Our text this morning is found in the 40th chapter of the book of Isaiah. We'll be focusing our attention on verses 10 through 18, 21 through 31. Isaiah chapter 40. Here now the word of God, see the sovereign Lord comes with power and his arm rules for him. See his reward is with him and his recompense accompanies him. He tends his flock like a shepherd. He gathers the lambs in his arms and gathers them close to his heart. He gently leads those who have young. Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand or with the breadth of his hand marked off the heavens? Who has held the dust of the earth in a basket or weighed the mountains on the scales and the hills in a balance? Who has understood the mind of the Lord or instructed him as his counselor, whom did the Lord consult to enlighten him and who taught him the right way? Who was it that taught him knowledge or showed him the path of understanding? Surely the nations are like a drop in a bucket. They are regarded as dust on the scales. He weighs the islands as though they were fine dust. Lebanon is not sufficient for altar fires nor its animals enough for burnt offerings. Before him all the nations are as nothing and they are regarded by him as worthless and less than nothing. To whom then will you compare God? What image will you compare him to? Verse 21. Do you not know? Have you not heard? Has it not been told you from the beginning? Have you not understood since the earth was founded? He sits and thrown above the circle of the earth and its people are like grasshoppers. He stretches out the heavens like a canopy and spreads them out like a tent to live in. He brings princess to naught and reduces the rulers of this world to nothing. No sooner are they planted, no sooner are they sewn, no sooner do they take root in the ground. Then he blows on them and they wither and a whirlwind sweeps them away like the chaff. To whom will you compare me? Or who is my equal? Says the Holy One. List your eyes and look to the heavens who created all this. Who brings out the story host one by one and calls them each by name because of his great power and mighty strength. Not one of them is missing. Why do you say, O Jacob, and to plain O Israel? My way is hidden from the Lord. My cause is disregarded by my God. Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary and his understanding no one can fathom. He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths go tired and weary and young men stumble and fall, but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles. They will run and not grow weary. They will walk and not be thanked. Let's return to the passage we read with Ed just a few months ago from Isaiah, chapter 40. If you don't have a Bible with you, take one from the few you'll find this passage on page 627. You really need to have this before you. We're going to turn to several other passages, but we'll be anchored in Isaiah 40. So turn to that passage, if you will. The message this morning was just an awful and terrible burden through this week. I think you know that I don't take lightly what in preparation for messages behind this desk. And it's not because of the crowd, it's not because of you. It's because I've got to give an answer for what is said behind this desk to God Himself. And it better be His Word. At times like this, the temptation is very real. To say to ourselves, to say to me, to say to you what we want to hear. At times very much like this in Jeremiah's day and Isaiah's day actually. Isaiah and Jeremiah talked about priests and ministers who came and said to the nation, peace, peace. But then they added that Jeremiah and Isaiah and God added, but there wasn't a peace. It is, it's very tempting to come with a message that we want to hear. So this week after I had finished writing the message from God's Word from Isaiah, I asked myself two questions. I went back and I read the passage, read the, read what I've written with one thing in mind. Would Jesus Christ preach this message? Would He? Is it so much His Word that He would preach it? And then I answered and asked a second question. I asked if my father who's now going home to be with the Lord, Presbyterian minister, but also Marine who landed at Iwo Jema, a Patriot among Patriots, I said, would dad preach this message? And my conclusion was Jesus Christ would preach this message, in fact He did because it's right here. And my father would preach this message. You'll hear some things that I didn't want to say, but Christ says it, Scripture says it. You'll hear some things that you like, you hear some things that are be comforting, you'll hear some things that will be disturbing. But I think Jesus would have us be disturbed. Let's pray together. Our father, I do not have the strength of heart and soul to deliver this message. But even if I did father, I couldn't deliver it so it would make any difference. But Jesus Christ is here, He said where He would, where two or three get His name, He would be there. He's here. We've already seen Him, we've already heard Him this day. Now pray now that He will speak to our hearts. Oh father, sometimes He spoke and it made no difference with the people at all. Oh don't let that happen here. The King of kings, the Lord of Lords is about to speak. Our father, I pray that you will send your spirit into our hearts and that we might receive, that we might wrap our arms around His words and be changed. Each one of us, maybe some of us for the first time, for His honor and for His glory, Amen. G. Campbell Morgan, perhaps the best known evangelical minister in Europe and the United States during World War I wrote these following words and I quote, we must interpret circumstances by God and not God by circumstances. The peril of the hour is that men and women of faith may be trying to account for God by the circumstances of affliction. It cannot be done. The true method is that of interpreting the circumstances by God. We are compelled to look again at this dark hour from the standpoint of the abiding, unchanging certainty of God. G. Campbell Morgan got it right, folks. If we are trying to interpret God by the circumstances of this week, we will not only miss Him but we will not understand the circumstances of this week. We must look at God and His word and interpret the circumstances. Isaiah understood that. When he pinned the verses we read this morning, he was writing for the editorial page of the Jerusalem Gazette. The year was about 700 BC. The armies, first of Assyria, and then of Babylon, were laying siege to Jerusalem. There was a reality of horror to their predicament that is not present even in our current situation. For the great cities of the Northern Kingdom of Israel had already fallen and had been eradicated. Now the people of Jerusalem could look over the walls and see the great armies, first of Assyria and then later of Babylon, right there, two hundred yards away and it was a fearsome sight. There was no Geneva Convention. They knew when Jerusalem fell there would be awful carnage. There would be pillage, there would be rape, there would be murder, there would be slavery. There would be no pretence of morality. The morality of the day was to the victor goes the spoils. That is why Jerusalem in real history would suffer from starvation rather than surrender. That is why mothers would kill their own babies to protect them from the savagery of the Assyrians and Babylonians. They knew their situation was hopeless. There was no power on earth to rescue them. There was no safe harbor. That was the situation when Assyria wrote these words. People were looking around and saying, where is God? How can a God of love let this happen? Why are the pagans prospering against us? Why doesn't God save us? They were interpreting God by the circumstances of that day. And Assyria wrote these words saying, you've got it wrong. You better be interpreting the circumstances by the Almighty, by God Himself, by holy, everlasting, unchanging omnipotent, omniscient God. Tuesday morning, the people at the World Trade Center in the Pentagon and in those planes were looking for a safe place. And the hours that followed all of us were looking for a safe place. We were like the people of Jerusalem 2700 years ago. Where can I be safe? Assyria answered that question for Jerusalem as she faced a dreadful enemy. Let's look at what he had to say to them. Assyria did not say, look at the circumstances in interpret God. He said, with G. Campbell Morgan, let's look at God. The Almighty eternal everlasting God whose immutable, unchangeable omnipotent, omniscient, let's look at Him and let Him interpret the circumstances for us. Where can I be safe? Assyria first said to the people of Jerusalem, there's no safety in the power of any nation. Look at verse 12. See, he begins to look at God. Now, remember, that's what we're doing. Look at God first, not the nations. Who has measured the waters into the hollow of His hand? In other words, God's got the oceans right there in His hand. Hey, any of you do that, can any of you hold a drip or two? Can you hold an ocean in your hand? Or oceans? What are you saying? Or with the breath of His hand marked out, you know, you mark off something with handspan? Who's God used handspan to lay out the galaxies? Who has held the dust of the earth and a basket or weighed the mountains on the scales and the hills and the balance? Why is He saying this? Look down to verse 15. Surely the nations are like a drop in a bucket. They are regarded as dust on the scales. He weighs the islands as though they were found dust. Lebanon is not sufficient for altifiers nor as animals, nor as animals enough for burnt offerings. Before Him, all the nations aren't as nothing there regarded as worthless and less than nothing. Look at verse 23. He brings princesses to knock and reduces the rulers of this world to nothing. No sooner are they planted, no sooner are they found, no sooner did they take root in the ground, then He blows on them and they wither in a whirlwind swoops them in like a way like the chaff. As the people looked over the walls, they saw the awful army of Assyria and then the awful later, the armies of Babylon. As they had said, look at God, those nations, those armies are dropping the bucket. They are like fine dust on the scales. He was saying, look at God, He is sovereign over the nations. He was saying there's no nation that is greater than He. In fact, the nations are as nothing compared to Him. I think about those words, ringing in the people's ears, the words are the great prophet. Is He stood before those armies? He said, people, don't look at the armies, don't look at the great nations, look at God. As they were saying, though, these great nations that make us fear so greatly, are to God like grasshoppers are to us. They're like a drip that falls in the bucket. Over Israel, over Assyria, over Babylon, there stands a sovereign God. Now, at this time, in the courts of the King of Judah, there were strategists, looks like they're strategists today in the White House in Congress. These strategists said, let's seek an alliance with Syria. We'll make an alliance with Syria, and we'll be saved. And others said, let's seek an alliance with Egypt, and we will be saved. I say here, Cambridge, middle of that. He said, what is this talk of a alliance with other nations? Don't you understand? You will not be safe into protection of those nations. God is over the nations. You had best seeking alliance with Him. Listen to Isaiah 31, one, as they spoke of alliance with Egypt. Listen to what he said, woe to those who go down to Egypt for help, who rely on horses, who trust in the multitudes of the chants and the great strength of their horsemen, but do not look to the Holy One of Israel or seek help from the Lord. Wow, to those who ignore an alliance with God and go depend upon these nations that are but a drop in the bucket. Now, most of us, if you cut us open this morning, if we're honest, most of us take great comfort in the fact that the United States is the most powerful nation on the earth. In fact, in history of the world, there's never been a more powerful nation than we are right at this moment. But, read the scriptures. God laughs at the arrogance and power of nations. There's a story in Second Kings 19. It's a wonderful story. Read it this evening. It will be an encouragement to you. Sinner, Sinner Kareb was king of the Syria. He was known all over the world in most fearsome king of the most fearsome kingdom of the greatest army in the world, and he was camped outside of Jerusalem with his army. And he stood before the walls of Jerusalem and he laughed at Israel and he laughed at the God of Israel. He mocked and he scorned and he teased the God of Israel. And Isaiah came to the king of Judah and he said, you are about to see that the nations are but a drop in the bucket and that it is God with whom we should form an alliance. And right after that, in one night, 185,000 Assyrian soldiers died of a virus, a plague. Sinner Kareb with her defeated. Now when it raised a sword, God showed what he could do with a simple virus. No nations saved Judah, no army saved Judah, no generals saved Judah. Isaiah would say to us this morning. Yes, the United States is powerful and was powerful nation in the world at this moment, but don't you see what happened? Last Tuesday morning, it was not an army of 10 million that did that great damage. It was 18 men with simple knives using our own passenger planes. Thanks. If we're depending on our raw strength to deliver us, we are the ones who are not even. What was it he said? Isaiah 31-1, woe to those who rely on horses, who trust in the multitude they're curious and in the great strength of their horsemen but do not look to the holy one of Israel or seek help from God? Where's the safe place? Isaiah said there's no safety in the power of nations, not even in the United States of America. Secondly, there's no safety in the gods that we have created for ourselves. Look at verse 18. To whom then will you compare God? What image will you compare to him? God's comparing himself with all these things in which people trust. And they trust in gods and he says, look at the gods. Look at verse 19, and it's for an idol of craftsmen. I mean, you make an idol of a snake or a cow and you cut out a cow, you cut out a snake, whatever it is an idol. It's a man-made thing. First, God looked at the nations and he says, when you compare the nations to me, that's a joke. And secondly, he looked at the other gods. He said, we compare other gods to me. They're man-made. Thanks. God is not pluralistic or relativeistic. I'm so tired of people who say, we live in a modern age so we're different from the past. I'm tired of people saying we live in a pluralistic society as if pluralistic societies are modern things. Came back and read about the societies in which Moses lived, in which Abraham lived. Their societies in religion were more pluralistic than ours. Why do you think God told Moses? I am the Lord your God. You shall have no other gods before me. That was the first commandment. Why? Because Moses was entrenched in a pluralistic society. And there stood God saying, I am the one. What was the problem Isaiah's day? The people in forsaken the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob to become a religious pluralistic society. They had hundreds of other gods. I will say to you this morning the same thing that Isaiah said to Israel. As Isaiah looked at God, God looked at God and he said, the God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ is God and there is none other. And you're free. We're free to believe in other gods. We would not force a man by law or by weapons to worship this God. But I'll tell you this. We've heard all week long that there's safety in religion. That's not what Isaiah said. There's no safety in simply being religious. The Bible teaches there's only one God and only one way to him. If we call upon other gods to deliver us, we're simply calling on gods that do not exist. We're shouting into the wind. What was he said as for an idol, a craftsman cast it. It's man made people. We are probably going to war in the pluralism of post-modernity will not get us through. Where the prophets of the Old Testament call it, go back to that. It's the absurd thing. We talked about last week. The postmodern man, he looks at a man bowing down to an image of a snake and he said, that's true for him. And so it's true. And he looks over here and he sees a man bowing at the foot of the cross. And he said, it's true for him. And so that's true. And they're both equally true. People, that is absurd. Where the prophets of the Old Testament calling Israel to turn to religion, no. Read Isaiah. Read Jeremiah. If you want to read, if you want to know what God is saying in this country right now, go home this week and read the book of Isaiah or Jeremiah. Pick either one. It will not matter. And they will be fresher than the commercial appeal. It's like reading the newspaper. Where the prophets of the Old Testament calling Israel to turn to religion. Were they calling people to believe in God, whether he was bail or the asher or the canonite gods or the Persian god, the prophets were calling Israel from these gods. They were calling Israel from the gods that did not exist to the one god that did. There's no safety in the gods that we have created for ourselves. Then there are a great, the great gods of our land in which we worship daily. Money and power and pleasure. Those are the great gods of the last part of the 20th century and the first part of the 21st century. Christians worship at these idols daily as well as the world. As I said in our last point, if you really cut most of us open as Americans, we are thinking our power is going to do it. Our money is going to do it. Our money will rescue us. Was God sending those of us and thought like that a message last Tuesday? Think about it. 18 men armed with knives. Where do they strike? They struck at the symbolic temple of money. They struck at the symbolic center of power. They struck the world trade center, economic center, materialist center and they struck at the center of power, the Pentagon. Was God sending us a message about the powerlessness of those gods, the gods of power and money? Maybe. Maybe he was. Alexander Sozenetson. We needed to listen to him about 15 years ago. Exile out of Russia, a Christian, a prophet and at first the liberal press lauded and praised him and then he began to sound like Isaiah and Jeremiah and just as promptly they turned their backs on him. He was like he did not even live in this country for years. You know why? Because he came with the message of the prophets. Alexander Sozenetson, when he received the Templeton prize for progress in religion, recalled that when he was a little boy and all these upheavals were happening in Russia, he required that he remembered that these old Russian elders would say men have forgotten God. Now all this has happened in that same speech. He said, I can't think of anything that describes the people of the present world better than this. Men have forgotten God. That's why these things are happening. Listen Isaiah people, there is no safety in the power of nations and if you think that's why our safety lies, you're going to be sorely disappointed. There's no safety in the gods we have created for ourselves. Thirdly there's no safety in our sin. Look at verse 10. See the sovereign Lord comes with power and his arm rules for him. See his rewards with him and his recompense accompanies him. Do you see those last words? He has recompense. He comes. He comes bringing judgment. Judgment comes with him. There's an accounting. There's a reckoning that comes with him. People, I love this land and American flag, the one that was draped across my father's casket flies off of my porch this morning. I believe that the United States is indeed the greatest nation in the history of the world but I also know and so do you that we are a sin formation. We are a wayward people. We are a nation that is so innocent said has turned from God and people we are not safe in our sins. We have worship and served money and power. We kill gods babies in the sanctuary of the womb in the name of the women's freedom and we actually fight for it. We have thrown God from the public forum and have substituted freedom from religion for our forefathers and tent of freedom of religion. We have laughed. We have all heard it. We have laughed. Actually laughed in mock God's word concerning marriage. We have called sexual immorality good and we have called sexual morality evil. How many times in the last two decades have we said if God does not do something about our country soon he will have to apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah. Let's be very clear. We have decried the events of this week and what the terrorists have done but we are no less sinful as a nation before God than those people who perpetrated those deeds and if you don't believe that you do not understand the sinfulness of your own soul and the sinfulness in which our nation has lived the last 50 years. Turn with me to the book of Amos another prophet who prophesied in the northern kingdom as it came down around these ears. Look at Amos a little harder to find. Look it up in the index. It will tell you and I want you to look at Amos the first chapter and Amos comes as a preacher and the people were crowded in the sanctuary. He was a time of danger and they said what does God say prophet and Amos came with this message. Look at it Amos one three. This is what the Lord says for three sins of Damascus a Syria. That's a Syria for three sins of Damascus. Even for I'll not turn my back. I'll not turn back my wrath. God says here's my message. I'm going to judge a Syria. I'm going to judge the Damascus and all the people. He's going to get to his guys and then God went around in the rest of that chapter and he talked about Gaza another pagan nation the Palestinian nation he said I'm not going to turn back my wrath from Gaza. I'm not going to turn back my wrath from tired. I'm not going to turn back my wrath from eat him. I'm not going to turn back my wrath from Amos. I'm not going to turn back my wrath from my wrath because of their sins and the whole sanctuary by this time they were walking across the back of the piece. Yes, get those guys. But then you come down to the second chapter, the fourth verse. This is what the Lord says for three sins of Judah. Even before I will not turn back my wrath because they rejected the law. The Lord and if kept not kept his decrees because they've been led astray by false gods and gods are ancestors. I was in fire upon Judah and they will be and that will consume the fortresses of Jerusalem. They weren't trying. They weren't cheering them. They weren't walking across the backs of the piece. The same God that was going to call the Damascus indigestion in space time history was going to call Judah indigestion in space time history. I intellectually believe that God is called every nation that's existed in the history of this world indigestion in real space time history here and now. And I can think of no reason why he would make an exception with the United States. You want to know what God says said to Isaiah about safe place. Where's the safe place? He said it's not in the nations. It's not in other gods. And there's no safety in your sin. And if you think we can go on and sin like we have been as a nation and reap the great blessings we've reaped, you don't understand. Reckoning is coming people. And if it doesn't come in this decade it will come in the next. But when we see something like happen this next Tuesday, understand how easily God can bring it all to an end. He can call our country indigestion. Fourthly, there is perfect safety in God alone. There is a safe place and this is the good part. In the middle of the fall of Jerusalem, where could the people who find safety? Look at verse 11, he tens his flock like a shepherd. He gathers his lands and his arms and carries them close to his heart. He gently leads those who have gone. There's safety in him. Why? Because he's omnipotent. He's over the nations. There's safety in his omniscience because he knows all. There's safety in his immutability because he does not change. He's the rock. He's the fortress. What's the largest thing you know? What's the largest thing? You know, you want to talk about power? What's the largest thing you know? It's the universe. Millions of galaxies with millions of stars. Black holes, the whole thing. So when God wants to speak of his power, to what does he point? Look at verse 25, to whom will you compare me? Or who is my equal? Says the Holy One. Lift up your eyes and look to the heavens. Who created? Look at the universe. You want to see power? He who brings out the story host one by one and he calls of this. He calls them each by name. And because it's great power in my district, not one of them is missing. God said, all right. Who are you going to compare with? Let's take the most powerful universe. He's saying, you can be safe with me because I'm greater than the universe. I'm the one who owes it all in his hands. There's no one greater. Up to this point, he's been speaking about the transcendence of God. And we love to talk about his grace and his aminats. But if you want to say place, you better speak of his transcendence because his transcendence is that he is omnipune, that there's nothing more powerful than he is. You better speak of his transcendence because he's omnipotent. He's transcendence. He's immutable. He's eternal. But here, right after he says that, he makes a switch to the aminats of God. You see his transcendence would be no comfort unless he was emanate, unless he was close by. And he says, look at it. He says, lift up your eyes and look at the heavens. Who created? He brings out the story host by one, one by one and he calls each of them by name. And because it's great power in my district, not one of them is missing. He's saying, hey, I know all the galaxies by name, I know all the stars by name. These are billions and billions and billions. I know all the planets by name. I know all the moons by name. I know all the comets by name. I know all the asteroids by name. I call them into a column. You know that should scare some facts because if you've made fun of God's word, if you've made fun of the cross, if you've rejected Jesus Christ, if you said, fill the onus God, let me tell you, he knows you name. This week I was listening to a Jesse Norman, I love to hear Jesse Norman sing. And she was singing a black spiritual on the CD that to which I was listening. He knew what the name of it was. There's a man going around taking names. Where did she get that? She got it from right here. God knows you name. And he won't forget it. He knows he knew hear it. He knew pilot. He knows Eddie Garmin. He knew him. He knows all the names. He knows your name. And one day you will stand before him and he will call you by name. That will strike hard in some people. But what's hard in some people is irresistible joy and security in others. He knows my name. He knows my name. I am in the hand of the God who holds the universe. He holds not the solar system, not the galaxy, but he holds in his hand. He knows my name. This morning, the World Trade Center, there are a lot of victims still missing, but with God, none of them are missing. We still have M.A.s from Vietnam, but with God, he has no M.A.s. That's why Moses wrote in Psalm 91, looking at his transcendence. He is omnipotent. He's unchangeable. There's nothing above him. And he knows my name. For that reason, he wrote in Psalm 91. Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations. Children listen to me. Don't you be scared this morning? Young people don't wonder. Paul Dylan wrote a song back in the Cuban Missile Crisis in New York. He really believed the earth was going to come to an end. He wrote a hard reign is going to fall. He was scared. He was panicked. Young people don't be scared. God has been our dwelling place in all generations. And he is not only transcendent. He's eminent. You dwell in his hand. And he knows your name. Last Tuesday morning, chaos was not in control. God was. Last Tuesday morning, chance was not in control. God was. Last Tuesday morning, evil was not in control. God was. Listen to what Jesus said in Psalm 10. This is in John 10. This is Jesus speaking himself. I give unto them eternal life. And they shall never perish. No one can snatch them out of my hand. And my father who's given them to me is greater than all who can snatch them. No one can snatch them out of my father's hand. Where can I be safe? There's only one place. There's only one place in his hand. Trusting him in his hand. Once Robert Bruce, the emancipator of Scotland, the great freedom fighter of Scotland was running for his life and his enemies were right on his heels. I mean right on his heels. He had no soldiers with him. Nothing. He thought he was dead. Came to a cave and it was a small opening. He dove into it. Small opening. He dove into the darkness. Right after he dove and he turned around and looked back out in a spider. The spider had begun to spin a web over the front of the cave. Just moments later, his enemies arrived and they thought, well, he's done the cave and then they looked at the entrance and he was covered over by the web of the spider. And they said, you know, if he went in the cave, the spider wouldn't get spider webbed there. And they went on later Bruce prayed, God, I think the that in the tiny bow of a spider, you can place for me. A shelter. Don't you love that? Bruce knew where it came from. God, you can hide me in the bow of a spider. Wow. Bruce shelter was not a cave. Bruce shelter was not a spider. He was the God who provided the cave and provided the spider. Stonewall Jackson, for many of us, a great hero. Stonewall Jackson once said to someone worried about his safety. He said, I am as safe in the field in a great battle as I am at home in my bed asleep. But you say, I know God and he's holy and I'm not holy. I'm unrighteous. And you cannot be unrighteous and be safe in his hands. That's a good point. We just said sinners aren't safe in his hands. Turn with me to one last place to Romans 8. Romans chapter 8, verse 31. Romans chapter 8, a great chapter of security, safety. Paul was talking about suffering. He was talking about hardship. And what did he say in Romans 8, 31? What then shall we say in response to this suffering, this hardship? This is what we will say. Romans 8, 31. If God is for us, if this transcendent, I'll nip it on omniscient God is for us. Who can't be against us? He did not spare his own son, but you come along and say, well, you know, I'm a sinner. He did not spare his own son, but gave him hope for us all. How we did not also along with him graciously give us all things. We'll bring a charge against those whom God has chosen. It is God who declares us in as it. Who can be the one that condemns? Christ Jesus has died more than that was raised alive and is at the right hand of God, interceding for us. What's that name? That his hand is a safe place, even for sinners. Because this morning, we're not covered here by our righteousness. We're not standing before God and saying, God, we're better than those terrorists. We're better than the other nations. We're better than this. We're better than God. We're sinners. And our only hope is the blood of Jesus Christ, cover us with His blood. And He says, you're safe. You're safe. Safe, not only from the nations, safe, not only from all the harm in this world, but you're safe from this omnipotent God, holy God Himself because He's provided a way. Let me tell you this morning. You want to help this nation? You want to help this nation? The best thing you can do right now is if you haven't done it before now. You say, please God, hide me in Jesus Christ. I'm a sinner and my only hope is Jesus Christ. If you hadn't done that, do it now. Do it now. That's the only safe place. Well, that brings us around for circle. You know, that is the message of all the scriptures. There's only one safe place and safe even for sinners. It brings us back to Isaiah 40 and to the end of that passage. And he says, why do you say, Jacob, my way is hidden from God? God's disregarded my cause. Why do you say that? Do you not know? If you not heard the Lord is the everlasting God, the creator of the ends of the earth. And He will not grow tired or weary. He gives strength of the weary and he increases the power of the weak. Even you should know we stand around. I wish I had a strength I had when I was 21. Even years pro tired and we're even young men. Some of those who opened on the floor. Those who say, my security is in him. My security is in his omnipotence. My security is in his omniscience. My security is in his immutability. My security is in his transcendence. My security is in his eminence. My security is in the blood of Christ as I dwell in his hands. That's my security. Since for those who opened the Lord, they will renew their strength and the sore, the thorn wings like eagles and they'll run and they'll not grow weary. They'll look at the, they'll look at the pagan, the Syrian army. They'll look at the pagan Babylonians and give it your best shot. Carry me off in the exile if you will, but I'm in him. Kill me if you will, but I'm in him. Remember Daniel, Daniel walked into this great Babylon and wasn't afraid now. He looked at him and thumbed his nose. He said, I'm not do what you say because God is my God. Three year old was being held by his father, his swimming pool. And the father was standing in water up to his knees and that little three year old was just, you know, no water on him. He was happy. He was content. He was using his dad's arms. His dad began to walk out and water began to rise up on the bed and on the baby. And the baby began to panic and began to cry. He hung on to his father and said, no, no, no. You know, if he had really thought about it, if the baby had thought about it, he could analyze the situation and say, now, you know, I'm in more danger than this deep breath than I am in the shallow end because both places are over my head. Yeah, both places are over my, if my father dropped me in either place, I'd be dead. I'd drown at various points in our lives. All of us feel like the water's coming up. It's going over our heads. Problems about the job is lost. Someone dies, thousands, thousands die. War comes. Our temptation is the panic. Our temptation said, we've lost control. Yeah, we really think about it like the child in the pool. The truth is that we've never been in control in any part of our lives. And the same God that sustains us, the baby we're born and the perfect safety of a hospital, that same God holds us in the middle of a great battle. What's the difference between this week and last week, this Sunday and last Sunday? We were held by him, then we're held by him now. We're under his blood last week. We're under his blood this week. The water is deeper. That's true. But folks, the good news is, it's not over here, see it? It never will be. We may go through a war. We may go through a depression.