FaithWalk Radio

Ron Susek: Of all the people that you have ever met in your life, all the people you've read about in history, which one would stand out to you as being the most likely or unlikely to experience futility? You have a shock ahead of you in today's program. Stay with me. I'll be right back.

Guest (Male): Finding and knowing God is a faith walk. The Bible says that without faith, it is impossible to please God. Our hope lies in the coming Messiah, who will establish God's peaceful kingdom on earth. This is FaithWalk with Ron Susek. Dr. Ron is an evangelist committed to encourage and equip your faith walk as we pass through these turbulent end time days, awaiting that soon coming kingdom. Here again is Ron Susek.

Ron Susek: The easiest thing in the world to do is to say, "Well, Ron, I know who it is. It's Solomon. He wrote a book on futility called the Book of Ecclesiastes." Yes, he did. And Solomon worked hard to write that book because Solomon so wanted to investigate every area of life. He became a highly educated.

And he said, "Writing books, there's no end." And concluded that he was not able to find a deep inner satisfaction in education. And then he tried hedonism, wild parties. That did nothing but rot his flesh and he decided, "No, that's that's not where you're fulfilled."

And then he became a workaholic. He built magnificent buildings. And even when he went to look at those buildings, he was empty inside. Solomon tried one thing after another trying to find fulfillment, and he threw up his hands in the end and said, "It's all vanity. It is all futile."

You work your life through to to to get a fortune, and you hand it over to one who will dissipate it, either your children or grandchildren somewhere down the line. Everything you worked hard to gain for your family will be dissipated by someone. That's the story of history. So don't think you're going to beat that.

It's a fact of history. And so that's why Solomon said, "It's all in vain that we do these things." But he came to an incredible conclusion that we'll talk about in just a moment. But in this conclusion that he came to, he really revealed that he was not the most shocking person to experience futility.

Guess who it was. Who would you think would really surprise you to no end? My friend, believe it or not, it was Jesus.

I'm inviting you to come with me to the Book of Isaiah and chapter 49, and we are going to look at five verses. The first five verses of Isaiah 49. And these comprise one of the most rare texts in all human existence. These verses take you literally into heaven, where you are overhearing a conversation between Jesus and His Father, some 700 years before He was born on earth. Think about that.

Think about that. You are hearing a conversation between Jesus and His Father some 700 years before He was born on this earth. What revelations you're about to see.

And in this conversation, He not only reveals futility, but rather, He also reveals the solution. Now, what do I mean, reveal futility? Not futility while He was in heaven with His Father, but He was looking down through the corridor of time, and He was looking at His life as it was going to be played out on earth. And He saw what was coming His way.

And He He comes to a conclusion of futility. We'll talk about that in just a moment. But I want you to begin with me in chapter 49 of Isaiah, and let's build this one block at a time. Very important if you want to conquer true futility. And I mean, let me say this.

Intelligent people are able to see through all of the hype of life, all of the positive thoughts, slogans and promises, and, "You can do this and you can do that." They see through it at some point and say, "You know what?" It all ends at the grave.

So you have your big binge while you're here, but it ends. And it ends with a bang, with nothing. It's futile.

I think that it's a person who is a bit dim, a bit unrealistic, a dreamer who tries to hang on to this dream all the way to his last breath, and not recognize the fact that life has a lace of futility running through it.

In Isaiah chapter 49, and verse one, we read these words, "Listen to Me, O coastlands, and give attention, you peoples from afar." Pause there. Already, the stage is set.

Jesus is setting the stage for a worldwide thing that we're going to see in today's program and in a future program, where this is heading. And God is about to talk to His Son about a global thing that must come to pass.

People from afar, not just Israel. People from afar, coastlands. Doesn't identify those coastlands, could be the coastlands rimming the continents of the earth.

And then we come to verse two. "The Lord called me from the womb, from the body of my mother He named my name." Pause there. Doesn't that strike a chord for the importance of the sanctity of life? The moment there is conception in the womb of a woman, that conception is all the design of a human, not an elephant, not an alligator, but a human.

Their hair color is determined at that instant, color of their eyes, their bodily features, all determined in that instant of conception. And thus Jesus said, "From my mother's womb, I was named." You remember that an angel came to Joseph and said to Joseph, the earthly father of Jesus, that His name will be called Jesus because He will save His people from their sins.

Guest (Male): Thank you for your gift to help Dr. Ron in building lives by advancing the teaching of God's Word through the programs of FaithWalk. You may never know until heaven whose lives you've impacted somewhere around the world. So please accept and enjoy your copy of, God Will Answer, as our personal thank you for standing with us at FaithWalk. You'll be encouraged and inspired as you open your gift book, God Will Answer, by Dr. Ron Susek. Each week throughout the year, within the pages of this rich 52-chapter hardcover edition, you'll discover compelling spiritual truth and biblical insights. Content that will enrich your life and challenge your heart to go deeper in your faith walk with God.

Ron Susek: You are named in your mother's womb. God has a divine purpose for you in your mother's womb. And the whole core of life, the secret to life, is to seek out that purpose that God established and fulfill that purpose. We'll talk about that another time, that is major.

And then the second part of verse two reads this way, "He made my mouth like a sharp sword." Isn't that an interesting statement? He made my mouth like a sharp sword. What is He saying?

Well, the Bible tells us that in the book of Hebrews, that the Word of God is sharper than any two-edged sword. It's sharper than a surgeon's scalpel. It can divide bone and marrow, spirit and soul. It can dissect you right down to the bottom of your being.

If you study the Bible, there are things in there that'll make you rather uncomfortable because it's revealing to you the real you, what you are inside. And so the Bible is like a sword. It's the Word of God. It cuts truth. It comes down on lies and deceptions, and brings truth to bear upon them.

But also, and by the way, for your notes, that's in Hebrews chapter 4, verse 12. But also Jesus said in Revelation chapter 1, verse 16, or as He was being revealed, "In His right hand He held seven stars, from His mouth came a sharp two-edged sword, and His face was like the sun shining in full strength." Out of His mouth, it was like a sharp two-edged sword was coming. What does that mean?

When Jesus was on earth, He never spoke anything other than truth. He cut down lies, deceptions, trickery. He cut through the core of it and spoke truth, which, by the way, was why He was so deeply hated by many and eventually driven to the cross.

And then verse two and the third part of the verse, it reads this way, "In the shadow of His hand He hid me." God hid His Son in the shadow of His hand. What is that saying? God blinds the eyes of the unbeliever. The person who chooses not to believe determines, "I will not accept the idea of God," or, "I'll make my own God. I I'm not going to believe the God of the Bible."

Well, as Jesus said when He was on earth, He began to speak in parables so that seeing they will not see, hearing they will not hear. Why? My friend, you can harden your heart to God one day too many. And you can be in a thousand Christian meetings, you could listen to a thousand telecast like this, and not be stirred or moved, even perhaps driven deeper into unbelief. That is not because you know more than we know. That is because you've made a choice not to hear truth. Jesus spoke truth.

And as a result, God hid Him in His hand. And when He was on earth, He spoke parables. And then we read in the fourth part of verse two, "He made Me a polished arrow." Now, that's a very interesting picture.

God made Jesus a polished arrow. I was speaking on this one time, and a professional archer was in the audience. And he came to me afterward and said, "Ron, you got it nailed. You're exactly right." What was I saying? You take a shaft, and you make sure that shaft is perfectly straight. If there's any curvature in that staff, the wind will carry it off to the side of the target, and you'll miss the bull's-eye.

Not only must that shaft be straight, it must be polished. Why? Because you want to reduce wind resistance as much as possible, so that now the arrow flies straight, directly to the target, and lands where you want it to land.

Now, why is this so incredible? Well, I I want to just get a little bit deeper for a moment and we'll come back to this arrow. Keep that in your mind, the arrow in your mind. In Ephesians chapter 6, the Apostle Paul reveals to us the armor that God provided for His Son, provides for you and me. The armor of God. We read of God putting it on in the Old Testament.

What is that armor? We wear the helmet of salvation. We know that we know that we've been redeemed through the blood of Christ. God has forgiven us, and we belong to God. We wear the helmet of salvation. We put on the breastplate of righteousness, which guards our morals, our ethics, our convictions. We wear the belt of truth, which means we are speaking truth, even if it means to our peril.

We wear the shoes of peace, which reveals what we're about. Blessed are the peacemakers. Those are the people of God. They will see God at the right time. And we hold up the shield of faith. Satan is throwing flaming arrows at us all the time, trying to destroy us. And we have the shield of faith, the promises of God that we hold up. And those arrows hit that shield, fall to the ground. And now, they get close enough at times they really burn, but they always are conquered by the shield of faith.

And the sword of the spirit. That is the Word of God. With the Word of God, watch this now, make a note of this. You cut down the enemy, you cut sin out of your heart, and you cut your path through to the throne of God, the sword of the spirit, which is the Word of God.

But now there are two pieces of the armor of God that Paul does not mention in Ephesians 6. This is incredible. Get hold of this. One is the glory of God. Twice in the Book of Isaiah, we read that the glory of God is our rear guard. We cannot see behind us.

So we can fight with the sword and the shield and the armor on the front, where we can see the enemy and what he's doing. But what this is saying is that Satan cannot blindside you, because the glory of God is your rear guard. Now we come back to the sword. What's the significance of that? It's part of the armor of God. God hid Jesus in His quiver. This this arrow that God has created in His Son. What does that mean?

When you're in battle, a sword is for close-up fighting, so is the shield and the helmet and and the breastplate and the belt and the shoes. But an arrow flies out ahead of you to bring down the enemy even before you get there.

Jesus is the arrow of God, hidden in God's quiver. And no man knows the day or the hour when He's going to shoot that arrow, who will arrive on this earth as the Messiah, and bring down the nations of the world, and dispel every lie, and judge the world, and build His Kingdom of truth and peace and justice.

No man knows as you are crying out to God to deliver you from something that is really tormenting your life, taking your life apart. No man knows when God will speak the word, and Jesus will fly out like an arrow ahead of you, and bring your enemy down. This is factual. This happens. Our job is to believe God, and He will take care of those things. Now.

We now have this arrow hidden away in verse two, the the uh, fourth part of that verse says, "In His quiver He hid Me away." So we have this arrow hidden in God's quiver. God will pull it out in the end time. He will pull it out in your lifetime. And Jesus said, "I am with you to the end of the age. Fear not. I will even go before you and win many battles before you ever get there because the battle is the Lord's, not yours." Are you with me now? Are you beginning to see how grand this is, how great it is?

And so, one final note before we transition. This was Jesus's protection. He had all this armor. This armor God wore, if we read in the Old Testament. This is the armor you can wear. And so, you may appear quite invincible. And guess what? You are. But invincibility will not automatically relieve you of the sense of futility at times. A sense that the war is lost, we are going down. And that's not uncommon, my friend. Hang on. Stay with me now.

And in verse four, we read this. Here's the shocker. And this is the part that is so, oh, I'm sorry. I missed one. I need to get it. Verse three. This is vital. "And He said to me, 'You are My servant Israel, in whom I will be glorified.'"

Why did God call Jesus Israel? Isn't that interesting? Strange. Well, I'll tell you why. The word Israel means one who wrestles with God and man and overcomes.

Jesus wept with loud cries in tears, we read in the Book of Hebrews, to the one who could save Him. Crying out to His Father. You and I cry out to God in fervent prayer. And it is God and God alone who is able to bring down the enemy. And as we wrestle before God, not that God were wrestling with God, we're wrestling against our own doubts and fears. We're wrestling against principalities and powers and demons, wicked spirits in the heavenly realms. We are in a war, friends. We're in a spiritual war. And only God's people have the armor to handle that war. But even in that war, you will have times where you will feel absolutely futile. It's over. It's done. We're getting no place.

But then we come to verse four. This is extraordinary. Now the transition. I told you a shock is coming. Here comes the shock. Who would be the one to say experience futility? When I say it's Jesus, watch this. Here's what He said to His Father.

"But I said, 'I have labored in vain. I have spent my strength for nothing and vanity.'" Whoa. Did you hear that? This is Jesus speaking. If Jesus experienced futility, so will you. And by the way, one of the reasons why Jesus had to experience full-blown futility, not a cover-up, full-blown, real futility, is because He had to be tempted in all points like as you and me, yet without sin.

If Jesus never knew futility, then He could not relate to me or to you. Any sane person has those times in life when it all appears so bleak, the war is lost. It may be in a marriage, it may be a pastor in a church. Who knows what it is, a million ways that we feel like the war is lost, and futility sets in.

However, Jesus having declared that He Himself experienced laboring in vain, spending Himself for nothing, drew an incredible conclusion as did Solomon. Solomon said this. He had a He had a solution to this, when he came to the end of his book. He said, "The end of the matter, all has been heard, fear God and keep His commandments, even when futility sets in. Fear God and keep His commandments for this is the whole duty of man, for God will bring every deed into judgment with every secret thing, whether good or evil." Wow. Isn't that something? That's what Solomon said.

Do you know what Jesus said? This is absolutely marvelous. He said in verse four, "Yet surely my right, my authority, is with the Lord, even when I'm experiencing the futility of life. My authority, my right is with the Lord and my recompense or my repayment for service rendered is with my God. My God is my strength. I am honored," He said in verse five. "I am honored in my eyes of the Lord and my God has become my strength."

The only thing that a Christian has to stand on when that time of futility comes. You're not going to find your strength in your mate, or your children, your church, your friends. There will come those times of abandonment and a sense of aloneness and futility. And that is when, by faith, you make God your sole strength. As the Psalmist said, "Find rest, find wholeness, find completion, O my soul in God alone." What a powerful verse that is.

Thus, we have Jesus saying that I have labored in vain, I've spent my strength for nothing. But what is His victory? Verse 4B again, "Yet surely my right, my my authority, is with the Lord, and my recompense is with my God. And I am honored," in verse five. "My God has become my strength." What an incredible, powerful punch of an ending.

God has has a never has never abandoned His children on the battlefield, friend. Every Christian at some point in life will come to the island of aloneness. It's a dark, dismal island. You cannot see the footprints of anyone else who has ever been there before. You are there alone.

And that is when you will not feel faith, you will not feel joy, you will not feel the spirit. In fact, God said of Hezekiah, "He left Hezekiah to test all that is within him." And there will be times when God will seemingly leave you totally abandoned, testing what's in you.

What's in you? What have you been looking to for for your strength, for your fulfillment, for your for for your sense of purpose, other than God? And when you begin to realize, "God, I was looking to my education. I was looking to my family. I was looking to my success. I was looking to my physical health. I was looking to this and that. And these things have been removed. My God." Now I'm left with a choice.

Either I go down in flames as a failure, or I'm going to say with Jesus, "My God is my strength. My God is my strength." I'm going to say with Solomon that this is the end of the matter, the conclusion. "Fear God and keep His commandments." Fearing God doesn't mean you're trembling and quivering inside. It means that you so reverence Him and so honor Him. You want to obey His commands because they are life-giving and good.

If you never face futility, you will. It comes to everyone God is working with. And in the Book of Ecclesiastes, the writer said, or rather the Book of Lamentations, the third chapter, the writer says, "It is good to bear that yoke when you're young, to learn that lesson for a lifetime." What lesson? To make God the singular source of your strength.

To make the ways of God, the commandments of God, the the the justice of God, the love of God, the mercy of God, all that you seek after and cling to. My friend, there is no battle, no battle that will take you down in flames.

I don't know where you are in your life. You may be listening to me saying, "Ron, I hear you, but I don't even know this God yet." I want to make sure you do. Let's start right there. I'm going to give you a prayer right now. I'll pray it out loud. I'm asking you to pray it after me. Let's pray this together.

Dear God, on the basis that Jesus died for my sins, I'm trusting Your forgiveness for all my sins. I'm asking You for the power to live committed to You, obedient to Your will from now until I meet You in heaven. I pray in Jesus' name. Amen.

If you prayed that prayer, drop me a note. In a few moments Dan will tell you exactly how to do that. God bless you.

Guest (Male): This has been FaithWalk with best-selling author, pastor, and evangelist Ron Susek. If you would like to know more about Dr. Ron and our mission, visit our website at faithwalk.org. We're certain you appreciate Dr. Ron's straightforward teaching of God's Word, along with his strong invitation to find salvation through Christ. But he needs your help in spreading the gospel to the far reaches of the world. Join our team by going to faithwalk.org and clicking on, Partner with us. Please accept and enjoy your copy of, God Will Answer, as our personal thank you for standing with us at FaithWalk. Well, thanks for being with us today, and we hope you'll join us again next week as we find courage for the journey in our faith walk.