Miracles Of Protection · Part 2

2:58 I titled today's message, Miracles of Protection. Turn over to Psalm 121 for a moment where we find the promise of God's protection. And I want you to notice in this psalm three truths about God that you can bank on today. First of all, God is sovereign. Notice verses 1 and 2. I will lift up my eyes to the mountains from where shall my help come? My help comes from the Lord who made heaven and earth. Secondly, the psalmist promises God is awake. He's awake. He's not asleep. Look at verses three and four. God will not allow your foot to slip. He who keeps you will not slumber. Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. Thirdly, the psalmist promises that God is a shelter.

3:56 He's a shelter. Look at verses five to eight. The Lord is your keeper. Six times in these eight verses, he says God is a keeper. He's one who keeps us. He protects us. He is your keeper. The Lord is your shade or your shelter on your right hand. The sun will not smite you by day nor the moon by night. The Lord will protect you from all evil. He will keep your soul. The Lord will guard you and you're going out and you're coming in from this time forth and forever. God is sovereign. God is awake, the Bible says, and God is our shelter. Well, how does God protect us then? What are the means of God's protection? As I look through scripture, I find there are three ways that God protects us. First of all, through direct fortification. His direct fortification.

4:51 Now, if you've been in church for any period of time at all, you've probably heard the phrase hedge of protection. You pray a hedge of protection around yourself or around other people. Christian comedian Tim Hawkins has a funny bit about those who pray for a hedge of protection. He says, a hedge, huh? I don't mean to complain, but is that really the best you can do? How about praying a thick cement wall with some razor wire on top of that bad boy? A hedge of protection sounds like it is one good pair of clippers away from being removed. And I'm sure the devil's got a pair of those lying around his old shield shed. We laugh, but what you may not know is the phrase hedge of protections actually found in the Bible. And it came from the lips of Satan. Remember the story in Job 1?

5:45 God was bragging to Satan about his servant Job. He said, have you considered my servant Job? He's an upright man who fears God and turns away from evil. There's nobody like him. And Satan says to God, well, of course he follows you. Look at all you've done for him. You've given him his family. You've given him his possessions. You've given him good health. But allow me to enter his life for a day and attack those things and watch him start to curse you. The interesting thing is Satan had to have God's permission to attack Job. And God gave him limited permission to enter his life. He said, no, there's one restriction you can't kill him. But otherwise, you can go after him if you want him to. You see, Satan said to the Lord, have you not made a hedge about him and his house and all that he has on every side?

6:39 Even Satan realized there was a wall around Job. He could only enter Job's life by God's permission. But God gave him limited access to Job's life. No, we need to remember that's true about Satan in your life, in my life. He has limited authority. Somebody said, Satan is like a junkyard dog. His power to destroy is considerable, but as long as he's on that chain, it's limited. Satan is on a chain. He can only go into your life as much as God allows him to. And if God allows him into your life, it is for a good purpose. Psalm 125 verse 2 says, it's not shrubbery that surrounds us to protect us. It is a mountain. As the mountains surround Jerusalem, so the Lord surrounds his people from this time forth and forever.

7:36 The fact that God has surrounded you is his direct way of protecting you. And nothing that is without purpose happens to the godly, the scripture says. One way God protects you is through his direct fortification, that wall he has built around your life. A second way he protects us is through angelic intervention. Angelic intervention. Remember the writer of Hebrews, what he said about angels? They're real. Verse 14 of Hebrews 1 says, Are they not all ministering spirits sent out to render service for the sake of those who will inherit salvation? Angels are what I call God's triple-A service, always available to assist. We're not to worship the angels, but we're to understand God uses angels to protect his children. And they're always available at God's disposal to help.

8:31 Remember the story in Matthew 26, beginning with verse 52, when Jesus was arrested in the Garden of Gethsemane, and Peter, you have to love him, pulls out his sword. He's going to fight the whole group. What did Jesus say to him? He said, Peter, put your sword back into its place. For those who have taken up the sword shall perish by the sword. Or do you think that I couldn't appeal to my father and he will put at my disposal more than 12 legions of angels? Now a legion with 6,000 soldiers. So 12 legions would be 72,000 angels. Remember it only took one angel in the Old Testament to kill 185,000 Syrian soldiers, Jesus said, I have at my disposal right now if I wanted 72,000 of those angels. They're always at God's disposal to render aid for you, Hebrews 1.14 says. You know, we have a great illustration of that in the story of 2 Kings 6 about the prophet Elisha.

9:32 Remember the prophet Elisha? The king of Syria was really hacked off at him. He was interfering with his plans for expansion. And he said, I'm just going to have Elisha arrested. So he sent some soldiers at night to capture Elisha, a whole mountain of soldiers. And the next morning, the servant of Elisha went out and he looked at the mass of soldiers out there and he came in and he said, boss, we've got trouble. We've got real trouble. And remember what Elisha said to him? He said, don't fear those who are outside, for greater are those who are with us than those who are out there. And the servant said, us? What do you mean, boss? It's just you and me here. Who's the us? And Elisha prayed that prayer. Lord, open his eyes that he might see. And the servant went out, and God opened his eyes.

10:26 He no longer just saw the Syrian army. He saw hundreds of people, hundreds of men in chariots of fire surrounding the mountain to protect God's servant. You know, Billy Graham used to tell a similar story of a missionary couple, John and Margaret Patton. They were ministering in the New Hebrides Islands, and an angry tribesman brought his tribe in to burn down the mission headquarters. and John and Margaret didn't know what to do. All they could think of to do was to pray. And so they prayed and prayed throughout the night for their safety. And when they awakened in the morning, the tribe had gone and the missionary headquarters were still intact. About a year later, the chief of that tribe who had threatened them was marvelously converted to faith in Jesus Christ. And John Patton had the chance to talk to him.

11:22 And he said, why is it that you didn't burn down our headquarters that night when you had a chance to do so. And the chief of the tribe said, it was because of all those men you had surrounding you. He said, man, it was just my wife and me. And the chief said, oh no, there were hundreds of men in shining garments with swords that were protecting that headquarters. And that's why we left. God uses angels to protect us. You know, one of the greatest illustrations of that in scriptures in Acts chapter 12, remember the story of Peter, Herod Agrippa arrested Peter, had him put into prison. And immediately when the church heard that Peter was in prison, they had a prayer meeting in a home. And they were praying for Peter's release. And suddenly an angel appeared in the prison, opened up the prison, freed Peter. And of course, the first place he went was to church to meet with that group praying for him. He knocked on the door. A servant girl opened the door and was astonished to see Peter there, she said, it must be a ghost, and she wouldn't let him in. He had to beg to get into his own prayer meeting, but that was the power of prayer. Somebody said it this way, Thomas Watson, the Puritan preacher, he said, the angel fetched Peter out of prison, but it was prayer that fetched the angel out of heaven. Angels work on our behalf, and that's why when we find ourselves facing danger. Our first response shouldn't be flight. It shouldn't be fight. You may have to do either one of those, but it should be to pray, to pray for God's protection. God protects us through direct fortification, through angelic intervention. But here's a third way God protects us every day that you may have never thought of, and that is through the Holy Spirit's direction.

13:11 Remember the night before he was crucified, Jesus said to his disciples, don't be troubled. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid. You believe in God, believe in me, for in my Father's house are many mansions. I go to prepare a place for you, and if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and take you unto myself. He gave the disciples the promise of heaven, but that's not all. He gave them a second promise, the promise of a helper. He said, don't worry about me leaving. Verse 16 of John 14, I will ask the Father, and he will give you another helper that he might be with you forever. I'm sending you somebody to take my place. Who is that helper? The Greek word translated helper, parakoletos, one who walks alongside, who offers help. It's the Holy Spirit of God. Jesus said, I'm going to give you my Holy Spirit.

14:05 Now, some translations use the word, I will give you a comforter, but that doesn't really capture the meaning of helper. Yes, the Holy Spirit gives us comfort in times of sorrow, but he does a lot more than that. He gives us power in the time of temptation. He offers us encouragement in times of discouragement. Yes, he gives comfort in time of sorrow, but he also gives us direction in times of confusion. You know, Romans 8, 14 says, those who are led by the Spirit of God, these are the children of God. One mark that you have the Holy Spirit in your life is he guides you in the way you should go. He leads you in the way you should go. Yes, he's a person, but I think of him also as a human GPS system, an internal GPS that gives us precise direction over the way we should go. You know, sometimes GPS systems can malfunction.

15:04 Have you discovered that? The other night, a couple of weeks ago, some of our staff were in another city and we were going to dinner. and I asked the bus driver, now, do you know where this restaurant? Oh, yeah, I know where the restaurant is. He had no clue. He typed it into his GPS, and so we started on our way to dinner, and we started going away from where I thought we were supposed to be, and we got into a worse and worse and worse bad part of town, and then he turned into a dead-end alley with no lights in it, and we were stuck there. Couldn't turn the bus around. He finally confessed his GPS system had failed him. Well, the Holy Spirit is a GPS system that will never fail. He will always lead us in the right direction. And ladies and gentlemen, the safest place to be in this universe is in the middle of God's will. And the Holy Spirit will always lead you into God's will. That's how he offers us protection. Now, it means we have to make sure the Holy Spirit is functioning at his optimal capacity in our life. You say, well, how do we do that? Listen to this. God has given every Christian the Holy Spirit. Every Christian has the Holy Spirit of God in him. 1 Corinthians 12, verse 13 says, for by one spirit, we were all baptized into one body. We're all baptized with the Holy Spirit of God. You don't have to beg or barter or plead with God for his Holy Spirit. He comes at the moment of salvation. We all have the presence of the Holy Spirit, but we don't all experience the power of the Holy Spirit. That's why Ephesians 5.18 says, be filled, literally be controlled by the Holy Spirit of God. We have the presence, but we don't have the power automatically.

16:54 There are some things we do that allows the Holy Spirit's power to be experienced by us. Remember this illustration? Just imagine a giant hydroelectric dam. You've seen those before, like Hoover Dam and so forth. You know how it works. At the bottom of the dam is a generator, an electric generator. Behind the dam are millions of gallons of water. Now, for that generator to start working, for the turbines to start functioning and turning, something has to happen. That water has to be released from the dam. And so there are various conduits. You open up one and the water flows and it begins to turn that turbine and produce electricity. If you open up a second one, more electricity is produced. Open up a third one, more, and so it goes. Just imagine the Holy Spirit of God is like that electric generator in your life.

17:49 He's there. He's ready to be activated. But there's some things you do that activates the power of the Holy Spirit. Reading the Bible, praying, being connected to other Christians and receiving their power and encouragement, obeying what you know to be true. These four things, the Bible, prayer, church participation, obedience to God, these activate the power of the Holy Spirit in your life. And that means if you want to make sure that the Holy Spirit is giving you the direction you need and that you're listening to him and not your own desires, you need to make sure the Holy Spirit is producing optimum power in your life. How do you do that? Number one, quickly, develop a plan for reading the Bible regularly. If the Bible is one way the Holy Spirit starts to generate activity in your life, have a time to read the Bible.

18:42 Secondly, set a time every day that you're going to talk with God through prayer. Number three, attend and participate in a church regularly. You'll never be filled with the Holy Spirit on your own. You have to have the energy that comes from other Christians. When you're in the body of Christ, you get power not only from the head, Jesus, but from other members you're connected to. And finally, through obedience to God. 1 Thessalonians 5.19 says, don't quench, don't extinguish the power of the Holy Spirit. And nothing extinguishes that power more than disobedience to God. Now, here's the point. When the Holy Spirit is controlling you, filling your life, that he provides, he promises the direction you need. All you have to do is follow that direction. Isn't that what Proverbs 3, 5, and 6 says?

19:35 trust in the Lord with all your heart and don't lean in your own understanding. In all your ways, acknowledge him and he shall what? Direct your path. The safest place to be, the place where you are totally surrounded by God's protection is when you are in his will. God promises that for everybody who seeks to be directed by the Holy Spirit. Listen to the promise of Proverbs 2, 7, and eight, God holds success in store for the upright. He is a shield to those whose walk is blameless. For God guards the course of the just, and he protects the way of his faithful ones. That is the promise of God's miraculous protection. Let's bow together in a word of prayer. I know I'm talking to many people this morning.

20:34 Many of you are already Christians. But there may be some who are here in this worship center or watching or listening to this message. You're not a part of God's family yet. How do I become a member of God's family? You can't earn your place in this family. You become a member of his family by grace. For by grace, you have been saved through faith and that not of yourselves. It is a gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. God offers you the forgiveness of your sins by his grace. All you have to do is ask for it. To believe with all of your heart that when Jesus died on that cross, he died for your sins and my sin. And when we tell God that we desire to be forgiven of our sins and we put our trust in Jesus and what he did for us to save us from our sins, we become a part of God's forever family.

21:30 If today you would like to become a part of his family, I want to invite you wherever you are to pray this prayer in your heart as I pray it out loud, knowing that God is listening to you. Pray this prayer. Dear God, thank you for loving me. I know I have failed you in so many ways and I'm truly sorry for the sins in my life. But I believe what I've heard today, that you love me so much, you sent your son Jesus to die on the cross for me, to take the punishment I deserve to take for my sins. And right now, I'm trusting in what Jesus did for me, not in my good works, but in what Jesus did for me to save me from my sins. Thank you for forgiving me and help me to live the rest of my life for you. In Jesus' name, amen. If you just prayed that prayer with me, I want to be the first to celebrate with you.

22:31 Welcome to the family of God. Go ahead and get in touch with Pathway to Victory and tell us about your decision. We want to rejoice with you and help you take your very first steps as a follower of Jesus. Look, this is the very reason Pathway to Victory exists. Everything we do is to let people all across our country and around the world know that God is waiting for them with open arms. That mission only continues because of friends like you. When you give a generous gift to support Pathway to Victory, I'll be pleased to send you my brand new book, Divine Invasions, as my way of saying thank you. I firmly believe that the biblical principles in this book, when applied, will transform your experience with God's miracles. And don't go anywhere, because at the end of today's broadcast, I'll be answering a listener's question in our special Ask Dr. Jeffress feature.

23:30 But right now, I want you to think about who your ministry gift reaches. Somewhere out there is a believer who once prayed with great faith and heard only silence. Over the years, they gave up on God. When you give to Pathway to Victory, you help me reach that person with the truth that God has not forgotten them. Would you stand with me today? Here's David to explain how you can get in touch.