That knowing God is the ultimate strength and essential for facing life's challenges, especially in these "end times." Drawing from Psalm 144, it highlights David's experience of God as his strength in battle and contrasts this with human frailty. The passage shares anecdotes, including an old missionary's advice that knowing God is paramount for service, and personal reflections on learning to rely on God's power through weakness, as exemplified by Paul's thorn in the flesh. The core lesson is that true strength and exploits come not from self-sufficiency but from a deep, intimate relationship with God, cultivated through stillness and communion, allowing believers to be victorious in spiritual warfare.
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Well, it's real good to be back. You know, we left Jamaica a few days ago, and you have to readjust yourself. The last meeting in Jamaica was a Sunday night meeting in one of the new assemblies in Kingston. We have ten assemblies in the city of Kingston, and about forty-three or four in the country parts. and it was a baptism of twelve disciples and the building which is about the size of this building was crowded people looking through the windows and right up to the front near the open pool where the folks were going to be baptized the boys and girls had gathered in the front like same all over the world wanting to see things and believe me I wish I could take you back to that picture.
There were, of course, ever so many little curly heads and red and yellow, black and white mingled in the audience. Chinese, Indians, Negroes, colored whites, people from all race. great enthusiasm as they watched these twelve being baptized. And now, you know, a short flight up to America and readjusting to face American and Canadian audiences for the next, well, let's see, it'll be ten or eleven weeks moving from Greenwood Hills to Jack Wilson's camps and up into the Canadian camps and conferences.
And it needs a little readjusting. You know, one of my biggest enemies is that old thing up in the corner there. You're supposed to be out at quarter past eight tonight, and here am I to give my opening message to you. So, I'm so glad that they've given me the chance to be with you each evening for a Bible talk, inspiration talk, And I think perhaps the best thing to do is to take one portion of the word and just go as far as that old proper letter from then, a serial story, go on night after night, you see, and just concentrate upon one part of God's word.
Now I'm going to turn you to a psalm, and I'm going to ask you to read the psalm through with me. Psalm I feel that this psalm is so full of truth and it's a springboard that will bring us to many truths during this week. Truth that we need in these tremendous days. Psalm a hundred and forty-four, a psalm of David. Now, will you come in with me on the alternate verses, I'll read verse one and let me hear your voices coming in at mine, verse two, four, six, right through to the end.
Blessed be the Lord my strength which teaches my hands to war and my fingers to fight. My goodness and my fortress, my high tower and my deliverer, my shield and he in whom I trust, who subjugates my people under me. Lord, what is man that thou takest knowledge of him, or the son of man that thou makest account of him? Man is like the vanity. His days are of a shadow that passeth away. Bow thy heavens, O Lord, and come down, touch the mountains, and day shall smoke.
Cast forth lightning and scatter them. Shoot out thine arrows and destroy them. Send thy hand from above and rid me, and deliver me out of great waters. from the hand of strange children, whose mouth speaketh vanity, and their right hand is a right hand of porthood. I will sing a new song unto thee, O God. Upon a sorcery, an instrument of ten strings will I sing praises unto thee. It is he that giveth salvation unto kings, who delivereth David his servant from the hurtful sword.
with me and deliver me from the hand of strange children whose mouth speaketh vanity and their right hand is the right hand of falsehood. That our sons may be as plants grown up in their youth. That our daughters may be as corn of stones polished after the similitude of a palace. That our garners may be full affording all manner of store. that our sheep may bring forth thousands and tens of thousands in our streets, that our oxen may be strong to labor, that there be no breaking in, nor going out, that there be no complaining in our streets.
Happy is that people that is in such a case, yea, happy is that people whose God is. the Lord. Now God will bless to our hearts the reading together of His precious word. Now can we bow for one moment of prayer again? Let's ask the Lord to speak. Loving Lord and Master, thou who didst take the loaf of bread and the little fish from the hands of a boy, and bless them and break and distribute to feed a multitude, and thou art the same today, still the great shepherd of the sheep feeding thy flock, And how utterly dependent we are upon the gracious Holy Spirit to be our teacher and guide, to make thy word live to us.
Stand amongst us tonight in thy risen power. We've come many of us long journeys today. We're excited, we're tired. Perhaps our minds feel that we cannot take much in. But make our hearts ready, ready for the teachings of thy word that will come in grace and power and blessing. And Lord, let the word be all that it can be to each one of us. And as the hours and the days go by, may thy work be deep and true. And may we go out to the battle more than conquerors.
through him who loved us. For his dear name's sake. Amen. Now, many, many years ago, in fact, over forty years ago, I had taken the step of believers' baptism and come into the fellowship of an assembly of Christians. And I remember how startled the assembly was when a young fellow, I suppose about eight or nine years older than myself at that time, had come to the elders of the assembly and said that he felt God was calling him to go to China as a missionary.
It was a young assembly and they had never had this experience before and they hardly knew what to do. But I think they did a very wise thing. They invited an experienced older missionary named Dr. Eager who was home on furlough from China. They said, would you come and spend a month with us? just live with us and mingle with the assembly and take part in our meetings and serve amongst us. And we want to ask you questions and we want this young man to have time with you. And if God is calling him to China, we shall feel a tremendous privilege.
Well, the days went by and this grand old man of God lived amongst the Lord's people. And the final meeting before he went away, I shall never forget. The elder brethren were sitting there, and this experienced old missionary with the young man, Leonard Steele, by his side. And there was the assembly gathered round, and they were asking questions of this missionary. And all of a sudden a man said, Dr. Eager, If you want to put down a list of things that were vitally important for a young man who was going to leave his homeland and live amongst the heathen and go out to a distant land, a new sphere of life, what would you put first on the list?
Would you say that he would need a good Bible school training? Would you say that he would need medical training, how to cure the sick and pull out a tooth or two? Would you suggest that he ought to have this in his equipment or that? Would you suggest that he should be able to cook a meal or build a house? What's the important things and what's the case one on the list? And let the old man of God made an answer which has lived with me. He said, you know, many of those things that you've mentioned will be very useful and in fact vitally important.
He said, if a mission is going to be practical, he should be able to not merely just preach. He may have to pull out a tooth when the nearest dentist is five hundred miles away. He certainly may have to go out with his gun and shoot something and know how to turn its inside out and prepare it for the pot and cook a meal. He may have to know lots of things that is going to be useful and practical, but he said if you ask me to put down a list, I would head the list with this essential thing. He must no God.
Now one people, that's the burden of my heart this week. I feel the other thing in the closing days. I'm not going to be a pessimist, I'll be optimistic, I hope to the end. I remember when the First Great War was brewing and I remember when Christians were shaking their heads and they said, well this is it, distress of nations and the end of the age is upon us. I remember when General Allenby took Palestine without firing a shot from the Turkish Empire and they said this is it, the end of the age must be tremendously near.
The first war passed by and there came twenty-one years of troubled peace. And then the second great conflict distressed the world with all its awfulness. People said this must be it. The years passed by but steadily before our eyes the stage is setting. And I think nearly everyone who loves the Word of God and keeps their eyes open realizes that we cannot fix states, we don't know just how near it is or how far off it is, but the end of the age happenings are growing out the past. And frankly, I cannot look into young people's faces and say, Now, for the next thirty or forty years, you may have the opportunity of serving Christ, and the adventure and wonder of it is thrilling.
I can't. I don't believe you, youngsters. They're going to have thirty or forty years. If you ask my frank opinion, I believe the end of the age happenings are so near to us that I don't think you will have the opportunity as I have had of serving Christ over thirty years in the gospel, in different lands, and being a simple missionary. But whatever the future holds, there is one thing that is absolutely vital. Would you take a note of this verse? Daniel eleven thirty-two. The people that do know their God shall destroy and direct exploit.
You know, Daniel is talking in chapter eleven as he moves toward chapter twelve of the time of the end. And he's speaking of a nation that's coming back to Palestine and will make a covenant with somebody. A covenant that will be distressed and broken and bring the time of Jacob's awful trouble to the restored nation of Israel in unbelief. And at the time of the end, the only solution is the outlook, the coming back of Messiah to bring blessing to broad-lined in Israel.
And amidst these verses comes this tremendous statement. Or that you know their gospel shall be strong and direct spite. It's a magnificent verse for troublesome days, for difficult days. And whatever lies ahead for America, whatever lies ahead for our Caribbean islands that are in turmoil at the moment, we seem to feel that trouble of days will increase. The distress of nations which we've heard of in distant lands may come closer.
And it may be perhaps before our loved Lord returns in the air for us he might allow his church to be purified by testing even in lands like this. But the people that do know their God shall be strong and do exploits, strong enough to stand up victoriously in the swirling days and happenings, and to be adventurers, real mutineers, not mutineers, well, mutineers as far as the world is concerned, those who will do exploits in the service of their Lord.
What will you look at verse one with me? Psalm a hundred and forty-four verse one. Blessed be the world, my strength, which teacheth my hands to war and my fingers to fight. Now I'm going to read it again. Blessed be the Lord, my God, which teacheth my hands to war, my fingers to fight. Now, when I read that the second time, did I misquote it? Yes or no? And none of you said no, because you didn't want to lose one of those pips in your pocket.
Those pills. Deliberately... I misquoted that verse. Blessed be the Lord my God which teaches my hands to war and my fingers to fight. He did not say my God, he said, Blessed be the Lord my strength, my strength. Well, what does this mean? To me it simply means this. Here is a boy who's grown to manhood and as a man of God he has coined a new name for his God, my strength.
I don't think for a moment He has any thought of this that boys are so proud of, this little bit of muscle that lies here. I sort of feel that David, the tail end of a farmer's family, the boy who went out to earn his living early on the bank hills, minding father's sheep, used to sit at nights perhaps, looking up at the stars. looking down at the old farm in Bethlehem and seeing the twinkling lights as they went out and he knew that mum and dad were safe in bed and he's minding the sheep on the back hills.
And as he sits there looking round at the sheep, he thinks of the stories he's heard, of the enemies of the sheep. He's there to protect them. He's there to care for them. Perhaps across the hills the shepherd's cries would come. They used to cry across those lovely hills around Bethlehem, and if the enemy came out they would sound a warning from flock to flock. I wonder if you've noticed that verse, would you turn with me to one Peter five for a moment. One Peter chapter five, verse eight.
It's a lovely verse, I believe, that dear old fisherman Peter is actually using the shepherd cries here in verse eight. Be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary the devil of the roaring lamb walketh about seeking whom he may devour. In the original it would just be one word. A shepherd conscious that the bears are out or that the lions are stalking through the valleys and coming up into the hills would lift up his voice and call across the mountains.
Shepherds would guard themselves and stand watching because they knew that at any moment some enemy could come in amongst the sheep. You just imagine David, just a big boy, and as he hears perhaps the growl of a lion that's come out of his cave and is coming out of the valley, skulking into the night after a sheep. Or he hears that noise that the old bear makes, the sort of grunting noise. He gets up and instinctively his hand goes to his natural strength. And oh my, he says, when I was down in the old schoolhouse and when I was fighting those other boys, I used to stick my chin down and stick up my fist and put out a straight left.
And I thought I was a strong kid. I could fight anybody. But a lion, a bear, And as he thought of the bear that would lumber up like this with great outstitched arms to sort of say, come on, let me embrace you and get my claws around you, or whether the skunk and lion would spring with a frightening roar right in amongst the sheep, David would say, O Lord, I'm not strong enough for this. I need other strength. Strengthen me with might by thy spirit. Make me strong in the Lord and the power of his might.
And as he's praying and seeking strength, all of a sudden the roar or the bear's growl comes. And he's up, and he's up to the lion. And he goes to the lion and catches hold of it and wrenches his mouth open. A lion had never been tackled like that before. It was completely shaken by surprise. And I can see David looking at that lion on the ground, and he said, Oh, Lord, you did it. Oh, Lord, you frightened me to do this. And in the morning he goes down to the farmhouse, and he sits down at the breakfast table, and dear old Jesse, his farming father, says, Well, David, did you have a good night up on the hills?
He said, Yes, Dad. Nothing after the sheep. Well, the lion was out. Or did it get near you? Yes, Dad, it came into our flock and I killed it. What killed it? Yes, Dad, I killed it. I just felt my weakness and said, Lord, give me strength. And I went and attacked the lion. I just caught hold of it and tore its mouth out. You didn't. Now to an experience like that a boy has come with a new experience of God and he's coined a new name for God. And from that moment he says, Blessed be the Lord thy God.
No, no. Blessed be the Lord my strength. Now be honest with the Lord this first night of our Congress. If I asked you if you know Jesus, you would say yes, this is life eternal, that they may know and be the only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent. And if you now learn to know Jesus, I learn to know God. In that day, that happy day, when as a girl and boy, I said, Lord Jesus, I will trust thee with my soul.
Guilty, lost, helpless, falcons make me whole. Then if thou in heaven, nor on earth like thee, thou hast died for sinners, therefore, Lord, for me, Lord Jesus, in all my guilt and need I come. I bring nothing in my hand, I'm crushing you only, you did it all for me. And he whispered pardon to your heart. And salvation came to your life. And you could whisper, I'm saved. You see, that night you coined a new name for your God, a new name for Jesus. You could say he's my Savior.
But you know, you didn't go very far from that day, that wonderful happy day, without saying, Oh, isn't it wonderful to think that this Savior of mine said he will never leave me, never forsake me. I can boldly say he's my helper, my friend, he's my friend. Just think of it, the friend that sticks closer than a brother. And you coined a new name for Jesus, my friend, my dearest friend. And then you came to the crossroads and you didn't know which way to go. And you said, Oh, Lord Jesus, my Savior, my friend, teach me thy way.
Is it this way or that way? And his voice behind you with a pointing finger said, This is the way, walk ye in it. And he said, Oh, thank you, Lord Jesus. You are my guide in life. And you coined a new name for him. I say, are you going on coining new names for the Lord as the months go by? Just now you were asked in the crib if you could give some wonderful names that came from his lips as he stood and said, I ask you.
And to a hungry world he said, the bread, to a dark world the light. to a world that didn't know the way, the way that comes to life. I am the good shepherd. I am the resurrection. I am the true vine. And one by one they came out in the quiz. That's what He is to you. But have you coined these names in your own experience for Him? My Savior, my friend, my guide, my lover, my strength, the one that will strengthen me.
The old missionary said the greatest need is for the young man to know God. Daniel says in the closing days as they seem to grow more intense, who shall be strong and do exploits. I wonder from love, David, if I could learn this lesson afresh, that we can learn to know God by every experience casting us back upon him. And if to know God is to know Jesus, who was sent to reveal the great heart of God, I can learn to know my loved Lord, the Lord Jesus, by coining new names for him.
It's very interesting tonight, wouldn't it? Around the campfire, if you will ask the question, what's the last name from living spiritual experience that you coined for Jesus Christ? Happy day when you coined the name Savior. Happy day when you first proved his friendship. Happy day when he became your guide. Happy day when he whispered his counsels from the word to your heart. Happy day when you first tasted of his power and strength. What was the last word that you coined for Jesus? Now, in a closing moment, would you look at one verse, turning back to Psalm forty-six, verse ten.
Psalm forty-six, verse ten. Another vital verse in our study. Verse ten be still and no. that I am God. You know, don't you come to me this week or uncorrell with me about what I'm going to say? You know, I had the best mother in the world. Now, don't you quarrel with me about that? If you do, I won't blame you, but I genuinely think God gave me the best mother in the world.
I never had a better. She was great. Now, this mother of mine, I used to get to know her as a growing kid in a hundred and one ways in practical experience. For instance, if I climbed on my bike and all of a sudden put on my brakes too hard and went over the handlebars, and came sprawling down on hands and knees and would get up with my knees all trickling with blood and torn, The first person I thought of was mother. And I'd come down to you and say, Lord, look!
Now where she got the things from, I don't know, but there was always bandages and hot water and soap and thoracic ointment and a hundred and one other things in some cupboard somewhere. And soon she was catching me up. If I got hungry, I'd come rushing in. No, I'm hungry. I never asked where they came from, but somehow three or four times a day she put on the old table all that I needed to fill up the bread basket down here. If my boots wore out, I never thought of Dad's pocketbook. No, not. The old boots have gone. She'd get me a new pair. And I learned to know, Mother, as the supplier of every need.
But you know, I had a Christian mother, and I learned to know mother in a new way as she put us boys to bed. We were wildish boys, dreadful little fellows. And when she got us through the bath and into our nightlies, I suppose we were as near looking like little angels as we ever would or could be. And when she got us safely in bed, you know, sucker thumb time... She would hang round the bed and talk to us and in that sort of in-between stage, you know, just going to sleep, she would pray for us and tuck us in and tell us little things and we would listen.
And sometimes we'd put our arms around our neck and pull our head down, and we would nestle our little heads right there in our breast, and we would say, Mom, Mom, and we would tell our things then that we'd never tell during the day. If she called us at three o'clock in the afternoon and said, Harold, I won't tell you something, come here. Oh, Mom, I've got football for you, no. But going to dead time, we would listen. And do you know it was then we learned to know Mother from a different angle, the secrets of her mind and heart, her desires toward us, that somehow she never revealed in the rush and bustle of the experiences of the day.
Through the day we learned to know Mother as the supplier of every need in the rough and tumble experience of a boy's life. But it'd go to bedtime, it was different. We learned to know some of the deeper things of a mother's mind and heart. You know, that's the one thing that God wants with us, Christians, and he's not getting it. Somehow we're always doing things, and if we get into a jam or a difficulty, Lord Jesus, we turn to him instinctively of Christians, and we know that he is our friend, our helper, our strengthener, our guide, our great high priest, our advocate.
Oh, he's so much. But he says, be still and not. And there are secrets that he can never reveal to us in the rush and bustle and adventure of the Christian life. The one thing that's so desperately needed today is communion. And lots of Christians are not getting it. And I say something to you thoughtfully, and I say it very carefully. Lots of Christians are not much different to the rushing world. You'll read of suicides increasing and breakdowns increasing and tensions of life needing a thousand and one things and it's thousand around us.
It's far, far too common amongst God's people. And sometimes we hide behind the excuse and we say, well, it's the Lord's chastisement. But is it? Is the Lord whipping all these people around us who are not in his family? Is it that we haven't learnt the lesson to be still and know? Is it possible that we are missing that which comes from quiet communion? Is it that there are responses that are uncapped? Is it that the sufficiency of the risen Christ isn't available because we only know him as the one we can turn to in the rough and ready experiences of life that do not commune with?
Oh, I shall press it as the week goes by, they that waits upon the Lord shall change their strength. They shall mount up on wings as eagles, They shall run and not be weary. They shall walk and not faint. Blessed be the Lord my strength. Yes, I'm watching it. I have one more story to tell you, just one. When I was about, let's see now, twenty years of age, don't ask me what it was, but there was a problem in my life.
And I felt the need to get alone, alone with God. And I remember getting a day off from the job I was doing, and I remember going out into the lonely countryside and finding a quiet spot where I wouldn't see a soul far from the big city. And I can never forget that morning I sat underneath a spreading oak tree. I looked down a hill toward a flowing river. at the side of me and behind me there was a wheat field that was just coming up to its golden ripeness. And as I sat there all of a sudden I noticed just above my head in the oak tree that two little birds were coming to a little round hole in the tree.
And every time they came there were four little beaks that went up and there was a lot of And as I sat there very quietly, I thought, hmm, hmm, I know all your secrets. A little couple of birds met each other and said, how do you do? And they went to courting, and they got engaged, and they went house hunting. and found a nice little place and built a lovely little nest and four little legs were dropped into the nest and they watched it all and one day four little legs were hatched and I knew all their life story not by rushing around but just by sitting still and as I sat there I began to chuckle I couldn't help it I said your secrets are all known to me by sitting still And when I looked round and I saw something, it was a rabbit.
And this old cotton-tailed rabbit had come out from his hole in the hedge and he had come toward the corn. And I've never seen this before. I've watched rabbits for years as a boy. But the rabbit went up on his hind legs and he pulled the corn down. And he began to have his breakfast of corn flakes. He was having it. I'd never feel it or love it if near us. That white platform top was, to me, pulling the corn down and eating it. And I just perfectly still watched him. And after he had a lovely breakfast, he stepped back and he began to go like this.
Whether he was shaving or going through his morning abolutions, I don't know, but I watched him before he hopped off to his hole again. And I thought to myself, well, I never saw that before. As boys, we thought we loved nature, and we used to say, let's do birds nesting our boys' wretched little beasts. And we'd go crying the trees and pushing through the hedges and shouting, Is he up there, Bill? No, Harold, anything over there? And all the little feathered creatures said, Shh. So the rude boys went by. Nature doesn't reveal her secrets to rough, rude, shouting boys.
Any naturalist will tell you that they have to watch for hours in perfect stillness to learn some of the little secrets of the little creatures. And God is just like his handiwork. Be still and know that I am God. I said, do you ever feel weak? You say, Mr. Wilder, do you ever feel weak? You say, no. Well, you haven't got very far in the Christian life. For let me tell you, there's no fear of Christian living and service that doesn't bring to us the same weakness as we face it.
You may talk to your colleagues. You may stand up and do the greatest job in the natural things of life. But when you handle spiritual things, you will be conscious of weakness. You will realize that without divine strength, you will do nothing. In my own strength, I can do nothing. And you will need to draw from the strength of the risen Christ, by the flow of his very life in you and through you, by the Holy Spirit. And then you can stand and say, I can do all things through Christ, who poureth his strength through me. Have you learned this lesson?
Blessed be the Lord my God. No. Blessed be the Lord my strength. You feel strong for the task, Paul? Well, I'm doing some wonderful missionary jobs. What was it? Don't ask me what it was. Whether it was I, trouble. It was a something in his body that made him prophetically weak. Lord, take it away. I'll be a better missionary. No, Paul. Lord, take it away. Three times I asked him to take it away. No, Paul. My strength is made perfect in weakness.
It's when you feel weak, then my strength has a chance. Three times he's tried to push it away, and now he's learnt the lesson. And he puts out his arm toward the thing, and instead of pushing it away, he embraces it. Most gladly, therefore. And he embraces the thing that he wanted to push out of his life. Blessed be the Lord Jesus, my strength which teaches my hands to wall, my fingers to fight.
The hands that held a shepherd's rod, the fingers that swept over the harp and produced the loveliest arms, will be the hands and fingers of a warrior, a fighter, a man who will go out into the country to win the victories. Blessed be the Lord my strength which teaches my hands to war. my fingers to fight. Shall we pray together? Lord Jesus, many of us bowed in thy presence in The battles of life realize that we are in the midst of a great conflict.
We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers. The kingdom of darkness is matched in conflict with the kingdom of light. Oh, we ask thee, our risen Lord, that thou would be the captain of our salvation and lead us victoriously in Jude with thy strength. into the battles. The bigger the battle, the bigger the victory. As we look at our hands and our fingers, which speak of our work and our skill, we can do nothing in this great conflict, and less we are strengthened with might by thy spirit and the inner man.
But we know that thou would only entrust this strength to us for one purpose, that Christ may dwell and be atone in our hearts by faith. Graciously, Holy Spirit of God, be our teacher and guide and lead us into these secrets that our risen Christ would love us to lay hold of by faith. We may be able to say, I can be strong in the Lord and the power of his might. Blessed be the Lord, my strength, which teaches my hands to war, my fingers to bite.
Bless us now as we turn to recreation and campfire, and make this the beginning of the happy, wonderful days with thyself during this Congress. For our Lord Jesus Christ's sake. Amen.