The Partnering Presence of God

I want us to today look at a passage of scripture. And I'm not going to read a lot today, but we're going to move around just a little bit. Matthew 28, Matthew, the 28th chapter. Now the 11 disciples, verse 16. I'm sorry, 28:16. Now, the 11 disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. And when they saw him, they worshiped him. But some doubted. Can you imagine that? Some doubted. And Jesus came and said to them, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And lo, I am with you always. To the close of the age. Lo, I am with you always. Have you ever noticed that when you've embarked on a task that you found to be difficult, nothing was more welcome than the presence of another person to work through it with you. How many of you have painted a room in your house recently? How many of you, boy, the rest of you. No one's painted a room in their house recently. Have you ever noticed that when you do a chore like that, to have someone in there with you to, you know, just talk to while you're, you know, routinely going through it? But a week and a half ago or so, I was trying to get this dilapidating body to go around the lap at the track and do some laps over by our house. And there was a fellow there I didn't know who was running. And I made about three or four laps in. And somehow or another, we caught up to each other. I think I caught up to him, and I slowed down, and we, you know, I was about to fall over at that point, and just running with him, we clicked off three or four laps with no problem. And it was because during that time, we were talking, we were engaging one another in conversation. I was listening a lot. To run and talk isn't all that easy, but it just so lifted me and moved me on. And I'm sure you could think of some very profound illustrations in your own life where someone came along just at the right time to lift you up, to encourage you, to speak a word to you, to help you out in an emergency, in a moment of despair, grief, in a moment of exhilaration, just to share a victory with somebody. How many people do you see riding around in new cars by themselves? Nine times out of ten, there's someone sitting on the other side of the seat there you share something lovely and something new with another person now today in this word. And I must say to you, the Lord so put this word in my heart this morning a number of days ago, and I didn't know how he was ever going to make a whole teaching out of it, but he has. He wants us to hear today the words, lo, I am with you always. If you were a disciple and Jesus Christ would give you a promise of all the promises he could give you, what one thing would mean more than anything else. You see, Jesus could have said, well, I'll always give you power when you ask, or I'll always give you this authority that I talked about, or anytime you need it, I'll give you guidance. But you see, saying what he said, he personified all those things. And he said, I am with you. I am with you always. And nothing that he could have said, in my estimation, could have meant anything more to those disciples and to indeed we who follow Jesus today than those words here. He speaks of a relationship that I think that a lot of us know about up here, but maybe aren't real convinced about down in here. It's one thing to know about the presence of God, it's another thing to know it and to live in it. Every believer knows that God's with us, right? We just sang a song, which one of those songs talked about the presence of God, Most particularly Emmanuel. You see, we all know that God's with us. Jesus is with us in the flesh. When he was here on earth, he lived with us and now he's here with us and we know. Sure, he lives in my heart. You can ask a three year old. We all know that. Philippians 2 talks about the fact that God came down and he became one of us and that when he left, he left his spirit. And yeah, we know God's with us, but I think God chuckles at that level of understanding because he knows that we really don't know. And what we're kind of doing is we're sort of covering up our ignorance. You ever notice how funny that is when you try to cover up an ignorance? A while back I'd say it's maybe safe. About 20 years ago. I remember this because it was so dramatic at the time. I had saved up several months worth of paper out money and a couple other jobs I was working and I'd taken a date down to the top of the triangle. Maybe it wasn't 20 years ago then was was the towers. The towers were there then. That's what it was. And it was a restaurant on the top. And we'd had this nice dinner, and I was playing Mr. Big Shot once in a while. And at the end, of course, they asked if I wanted coffee or tea, as they do after a nice meal. I said, well, I'll have some tea. And I don't remember anything about what else happened that night. But as the tea came, as she said, lemon or cream? And I said, well, cream. But she brought the teacup out and had lemon on the side and cream in the pitcher. And when they came, I said, well, I'm going to go ahead and have the lemon. So I squeezed the lemon in and I said, no, I'll have the cream. So I poured the cream into the cup of tea with the lemon in it. And of course, what happened? It curdled. Well, right away I said, hey, waiter, this cream's bad. And of course, he's getting paid enough to not make me look like the fool I was being with that date sitting there. But he politely said, yes, sir, I'll get you another one right away. And then I realized that probably I'd oathed out pretty badly and I was covering my ignorances. Maybe you've had something like that happen to you also. It's very easy for us to assume or to act like we know something that we don't really know. What I want us to see today, beloved, is that this is a progressive manifestation that Jesus is talking about. Here, look in your scripture. Now, you'll never know this unless you understand the New Testament language, and maybe one or two translations have it, but in verse 20, Jesus said, I am with you always. The tense of the verb is what is known. And A.J. robertson says, it's the prophetic present. Why don't you write that down if you're taking notes? The prophetic present. Now, the present tense in Greek signifies action that has begun and is ongoing. And the prophetic present tense is action that is progressing as it goes. So, for example, when you say, I am hungry, you could say that in a couple different ways in Greek, but in prophetic present you would say, I am hungry, and in five minutes I will be hungrier. And Jesus is saying, I am with you. I am with you, and I will be increasingly with you. The presence of God will progress in your life. Now, I did something. Made a little bit of a diagram here, and I think it will help you to see that the presence of God is something that we can experience progressively. Why don't you look at that, Paul? Turn on, please. Now the diagram. The circles represent God's presence and the top line says progressive experience of God's presence. Now at the farthest perimeter is God's omnipresence in Him. We what live and move and have our being. God encompasses all things. That means anybody, anywhere can experience that dimension of the presence of God. When an atheist walks out on the hillside and sees the beautiful nature and all that stuff, he thinks that he's experiencing nature. But what he really is experiencing in a sense is the omnipresence of God. Psalm 139 says God is everywhere. But then you can progress on in your experience of God's presence and go and as we know from the Old Testament pattern, there is a place where God's presence dwells. He tabernacles with his people. And so we can experience God's presence in that way. Psalm 48 talks about that. Then there's the corporate sense of his presence. You may be here among us today and as we worship the Lord, the Bible says that he inhabits the praises of his people. And you may have experienced something that's new to you, the presence of God among His people. And then we can go on and experience the presence of God personally in our hearts. The Lord God would inhabit your heart if you would yield to him and accept His Son Jesus. And finally, I've made up a term here, but it's the partnering presence or the Koinonia presence of God that is indeed that highest experience of the manifestation of God's presence. It is there that we find, beloved, the unique and refreshing and invigorating and life changing reality of God's presence. And I'm going to talk to you more about that. It's the intimacy that only comes on the rare occasions when we redemptively partner with God and his purposes. And I'm going to talk about redemptive relationship with God now. Today I want to address with you and have you look at with me four circumstances where we can experience this Koinonia presence with God. Four experiences of biblical characters. Four experiences that may relate to where you are, where if you are aware, beloved, you can take what might be. No thanks. I can't risk it. I will risk it. Remember that day I used a pointer? I got some junk mail on that. I'm never going to do it again. So I'm going to use just a pen today. Ok? The pointer looked like someone said I was making a presentation at Mellon bank or something like that. It's just convenience. All right? If you redemptively use the experiences that God brings in your life. You can come to know this koinonia experience with God. And so that's the desire of what we're going to look at today. All right, turn with me first of all to Exodus, chapter three, Exodus, the third chapter. Here's somebody that we can all relate to. And if we're honest, it's extremely humbling. But we see ourselves in Moses in a lot of ways. He's such a picture of us here. He was in the field, and we won't take the time to read it all, but we'll look at chapter three, verse one. Moses was keeping the flock of his father in law, Jethro, and he'd been with him for how long? How long had he been away? 40 years. How many of you think he was in pretty much of a rut? He was really content, beloved. He was really happy. Some of us are in ruts. Some of us have kind of planned that we're going to finish our productive careers doing what we're doing. And so we get into a Ruth. But Moses was addressed by God. Look at verse 10. Come, I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring forth my people, the sons of Israel, out of Egypt. And he had a call in his life, and God put his hand out and said, moses, come with me, beloved. The first instance when you can experience the redemptive presence of God, the partnering presence of God, is when you come into direct confrontation with your own weakness. Moses, look how he answered verse 11. He said to God, who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the sons of Israel out of Egypt? Who am I? I can't do that. Who am I? I'm not able. And if you've read much Christian biography or history in the last decades, you know that great, great things were done by men and women of God who just of themselves had no possible way of accomplishing what God had in store for them. David Wilkerson, who many of you know by name, writer of the Crossing the Switchblade, was a pastor in a small rural church in northern Pennsylvania, basically content to sort of live his life there. And he was watching television two hours every night from 11 to 1, and he realized, you know, this is such a waste. I'm not going anywhere. And he said, I'm going to pray from 11 to 1. Six months later, he was on the streets of New York City. And it's had one of the most profound impacts of reaching the cities of America for Jesus Christ. Why? Because he was clever and he Had a strategy and a plan and all that stuff. No, in fact, he said to God, I can't do that. But God said, I can. I can do it through you. Look at how Moses rejects this offer, folks. This is great. See, if you see yourself in this verse 13, God said to Moses, if I come to the people of Israel and say to them, the God of your fathers has sent me to you. And they asked me, what is his name? What shall I say to them? Well, first of all, Moses questioned his strength by saying, I don't know what to tell them. Then later on, verse four, I mean, chapter four, verse one, Moses answered, but behold, they will not believe me or listen to my voice. For they will say, the Lord did not appear to you. Who are you? The question began. God, each time is very faithful to answer. Look at verse 10 of chapter 4. Moses said to the Lord, O my Lord, I am not eloquent neither heretofore, since thou hast spoken to thy servant. But I am slow of speech and tongue. And then he gets on and he starts berating his ability to speak. The Lord said to him, who's made man's mouth, who makes him dumb or deaf for seeing or blind, is it not I, the Lord? Look at verse 12. What a promise we ought to claim this one. I will be with your mouth and teach you what you shall speak. And each time, Moses resisted. And God said, I will be with you. I will be with you. I will be with your mouth. How many of us said to God when we know he's put a call in our lives? We said, I can't do it. I can't do it. Not me. And, beloved, God says, I will be with you. He said it to Abraham when he asked him to go out. He says it to Moses when he asked him to partner. Now, if you're in a leadership position right now, I want you to especially note this. Moses, as we know, finally gives him. God got angry with him, but he still did what he promised. We won't read that, but turn over to Joshua and see what happens when you do. Obey the Lord and confront your weakness. And listen to what he has to say. Joshua, the first chapter. The Lord promises to be with him. Verse five. What a blessing. Now, beloved, I want you to notice something. God does not say this to everyone in the Bible like this. Only those that he's calling forth to promise to partner with him in redemptive purposes. Look at verse 17. Look what the people say to their leaders. Just as we obeyed Moses in all things so we will obey you only may the Lord your God be with you as he was with Moses. And if God's put you in the leadership of a prayer meeting or of a Bible study or of a home group, I want you to see that the Lord is saying that the people want to know that the Lord is with you even as he was with Moses, even as he was with Joshua and David and so on, as we'll see. Okay, so that's the first, Paul, you want to show that just if you're jotting down the outline, it says God will appear in his partnering presence as you come into direct confrontation with your weaknesses. Second, he will come to you in difficulty. God's presence comes to us intimately as we agonize with trouble. The Scripture has some very precious things to say to people who are struggling. Maybe you're here today and you're struggling. The Lord said to Isaiah, The Prophet, chapter 43, verse 2, when you pass through the waters, I will be with you. And through the rivers they shall not overwhelm you. And when you walk through the fire, you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you. Are you passing through the rivers today? Psalm 37:18 says, the Lord is near the crushed and the brokenhearted. In Isaiah 57, the Lord says, I dwell with the humble and the contrite in heart. You see, beloved, you can come to know that special presence of God in difficulties. This is why James would say, later on, when all kinds of trials come into your life, what? Count it as joy, because you're on the verge of having a koinonia experience of the presence of God. This is why David could say, in Psalm 23, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, behold, Thou art with me. I was taken back by an article that I had read of a woman by the name of Diane bringgold, who in 1975 was with her family, three children and her husband and two friends going on a ski weekend up in the mountains in Southern California, headed up into Big Bear, one of those mountains, and the plane that they were riding in smashed into the side of Mount Shasta. She was thrown clear of the plane and was a survivor along with the two friends. But her husband and all three children were killed instantly, and she was very badly burned. And in the book that has followed this experience, she says these things, and it's a quotation I think I'd like to read to you. Suddenly something caused me to look up. Here she is laying outside of the plain in the snow, on the side of the mountain. But not too far up, about 8 or 10ft away, I saw a white robed figure. The figure was radiant, but the radiance did not dispel the fog that was around me. He seemed to be a man, though I couldn't distinguish his features clearly. Somehow I knew it was the Lord. Diane. His voice was warm, but full of authority. It was not up to you to decide whether to live or die. You see, she had said, lord, I want to die. I want to die. I don't want to go on. She knew her family was dead. Her face and hands were badly burned. And the Lord said, that decision is mine and mine alone to make. He remained silent as she argued with him about wanting to live. And then she said, lord, if you want me to live, I will give you my life. I will give you my problems. You will have to cope with the pain, with the loneliness and with the grief. I can't still. He did not speak, but such love flowed from him that I knew he would care for me, that he would handle the grief and the pain, the loneliness. And I knew that I was in his care, that everything would be all right. And he had given me such a precious gift, the gift of faith. And since that afternoon, I have never doubted he is with me. You see, beloved, in the face of difficulty and even death, the Lord says, I am with you, redemptively partnering with him and his purposes. Now, you may find that perhaps you're not in such a difficult circumstance. I know some of you are, but there's maybe for some of you another circumstance that you're facing, and it's discouragement, okay? It's discouragement. All right. Turn your bibles to Acts 18. Acts chapter 18. Now, just a nutshell expression of the circumstance around this situation. Paul is in his second missionary journey in Macedonia. He was thrown out in Athens. He was barely tolerated. He was wearying physically. You know, he had physical problems. He was facing hostility and rejection. His weaknesses were overwhelming him. And there he finds himself in Corinth, which, as I've said in other teachings, was sort of the pinnacle of the decadence of that culture. To Corinthianize was another way of saying to have adultery and temple worship with goddesses of infidelity was part of the ritual and practice of the people. And beyond that, it was a port town and people were coming and going and just flinging and going on. And it was really, it was like the Liberty Avenue of the ancient culture, alright, all kinds of smut and all kinds of decadence. And likewise, all kinds of hurt that goes with that kind of a circumstance. But Paul was discouraged. And Paul was worn out. And look at what happens as he's testifying to them, trying to persuade them in verse three and four, verse six. Let's turn there. When they opposed and reviled him, he shook out his garments and said to them, your blood be upon your heads. I am innocent. From now on, I'm going to the Gentiles. Now that was uncharacteristic. Paul was very patient generally, but he'd had it and he just gave up. He said, forget it. I want you to know something many, many times. It's not until you've been pushed to the limit that then the Holy Spirit reveals what really is in your heart. How many of you know that? You can fake it for a long time. You can hold on for a long time and keep up that facade for a long time until you are pushed to the very end and in weakness, finally you lash out. Because then God's really revealed what's deep inside of you. And there's something about unrelenting evil. There's people here today who've been facing the same circumstance. And every time someone partners with you in prayer to tear down a stronghold of Satan, the next day or the next week, up comes another one. There's always a fresh troop of the enemy to replace where you've knocked down another one. And you find that evil keeps going on and on and on, and discouragement builds and builds and builds. And beloved, it's at that time that God would say to you what he said to Paul. Verse 9. And the Lord said to Paul one night in a vision, do not be afraid, but speak and do not be silent. Say the words with me, for I am with you. Hallelujah. What did that do to Paul? What did it do to him? He was so reassured by that word from God. Now listen, how many of you know that Paul understood the doctrine of the Holy Spirit's indwelling presence. He wrote about it right, in fact, to the Corinthians. So he knew that the Holy Spirit was there with him. But he needed to know more than that. He needed to know that the Holy Spirit not only in dwelling, but that the Lord Jesus was with him in that Koinonia experience of his presence. He needed the reality and not just the doctrine. And I want to say and love, some of you need to know the reality and not just the doctrine of God being with you. Paul stayed on for 18 months in Corinth. 18 months. And taught and lived with the people. One word from God, it tells me one word from God can change your whole circumstance. Somebody here today who's struggling with continued discouragement and defeat. And discouragement and defeat. One word, one experience of the presence of God can turn you around. And I say that, and you might say, hallelujah. So what does that mean? Well, that means we come before God and say, lord, I give you this circumstance and I seek your koinonia fellowship with me, your koinonia presence. The final illustration of God's being with us in a special way is back where we began in Matthew 28. Look with me. The context of these words. Lo, I am with you always is. Probably you all noticed the Great Commission. Now, I've heard people say things about this passage. They'll say, well, Jesus was just talking to the disciples. Does anyone that needs to get that cleared up. Who is he talking to here? He was commissioning us all. Yeah, he was talking to me. We are to go out and make disciples of all nations. Because, you see, if you don't claim the responsibility, then don't claim the promises either. Don't let yourself be trapped in the well. I'm going to claim the promise of greater works. Will I do than he did when he was here and all that. But I don't want to claim this. I'll let someone else take care of that. Now, I'm encouraged by this. First of all, I'm encouraged by what he says here, because I can relate to these people. Did you catch when I mentioned that they were there with him, but some doubted? Maybe you've been here at Northway for 15 months, ever since we began, but you still can't quite come to be as released as you feel everyone else is. You still doubt that it's real. Some doubt it here as well. But notice Jesus didn't condemn that beloved. If you have doubts, don't be condemned. If you have doubts, don't be condemned. I take great, great encouragement from that. Jesus said to them, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore, and make disciples of all nations. Now, why wasn't that enough? Why wasn't it enough for Jesus just to say, all that's been given to me? Now you go. Why didn't he just stop there? Because the Word isn't enough to overcome our doubts and fears. Somehow we need more than that, and Jesus knows that. In my high school ministry a number of years ago up at North Allegheny, I had permission from the principal to be in the lunchroom and to Be in the halls and so forth. And one day earlier in the year, I was in the lunch room and was obviously a little bit out of place there. You never knew what to wear up there. If you wore an open collared shirt that day, then it was tie day or something. And if you wore something ratty, then it was always something different. But I was out of place. And several teachers kind of came together and sort of confronted me and said, what are you doing here? And I said, well, I have permission from the principal. And I named his name. And they didn't buy that right off the bat. And I was getting a little uncomfortable. And I had the authority, but I wasn't convincing them that I had the authority. You know, I was. They were eroding my own confidence. And out of the corner of my eye in the back of the lunchroom, I saw the principal at that time, it wasn't Mr. Barber, it was one before him walk by. And I kind of signaled like, you know, call off the guards here. And he came over and he, you know, he reached us in, he said, well, hey, it's good to have you up here. And well, he's just like that. Lo, I am with you always. Do you know what would happen to you if the next time you began to talk about Jesus Christ with your friend, your neighbor, your co worker, that you had an experience of God's presence right beside you and you knew that he was there, how that would change your confidence level? But see, we forget about it. He slips back out of our consciousness and we wonder, oh, I'm out here all alone, God. And Jesus says, I'm there. I'm your evidence, I'm your support, I'm your encouragement, I'm your wisdom, I'm your discernment. I'm everything. And I'm right there with you always. Don't you wish that when you share with somebody and they said, well, prove to me that Jesus rose from the dead. And you could say, here he is, you know, the Lord just let the veil be ripped back for about a second and a half. I'd love to do that. I'd love to do that. But beloved, Jesus knows our fears when it comes to sharing his life. He knows our frame. He doesn't say, now you get out there and do it. He says, what? Let's go out. Go out. I'm with you always. And you can, in that redemptive experience of sharing your faith, come to know the Koinonia presence of God. Why do you think that the persecuted church knows so Much of the glory of God. Why do you think that testimony after testimony from incarcerated Christians behind the Iron Curtain talks about the fact that Jesus Christ is real to them? Because they've come to know that Koinonia presence. They've partnered with God in redemption of their guards and of their neighbors. And God has appeared to them. And I want to say to you, beloved, in the name of Jesus, that that presence is available to us as we partner with God and his purposes. In conclusion, there's two qualifications given to that presence. The first one is this. Lo, I am with you always. Literally means all the days. That's what the Greek word says. All the days, the good days and the bad days. I am with you, the happy times and the sad times. And I want you to experience my presence all the days, even to the close of the age. And I want to say, as we come into these tumultuous days, the lull before the storm, I take great comfort in knowing that Jesus realizes at the close of the age we need his presence more than ever. And I want to ask us all, are we living in that Koinonia presence of God, the partnering presence? All we need to do is yield to him, whether it be through just our own weaknesses and seeing our need, through difficulties, through discouragement, or through taking a step of discipling in your home group ministry or whatever it might be, God will meet us. I want to pray that that happens, don't you? Amen. Praise the Lord. Let's do that together. As we turn in our circles. Let's pray for that presence, that Koinonia presence of God, to be with us. Praise the Lord. Now, if you're visiting with us and we turn in a circle and we ask you to pray, you may say, I don't know what to do. And I want to invite you to do this. You just turn your chair in, in a small circle of four or five and say, I'd like to have you pray with me. Or just say, I'm new and I don't know what to say, or please just let me listen today and you can do that. Others of you, I want you to pray. Which of those four areas are you struggling with today? Weakness, difficulty, discouragement. Or maybe you're one of the home group people who are coming into these outreach studies and you're saying, I don't know, I'm really uncomfortable with that and you need a touch of God. Would you go ahead and pray in your circles for several minutes? Don't talk the whole time, just briefly share here's my need. Here's where I want the presence of.