Speaker: -range called the Superstition Mountains, and it
was out kind of our back door.
We lived in far East Mesa, and you could see them from where we lived.
And the Superstition Mountains were, were beautiful, and they
were also notoriously dangerous.
People would lose their lives going on hiking trips and things
like that on a, a yearly basis.
I remember one of the, the guys in our church had a small prop plane, and he
flew over the Superstition Mountains, and I was foolish enough and young
enough to go up in that plane with him.
Uh, but it was beautiful.
It was beautiful to see from the top.
But the Superstition Mountains are known for something other than just
being beautiful and dangerous, and that is they're known for having
deposits of gold, and that enters in the Lost Dutchman's Goldmine.
The man's name was Jacob Waltz.
He lived in the 1800s, and he was supposed to have discovered a goldmine that began
to produce, uh, in immense quantities.
And so Jacob and his partner at the time began to mine the, the gold, and
they would mine the gold, and they would store it away there on the mountain.
Well, his partner died and, and Jacob was left by himself to mine the rest of it.
And so he continued to mine the gold from, uh, the, the Lost Dutchman's
Goldmine there until he himself got sick and was on his own deathbed.
Now, he had hidden all of his treasures up in the Superstition Mountains.
His caretaker at the time knew that he was dying and said to him, "Jacob, you need
to tell me where you've buried the gold."
Jacob, in his last few moments of consciousness, was reported to have
given her directions to his goldmine.
But the problem was he didn't give her all the directions to the goldmine.
And so his caretaker, after he passed away, took what she had, and she
thought she had the directions to the Lost Dutchman's Goldmine, and she
went up into the mountains, into the Superstition Mountains, and she began
to search far and wide for this goldmine that was supposedly up there containing
all of these riches as well as active veins of gold to continue to be mined.
Well, she never found it, and those directions got passed on from her to other
people and so forth and so on until even today, there are still people that will
set out in search of Jacob Waltz's lost
goldmine.
Can you imagine if you found his goldmine?
That's what drives so many people to go up there, and in fact, people that
go up there year after year after year trying to find the lost goldmine
because they're thinking about what it would be like if they found the gold,
the joy that would- they would feel in finding all of this that Jacob had
mined and stored away, but then knowing there's more to be discovered too.
They would think to themselves, "We found not only the gold, but also
the mine that's producing the gold."
And they would think to themselves, "All of these veins
of gold in here, my life is set."
Can you imagine being the one to find that?
To think to yourself, "The joy that I have in knowing that I have all of this
money, all of this gold at my disposal," the benefits that would come from
having all of that, and then knowing that all of your needs were gonna be
taken care of from that point forward
What if I told you that there's a greater source of riches that you
have access to that you wouldn't have to work nearly as hard for?
A greater source of, of wealth that you have access to that is actually
genuine and not just a myth and a legend that's been handed down
from generation to generation.
One of the reasons why nobody has found Jacob Waltz's gold mine
is because I don't believe Jacob Waltz's gold mine actually exists.
And yet people are willing to risk their lives in the heat of Arizona,
and the scorpions, and the snakes, and everything else up in the Superstition
Mountains to go to try to find it.
They go to such great lengths to find riches that don't actually exist when you
and I this morning have sitting in our lap untapped riches in the Word of God.
And I wonder, do we realize what we have?
Psalm 119 verse 14 says this, "In the way of your testimonies I
delight as much as in all riches."
Can you say that this morning with the psalmist?
In the Word of God, I delight, I find joy in God's Word as much as in all riches
What if the joy that you could feel in discovering the, the goldmine of The
Lost Dutchman could be surpassed by the joy that God has for you in the Word?
That's what I want us to think about this morning in a sermon called Untapped Joy.
Untapped Joy.
We're gonna look at, at, at five veins of joy that we find in the scriptures,
just like five veins of gold in the mountain there, that you could mine
and find that they would never run out.
There are five veins of gold that are there, five veins of joy that are
there in the scriptures for you this morning, that if you will mine, if you
will give yourself over to the study of the Word of God and to reading it
and to obeying it and to pursuing it, you will find that these veins of joy
will never run out for you either.
There is untapped joy sitting on your lap this morning, sitting on your
phone this morning, sitting in the Bible that you have this morning.
The verse that we're gonna use to springboard this morning
is Psalm 119 verse 111.
I say springboard because this is gonna be a little bit of a different sermon.
Usually, you're used to me taking one passage and just walking through
verse by verse all the way through.
Well, this morning what we're gonna do is we're gonna do a survey of Psalm
119 to find all of the different things that Psalm 119 promises us that should
be for us these veins of joy that continues to sustain our joy in our lives
throughout anything and over- overcoming anything that, that might come our way.
Psalm 119 verse 111, though, this is gonna be our springboard.
It says this: "Your testimonies are my heritage forever, for
they are the joy of my heart."
Your testimonies are my heritage forever, for they are the joy of my heart.
The word heritage there means inheritance.
They're my portion.
They're my possession.
They're, they're the riches that I am gaining, because
they are my joy of my heart.
Uh, the idea of an in- inheritance or a heritage is something
that we still understand today.
It's, it's something in effect today.
Uh, when a loved one dies, if they have saved up for you, they're
leaving you behind an inheritance.
You know what that is to have that.
A- and so often that's more than just the, the possessions or the money.
That's, that's what it's going to do for you.
It's the benefit that that's gonna produce in your life.
It's what that's going to do to, to make your life better.
And the psalmist is saying, the author is saying, "The Word of God is that for me.
I'm gonna choose the Word of God.
I'm gonna delight in the Word as much as in all riches.
I'm gonna choose God's Word for my portion, for my possession."
Why?
Because he says, "It's the joy of my heart."
He's gonna say as, as much as, as people may rejoice in gaining an
inheritance of millions of dollars from a loved one, or as much as someone
may enjoy in discovering a lost gold mine, the psalmist is saying, "My
joy is anchored to the Word of God.
My joy is anchored to the scriptures.
That's where I find my satisfaction.
That's where my true satisfaction and joy and hope is."
And I wonder this morning if we could say the same thing.
Could we say with the psalmist that the Word of God is my portion, the
Word of God is my heritage, the Word of God is, is what I'm choosing
to be mine, it's my inheritance?
Again, there's untapped joy sitting in our laps this morning
in the form of the Word of God.
We're gonna look at five different veins of that joy as
we walk through this morning.
The first, I want us to, to think about verses one through three of Psalm 119.
Now, we already covered this back in our first sermon about four weeks ago.
Verses one through three of Psalm 119 says this, "Blessed
are those whose way is blameless, who walk in the law of the Lord.
Blessed are those who keep his testimonies, who seek him with
their whole heart, who also do no wrong, but walk in his ways."
And so in this, these three verses, what we find is the psalmist is saying the
one that is blessed, the one that is happy, is the one that is living a godly
life, the one that is coming to the Word of God, reading the Word of God, and
walking in the Word of God, doing the Word of God, obeying the Word of God.
In other words, living a life that is a life of godliness, a life of holiness.
See, that's one of the veins of joy that we find in the Bible here, is that
as we come to the Word of God and we read the Word of God and we obey the
Word of God, what that does in our life is it produces a godliness within us
that's going to lead to our first vein, which is the joy of a clear conscience.
The joy of a clear conscience.
And God's Word does that for us in really two different ways.
The first way that the Word of God does this for us and provides for us
the joy of a clear conscience is it reminds us as we come to the pages
of the source of a clear conscience.
Now, let's talk about a clear conscience first before we,
we, we unpack this any further.
A clear conscience is, is that conscience that says, "I'm, I'm not guilty.
I don't have anything to be ashamed of.
I don't have anything to, to carry condemnation about.
There's no charge that could stick to me.
I've got a clean conscience."
Versus a guilty conscience is someone that says, "I know I've done wrong."
And a guilty conscience is going to shy away, a guilty conscience is going to
hide, a guilty conscience is going to flee from instead of draw near to God The Word
of God is the access point to you and me having a clean conscience in two ways.
First, it's revealing to us the source of a clean conscience.
What is the ultimate source of the clean conscience for the Christian?
The Gospel.
It's the Gospel.
It's Jesus.
The, the bedrock foundation that gives you confidence to be here this morning and
not feel the guilt of sin, not feel the condemnation, and not feel the shame is
not because of what the work that you've done to put in on that front, but the
work that Christ did for you on the cross.
What cleanses your conscience once and for all is Jesus Christ dying on the
cross in your place for your sins, for your guilt, for your shame, taking that
upon himself so that you can be declared not just not guilty, but innocent
with the righteousness of Christ.
So in that sense, your conscience is objectively clean before the Lord.
You are justified.
You are righteous in his eyes.
So the Word of God is a source of joy to us because we can come to it and we can
be reminded of that reality, that it's not about, uh, us pulling ourselves up by our
bootstraps and just being a better person.
That if you desire a clean conscience in God's eyes, in other words, if you
desire for God to look at you and see you as righteous, it, it's not that
you have to live a morally upright life or that you even could do that.
See, the, the, the problem is, is the Bible teaches us a, a couple
of things right off the bat that, that are not good news for us.
And that is, number one, the Bible tells me who I am.
And what that is, is that the Bible tells me that, that I am a sinner.
The Word of God says that, "All have sinned and fall
short of the glory of God."
The wo- Word of God says there, uh, "There's no one righteous, no not one.
There's no one who seeks for God."
A- and so that's bad news because for me then, that tells me that I have
a, a problem in that my conscience is not clean because I have sinned.
And so if I want a clean conscience with God, then I'm left to say, "Okay,
what, what can I do about that?"
Well, the other bit of bad news that the Bible talks about is it tells me not only
who I am, but it tells me who God is.
And in that, it tells me that God is holy, and God is righteous, and God is just,
and that, that God being holy, righteous, and just cannot tolerate any sin.
And so that tells me more bad news because that tells me because I am a
sinner, and God is holy, righteous, and just and can't tolerate any sin,
that tells me then that I, I can't have a right relationship with God
Until the good news comes, which the Bible also tells us.
It not only tells us who we are and who God is, but it also
tells us what he did about that.
See, the Bible tells us that God didn't leave us as those with this plagued,
guilty, stained conscience, as those that could never be made right with
him and say, "Well, sorry about you."
But instead, the Bible says that God gave His Son for us.
2 Corinthians 5:21 puts it this way, that He made Him who knew no sin.
The only one with truly a clean conscience before the Father was
the Son, and the, the Bible tells me that God the Father made Him who
knew no sin, the Son, to be sin.
W- w- what sin?
Whose sin?
My sin that stained my conscience, and your sin that stained your conscience.
God made Him to be sin who knew no sin so that we might become righteous.
Righteous.
In other words, Jesus took the clean conscience that He had, and He transferred
it to our account and took our guilt, our sin upon Himself, and He died on the
cross for us so that we might be forgiven.
See, the Bible reminds me of the source of my clean conscience before God, which
is ultimately Jesus' work, not my work.
Objectively, I am righteous before the Lord because of the cross.
But the second thing that the Bible tells me, and the second reason that there's
joy in the Bible when it comes to a clear conscience is this: n- not only
is there an objective reality of a clear conscience, but there's also a subjective
reality of a clear conscience that can impact your day-to-day intimacy with God.
You are once for all secure and saved in Christ if you are in Christ, okay?
That never changes, but how close you feel to Him, how, how strong you feel
like your relationship with Christ may be at any given time, that fluctuates, and
oftentimes that fluctuates based on the state of our conscience before the Lord
Meaning this, i-if I as a believer have sin in my life, if I as a believer am
openly rebelling against God's word, if I'm not walking in obedience to what God
has called me to, to do, then I shouldn't expect that I'm gonna feel close to him.
I shouldn't expect that I'm gonna have an intimacy with God.
A-and when I sit here and I think, "God, why do you feel so far away?
Why does my walk feel so dry?
Why do you feel so distant?"
Oftentimes, we can trace it back to the fact that we have a guilty
conscience in the sense that we are carrying sin that we haven't brought
before the Lord and confessed.
And so the reason that God's word con-contradicts that or, or counteracts
that and provides joy for us, is God's word lays out the path for us that we
should be walking in order to maintain that clear conscience with the Lord,
in order to, to not feel the guilt that makes me want to not pray, but run.
The, the, the guilt that leads me not to want to read the word, but to ignore it
and, and just get through my week, and get through another Sunday, and go on and,
and try to forget about how bad I feel for the sin that I know I need to put off.
See, God's word is a joy for us.
It's a source of joy for us because it tells us, "Hey,
Christian, this is how to walk.
This is what it looks like to live a life that's pleasing to the Lord
so that you will feel close to him.
You'll feel the intimacy with him that you want to And that's
not found anywhere else, y'all.
The Spirit of God uses the Word of God in our life to make
us most like the Son of God.
That's what he does.
He uses God's Word to make us more like Jesus, and the more like Jesus
we become, the more clean we will feel in our conscience, and the
closer to the Lord we will feel.
And so there's the objective reality.
Your conscience has been ultimately, once and for all, cleansed in the sense
of your standing with God, because you have been declared righteous.
But there's a subjective reality of whether or not you're carrying a clear
conscience on a day-to-day basis.
Are you carrying sin that you know that you need to put off?
God's Word is a source of joy because it opens up our lives and says,
"Hey, this is what it looks like to walk in faithfulness to the Lord."
And so there's joy to be found therein.
There's the joy of the clear conscience to walk with him, which I trust that
you know what that feels like, the joy of a clear conscience versus
the joy of a, a guilty conscience.
God's Word leads you into the joy of the clear conscience and does
that, again, uniquely for us.
But it's not just a clear conscience.
There's more that the Word of God offers for us.
There's other veins of joy here in the pages of scripture.
In Psalm 119:44-45, we read this.
The psalmist says, "I will keep your law continually forever and ever,
and I shall walk in a wide place, for I have sought your precepts."
I have sought your precepts.
Weathering the storms that will inevitably accompany life will depend
greatly on what we do with the Word.
The Word of God provides joy for us as Christians because we can keep coming back
to it over and over and over again, and if we persevere in steadfastness, in coming
back to the Word, what God is gonna do through the Word is he's gonna strengthen
our faith to enable us to stand firm, even in the midst of the darkest valleys and
the hardest trials that we walk through.
And so there is joy, point number two, in the joy of perseverance.
There's joy in persevering.
Notice in Psalm 119:44-45, he says, he, he compares it to walking in a wide place.
Walking in a wide place.
Uh, that's the feeling of, of security.
Contrast that, if you've ever seen the movie Free Solo
with Alex Honnold, he, he's
There's a scene in that movie where he's standing on a ledge that's about
an inch wide on the, the, the rock face.
I think it's El Cap that he's standing there.
And I think in the, the interview, at one point in time, he says, "I felt
such relief once I got to that ledge."
And I'm just thinking, "Are you crazy?"
Like, if he sneezes, it's over, it's gone.
And, and that, to me, I, I look at that and I think that, that I'm so thankful
that's not what Christianity is.
Christianity is, is not clinging to a sheer rock face, just trying with
everything you can to hold on I- instead, what Christianity is, is you
weather the storms, is it's coming back to the word of God and finding
in the word of God the encouragement to keep going, to keep persevering.
A- a- and God's word does that for you.
The world, what the world will do, when you come to the world and, and
you look for answers, the world will say, "Well, have you tried this?
Well, what about this?
Why don't you try this?
Okay, that's not working.
Why don't, why don't you try this over here?
Hey, th- you know what?
That, that doesn't work.
Why don't you try this over here?"
You know, the, it's interesting.
There's, there's a whole, um, counseling thing that's, that's out there now,
and, a- a- and I don't mean to throw stones, and, and maybe you've, you've
participated in this and, and benefited from it, and that, that may be.
But the whole BetterHelp, th- that whole counseling organization, here,
do you know that one of their selling points is if you don't like your
counselor, you can just find another one
Do you see the problem with that?
If, if I don't like what you're telling me, I'm just gonna go find somebody I
like what they're telling me instead.
See, that- that's what the world offers us.
"Oh, that's not working?
Why don't you just try something else?
Try this over here.
This'll work better."
When we come to the Word of God, there's joy to be found in the Word of God in
the midst of trials because God's Word is gonna keep us on the same path,
trusting the same Lord, doing the same things all the way through it.
Y- you don't have to get to this place and say, "I-- Life isn't going well.
This isn't working.
What else do you have for me, Lord?"
You may get to the place where you say, "Life isn't well," and it
feels like this isn't working, but God's gonna say, "Just trust me.
Trust my plan.
Trust my path."
When you come to God's Word, you find a God who is unchanging, and you can
trust that, and you can take confidence in that, and you can find hope in
that, and you can find joy in that.
Every time you come to the Word of God, you're gonna find the same God.
You're gonna find the same God.
He's not gonna change.
He's not gonna say, "Well, oh, well, that's not working.
Well, let's try something totally different."
And so there's joy in perseverance.
As we come to God's Word, we can find that God is gonna call us to keep pressing on,
and in that perseverance, there's joy in the fruit that will be born from that.
Galatians 6:9 says this, "Let us not grow weary of doing good."
How do I know what it looks like to do good?
I go to the Word of God.
Let us not grow weary.
Let us persevere in coming to the Word.
Let us persevere in doing good, for in due season we will reap if we do not give up.
God's promising us that.
Now, that may be reaping the joys in eternity and not necessarily here,
but the promise nonetheless exists.
It's the same, and those joys are gonna far surpass anything that's here.
Psalm 16:11 says this, "In Your presence there is fullness of
joy, and at Your right hand there are pleasures forevermore."
And so, uh, uh, you may want to, to have the Bible say, "And God will bring you out
of the trial that you're facing right now right away, and you will feel comforted,
and you will feel happy, and you will feel joyful with all of the joy that
the world holds out for you right now."
But the Bible offers you something far better than that.
Maybe you're not gonna come through the valley right now.
Maybe you're not gonna get the joy that the world holds out to
you in, in other areas right now.
But the Bible says if you persevere, there's a joy that's way better
than that that's waiting for you
That's why Paul says in Philippians chapter three, he says this, "Brothers,
I do not consider that I have made it my own, but one thing I do,
forgetting what lies ahead, I press on
Forgetting what lies ahead, straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on
towards the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.
Paul's saying, "I'm, I'm not concerned with what's behind me anymore.
I'm not concerned with the, the accomplishments in my life even.
I, I'm gonna press on towards the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.
I'm gonna keep persevering towards the prize."
God's Word holds the truths that are gonna sustain us through whatever
season that we're in, whether it be the valley or the victory.
We can come back to the Word of God and have Him say, "Keep going.
Keep pressing on," and there's joy to be found there.
So there's the joy of perseverance, but there's another joy here,
the third joy that we find, the third vein of joy is here.
Uh, he says in Psalm 119:165, "Great peace have those who love your law,
and nothing can make them stumble."
I was praying about that earlier from Philippians chapter 4 when Paul
says, "There's a peace that guards your hearts and your minds in Christ
Jesus that surpasses understanding."
Great peace have those who love your law, who love the Word.
The peace that nothing can happen to that person, that nothing can ultimately make
them stumble, comes from the Word of God.
Peace is something in our world desired by many but pos- possessed by few.
I- it's something that in a topsy-turvy world like we live on, live in, we,
we find all kinds of different ideas of what peace looks like or should be
It may even lead us to, to wonder, is peace really attainable at all?
But what God's Word holds out for us is a, a peace that's unrivaled, and
a peace that's unparalleled, and a peace that can be ours that surpasses
understanding, that lasts, and it's a, a peace that's ours, that if we
have it, nothing can make us stumble.
And so our third joy that we can find in the pages of God's Word
is indeed, yes, the joy of peace.
The joy of peace.
And there's two forms that that peace takes within the Word of God.
The first is similar to having the clean conscience.
The, the first is the Word of God tells us about the peace that we can
have with God, that we're born without that, that we're born in need of that.
In fact, if you're here this morning and, and you're not in Christ, the peace
that you need is not marital peace.
It's not peace with your kids.
It's not peace with your neighbors.
It's not peace with your boss or your coworkers.
It's not peace geopolitically.
Th-th-the greatest peace that you need this morning is the peace
that's only found in Christ, the only
that is, is only revealed to us within the pages of the scriptures.
The peace that you need this morning is peace with God, the
peace with the God of the universe.
And the Apostle Paul writes it this way in Ephesians 2:13-17.
He says, "But now in Christ Jesus you who were once far off have been
brought near by the blood of Christ.
For He Himself is our peace, who has made us both one, and has broken down
in His flesh the dividing wall of hostility, by abolishing the law of
commandments expressed in ordinances, that He might create in Himself
one new man in place of the two, so making peace, and might reconcile us
both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility.
And He came and preached peace to you who were far off and
peace to those who were near."
The peace with God that we need is what Paul describes in Colossians 1:20 as
well, where he says, "Through Jesus, God was pleased to reconcile to Himself all
things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of the cross."
The peace that you need most, which is peace with God, only
comes through Jesus Christ.
It only comes through the cross.
That message is only found revealed in the pages of God's Word, the Bible.
See, here's the thing, y'all, Christianity, Christianity i- is not
just the best of a bunch of options.
Christianity is the only option
There is no other religion that will get you to God
Period.
End of story
Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, atheism, Mormonism, Jehovah's
Witnesses, none of them work
Christianity alone will get you to God
Jesus himself said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life, and no one
comes to the Father but through me."
The greatest need the world has for peace is not peace between Iran and the United
States, or peace between Israel and Lebanon, or peace in the Middle East, or
peace with Russia, or peace with China.
That is not the greatest need that the world has.
The greatest need that the world has is peace with God, and the only
place that that's found is the Bible.
And if you're here in Christ this morning and you've experienced that, then the
Bible reminds you of that every time you come to a passage like Ephesians
2 or like Colossians 1, you can say, "Lord, praise God," and feel the joy
of knowing that you sit here this morning at peace with the God of the
universe, and nothing can change that.
And so there's joy knowing that.
That's the first component of, of joy.
There's-- the first component of peace that we think about is
the peace that we have with God.
The second component of peace, though, is that peace that we experience as
followers of Christ, and that's the peace that surpasses understanding.
That's this peace from Philippians 4:7 that we read about during our scripture
reading that I was praying about.
This is a peace that produces a joy in us that surpasses all
understanding and that guards our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Or like Paul writes in 2 Thessalonians 3:16, Paul said this: "May the
Lord of peace himself give you peace at all times in every way.
The Lord be with you all."
May the Lord of peace give you peace in every way.
Y'all, this is something the world is after and grasping at straws to find
Peace
And you might look at somebody who by all outward appearances would be
somebody that you would say that, that person should be at peace
And how many times have we heard that that person is on the verge of or
does eventually take their own life?
It comes to mind often for me, but Robin Williams
Actor, comedian, made people laugh for a living and was really good at it
made millions and millions of dollars
To the point that he didn't have to make another movie for the
rest of his life if he didn't want to, and he would've been fine.
Not only that, he-- married, with a family, living in a nice house
There was no scandal that popped up in Robin Williams' life
There's just simply him looking at what the world held out as, "You're
gonna be at peace if you get all this."
And then he got all that, and he said, "I'm not at peace
And he took his life
See, we have to, to, to say that, that if we want peace that lasts, there's a
different kind of peace that a Christian has that allows them to walk the trial
and to keep going, and allow everybody outside of them looks at them and says,
"How are you still getting out of bed and, and moving around in the morning?"
I have a peace that comes to me through my relationship with God.
I trust Him.
I, I, I don't get my circumstances, I don't love my circumstances, but I trust
Him, and so I have a peace that really I can't explain if you don't know Christ.
Charles Spurgeon put it this way.
He said this: "They have learned the secret of the reconciling blood.
They have felt the power of the comforting spirit.
They stand before the Father accepted.
They have many troubles and are likely to be persecuted by the proud,
but their usual condition is that of a deep calm, a peace too great
for this little world to break."
I love that picture of the Christian possessing a peace too great
for this little world to break
If you've been walking along with the Lord, you've come to know that the
Word has that peaceful, calming effect.
You go through a trial and you feel like life is falling apart,
and yet you come to God's Word and there's a balm that is found there.
There's a peace that comes from the Word of God that produces,
again, a reason for us to find joy in the riches of the Word of God.
If our world is hungry for peace, it's equally hungry for
this next one, which is hope.
Verse 114, "You are my hiding place and my shield, and I hope in your word."
I hope in your word.
People hope in all sorts of things in
our world.
They hope in politics.
They hope in peace.
They hope in power.
They hope in possessions, in career, in children, in family, in health,
in achievements, in retirement investments, in everything.
That, people hope in all of those things.
But just like with peace, true hope is gonna be elusive until it's captured by
the person who's laid hope, laid ahold of, of hope that's found in the Word of God.
Our fourth vein of joy to be found in the scriptures is the joy of hope.
The joy of hope
We talked about this in 1 Peter chapter 1 verses 3 through 5 back in our series.
It says this, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living
hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead to an inheritance
that is imperishable and undefiled and unfading, kept in heaven for you,
who by God's power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready
to be revealed in the last time."
The living hope that's ours in Christ is something the world can't offer you.
There's nothing that you can hope in this side of eternity that, that holds
a candle to hoping in Christ and the riches that will be ours in eternity.
Or like Paul wrote in Romans 15:4, he said this, "Whatever was written in the former
days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through
the encouragement of the Scriptures," notice, "through the ins- encouragement
of the Scriptures we might have hope."
God's Word provides hope because God's Word tells us what was,
what is, and what's coming
And as we see in God's word all that He has already done and all of the prophecies
that have already been fulfilled and all the ways the word of God has already
come to fruition, we hope in what will yet come to fruition in the future
The countless stories of, of so many martyrs who went to their deaths
willingly because their hope was so sure that they were moments away
from standing in the presence of their Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
Those accounts, those stories, those men and women and their faith
is traceable to what they had come to know to be true through their
hope that they found in God's word
If you haven't looked into them, I would encourage you to.
I've mentioned them before, but the, the accounts of the Marian
martyrs, many of them are recorded in Foxe's Book of Martyrs.
You can find others, uh, I believe J.C.
Ryle has a book called Light from Old Paths that contains a lot of
the stories of these Marian martyrs.
These were men and, and women, and even children, who died under the
reign of Bloody Mary for their refusal to deny the truth of God's word.
And many of them were tied to a stake and, and burned, and they
went to their deaths not whimpering, not cowering, not recanting.
They went to their deaths boldly.
Some of them singing hymns as the flames were lit about them.
Many of them praying as the flames were lit about them.
You say, "What would cause somebody to do that?"
Their hope in the word of God, their certainty that came with this hope that
they knew that though they died here, they were about to live forever with Christ.
One of the m- martyrs, not of the, the Marian martyrs, but of the early
church, was a man named Polycarp.
Maybe you've heard of him.
Polycarp was a disciple of John.
John the, the Apostle John.
So Polycarp, being a disciple of John, learned at John's feet and, and Polycarp
began to teach others and, and to be a leader in the early stages of the church.
Well, Rome didn't love that because Rome didn't love Christianity, and
so the Romans eventually sought out Polycarp and arrested him and
condemned him to die by burning.
One of the overseers, one of the officials, Roman officials, came
to, to know Polycarp and, and came to discover that he was in his 80s,
and this man didn't feel right about burning an octogenarian at the stake.
And so he went to Polycarp and he entreated Polycarp and he said,
"Polycarp, uh, just, just, just recant.
Just give allegiance to Caesar.
That's all they're looking for you to do.
That's all you need to do, Polycarp, just do that."
See, he, he was holding out to Polycarp what the world holds out
to us, and that is a, a hope that we think is, is about here and now.
Live here.
Uh, think about it.
Just ride out y- your, your days in, in peace and comfort here.
You know, the, the, the world may come to you.
You're not getting ready to be burned at the stake, I hope, but the world may
come to you as a Christian and say, "Why are you sacrificing so much for Jesus?
W- why don't you just give in a little bit to, to the things
that, that can satisfy you here?
Why don't you hope in, in riches?
Why don't you hope in your retirement?
Why don't you hope in the next election?
Why don't you hope in your marriage?
Why don't you hope in your kids?
Why don't you hope in having kids?
Why don't you hope in, in your job and your career?"
Aren't these things so good?
Look at all the people who have hoped in these things, and look
at how happy they, they can be
Polycarp was, was beckoned to, to hope in living a little bit longer by this man.
And Polycarp responded to him and he said this.
He said, "86 years I have served him, and he never did me any wrong.
How can I blaspheme my king who saved me?"
And then as Polycarp was tied to the stake and the flames
were lit, Polycarp prayed this
He said, "I bless you," speaking to the Lord.
"I bless you that you have thought me worthy of this day and hour to
be numbered among the martyrs and to share in the cup of Christ.
For resurrection to eternal life, for soul and body in the
incorruptibility of the Holy Spirit.
Among them may I be accepted before you today as rich and acceptable
sacrifice, just as you, the faithful and true God, have prepared and
foreshown and brought about."
Those are words of a man who had his hope fixed on Christ.
And that hope is informed by the Word, by the scriptures.
And so if you wanna be ready to weather, if you wanna be ready to go through
it, if you wanna be ready to hope in the face of insurmountable odds, the
Word of God has the vein of joy, of the hope in Christ that can be yours.
Again, to come to it, to read it, to understand it, and to say,
"Lord, I'm, I'm hoping in you."
This is connected very closely to our final point this morning, and that is
found in verse 76 of Psalm 119, and it's this: "Let your steadfast love comfort me
according to your promise to your servant.
Let your steadfast love comfort me according to your
promise to your servant."
This is one of those veins of joy that we've all needed to tap into at some point
in time in our lives, and God gives us His Word and His promises to do just that, and
that is to comfort us with a comfort that is unique, again, only to the Word of God.
Point number five is this, God offers us in the scriptures the joy of comfort.
The joy of comfort
It seems more and more as, as we check the news headlines every day,
and as we see the world around us, and as life just happens, that we
could use some of this comfort.
Some of this comfort like we find in John 14:1-3 where Jesus says this,
"Let not your hearts be troubled.
Believe in God, believe also in me.
In my father's house are many rooms.
If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?
And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and I will take you to
myself that where I am, you may also be."
See, Jesus was talking to his disciples here, and he's getting ready to go
in the sense that he's getting ready to die on the cross for their sins.
But not only that, he was gonna rise from the dead three days later, and then 40
days after that, he's going to ascend up to heaven to sit at the right hand
of the Father where he still is today.
And so anticipating the fact that his disciples may be a little disconcerted
by losing Jesus to the right hand of the Father, by being troubled by that, Jesus
says, "Let not your heart be troubled."
And then he moves to comfort them by saying, "I'm going away, but
I'm coming back for you, too.
I'm gonna come get you."
And that was a promise not only for them, but also for us.
And so we can be comforted when we go to the Word of God to be reminded that Jesus
is gonna come back for his bride, that the, the evil in this world doesn't win,
God wins, and that Christ is coming back for the church, that we are gonna go and
be with him because he promised us, "I'm leaving, but I'm gonna come back and get
you to take you to be with me where I am."
Or 2 Corinthians 1:3-4, notice how God reveals himself to
us through the pen of Paul.
Here he says, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the
Father of mercies and God of all comfort."
God says h- he is the God of all comfort.
He's the God of all comfort.
Wherever you are, whatever you're facing, whatever's going on,
you need to be comforted by God.
God's got you.
He's the God of all comfort who comforts us in our afflictions so that we may
be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with
which we ourselves are comforted by God.
God is in the business of comforting his people, and God comforts his people
through the Word of God as we come to it, as we read about his promises.
Promises like this one in Revelation 21:4.
This one speaks to me often, "He is gonna wipe away every tear from their
eyes, and death shall be no more.
Neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for
the former things have passed away."
Christian, this is a comfort to you as you cry the tears, that God
is gonna wipe those away, that God is gonna take away the pain, God's
gonna take away the sorrow, he's gonna take away the heartache, and
so we're comforted by those things.
The Word comforts us with passages like Revelation 21 reminding us of our future.
The Word comforts us and brings a joy and that comfort with reminders
that Jesus is coming back for us.
The Word comforts us even as it's produced what this is right here.
This is, as the early church fathers called it, the creature of the Word.
That's the Church.
When we as brothers and sisters in Christ sit under the Word of God
and read the Word of God so that we can be comforted by the Word and
comfort one another with the Word.
The Word comforts us by reminding us that we are forgiven.
The Word comforts us by reminding us that God is a God of ultimate justice, such
that maybe you're here this morning, and you're thinking, uh, uh, something has
happened to me, and I long for justice that I don't know if I'm gonna get.
And you can come to the Word of God and be reminded that God's got that.
God hasn't given that to you to see about doing that.
He's the God of ultimate justice.
He'll take care of it.
The Word of God comforts us by the character of God, that God is
good, that God is all-knowing, that God is all-powerful, that God is
holy, that God is just, that God is patient, that God is steadfast.
Or maybe you're comforted by God's sovereignty.
You read something like the Book of Daniel, and you just see God's sovereignty
on display in the Book of Daniel.
Or maybe you're comforted by the, the Exodus account, that God provided manna
for Israel, and you're reminded that God provides for your daily bread.
Or maybe you're comforted by the, the, the words of Jesus from the Sermon on
the Mount when he says, "Have you looked at the birds of the air and considered
that not one of them falls to the ground apart from your father's knowledge?
How much of m- more value are you than the birds?"
That's what Jesus says to us.
Maybe you're comforted by that this morning.
Or maybe you're comforted when you get into the, the epistles and Paul
says, "God is working all things together for your good," Romans 8:28.
You may not get what that good is right now, but you can trust and be comforted
by the fact that God does, and he's at work for, for your good and his glory.
Or maybe you're comforted later on in Romans 8 where Paul says,
"Nothing can separate you from the love of God, not height nor depth
nor angels nor, nor demons, nor any other principality or ruler.
Nothing in all creation can separate you from the love of God."
Or perhaps you're comforted by Peter's reminder to us that we are
being guarded by God's power through faith for our salvation ready to
be revealed in the last times.
Maybe that gives you comfort this morning, that you don't have to
worry about, am I, am I gonna wake up tomorrow and not believe?
No, you're gonna wake up tomorrow and keep believing.
Why?
'Cause you're being guarded by God's power through faith for salvation
ready to be revealed in the last times.
There's great joy to be found in the comfort that comes from the
pages of God's Word, a- and, and the world can't offer that to you
If you've been seeking comfort in alcohol, or you've been se- seeking
comfort in drugs, or you're seeking comfort in a relationship, or you're
seeking comfort in a career, or you're seeking comfort in fill in the
blank, and it's not the Word of God
It won't work.
It's a band-aid
God's word provides abiding, lasting comfort, and it's ours through Christ.
There's untapped joy in the pages of God's word this morning.
It's waiting for us.
You don't have to climb into the Superstition Mountains to go find it
Uh, but I wonder if, if we think about all of these, if, if we said, "Man,
would you like to know that you can have a, a clean conscience and, and
you're gonna have something that's gonna let you keep going no matter what?
And, and there's an offer of peace, and there's an offer of comfort, and
there's an offer of hope that's yours just c- that will never run out.
But you know what?
You're gonna have to take a flight to Arizona a- and you're gonna
have to get a backpack, and you're gonna have to hike up into the
Superstition Mountains to find it.
But if you get it, those things that I just listed off here, these, these five
things, they'll never run out for you.
You'll have them for the rest of your life
My guess is we'd be filling up some flights to get to
the Superstition Mountains
You don't have to do that.
You don't have to.
All of those things are right here
Let me just say this, if you're in Christ.
I- if, if you're not, can I just talk with you this morning for a second?
Um
You can read the Bible
But you're, you're really not gonna get any of that out of it
Because what you have to do first is you have to repent from your
sins and put your trust in Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior.
And that offer's free to you this morning.
I- i- if you're here this morning and, and, and man, you have tried
everything looking for comfort and hope and peace and, and a clear
conscience, and you've tried everything.
You, you've, y- you, you want joy, you want abiding joy and, and the world has,
has offered you things that you thought would do it, and yet none of it has,
and I'm pretty confident that wherever you are this morning, none of it has.
F- feel pretty, pretty good about saying that.
And whatever you're pursuing right now, thinking it's gonna do that, just let's
be honest with ourselves for a second.
Look at your track record.
It's probably not gonna come through for you, huh?
If you want it, it's here this morning
It's a surrender to Christ.
Is it you doing business with the Lord?
Lord, I wanna trust Jesus as my Lord and Savior this morning.
I trust that He died on the cross for my sins so that I can be
forgiven and rose from the dead so that I can live with Him forever.
I need Jesus.
I need Him, and I need the joy that comes from your Word.
That offer's here this morning for you.
If you were with us during testimonies, you heard one of the, the younger
girls stand up here and she said, "I sat there as the pastor said that over
and over and over again, and I sat there and I thought to myself, 'God,
I don't know why I'm not doing that.'"
Don't let that be you this morning.
If that's you and you're sitting there saying, "Yeah, I don't know why I'm not
doing that this morning," let's talk.
After service, I would love nothing more to talk with you.
Say, "Let's do this."
Let's see you go from death to life this morning.
It's not a plane flight, it's not a backpack, it's not snakes and
scorpions, it's not mountains, it's not a lost Dutchman's gold mine
It's some time with the Lord saying, "Lord, I'm, I'm ready.
I wanna be all in."
If you are and you're there and you're a follower of Christ, again, you've
got untapped riches of joy in your lap.
Pursue it this week
Not in a bad way, but in a good way.
Put God to the test this week.
Say, "Lord, I want the joy that's there in the scriptures.
Will you help me find it?"
Let's pray.
Lord God, we love you, and we are thankful for your Word,
and we are thankful for joy.
We are thankful that you are a God of joy.
You are … We are thankful that you are a God of, of, of grace and mercy and
peace and comfort and hope, and all of the things that we talked about this morning.
We are grateful that that is who you are, and you've revealed yourself
to be that in your Word, and through your Word, you've given us access to
find all of those things in its pages.
And so Lord, I pray for us this morning that we would give ourselves over to
the scriptures, that we would find great joy in them, and that we would find joy
that is unrivaled and unparalleled by anything else this world would offer us.
God, help us to love your Word and to be a people that just wear on our faces
and just in our personalities and who we are a joy that causes the world to
say, "What do you have that I don't?"
Lord, I do pray for those that are here this morning that maybe would say,
"I'm, I'm not there," that you would impress upon them that today's the day.
What's holding them back from coming to you and finding this great riches of joy
through your Word and through Christ?
We praise you, we thank you, we love you.
We pray this all in Jesus' name.
Amen.