Okay. Let's dig in today. We're in Psalm 46. I want to read the whole Psalm and then we'll go back through it all. verse at a time. Psalm 46.

God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore, we will not fear. Though the earth gives way, though the mountains be moved into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam, though the mountains tremble at its swelling. There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy habitation of the most high.

God is in the midst of her. She shall not be moved. God will help her when morning dawns. The nations rage, the kingdoms totter, he utters his voice, the earth melts. The Lord of hosts is with us, the God of Jacob is our fortress. Come, behold the works of the Lord, how he has brought desolations on the earth.

He makes wars cease to the end of the earth. He breaks the bow and shatters the spear. He burns the chariots with fire. Be still and know that I am God. I will be exalted among the nations. I will be exalted in the earth. The Lord of hosts is with us. The God of Jacob is our fortress. This is God's word.

All right. The basic message of Psalm 46 is contained in the first verse and a half. It says this, God is our refuge and strength. Amen. Amen. A very present help in trouble, therefore we will not fear. Very simple message, there's a simple promise and a simple response. The promise is God is our protector, He's our shield, He is our strength.

And the response, therefore we will not fear. That's the message of this psalm. So, God is our refuge, which says here, God being a refuge, you can imagine like a child hiding under a blanket, like it protected feeling the protection and the safety of being hidden under this blanket.

It makes the child feel safe. And that's what God being our refuge, it's because God is our refuge, we feel safe. We feel protected. That means whatever threats we face; God is always watching over us. God is always eager to help us. And then God is a very present help in trouble. Very present help.

So very present, it's not just an attribute. God is omnipresent. So, we know that is an attribute of God. He's everywhere, at all times, in all places. There is nowhere that God is not present. But that's not precisely what he's talking about here. He's talking about God's presence in a particular way. It's a personal presence.

Attribute. It's God's present with us. God is present with us and for us. He's with us in our trouble. So other scriptures speak in a similar way. It speaks of God's nearness as a unique feature of his covenant love for his people. Let me give you some examples. Deuteronomy 4 verse 7 Is comparing our God, Yahweh, the God of the Bible to the pagan gods, that the gods that the nations worship.

And he says, for what great nation is there that has a God so near to it as the Lord our God is to us whenever we call upon him, say, who? What other nation has a God like this? Allah? No. No, it's like those are fake gods. Those are a pantheon of false gods, false deities. But our God is with us.

He's present. What other nation has a God like this? A God who answers whenever we call out to him because he cares for us. Here's another one, Psalm 34 verse 18. The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit. God is near people whenever they are in pain, whenever they are suffering, the people that he cares about.

What God is there that cares about his people? Not Islam. The God of Islam doesn't care for people. He's not really even a personal being. He's just this distant force, this power, but the God that we believe is a God that knows you, made you, he cares for you, you matter to him. And so, whenever you're crushed in spirit, whenever you're broken hearted, whenever you're in pain or need, he is near.

He draws near because he cares for you. Here's another. Psalm 145, the Lord is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth. Here's the point. When God's obedient people are in trouble, he's there for them. He's there with them. And as strange as it is, the way that it's worded here, He is very present.

It's a strange way to say it. But that strangeness is part of the power of what He says here. God is, He's not just present with you. He's very present with you. God draws near in a special way. Whenever his people call out to him because they're in trouble, they're in need, they need God to be there and he's there.

It's like the harder life gets, the nearer God gets. And there's great comfort in that because we serve a God who cares. So, what do you do whenever you're in trouble? Like whenever we, and whenever there's trouble in our lives, there are typical things that might be habits, things we normally run to.

And I would imagine for most people, even most Christians, drawing calling out to God and taking refuge in Him and relying on His strength and His power and His presence is not the first thing. A lot of times we find some other thing that we take refuge in. Maybe taking refuge in God is more of an afterthought.

Or maybe it's only when things get really bad. That's when we call out to God. I suspect a lot of us is, we find ways to distract ourselves. Find a way to get our mind off our troubles so we're not worried about it. So, we're not thinking about it. And we do that instead of taking refuge in God.

Facing the trouble head on and taking that directly to God. And say, God, I need you to deal with this. I need you to answer this. I need your presence and power in this. And rather than me thinking, I don't want to think about this. I want to forget about this. I want to ignore this. I want to distract myself from this, numb the pain of this.

Entertainment is probably a big one for a lot of us. We just entertain ourselves to death. Take our mind off. It's like an escape. TV, books, movies, whatever is our thing, but we find ways to entertain ourselves to get our mind off of the problems and that's distractions. Or maybe we take it a step further and we rely on some substance or chemical.

I don't know. some drug, something that is we'll put into our body in order to help numb the Whatever the feeling is, the trouble that takes the butterflies in your stomach and the anxiety that wells up in your throat and you use some chemical to ease the pain of that. So, you take refuge in some created thing rather than taking your problems, your troubles to God and say, God, I need your presence at work in this thing.

If your troubles are a person, maybe somebody is hurting you, threatening you. There's some pain because of a human being. You might take refuge in vengeance or at least fantasies of vengeance. You want payback. You want them to hurt the way they hurt you. These are faithless strategies. These are not faithful strategies.

They're faithless strategies because God is your refuge. God is your strength, and God is your very present help and trouble. It's Him and this is who God is, and his promise is that he is there and that He cares and that he, this is what he desires. And we are his covenant people. He loves us. He made us he draws near to us in that very pain.

So, what kind of things does it, it gives us some examples. What kind of things, what kind of troubles might we face? So, if we just pick it up here, we will not fear, and then there's two big movements. There's a movement of nature and a movement of nations. And this first movement is one of nature, which is just kind of life circumstances.

Things that, things, the ordinary things that may happen. It says, therefore we will not fear, though, and this word though is repeated, as a variety of different things that might happen. Though the earth gives way. Though the mountains be moved into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam, though the mountains tremble at its swelling.

Therefore, is what we're, where we started, therefore, because of God's presence, his refuge, his strength, therefore we will not fear, though all these awful things might happen. All these things are outside of our control, big, massive forces of nature, all those things may happen, but we're not afraid because God is stronger than those things.

God is bigger than those things. God controls those things, and we are his and he cares for us. He's present with us. The most common command in the Bible is do not fear because if God is our strength and our refuge, we've got no reason to be afraid.

And so, he has these examples, though the earth gives way, these are the kinds of things that we shouldn't fear. These natural catastrophes. Or it's it describes water, and of course in the Bible, water is a sign of chaos. Like a sea, an ocean, those are, these are signs of chaos. It's those terrifying thing.

And they didn't understand it. They didn't have scuba gear or submarines or any kind of aquatic equipment. They could float along it in a boat, but what's underneath, you had no idea what was down there. And so, it was a symbol of great terror and chaos. And so, what he's describing in these in verses two and three here are the sorts of things that would be the most terrifying experiences that humans could have.

I'm going to imagine like a mountain being dissolved, like sugar and a cup of coffee mountains being dissolved in the ocean. That's terrifying. Mountains thrown into the sea waters foaming and swelling. And it's like a hurricane being blown up. It's a nightmare scenario, like a disaster movie.

And what he describes here is like an uncreation, at the beginning of Genesis one, there was this, the sea and then God created cause the dry land and the sea to separate. This is like a reverse. It's like things going back to the chaos of Genesis one before God created anything.

This this watery chaotic mass. And though those things are happening. It's like in the Hebrew equivalent of saying all hell is breaking loose. Things are nuts, chaos, all kinds of crazy stuff's happening. Apocalyptic events are happening, but we're not afraid. Why would we be? The God who made all those things, the God who's in control of all those things, the God who has the strength to stop it in an instant.

That God is the God who made us. He cares for us. He loves us. And he's very present with us. Why would we be afraid?

He is very present. He's our refuge and strength. Verses four and five, now here's he, there's a change in imagery here of water. Now he talks about a river flowing through Jerusalem. Verse four, there is a river whose streams make glad the city of God. That's Jerusalem, the holy habitation of the most high.

That's the temple. So, Jerusalem is the city of God. The temple is the dwelling place of God where God was present in some unique way. In the midst of his people in the temple. God is in the midst of her, the feminine pronoun there refers to the city of Jerusalem. She, the city shall not be moved.

God will help her when the morning dawns. What's going on here? So, the city of Jerusalem, if you know the topography, it's like up on a hill. And since it's up on a hill, there's no river flowing through the city. There is a temple there, and God's temple was built in the city of Jerusalem, which is on an elevated place, but there's no river in the city of Jerusalem.

And so, the river that he's talking about here is the river of God's presence, which provides sustenance and life. It's a life source. So anywhere, anywhere you live, you need to be, you need to live near a body of water. And of course, we just have running water now, but in the ancient times, you needed to live with some proximity to a body of water.

So that way you can, you could be sustained by the water that you needed. And so, you needed to be near water in order to survive. And what the psalmist is saying here is that the life source the thing that keeps you going, that sustains you in the city of God is his own presence in the temple.

God is there with his people because he cares for his people. That is the river that is flowing through the city of Jerusalem. And because of this, she shall not be moved. There's nothing to fear, nothing to be afraid of. God's taking care of her. The city of God is well watered with the presence of God.

And it makes, the streams make glad the people in the city of God. No enemy can overpower them. The city, and since the city itself is the, it's the capital city, it's the representation of the whole nation. By extension, all of God's people that, that live in the land that God has given to his people.

They're all protected like that. That canopy of protection extends across all the people because God is in the symbolic, Place that represents the whole God's presence is everywhere. His sustenance is everywhere. He is, there's no place you can go. If I, if you're one of God's people, then you enjoy the blessings of God's presence with you, wherever you go.

So, Psalm 139 speaks of this. It was one of my favorite Psalms, a beautiful Psalm. Psalm 139 says, where shall I go from your spirit? Where shall I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there. If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there. If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me.

If I say, surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light about me be night, even the darkness is not dark to you. The night is bright as the day, for darkness is as light to you. Here's another one, Psalm 4, verse 8. In peace, I will both lie down and sleep. For you alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety.

Because we're God's people, He's present. He's present, His power, His strength, He’s, our refuge. And His present is watching over us wherever we go. It is the stream that waters our lives. It is the life source, it sustains us. And because of this, these provisions and these gifts, we don't fear. Let me read you, I have a little quote from Charles Spurgeon, from his book.

His commentary on this, talking about Jerusalem, I'll just read you a paragraph. He says, Jerusalem, which represents the church of God, is described as well supplied with water to set forth the fact that in seasons of trial, all sufficient grace will be given to enable us to endure to the end. The church is like a well-ordered city, surrounded with mighty walls of truth and justice, garrisoned by omnipotence, fairly built and adorned by infinite wisdom.

It's Burgesses. The saints enjoy high privileges. They trade with far off lands. They live in the smile of the King. And as a great river is the very making and mainstay of a town. So is the broad river of everlasting love and grace, their joy and bliss. His presence renders all hope of capturing and demolishing the city.

Utterly ridiculous. And so, in the next few verses it shifts from the chaos of nature to the chaos of nations or threat of nations. Verse six here,

the nations rage, the kingdoms totter. He utters his voice and the earth melts. The Lord of hosts is with us. The God of Jacob is our fortress. Come, behold the works of the Lord, how he has brought desolations on the earth. He makes wars cease to the end of the earth. He breaks the bow and shatters the spear and burns the chariots with fire.

So, we've got the language of warfare here. We've got nations raging. We have kingdoms tottering. And we cannot really comprehend just what this was like in the ancient world because we rise and fall every day with safety. As the presumed reality, might have crime, we might have things that would happen, but we don't live under the same kind of threat of enemies that a lot of the ancients did.

Imagine being like one of them, you go to bed at night and there's some foreign nation that could literally attack you, invade your city. In an ancient time, that was a real possibility. And your, the kind of ways that you would protect yourself was like primitive weapons. That's all you had to defend yourself with.

And if the enemies defeated you most likely the men would be killed, the women would be taken off as wives, and the children would be turned into slaves. I cannot imagine something more horrifying. If that was a real possibility that I lived with every day, that would be a horrifying possibility.

That would be terrifying. And this was the reality, the possibility that they lived under. And even now, in some parts of the world, that's their reality. And so, for us it's, it can be a little bit distant for us to really wrap our minds around what the promise is that God is providing here.

The psalmist is saying that God is stronger than your enemies and he's more powerful than hostile nations. And so, it is foolish for God's people to put their trust in mere human strength, mere human weapons, or mere human power. God is the one who protects you. God is the one who looks after you. God is the one who provides for you.

At the mere sound of his voice, the earth melts. It's crazy. The Lord of Hosts is with us, and it says here in verse 6, he utters his voice. The earth melts. God can just speak a word and things just melt. And so, this is nothing to him. And does not threaten him. It's effortless for God. Now there's a right way and a wrong way to apply this and the wrong way to apply it, I would call it, a pietistic error.

I'll tell you what I mean by this. The pietistic error is to deny the ordinary use of means by which God provides his protection. So, the promise is God is our protector and we need not fear our enemies, right? That'd be, we see that pretty straightforward in the text. But we also have to acknowledge that God does work through ordinary means.

After all, Jerusalem had walls, Jerusalem had armies, Jerusalem had weapons, they still had to go out and fight battles. Those things happened, but they did so knowing that the strength in those activities and in those means is God himself, who is present with his people, whose strength goes before his people.

And the presumption also is that God's people are being faithful and obedient to him. And they're not being disciplined by him for their disobedience, thereby God withdrawing his protection. These things are predicated upon we are being faithful and obedient. So, God's promise of protection does not negate the ordinary means that God uses to provide that protection.

So, let's say if somebody's coming at you with a knife. They're rushing toward you, and you say, I'm not going to run because God is my protector. That would be foolish because the ordinary means God would give you to protect yourself would be to run or to fight back if that's what it took and the strength that is with you in that encounter would be God himself who is protecting you.

So that to stand there and to not take some action. to put into use the ordinary means that God uses to protect us. That's putting God to the test. That's expecting God to intervene miraculously in ways that he does not promise. Another example let's say you're broke and you got no money. He ain't got no food.

He ain't got no job. Can't pay your bills. And you say, I'm not going to get a job. I'm going to pray for God to provide and God's going to provide. That's a foolish decision because you are putting God to the test to provide for you in a miraculous way, apart from the ordinary means that God normally uses to provide for his people.

That's pietism. Pietism takes our faith and just internalizes and spiritualizes everything to the point to where ordinary, the ordinary way that the world works is being negated.

And so, we don't apply this in this way. Pietism misapplies the promises of God and puts him to the test. God is sovereign and powerful, and it may be his will to operate outside of those ordinary means. And if he does praise the Lord. It's his prerogative. God may very well do that so we can pray for miracles.

God may give us miracles. But the promise and the application here in this text is to trust God's strength over every danger. Trust God's heart with us in every trouble, be they peace or war, natural disaster, disasters. These can all be worst case scenarios. But we trust God also that He works through ordinary means.

And so, we trust God that we have armies, we have defenses, we have jobs, we go through our lives in ordinary ways. But we do so not thinking that this is the only factor at work. So, you can get a job. You can work your 40 plus hours, whatever, collect your paycheck. And two things are true at the same time.

One thing that is true is like you worked, you earned a paycheck and you got paid for it. The other thing that is true that non-Christians wouldn't believe is that God was at work providing for you through those ordinary means. You can put a deadbolt lock on the front door of your house. You can install a security system.

Two things are true at once. One, you put the deadbolt on, you put the security system in and those things, those measures that you took protected you. And the other thing that Christians believe is that God is your fortress. God is your refuge. God is very present with you. God worked through those ordinary means to protect the ones that he loves.

So, we're not pietistic where we say, I'm going to leave my door wide open with a sign out front that says, I dare you to come and steal something because God is here, and he will protect me. Your house will be empty in the morning. That's pietism. We trust God through ordinary means, and we put ordinary means in place, but through a heart of faith, we know that God has told us, here's how the world works.

Here's how the human heart works. Here's sin. Here's wickedness. Here are things that happen in us using pietism. The Word of God, equipped with Christian wisdom, can know God protects me through the use of my own mind and my own steps and measures that I take to protect myself. So, he's talking about a heart of faith that trusts God, that sees God as the active agent at work in all things.

God is not distant or aloof. God is not detached from the realities that we encounter. God is leading us, and he is telling us, here's how you need to behave. And we do and then we do so with a heart full of thanks. God, thank you for this protection. Thank you for this provision. Thank you for this car, this house.

Thank you for this wife, this husband, these children. Thank you for this church. Thank you for the air conditioner that you fixed. Even though we coughed up eight grand to fix it. God fixed it because we trust in God. He is the one who loves his people and acts on our behalf. Through ordinary means.

So even though God makes wars cease and God breaks the bow and God shadows the spear and God burns the chariots with fire, we know behind all of those things, those, the ordinary things we experienced, God is the one who is active and he's at work. And even in terrifying realities where God may allow things to happen or limit things from happening that could have been worse.

God is the one who is working for his own purposes. There may be a lot of times in our lives, I've experienced this, where there's something that Some potential scenario worst case scenario that scary you're afraid of that It's a worst case scenario that you're anticipating but that worst case scenario didn't happen And so this thing that you were afraid of all the worry and anxiety ended up being wasted energy And there'd be other times when there's a worst case scenario that does happen

and when it does happen when it came to pass You found that God was there with you present in the trouble as your refuge and your strength helping you, strengthen you through that worst case scenario. And then on the other side, you emerge thinking God carried me through something I couldn't even believe or fathom.

And yet here I am on the other side of it. And even though terrible things happened, my God is faithful. That's the kind of faith we need. This psalm doesn't promise troubles will never happen. God is our refuge and strength, therefore He's present such that no trouble will ever happen to you. That's not what it says.

God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in. Trouble may happen, but in the trouble, God is present with you when trouble does happen.

So, what do we do with it? At the conclusion of all these things he's talking about, he says, be still and know that I am. That was sloppy. Let me do it again. Know that I am God.

God can, by a single word, bring an end to wars. That's the kind of power he has. It is literally effortless. He could just speak it. And so, whatever happens, we can know that God is the active agent behind it. Things are happening either because he caused it or at least allowed it. And in doing so, he had some purpose in it.

So, when he says, be still and know that I am God, that's not like Buddhist meditation where you're just sitting in a lotus position with this, whatever the finger thing is they do and they're just still and just. Quiet. Meditating. It's no it's your still, but your stillness is filled with a knowledge.

You're not thinking of nothing. Like Yoda told Luke, empty your mind. Free your mind, or what did he say? Empty your mind of questions. It's Buddhism. We're not called to be like Yoda. Now we say, be still. Yes, but be still and know, fill your mind with something. What do we fill our minds with?

We fill our minds with the knowledge that he is God. But what about God? God is exalted among the nations and God is exalted in the earth nature. He's exalted in any kind of reality, any kind of circumstance, any kind of trouble, any kind of danger or threat. Be still and still your heart with a, the knowledge of this faith of who God is.

So, the stillness is not so much a passive meditation, but more of a cease and desist, more of a chill. Keep calm and know that I'm God. Just chill. Because God's got this thing. I imagined a tone of voice whenever Jesus talked to, Martha and Mary. Martha was buzzing around and all busy and Mary was just there chilling, listening to Jesus teach.

Whenever Jesus spoke to Martha, I just of course the Bible doesn't give us tone of voice. But I imagine something like Martha. Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things. Mary has chosen the greater portion. I can, I don't know, maybe he was annoyed, who knows but I imagine in my mind that sort of calm.

He's saying, hey, calm, Martha, all the dinner in the oven and the rolls, all the stuff you're worried about, those things will be fine. And so, God is saying like all the things that, that's running through your mind, probably in a room like this, there's all kinds of things running through your minds. It's like. What about this? What about that? And man, after church, I got to do this thing and I got to call them and send that text and respond to the email. And there's like a bajillion little details running through your mind of just stuff to do that could be troubles, things you're worried about and we'll get the test results this week.

I'm worried about that. I've got, how's this baby going to be? I'm worried about that. I'm worried about my mom, dad, grandma, grandpa. I'm worried about this bill coming up. I'm expecting an estimate on the repairs we got to have. I'm worried about that. Be still. You're anxious and troubled about many things.

Be still and know that I am God. Who's God? He's your refuge and strength. He's your very present help in trouble. That's who God is. A God who's exalted in the nations and a God who's exalted over nature. That's who. Be still and know that I am God. We gotta, we can't lose sight of the fact of what an unfathomable privilege it is that we know God.

I, it's the sort of thing that we can, so we get so accustomed to it, we don't take it for granted and we don't. Pause and think, I know God. There are literally billions of people walking this planet right this moment that would love to have the sort of confidence that we have. That I know God, I know who He is, I know His character, I know His story, I know where I came from, I know why I'm here.

I know what is wrong with the world and I know what he did to fix it. And I know where it's headed. I know all of that because I know God, Christian, that you have not, you have that knowledge. You can be still and know all of those things of who God is. And there are people right now that they don't have a clue about that.

A lot of them think we evolved from some primordial soup, and we came from apes and frogs and turtles or wherever they think that we evolved from, and they don't know God. Atheism is the most hopeless. ideology of despair to think they don't know God and they think some of them are so confident in their atheism.

They think it doesn't matter because this all just happened. This is just a cosmic accident. And even the thoughts through my mind right now are an illusion. There is no meaning because meaning Requires some sort of transcendent purpose, some sort of action orchestrating at all some sort of direction or end that it is headed towards.

And there's none of that. This just happened. This is just weird happenstance of nature because Some planet exploded in the Big Bang and things just happened to progress along a certain course to where this thing happens to where Wouldn't you know it? There are a hundred people hanging out in this room believing some fiction that is concocted in their minds Because this is what happens when atoms and chemicals break down at this temperature and these conditions And we just happen to believe the same stupid fiction that there's some God that made it all happen When really an atheist thinks none of that is true There's no meaning, there's no morality, there's no rational basis of saying killing is Worse than living.

We got here by survival of the fittest. If I'm stronger than you, why about it? How about I kill you? Take your resources. That's how I got here. I guess that's how we're going to keep going.

But you Christian, God, and because God and you know all the stories and the facts and the truth behind your very existence, you can, whatever trouble you've got in your life, whatever thing you're worried about, and it could, there could be some awful stuff you're worried about.

You could have some really massive things that are weighing you down right now. Be still. Why? Not, ignore the trouble. That's, that's absurd. Of course, we're not told to just ignore and act like there are no troubles. No, it's in the midst of the trouble, be still and know that I am God.

Because God is your refuge. God is your strength. And God is very present in that trouble.

So, he says he will be exalted in the nations. Amen. When you're threatened by evil men, people in the world that may hurt you. Psalm 37 says, be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him fret, not yourself over the one who prospers in his way over the man who carries out evil desires or evil devices.

So, you're still before the Lord knowing that there are evil men out there with evil desires. Be still. That guy at work that's gunning for your job, the person that thinks you're a hateful bigot, that neighbor that wants to take you out and, take your parking spot or something.

Be still.

But also, be, he will be exalted in the earth. Take refuge in God when you're troubled by various problems and circumstances. And Jesus says something very similar whenever he calmed the storm. Remember this in Mark chapter four, at the end of the story. It says, Jesus, he, there's Jesus, he awoke, and he rebuked the wind and said to this, the sea, peace, be still.

Now he's telling the ocean to be still, and the wind ceased and there was a great calm and then he turned and said to them, why are you so afraid? Have you still no faith? And then their fear changed from fear of the sea to fear of the guy who controls the sea, and they were filled with great fear and said to one another, who is this and even the wind and the sea obey him.

They got their answer. He is the God who made the sea, and he is the God who controls every force of nature.

The last verse in this psalm, verse 11, we've already heard it once because he said it in verse 7, but he circles back around and says it again in verse 11. The Lord of hosts is with us. The God of Jacob is our fortress. Wade mentioned this earlier, whenever we sang A Mighty Fortress, Martin Luther wrote that song based on this psalm.

God is our fortress. He's with us. The Christian Standard Bible says the Lord of armies. Hosts is like a like an army. The NIV just says the Lord Almighty, meaning God that has all power. Regardless of how you think of it, it is talking about God's utter control, His omnipotence. The Lord of all strength, but Where is the Lord of all strength?

The Lord of all strength, of hosts, of armies, is with us.

Verse 1, God is our refuge and strength, very present help. You know what the Hebrew is for with us? God with us? With us is Emanu, is the Hebrew word. And then the word El is God. So, we know this as Immanuel, which is Immanuel, which is the name that is given to Jesus Christ. That was prophesied in Isaiah, and then in the book of Matthew, we see the same thing.

Matthew, verse 1, chapter 1, verse 23, Behold, this is a quote from Isaiah, Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel. Emmanu is with us. El is God. God with us. God is very present in the time of trouble. And then verse 11, it says, the Lord of hosts, the Lord of armies, God Almighty is with us.

And then Isaiah promises the virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and that son will be called God with us. And then in Matthew chapter 1 it actually happened. God Almighty, God of armies, the Lord of all power, the Lord who controls the wind and the waves and the sea and the oceans. And he breaks the bow, and he shatters the spear and burns the chariots.

That God became a little baby and he entered into humanity, and he was not only with us, he became one of us. He became God with us in a more intimate and personal and powerful way, something that would have, that is so hard to fathom that it actually happened. And so, this angel came to Mary and said, God is going to be very present in a way that is going to blow your mind.

You're going to give birth to a baby and that baby's name will be God with us because that baby will be God. That will be him. And then at the end of Jesus's ministry, after he lived a perfect life, and he was crucified on our behalf, and he died, and he was buried, and then he was raised again, and then right as he was taken up to be with the Father forever, in his ascension, he tells them this.

Behold, I am with you always to the end of the age. I'm with you, and I'm never leaving ever again. There will never be a time, Christian, where you will not have the presence of God with you, very present with you. And not only that, after this, some weeks later at Pentecost, the Holy Spirit came down. And when the Holy Spirit came down, God with us became God within us.

So now Christian, God is not only very present with you, and God is not only very present with us as a human, now through faith in Christ, God is within us by the Spirit right now in our hearts. He is nearer than we can, there's no nearer that he could possibly be than within us. And so, the death and resurrection of Jesus made all of this possible so that through faith in Christ, whenever we repent of our sin and we turn to him, we walk in obedience and we ask God, save me, God, forgive me, God, make your mercy shine on me.

God forgives us. He answers that prayer and then we are filled with his spirit and God with us becomes God within us and that is the hope of the Christian. And then Jesus said, I'll be with you to the end of the age. From now and 15 trillion years from now, we will be no less in the presence of God and his presence will be no further away than it is now.

However that looks, it's like the presence of God will be even more real and more powerful than we can even imagine. Yeah. So, if that's true, how much more can we as Christians, even then when the Psalmist wrote this, because we know more of the story and we have a fuller experience, how much more can you and my, and I say, God is our refuge.

God is our strength. God is our very present help and whatever trouble you run into. And the Lord of hosts is with us. The Lord of hosts is within us. Therefore, do not fear, be still and know that I'm God. Let's pray. Our Father. Man, it is such a joy and a delight to know all that you've done for us. And we don't know it all.

We only know s just we know the best parts, but we don't know every part. And what a thrill it is to know what you've done, that we have this. This incredible hope, this promise that is laid out for us in the Old Testament in the psalm that you are a refuge and strength and very present help in trouble.

And how much more do we have that reality operative within us?

And Lord, I pray that you will, by your spirit, apply this song to each of our hearts. For anybody here that doesn't know Christ, Lord, I pray that it will begin with That faith of repenting of sin and trusting Christ as their savior and being forgiven.

And for everyone here who knows you, that we will be so filled with the knowledge of God, that we will be still and know that I'm God, as you say, that our fear, our anxiety will evaporate because whether the worst-case scenario comes to pass or whether it does not, it doesn't matter. You are still with us.

You're in control of it all. And whatever comes to pass happens because you've ordained it for a good purpose. So, it's win, either way, no matter what. You are doing something good and glorious and that is the God that we serve, a God who cares for us and loves us. And so, our Father, I pray that you will press that truth, that hope home into our hearts so that your children today can believe that in a new way and walk out of here today with a new power and a new resolve and a new hope.

That their God is with them all made possible by your the death of Jesus Christ, which we celebrate as we come to the table. And we ask you, God, that you will meet with us in a special way and powerfully demonstrate your truth to us in our hearts. Testify to us as we come to the table. We pray all these things in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

Amen