Wait Until You Hear

Transcript

Alright, thank you very much. And hello again, dear radio friends. How in the world are you? Doing Alright? Well, I trust so. I was over at the Moody Bible Institute the other day where they gave me a luncheon and said some kind words about yours truly. I love the institute because I got my start there as a boy of 16. Those years that I spent studying there formed the thrust of much of the rest of my ministry. But one of them who made a speech said, “You know, when I first heard Dr. Cook, I didn’t like him. He didn’t have any musical theme. He was folksy, oftentimes corny. And then,” he said, “I began to listen.” [chuckle] Well… I had a professor say to me one time, he said, “You know, Cook, I have always thought you were too simplistic, and then I began to see that there’s some profound truths in the Word of God as you present them.” Well Alright, whatever, I am how I am. Like Popeye said, “I yam what I yam.” Well… But for the glory of God, this is what we want. We want somehow to put a handle on the Word of God so that you can get hold of it for yourself.

You know the Bible is true whether or not anybody reads or believes it. The old philosophical chestnut about if there’s a sound in the desert and nobody’s there to hear it, is it really a noise? All of that business. Well, the truth of God is objectively true. The Bible, God’s inerrant, inspired, infallible, eternal Word is true, whether or not you and I read it or believe it, but it becomes of value when you apply it to your life and when you obey what God says to you. My purpose then, is to bring you with me to the place of understanding and application and, best of all, obedience. Promise yourself that you’ll obey whatever God says to your heart today, beloved.

Well, we’re in Mark chapter 10, and we’ve come down past verse 45. We were talking about that the last time we got together. “Even the son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister and to give His life a ransom for many.” The Lord Jesus Christ is our Redeemer. He has ransomed us, He has redeemed us, He has bought us out of the slave market of sin and brought us back to His own heavenly home and made us co-inheritors of the riches of glory with Him. “We’re children of God,” says Paul, “and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Jesus Christ.” What kind of an heir is a joint heir? Well, if you and I were joint heirs to $2, would you own the $2? Yes, you would. Would I own the $2? Yes, I would. Could you spend the $2? Yes, you could but not without me.

Could I spend the $2? Yes, I could but not without you. Everything that we have, we have together. And you and I are together with the Lord Jesus Christ. Isn’t that great? So that you can believe then and apply to your life 1 Corinthians 1:30, “Christ is made unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, redemption.” You can apply the Colossians passage that says, “Ye are complete in Him.” You can apply the verse that says, “The secret, the mystery that we preach among the nations is Christ in you, the hope of glory.” And as you believe God, and believe His word and apply it to your life, then you can apply the promise that says, “Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace and believing that you may abound in hope through the power of the Holy Ghost.” All that Christ is, is yours, all things are yours, and ye are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s. That’s how Paul puts it.

So we come to verse 46, “They came to Jericho and as he went out of Jericho with his disciples and a great number of people, blind Bartimaeus, the son of Timaeus, sat by the highway side begging.” All that a blind person could do was to beg. “And when he heard it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to cry out and say, “Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me.” Many charged him, he should hold his peace, said, “Be still.”

There’s always somebody to shush you if you have a burden for God. Have you noticed that? [chuckle] I don’t know why it is, but anytime anybody gets excited about Jesus, there’s always somebody that says, “Come on now, don’t be a fanatic. Come on, be still, be quiet.” And I’m not opting for emotional pyrotechnics and extravagances, you know that. Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse used to say, “Fanaticism is not too much religion, it’s too little sense.” So, I’m not opting for fanaticism, but what I am saying is that the crowd is always wrong, because they always say, “Don’t get serious about the things of Christ. Don’t get excited about them and don’t go after more of God’s blessing. That way, you know, just don’t do it.” They said, “Keep still.” “Hold his peace” means “keep still.” But he cried the more a great deal, “Thou son of David have mercy on me.” And Jesus stood still and commanded him to be called, and they called the blind man, saying, “Be of good comfort, rise, He calleth thee.” Now the word of the crowd has changed. The crowd will always respond to the present stimulus.

You and I have to have deeper convictions and stronger guidance than that of the crowd. Will you remember that, buddy? To say everybody’s doing it does not mean that it’s right. The crowd will always respond to the present stimulus. The crowd that cried, “Hosanna to the Son of David!” on the triumphal entry was the same bunch that cried, “Crucify Him!” a few hours later. So, my dear friend, you and I have to have deeper motivation than that. Paul says, “It is God that worketh in you, both to will and to do of His good pleasure.” Your question and mine always has to be, what does God want me to do? “What wilt thou have me to do?” That was the prayer that Saul of Tarsus prayed as our Lord apprehended him as he traveled on the road to Damascus. His first question, “Who art thou, Lord?” The answer came, “I am Jesus whom thou persecutest. It is hard for you to kick like a dumb ox against the ox goad.” And then, his second question was “Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?” Always ask for God’s guidance. Always line up with God’s revealed will. Always obey what you know to be the will of God.

Small thought here, somebody says, “What if I don’t know? What should I do then?” The Bible says, “Wait on the Lord. Be of good courage and He shall strengthen thine heart.” God is never late, and if you do not know at this minute what to do about a given question, wait on God until you do know. Someone has said that the Christian soldier has a right to wait at headquarters until he gets his marching orders. Then he can go out in the field. “Wait on the Lord. Rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him,” says the psalmist in the 37th Psalm. If you don’t know the will of God about a thing, it’s because you don’t need to know yet.

You don’t have to take precipitate action based on any hunches or any feelings or any desperate idea that I have to do something about it. Many of my mistakes have been made in a hurry because I felt I had to do something about it. No, you don’t. You don’t have to speak up and you don’t have to show up. You don’t have to make waves, you don’t have to make sudden, and oftentimes, ill-advised decisions. You can wait until you know the will of God about a matter, then move immediately.

Paul tried to go into Asia, tried to go into Bithynia. Everything was closed to him. Finally came down to Troas and God gave him that vision of the man from Macedonia saying, “Come over into Macedonia and help us.” And if you’ll read the passage there in Acts, it says, “Immediately, after we had seen the vision… After Paul had seen the vision, we endeavored to go into Macedonia, assuredly gathering that the Lord had called us to preach the gospel to them.” Immediately, he didn’t waste any time. As soon as he had had this revelation of God’s will, I’m sure he pounded on the wall and woke up Dr. Luke. And Luke woke up sleepily, you know, “What day is this? Where am I?” And he heard Paul saying, “Dr. Luke, hey, brother.” And he said, “What’s the matter, Paul? Are you sick?” [chuckle] Can’t you just see the scene there? “No”, he said, “I’ve just heard from the Lord and we’ve gotta go over into Macedonia. We’re gonna leave right first thing in the morning. So you better be ready.”

At this point, the landlady, who had just gone to bed and she got up, threw a robe on her. She came plodding up the stairs. Can you see her? [chuckle] She knocks on the door and says, “Brother Paul, are you Alright?” “Oh, yes.” He says, “Praise the Lord.” He said, “I just heard from heaven, we’re gonna have to leave for Macedonia first thing in the morning. I’ll have my eggs sunny-side up, please.” [laughter] And she goes down, mumbling to herself, “I’ll never understand preachers.” [laughter] Well… No, maybe it didn’t happen that way. That’s the Cook version. But you know, the point I’m raising is if you don’t know the will of God for sure, don’t try to kick the doors open. You wait on God until you know. But when He does reveal His will to you in His Word and through prayer and through the promptings of the Holy Spirit, then don’t you waste a minute. Get going for God. Good idea?

Well, that was kind of a detour but it was an important one. So they said, “Be of good comfort. Rise, He calleth thee.” The crowd always changes its tune, depending on the present stimulus. You don’t have to follow the crowd. It said, “He casting away his garment, rose and came to Jesus.” His outer garment fell from those eager shoulders as he stumbled his way toward the Savior. Now, here is this confrontation between the needy, blind person and the Savior, the Creator, the Redeemer. Jesus said to him, “What wilt thou that I should do unto thee?” Now, our Savior asked this question of others other times.

And if you assume correctly that the Lord Jesus didn’t need anybody to tell Him… John says this very clearly in his first or second chapter. You remember that passage? It said, “He needed not that any should tell Him about people. For He knew what was in man.” Over in the sixth chapter, John says, “He himself knew what he would do.” So the Savior, God in the flesh, knew all of these things before people would ever tell Him, didn’t He? If that is so, and it is, then why should He ask a question? Well, He asks the question because God asks questions of us all the time. And God says, “Ask Me what you want.” He says through Isaiah, “Ask Me concerning My sons and concerning the works of My hands command ye Me.” James says, “Ye have not because ye ask not.” Jesus said, “Ask and ye shall receive. Seek and ye shall find. Knock and it shall be open unto you.” And that’s in the linear form of the verb, ask and keep on asking. Seek and knock and keep on knocking. Seek and keep on seeking. Don’t quit!

He, our Savior, taught that importunate prayer, that means prayer that refuses to quit, is the order of the day. And He told the story of the widow lady who, although the judge wouldn’t listen to her because he was a judge, yet because she came often and often and often to him, he did listen to her. So it is with prayer. Oh, God wants you to tell Him. God wants you to tell Him what you need. Can you remember that today? Don’t drift on, dumb and dissatisfied and discontented and failing. Why don’t you, like Bartimaeus, say, “God, this is what I need,” and tell Him about it. You’ll be amazed and delighted with the answers that come from our gracious Lord.

Father God, today help us to obey Thy Word and help us to be sensible enough to tell Thee what we need. Through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen.

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