Transcript of message from TV Broadcast 790 -- taken from Closed Captioning Text

-- Brother Phil Enlow: Praise God! I appreciate the Lord's presence this morning, and I'm here to declare to you that I'm strong this morning because I feel real weak so I must be...must be strong in the Lord. The Lord is good, isn't He? He doesn't depend on our strength, He doesn't depend on our intelligence, He doesn't depend on anything that we have.

You know it's like we heard those of you who were here Friday night, we played the message that we heard last week in New York and I love it when Pastor Cymbala mentioned, you know, about the Lord using us. He said the Lord doesn't need your intelligence. He's God. He knows everything. He doesn't need anything that we possess in ourselves. He just needs us. So that's my desire this morning, that He will take possession and do what He will, because He is the only hope and the only help that we have. As we look to Him things will be all right. Praise God!

Let's turn to a very familiar passage this morning and I trust that the Lord will do something that will make it fresh. Proverbs, chapter 3, verses 5 and 6. Somehow my mind has been drawn to this and I just trust that the Lord will bring forth out of it what He desires me to know because I see plenty of needs in my own heart with respect to the truth that's contained in this simple scripture that we learned to quote.

It's one of the first things we tend to learn to quote, isn't it? "Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight." (NIV). Now the issue of trust and trusting the Lord in particular is...it gets to the heart of the human condition, doesn't it?

( congregational amens ).

That's exactly what Satan attacked in the beginning when the Lord had told Adam and Eve that they could eat of everything except one tree. So the devil came to Eve when she was alone, separated from Adam, and he said, yeah, has the Lord said...or what has the Lord said? Anyway I forget the exact conversation, but anyway she reiterated what the Lord had said--we can eat of everything but this tree.

Now of course Satan didn't say, well isn't that great? God has given you so much. He focused on the one thing the Lord had forbidden. Isn't that the devil's way?

( congregational amens ).

Trying to make that seem desirable, as though God's holding out on you. That's the exact line he took with her. God's holding out on you. He has an ulterior motive. He does not have your best interest at heart. He's selfish. He's evil and selfish, trying to repress you and keep you from your destiny, and so the way...the pathway to your destiny is to take this, because if you partake of this fruit you will be as gods knowing good and evil.

The fundamental issue, though, that Satan attacked was the trustworthiness of God. Can you really trust Him? Does He have your best interest at heart? So this is the condition of the world into which we are born. It's the condition of Adam's race. Fundamentally we just don't trust, and whenever we try to trust something... I tell you life has a way of knocking us, doesn't it? Life has a way of beating us up and just destroying our...even our ability...what little ability we have to trust. It's a very difficult thing for a human being to truly trust.

But that's the subject of this and notice that the object of this particular passage has to do with our paths. So this is not strictly speaking a salvation message, although if you have never come to the place where you have truly seen the weakness and the sinfulness of your own life, and your hopelessness before God, and put your trust in Jesus Christ to save you for time and eternity then this passage here means nothing to you. This will go in one ear and out the other.

Trust God, what do you mean? The world's wisdom says trust yourself. "If it's to be it's up to me." How many of you have heard that saying before? That's the world's wisdom that we're gonna have to trust in ourselves, we're gonna have to look out for number one... that's another one you hear a lot.

But what this passage is about has to do with our paths being straight. This is about practical day-to-day living. This is not talking about somebody who needs to come to Christ and become saved, but this is talking about somebody who has done that, who has been brought to that place.

And I would emphasize that it is God who brings us to that place, because we would never seek Him if He did not seek us. We are the recipients of God's incredible, amazing grace. It's favor He shows us, we could never earn and never deserve. Praise God! That's what we've been singing about this morning. All of our songs are pointing to the Lord and His victory, and rightly so because we are nothing except recipients of His grace. Praise God! The Lord has got to be the center.

So what he's talking about here though is straight paths for your life. This is being able to live for Christ in the world successfully without your path going here and going there, getting off course and getting off in the swamp somewhere, and in the quicksand, and in the mire. How many of you know what I'm talking about?

( congregational response ).

Yeah! You know, you've been in some mire, some of you, this week. You know what I'm talking about. The key is in this scripture and it's such a simple one. "Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him..."--and then the consequence--"...He will make your paths straight." He will do it. This is something that God alone can do. There's not a single person upon the face of the earth who knows how to order his steps in this world.

( congregational amens ).

Praise God! Isn't there a scripture to that effect, it came to me, I can't think of the exact wording of it. It's not in man that walks to direct his steps. You see we are constituted a certain way in our very creation. Our creator designed us to work a certain way. He didn't design us to be independent, to run our own affairs.

He designed us to walk in loving harmony with Him in a relationship of love and trust where we constantly are looking to Him and honoring Him and desiring to do His will. And He in turn showers us with love and blessings, and fruitfulness, and joy, and peace, and all the wonderful things that flow from His heart toward us. That's what this is about.

This isn't about some austere God in the sky somewhere that we tremble before and we try to somehow be Christians so we won't make Him mad. And we're worried if we make one misstep that He's got to hurl thunderbolts at us. This is a loving, Heavenly Father whose love extends to everyone who will turn their heart to Him. I tell you, He loves the rest. In one sense He loves the world, that's why He sent His Son to die. But, oh, I'll tell you, it makes a great difference what you do with Jesus.

But once again this has to do with our lives every single day in the world and the key word here is "trust." Trust and faith kind of go hand in hand. Trust is sort of like faith in action. It's actually depending, leaning upon. Notice the parallelism here in the scriptures in verse 5. "Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not...." You see he's really saying the same thing, the same concept in both halves of that verse. Trusting and leaning are really two sides of the same coin. There are two ways of speaking of the same thing.

Now I've used the illustration many times of a bridge. If I am truly trusting a bridge, I'm not standing there and kind of keeping my weight on the cliff, let's say, and there's a bridge across the gorge, and daintily putting my foot out there saying, I'm trusting that bridge. I think a lot of times that's the way we are in different areas of our lives though. We're afraid to really put all of our weight upon Jesus and really trust Him with the issues of our lives. That's what this is about.

Now somebody who truly trusts a bridge across the gorge is gonna get out there in the middle. All of their weight is going to be on that bridge. If the bridge collapses, you're dead. That's the degree of trust that He is talking about.

Because the thing is, these two trusts here are mutually exclusive. There's no such thing as trusting in the Lord and leaning to our own understanding at the same time. It's like holding on to two different worlds. As long as we are going by our own thoughts, our own desires, our own wisdom, we are not trusting God.

We wonder why our paths go in funny directions and why we get in trouble. This is the whole issue. And so trust in the Lord. Now the Lord himself is to be the object of that trust. I would suggest that two particular areas in which that trust is expressed. First of all it's in His character, isn't it? Is He worthy of our trust?

( congregational amens ).

See, we everyone asserts that. Everyone that really knows the Lord, we know to say, yes, the Lord is worthy of our trust. But you see, just because we come to Christ, and He comes in and He begins to work in us, that doesn't mean that all the things that are necessary to happen in our lives are done at that point. Our entire life, from the time we are born again into the family of God until our toes turn up or until Jesus comes, all of that time is taken up with the very purpose of God.

What is that purpose? Does anyone know what God's purpose is here this morning? Or are you just afraid to say? God's purpose is to make us like His Son. Now that's a far piece from Adam now, isn't it?

( congregational amens ).

You look at how Jesus walked upon this earth, the perfect, one hundred percent trust that He had in His heavenly Father. Didn't matter what happened to Him. Didn't matter what anybody said about Him, and boy, they said all kind of things about Him. You cast out devils because you're in league with the devil. That's what you're doing. You're just a fake. You're out here trying to fool the people and trying to deceive 'em. You're a wicked deceiver.

And Jesus said, Father, I'm trusting in you. Lord...Father, what do you want me to do today? Father, use me today. Use me today. I'm available to you, Lord. That's why I'm here. I'm here not to do what I want. I'm here to do what you want. Father, my trust is in you today. If it's your will that I die today, that's in your hands and if it's your will that I live, if it's your will that I go to the cross, because that's the only way that you and your great heart can reach out and save a people out of this wicked world. I'm willing to do it. I trust you.

He knew his Father, didn't He? He knew everything about His Father, His character. When the devil attacked God's character to Eve, Jesus knew better. He said there is not one selfish... I was gonna say bone in His body. He doesn't have a body but there is not one selfish atom in His being, however you want to express it. There is not a bit of any darkness. In fact the scripture says, "...God is light..."--and what? Just so you get it straight--"...no darkness at all." Not just light but no darkness at all. This is pure. He is the purest, holiest Being there is. I tell you this is Somebody worthy of my trust.

( congregational amens ).

Praise God! What is the greatest characteristic the Bible declares concerning God is what? God is love. God is love. I tell you, men don't know what love is. They fall in lust. It's a self-centered kind of thing that men call love in this world. It's so centered in me and what I want and what I'm feeling, and what I'm going through. But I love this one because they sort of rubbed my fur the right way for a while and then it kind of goes away.

Oh, I tell you what, we need... there is only one source of true love and that's Him. You want to know what love is? He sent His Son to die for us. That's how we know what love is. That is the measure of the very character of the love of God towards you today. I can trust Somebody who loves me that much, can't you?

( congregational amens ).

That's the whole thing. His character is utterly, completely trustworthy, and that is the thing that God is seeking to establish. I believe when He saves us, there is a basic sense in which He establishes that truth. We come to trust Him with our souls. We come, instead of saying, oh, God, what do I have to do to be acceptable to you? we come and realize there's nothing I can do. Nothing, I'm hopeless, if you don't have mercy upon me, I have no hope. But I see that you and your love have sent your son to the cross. You've done what was necessary for me to have life and I trust in that. I trust in Him. I call upon the name of Jesus and there's not a devil in Hell that can keep me out of the kingdom of God if I call on that great name.

( congregational amens ).

Satan himself will have to flee. Praise God! Praise the Lord! What a gospel we have! But oh, when we come to Christ, we come with a lot of baggage don't we? That's what the Christian life is about--getting rid of the baggage, getting us to the point where every single day, not just in the church house when we're singing and feeling happy, but when we're out on the job and we're trying to deal with the issues of life. That's where God is seeking to establish in us this quality of trust.

And here's the thing, we need to trust in the character of God, that's part of it but we need to trust in the purpose of God, because that's our problem most of the time is we have one purpose and God has another. God is seeking to conform us to the image of His Son and we'd like life to go smoother. We want our nest feathered. We don't like being in a place of need. We don't like having things that we consider to be negative to happen to us. After all we're serving God. Why should anything bad ever happen to me?

We don't realize God's purpose. God's purpose is to deliver us from this terrible strong man called Adam and the death grip that he tries to hold on. He's dealt with him at the cross, but we've got to experience that victory and that deliverance in our lives. There's no way that God can do it except by bringing us through the circumstances of life in which we learn to trust Him anyhow.

( congregational amens ).

Praise God, we sing the song, "Hallelujah, Anyhow!" You know we learn to sing that, not just grudgingly but praising God because we understand, Lord, if you have allowed the thing that has come upon me there is a reason. I know you love me Lord.

I referred to this recently, I think. Brother Thomas, when he lost his little boy suddenly, totally unexpected, all of a sudden he get's word Phillip's drowned. Did he weep? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. But as he drove to the hospital to identify the body for all the official records and all that, through his tears he said, Oh God, I know you love me. I know you love me. That's trust where it matters. That's just not sitting on the church pew and saying, I trust you Lord, I trust you. But it's trust where the rubber meets the road.

That's what God is wanting to establish in my life and in yours. You've got issues and I've got issues that God is seeking to deliver us from. Sometimes it takes the sword. Sometimes it takes suffering. Sometimes it takes trouble. It takes so many things for us to turn loose and let God have His way in our lives. But oh, I tell you, we need to learn to praise Him and to thank Him.

( congregational amens ).

Is Romans 8:28 still in the book?

( congregational response ).

I don't care what translation you get, it's in there. "And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose." And His purpose is the center... is the key word there. Does God have a reason for the things that He puts you through that hurt? And the answer is, yes, He does.

That's when it matters. That's when this verse matters. It's easy here to say it, but oh, when we're staring those kind of circumstances in the face, God desires to give us the grace and the strength to say, yes, Lord, I trust you now. I don't understand what's happened, I don't understand the whys and wherefores of my circumstances, but I trust you, Lord. I know you love me.

Just because things didn't go the way I thought they ought to go, the way I planned, Lord, you love me. You know best and I trust you Lord because of who you are and because I know what your purpose is and I believe in your purpose. I'd rather be in the new heavens and the new earth set free from all this than to have all that the world has to offer. So Lord, where you see that I need to die, I'm willing to die Lord. I put my life in your hands.

Oh, God, I see things in my life I can't fix, I don't have the power. I don't have the strength to even to say Lord, I trust you, but I'm trusting you for that Lord. You are all that I need, so I lean with my whole weight upon you. I'm not just sort of sticking my toe out testing the waters saying I'm trying to see if Jesus will help me here. I'm standing on Him. I'm putting my whole weight upon Jesus now because I have no one else I can trust in.

What's the alternative, folks? Leaning on your own understanding? What do you know? What do I know? Oh, I tell you what--that was the problem with Eve. She tried to lean on her own. She tried to figure it out herself. She said, yeah that makes sense--what the devil is saying. Boy, that fruit looks good. Being like a god, that sounds great. Praise God, I'll try some of that and gave it to Adam and the rest is history.

Oh, the Lord is undoing that in our lives here today. I see, as I say, I see so many areas of my life that need His help, need His work and I need Him to do something in me that I cannot do. In the process there's one way that my path's gonna wind up going straight and that's to say, Lord, I trust you. I surrender. Oh, Praise God!

I was just thinking about... well, Lord direct me to as to which way to bring this out. But notice the phrase that follows trust in the Lord. What does it say? With how much of your heart? "...With all your heart..." This is where we trip up folks. There's not a person here who doesn't have portions of your heart that have been wounded, that have been hurt, that have been scarred by life--areas where you've tried to trust and you've gotten burnt, areas where you wanted a certain thing and you got hurt real bad. Things have accumulated in your heart. You learn to react, you learn to protect yourself. Anybody know what I'm talking about?

( congregational response ).

That's a natural reaction. Look at the body when it gets a wound and how a scab forms. I tell you, our spiritual heart gets scabs. We get places that...well, we preached one time on the stony places in the heart. This really is covering the same ground, folks. God is not wanting us just to have a half-hearted, yes, Lord, I trust you, and then there's certain areas of our heart in our life where we have never learned to let go and trust God. We've never brought those wounded, weak areas of our heart where our affections have been...maybe our affections have been engaged in something that they shouldn't have been engaged in. If we're gonna trust God with all our heart, we gonna have to trust Him in all of it--in those things too.

But somehow I'm thinking this morning of all the things that have happened in people's lives that cause them to be self-protective. What do you do when you trust and you go through life's experience and you get that kind of a wound in your heart, what do you do? Well people react in all kinds of ways. Sometimes it's bitter. Sometimes it's angry. But I tell you we surely do learn how to protect ourselves, don't we?

We develop a way of thinking, a way of looking at life where we've got it all reasoned out. It's just a, how we have to react to people with a sort of defensive, careful, don't you touch that area of my life. I've been hurt there and I don't want to be hurt again so I know how to stand up. I know how to resist certain things when they probe too close.

I tell you the Lord wants to do some healing in our hearts and He can't do it unless we trust Him with all of our heart. I pray that God will do that in me, all those areas where I find it so hard to trust. This is the same...you know we talk about the heart is like a house and there's rooms that we don't want the Lord to go, this is kind of along the same lines.

There's areas of our hearts that the Lord says you're gonna have to give me that. You're gonna have to surrender. You're gonna have to trust that thing that you have not been able to handle. You've struggled to handle it and it's made you hard and bitter and resistant in that area, but I want that heart. I can heal it. You know Jesus heals the broken hearted?

( congregational amens ).

He doesn't want to just cover it up and give you a better defense. He wants to heal it completely. He can take a wounded heart and He can fill you with trust in Him, not just trust in circumstances and people. You'll never find any hope down here.

( congregational amens ).

But I don't care what relationships you're in. I don't care what your circumstance is. You can trust Him to look out for you and to keep you in the center of His will, to make you the kind of person He wants you to be. He'll take care of these other things His way.

Return to Transcripts Page

---

---