A New Beginning

Greg Laurie: We wonder where is God, when in fact God is with us. God is present when he seems absent.

Guest (Male): Ever felt like God was distant? He seemed distant when you needed him most. Pastor Greg Laurie reveals the truth.

Greg Laurie: The Bible says that the Lord is a very present help in times of trouble. So maybe I'm talking to somebody right now going through a valley, someone going through a storm, someone going through a difficulty. God is with you.

Guest (Male): Ever walk up to an order counter and not a soul pays attention to you? You clear your throat, you utter a polite "Excuse me", nothing. Some people think they get the same response when they call on God: silence.

Well, today on A New Beginning, Pastor Greg Laurie points out that God hears our prayers, he cares about our needs, and he never stops working on our behalf. Even when it seems like nothing's happening, something's happening.

Greg Laurie: We're starting a brand new series that we're calling Jesus and You 2. It's a sequel because we're looking at Jesus in the Old Testament, and the title of our first message is "God is Now Here". I'm going to ask you to turn to the book of Genesis. Genesis. Okay, so if you don't know where that is, grab your Bible and take a hard left. It's all the way at the beginning. We're going to look at Genesis 3 and Genesis 22.

Heard the story of an atheist father who was talking to his daughter. He wanted her too to be an atheist. And she was just learning to spell, and so he wrote these words out: "God is nowhere". God is nowhere. And he said, "Read that." And she's just learning to read, so she's sounding out the letters: N-O-W-H-E-R-E. And she says, "Oh, I get it, Dad! You're saying, 'God is now here'." Ah, well, she saw it differently. She saw it right.

And there are times in life when it seems as though God is nowhere. We wonder where is God, when in fact God is with us. God is present when he seems absent. The Bible says that the Lord is a very present help in times of trouble. Jesus said, "I'll never leave you or forsake you." And he also said, "Lo, I am with you even to the end of the age."

One of my favorite passages is when the Lord says in Isaiah 43, "When you go through deep waters, I will be with you. When you go through rivers of difficulty, you will not drown. When you go through the fire of oppression, you'll not be burned up and the flames will not consume you." And then one of my all-time favorites, Psalm 23. I bet you know this one by memory. We'll say it together: "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me." That's right.

So maybe I'm talking to somebody right now going through a valley, someone going through a storm, someone going through a difficulty. God is with you. Now, we know this intellectually, and we know this by faith, and we'll even say it to others, but there are times when our emotions have to catch up with the facts. And there are times in our life where we might say, "Where is God in all of this?" Maybe you're feeling that right now.

But God is with you. God is now here. I think of Joseph in a prison cell. He probably felt all alone and abandoned. And how did Joseph end up in a prison cell? Well, it started with his brothers selling him off to slave traders because they were jealous of the father's attention that was put on Joseph, their brother.

He ends up in the house of a guy named Potiphar, who had a lustful wife. Her name was Mrs. Robinson. You laughed at that, you're old, because that's a very dated reference. And she was lusting after young Joseph and basically grabbed him and pulled him down on the bed and said, "Lie with me," basically have sex with me, in so many words.

And he ran for his life, and she accused him falsely of rape. And so he ends up in a prison cell, not because he broke the law but because he kept the law, God's law. And how easily could he have said, "God, what is going on here? Why would you let this happen to me?"

And then ultimately, through God's providence, Joseph ascends to become the most powerful man in all of Egypt. And one day the very brothers who betrayed him stand before him. And you remember that verse where he turned to his brothers and said, "I have a very particular set of skills. Skills I have acquired over a very long career, skills that make me a nightmare for people like you." Remember that? Now, that's from the movie Taken, a more recent cultural reference, though that's pretty old too.

No, really, what he said was, "You meant this for evil, but God meant it for good to save many people alive." Basically, Joseph was quoting Romans 8:28 before it had been written, which says, "For we know that all things work together for good to those that love God." God can bring good despite the worst imaginable situation.

I think of Charlie Kirk, this courageous young man cut down at the age of 31 by an assassin's bullet. It's what you would call a worst-case scenario. But instead of stopping what Charlie was trying to accomplish, now we have thousands of young people returning to church, many coming to church for the first time, many buying a Bible for the first time, wanting to know more about this faith. So despite the bad, God is bringing good, right? It's true.

But you know, Joseph probably felt alone and abandoned, but God had his hand on him. Now let's go mentally from a prison to a palace and think about Esther. How did Esther become the queen of Persia? She was a Jewish girl. Well, she won a beauty contest.

But why was she in a beauty contest? Because there was another woman in this story that is often forgotten, but I think in some ways is part of the story in a significant way and is an unsung hero, and her name was Vashti, Queen Vashti.

So the King of Persia throws a big giant party that's going on forever. And he has all of these people getting drunk and carrying on, and he decides he wants to bring out his wife, the Queen. He wants to parade her before his subjects. So he gives the order, "Bring out Queen Vashti wearing her crown."

Some commentators believe that contextually, what that verse means is he was asking her to come wearing only her crown. In other words, no clothes, just the crown. But whatever the case was, he was objectifying her, using her as a mere object, and much to her credit, Queen Vashti said, "I'm not doing it."

Well, then all of the aides of the King freaked out because they said, "Look, if you let her get away with this, we'll never hear the end of it from our wives. Because they won't do what we say anymore and they'll say, 'Well, Queen Vashti didn't do it, why should we do it?' You've got to throw her out from being Queen."

And that's exactly what happened, but that opened the door for Esther to get in there, which ultimately resulted in Esther being able to speak up for her people, the Jews, and she literally spared her whole race in the process. But I think Vashti deserves a little credit. She's a model for young girls today.

Girls, don't let men reduce you to some object and become arm candy or a trophy wife to some vain man. You are a woman made in the image of God. You are a woman of purpose. You're a woman of value, and men, you should respect women. And so often, men don't and women don't ask to be respected. Listen, if you present yourself cheaply, don't expect to be valued royally.

So here's the thing. Outward beauty is fine. I'm all for pretty girls, okay? I married a pretty girl. I heard a girl just go, "Aw." And it was my wife. Aw. No, it wasn't. I married a pretty girl, and I wanted to marry a pretty girl. I'll be honest about it. But the Bible says, "Beauty is vain and favor is deceitful, but a woman that fears the Lord, she shall be praised."

It's not that beauty is bad, it's just that time passes and beauty changes. But an inner beauty begins to come that is even more attractive than the outer beauty, you see? And so many girls today only focus on the outside and they don't cultivate who they are on the inside.

So Vashti, the Queen, provides a great example, and then Esther becomes the Queen ultimately and saves her people. You know, funny thing about the book of Esther is the name of God is never specifically mentioned. There's no mention of God, but yet the hand of God is in the book from beginning to end, in every scene, in every movement of every event.

And it just reminds me that there are times in life when God seems absent, but he's always at work in the life of the believer every hour of every day. And he's working things together for his purposes. It's called providence. You know, the word providence is a fascinating word. It comes from two words: "pro" in ahead of time, it comes from the word "providentia", which means "before" and "videntia" which means "to see".

So it means that God sees things ahead of time. He knows what's coming and he's in control of your life. That's why as Christians, we don't believe in coincidence, we believe in providence. And so God is there.

Guest (Male): Pastor Greg Laurie will have the second half of his message in just a minute. Hey everyone, I want you to know about our app called Harvest Plus. Think of it as a Harvest version of Netflix. We have all of our resources in one place. We have our movies like Steve McQueen: The Salvation of an American Icon, Johnny Cash: Redemption of an American Icon, A Rush of Hope, and much more.

Then we have our television program, daily devotions, and much more. So go and download the Harvest Plus app. Well, Pastor Greg Laurie is pointing out today how the Lord's providence is always at work. God cares for us 24/7, even when our emotions try to convince us to the contrary. Let's continue.

Greg Laurie: Take the story of the Israelites at the Red Sea. Man, they were between a rock and a hard place. Coming toward them was the Egyptian army ready to destroy them. Behind them was the Red Sea. What are they going to do?

And so they freaked out and they started getting mad at Moses, and they said, "You know what? It wasn't that bad back in Egypt. At least we were alive. You've brought us out here to die." And Moses says to them, "Don't be afraid. Stand still and watch the Lord rescue you today. The Egyptians you see today will never be seen again. The Lord himself will fight for you, so just stay calm."

I love that. Stay calm. Have you ever been really upset and someone says, "Calm down"? And it just makes you more upset. "Calm down!" "I am calm!" You know, just stay calm. Easy for you to say. Just stay calm. And then he held up a staff and the Red Sea opened.

And then Jesus showed up. You're going, "Greg, you're confused, we're in the Old Testament. Jesus doesn't show up in the Old Testament." Well, that's my whole point of this series. He shows up a lot in the Old Testament. You see, Jesus is in the Old Testament concealed, and he's in the New Testament revealed.

Jesus, being God, is co-eternal, co-equal, and co-existent with the Father. In fact, Jesus was there at creation. When God made all things, we read in Colossians 1:16, "By him were all things created, things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, all things were created through him and for him. He's before all things, and in him all things are held together."

Jesus is the Creator. It's not like he just showed up in Bethlehem. That's when he entered our world as a man and walked among us as a living, breathing human being but without sin. But he pre-existed and made many appearances in the Old Testament.

So yes, Jesus showed up because Exodus 14:19 says, "And the angel of the Lord went before the camp of Israel, moved and went behind them, and the pillar of cloud went before them and the Lord caused the Red Sea to collapse on the Egyptian army."

The angel of the Lord. Many commentators believe when you read that phrase in contrast to "an angel of the Lord", "the angel of the Lord", maybe what we call a Christophany. A Christophany is an appearance of Christ in the Old Testament. And he made many of these appearances, and we know this because Jesus said in John chapter 8, "Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day and he saw it and was glad."

So basically saying, "I knew Abraham. Yeah, we hung out a little." And they're going, "Wait, wait. What are you talking about? You've seen Abraham?" And Jesus responds, "Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am." He's saying he pre-existed before Abraham and had seen him.

And there's one occasion when after Christ arose from the dead, he appeared to two disciples on the Emmaus road. It had been three days since he died. They did not know he had risen. And he joined them incognito. They didn't know it was Jesus. So he sees their sad face and goes, "Hey guys, what's up? Why the long faces?"

"Oh, haven't you heard about Jesus, a prophet mighty indeed? We were hoping he would have been the one to deliver Israel. But it's been three days since this happened. You haven't heard about these things?" Jesus says, "No, tell me, what things?"

So now they're telling Jesus about Jesus, and they're not doing a very good job. And after a while he says, "You fools and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken." And then we read that starting at that point, beginning at Moses and the prophets, Jesus explained to them what was said in the Old Testament Scriptures concerning himself.

He took them on a guided tour of all of the Christophanies, all of the types, all of the shadows, all of the things in the Old Testament that pointed to his fulfillment in the New Testament. I wish someone took notes on that sermon. I want to know what I missed.

But that's what we're going to focus on a little bit in this series that we're calling Jesus and You 2, where we look at Jesus in the Old Testament. You see, as I already mentioned, the beginning of Jesus—well, there is no beginning, he's God, he's eternal.

But we think of Jesus, well, he was born in the manger in Bethlehem and that's the Christmas story. But Jesus was there long before that. Long before there was a birth in Bethlehem, there was a tree that we could call the first Christmas tree. Not the kind that you might have in your home that you decorate with brightly colored lights and ornaments.

The first Christmas tree, if you will, was in the Garden of Eden. It was the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And there were placed our first parents, Adam and Eve, in a literal paradise. Radiant beauty at every turn, exotic wildlife, the perfect temperature, and best of all, no sin or guilt or the shame that accompanies it.

And the Lord told them to stay away from this tree. "You can enjoy the garden, enjoy everything I've created, but stay away from this tree of the knowledge of good and evil." For God says, "If you eat of it, you will face sin." But of course, they listened to the devil who tempted them there and they ate of the forbidden fruit. First Eve ate, then she gave to her husband and he ate too.

So God shows up in the garden, as it appears he would do every day. We read that Genesis 3:8, "When the cool evening breezes were blowing, the man and his wife heard the Lord God walking about in the garden." I love that. What a beautiful picture.

I love it when the sun sets, that final breeze of the day is blowing, and here comes the Lord walking through the garden. Which makes me think this is a Christophany, because God is a spirit, and yet we hear that he walked through the garden and they could hear him walking through the garden.

And normally Adam would probably talk to the Lord about his latest discovery, "Lord, I saw this, what on earth is this unusual plant or this creature? Look at this creature, Lord, or I saw this other thing." But on this particular occasion, Adam was hiding because he had sinned.

And we read in Genesis 3:8, "The man and his wife heard the Lord God walking in the garden and they hid from the Lord God among the trees. And the Lord called to the man, 'Where are you?' And he replied, 'I heard you walking in the garden, so I hid and I was afraid because I was naked'."

It reminds me of a story of a pastor that went to visit a member of his congregation. He knocked on the door, there was no answer. Well, it turns out the lady inside was just getting ready to take a bath, so she quickly hid and noticed that a little card was slipped under the door.

And it was the name of the pastor with this verse written down: Revelation 3:20, "Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If any man hear my voice and open the door, I'll come in." She said, "Okay." So she went to church on Sunday and saw the pastor and handed him his card back, but she wrote her own verse below his verse and she wrote down Genesis 3:10, "I heard your voice in the garden, but I was afraid because I was naked, so I hid myself."

But Adam and Eve are now hiding from God. Why would anyone want to hide from God? You would hide because you were ashamed. When my grandkids were little, we would play hide and seek. And they were so easy to find because they would hide behind the curtains and I would see their feet there, or I would hear them laughing. "I caught you!"

And then they'd go back to the same place again and again. It's crazy, right? But that's us hiding from God. It's impossible. The Bible tells us that "Where shall I flee from your presence? If I go to heaven, you're there. If I go down to the grave, you're there."

Guest (Male): Great reassurance about the presence of God today here on A New Beginning. Pastor Greg Laurie with a message called "God is Now Here", and there's more to come.

But you know, the Lord's care and concern for us extends from this life into eternity. He wants us to join him in heaven when this life is over. Are you going to heaven? Are you sure? Pastor Greg, what would you say to the person listening who's pretty sure they're going to heaven? They've lived a good life, followed the Golden Rule, they're reasonably sure though they'll go to heaven. It's just not a good idea to assume everything's just going to work out okay, is it?

Greg Laurie: No, this is one area of your life you want to be sure about: where you're going to spend eternity. The Bible says, "These things we write to you that you may believe on the Son of God and that you may know that you have eternal life." Listen, I know I have eternal life. I know I'll go to heaven one day. And I hope that doesn't sound boastful, and if it does, I'm boasting in what God has done for me, not in what I've done for God. The reason I know these things is because I've turned from my sin and I've put my faith in Christ, you see? And if you do the same, you can have the same hope.

You just need to call out to the Lord and admit you're a sinner and ask Jesus Christ to forgive you and come into your life. The Bible says, "Whoever will call upon the name of the Lord will be saved." Will you call upon him right now?

I'm going to pray a simple prayer, and I'm going to ask you to pray this prayer after me, if you would. So if you want to know that you'll go to heaven when you die, if you want to know for certain that Christ is living in your life, then pray this prayer with me. Just pray these words:

Lord Jesus, I know I am a sinner, but I know you are the Savior who died on the cross for my sin. I turn from my sin now and I choose to follow you from this moment forward as my Savior and my Lord, as my God and my friend. Thank you for hearing this prayer. Thank you for answering this prayer. And I ask this in Jesus' name. Amen.

Guest (Male): Amen. And listen, if you have just prayed that prayer with Pastor Greg and you've meant those words sincerely, the Lord has forgiven you of your sin and you're now a Christian. And we want to help you get started in this new life of faith.

Let us send you Pastor Greg's New Believer's Bible. It's in an easy-to-understand translation, and there are scores of features to help a new believer build a solid foundation. You know, there are more than 10 million of these in print. So many have been blessed by this resource. Let us send it to you free of charge. Ask for the New Believer's Bible when you call us at 1-800-821-3300. You can call anytime, 1-800-821-3300, or go online to harvest.org and click "Know God".

And then let us take a moment to thank you for praying for this ministry and for supporting it through your generous donation. It's an investment in kingdom business, isn't it right, Pastor Greg?

Greg Laurie: Yeah, it's really true, Dave, and I believe it's so important because you know, the Gospel saves lives. It saves eternal lives because when a person believes in Jesus according to Scripture, they pass from darkness to light, from the power of Satan to the power of God.

And then of course that changes the course of their future, that impacts their children and their children's children. The Gospel changes everything, and thousands and thousands of people respond every single year, thanks to the Lord, also thanks to you for your investment in this ministry, enabling us to reach people wherever they are. So if this is something you care about, I encourage you to make a financial investment in A New Beginning and Harvest Ministries.

Guest (Male): Yeah, that's right, and we really do appreciate your support. Thanks for partnering with us today. It can make a real difference not just for today or this week, but for eternity.

So get in touch with your support today by calling 1-800-821-3300. That's a 24/7 phone number, 1-800-821-3300, or go online to harvest.org. Well, next time, more insight from this opening message in the series Jesus and You: Finding Christ in the Old Testament. Join us here on A New Beginning with pastor and Bible teacher Greg Laurie.