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Advent HOPE Sabbath School

Adrian Zahid

Evidence Locked In A Box

Before I begin this morning, I would like to invite you 1 more time to restoration.

I was thinking as I talked with the speaker a few weeks ago at Southern, He was there preaching and I had gone there to record the sermons there and he was telling, I asked him, hey you know I've never heard you tell your testimony before, can you tell me your testimony?

And so he began to say a little bit about his testimony and he shared that he was an Adventist and then he kind of fell away and he got into, in his words, he said, if you're going to go into the world, you might as well go full force.

And so he went in there full force and then slowly the pleasure started to be less and less satisfying.

And so he ended up going for better and better pleasures and he got into drugs.

And he said 1 day he took some, he took drugs and then he, a thought came to him, man, you know, these drugs are expensive.

If I buy them wholesale, I'll get a lot for them for cheaper.

And then he bought a whole lot of them and then he decided to sell them.

And so, it is amazing what God has done in that man's life.

And when I thought about it, last year we had a speaker who was a former hip hop rapper.

And this year we have a former drug dealer.

And restoration is truly living up to its name.

Restoration stands for, we believe in that, in restoring the image of God in man.

And that is what restoration hopes to do on the campus of Lone Land University.

And all of you are invited to that and we have several locations this year and a lot of logistics and a lot of help And as Claudio mentioned a lot of departments need help.

And so if you are willing We will use you and So please do come out to the day of prayer and fasting to pray so that we can be better at witnessing to our friends.

And just let me kneel and pray before we start.

Dear Father, I come before you and I ask that you prepare the hearts of my listeners today for the message that you have placed in my heart.

Lord, the message is in my mind, but it's very hard for me to get it out exactly the way I feel you want me to.

But Father, I ask that you guide my words and despite my inability, Lord, I ask that you make it so that people understand and that your message is clear.

There are times in our life when God does not seem to come through for us.

There are times in our life when people fail our expectations.

Our boyfriends, husbands, wives, bosses, whatever it takes, whoever it is, at some time it seems they do fail and sometimes it feels that it seems like God is also failing us and in those times when we feel that God is utterly failing us is when we need God And it is at those times when we feel that God is far away, that God is very near and He wants to help us.

Turn with me in your Bibles to 2nd Kings chapter 6.

We find here a king who is walking on the wall of his city inspecting the honor guard and the defenses set up by his army against the enemy which is right outside his city gates.

2nd Kings chapter 24 chapter 6 verse 24 the Bible reads And it came to pass after this that the king of Syria gathered all his hosts and went up and besieged Samaria.

And there was a great famine in Samaria and behold they besieged it until an ass's head was sold for 4 score pieces of silver and doves dung for 5 pieces of silver.

And as the king of Israel was passing by on the wall, there cried a woman unto him and said, saying, Help me help my lord.

And that cry of that woman that day is 1 of the most chilling stories found in the Bible.

The king heard that story, and something just happened inside him.

And he decided to take out his anger on someone that was very close to God.

And we read in verse 30, it says, And it came to pass, when the king heard the words of the woman, that he rent his clothes.

Verse 31, then he said, God do so and more also to me, if the head of Elisha shall stand on him this day.

And so he decided that he was going to take off the head of God's prophet because he was upset at God because here, look at the realities.

There was an enemy outside the gates, the city was under siege, the food had ran out, people had resorted to eating dung and can you imagine the conversation at a dinner table where a family is sitting down to eat and the boy doesn't want to eat because his food smells bad and the father says, eat it because it's good for you.

That was what this city had come to, and this king had just lost all hope.

It seemed like God was not going to come through for him.

Those were the realities that this man was facing.

It seems sometimes in our life when we're faced with circumstances that we read the Bible and it just seems like God is up there and we're down here and there's no changing that.

And whatever God is saying is just too high for us it is just too heavenly for us it is just not practical for today God's message that day for that king came through the prophet just in the nick of time we read in chapter 7 verse 1 then Elisha said Hear ye the word of the Lord.

Thus sayeth the Lord, Tomorrow about this time, remember, 80 pieces of silver for a donkey's head.

Don't know if the rest of the donkey was there, but 80 pieces for the head, and 5 pieces for the dove's droppings.

Elisha said, tomorrow about this time shall a measure of fine flour be sold for a shekel and 2 measures of barley for a shekel in the gate of Samaria.

But to the king and to those listening, it just seemed like it was impossible to happen.

There was a man that day who doubted God's ability to do what he said.

He had seen the enemy, he had heard the woman cry, and he had heard that story and he just Blurted out what was on his mind Verse 2 then a Lord who's on whose hand the king leaned Answered the man of God and said behold if the Lord would open would make the windows of heaven Make windows in heaven might this thing be so pretty much.

He was saying even if God were to open the floodgates of heaven, this would not be possible.

Fast forward a few thousand years to Luke chapter 24.

We'll join some disciples who are also faced with some unpleasant realities.

Luke chapter 24 verse 13 and behold 2 men, 2 of them, went the same day to a village called Emmaus, which is from Jerusalem, about 3 4 longs, 3 score 4 longs, and they talked together of all the things which had happened what were the things that had happened Jesus the Lord and Master had been crucified and declared dead on the day of preparation all the disciples even those like Peter who said that they would stand by Jesus were in hiding.

And now some women were claiming that that they had seen visions of angels and that the tomb was empty.

Men had gone and checked the tomb and they had found that it was indeed empty.

And as they communed together and reasoned, Jesus himself drew near and went with them.

But their eyes were held that they should not know him.

And He said unto them, What manner of communications are these that ye have 1 to another, as ye walk and are sad?

And then they began to describe to Him, and they said, Are you the only person in Jerusalem who does not know what happened this last weekend?

And they talked about how things transpired that weekend and how it just dashed their expectations, dashed all their hopes.

And in verse 20 they said, And how the chief priests and our rulers delivered him to be crucified?

Verse 19, And he said unto them, what things?

And they said unto him, Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, which was a prophet, was, was a prophet, mighty indeed, and the word before God and all the people and how the chief priests and our rulers delivered him to be condemned to death and have crucified him.

But we trusted, they said, but we trusted that it had been He which would have redeemed Israel.

Have you ever trusted and have someone not come through for you?

Adventists talk about putting God in a box.

Most of the time when I hear that cliché, you're putting God in a box, is usually in the context of when you say something that is perhaps convicting to that person, and then they just feel uncomfortable and they say, you know what, God really doesn't say that.

But today I'd like to tell you my idea of what putting God in a box is.

We put God in a box when we hold on to those 1 or 2 things that we just really love doing, even though we know that it is wrong and those sins that we hold on to put Jesus on the cross.

We put God in a box and we are convinced based on our own spiritual condition that God is unable to keep us from falling, that He is powerless, yes powerless, to keep us, to give us total victory from sin on this earth.

I was talking to a minister sometime back about total victory over sin and he said you know I don't believe in total victory over sin this side of eternity and I said you know I don't believe in victory over sin that side of eternity because what's the use of having total victory over sin on that side of eternity?

It's like having a fire department in heaven when there's no fire to put out.

You need victory over sin on this side where you have a tempter and where you have sin and you have to face temptation every single day.

Why do we need victory over sin in heaven when sin is done away with.

We put God in a box when we convince ourselves that our relationship with things in this world precludes or bars us from living our lives in such a way as to tell the real truth about God to our friends.

We put God in a box when we are convinced that we have everything to lose and nothing to gain by sharing Jesus Christ with our friends That is what it means to put God in a box We trusted they said Church members put God in a box when they believe preachers who interpret the Bible so loosely that it loses its force upon the conscience and they go on in their latest in condition down to the path to hell.

It is the mission of Avinhope as it says in the front over here, preach the word, that every word that is preached over here that you go home and you check it out to make sure that what we're saying is true.

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Evidence Locked In A Box

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