True security is found only in the incomparable God, not in man-made idols or earthly powers. It highlights how people seek security in material possessions, political leaders, or even their own creations, but these ultimately fail. The message emphasizes God's infinite power and knowledge, contrasting it with human frailty, and calls listeners to look to God, who created the heavens and earth, as the ultimate source of hope and security. The sermon concludes by urging individuals to trust in God's might and power, which ensures that not one of His creation will be lost.
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Isaiah chapter forty and commencing tonight at verse eighteen. Isaiah chapter forty and verse eighteen. To whom then will you liken God? For what likeness will you compare unto him? The workman melted the grave an image, and the goldsmith treaded it over with gold, and casteth silver chains. He who is so impoverished that he hath no oblation, chooses a tree that will not rot. He seeketh unto him a cunning workman to prepare a grave and image that shall not be moved.
Have ye not known? Have ye not heard? Has it not been told you from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth? It is he that sitteth upon the circle of earth, and the inhabitants are of earth as grasshoppers, that stretches out the heavens as a curtain, and spreadeth them out of the tent to dwell in, that bringeth the princes to nothing, and makeeth the judges of the earth as vanity. Yea, they shall not be planted, Yea, they shall not be sowed, yea, their stock shall not take root in the earth.
He shall also blow upon them, and they shall wither, and the whirlwind shall take them away as shovels. To whom then will you like and need, or shall I be equal, saith the Holy One? Lift up your eyes on high, and behold, who hath created these things, that bringeth out their hope by number? He calls them all by name by the greatness of his might, for that he is strong in power, not one failure. For the information of those who are with us for the first time in this series, I would just say this, that we have been studying this fortieth chapter of Isaiah under the general title of words of hope, comfort, and cheer.
And so far in our studies we have seen, first of all, an introduction to the whole thing in the first two verses, where you have got through the prophet announcing comfort to his people and giving them some of the basis of that comfort. And in the next address, where we heard the voice crying in the wilderness and so on, we saw the preparation for this. And then thirdly we noticed how those who had received comfort become messengers of that comfort. As you'll notice in verse, excuse me, verse nine of the chapter and so on, old Zion that bring us good sightings and so on, going out with a message of this comfort.
Then this morning, as we gave our last address, we spoke of the questions which God himself raises and pointed out how that even in these questions concerning himself, we find great hope and comfort and tears. I might also say that we have justified what we're doing by a quotation from the fifteenth chapter of Romans which says that what sort of things were written aforetime were written for our learning that we through patience and comfort of the scriptures might have hope. And I think you'll agree with me that we live in a day when there is plenty of need for just this.
I do not deny that there is plenty of need for our hearts to be stirred up with regard to the needs of those who are still in their skin. The very fact that I am a member of at least three different mission boards proves that I have an interest in that very thing. But I believe that there is also a need for those who are at home, who are facing the battles and trials and struggles of life. There is a need for a ministry of words of hope and comfort and cheer. And so it has been the purpose in this series of meetings and addresses on this fortieth of Isaiah to give some of these words right out of the book itself. Now in the section that is before us this evening, I believe if I were asked to give you a title for this little talk, I would call it the quest or the search for security.
And I believe I've only used to state it that way to Right away in your own heart there is an answer. You say, why, that's exactly what I'd like to have. The very fact that men have been clamoring for this and that and other benefits in connection with their yearly wages and so on is proof of what we say that men are seeking for security. You can call it social security. You can call it whatever kind of security, but they're looking for something to give them that feeling of security. alas, many of them don't know where real security is found. They're trying to tie to something that has no security in it, instead of coming to him who alone can make us secure.
And so we now study of these verses which I've read this evening, and tomorrow morning we're going to continue our study and complete this fortieth chapter of Isaiah. May I say for the information of those who may have been debating whether you'll be out tomorrow morning for the first hour, that we are going to complete our study of this fortieth chapter of Isaiah tomorrow morning. And I believe that you will notice there's a climax as we come right up to the renewal of our strength and so on as we have it in the closing verses of this chapter. But now to address ourselves to the verses which we have just now read. I believe I can see in this very activity that we have here in verses nineteen and twenty that very thing that we've been talking about, men wanting something to which they can anchor their souls.
Dr. Ayer referred to it this morning, quoting from the writer, from one of the writers in New York City, who referred to God as a hitching post. As he preferred, he said, and I agree with him, to speak of God as our hiding place. But then you have the idea. men wanting something to which they can tie, something to which they can anchor their soul. As I said a moment ago, they've cast off to one side, the only one who can give them that security, but they find that in their heart, if they've cast off the ones, they're bound for replacing with something else.
And so we find in this passage of Scripture here tonight in verses nineteen and twenty, that those who have cast off the living God immediately go about to manufacture another one for themselves. Those who are rich can make him of gold and silver. Those who are not so rich have to make him of worthy. But he must be a God nevertheless. And you'll notice in the twentieth verse it must be a God who will not rot and a God who cannot be moved. Now you see those two ideas that you have there in that twentieth verse. They want somebody that will not rock, somebody that will not go to corruption, and they want something that will not move.
And I take it that that's the purpose of these silver chains that are mentioned here. But after this man has his God made, he's afraid perhaps that his God will depart from him. So he chains him down. Or it may be that he's afraid his God may topple, and therefore he secures him with chains. so that the very one to whom he's looking for his security has to be secured himself. Reminds me greatly of a remark made by a psychiatrist down in one of our southern cities. He's talking about his work. He's been examining some of our prospective candidates to go to the mission field. I believe he's a very fine Christian psychiatrist.
And when we were talking about a certain missionary who had required the services of a psychiatrist, I said, well, I'm sorry that she can't stay right here with you in this city and receive your attention. But I said, you know, we have a psychiatrist, and I mentioned another city, where there's another so-called Christian psychiatrist. Well, he said, yes, but I'm afraid he's a little insecure himself, referring to this other psychiatrist. Well, now, what in the world would you do, dear friends, if you need a psychiatrist, you feel the need of security yourself? But you go to somebody who isn't too sure of himself. And you say to yourself, there couldn't be any benefit in that.
No, dear friends, neither can there be any benefit in putting something in the place of God, in something in the place of the living God, when you can have the living God himself. Ah, but somebody says to me, you must remember, we live in America. We're not idolaters. We weren't born in China. We weren't born in Africa. We weren't born in any of these places where they bow down to the gods of wooden stones. Let me tell you something. You don't have to be born in China. You don't have to be born in Africa. You don't have to be born in some hidden country to be an idolater. Anything that takes the place of God in your life is an idol.
It doesn't make any different what it is. And it may be that you've got something built up in your heart. that you're looking to for that security. And when I uncover the whole thing tonight, by the spirit of God, you're saying to yourself, my, that fellow makes me squirm. For that's the very thing I've been doing. I've been setting up something in my life to which I've been looking for security instead of finding it in him who is absolutely securing himself. Now it is the face of these things that God raises the question that he does in the twenty-first verse of our chapter. There are four questions in this verse, and I want to just pause briefly over each one of them.
Notice what God says here. After he has told us what these people are doing in order to find something to which they can anchor their souls, he says, have you not known? Have you not known? You know, dear friends, what I get out of that question is this, that somehow even in the hearts of those who say they don't know God, there is what we may call an intuition that there is such a being. Even the atheist, who is constantly defending his negative philosophy of life and trying to prove to it that there is no God, he's fighting that intuition with him, which it seems to me is born in every human being in his heart.
that there is such a being as God. On the basis of that God commands, ask this question, hast thou not known? Doesn't your own intuition say to you that there is such a being? Secondly, notice that he says here, had ye not heard? Yes, there has been a communication from this God. From the very beginning God has communicated with man. His book has been in the making now for many, many years. And even though the Bible may not be found in every part of the world tonight, thank God here it is, and its voice has been speaking. And so God may very logically, very rightly raise the question, have you not heard?
Have you not heard? If you haven't heard here in America, dear friends, you're certainly without excuse for all you need to do is turn the button on your radio anytime. And you can hear. Then notice the third question. And he says, Has it not been told you from the beginning? Yes, there's been a God tradition from the very beginning. From the very time that Adam stepped into this world, dear friends, there has been a tradition of God. Time was when everybody knew there was a God. The Bible says so in the first chapter of Romans. He says, But when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, but they became vain in their imaginations.
And their foolish heart was darkened, possessing themselves to be wise. They became fool. And it was then that they adopted idolatry in order to satisfy the craving and hunger with him, to have something before which they could bow down and worship, and something in which they could put their sight. Then notice the fourth question. He says here, have you not understood from the foundations of the earth? Yes, we can know God, first of all, by intuition. We can know Him by the communication in His words. We can know Him by the tradition of God that there is in the world. But there's still another way. We can know Him by the doctrine, from the very foundations of the earth, the world in which we live.
He's so full of evidence of God. that anyone who studies these things must come to the conclusion that there is such a view. How simple is the illustration that has been used for many, many years, that when one takes a watch such as we have in my hand here tonight, I've only to ask the question, do you think that that thing just happened by itself? Would anybody be so foolish as to say in this audience tonight, yes, I believe that watch just happens. It simply came together. These atoms, these molecules, these parts of this watch, they simply travel together, and lo and behold, I've got a watch. Oh, you say, I wouldn't be so foolish.
And yet people are foolish enough to believe that a creation such as we live in tonight somehow happens by what they call a fortuitous concoct of atoms. and they refused to believe that there was a mastermind at work in the production of that thing. Oh, my dear young friends tonight, let me say this, you'll be studying your received subjects and trapped some of you in schools where they were denied the existence of God. I myself am the graduate of the university where I had infidel professors, where in a class in philosophy, one of the students to dare to stand up and say in that class, there is no God.
I don't believe in God. That was said in a state university, supported by the tax payers of that state. A man could stand up and dare to say, there is no God. That's the kind of an intellectual atmosphere in which I had to study during my university days. But dear friends, I thank God for this. And when I went to that university, I had on the helmet of salvation. And when you've got on the helmet of salvation, your mind is protected against those fiery darks of the wicked. I had on the breastplate of righteousness covering my heart so that both mind and heart were protected, as one studied in the midst of those infidel professors.
and set that simple child like faith, which had been decreed to one from his parents, and which he has confirmed as we read the word of God, here is something to which I can anger my soul. Yes, I say, Lord, I know that thou art. My very intuition tells me so. I have heard of him by the hearing of the ear, and I believe the report. Yea, the tradition that came down to me from my parents I believed it. Moreover, I have seen thy handiwork in creation, and from the very simple process of dejection, I come to conclusion that there is a God.
And then notice what God says about himself. As you go down here, verse twenty-two, he tells us that he actually sits on the circle of the earth. He sits on the vault of heaven. It is he who controls the whole orbit of this earth, each movement as well as the movement of other planets in the solar system, not to speak of the systems outside of our own. And then you'll notice that he compares himself with the inhabitants of the world. He says, as compared with him, they are nothing but grasshoppers. You know, we think we're wonderful when we get in at least constellation or at least these heavens. and we leave the earth and we've walked to, say, twenty-one, twenty-two thousand feet, and then we come down again, and we've left in Los Angeles, we've come down and you're saying, this is wonderful.
You know what God says that is? That's just like a grasshopper hopping in one place, true enough, that's all. You say, well, that's a long hopper, a grasshopper. Well, it is as far from your human standpoint. But in the eyes of God, that's nothing more than it is for you and me to watch a grasshopper just jump from one field of grass to another. That's all. He says the inhabitants are just like grasshoppers. For this is the one who stretches out the heavens as a curtain or a jaws and spreads them out of the tent to dwell in. And how wonderful is that now. Friends, when you and I consider the size of this universe, some of them are foolish enough to tell us that he has limitations.
For those who are wiser say no, there seems to be no limit for this. They tell us that these spiral nebulae and these great systems outside of our own system are so innumerable. We were hearing the other night, and one was asked how many stars that are in the heavens. He said, the scientists have come to conclusions that there are as many stars in the heavens as there are transgressions of kind of music. Oh, what a wonderful music to you. Oh, dear friends, there is still another thing to which men look for security, and that is found in verse twenty-three, where you have reference made to the princes and the judges of the earth.
These are taken of the men who are supposed to guide our political affairs and our judicial affairs, and so on. These are the names to whom we give credit for being able to discern the signs of the times and to give their blessings. What does God say about them? He says he brings them to nothing. He makes the judgments of the earth as planetary always. Are you putting your trust in that kind of thing tonight? Don't misunderstand me, dear friends. I'm an American. I was born under the stars and stripes, and I love them. I love my country.
But I'm not so foolish, dear friends, as to put my hope for time and for eternity in my country. I'm not so foolish as to do all of that. It is true that my country celebrated its one hundred and eighty-year first day on the fourth day of this month. One hundred and eighty years! since this country declared its independence in seventy-seven years. This is a healthy infant, you say, a hundred and eighty years old. Yes, if your friends remember this, we probably have reached the genus of our growth. We have seen in our own brief lifetimes how other nations with whatever genus at the peak have drawn down I can remember when as a boy I used to admire the greatness of countries in Europe, and particularly the British Empire.
And I listened to the statement of a man like Sir Winston Churchill, who said that he would never preside over the liquidation of the British Empire. Well, he never had to preside over it, but he had to wish. And you and I are living in days. when that was used to be the great standard of the world, the pound sterling, has passed out of a picture, and the American dollar has taken its place, and we're asked to break our own arms, patting ourselves on the back because of it. But we won't make any mistakes, dear friend. We too, we too will discover, if we left you a little while long, probably this is the very key.
We were reminded this morning of the explosion, population explosions of the south of us in Latin America. And do you know what will happen, dear friends? When that explosion that is taking place down there, we realize we will be so proud outnumbered that the North American will be, shall I say, a good man, alongside of these people who will outnumber us for this time. Right now we can train numerical superiority at least so far as the Western Hemisphere is concerned. But don't make any mistake, dear friends.
We are far outnumbered as compared to the population of the world. Their plot blows on the seams of all beasts, and judges for a purpose and tells us in the twenty-fourth words that they can't laugh. They're just like little strips that are planted in the ground, but never they believe. that can be said of a country like ours if you're a hundred and eighty years old. And say, I thought you were going to talk to us about words of hope, comfort, and fear. I am. You know, dear friends, some people are so ignorant of what's going on that they don't realize that they need words of hope, comfort, and fear.
And one of these days when the storm overtakes them, they're going to wonder where they can go. Now, dear friends, it's with that indeed that we're talking about these things tonight. And so I'm going to bring this to a close this evening by turning now to the brighter side of the picture which is found in the twenty-sixth verse, the last verse which we read today. What does God tell us to do? In this quest for security, First of all, he has asked us to look around and see this creation. But now what has he asked us to do? He asked us to lift up our eyes on high.
I think you know the way that's put me. It would have been enough to say, look up. But he says, lift up your eyes on high. And I believe there's real purpose in this word of lifting up your eyes. Because God told us that husbands are looking down. So accustomed to looking down into the world. So accustomed to looking down on others. They used to be the habit of our lives. To look down on others. To look down all the time. Instead of looking up. And sometimes God has to put us on our back. In order to teach us a lesson just like this. I remember talking to a lady down in New Zealand when we made our home down there.
She was a helpless cripple with our frightness. I've been lying on our back I think for some ten or twelve years. I remember speaking to her and I said, Listen, if you tell me what is this you, the greatest lesson that you have learned here on this day of Christmas, she said, Brother, the greatest lesson I have learned is from Lookout. The only way she could have. Even while she was talking to me, she couldn't turn her head from one side to the other. Her name was told she if you were this upright. But she learned from Lookout. It may be, dear friends, that God will have to bring us into just such a position as that, in order to teach us to look up and get strange to say.
The very word which is used in the original language of the New Testament for man, I'm speaking of the word anthropos, from which we get our word anthropology and so on. I am told that anthropos, the Greek word for man, really means the uplooker, as though man had been constituted by nature as a gift from his creator are. Look out. Lift up your eyes on high. And behold, who hath created these things? And I want to give you three things that will really give you words of hope, comfort, and peace. The first thing he says about these things is that he brings them out, brings out their hope by nothing.
He says in what there is no company about that. something thing about that, dear friend, is that God knows how many creatures he has. He never loses sight of one of them. And not only that, he never loses any of that. But he's never lost sight of you. Just as surely as he is put within your bosom as well as put within my bosom something that the grave either cannot bury. Forget that. You are more than a mass of breathing clay. God has given to you a spirit by which you may have God consciousness, and he's never lost sight of you.
He sees you exactly where you are tonight. He knows your number. He knows exactly where you came in in the whole scheme of creation of the millions and millions of human beings that have plotted earth. He's got your number. And I'd like to just play on that for a little bit. You know, when we say we have a certain person do not know, we sometimes mean by that that we have his measure. And that's exactly what I would like for a week in for tonight's sermon. He not only knows where you come in into this great process of created meaning, this great procession rather of created meaning, but he knows exactly your state and your community.
He knows you by now. And then notice he says, here he calls them all by name. and more wonderful yet, isn't it? Some of us have worked in institutions in factory where we had a number. And as I said to some of you the other evening, while I refused social security a few years ago, now that I'm going back onto the teaching staff of Whitten College this fall, I'm told that I shall have to pay social security. So beginning with September the third, I shall have a social security number. And in Washington, there are no parliamentarians by number of billion souls. I'll have a number.
That'll be more important in Washington than my name is. Just as it's more important sometimes when you walk into a plant to have your number on your coat lapel, a friend's God has something more than a number for you tonight. He's got a name for you. Yes. Preturn somebody says to me, doesn't this here package of scripture really talk about the stars? Aren't you just stretching this a little bit tonight and referring this to the human being? Yes, a lady down in Florida tried to set me up with that question some years ago. As I was talking about this verse, she said, why, that twenty-six verse doesn't talk about human beings. That talks about stars. I said, lady, can you go to the motion picture?
Oh, yes. I said, do you have any favorite actors? Where she had her favorite actors. And she named some of them, and that's Mrs. Sue. I said, it seems to me, if my memory serves, that back in Hollywood where they make these pictures, they call these individuals that you've just now named, they call them stars. And if they're just a little bit young, they call them scarlet. Is that right? I said, what right have you got fallen stars? Many of them, I said, are stars all right, but they are fallen stars. Stars, yes.
But Daniel is the one who gives us the right to use the figure right in the Bible itself. When he says this day that turn many to righteousness shall shine like the stars forever and ever. Yes, we believe we have a right, dear friends, to apply this verse to human beings, given them, to say that not only does God know the complete number of us, but he knows each one of us by name. I don't know what his name for me, my friend. I have a very humble name so far as my name Armageddon is concerned. I made them smile a little bit in Germany last fall when I was giving some addresses over there in the first epistle of Thessalonians, and I referred to myself as an Armageddon.
And they laughed because they knew immediately that it meant a poorer thing. I used to think it meant poorer things. So one day I discovered that armor is in the comparative degree. So I was not only an armor king, I was an armor king, poorer yet. Ah, friends, thank God. When he puts your name in the book of life, you're nothing but a poor sinner, but saved by grace and enriched with grace divine. What a wonderful thing that is. Now let's look at this last statement connecting with its security which we're looking for tonight. Notice this last statement. It says, by the greatness of his might and because he strong power not one fathom.
Or as the revised standard version puts it, not one is missing. What better security could you ask for now? Here's a God who's never lost sight of me. He's made me. Here's a God who knows me by my name. And he's written my name down in his book. Since I trusted his beloved son as my Lord and Savior. My name's written there on the page right and straight. I challenge you at this point. As I close this simple talk tonight. your name written in?
Can you rejoice tonight that your name is written in the Lamb Book of Life? Friend, you can have it written there tonight by putting your simple faith in the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal faith. He is just assured that he who writes your name there will never have to erase it. Because by his might and by his power He sleeps, so do you say. You notice it doesn't say by their strength and their power. We will talk about that tomorrow morning. But tonight we're thinking of his power and his strength. And it is because of that might that not one of those nations.
I never talked along these lines of what I think of an incident that occurred in our ministry out in the state of New Mexico when we were living in the city of Albuquerque. One night I was speaking along these very lines, and I think I must have used these questions internally secure. In any case, I said I was as pure of being in heaven as if I were there already. As I looked in that audience, it was a small audience. I noticed one lady's countenance changed immediately when I said that. I had reason to believe that Somewhere along the line she'd been offended that evening, for when she went out that evening, she gave me one of those cold free time cases.
You know what I mean? And she was gone. When I got home, I said to my dear wife, I said, I'm afraid that I attended Mrs. Cox tonight. I said, we better go around and see her and find out what it is. So my wife says, well, let's go tomorrow. Don't let her say that's too long. Well, I said, maybe tomorrow she'll be busy watching. You don't want to get in there and complicate something. The way that she threw her to watch me. So we did. We went. And when I arrived at the house, I very carefully put my wife in the van's arm. She begged me to take the first blow. Well, my wife treated me, and Mrs.
Cox was there, and she looked at the door, and she was very fortunate. I thought, I remember correctly, and they didn't teach each other. I thought, well, that's fine. Everything's looking all right. Not that I expected the same kind of treatment. Went in and said, I thought, do you think you're going all right? Well, when I got to the door, another one of those cold fish hands is, that's all I got. And when he got inside, he ignored me in the conversation. He never said a word. And he was hurt. He was hurt. And finally, I couldn't stand him. He was longer. I said, look, he's talking. I said, we'll come around here this afternoon because I believe that I've offended you in something I've said. And I said, it's all possible.
I want to apologize for it and make it right. I said, is there anything I've said that is offended you? He said, I should say so. He said, the audacity of you, the presumption of you, to stand up in that pulpit Sunday night and say, that you're sure of being in heaven as if you were there already. Who in the world do you think you are anyhow? We're all out now. Oh, I said it's right, Mrs. Cox. Yes, that's it. Well, I said, now, Mrs. Cox, let me explain to you how that'll be. I said, I'm not so sure of being in heaven as if they're already keeping because I'm secure. But I said, Mrs.
Cox, the same one who saves me is keeping me. He says that when he works, we're kept by the power of God, through faith under salvation. We're kept by the power of God. I said, you see, Mr. Cox, my faith was not based upon my own strength or my own ability, but it is based upon the strength and power and might of my Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. By this time his judgment on our faith was beginning and following the day. And before that afternoon was over, we had the pleasure of meeting with Mr. Cox to hear us thank the Lord He was as sure of being in heaven as if he were there all day.
Friends, why am I so sure tonight? Because the one who loved me and gave himself for me is what he hoped. Do you think that the one who paid so dearly for the salvation of my soul is going to let him slip through his fingers now? What a What have you seen that we're seeing? Hey, friends, we've owned reputations of success. These promises save a fool or fool and sinner like me. And I've submitted the business to him. I've turned it over to him.
Fifty-two years ago, last month, I've turned it over to him. In all those fifty-two years, dear friends, I thank God for this assurance. want to save me from evil. And because he is strong in life, not even parliamentary, will be missing there. God grant that everyone listening to me tonight may know something of joy and of comfort and peace and hope I, Heavenly Father, and how can it be thy precious word if it has been for us?
And thank you, O Lord, that it is possible for us in