As most of you know, I’ve not always been a pastor. I began my ministry to the church as a youth minister and served in various combinations of that particular staff position for 24 years. Then, seven years ago God called me to serve His church as a pastor-and in the first few months of this new job I must admit-I couldn’t help but COMPARE these two staff positions.
In my “comparative” study I learned there are several differences between being a pastor and being a youth minister-other than the obvious job description differences, of course. For example: Pastor’s get more JUNK MAIL and SALES CALLS than youth ministers. Everybody and his brother wants me to either buy something FOR the church or to let them sell something IN the church. Praise the Lord for voice mail and secretaries who know how to use it! Pastor’s also attend more MEETINGS that youth ministers. This is because pastors like myself serve as an “ad hoc” member of every church committee. That’s a lot of meetings! I mean, pastors like myself contribute a great deal to the wear and tear on our nation’s highways!
But the BIGGEST DIFFERENCE I noted in my first few months behind the pulpit was that, unlike my days as a youth minister, the buck stops at the pastor’s desk. I realized that, as senior shepherd, there is a sense in which I’m responsible for everything, and I must admit-at first this thought was very overwhelming. It caused me a great deal of stress and several sleepless nights. I remember during a particularly tough day sitting behind my desk-a desk piled high with recently arrived “bucks”-reminiscing about the “good old days” when, if confronted with a big problem-I could say, “That is really something THE PASTOR should deal with. Let’s go to him with this.”
But over the next few months God humbled me and helped me to realize that the buck doesn’t really stop with me. No, the buck stops with Him. He is in charge-not me! One of the first incidents God used to teach me this lesson was a business meeting-I believe it was the first one I attended as a pastor. At that meeting the Building and Grounds Committee, along with our administrator, came with a list of emergency repairs that needed to be made on our facility: parking lot and roof repairs, etc. The price tag for all the work totaled nearly $100,000 and I kind of panicked thinking, “My goodness, it’s my job to come up with all that money. How am I possibly going to do that?”
Well, we prayed and in just a few short weeks the funds had all been donated by Redland members-motivated to give by their love for our God and His church. I remember watching that particular “mountain” I worried about turn into less than a speed bump in no time at all. We raised the money and did all the repairs-with absolutely no problem. And in the years since, things like that have happened over and over again-in everything from huge financial challenges like this, to almost weekly fears that I wouldn’t have enough time to prepare a particular sermon, to open doors to send mission teams all over the world at great expense, to crises in the church that seemed sure to destroy our precious fellowship. In all this over and over again I have seen how God has enabled us to handle these “trials and tribulations.” And “watching” God do this has helped me to begin to understand one of His divine attributes-His absolute sovereignty.
I’ve learned that, as I said a moment ago, the buck does not really stop at my desk-it stops at His throne. So now, when I am faced with problems that are too big for me, instead of saying (as I would when a youth minister) “We need to take this to the pastor…” Instead, I say, “We need to take this to God.” because He is SOVEREIGN!
And this is the aspect of God’s character that I want us to study this morning as the next part of our advent study. But-before we go any farther let’s be sure we understand this word by turning to one of the greatest TOOLS for Bible study-the dictionary. Webster defines “sovereignty” like this: “above or superior to all others; chief, greatest, supreme…independent of all others.” In other words, when we say God is sovereign, we’re saying He’s the boss. He calls the shots and has the authority. What He says goes. No one tells Him what to do. He is over and above ALL things-good and bad. I mean, there is no such thing as partial sovereignty. To be sovereign is to be absolutely superior to everyone and everything.
The phrase I like best when it comes to this attribute is this: “GOD IS IN CONTROL.” His hands are on the wheel of my life and I don’t know about you but that thought is such a comfort to me.
Whenever I am confronted with a close friend wrestling with a terminal illness or the death of a loved one or worries about our nation and where its going…or stress in child-rearing or worries about personal finances-I mean, no matter how rough life gets, I remind myself, GOD IS STILL IN CONTROL! My completely faithful, all-wise, all-powerful, loving Heavenly Father is sovereign. And I know He is-not only because of personal experience but also because the Bible repeatedly teaches us that this is indeed an attribute of God. Here’s just a small a sampling of texts that proclaim this comforting truth:
Proverbs 19:21, “Many are the plans in a man’s heart, but it is the Lord’s will that prevails.”
Proverbs 16:9, “In his heart, a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps.”
Proverbs 21:30, “There is no wisdom, no insight, no plan that can succeed against the Lord.”
Lamentations 3:37, “Who can speak and have it happen if the Lord has not decreed it?”
Revelation 3:7 reminds us that, “No one can shut the doors that God opens and what He shuts no one can open.”
And one more. In Job 42:2 it says, “I know that You, [Oh God,] can do all things; no plan of Yours can be thwarted.”
All these texts proclaim the consoling fact that nothing will enter our lives that our loving Heavenly Father does not either decree or allow. His will is always done. In his book, Trusting God, Jerry Bridges tells us that in 1902 a young English boy came down to breakfast to find his father reading the newspaper…a paper that carried news of preparations for the first coronation in Britain in sixty-four years. In the middle of breakfast, the father turned to his wife and said, “Oh, I am sorry to see this worded like that.” She said, “What is it?” and he replied, “Here is a proclamation that on a certain date Prince Edward will be crowned king at Westminster BUT there is no ‘Deo volente.’ There is no, ‘God willing.'” These words stuck in their minds because when the appointed date rolled around, the future Edward VII was ill with appendicitis and his coronation had to be postponed. Now, we don’t know why the situation occurred as it did but we DO know that whether we acknowledge it with “Deo volente” or not, we cannot carry out any plan apart from God’s will. As James 4:13-15 warns, “Now listen, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.’ Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow….instead you ought to say, ‘If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.'”
So to understand God we must realize that He is in control. He is absolutely sovereign. Listen to what Tozer has to say about this attribute of God. It’s a long quote but I love it. He writes: “God’s sovereignty is the attribute by which He rules His entire creation, and to be sovereign, God must be all-knowing, all-powerful, and absolutely free. The reasons are these: Were there even one datum of KNOWLEDGE, however small, unknown to God, His rule would break down at that point. To be Lord over all creation, He must possess all knowledge. And were God lacking one infinitesimal modicum of POWER, that lack would end His reign and undo His kingdom; that one stray atom of power would belong to someone else and God would be a limited ruler and hence not sovereign. Furthermore, His sovereignty requires that He be absolutely FREE, which means simply that He must be free to do whatever He wills to do anywhere at any time, to carry out His eternal purpose in every single detail without interference. Were He less than free, He must be less than sovereign.”
Well, the Bible teaches that God is sovereign in each of these senses. So-understand, when we pray-when we face a mountain of a problem-this is the God we are talking to-the One Who has power over the entire universe from the sub-atomic level on out, the one Who has absolute freedom-and Who, as I have said in the past couple weeks, is absolutely faithful, all-wise, and infinitely loving. Now-if you have trouble conceiving of God as being sovereign-if you need more evidence-then listen up, because I’d like us to take the next few moments to reveal exactly how God has REVEALED His sovereignty.
In his book, God, As He Longs for You to See Him, Chip Ingram reminds us of four ways God has shown us this attribute.
1. First, we see it revealed through His TITLES.
In my second church staff position I had a long job title-it may have been a record. I was the “part-time” Associate Pastor in Charge of Music and Youth. It was embarrassing to introduce myself to visitors because it took so long to say! Even the acronym for my job, APICOMAY, was longer than my current job title of PASTOR. A regular sized business card almost would not contain my title. Well, no business card-no matter what it’s size would contain all our sovereign God’s bold titles. Listen to a few of them. In Genesis 15 Abraham refers to God as, “The SOVEREIGN Lord.” Psalm 47:2 says God is, “…the LORD Most High, the GREAT KING over all the earth!” In Revelation 1:8 God says, “I am the Alpha and the Omega….Who is, and Who was, and Who is to come, the Almighty.” In 1st Timothy 6:15 Paul says that God is, “…the blessed and only Ruler, the King of kings and Lord of lords.” In Exodus 3:14 God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM.” saying, that He is eternal-self-existent. We could go on and on because, unlike any other religious system, the God of the Bible makes bold, unequivocal claims about His sovereignty-TITLES that set Him above anyone or anything else.
2. We also can see God’s sovereignty revealed by studying His actions in HISTORY.
As we learned in the 40 Days, history is really His-story. The historical record is really the story of the way God is sovereignly working out His purposes. And a study of history shows that nothing has been able to stop God from fulfilling His purposes. Let’s review just a little of the recent historical record and you’ll see what I mean. In the days before the fall of the iron curtain one of the most cruel world leaders of all time, JOSEPH STALIN, the leader of the “proudly” atheist soviet union, was quoted as bragging, “We will pull that bearded God out of the sky.”
But guess Who still sits on high in His eternal throne? And guess who is long dead? In fact, I believe Stalin’s body was pickled and put on display in the Kremlin. Today it’s probably rotting in some Moscow basement. God is sovereign! The Communist nation of China did all they could to snuff out the Christian faith but today, in spite of decades of persecution, the church in China is thriving. God is sovereign!
Here in the U.S. back in the 60’s the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. threatened to sabotage and undermine all the gains of the civil rights movement. I say this because history shows that the movement was fragile at this time-many of it’s participants were demoralized and King’s death seemed like the end. In fact, many thought that his funeral was more than a burial service for King-it had the potential to be the burial service for the entire movement. There was a large roster of speakers, eulogizers, exhorters at the funeral service, but one stood out: His name was James Bevel. Bevel mounted the podium, stern and heavy, and in a voice like a storm gathering at the far edge of a clear day, he said,
“There’s a false rumor going around that our Leader is dead. Our Leader is not dead. Martin Luther King, Jr. is not our leader.” At this he paused and let those present absorb the implication of his words. Then he continued by saying, “Our [real] leader…is the Man Who led Moses out of Israel. Our [real] Leader is the Man Who went with Daniel into the lion’s den. Our [real] Leader is the Man Who walked out of the grave on Easter morning! Our Leader neither sleeps nor slumbers. He cannot be put in jail. He has never lost a war yet. Our Leader is still on the case. Our Leader is not dead. One of His prophets died but the movement will not stop because of that.”
And Bevel was right-The civil rights movement continued, making great advances even after King’s death because this was God’s will, and nothing stops Him from accomplishing His eternal purposes.
So, understand-the historical record shows that God is sovereign. He has never sat around biting His nails wondering what Hitler or Pol Pot or Saddam Hussein or Osama Ben Laden were going to do. And so, no matter what the nightly news says, we can have a sense of peace and trust because the world is not spinning out of control. God is at the helm. He has a firm grip on the wheel and He knows where He’s going! God is sovereign over history.
And this Christmas I believe God wants each of us to know that He is sovereign in OUR personal history! When there’s a problem at work. When your children rebel; when your loved ones die, no matter what happens in the course of your life, God is in control. Remember, as we have already learned this Christmas, He is all-wise. He is completely faithful. He’s the King of kings and as a Christian, you’re His child.
3. A third way we see God’s sovereignty revealed is through fulfilled PROPHECIES.
I mean, one of the most amazing testimonies to the fact that God is in control-and that nothing thwarts His eternal purposes, is His ability to tell the future 100 percent of the time. Look at our text for this morning, Isaiah 44:6-8: “This is what the LORD says-Israel’s King and Redeemer, the LORD Almighty: I am the first and I am the last; apart from Me there is no God. Who then is like Me? Let him proclaim it. Let him declare and lay out before Me what has happened since I established My ancient people, and what is yet to come-yes, let him foretell what will come. Do not tremble, do not be afraid. Did I not proclaim this and foretell it long ago? You are My witnesses. Is there any God besides Me? No, there is no other Rock; I know not one.
Well, there IS no being like God-He is above time-and one way we know this is because over and over again God has accurately foretold what would happen. He has NEVER been wrong. And, since a third of the Bible is prophetic, there are plenty of examples to cite that show this.
One of my favorites is found in Ezekiel 26 where God prophesied that the city of Tyre would be destroyed. Listen to what He said would happen and note the precise detail: “They will destroy the walls of Tyre and pull down her towers; I will scrape away her rubble and make her a bare rock. Out in the sea she will become a place to spread fishnets, for I have spoken, declares the Sovereign Lord. She will become plunder for the nations, and her settlements on the mainland will be ravaged by the sword. Then they will know that I am the Lord.”
Now, when Ezekiel shared this word of God with the people, they must have all shaken their heads thinking, “This will never happen! No way!” because Tyre was a powerful kingdom.
They even had a navy-an especially big deal from the perspective of the Hebrew people. I mean, no one would have thought that so powerful of a nation would ever fall. But the Bible predicted it in stark detail and this is exactly what happened! Here’s how. King Nebucanezzer destroyed the mainland city. And so people moved off to an island off shore from the original city. Then years later Alexander the Great came along and sent a boat out and asked for supplies for his army. The people of Tyre said “No.” I guess they thought they were safe out on the island but they weren’t because Alexander took all the rubble of the original city threw it in the sea and built a causeway.
Then he marched out there and destroyed the place. To this day fishermen dry their nets on that island, just as God said. It has never been rebuilt
And here’s one more powerful example. Think of it-can you name any people group in all of history that, after being pushed out of its land, has kept its identity? We talk about German Jews, American Jews, and Arabic Jews. How have they kept their Jewish identity and not just blended in to the culture around them? Because it was foretold! God said, that after His people had been spread abroad for almost two thousand years, He would bring them back, and in 1948, He did-Israel became a nation. Thousands of years after God’s prophets spoke about the return of Israel to its promised land, where are the eyes of the world? -on a tiny strip of land given to a resilient, sometimes hard-headed people who won’t let go-a people who say, “We are the Jewish people. God gave us this land and He brought us back to it.”
And this leads to a fourth way God has revealed His sovereignty…
4. …through the coming of JESUS CHRIST.
You see, as I’ve told you repeatedly in past messages, through His birth, life, death, and resurrection, Jesus fulfilled each of the prophecies about the promised Messiah, hundreds of specific prophecies given hundreds and even thousands of years before He was born that first Christmas night. And as Galatians 4:4 says that first Christmas night came when the time was right-perfect for Jesus’ coming. Now-what did Paul mean when he said that? How was the time right? Well, there was a unique set of conditions that the sovereign God of history had brought about. For example: Greek had become a “universal” language. This and the Pax Romana, the Roman-enforced peace, made travel and communications easier than ever before in the history of man. Synagogues full of God’s chosen people had been dispersed all over the Roman Empire so that when the church was birthed it would have strategic centers of operation.
All this made the spread of the gospel relatively easy.
But, please understand-at the time of Jesus’ birth, no one realized that God was working out His sovereign purposes. Charles Swindoll writes, “Who could have cared about the birth of a baby while the world was watching Rome in all her splendor? This nation had conquered the world. Palestine existed under the curse of Rome’s heavy boot. All eyes were instead on Augustus, the cynical Caesar who demanded census so as to determine a measurement to enlarge taxes. At that time who was interested in a couple making an eighty mile trip south from Nazareth? What could possibly be more important than Caesar’s decisions in Rome?
Who cared about a Jewish Baby being born in Bethlehem? God did. Without realizing it, mighty Augustus was only an errand boy for the fulfillment of Micah’s prediction, a pawn in the hand of Jehovah…a piece of lint on the pages of prophecy. While Rome was busy making history, God arrived. He pitched His fleshly tent in silence on the straw-in a stable under a star. The world didn’t even notice. Reeling from the wake of Alexander the Great, Herod the Great, Augustus the Great, the world overcooked Mary’s little Lamb.”
I pray we never make the same mistake because Christmas is a celebration of the fact that God is sovereign. It reminds us that no matter how things may look, He IS in absolute control! And, as I said, like God’s wisdom and faithfulness-knowing that He is sovereign-knowing the buck in your life stops at His throne is indeed a very comforting thought. I keep coming back to the thing I read to you from Tozer’s book weeks ago, “What we think about God is the most important thing about us.” It is! I mean the better we understand God, the easier life is to deal with! But you know, many of us are hesitant to rest in this attribute because God’s sovereignty raises questions-questions that may in fact be on your mind right now.
1. First, many of us wonder, “If God is sovereign, why is there EVIL and SUFFERING in the world? If God is in charge why do the bad guys win so often?”
If memory serves me right, it was Robert Browning who wrote, “God’s in His heaven-and all’s right with the world!” Well, on happy days we hear that phrase quoted but one only has to read a newspaper headline, or watch the nightly news to see think that Browning was wrong. In spite of the fact that God is on His throne, all’s NOT right with the world, and we wonder, how can God be in control and the world be so messed up?
Well, basically the world is messed up because we human beings are messed up. You see, every day we make sinful choices and foolish mistakes that cause all manner of hardship and heartache.
I mean, we have evil in the world because we abuse the free will that God has given us. Over and over again we use our free will to do evil. It’s just as Isaiah prophesied, “All we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned to our own way.” (Isaiah 53:6) And the reason God gave us this free will that we so often abuse is because that is the only way we could choose to love Him back-and the thing God values most is love.
I think Soren Kierkegaard’s familiar parable illustrates this fact well: Once upon a time there was a king who had no queen. And this king loved a humble maiden in his kingdom. Now you must understand, this king was not just any king. In fact there was no king in all the world that could match his power, wisdom, and grandeur. Every statesman trembled before him. No one dared breathe a word against him, for he had the strength to crush all opponents. And yet this mighty king had a problem. He was melted by love for a humble maiden. He wondered, how he could declare his love for her? You see, in an odd sort of way, his very kingliness tied his hands. If for example, he brought her to his palace and crowned her head with jewels and clothed her body in royal robes, she would surely not resist-no one dared resist him. But would she love him? Really love him? She would say she loved him of course, but would she truly? Or would she live with him in fear, nursing a private grief for the life she had left behind. Would she be happy at his side? He wanted her to be genuinely happy because he genuinely loved her…but how could he know? And….if he rode to her forest cottage in his royal carriage, with an armed escort waving bright banners, that too would overwhelm her. He did not want a cringing subject as his wife. He wanted someone who would love him…He wanted a partner…a helpmate. He wanted her to forget that he was a king and she an humble maiden and let shared love cross over the gulf between them. The king, convinced that he could not elevate the maiden without crushing her freedom, resolved to descend. He clothed himself as a beggar and approached her cottage incognito, with a worn cloak fluttering loosely about him.
Well, in essence that is what God did when He became flesh. In the form of His Son, God descended to our level of existence. In the Man, Jesus, He laid aside His power and privilege and became like one of us. He lived a perfect life and died on the cross as a payment for our sins and He did this to give us a choice. We can accept Him. We can love Him back and serve Him or we can choose to reject Him. Philip Yancey writes,”God…desires what power could never win. He is a King Who wants not subservience but love. He desires not the clinging, helpless love of a child who has no choice, but the mature, freely given love of a lover.”
So you see, free will makes a relationship with God possible. But it also makes sin possible. And then a second question that may be on your mind is this…
2. “How can God be completely SOVEREIGN and we still have free will?”
I mean, if God is sovereign, then aren’t we just puppets? How can God be totally sovereign and we be totally free to do what we want-even when we want to do things that are contrary to God’s will? Now, in my opinion, this is one of those things we won’t understand completely until we get to heaven, but I like the way Tozer explains it. He says the answer to this question is simple. Man has free will because God in His sovereignty has given us free will. He writes: “A god less than sovereign could not bestow moral freedom upon His creatures so, when we do what we please we are fulfilling the will of God, not controverting it, for God in His sovereignty has sovereignly given me freedom to make a free choice.”
He suggests the following illustration. An ocean liner leaves New York bound for Liverpool. Its destination has been determined by proper authorities. Nothing can change it. This is at least a faint picture of sovereignty. On board the liner are hundreds of passengers. These are not in chains, neither are their activities determined for them by decree. They are completely free to move about as they will. They eat, sleep, play, lounge about on the deck, read, talk, altogether as they please; but all the while the great liner is carrying them steadily onward toward a predetermined port. Both freedom and sovereignty are present here and they do not contradict each other. You see in a similar way, the mighty liner of God’s sovereign design keeps its steady course over the sea of history. God moves undisturbed and unhindered toward the fulfillment of those eternal purposes which He purposed in Christ Jesus before the world began. And then, our study leads us to one final question…
3. How should we RESPOND to God’s sovereignty? I like Ingram’s response to this question.
A. He says our first response should be to BOW-to humble ourselves before God.
And he’s right-because realizing that God is totally sovereign should lead us away from pride and toward humility. Understanding how BIG God is, should remind us how SMALL we are. Theodore Roosevelt is considered by many to be one of our greatest presidents. Perhaps this is because Roosevelt knew how to keep himself small. He knew the buck didn’t stop at his desk.
Some nights, before going to bed, Roosevelt and his friend, the naturalist William Beebe, would go out and look at the skies, searching for a tiny patch of light near the constellation of Pegasus.
When they would find it, they would chant together: “This is the spiral galaxy of Andromeda. It’s as large as our Milky Way. It is one of a hundred million galaxies. It consists of one hundred billion suns, each larger than our sun.” Then Roosevelt would turn to his buddy and say, “Now I think we are small enough. Let’s get some sleep.” Well, looking at all the evidence of God’s sovereignty helps us to see how small we are. I mean, this is a humbling doctrine. Sovereignty means that God is God and we are not.
B. Our second response should be to BELIEVE.
I mean, God’s sovereignty should motivate us to a deeper trust-a belief that everything that has entered our life has been divinely allowed or decreed by Him for our good or His glory. I like what Oswald Chambers did in response to his understanding of God’s sovereignty. He decided to adopt the following foundational principle. He said, no matter what happens in life: “Absolutely refuse to worry.” We should embrace a trust in God that leads us to do the same. Your retirement going down the drain? Keep working but absolutely refuse to worry. Marriage falling apart? Pray, seek counseling, but absolutely refuse to worry. A loved one lying in ICU-get a good doctor but absolutely refuse to worry. No matter what happens BELIEVE that God is doing things that you don’t understand, things that are deeper and better and more wonderful than you can imagine-absolutely refuse to worry. Stop trying to manipulate situations. Stop trying to figure out how to make them work out because you know Who is in control. Rest in His sovereign goodness. Memorize and live by the words of Paul in Romans 8:31 “If God is for us who can be against us?” No one-because He is in control! So absolutely refuse to worry.
Bill Hybels writes, “When I was first learning how to sail my dad’s sailboat out on Lake Michigan, he would often say to me, ‘Go ahead and take the boat out, but take a friend with you.’ Now, a 42-foot sailboat on a body of water the size of Lake Michigan is a big responsibility. But, always up for a challenge, I’d find a junior high friend to accompany me and we’d sail past the breakwater, hoist the sails, and head out to open water. But as soon as I’d see any cloud formation coming our way or the wind piping up, I’d head back toward shore, take the sails down, and regain my normal breathing pattern, only when we were safely tied up to the slip. Most of the time, it was fun having a friend along, but in a storm, I knew this kid wouldn’t be much help. Other times, though, my dad would come home from work and we’d go out together. When I was sailing with my dad, I’d actually look for loud formations and hope for heavy air. I loved the feel of strong winds and huge waves with my dad at the helm! You see, my dad had sailed across the Atlantic Ocean. He had endured five days of sailing through a hurricane. He was a veteran and I was confident that he would be able to handle anything Lake Michigan could throw at us. Every thing changed when my dad was aboard.”
Well everything changes for us in life, when we understand that our sovereign Heavenly Father is on board-and at the helm. As God says in Jeremiah 32:27 “I am the LORD, the God of all mankind. Is anything too hard for me?” NO! As Mary said, “Nothing is impossible with God!” (Luke 1:37) When we begin to know-really know God-our God Who is faithful, wise, and absolutely sovereign-we’ll develop a supernatural confidence even during the storms of life, because we know He can handle anything that the world throws at us. We learn that, as Tozer reminds us, “Whoever is on the Lord’s side is on the winning side, and cannot lose; whoever is on the others side is on the losing side and cannot win.”
C. And then, our final response should be to BEHOLD-to behold in awe the mystery and majesty of God’s sovereign rule.
In other words an understanding that God is sovereign-that He is infinitely above us-should inspire us to WORSHIP-and remember, worship is giving ourselves to God. This morning let’s make our time of invitation a time of worship in which we each say to God, “Sovereign Lord, this Christmas as I behold Your sovereignty, I want to give you my life! Take it and use it according to Your sovereign will.” Let’s all say, “I give my life to Your control God-my checkbook, my marriage, my parenting, my career-everything I am and everything I have.”
As Aaron comes to lead us, I encourage you to respond to our study in this way…MEAN the words we sing in a moment. And if you have a public worship offering to make, then come forward and tell me about it. Perhaps you need to respond to God’s sovereignty by joining this church-giving Him your time and talents to use here with us at Redland. If you are not a Christian, I urge you to respond by giving God your life-inviting His Son into your heart as Savior and Lord. Won’t you come as we sing?