Voice of the Nazarene 3-22-26

Voice of the Nazarene 3-22-26

Transcript

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Coming to you from North Central Ohio, we share with you the Voice of the Nazarene, a week-by-week venture into the Word of God sponsored by the Busyrus Ohio Church of the Nazarene. We join our pastor, Reverend Ray Lassau and the Voice of the Nazarene.

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Chapter 1, verse 8. Paul is writing, he said, For we know not, brethren, to have you ignorant of our trouble which came to us in Asia. We were pressed out of measure, above strength, insomuch that we despaired even of life. But we had the sentence of death in ourselves. We should not trust in ourselves, but in God which raiseth the dead. Could I talk to you for just a few minutes? Maybe it's a Bible study, I don't know. About we really need to know the Bible. We need to know our Bible. Many people in America do not know the Bible. 82% of people in the church believe that the Bible teaches that God helps those who help themselves. Others believe that the Bible teaches that cleanliness is next to godliness. And may I say, I yeah, I hope you got clean when you came. I hope you brushed your teeth and put on a little come thither aroma. And I highly recommend that, but the Bible didn't say that cleanliness was next to godliness. Down in the South, I've had them tell me that the Bible teaches that every tub sets on its own bottom. But the Bible really doesn't say that. Others have said that in the end times that you can't tell the seasons apart. But look at Genesis 8, verse 22, while the earth remaineth, seed time and harvest, the cold and the heat, summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease. There'll always be a day and a night, there'll always be a winter and a summer. There'll always be cold and hot, even with climate change. Somebody else said that the Bible says that money is the root of all evil, but really you left out a word. The love of money. This is what I know. We have Bibles in our homes and on our hearth. But we really need to get the Bible in our hands and down here in our hearts. D.O. Moody said, God didn't just give us the Bible to increase our knowledge, but God gave us the Bible to change our lives. The principles you live by will determine the world in which we live in. And here's what I want to preach about for a few minutes. Maybe a little different than you're thinking, but uh hang in, don't leave. If you do, I might leave with you. And I'm hungry, you'll have to feed me. But people say that God will not put more on you than you can stand. I have a news flesh for you. God didn't say that. We kind of get that inference from out of 1 Corinthians 10, 13, where it says this there hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man. But God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able, but who will with the temptation also make a way of escape. Now listen, there's a big difference between temptation and trials. Temptation and trouble. Temptation and adversity. And I want to make three statements quickly and then move to the heart of my thoughts. Adversity is a reality. Look at what Paul says in verse 8. And he's the greatest Christian that ever lived, other than Christ. He's the man that wrote a little over half of the New Testament. And the great apostle Paul said, For we would not, brethren, have you ignorant of our trouble which came to us in Asia. Now I'm not going to speculate or guesstimate on what his trouble may have been. The reality is we do not know what he went through. It doesn't tell us. We don't even know what in the world that he faced. I'm standing here today and I don't even know what some of you are dealing with. The only thing I know is this is what God laid on my heart for this service. Out of the 34 years we've been here, this is what I feel to lay on your heart because God laid it on my heart for this service this morning. He said, trouble came to me in Asia. And so immediately you have to realize Paul wasn't one of those happy clappy sort of preachers. Believe it and receive it and name it and claim it and blab it and grab it, and everything's going to be wonderful. He was a preacher that understood the oldest book in the Bible and what it taught. The oldest book being the book of Job. And in chapter 14, verse 1, Job had said, Man is born of woman. That might be some of you. Maybe how you got here. But man born of woman is a few days and full of trouble. That's what the Bible teaches. Dr. Jerry Falwell said there are more valleys in life than mountaintops in the Christian life. Sometimes for every two days that are bad, God only sends one good day, but it helps to remind you to look to Him. Can I say something to you this morning? Even Christians can get cancer. Even Christians can have heart attacks. Christians can die in accidents. Christians can raise children and give it the very best they have, and they can still turn out as prodigals. Christians can have heartaches. Christians can have disappointments. Christians can go through divorce. And I'll stop to say that God hates divorce, but he loves the divorcees. Christians are like human beings. We face all kinds of adversity. And what I'm trying to say, this is not a happy, clappy faith. This is a faith that says that adversity is a reality. And what frightens me as a minister of the gospel of all of these years is all the preachers that are trying to tell you that everything's going to turn out good and everything is fine when people are hitting the wall and it throws their faith into a tumble. And you need to understand that adversity is a reality. You say, Pastor, are you trying to empty out the church? No, I'm just trying to preach the Bible. I'm trying to be honorable this morning. And a second thing I want to say, adversity can be rigorous. Look at what Paul said in verse 8. For we know not, brethren, have you to have you ignorant of our trouble which has come to us in Asia, for he said that we were pressed out of measure. Now, I don't know all the meaning of that, but what he's talking about, the picture here is of a donkey, and a donkey so overloaded that it goes to its knees and cannot bear up its load. And Paul, the great apostle Paul, greatest man that had ever preached the gospel except for Christ, said, I was crushed. He said, I was crushed, literally crushed. And he said, as you go on, above measure, I was crushed and all of my strength was gone. Somebody said, When the going gets tough, the tough get going. Well, Paul didn't. Paul said, I was totally out of all strength. And then he goes on to say, insomuch that we despaired, even of life. What that means? He said, I was crushed. All my strength was gone, and I'd lost hope. The greatest man that preached hope. He preached more about hope than Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John all put together. He said, I was crushed. No strength. All my hope was gone. You say, Well, Pastor, God will put more on you than you can bear. That's not what the word of God teaches. Just face life. I'm thinking of the girl looking into the eyes, and she said, You don't understand, Pastor. I can't find any reason to go on living. I'm trying to find God in the midst of all of my hurt and the damage of my mind. She said, What you don't understand, preacher, my own daddy raped me all the years of my teenage years and then forced me into an abortion. And looking into those eyes, you saw a mind and a life that they were bearing more than they could handle. I've had to walk into homes and tell parents that their son or daughter had just been killed in a car wreck. And the screams that racked the house, and looking into their eyes, I saw that all hope it was more than they could bear. What I want you to know is adversity is a reality. Adversity can be rigorous, but adversity has reasons. Psalm 119, verse 71, is good for me that I've been afflicted. None of us are standing in that light. But he said, it was through that that I might learn thy statutes. I walked a mile with pleasure, and she chatted all the way, but left me none the wiser for all she had to say. I walked a mile with sorrow and narrow words, said she. But all the things I learned from her when sorrow walked with me. Adversity has reasons, and first of all, I'll give you several of them. Adversity may be how God answers your prayers. If you want some scripture, look it up later. Acts 19, 21, Acts 23, 11, Romans 1, 15. It's the great apostle Paul and he's praying. And he's saying, God, I want to go to Rome. I've been to these other places. We've been on missionary tours. We've started churches, but I want to go to Rome and share the gospel. God, can you let me get to Rome and preach the gospel? You say, Well, Pastor, did he ever go to Rome? Yes. He went to Rome and he shared the gospel, but not as a preacher. He went to Rome and shared the gospel as a prisoner. I'm saying adversity may be the way that God answered your prayers. I left evangelism. I'd been in it 23 years full time. 50 some weeks a year. Generally at least 51 weeks a year, every year for 23 years. Great days, tremendous times. I was eight years as a single evangelist, and then I married a girl by the name of Jan, and she traveled with me, and we carried some of the music and great days. All I wanted to do was to reach people. For some reason, God gave me a love in my heart for people, most of them. And after a horrific car crash, I began to develop some stomach problems. And I knew I couldn't keep traveling. And I began to consider the pastorate. And I accepted a ministry out in the state of Kansas. They had a beautiful facility. They owned six streets of duplex homes, 34 duplexes. They had a quadplex. They had a farm across the state line. They had a Christian school building located out on the hillside from the little city. We went from first grade all the way to the 12th grade. The facility was located, beautiful brick building, located right along the four-lane highway that connected into the city. And we were right on an exit, and there was only 78 people average. I'm a novice, I'd never pastored before. Maybe that's why they called me pastor instead of pastor. And we were there only 14 months. And interesting enough, the attendance literally doubled. We were averaging 150. And then I hit a wall. I hit a wall. And the wall wasn't the city, and the wall wasn't lost people, and the wall wasn't people new coming in. We had people moving from out of state moving in just to attend the church, to be under the ministry. The wall that I hit, the leadership of the church came and they gathered and said, Pastor, there's a lot of new people coming, but we don't want all these new people. If we're not careful, we're going to lose our power. I said, Power? What's that? Our leadership. We won't get to be the board members. We won't get to run this thing. And we don't want any more growth. And I went to God in prayer and I said, Lord, I'm not sure I understand this. You gifted me whatever gift I have. There may not be many. I didn't get gifted in size, and I wasn't gifted in the great universities to attend, and a lot of things I missed. But I seem to be able to reach people. Maybe just because I like them. I don't know. They can't get rid of me. I go home with them, and so they come to get rid of me. But I said, God, I want to reach people. If I hadn't hit the wall, and if things hadn't come to an abrupt halt, I'd have never moved on. Can I just stop for a moment and say, chickens don't eat their own eggs? I think I'll have my eggs over easy. Chickens don't say that. Do you know that cows don't drink their own milk? It'll be a great day in your life when you realize the gifts that you have are not for you. They're for others. God didn't equip you for you to absorb it all, but to affect others. We're here on this earth for others. And if I'd have stayed there, I'd have not moved on to Brazil, Indiana, the little city that I was born in. I was there only two and a half years. Still didn't know anything about pastoring. I was tired from the 23 years of evangelism, worn out, burned out nearly. But God took the church from 140 and blessed it with 90-some new households, and we were averaging 300. If I hadn't hit the wall, I'd have never moved on to Vesiris, Ohio, where God gets all of the credit for the growth of this ministry and all that He's done. What I'm trying to say is, adversity sometimes, is how God answers our prayers. When it hurts the most and you're the most disappointed in life, and you just feel like it's over and your vision is nearly killed, your will's been crossed. Sometimes God's just right in the middle of answering your prayer and putting you where he wants you to be. Can I tell you about a man that was on an island? And he was praying, God, rescue me. Her ship went down. I'm the only survivor. Don't leave me here forever. And the months passed and the years passed, and he had to build his own little hut and he had to make uh pots to cook his meals in and made weapons so he could go out and spear fish and try to trap animals. And one day looking for food, he saw smoke billing into the sky, and and when he went running toward the fire, only to find his hut burning to the ground. All of his possessions gone. And he said, God, he said it couldn't be any worse than this. I asked you to rescue me, and now you let my hut burn down. It couldn't get any worse. And the next day a ship showed up, and the captain said, We're here to rescue you. We saw your smoke signals. Sometimes adversity is the way that God answers our prayer. That's what I've learned. And the second thing, a second reason, adversity reveals the depth of relationships. In prosperity, our friends know us. In adversity, we know our friends. In Philippians chapter 4, verse 15, Paul said, When I went on my first missionary journey, and he said, You were the only ones that supported me. There in verse 16, he said, I went to Thessalonica two times, and he said, You sent offerings to me. And he said, When I went through adversities, I found who cared for me. Do you know what a true friend is? A true friend is one that walks in when everybody else is walking out. A true friend is the one that knows your good and your bad and still loves you anyway. Well, that narrows it down, doesn't it? A true friend comes into your life to help you and to lift you and encourage you, and they stay with you at the lowest point in your existence. Somebody said, I want to be, I want to be like God. Well, if you want to be like God, you need to read Hebrews 13, 5. Where God said, I'll never leave thee nor forsake thee. If you want to be like God, be that kind of friend that sticks through the years, never leave, never forsakes us. And then adversity, number three, can impact others. Paul's talking, it's Philippians 1, 12. He said, Everything that has happened has happened for the furtherance of the gospel. Everything that I've gone through. He said, I'm not knocking any of it. It's helped to further the gospel. There were three men in the Bible that were called Hebrews, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. And they told him, they said, when you hear the sound of the music, you better bow down and worship the golden image. And they said, we'll never bow down and worship that golden image. We bow down and worship the true God. And they said, if you don't bow down to the golden image, we're going to put you in a furnace and turn the heat up seven times hotter than it's ever been. Well, they said, just go ahead and throw us in the furnace then. Because we're not going to bow down to the golden image. We're only going to bow down and serve the true God. And so they threw him into the furnace. There was a pagan king by the name of Nebuchadnezzar, and he was on the throne there, and he got up the next morning and walked down, and he looked into the furnace, and to his utter amazement, there's those three Hebrew boys right in the middle of the furnace, seven times hotter, and not even consumed. And then he said, He saw one like unto the Son of God. He said, Did we not cast three men into the fire? There's a fourth man. Looks like the Son of God. Did you know the Bible never said that those three Hebrew boys that Saw that fourth man. The pagan king saw him, but never said the three Hebrew boys saw him. There may be times when you go through the fire and you think you'll not make it. But I want you to know the fourth man's there. You may not see him. There may be times you feel like you're going through hell itself. Everything that you've counted on falls apart. You may not see him, but he's close. That fourth man. Sometimes we may go through terrible things so that lost people, looking at our lives, will see the fourth man that we don't see, but they're able to see him. And you say, Well, Pastor, what do you recommend when you're going to the far? Just keep on walking. Here's what I know He knoweth the way that I take, and when He hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold. Here's a fourth thing I want to leave with you. Adversity can push us to God. He said in this next verse, but we have the sentence of death in ourselves that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God which raiseth the dead. Now, that's 2 Corinthians 1.9. He said there's no hope. Paul said, I was crushed. All my strength was gone. I didn't even have any hope. But wait a minute. I decided I wasn't going to trust in myself. I'm going to trust in God Almighty. That's what this is all about. When we go through the tough times of life, we come to understand we can't do it on our own. It's all about God. Now here's what I know: let adversity push you to God. C.S. Lewis said, God whispers to us in our pleasures. God speaks to us in our conscience. And God shouts to us in our pain. I'd been traveling as an evangelist. I don't know if I've told this. I bought a travel trailer. I'd just gotten married. And she kind of wanted to live without living with people all the time. Women are a little different. Eight years I put up wherever they put me. And you cannot believe where I've been put. And so we went to this travel trailer place and they had them all lined up all the way down and just all the they were even all the way down. I didn't realize some trailers were longer because I wasn't on the back side. I'm just seeing all the trailer tongues all in a line. And there was one trailer. She said, This seems bigger. Well, it was. I just didn't realize it. She said, This is the one I want. It was 32 foot. That wasn't counting the tongue. They hooked my old car on the front of that thing, and I started pulling forward, and the guy said, Don't turn yet. You haven't got the trailer out from between the other two trailers. How's her cross the lot? I'm beginning to get a little nervous about this whole call to preach and evangelism now. Finally, I got it out from between the two trailers, pulled out to the edge of the parking lot, and I pulled out into the street and started up the street and looked in my rearview mirror, and I still didn't have the trailer off the lot yet. If you talk about becoming a nervous wreck, I'd just gotten over a nervous breakdown and I had another one planned in case that one didn't work. We started up the, it was Morgantown, Indiana, and it's hills and valleys down through there. And I had that car floored almost to the floor, giving it fuel, and I'm trying to get that trailer up that hill, and it didn't want to go. And when we got to the top of the hill, here it went, and I'm trying to slow it down, and it's trying to get around me. Boy, my nerves were bad. I pulled that thing for eight years. Never did learn how to weight it just right. It needed more tongue weight, but I didn't give it any. Most of the weight was in the back of that thing would swing, trucks would go by, and that thing would just wave like that. I had CB radio, and I was called a lot of things. They renamed me many, many times. My wife had a friend that had a big dealership. She had known them ever since college days, and and uh they uh they were going to the national RV show up in Detroit. That's where all the big companies bring their greatest motor homes and things, and and they they they want to impress everybody to buy their particular motorhome. So they they loaded them down with all kinds of extras. We got our two tickets, and they told us now don't don't don't show too much interest in anything, they'll realize you're not a dealer, and this is for dealers only. And I remember getting down looking up one, and another guy said, that don't look like a dealer. Boy, I straightened up and act like I wasn't interested looking under motor homes anymore. We saw a motorhome built by uh Coachman. Five greatest uh RVs at that time. One of them was Coachman. This is back in the 80s. I'm not talking about today when they're running them 40-some feet long. This was 32 foot long. That was huge for a motorhome. It had two air conditioners on top. That don't mean a blessed thing to you, but they didn't have any place where you could plug two, uh plug into and run both air conditioners. It'd blow the circuit at any church. Now the they had a 6.5 generator, and if you ran it, you could run the two air conditioners. And uh this is boring you, so I'm just gonna move on. But it was really a fancy motorhome. Big full bed in the back, and we're newly married, and we loved each other. We didn't know you were supposed to, you know, stay in buck beds. So, anyway, we uh we left that place and I uh I got to thinking about motorhomes, and I needed to get rid of this travel trailer, and the the largest dealership in Indianapolis, we went to it. And to our amazement, there was that motorhome, that big coachman. Two air conditioners, full bed in the back, generator 6.5, loaded, air ride in the front, and uh I made an offer. I I offered $8,000 down and I cut a check. It's everything my wife had. And uh Citicorp, we filled out all the paperwork so the Citicorp would uh finance it for us. And they assured us that you'll have this motorhome, come back this next week. So I advertised my travel trailer for sale and my truck. I sold both of them. Then I get a phone call said they turned you down for the motor home. But they said if you'll do a second mortgage on your home, they'll finance you. I said, I'm not gonna risk my home for a motor home. I've worked hard to get this thing paid for. I've saved every dime, I've tightened my belt. If $8,000 down is enough, forget it. And we walked away, but we had no place to stay. Booked solid for the next eight weeks, no motorhome to stay in, and we we didn't get put up in motels. We stayed in some of the toughest places I've ever known in my life. Brenee had just been born, she was a premi. She came along about seven, seven and a half months, and little bitty things. She had the croup. In fact, I when she was born, I could hold her in my hand. Just a little thing. Spend her time in the incubator with daddy reaching in and mama not being able to hold her for several weeks there. Well, in order to go on the road, we had to ride ahead to every church and ask to have an old mama to take care of Renee and keep her in a back room because she couldn't circulate among people. She had no immune system. So we hit the road with Renee. We get to this house and it's winter time, and they were running less than 60 degrees in the parsonage. Everybody's sitting around in overcoats. And Renee's got the croup, but she's doing that little croupy cough. Finally, I borrowed a heater from somebody, and uh I offered the pastor some money for extra electricity, and he took it. It was kind of a hint if you turn the heat up, you know, maybe we could get out of the overcoats. They didn't have a door on the bedroom. And everybody had to walk by to get to the bathroom right by our bedroom. So Jan asked, Do you have a blanket? They said, Oh, certainly. They gave us a blanket, it had holes in it. And she uh took Bobby pins, not Bobby pins, safety pins, and put underwear over all those holes. They'd walk by and you hear them giggle about it. They thought it was funny. I thought, I'm about through with this evangelism thing. This is tough stuff. God's called somebody else to replace me, I'm sure. And it was placed eight weeks of that. And I told Janna, if God doesn't provide us a rig, I'm going off the road. I'm gonna take a church or something. So we came home. I was gonna give it one more shot. I called the RV dealers all over Indianapolis out of Indianapolis. Everything that was in the yellow pages, I let my fingers do the walking. I called everybody but one last one, and all it was was initials like B and L RVs or something like that, and just a phone number. You knew it wasn't much. So I dialed it. This guy answered, he said, I was just ready to leave, you just barely caught me. And what do you need? I said, Well, I need a motorhome. And I'd like to have a full bed just buried, you know. You missed it. And uh I told him, and he said, Well, we don't we don't carry anything that big. We're a small dealership. I said, Okay. I said, I I I wanted one with a good generator and a like a 454 engine and and uh maybe a full bed. Wait a minute. He said, we got a rig like that in the back lot, but it's hid. I said, what do you mean? Well, he said the largest motorhome dealer here in Indianapolis went bankrupt. And the bank, Citibank, sent in 50 drivers in one day, and they took all the inventory and pulled it out. They've got it hid all over Indianapolis. He said, Are you talking about a coachman? I said, Yes, sir. He said, a full bed in the back? I said, yes, sir. 6.5 generation? Yes, sir. An awning that nearly the whole, yes, sir. He said, we've got that motorhome. It was the on the national RV show up in. I said, yes, sir. I said, sir, I put $8,000 down, and Sydney Corp said they turned me down unless I did a second mortgage. He said, I want to tell you something, sir. I don't know what you do, but there must be a God somewhere. He said, You can get that from Sydney Corp. I'll guarantee you you won't have to have anything down, and they'll sell it to you at cost and maybe not even charge interest. We climbed aboard that thing. I tell you, we'd been so defeated, ready to walk off. And I'm saying, God, if you don't come through, I'm through. And in one year, people paid for that motor home. I'm telling you, God's a God's a good God. And sometimes God literally pushes us, and He used adversity to do it. Scriptures never said that God would not put more on you than you can bear. And this is what God's word said: God won't put more on you than He can bear. And here's your secret. It's 2 Peter 5 7, casting all your care upon him. For he careth for you. We used to sing a song. Maybe maybe Patty would know it. If the world from you withhold all its silver and its gold, do you remember that one? And you have to get along with meager fare. Just remember in his word how he feeds the little birds. Take your burden to the Lord and leave it there. Leave it there, leave it there. Take your burdens to the Lord and leave it there. If you'll just trust and never doubt, he will surely bring you out. So take your burden to the Lord and leave it there. I cannot tell you how many times in the years past I bet at wits in corner. I thought I'd live there. I'd carry my worries to bed and I'd worry through the night, and I would get up the next day and I'd pick up my worry satchel and I'd worry all day long. I got a hold of that song one day, take your burdens to the Lord and leave them there. For God can handle it. May I say, God will not put more on you than you can bear, but never more than He can bear. And you may not be able to handle things this morning in your life. I don't know. You may be able, you may feel like throwing in the towel. You may feel like just walking off. Where's God? I've got more on me than I can bear. Well, it's not more than he can bear, and all you've got to do is just take your burden to the Lord. And just leave it there. Leave it there. If you'll trust and never doubt, he'll surely bring you out. Just take your burdens to the Lord.

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Thanks for being a part of the Voice of the Nazarene. Visit us every Sunday at 9 a.m. with BNC's Pastor Ray Lastile. For more information regarding BNC, visit UstiresNazarine.org.