He Will Open the Door

Transcript

Alright, thank you very much. And hello again, radio friends, how in the world are you? You doing alright? Well, I trust so, bless your heart. I’m so glad to be back with you. I treasure the opportunity that this radio ministry gives to share the Word of God with you, and in the process, you know, of course, that my own heart is blessed. We’re looking at Colossians chapter 2. Paul says, “I’m praying for you and for the folk at Laodicea and even for people I haven’t seen.” Small thought here, can you pray for somebody you haven’t met? Why, of course, you can. Of course, you can. One of my dearest friends was unmarried, but knew that he ought to have God’s choice for a wife. And so he began praying that God would lead him to the proper choice for his life’s companion. At the same time in another part of our world there was somebody else praying that God would lead her to his choice of a life companion. How they got together, I haven’t time to tell you, I only can tell you that God did answer their prayers wonderfully and brought them together. And for many, many years now they’ve been enjoying a rich ministry.

Can you pray for somebody you haven’t seen? A missionary on the other side of the world? Believers in a remote country somewhere? Or people even across town from you whom you don’t know, but whom you know are there? Can you pray for people you haven’t seen who are your critics and your enemies? Probably because they don’t know how nice you are. [chuckle] Can you? Yes, you can. Dare to broaden the scope of your prayers to include people whom you may not have met but whom you know about and concerning their needs and their burdens, their heartaches, their hang-ups, dare to pray. Broaden the scope of your prayers, because you’ve got a big God, and he’s able to answer. Well, that was a detour, but maybe a good one. He said, “I’m praying that their hearts might be comforted, being knit together in love unto all riches of the full assurance of understanding, to the acknowledgement of the mystery of God and of the Father and of Christ in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.” In Christ are hid, in Christ are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.

What does he mean by this? Does he mean that if you trust the Lord Jesus, you don’t have to study anymore? No. 2 Timothy 2:15 says, “Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed rightly dividing the word of truth.” So that a red hot prayer meeting, as I used to tell my students, a red hot prayer meeting is no substitute for doing your homework and God will never on an exam help you to remember something you didn’t first forget. You have to put it in that computer between your two ears before it can ever be cranked out. So that this verse that says, “In Christ, are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge,” doesn’t mean that you can just sit and believe on the Lord and then sit and sing yourself into sanctified senility and some day go off to heaven. That isn’t it. Nor does it mean that you can follow your own hunches because you’re a Christian. Now and again, you’ll run into people, you know, who say, “You ought to do this because I think you should, and you know I’m a Christian, and I believe the Lord has led me to tell you this.”

Well, my stock answer, it may not be very nice, but my answer is, “Well, the Lord told you, He didn’t tell me yet.” [chuckle] You know, you have to do your homework, you have to exercise good sense, and you have to realize that God will not do for you what you ought to be doing for yourself. at the same time. At the same time, the Bible does say the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and a good understanding of all they that love Thy law. So that your relationship with God may very well affect your decisions day-by-day. I might even go further and say it should affect your decisions. Now, with that kind of background you come to a verse like this, “In Christ are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.” Let’s take that verse that I just quoted for you, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. How do you apply that? You apply that verse by getting acquainted with the Lord Jesus Christ.

How can you… This word fear as used in the Bible means reverential, awe and trust, and obedience, all wrapped together. How can you have reverential awe and trust and love and obedience? In other words, godly fear. That’s respect, see. How can you have that if you don’t know anything about the person that you’re talking about? Jesus our blessed Lord reveals to you who and what God is. He said, “He that hath seen me hath seen the father.” He said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man cometh unto the Father, but by me.” People say sometimes, do you mean that if I don’t know Jesus, I’m lost, I can never know God? Well, I know about God. Oh, yes, you do know about God, but you’ll never know God as your Father and your friend unless you come by way of the person who can show Him to you, and that person’s name is the Lord Jesus Christ. In Him are hid the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. Alright, if you want any wisdom, you have to have a right relationship with God. And to have a right relationship with God, you have to come by way of the person who can open the door for you. His name is the Lord Jesus Christ.

He’s the one who opens the door of the Holy of Holies. By him therefore, let us enter in, says the writer to the Hebrews. Let us come boldly to the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need. He’s the one who gives you wisdom, he’s the one who gives you grace and forgiveness. He’s the one who gives you help when you have needs. Jesus is His name. He’s the one who represents you to a holy father. If any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous. He ever liveth to make intercession for them that come unto God by Him, so that He’s able to save to the uttermost. Everything is wrapped up in the Lord Jesus, everything you ever need to know about God is in Him. Every blessing you ever need to receive is from Him. Every enablement that you seek to do the will of God comes by way of yieldedness to the Lord Jesus Christ. In Him are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.

Do you want to know the will of God? Yes, you do. Get on your knees, seek God, ask your blessed Lord to reveal his will to you. And He will fulfill for you, I promise, the words of Proverbs 3:5-6, “Trust in the Lord with all thy heart and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him and he shall direct thy paths.” Do you ever pray about going shopping? Where to shop, what to get? Do you ever pray about a decision involving so simple a matter as getting the car serviced? Do you ever pray about your list of clients on whom you’re going to call if you’re a person in sales? Do you ever pray about what you’re gonna say to the boss if you’re in for a conference with your boss? Do you ever pray about how to deal with Junior in his stormy teenage years where nothing seems to satisfy and nothing seems to be right? Do you ever pray about your relationship as husband and wife? Oh, one could go up and down the list. In all thy ways acknowledge Him and He shall direct thy paths.

Dear friend, you and I are fallible. We don’t know, nor can we know in this life, enough to be successful and to avoid the pitfalls that come either from error or from that built-in perversity that resides in a human heart. But Jesus Christ, the Son of the living God, our Lord and our Savior is the answer. “In Him are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.” It’s a beautiful truth, isn’t it?

That’s why I used to tell the students, pray your way through the day. Pray when you wake up, start the day with God, pray before you greet the family or your fellow students with a loving snarl. You can act like a Christian, even before you’ve had a cup of coffee. Pray before your first class, or your first office appointment, or your first task in the home, if you’re a homemaker. Pray before you answer the phone, you don’t know who’s at the other end of the wire, why not be poised and under the control of the Spirit of God. Pray before you open a letter, you don’t know if it’s a check or a bill, or something else. Pray before you make a decision, pray before you go on a date, pray before you either take a job or quit a job. Pray if you’re in supervision before you promote a person or demote or transfer sideways or whatever. Pray before you sign a contract, God has already read the fine print, he knows. You know the old saying, “The large print giveth, the fine print taketh away.” So, pray before you sign a contract, and then put on your spectacles and read it carefully. God will show you what you ought to see.

Pray your way through the day. Pray when you feel discouraged and God will lift your spirits. Pray when you’re impulsively about to jump into something and God will steer you and hold you steady. Pray when you’re tempted, and God will help you overcome. Pray when you feel like giving up and God will help you hold on. There’s a Southern Gospel song that says, when you feel discouraged and you feel like your hope is all gone and you’re at the end of the rope, he says, tie a knot in the end of the rope and hold on. [chuckle] Pretty good advice, pretty good advice. Pray your way through the day. Why? Because, my dear friend, you’re serving a savior who has promised to reveal to you all you need to know about God and all you need to know about living this side of eternity. I am the way, said he, the truth, and the life. He’s the way to God, he’s the truth about God, and he’s the life of God, all given to you freely by the grace of our Lord.

“In Him are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.” You’ll never go wrong as long as you are making the Lord Jesus Christ the center of your life and the determiner of your actions. Well, he says this, “I say, lest any man should beguile you with enticing words.” Now, the temptation is always, and it always has been through the centuries to say, yeah, that’s all true, but you need this and that, it’s Christ plus, a certain kind of good works, or Christ plus a certain kind of regulations. He’s gonna get at that a little later on, he says, “Let no man beguile you of your reward in a voluntary humility” and so on. And not holding the head, the Lord Jesus, in which all the body is ministered. So he’ll get out that a little later on in this same chapter. But the problem is, he said, “this I say lest any man beguile you with enticing words.” Why? Because the tendency of human nature is to say, Christ plus the church, or Christ plus good works, or Christ plus some regulations. No, that isn’t it.

The Lord Jesus Christ in your heart and life, and the infallible Word of God, the Bible, and the ministry of the indwelling Holy Spirit, beloved, that’s the combination, and it’s enough, enough for every day’s life and enough to get you safe home to glory, Hallelujah.

Dear Father, today, walk with us and may the Lord Jesus be real in our lives, in His name I pray, Amen.

Till I meet you once again by way of radio, walk with the King today and be a blessing!