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Newington Three Angels Church

Eric Walsh

Courage in Crisis

A good day to everyone who is joining us.

It's been a little while since we've done 1 of these, but we praise God to be back today.

We're gonna jump right into our message today.

Our scripture readings from Revelation 3, 18 and 19, which says, I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich.

And white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed.

And that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear and anoint thine eyes with eye salve that thou mayest see.

Message this week is entitled, Courage in Crisis.

Father God, we thank you for this opportunity, Lord, to just study your word.

I ask once again, Lord, that you make me a nail upon the wall, a rusty, sorry nail, Lord.

But upon that nail, Lord, I ask that you hang a portrait of Jesus Christ.

Instead, Father, let us hear a word from the throne room of grace.

We're gonna go to the book of Jeremiah to start.

Jeremiah in the 13th reign of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, is called as a young man to be a prophet to the nations.

The book of Jeremiah is similar to Isaiah and some of the other Old Testament prophets in that it is full of prophecies and rebuke against how Israel and or Judah was behaving.

But Jeremiah's is different because he reveals more of his own story in the book.

We'll do some more Jeremiah talks in the coming weeks.

But to start it off, Jeremiah 1 and verse 4 says, Then the word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Before I formed thee in the belly, I knew thee, and before thou camest forth out of the womb, I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations.

I wanna tell you that, before we even start, 1 of the recurring themes, in my opinion, in the book of Jeremiah is 1 of purpose.

In Jeremiah 29 11, Jeremiah says, "'I know the plans for you that I have, saith the Lord, "'plans to prosper you and to give you a hope.'" Purpose is written into the book of Jeremiah at a time when there was not much left to seemingly be purposeful about as he would live to see the destruction of his beloved Jerusalem and the complete overthrow of the kingdom of Judah.

But here God says, listen, Jeremiah, I formed thee in the belly.

Or as you were being formed in the belly, God says, I knew you, Jeremiah.

Before you were born, before you were delivered, I had already set you apart.

And I ordained you a prophet unto the nations.

The call came from God and Jeremiah was such a 1.

So Jeremiah 1 verse 6 says, then said I, ah, Lord, God behold, I cannot speak for I am a child.

Jeremiah's response is 1 of incompleteness.

It's similar to Isaiah's response and Moses' response.

When they are called, Isaiah says, listen, I am undone.

I'm a man of unclean lips, and I come from a people of unclean lips.

The idea is that, from Jeremiah, is I'm incomplete.

But I wanna tell you, especially for the young people, God wants to bring you in while you're developing.

His calling on you, you will never be perfect enough to claim.

God takes the imperfect person and uses them for his perfect work.

He did it with Isaiah, he does it with Jeremiah, but the Lord said unto me, say not, I am a child.

For thou shalt go to all that I shall send thee and whatsoever I command thee, thou shalt speak.

Be not afraid of their faces, for I am with thee to deliver thee, saith the Lord.

God says, listen, don't say, O child, because what I tell you to go and do, you're gonna do it.

And what I tell you to say, you're gonna say it.

Then he says, listen, you're gonna face some adversity, Jeremiah, do not be afraid of their faces.

For I am with thee to deliver thee, saith the Lord.

I wanna ask you if you are ready to face the faces of the end times.

This picture here shows you a rally, a Black Lives Matter rally.

People are in each other's faces, not in this picture, but in general in America right now.

It's interesting, you can see there's a young man here with the crest and the initials of the former Soviet Union.

I would never have thought you'd live to see that in the United States as almost seemingly a badge of honor or of rebellion.

But I want you to know that we are called, before you were born, every 1 of us, if you're listening to this and you're a Christian, you have been called to speak into this climate.

A climate of confusion and chaos, of hatred and division, a climate of uncertainty and unpredictability.

You have been called like Jeremiah to speak.

You see, Jeremiah had hoped that Josiah, the king's transformation and his return to God and his call for the people to return to God would have led the kingdom of Judah back to God and that they would have been restored.

But as soon as Josiah was dead, in fact, his grandson Jehoiakim takes over and they spiral back into idolatry and what was supposed to be religious service and worship to the God of the universe, degraded into pomp and circumstance, pride and selfishness.

And I'm telling you that you are called to have courage in the current crisis.

God says do not be afraid of their faces.

How will you speak into the faces of this world now?

We are called to preach truth when lies have become the norm.

We're called to give hope when all we see around us is destruction.

We are called to preach the love of God when men now see God as a great malfactor.

And I can show you a picture, but I'll go back to where we started at the beginning of this pandemic.

We began in Matthew chapter 24 and verse 7.

I think it's 1 of the first 2 or 3 messages I brought.

For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes in diverse places.

All these are the beginning of sorrows this year 2020.

We started doing these in March and I can tell you that these prophecies have only been more fulfilled since we started.

Remember I said it was ethnos versus ethnos, ethnic group versus ethnic group.

We have seen an even greater polarization of people along color lines and political lines in this country than probably ever before.

There's a verbal war and some bit of a trade war between the US and China.

A Soviet, I can't keep saying Soviet, a Russian warship sailed through a fleet of American fishing ships last week.

This year there were locusts that went through Africa and famine caused by the pandemic and pestilence, not only are we dealing with the coronavirus But now they're talking about a twindemic as we go into the fall flu season, that in fact there might be a terrible thing that happens.

And even this far into this pandemic, we still have states in America and places around the world are having spikes in coronavirus cases.

Earthquakes, I could name off all the places that have earthquakes.

But Jesus says all these are the beginning of SARS.

What I want you to get when you watch CNN, Fox News, the BBC, Al Jazeera, whatever news station you watch, I want you to get that when you see the hostility in the streets and in the political sphere, Not just in America, but around the world, but specifically here in America.

When you see the angst and the vitriol with which people are speaking to each other, the fact that we cannot disagree and be agreeable.

In fact, we have only learned to disagree and be disagreeable.

What I'm telling you is that the way that they have come after the world is coming after 1 another today is the way that they will 1 day come after us.

If you don't have the calling on your life that Jeremiah had, You will not be able to stand on the last day.

Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted and shall kill you and you shall be hated of all nations for my name's sake.

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Courage in Crisis

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