Sheryl Brady - This is All About a Trust Thing

Tell somebody around you this is all about trusting. Yes, bless the food, Lord. Yes, glory to God! So, it was in Genesis 22. If you know me, you know I like to preach. There are certain people in Scripture that I love to preach about, and Abraham is one of them. We recently talked about Abraham, but I’m going to hit a couple of things today here because it’s important for where we are. God, in Genesis 22, takes Abraham through a series of tests because God will do that to you from time to time. He’ll pull you to the side or pull you into His garage of greatness, and He’ll start tweaking your life. So, He took Abraham through a series of tests, and He said to him, «Now, I want you to take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love.» He said, «I know that you love him, but I want you to take him and offer him up as a sacrifice.» You know this. So, he takes Abraham up the mountain, he ties him to a stake, he pulls out a knife, and he raises that knife to slay his son. Now, we kind of breeze through that in reading it and me talking about it, but let me assure you that this was not as easy as I just made it sound because he loved his son. As a matter of fact, his son was his promise. You go through a lot to obtain the promise; you don’t expect God to come around and snatch the promise out from underneath you. Just in the nick of time, God says to Abraham, «Stay your hand because I have provided a ram in the thicket.» The Bible says that Abraham called that place where he had his son tied to the stake, the place in verse 14 of Jehovah Jireh. I mentioned that a few weeks ago. The reason he called it that was because God told him it means Jehovah Jireh, which means that God Himself shall provide the sacrifice. Now, there is a huge difference between what Abraham means when he says Jehovah Jireh and what many in the church today mean when they say Jehovah Jireh. So, whenever we think of Jehovah Jireh, it’s usually because we have a financial need, or we have some kind of big purchase to make, or we have a bill that we have to pay. But when the Bible refers to Him as Jehovah Jireh, it’s not talking about anything you have to buy. He’s not talking about your clothes; He’s not talking about your car payment; He’s not talking about your mortgage payment. That’s not the best and highest use of Jehovah Jireh. He is talking about Him providing things that you need that are far more important than money. He’s talking about providing your redemption for you. Jehovah Jireh provided your salvation; He provided your eternal life. Jehovah Jireh provided healing for you. He’s talking about how Jehovah Jireh brings deliverance from the curse of the law; He brings deliverance from sin and from death. And yet we know that if He can do all of that, certainly He can meet every material need that we find ourselves in. That’s true, right? One thing that we have to understand is that our faith has got to be anchored in truth. Somebody shout, «Truth!» We cannot waste any time anchoring our faith. I’ve learned this in the last probably two years of my life like never before, but we cannot waste our time anchoring our faith in our feelings. We cannot waste our time anchoring our faith in the way that we think, or the way that we’ve always been taught. We cannot even waste our time anchoring our faith in what our favorite preacher said. We cannot even waste our time anchoring our faith in what our favorite prophet said. You can’t do that. We have to anchor our faith in Jesus; it has to be anchored in truth. Somebody shout, «Truth!» Therefore, like Colossians 3:16 says, we need the word of Christ to dwell in us richly in all wisdom. Not just sporadically, but we need it to dwell and live within us, and it needs to be rich so that we can have all wisdom. I love what The Message Bible says: it says, «Give the word of Christ the run of the house; give it plenty of room in your life.» You’ve got to give the word of Christ room; you’ve got to let it reign; you’ve got to let it rule in you. Tell somebody, «If you’re going to drop your anchor, drop it in truth.» In other words, don’t drop your trust in what is not truth. One of the greatest questions that we will all eventually have to answer is, «Who are you going to trust?» Who are you going to trust? Well, let’s consider the options— a few of them. How many would say, «I think I will trust in Congress»? Not today. How many of you would say, «I’m going to trust in the White House»? Not well. «I’m going to trust in the media»? Really? «Well, I’m going to trust in popular cultural opinion»? Well, good luck with that, too, because it changes every two seconds. «Well, I think I’m just going to— you know what, I’m just going to trust…»