 Happy New Year 2019! We have all made it and those that didn't rest in peace and those that are still with us to God be the glory. And the scriptures that we'll read today will come from Psalm 143 and also Psalm 91 about God's rescue and and those who find refuge, a safe place of security in him and that his spirit will continue to guide and lead us in the right direction for this year and the days to come. Heavenly Father, we thank You, Lord God, for another year, another day we have not seen. We thank You, Lord God, for Your gracious spirit. Rest upon each of us. Be with us in our homes and our daily activities. Grant us Your peace, not the peace that the world gives, but the peace that You give, the peace that surpasses all human wisdom and understanding, that shall guide and keep our hearts in our minds through the love of Christ Jesus. Thank God, Amen. Psalm 143 reads, Hear my prayer, O Lord, listen to my plea. Answer me because You are faithful and righteous. Don't put Your servant on trial, for no one is innocent before You. My enemy has chased me. He has knocked me to the ground and forces me to live in darkness like those in the grave. I am losing all hope. I am paralyzed with fear. I remember the days of old. I ponder all Your great works. And think about what You have done. I lift my hands to You in prayer. I thirst for You as a parched land thirsts for rain. Come quickly, Lord. Answer me, for my depression deepens. Don't turn away from me. Or I will die. Let me hear of Your unfailing love each morning, for I am trusting You. Show me where to walk, for I give myself to You. Rescue me from my enemies, Lord. I run to You to hide me. Teach me to do Your will, for You are my God. May Your gracious spirit lead me forward on a firm footing. For the glory of Your name, O Lord, preserve my life. Because of Your faithfulness, bring me out of this distress. And Your unfailing love, silence all my enemies. And destroy all my foes. For I am Your servant. The psalm is recorded as a psalm of David, a prayer in the midst of hopelessness and depression. It reads in New Living Translation, our prayers should fit into what we know is consistent with God's character and His plans. As we, as I read through some of the action phrases the psalm has had mentioned, show me where to walk. That's an action phrase, desiring God to show such persons where to walk. Another phrase that sticks out is, teach me to do Your will. Being in a position of humbleness, asking God to teach me to do Your will. So the psalm is asked God to teach him or her to do God's will. Even though it's a psalm of David, but anyone reading scriptures can make it as it's a personal prayer for themselves. And also captured my eyes was when You trust in God. It says, let me hear of Your unfailing love each morning. For I am trusting You. God's mercies are new every morning. We have woke up this morning and we also see a new day. We never seen this day before, nor have recorded things that took place that will take place to come. For each morning God's mercies are new. Each day is a new day to begin a new, a fresh. Also, the psalm is mentioned that God's spirit will lead him forward on firm footing and preserve his life or her life because of God's faithfulness and of his unfailing love. And he will silence all the adversities that comes your way. Now, if you read this in conjunction, in conjunction with Psalm 91, you're going to see similar phrases. And again, I'm reading from the New Living Translation. Psalm 91, those who live in the shelter of the most high will find rest in the shadow of your mighty, His covering. Just like when you read the New Testament, the Apostle Paul mentions that those who came to Paul wanted to receive healing just by the shadow, or was it Peter? Just by the shadow of the Apostle's garments they receive healing. Imagine God's umbrella when He shadows us. He gives us His protection. And it also reads in Isaiah, buy from me those that have no money, for I will give you rest. I will bring you to your soul care that you need. I will bring you life. And so things that we need cost nothing, most of the time, to bring us healing, healing and help, to a living hope. I'm not talking about something temporary. I'm talking about eternity, eternal hope, not just in the buy and buy, but in eternal. Take it as for yourself. Your inner soul, your inner most being is healing for your soul that God offers all of us. It says, those who live in the shelter of the most high will find rest. Have you been weary? It says, cast your cares upon Jesus, for He cares for you. All those who are heavy with burdens heavy lading, for I will give you rest for your souls. I know it's after the holiday seasons of we celebrated Christmas, New Year's Eve, New Year's, and now it's a new year. What is your load? What are the loads that you're carrying into this year? I pray that you'll find rest in abundance this new year of 2019. This I declare about the Lord in Psalm 91 reads, He alone is my refuge, my place of safety. If you know refuge means to seek help, to seek aid, to seek safety. Okay, is a place, God is a place of safety. He is my God and I trust Him. This prayer in Psalm 91 is a prayer of protection and the midst of danger. And it doesn't mention that we don't experience challenges or trials, but that God will secure us and protect us and give us a living hope. It reads furthermore in Psalm 91, 3, verse 3, for He will rescue you. He will rescue you from every trap. He will rescue you from every trap, every insidiousness from the wicked one and protect you from deadly disease. Are you covered? Plead the blood of Christ Jesus over you? Plead God's protection of Psalm 91 over you? The doctors have an antidote. They give out the prescriptions but also know that you can claim your health and healing as a compliment for your life as well. So don't be afraid to compliment your healing and your health with God's prayers over your life. He will cover you with his feathers. He will shelter you with his wings. His faithful promises are your armor in protection. Has God promised you, anytime you read in the Word, God says, I will never leave you nor abandon you. You can take that, beloved, as a promise and you can take him at his word and recite that to God and say, Lord, you said you'll never leave me nor abandon me, nor will I be isolated, nor will I suffer. Lord God, distress, you would uphold me in your right victorious arm. So what he promised, declare his word back to him. He said his word will not return to him void, but shall accomplish the end in the thing which he sent it to do. It will prosper. It will not return to God void when you speak his word to him and ask God in prayer. So let me know, let you know this, that his faithful promises are your armor and protection. Do not be afraid of the terrors of the night. God doesn't want you to be afraid, beloved. Don't want you to be in fear because God has not given you a spirit of fear, but he has given you love, power and of a sound mind. So be not afraid of the terrors of the night, nor the arrows that flies in the day. No matter what flu season it is, it's winter here in New England, January 2019. So do not be afraid of the pestilence of the flu of any bacteria that may fly during the day. Do not dread the diseases or disease that stalk in darkness, nor the disaster that strikes at midday, though a thousand fall at your side, though 10,000 are dying around you. These evils will not touch you. So God has promised us that though we walk through the valley of the shadow of death, we do not have to fear evil. We do not have to fear the calamities that are moving around about that we are protected. You can claim God's promises as a protection around about you and about your loved ones and about your dwelling, about your city. God has allowed you to be ministers of reconciliation, reconciling people to God in this world. You may be able to touch someone with the word or with God's blessing that I cannot touch, but God has allowed all of us to do our part because we are together, co-laborers with God, co-workers with God, co-laborers. And Jesus asked in the New Testament, pray to the Lord of the harvest that God will send laborers into the vineyard. Okay? Amen. It says, just open your eyes and see how the wicked are punished. If you make the Lord your refuge, your help, your security, the one you find safe place, if you make the most high your shelter, no evil will conquer you. It will not have its way with you, as does the wicked. No evil will overtake you. You will go through trials. I agree, beloved, but it will not overtake you, will not take you out, take your mind. You will still be able to drive. No evil will conquer you. No plague will come near your home, just as the children of Israel and the Old Testament, and they had to put blood on their doorposts as a representation of Passover, that the God of heavens did not kill that firstborn, that the death angel would pass them by. Just as the blood of Christ Jesus, that represents us, our redeeming blood of Christ Jesus that we take. We have communion each Sunday and we take of the blood of remissions of our sins and the body, the bread of the Lord to remember that his death until he comes, he was resurrected and he's sitting at the right hand of the Father. But no, the blood that he shed for me, the blood he shed for all of us, yourselves and the entire world, is for our healing, for our redemption. And we can claim that for our health and also for our protection, that no evil will come near our dwelling. So see that when you are in Christ Jesus, there's now no condemnation for those who are Christ Jesus. So when you have made Christ, your Lord and your Savior, God's seal is upon your life. He purchased you, your bloodbath and he promises to protect you and you are in his hands and no man can snatch you off the Father's hands. It says no evil will conquer you. No plague will come near your home for he will order his angels to protect you wherever you go, just like military, as a military service woman. When we receive orders, it decrees and tell us what our boundaries are, what are we to execute, what place we need to be, at what time we need to be there, and what kind of allowance, mileage, cost there is, and what are our substance that we have that's allowance if we're able to have a vehicle and if we're able to have this attached with our orders, it shall read everything that we need. All of our provisions are on those orders. And just like military or government, Congress gives orders, God is giving orders to command his angels to protect us wherever we go. And that is yours as a promise. They will hold you up with their hands so you won't even hurt your foot on a stone, so you won't hurt yourself. You will trample upon lions and culverts. You will crush fierce lions and serpents under your feet. And that is almost like also not physical sense, but if we look at it as analogy, shutting the mouths of liars, also shutting the mouths of deceptions, because serpents is an illustration of the deceiver, Satan, who tells lies, who accuses children of God against God. So he's always accusing us, the serpent, Satan, to God. Just like Job, if you ever read the book of Job, Job replied and said, this is a righteous man. Take his life. And I bet it on Job. I bet he cursed you, God. And throughout all, Job did not curse God. No matter he got received boils, he suffered, his family had disasters in his family. One death after another death, all his children died, were killed all at one time. And even his wife said, you ought to curse God and God. He said, Job replied to his wife, shall we not receive the good of God and not also the bad. Because we know, beloved, all things work together for the good of those who love God, to them who are called according to his purpose. And we know that the enemy comes not but to steal, to kill, and to destroy. That's Satan. But God has come to give us life and life more abundantly. And what did Job receive in the end of all those trials that was put on him by Satan, by tax, by the culprits, by the lions. In the serpent, God restored him seven times as much, more children, more wealth, and more health than he could ever imagine. God keeps his word. His promises are yes and amen. In verse 14 of Psalm 91, verse 14, the Lord says, I will rescue those who love me. Just like Romans 8, 28 in the New Testament, for all things work together for the good of those who love God, to those who are called according to his purpose. And it doesn't mean whether this person is received Christ as their water saver or not. God looks high. He's, he's set high and he looks low. So some people say, why is this person's blessed? And this person's not blessed. God said, I'll have mercy upon whom I have mercy. I'll show compassion upon whom I show compassion. And that's what God says. I will rescue those who love me. I will protect those who trust in my name. When they call on me, I will answer. I will be with them in trouble. I will rescue and honor them. I will reward them with a long life and give them my salvation. Awesome, sotiria salvation, holistic health, holistic being, your mind, your body, your spirit, your physical, your mental, psychological being. God wants to provide, he wants to rescue. Someone just said, what God wants to do in this season, just open your mouth and ask God to help you. Send out your invitation to God, inviting, inviting him in to your soul to help administer justice, to administer care, to bind up your wounds, to show you his grace and his mercy, his loving care that he has for each of you. And we just think, you know, God, that God is not slack concerning his promises as man counts slackness. Because someone would say, I promised you $10, $15 one day and then you're waiting for it. And then it's been a week. You're not going to go begging. You already sent the invitation to invite somebody to bless your life. But when God, when you send God a request, it says, though you send a request, do not grow word in doing well doing. So wait on it, though the vision, Terry's wait on it. And God does not want you to grow weary in doing well. He wants to answer all your prayers. And he has be sometimes before we even asking prayer, he's already answered, already supplied. And sometimes when you're dealing with prayer, and you are, your backs feel like it's against the wall, as Daniel did when you read the book of Daniel. And Daniel had adversity, you know, sent an alliance then, because of the excellent spirit of God, a wisdom of grace, of how he governed jealous people, maliciously attacked him, and maligned his name. And he was sent to the lion's den by just his act of reverence to God. And even in the midst of that, the lion's mouths were shut, and did not harm Daniel. As we read in Psalm 91, not just in an allegory now, it was in a physical sense in the biblical text that Daniel survived the lion's. You might read that on your personal space of your quiet time with God. And so know that he answers, he delivers, he rescues, he brings out, he shelters, he provides safety, and he is all sustaining, unfailing love, faithfulness, righteous altogether, perfect. Wow, what are some of the characteristics of God that you serve? Can you name them? Can you honor his works of what he has done over the years for you, made a way out of no way, paid your bill, paid your light bill, made opportunity for you to go into the work field, gave you a blessing on your health ticket and saying you're good to go, you can return to work, whatever it was, open a new business for you in the past, and continue to give you blessings after blessings, one blessing after another blessing, one door open, another door is open, and that the floodgates are pure, are pouring and overflowing in your life. Only the hands of God has said the Lord, the Lord's blessings, it makes it one rich, and he adds no sorrow to it. So some people, when they said you have to pay them back, that's sorrow because you have to pay somebody back, and you didn't have enough money to have it in the first place. But when God gives you something, beloved, and blesses your wife, there's no sorrow, and there's no repercussion, no retroactive pay, God paid it all, hallelujah, to God be the glory. And someone said you can go ahead and make sure that that check clear is God, God, it's stamped, it's insured, hallelujah, to God be the glory. Just let you know that there's no comparison with what God has in store for you. And what God has in store for you, it says that men may take awe and know that it's God and not of ourselves, that we didn't do what God is doing in this season. Yes, God wants to bless us, God wants to do great and mighty things, but are we going to avail ourselves? Are we going to be willing and obedient? As Psalm, Psalm is mentioned in Psalm 143, teach me to obey, teach me to have a willing and obedient spirit in this season. And that's what is required of us to be taught in obedience to God, amen, to observe what it is, to walk by faith and not by sights. Amen, and may God continue to uphold you, beloved, with his right victorious hand, and that his angels will be with you wherever you go, that you will not stumble, you will not be derided, you will not be confused, that you know that this is the way, the path for your life, and God has made a spacious place for you, and that your gift will make room for you in this season, and you will turn out all right, beloved, trust in God and lean not into your own understanding, but in all your ways, acknowledge God, and he will direct your path. Bless God, bless God, bless God, amen, happy new year.