all of your needs according to His riches and glory in Christ Jesus.

He's got full supply for us. Think about it. Our God has the awareness. It says the Lord Jesus could sympathize with us in our weaknesses because He was made like us in every respect except sin. And our God is able to fulfill such a promise.

He's sensitive to us. He does not sleep. He does not slumber. Think about it. Our God is able to keep this promise because He has the patient love that even in our shortcomings, He's able to be loving.

Even if I make that promise to my family, obviously, I can't make that and keep it. But what happens when they don't give me the love I think? I think it's harder to love them. And I might fail in some way.

Our God is long-suffering. He's faithful. He's omnipresent. He's omniscient. Third question here is what is the promise? If you look, he says in v. 5, I will never leave you nor forsake you. If someone promises to never leave, they're also promising what?

To be with. If they say I'll never leave, the implication is they're going to be with. And that's exactly how it was worded in the Old Testament. Our God will be with you. And then He says He will never leave you.

So God's promising not just to leave, but to be with. Even as the Lord said, and behold, I am with you always to the end of the age. So it's not just a promise to leave. It's a promise to be with. And even as the writer here says, in view of this, we can confidently say something.

We should be saying the Lord is my Helper. So if I believe that the Lord will not leave me, then I'm also believing He's there with me as my Helper. And if I really believe He will not leave me or forsake me, then I should be confidently saying, Lord, You're my Helper.

You're the one who's going to help me. I will not fear what man can do to me. So He's with us. He who does not change. He who does not lie. He who does not sleep or slumber. He's with us. He's observing us.

He's in control. He sustains the universe with the Word of His power. He's watching over us. As John G. Patton said, here he was on this island of cannibals, constantly facing death. And he said, my peace came back to me like a wave from God.

I realized that I was immortal till my Master's work with me was done. He had peace. I don't need to fear. The Lord is my Helper. He is my Protector. No, never, no, never will He forsake. Okay, a fourth thing.

What the Promise Does Not Mean

What does I will never leave you not mean? What does I will never leave you not mean? I would say this, it's not referring to God's omnipresence. In one sense, God who's omnipresent is present everywhere, even among the lost.

He sees what they're doing. And there's a record, and they're going to be judged based on what they did, good or bad in the body. He's seeing all they do. So this leaving and forsaking, he's not talking about the omnipresence of God.

He's talking about God being with the Christian in a unique way. A way that He's not with everyone. He's helping us, as it says in v. 6. The Lord is my Helper. I will never leave you. What does it not mean?

It doesn't mean we won't suffer. You think about 2 Corinthians 4. He says we're afflicted in every way, but not crushed. We're perplexed, but not driven to despair. We're persecuted, but not forsaken.

So the promise that God will not leave us or forsake us does not mean we will not face persecution, but it does mean when we face that persecution, we will not ultimately be forsaken. We might be struck down, but we will not be destroyed.

We're always carrying in the body the death of Jesus. So God is with us in our suffering. Another thing that it does not mean, it does not mean there won't be times you don't feel that you've been forsaken.

We hear the Lord will not leave me or forsake me. That doesn't mean we won't feel that. Even our enemies will tell us God has forsaken us. Psalm 71, David says, for my enemies speak concerning me. Those who watch for my life consult together and say, God has forsaken Him.

Pursue and seize Him, for there is none to deliver Him. What does it not mean I will never leave you? It doesn't mean that there are not times as a Christian that we grieve the Holy Spirit and the Lord's nearness does leave us.

He's not as near as He was. There's something grieved in our relationship with the Lord. His felt presence, His felt nearness is not near as it was. Let's pray. Father, I just pray for Your help, Lord, quicken my mind.

In Jesus' name, Amen. What does it mean that He'll never leave us? It doesn't mean Christ didn't actually leave bodily when He died. Right? Here Christ is with you. Yet He says, I'm always with you. Well, John 12, He says, the poor you'll always have with you, but you do not always have Me.

Well, sure, you don't always have Him there in the body right by you. He says in John 13, little children, yet a little while I am with you. You will seek Me just as I said to the Jews, so now I also say to you, where I'm going, you cannot come.

John 14, and I will ask the Father and He will give you another Helper to be with you forever. So the Holy Spirit's going to be with us forever. Again, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, our triune God, will not leave us.

Different persons of the Trinity are in our Father's fatherly discipline will not leave. The Spirit's convicting work will not leave. Christ's intercession for us will not stop. So a fifth question. What does believing this promise produce in us?

Confidence, Contentment, and Looking to the Lord

What does it produce if I believe this? Look back at Hebrews 13. Number one, it should take away fear. I will never leave you nor forsake you. And in view of this, so we can confidently say, the Lord is my Helper, I will not fear.

So if I believe that God will not leave me, then I should not fear because in the situation that is so fearful, He is with me. It should give us confidence. So we can say, I will not fear. No. So we can confidently say, the Lord is my Helper, I will not fear.

So when you believe this promise, it should create confidence. It should take away fear. Why do we often fear in tough trials? Because we don't believe the Lord is with us. We might question it. Lord, are You really with me?

Have You really orchestrated this circumstance and put me in it? Why do we fear man? Because we look at what man can do. But when we realize the Lord is with us, we realize man can only do what God allows them to do anyways.

What's another thing this promise should produce in us? A continual looking to the Lord. Here He says, I will never leave you nor forsake you. And what does that produce? We confidently say, the Lord is my Helper.

It produces people who are continually looking to the Lord for help. Another thing, if you believe this promise, it should take away coveting and discontentment. It should subdue it. He says right here, keep your life free from the love of money and be content with what you have.

Why should I be content? Why should my life be kept free from love of money? Because He has said, I will never leave you nor forsake you. So believing that promise allows me to be content. Because I believe, you know what?

Even in this poverty, the Lord's not left me, He's brought me into the poverty. Even in this sickness, the Lord's not left me, He's brought me into it. So now I can be content. I don't need to be discontent in this.

Believing God's promises, that He'll never forsake us, they produce contentment. In a subtle way, the believer who's discontent is believing that the Lord has left them and their present circumstances are not brought about by God.

Christ's Forsakenness as the Basis of Our Assurance

So sixth thing, what is the basis for which the Lord can promise to never leave us? What is the basis for which the Lord can promise to never leave us? And I would say the answer's found in Christ leaving glory and coming down and taking upon Himself an addition of human flesh and living His perfect life going to the cross.

Why can this promise be made to us? Ultimately, because of Christ. Because of what He has done on the cross. You think about Ezekiel 16. It says when we were born, we were cast out. Talking about Israel, it's a picture of all of us in our sin.

We were cast out on the open field in our blood. What else does it say? It says the umbilical cord was still attached. You want to talk about being abandoned? You want to talk about being left to die?

That's how we were in our sin. And yet, the Lord has come and He has taken us in. He's come. John 16. Let's turn to John 16. I feel like I struggle sometimes. Sometimes I need to have people turning more in their Bibles.

I go too fast. I don't know. So we're thinking about our triune God promising to not leave us or forsake us. John 16. 32. Behold, the hour is coming, indeed it has come, when you will be scattered each to his own home and will leave Me alone.

So the disciples, they're going to leave the Lord Jesus. Right? We know it. They deserted Him. They fled. And look what He says here. Yet I am not alone, for the Father is with Me. So, all of men forsook Christ, abandoned Him right there.

John 8, He says something similar. He who sent Me is with Me. He has not left Me alone. For I am always to do the things that are pleasing to Him. Think for a moment. The Lord says to us, I will not leave you or forsake you.

Now how can He say that? What is the basis that He can say that? Here we see in John 16, He says, you're all going to leave Me alone. And then He says, I am not alone, for the Father is with Me. And I just ask this question.

The Father is with Me. The Father is with Me. Yet what happened on the cross? My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me? I would take that to mean Christ on that cross did have His Father forsake Him. So here He says, I'm not alone, for the Father is with Me.

So here, God says to us, I will not leave you or forsake you. Why can we have such a privilege of such a glorious promise? Because Christ, who we left, goes to the cross, and then there His own Father forsakes Him on the cross as our sins were placed upon His head and He was the scapegoat, He was the lamb from God to take away our sin.

And it says that in Isaiah 53. It was the will of the Father to crush Him. It was God's will to crush Him. You crush someone who you've turned your back on and forsaken. And in those three hours, and Christ said, My God, why have You forsaken Me?

I have a hard time, and maybe I'm wrong, but I have a hard time thinking at that moment Christ would have said, for the Father is with Me. Right there, in a good way, I would rather say the Father was with Him in a way of judgment.

The judgment we deserve being poured out upon Christ in our place. Smitten, stricken, and afflicted for us. And brethren, the reason the Lord will never leave or forsake us is that even after His disciples left Him, even after He left glory, He didn't need to do that.

He could have let us all perish and God would be just. Then He was left by us. And then ultimately, He was forsaken by the Father because He took upon Himself our sins. And the Father being just and the Justifier had to pour that wrath out upon His own Son.

And that's again, the great place of confidence. In Romans 8, Paul says there, He who did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up, He gave Him up for us all. How much more with Him will He not graciously give us all things?

And one of those gracious things that the Christian has is they're able to say I have a confidence that I have a Helper who will never leave me nor forsake me. As Jesus said, the Spirit is with you always.

Forever, it even says. I remember that verse right. Forever. He's with us. This should produce confidence in us. This should produce assurance in us. The Lord. Now, ask this question. What are the conditions of this promise?

Warnings, Perseverance, and the Conditions of the Promise

Conditions. What are the conditions of this promise? We have to ask this because verses like 2 Chronicles 15 -2, if you seek Him, He will be found by you, but if you forsake Him, He will forsake you. Or, turn to 2 Timothy.

In 2 Timothy 2, there's a strong warning. In verse 11, we're going to see Him saying, I will not leave you nor forsake you. Obviously, just like all the promises of God, it does not mean a person can go and live in true rejection of the Lord in sin and all is just going to be okay.

Yes, those who the Father has given Him, He will lose nothing. And all will be raised up on that last day. But there's going to be evidences that these people are His. And in 2 Timothy 2, verse 11, He says this saying is trustworthy.

This is a saying He's about to mention. If we've died with Him, we will also live with Him. If we endure, so we've died, we've been united with Christ, we live with Him. You get further on in the Christian life.

If we endure, then we'll also reign. So we're living with Him. Will we reign with Him? And then He says this, if we deny Him, He also will deny us. And then verse 13, a very misunderstood verse. And if I'm honest with you, I only got a right understanding of this verse this morning.

Sitting at the breakfast table and I didn't even have this verse, and Bethany said, what do you think He means? If we are faithless, He remains faithful. And heard one of those look-at-the-books by John Piper, and I left it knowing He's dead right.

What He says. So if you want a fuller understanding of this verse, I encourage you, Google John Piper's 10-minute teaching on it. If we endure, we'll also reign with Him. If we deny Him, He will also deny us.

If we are faithless, He remains faithful. Faithful to what? Faithful to what? This trustworthy statement that if you deny Him, He will deny you. And as he says, He cannot deny Himself. So this is actually a warning.

If we're faithless, He remains faithful. It's not a text to encourage you. It's a warning that if you go on, and he just used the word deny before, and then if you're faithless, He will remain faithful to Himself to deny you.

Because He cannot deny Himself. It's a warning. So yes, will the Lord never leave me nor forsake me? Yet it says if we forsake Him, He will forsake us. Well, many do forsake Him. We know that. 1 John 2 .19.

They went out from us because they were not of us. If they had been with us, they would have remained. If they had been with us, they would have remained with us. Butchered that verse a little. But there is a reality, a conditional reality.

We're enduring. Yes, are all those to the Father given to the Son? Are they going to make it? Is He going to keep them and none can snatch us from the Father's hand? Absolutely, that's true. Yet we have warnings like this that Paul gives.

And when he says if we deny Him, someone might say, well, Peter denied Him. Yeah, Peter denied Him. Sure, in Galatians, He messed up. He sinned. It's not mess up. That's a cheap way of saying it. He sinned.

He dishonored God. And yes, with Christ, He denied Him. But He went away and leapt bitterly. We're talking about one day of His life right there. This is not someone who's going on in absolute faithlessness and denial of the Lord.

It's not someone who has the appearance of godliness and denies the power thereof. So, many other verses. Isaiah,. But rebels and sinners shall be broken together, and those who forsake the Lord shall be consumed.

Isaiah 65,. But you who forsake the Lord, who forget My holy mountain, who set a table for fortune and fill cups of mixed wine for destiny, I will destine you to the sword, and all of you shall bow down to the slaughter.

Because when I called, you did not answer. Well, when the Lord called, Peter answered. When I spoke, you did not listen. What you did was evil in My eyes and chose what I did not delight in. Peter delighted in the Lord and that's why he was so grieved at His denial of Christ.

So, the wicked who do not forsake their way should find no comfort in such a glorious promise of the Lord saying, I will never leave you nor forsake you. Yet, the struggling Christian should find comfort in that.

They should find comfort in the midst of darkness where the enemies are saying, God has forsaken you. He wants nothing to do with you. The struggling believer should lay hold of it. And they can look at their life and they say, look, yes, I'm not perfect, but I know this, I don't want sin.

I want the Lord. And Lord, You feel distant. Lord, draw near to me. You said if I draw near to You, You'll draw near to me. The Lord will never leave us, yet He leaves some. And Romans 1 says He leaves them over to the lusts and the passions of their flesh.

God abandons them. He won't abandon us, but those who reject Him, who refuse to give thanks and acknowledge God, He gives them over to homosexuality. He gives them over to the lust of the flesh to envy, hatred, and bitterness.

It's no surprise there's as much homosexuality in our country as there is. It's because people will say God made me this way. Sure, men are born in sin. I'll tell you this, it's kind of scary. In some way, God does have something to do with why there's so much homosexuality as there is.