"God Himself" by Hiram Kemp

I guess you could say the prime time in our country and in the professional

world for secretarial work was between the 1950s and the 1980s.

It's true, we still have secretaries today in many businesses and, of course,

also in the church, and Neil and I couldn't do our work without them.

Kai and Ashley and Linda who have served before and many of you others who

have done that work, but there was a time when this job was taken a

lot more seriously than it is today out in the corporate world. Those that would

serve as secretaries would sometimes go to secretarial schools or to

what was sometimes called business colleges to learn how to record

and to take care of things so that in so doing they could manage the

office. When computers first emerged on the scene, many business executives

couldn't type themselves, and so just like maybe you've seen in a movie before,

they would pace in the office and they would dictate verbally the things

that they needed to be typed in, and a secretary would record

that information and do that work for them. She was allowed to go into these

meetings and receive top security information. The word

secretary comes from a Latin word, secretarius, which basically means

secret keeper. They couldn't do their jobs without these individuals coming

alongside them and helping them. And you think about the song that Jeremy just led

us in, think about the angels. Hebrews 1:14 says, they're ministering spirits

Hebrews 1:14

sent out by God to aid those of us that will be heirs of salvation.

In Psalm 103:20-21, the psalmist says that angels

Psalms 103:20–21

are his ministers and they go out and do his will. Revelation 5:11,

Revelation 5:11

John says that there are myriads upon myriads of angels and thousands upon

thousands, and God dispatches them not because he's incapable

or incompetent, but because he's omnipotent and oversees everything and

sends them out to do his bidding as he desires. The Bible even calls you

and me servants as we carry out our will— out his will and our task

as human beings. Isaiah 43:7, God created man

Isaiah 43:7

for his own glory, and to that degree, we're his servants.

But there are some things that the Bible explicitly says that

God is going to do himself. There are some things in the Bible

that God's not going to send an angel to do or a human being to

do. God has taken ownership, and in these categories and concerning these topics,

these things mean so much to God that he won't let anybody else

do it for him. He's decided He's going to get his own hands dirty and

he's going to do this himself. And maybe you could think of a long list

of things that fall into this God himself category, but I just want to give

you 3 briefly tonight to send us out into our week to hopefully encourage us,

strengthen us, and embolden us as we go out to live for a God

who cares enough about us to get involved in our business himself.

Number 1, if you have your Bible, go to 1 Thessalonians 5. This is the

first one. God will himself purify you. The first one

is God will purify you. Dave read a moment ago from 1 Thessalonians 5:23-24.

1 Thessalonians 5:23–24

There Paul says, and I pray that the God of peace himself

will sanctify your whole body, soul, and spirit, and that it'll be preserved

blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Faithful is he who calls

you, who also will do it. The first thing God's going to do himself is

God will purify himself. Paul gives a long list

of imperatives starting really in verse 11 down through verse 25 in this chapter,

but near the end in verses 23 23 through 24, he says God himself

is going to do this. He'll sanctify your whole body, soul, and spirit

and keep you blameless. And then in verse 24,

he doubles down on it. Faithful is he who calls you, who also

will do it. This is a task, this is a job that God

delights in doing, purifying us and sanctifying us, and he won't delegate it to

anybody else. He's going to do this one himself. If you think about

your laundry and your clothes, If you want to keep your clothes clean, you really

have 3 options. Option number 1 is to be flawlessly perfect.

Never get any stains or spills on your shirt, but also no

body odor or anything like that. If you do that, you'll never have to do

laundry. You won't have to worry about it. Option number 2 is, in the event

that you're not perfect and something does happen to your clothes, you can wash them

yourself to the best of your ability. Or option number 3,

if you do get stains and things on your clothes and you don't desire to

or incapable of washing them, You can take them to the cleaners and have somebody

else to wash them for you, and the human soul works the same way.

We only have 3 options as it relates to getting our souls cleansed.

Option number 1 is to be sinlessly perfect, and if you never make a mistake,

you don't need anybody to clean you up. But the Bible says in Romans 3:23,

Romans 3:23

all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. Option number 2 is

you could try to clean yourself up through human grit and effort and tenacity,

but our righteousness separated from God, it's like filthy rags, Isaiah 64:6.

Isaiah 64:6

So, the third option is to have someone else do it for us, and God

delights in doing this. Paul says, oh, wretched man that I am! Who will deliver

me from the body of this death? I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord

that He delivers me. Romans 7:24-25.

Romans 7:24–25

God is going to do this Himself, and this revolutionizes how

we read the passages in the Bible that command us to be holy.

1 Peter 1:15-16, as He has called you as holy,

1 Peter 1:15–16

so be ye holy. And all of these commands about a holy and sanctified

life. This passage in 1 Thessalonians reminds us there are at least

2 of us working. As you're doing your best to live a holy life,

God says, I myself will come alongside you and I'll

sanctify you. 1 Peter 1:2. Sanctification begins at baptism,

1 Peter 1:2

but it ends at the throne of God. 1 Corinthians 6:11,

1 Corinthians 6:11

you are called and sanctified and justified in the name of

the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God. God himself will

purify you. But here's the second one. It's in 1 Peter chapter 5.

1 Peter 5 · chapter mention

The second thing that God himself will do is put you back together.

1 Peter is a book about suffering, and Peter talks a lot about this.

1 Peter 4:12, if any man— you're going through a fiery

1 Peter 4:12

trial. 1 Peter 4:16, he says, if any man suffers as a Christian, let him

1 Peter 4:16

not be ashamed, but glorify God in this name. This is a book about

hardship and suffering, but he ends this book talking about glory and

heavenly aid and help. And 1 Peter 5:10,

1 Peter 5:10

Peter writes these words: And after you have suffered a little while,

the God of all grace, who has called you into his eternal glory in Christ

Jesus— underline this phrase— will himself— he'll confirm and

establish and strengthen and he'll settle you. See,

Peter says God's not going to delegate this out to anybody else. After you've

suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who's called you into his eternal

glory in Christ, he's going to do this himself. The second thing God will do

for us himself is he'll put us back together after suffering, after hardship,

and after difficulty. I don't know if anybody's ever told

you this before, or maybe you've said this to somebody or about somebody else before,

you're a lot. Anybody ever said that to you before? You said that about somebody?

You're a lot. Well, what that normally means is, it means a host of things.

Sometimes it means like you're high energy, or sometimes you're

an emotional, you know, yeah, there's a lot, right?

That means that you're just a lot to deal with. And sometimes we say this

about people in a positive way, big personality, a lot of emotion,

But at the heart of it, sometimes we say, I got to get geared up

to deal with this person. They've got a lot going on. When God looks down

at us, God never says, you're a lot. He actually says,

no, you're my lot, and I'm going to stick with you to the end.

Notice what Peter says in 1 Peter 5:10, 4 different

1 Peter 5:10

ways. After you suffered a little while, the God of all grace will himself— what

is he going to do? He'll restore. Joel 2:25, the prophet Joel

Joel 2:25

says, what the locusts have eaten, God promises to restore.

He'll confirm you're my people. 2 Corinthians 6 and verse 18,

you'll be my people, I'll be your God. He'll settle you and strengthen

you. Ephesians 3 and verse 17, Ephesians 6 and verse 10.

The God of all grace is going to put us back together himself.

Sometimes you might go to the store and you go to purchase something, and on

the box on the outside it'll have these words: Easy assemble.

And what that normally means is just about anybody can do this. If you've got

minor tools and a little bit of competence, easy assemble. You can put this one

together yourself. It's not going to be a really in-depth process. And maybe you think

about your life, think about my life, and our lives sometimes through hardship,

suffering, our own failings seem to be shattered into a million different

pieces. And as we look at our lives, we say, who's going to put all

this back together again? I mean, who can put this back together again? And we've

got options. Sometimes when our lives are shattered, we say to ourselves,

I know how to put this back together again. What I need is a vacation.

And you go on vacation and you come home and your problems are waiting for

you. Nope, it's not vacation. It's this job. It's where

I work. And if I could just get a new job— and all of a

sudden the problems from your old job, they follow you to your new job.

If I could make more money. If I had more money, then I wouldn't have

these problems. I could fix it and put the pieces back together if I simply

had more income. But you know about money, more money,

typically more problems. And throughout your life, there are all sorts

of ways, and God comes along and he says, I look at your life,

I see it shattered in a million pieces, and this is easy assembly

work for me. God's not sending an angel to patch us up after

we've been beat up in this life. The God of all grace will himself

put us back together, and he delights in doing so. Isaiah 1:18,

Isaiah 1:18

though your sins be as scarlet, He'll make them white as snow. Though I

was angry with you for a moment, in my compassion I will restore

you again, Isaiah 54:7-8. What will God do himself?

Isaiah 54:7–8

Purify you, put you back together. And here's the third one,

and this is at the very end of the Bible, Revelation 21:1-5.

Revelation 21:1–5

God himself, he will be present with you, and at

the end, he will permanently remove all hardship and difficulty. He'll be present with

us and permanently fix everything. In Revelation

21, John says he saw a new heaven and a new earth, and coming down

from heaven there's this holy city. And in Revelation 21 and verse 3, John says,

I saw this holy tabernacle, and the dwelling place of God is with men.

God himself will be their God. And then in verse 4,

God will wipe away all tears from their eyes, and there'll be no more death,

no more mourning, no more crying, for the former things have passed away. And then

in verse 5, God says, I am making everything new.

See this in Revelation 21:3-5. God himself will

Revelation 21:3–5

be present with us. That's verse 3. And then God promises to

permanently fix absolutely everything. John says

this is going to happen at the end of time. And as we look at

what John's saying to us about the way that God plans to be involved in

our lives, we can't help but be encouraged. We look at our lives, and again,

there are a lot of hardships and difficulties we face, but John reminds us

God cares. I don't know if we realize how personal this

is in Revelation 21 and verse 4. Think about your life. How many people's tears

in this life have you, have you personally wiped away yourself? A lot

of people probably have cried in front of you, but have you ever taken it

upon yourself to literally wipe somebody's tears away? You're probably saying to yourself,

if I've ever done this before, maybe a spouse, maybe a child,

maybe a grandchild, but we don't just go around wiping people's tears away.

God himself will do this. Psalm 56:8 says,

Psalms 56:8

he keeps count of all of our tossings, and our tears are in his

book. This means that God one day won't just

mend our suffering, he's going to redeem it and fix it. And all of our

scars, all of our hardships, all of our difficulties, they'll become trophies

of triumph for us. Maybe there are some things in your life you just have

accepted. Some things are just going to always be— they're unending.

Laundry is unending. It just never ends.

Marvel movie series, unending. They never end.

Road construction, at least somewhere, it's just always going

on. And maybe in your life there are things you've cried so

many times and cried so long about, it's just become a part of you.

This is just how it is. Maybe you've always been scared,

always been scarred, always been anxious, and in your mind this is

just going to go on forever. John says one day it's going to come to

an end. But more than that, It's going to come to an end because God

himself is going to fix it.

When you think about the judgment, maybe we only think— and in cartoons and

in movies and in picture books, you only think about the judgment— there's this long

line of people and there's this big book and there's God on the throne

and there's a trillion names in this book and people come before the throne of

God to hear whether they're in or whether they're out. And the Bible teaches there's

going to be a judgment and a separation, and that's a part of it.

But we sell ourselves short if we don't get to the end of the Bible

and also see at the end of the Bible John saying, one day you're

going to stand before God. And he doesn't just say there won't be any tears

in heaven, he says God himself— see God coming to you in

delight with desire to remove all hardship

and difficulty. There won't be any tears in heaven because God will be

himself personally wiping them away from everybody who's ever suffered, ever gone

through hardship, ever gone through difficulty. He won't send Michael.

He won't send the archangels. He won't send the heavenly creatures.

The Bible says God's going to take this personal and he's going to

do it himself because we serve a God, though he has myriads and myriads and

thousands of angels, he's not aloof or disengaged. He says, I want you holy,

and I'm not just going to command it. I'm going to cooperate with you and

come alongside you, and we're going to do it together. He says, I know you're

broken, but I'll take it upon myself after you've suffered a little while. I'll put

you back together again. And then he says, if you're faithful to me throughout the

entirety of your life, when you finally stand before me, I myself will be

forever present with you, and I will fix absolutely everything that's

gone wrong in the world. So tonight, as we conclude our singing

service and this devotional, just think about the God who will himself

do this and so many other things for us. It's the same God who,

when humanity was in her greatest trouble, he didn't send an angel to die for

our sins, but instead he says, they're in trouble, I've got to fix it.

And God the Son says, I'll go myself. The Word became flesh and

dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, glory as of the only begotten of

the Father, full of grace and truth. Everything we said tonight,

God wants to do for you, and he wants to do for me, but we've

got to let him. We've got to allow him to, by submitting to his grace

and his will, turning from sin, and if we haven't, been immersed in water for

the forgiveness of our sins, Acts chapter 2 and verse 38. If you've

Acts 2 · chapter mention

done that, and you need the prayers of the church, we'd be happy to assist

you. If we can do anything as God's earthly servants to help you, let us

know how we can do so tonight as together we stand and as we sing.