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Colin Smith: With all this that I don't know, how can I live? How can you navigate your way through a world where God has kept so much secret, where so many of the big things that you think, "I really need to know these things," and yet God has said, "I'm not going to tell them to you"?

Steve Hiller: Welcome to Open the Bible Weekend with Pastor Colin Smith. Colin, last time we began a message where we looked at Deuteronomy chapter 29, verse 29. Just one verse having to deal with how we handle the things that God doesn't answer.

Colin Smith: The secret things belong to the Lord, but the things revealed belong to us and to our children forever. It's a marvelous verse, Deuteronomy 29:29. The secret things belong to the Lord. Now, we struggle with the secret things. We want to know the whys of events and turns that happen in our lives, and we're being told here, "You know what? That belongs to God, and he has not revealed it."

What we need to focus on is our confidence in what he has revealed—the promises that he's given to us. Today, we're going to look at seven promises that belong to us. That's where we need to focus our faith. I've got to leave what God has kept secret in his hands. I've got to trust what he's revealed and act on it.

Steve Hiller: Well, as you just heard, we're in Deuteronomy 29:29. So grab a Bible, join us there as we continue, "Act on What You Know, Leave the Rest to God." Here is Pastor Colin.

Colin Smith: Seven secrets that belong to the Lord, and then seven promises that are given to us. Well, here we go.

Secret number one: the future of your children. Now, is there any parent who hasn't wondered about this? What will happen to your children? What about your grandchildren? What kind of world will my grandchildren inherit? You ask that question?

This was surely in the minds of those who were standing beside Moses when he's telling them that there are two very different futures that may happen in the land. What's the future for our children, your children? The secret things belong to the Lord.

Secret number two: the reason for your suffering. All of us at some time in life will ask the question "why?" You will come to some painful experience, and for some of us, this is so acute.

And you're locked into this question: Why was I born into that family? Why did this illness come to me? Why did that awful event happen to my son or my daughter? The secret things belong to the Lord.

Secret number three: the manner of your death. How long will you live? Will you reach old age, or will God take you while you are young?

Will you die with a sound mind? Some of us think about that perhaps quite a lot. And perhaps you ask the question, "Will I experience pain?" The secret things belong to the Lord.

Number four: the salvation of your loved ones. I'm thinking today about someone that I have been praying for for over 20 years. He has no interest in God. He has no love for Christ. Will he be converted? I do not know. I don't know. The secret things belong to the Lord.

Number five: the events of tomorrow. Karen and I plan to fly to England tonight, to arrive in Glasgow with a second flight tomorrow, and then to get on a bus that will take us from Glasgow to the north of Scotland in Inverness where we've got some days with my parents and then visiting hers.

We've got it all worked out. It's about 14, 15 hours altogether with the three legs of the journey. We've done it many, many times before, and we're planned and ready to go. And every time I travel, I think about the words of James: "Listen, you who say, 'Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city.' You do not even know what will happen tomorrow."

You don't know what's going to happen for you tomorrow either, whatever you've got planned. The secret things belong to the Lord.

Number six: the outcome of your ministry. Now, as you serve the Lord, as so many of us are engaged in ministry, you will have discovered—you don't need me to tell you—that there are times when you find yourself asking this question: "Am I doing anything of lasting value?"

You are praying and you say, "Now, is this making any difference?" Is there any Christian who hasn't been there? You make sacrifices and you wonder, "Well, does anybody even notice?" The truth is that the last day will hold so many wonderful surprises because you don't know the outcome of your own ministry. You don't. The secret things belong to the Lord.

Here's number seven: the progress of your Christian life. If you are a Christian today, you will know what it is to be alarmed by your own lack of progress as a Christian. God, of course, is conforming you to the likeness of Jesus Christ, and there is progress in sanctification.

But the truth is that it's not always obvious, and if it is seen, and where it is seen, it's more likely to be seen by other people before it is seen by you. And the reality is that sin lies so deep within the best of us that we often find ourselves alarmed and astonished and even confounded when it breaks out in unexpected ways.

You thought you were making progress, that you had left those things behind. But now the sin that you thought you had conquered, it's back again and it's staring you in the face. It's almost as if it's laughing at you and you say, "Well, now have I made no progress? Will I ever be the person that God is calling me to be?"

If you are a Christian, you will know what it is to stare into the mystery of your own sin. The secret things belong to the Lord.

Folks, this is humbling truth today, isn't it? There's a stillness among us as there ought to be, because you start looking at life, what you see is that, however powerful sometimes we may feel, the truth is that the vastness is of that which we do not know, the things God has kept secret.

You don't know the future of your children or the reason for your suffering or the manner of your death or the salvation of your loved ones or the events of tomorrow. You don't know the outcome of your ministry. You don't even have a sure read on your own progress in the Christian life.

And you say, "Well, now with all this that I don't know, how can I live? How can you navigate your way through a world where God has kept so much secret, where so many of the big things that you think, 'I really need to know these things,' and yet God has said, 'I'm not going to tell them to you'? They belong to me."

Well, here's the principle that's right at the heart of this single verse that I'm trying to work into our hearts and asking that God will seal in our minds. You live with what God has kept secret by trusting what God has revealed.

Steve Hiller: We're going to come back and continue to look at that in just a moment. So I hope you'll stay with us. This is Open the Bible Weekend with Pastor Colin Smith and our message, "Act on What You Know, Leave the Rest to God," is part of a series called Take Two where we're studying the book of Deuteronomy.

If you want a copy of the entire series on CD, ask about Take Two: The Power of a Fresh Start when you call 1-877-OPEN-365. That's 1-877-673-6365, or you'll find ordering information at openthebible.org. Back to the message. Here is Pastor Colin.

Colin Smith: The reality is that wherever you turn in life, we are surrounded by what we do not know and what we do not control. And you live with what God has kept secret by trusting what God has revealed. The secret things belong to the Lord. You're not going to get them.

But the things that are revealed belong to us so that we may be able to walk according to all of his laws. That's the principle. So as we've been humbled by seven secrets that belong to the Lord, let me try and encourage you with seven promises that belong to us because the revealed things belong to us.

Let's think about how they tie together. What about the future of your children? I don't know what the future will be for my children, but I know this: God is faithful, and as he has been faithful to me, he will be faithful to them.

Acts chapter 2 and verse 39: "The promise is for you and for your children and for all whom the Lord our God will call." God is faithful, and the same God who is faithful to you will be faithful to them.

What about the reason for your suffering? I don't know why some of the painful things that have happened in my life occurred. But I know this: that our present suffering is not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.

That's Romans chapter 8 and verse 18. Paul says even more than that. He says, in fact, our troubles are achieving for us an eternal weight of glory that far outweighs them all, far outweighs them all. So I live with what God has kept secret by trusting what he has revealed.

What about this business of the manner of your death? I don't know how I will die. But I know this: to be away from the body is to be at home with the Lord. You believe that? And to be with the Lord, I know this and believe this because he has revealed it, is better by far. That's Philippians chapter 1, which is why Paul says, "For me to live is Christ and to die is gain." Really is.

So there are so many things in life that I want to do, but I'm not going to live in a craven fear of death because I stand on a promise.

Number four: the salvation of our loved ones, your unbelieving loved ones. How do you stand on the promise there? I don't know if my unbelieving friends or loved ones will be saved. But I know this: God saves people who are not looking to be saved. That's my only hope.

And let me give you the promise for that. It's Isaiah chapter 65 and verse 1. It has been a foundation of my prayers for unconverted loved ones for many, many years. God says, "I revealed myself to those who did not ask me, and I was found by those who did not seek me."

Are you praying for someone who is not seeking God? Are you burdened for someone who's not asking of God, doesn't pray at all, and you say, "Well, now how will they ever be found? How will they be found if they're never seeking God?"

Here's the answer: they'll be found by him seeking them. It is not the sheep that seek the shepherd; it is the shepherd who seeks the sheep. That's the basis of hope. That's the foundation of prayer. That's the promise to hold on to.

So when I pray for unbelieving friends and loved ones, I say to the Lord, "You don't need their permission to intercept their lives. They'll never find their way to you, so Lord, please, in your mercy, find your way to them." And the secret things belong to the Lord, but that revelation gives me a basis for hope and a sustenance for prayer.

Number five: what about tomorrow? How do you live when you don't know what's going to happen tomorrow? I don't know what tomorrow holds, but I do know who holds tomorrow, and so do you if you're in Jesus Christ.

The future lies in the hands of God, and he is my loving heavenly Father. Do you remember how our Lord Jesus speaks about this in the Sermon on the Mount? He says, "Do not worry about your life." And then he explains why.

Why are you not to go through worrying about your life, worrying about tomorrow? And he says this: "Look at the birds of the air. Your heavenly Father feeds them. Now, are you not much more valuable than they?"

So he says, and here's the conclusion, instead of worrying about tomorrow, he says, "Here's what you do: you seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. Your Father knows what you need."

So you see what our Lord Jesus is saying? Don't live a life that is consumed by worry about things you cannot change, things you don't control. Here's what you should do: live flat out for the kingdom of God. Go for righteousness today. Pursue it every day of your life, and remember that tomorrow is in the hands of God who is your loving heavenly Father.

Number six: you see how this is applying to the whole of life? I mean, it goes everywhere. This one principle, it's a principle to live by. What about this issue of the outcome of your ministry? You think about this.

What is God going to do through our ministry? I don't know. I don't know. But I know this: God has said, "Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain, not in vain."

You know, in the presence of Jesus, you are going to learn about prayers you never knew had been answered. You are going to discover in the presence of Jesus deeds that you never knew had mattered.

You're going to discover ways that God has used you that you had absolutely no awareness about during your entire lifetime. The outcome of your ministry. You stay strong in all the many questions that you have in the cut and thrust of ministry and you hold to this revealed promise: that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.

And then here's the last one: your progress in the Christian life. How are you to live in this reality where sometimes you see things in yourself that are so discouraging and you say, "Oh, is that still there?"

I know that I'm not what I used to be, and I also know I'm not yet what I hope to be. Do you feel that too about your Christian life? Right now the work of the Holy Spirit, it's woven into all our battles with the flesh.

But here's the promise that's revealed to hold on to in all that we don't know. Christ has said, "When he appears, we shall be like him." Feed your soul on that. In the middle of all your struggle with sin, in the middle of all your battles with temptation, when he appears, we shall be like him.

Seven secrets that belong to the Lord. Seven promises that belong to us. Faith bows before the mystery of what God has kept secret and faith stands in the strength of what God has revealed. You see that even in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.

What's happening when on the cross he says, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" He's staring into the mystery of what God has kept secret. And what's he doing when he says on the cross, "Father, into your hands I commit my spirit"? He's trusting in the promise that the Father has revealed.

That's what he's calling us to do, and he's going to walk with us in it. The secret things belong to the Lord, so trust him in what he has kept hidden, and the revealed things, they belong to you. They're yours to enable you to stand today, this week, and to follow after him in all that he calls you to do.

And my very last word is simply this: it's on my heart that there may be someone here today and you've just come into the church and you're just plain confused. And you've seen that life is empty.

You don't know God. God seems to be distant from you. You'd like to find him, but you don't know where to look. You'd like to have faith like other people around you seem to have faith, but you don't know where to begin.

Listen to these words of Jesus in this last moment. He said this, Matthew 11: "No one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him." That's what Jesus said.

So here you are and you say, "Well, I don't know God, I don't know where to find him, where do I begin?" Jesus says, "Well, you're not unusual. No one knows the Father. You can't find the Father."

But Jesus says there's only one who knows the Father. He says, "I know the Father, and I can reveal the Father to those to whom I choose to reveal him." There's hope for you there. You see, that is why Jesus says, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except by me."

And so in the very next verse, he says in Matthew, "Come to me. Come to me," Jesus says this. And you should hear Jesus who's risen from the dead saying this to you today. Now, you don't know God by yourself, you can't know God by yourself, but Jesus is saying, "I do."

The Son of God knows the Father and he says, "Now you come to me. You come to me all you who are weary and all you who are heavy laden. You come with all your unanswered questions to Jesus Christ, the Son of God who died and rose again. And you come with all your unanswered questions, all that's the secret to you, all that you do not understand, and you believe the promise that he has revealed right here."

He says to you, "Come to me, and I will give you rest for your soul." Jesus Christ says that to you. And in everything that you do not know, that is a promise that today you can believe.

Steve Hiller: You're listening to Open the Bible Weekend with Pastor Colin Smith and a message called "Act on What You Know, Leave the Rest to God." And maybe as you've been listening to today's program, you realize that you don't know God—at least not in the way that you've been hearing Pastor Colin talk about in today's message—but you'd like to know more.

You've got questions. I hope you'll contact us here at Open the Bible. Our toll-free number is 1-877-OPEN-365. That's 1-877-673-6365. Today's message is part of a larger series entitled Take Two: The Power of a Fresh Start. If you ever miss a broadcast in the series, I hope you'll come and listen online at openthebible.org.

Well, Open the Bible is listener-supported. We do depend on your generosity to keep this teaching on the air. And as you give a gift of any amount this month, we want to send you a copy of Lincoln's Daily Devotional. And Colin, tell us about this book.

Colin Smith: What the first thing that's absolutely fascinating to me is that Abraham Lincoln had and used a devotional. He read scripture and had it in his mind and in his heart. I discovered this because a friend of mine a while ago gave me an early edition of the actual devotional that Abraham Lincoln used.

And it's brilliant. It lays out each day a verse or two of scripture. They're organized topically around a month, and they go through the experience of a Christian believer—our joys, our sorrows, our temptations, and of course our final hope and blessedness.

I was absolutely thrilled to discover that all these years ago, Abraham Lincoln was reading and meditating on a verse of scripture each day. And then I discovered that the book's been reprinted, and it's been beautifully reproduced.

And so Steve, it's a joy to make this available to folks. It's in the old King James Version, which of course is so beautiful in the way that it expresses the Word of God. I've found this just to be very wonderful and rich. I think people will treasure having a copy of the devotional that Abraham Lincoln himself used to meditate on the Word of God.

Steve Hiller: Well, we want to send you a copy as our way of saying thank you for financially supporting Open the Bible this month. You can give a gift online at openthebible.org or when you call 1-877-OPEN-365. That's 1-877-673-6365, or again our website is openthebible.org. For Pastor Colin Smith, I'm Steve Hiller. Thanks for listening, and I hope you'll join us next time.

Colin Smith: Jesus said, "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God." God's word is the food that will nourish your soul. You need it every day.

And Open the Bible Daily is a daily devotional that will open the Word of God and lead you to Jesus. It's available for free on our website, openthebible.org. For more information, visit openthebible.org/daily. That's openthebible.org/daily.