It’s one thing for us to trust in God … in theory. The theory, as it turns out, is pretty simple. It’s the practice that many of us find much harder. Because trusting Him is something we need to do, very often, when times are tough.   The View from Heaven’s Balcony I was recently confronted with a situation that really tested my faith. You see, I don’t want you to think that just because I happen to be this smooth voice on the radio – that I somehow get an exemption stamp in my passport, from turbulence on the journey. In fact, probably the opposite is the case. Because I’m out there, sharing the fantastic news of Jesus with people all around the world, week after week through these radio programs, our enemy the devil’s got me in his sights. I’ve got a target painted on my chest as far as he’s concerned. So, here’s what was going on. There was one particular country, one of the world’s most populous countries, where our team had been working to get these programs to air on a radio station with a huge listenership. The daily audience for the program was going to be over one million people – that’s actual listeners. That’s a big deal! I mean one listener is a big deal to me. A million – I can’t even imagine that many people. It’s a big deal. We’d been working for two years on this project, including finding translators and a voice to record the messages in the local vernacular language. Quite an investment of time and effort and money. And then the day came when finally, the radio network in question accepted the program and placed it in a prime time slot. Amazing stuff. We rejoiced. We gave thanks. Really – it had been such a long road and so much was at stake. So many lives, so many people to hear the good news about Jesus. Wow. But on the first day we were due to go to air they told us, well … we can accept the program for the moment, but in a few weeks’ time, we’re having a review of all externally provided programs and we don’t know what that is going to mean. When our team in that country got in touch with me to tell me the news, they were gutted. I can understand how they felt. All that effort and now, all of a sudden, the whole thing was up in the air again. Devastating. What would happen? I’ll share my reaction to that whole thing with you in a minute. But first I want to go to what Isaiah has to say into situations like that. Remember, if you’ve been able to join us these past few programs, you’ll know that Israel has been in slavery in Babylon for 70 years, since about 586 or 587 BC. And God comes to them through His Prophet Isaiah and brings them the good news that He is about to set them free; that they are about to return to the Promised Land. Whoopee! You’d think. But just like you and me, when everything’s bleak, they struggled to digest the good news. You know what it’s like. When all your circumstances are screaming gloom and doom at you, it’s very hard to believe that something good is going to happen. Even if you believe in God. Even if you’ve put your trust in Jesus. Even if you’ve heard a million sermons on trusting God. When your Goliath comes stomping into your life with weapons of destruction pointing at you – yah, believing that God is there to protect you, that God has a good plan for you – that’s really, really hard. It was hard for Israel, way back then and it’s hard for us today. Here and now. So here’s what God says to His people through the Prophet Isaiah. Have a listen Isaiah 52:12: For you shall not go out in haste, and you shall not go in flight; for the Lord will go before you, and the God of Israel will be your rear guard. You see, they were going to leave Babylon and their slavery behind. But how does that actually happen, they’ve been wondering? Babylon – the global world power of the day. The most fearsome and powerful of armies. Are we going to have to run for our lives? Are some of us going to be killed? What? How’s this going to happen? All well and good for Isaiah to be carrying on with all this good news, but what if he’s wrong? What if God doesn’t show up? Have those thoughts ever crossed your mind when you’re between a rock and a hard place? Yep – well, Israel too. And so God points back to a time when He’s done exactly the same for them before. He’s pointing back to a time in their history that every man, woman and child knows from top to bottom, inside out, back to front, because it’s been handed down from generation to generation for centuries. He’s pointing back to the Exodus of course, to their escape from Israel. Remember? They fled and God hardened Pharaoh’s heart and so the greatest army of that time, Egypt, came after them. In front of them was the Red Sea – an uncrossable body of water for a million men, women and children. Behind them, coming up fast was the mightiest army on the planet. Here it is.  Exodus 13:21–22: The Lord went in front of them in a pillar of cloud by day, to lead them along the way, and in a pillar of fire by night, to give them light, so that they might travel by day and by night. Neither the pillar of cloud by day nor the pillar of fire by night left its place in front of the people. So God went ahead of them. But what about the rear, as the Egyptians closed in on them? Exodus 14:19–21: The angel of God who was going before the Israelite army moved and went behind them; and the pillar of cloud moved from in front of them and took its place behind them. It came between the army of Egypt and the army of Israel. And so the cloud was there with the darkness, and it lit up the night; one did not come near the other all night. Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea. The Lord drove the sea back by a strong east wind all night, and turned the sea into dry land; and the waters were divided. There it is. God went ahead of them, and behind them. He led them and opened the way, and He protected them from an attack from the rear. So when He promises now all these centuries later to do exactly the same – what is it that He’s doing? Is He asking them to rely on blind faith? Is He asking the to conjure up courage that they don’t have? No! He’s asking them to look back at what He has already done. That’s the amazing thing with God, He never takes us to the point, where we can’t take it. Each challenge, He comes through. And so the next time, when the challenge is bigger and scarier than last time, He asks us to look back on what He’s already done in our lives. We forget that each time. We forget He’s already proven Himself faithful and true. Oh yeah! He did that last time. Of course, in fact as I look back, He’s always come through, He’s always been there, He’s always somehow some way made it happen. Wow! And there is the bedrock of our faith this time. When I heard the bad news about the radio program in that country, my reaction was this. We have seen this happen so many times. Today God has tens of millions of people listening to this very same program that you’re listening today in 160 plus countries around the world. There are so many times when we shouldn’t have ended up on stations and God opened the door. He went ahead of us. There are so many times when the ministry should have folded because there weren’t the resources. But He brought up our rear. He’d trained me to trust in Him over and over again by putting me between a rock and a hard place and showing up and making things happen. After a while even someone as spiritually thick as me starts to get it. We don’t have to listen to the theory, God plans for us to put it into practice over and over again and then shows up and proves Himself true. He teaches us in our experience that this verse is absolutely true: For you shall not go o...

Released on 6 Jun 2021