Ron Dunn Podcast - When the Upright Get Uptight - Part 3 - Bellevue

Episode Date: April 10, 2024

Ron Dunn continues his series at Bellevue in 1991 in a message out of Psalm 37.

Thank you for that. The Lord did pay a high price. He had to bankrupt heaven in order to save us. He had only one son and He gave him. And I love that song. As I've loved all the music this week, as James said, as Whitmore said a little while ago, we came that close to working together a bunch of years ago. And I have always admired him. And I tell you, he's just done a tremendous job this week, this choir and all these musicians and singers. I appreciate it so much. And I want to thank you for making this week so delightful for Kay and I. And you have ministered to us.

I don't know if I've done any ministering to you or not, but I want you to know you have ministered to me. I told Kay last night, I just was overwhelmed last night with the goodness of God. When the choir started out and then she began singing, When we behold him, I shall see him. And I was sitting there in this magnificent place, and I looked around, and I was sitting next to John Phillips there with Stephen Oford, and there was W.A. Criswell. And I said, Dear God, what in the world?

Why would God bless a person to be able to be in this kind of place and hear this kind of music and hear this kind of music and have this kind of—I don't know, it just overwhelmed me. And I just thank God for this week. And the people here have been so kind. I appreciate Michael Carrier and Mike Foster for driving us around and taking care of us. Every staff member that I've had any contact with have been overly gracious and have made us feel so absolutely welcome. And Bob Shorrell, I appreciate especially

because every time I ask him if he can do something, he says I can do it, and I believe that he can. I just feel confident with him around. I really do. I feel like everything's going to be all right as long as Bob Shorrell is around. I appreciate Bob. And then, of course, Adrian that I love. I have said to people many times through the years, Adrian Rogers is the most consistent Christian gentleman I know. He makes me proud to be a Southern Baptist. Thank you. Now would you open your Bibles this morning to the 37th Psalm, the 37th Psalm, and we

will finish our three-part series on when the upright get uptight. The first day we saw three things, among many things, of course, but three primary things that cause Christians to fret, to be filled with fear and anxiety, and they are peculiar to Christians. One was the injustices of life, the fact that life is not fair, causes us to fret. Once the charm has been broken, it does something to a person. I just lately talked to a pastor who's been seriously, seriously ill. He's recovering, but he says, my imagination, my imagination. The devil is using my imagination because now I imagine every pain, every ache might be something serious and might be something deadly. Most of us grow up believing we have a charmed life and that somehow we are insulated and that nothing can ever bad happen to us. We read in the newspaper, we see on television,

those are other people. But once the blow falls on you, it breaks the charm in a sense and all of a sudden you become unusually aware of how unjust life is. And so that contributes to our fretfulness. And then it is the absence of God in doing anything. Why doesn't God? If I were God, I would do such and so.

And that causes us to fret. And then, of course, as I mentioned, the main primary reason, of course, we fret is because we are ignorant of the ways of God. I am confident that when I get to heaven, by then then I will agree that everything God did was best. I still have trouble with a few things, but I'm getting better. But if I could see my life, your life, this world as God sees it, I'd never fret again. I'd never fret again. I'd never fret again. Back in the early 60s, after I was out of seminary, we were having a very, very difficult time, Kay and I and our family. And, you know, you don't realize that your parents, even though you're grown, they still worry about you. I didn't. And I didn't know this until just a couple of years ago before my father died. My dad has never been a really emotional person,

and he's never really talked out of the depths of his feelings so often. But I was amazed. He said, you know, son, during those days, he said, I worried so much about you. And he said, I couldn't sleep at night. I'd go to bed at night and lie there and think about you and I'd cry. And he said, one night as I lay there in bed unable to sleep and I was so concerned, he said, all of a sudden I sat bolt up right in the bed and he said, God said to me, if I don't take him through these things,

he'll not be what I want him to be. My dad said I laid down, went to sleep, and never worried again about it. I know that we would be confident. And then there is the alternative. I said yesterday I hesitate to call them conclusions. I mean, solutions or cures, because I'm afraid that we're going to be struggling with these things as long as we're in the veil of flesh. But the psalmist gives us four alternatives as we looked at them yesterday.

Trust in the Lord, delight thyself in the Lord, commit thy way unto the Lord, and rest in the Lord. Those four statements. How do you respond? What do you do when God doesn't right the wrongs? How do you live in the midst of injustice? How do you live in the midst of a broken heart? Here's how you live. You trust in the Lord. You delight yourself in the Lord. You commit your way unto the Lord. You rest in the Lord. That's how you do it. And I said that the first one, trust in the Lord, really contains the whole. It is the summary solution.

And I look upon trust as a nut, and you crack it open, and on the inside you find delighting and committing and resting. So that the ingredients of trust, when a person is trusting in the Lord, he is delighting himself in the Lord. He is committing his way unto the Lord, and he is resting in the Lord. How do I trust God?

How do I trust God? Delight yourself in Him, commit your way to Him, and just rest in Him. We took the first one, trust, yesterday. We're taking the other three this morning. First of all, verse 4, "...delight thyself also in the Lord, and he shall give you the desires of your heart." Oh, what a precious promise that is.

All of us have quoted this. Some of us live by this verse. But most of the time when I hear this verse quoted, I hear it quoted like this. If you'll just delight yourself in the Lord, bless your heart, God will give you whatever your little old heart desires. You want a new Cadillac? Delight yourself in the Lord,

and he'll give you the desires of your heart. You want a new house? Delight yourself in the Lord, and he'll give you the desires of your heart. Now, folks, I'm not saying that that won't work. What I am saying though is I think the psalmist had something a little bit deeper in mind when he wrote those words. Delight yourself in the Lord and you'll have a heart that is always delighted. I think it is similar to what Paul says

in Philippians 4, 11. I have learned in whatsoever state I am therewith to be, King James says, content. The word literally means self-contained. I've learned whatever my situation that I have within the confines of my own life, all that I need to survive

and all that I need to make my life full and meaningful delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart well I asked myself a question what in the world does this have to do with fretting on the world does this have to do with fear I'm uptight about something and you're telling me to light yourself in the Lord I don't understand what's the connection. Well, to answer that question, you'd ask another question. Why are you fretting? What's bugging you?

Why are you so worried? Why are you so fearful? I know why. One of the reasons is because this thing that you're dreading, this thing that you're afraid of, if this thing actually comes to pass, it is going to devastate you and you will not be as happy as you would be otherwise. A source of your delight, a source of your joy, a source of your satisfaction is in jeopardy.

That's why you're uptight about it. If this thing happens or if God doesn't solve this thing and doesn't change this thing, I tell you what, I can't be happy. How in the world can I ever be happy again if this thing happens? I think what the psalmist is saying is that as a safeguard against fretfulness and anxiety, we need to have at least one source of joy that can never be in jeopardy. You need to have one well that never runs dry, even in the severest of droughts. I don't think he's saying that we ought not to delight in lesser things. I believe that we ought to delight in everything that God gives us. He has given us all these good things, and we ought to take joy and delight in them.

But just having those things is insufficient. Those things are not a buttress. Those things are not a fortress against the evils of life. You need to have a well of joy that never runs dry. I sat down some years ago and I began to ask myself, what are the basic sources of joy? I mean, you know, just the very fundamental things. I came up with five, and you may come up with four or five or six. Yours may be different, but I think we can all agree that these are pretty basic. First of all, life itself is a source of joy. Oh, I'm so glad to be alive. I'm just glad God has given me as long as he has,

and I like it. And my health, that's a source of joy. I've had some problems in the past. I'm not in perfect health, but thank God I'm healthy enough to be up and about today. And that's a source of joy. Then there's my wife and my children, tremendous source of joy. They're my parents now. I've lost both of them, but my parents have always been a source of joy.

And then there's my occupation, my vocation. I'm a minister of the gospel. Now that is a source of joy. I'm telling you, I love to do what I'm doing. I'd preach for nothing. I'm not going to, but I would preach for nothing. Now, wouldn't you agree with me, the fools are pretty pretty basic and we are never to feel guilty because we rejoice in these things so much I I won't be honest with you I want to see Jesus when I get to heaven but sometimes I think I want to see my son even more and see him first. I'm not saying that's right. Sometimes I wish that I were as anxious to see Jesus as I am anxious to see my boy and my mom and my dad. I don't think there's anything wrong with delighting and taking joy

in the things that God has given us. But you know, every one of those things are temporary. Every one of those things are fragile. The scariest sound in all the world is a phone ringing after midnight. Here you are in your world, so safe, so secure, so insulated, and one phone call can destroy every bit of it. You'd better have something besides that

delight yourself in the Lord well how do you delight yourself in the Lord let me just read a couple of verses that pretty well tells us how to do it in Isaiah 58 verses 13 and 14 he says if thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day, and call the Sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord honorable, and shall honor him, and not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasures, nor speaking thine own words,

then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord. And I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of What's he saying? He's saying simply this. If you will honor the Lord and honor His ways and do His thing instead of doing your thing, he says you will delight in the Lord. Delighting in the Lord is taking honor and pride in the things that belong to God. Delighting in the Lord is honoring Him, reverencing Him, and honoring and obeying His ways. And if you will do that,

you will have a heart that always has its desire, its delight fulfilled. You say, preacher, that's hard to believe. Take my word for it. I have sat down with too many wives whose husbands have died. I have talked to too many parents who've lost a child, and even though through their tears and heartache, there is a delight, there is a joy, there is a security. Some time ago, I was preaching in a place, and after the service was over, a couple came

by to say hi. They were not members of the church, they were visitors. The woman said, Brother Dunn, it was so good to see you smile tonight. I said, well, thank you very much she said no I mean it it was it was so good to see you smile tonight well amen thank you for that she said you don't know what I'm talking about do you I said no ma'am I'm sorry I don't have the slightest idea she said said, six months ago, our 17-year-old daughter was killed in a car wreck, and she said, life has died for me.

But she said, I saw where you were going to be here, and I knew that you'd had a similar experience and I wanted to come over tonight and just watch you and hear what you had to say. And she said, I was sitting out there in the congregation and I saw you sitting on the platform and I saw you smiling. And I said to myself, well, if he can smile again,

I know one day I'll smile again too. It was so good to see you smile. Yes, it works. Delight thyself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart. The second in verse 5, commit thy way unto the Lord, trust also in Him and He shall bring it to pass. Commit thy way unto the Lord. Now here's another verse that

we frequently quote. And I think most of the time I think of this verse and I quote this verse within the context of the morning, the context of the day, that I'm ready to go out and to do my job this day, take care of my daily responsibilities. But before I go, I want to commit my way to the Lord. Dear Lord, I commit this day to you, and I pray that you'll guide me and that everything I do today will be pleasing in your sight." That is a good thing to do, and it's good to use this verse. But again, the psalmist means something beyond that. You know, of course, the word commit, if you have a marginal reading in your Bible, it

says roll. The word commit, the Hebrew word to roll. What he's saying is roll your way upon the Lord. Roll your way upon the Lord. It's the picture of someone who is carrying a tremendous burden that is bending him over, and you need to get relief and release roll that burden off your shoulders and put it on his but the real key is the word that the The word means a path worn by constant travel. It's translated custom or behavior.

It is not the way you're walking today he's talking about. It is the way you walk every day. It is a well-worn path, beaten down, made as hard as concrete because of constant travel on it. One translation reads this way, commit your career unto the Lord. Another one, commit your reputation unto the Lord. Another one, commit your reputation unto the Lord. I think, for me, the best word that says it all is this, commit your lifestyle unto the Lord. Not that he's talking about committing this day, but he's talking about your entire life, the program of your life, your career, your reputation, your lifestyle. Commit that unto the Lord. Well, what in the world does that have to do with fretfulness?

You answer that question by asking another one. Why are you fretting? What is it that you're so uptight about? I'll tell you why your lifestyle is being threatened your career is in jeopardy your reputation is at stake you know we all have our lifestyles

we fit into our homes there's no place like home they say Kay and I travel. I'm in about 36, 37 meetings a year. I stay in motels. I prefer to stay in motels rather than homes because a hotel is mine. In a home, I'm always a guest. In a home, I have to adjust my daily routine so much to that of the family. But if I'm by myself in a motel, I can maintain my normal lifestyle. And you can't stay on the road 37 weeks a year adjusting your lifestyle every week to a new place. You have to, as much as possible, maintain a normal lifestyle. And besides, the maid makes the the beds and I don't have to worry

about it but we all have our familiar lifestyle and we don't like for that to be threatened this is a silly illustration I know but back during the first problems we had with oil and gasoline. And gasoline started going up. And I said, man, I'll never, I'll never be able to pay 50 cents a gallon for gasoline. I'll never be able to pay 50 cents a gallon. President Ford came out and wanted all Americans to carpool and wanted us to give up our Sunday afternoon leisure driving.

You know, conserve, conserve, conserve. Well, I'm going to tell you something. I didn't want a car pool. And if I want to get out and drive after noon, I want to do it. And you know what I was fretting about? I was just fretting. You know why? My lifestyle was in jeopardy. My lifestyle was being threatened. That's silly, but you get what I'm asking. The truth is that what we're fretting over, what we're worried about, is not so much the thing itself as it is the effect that thing will have on our reputation, our lifestyle, our career. The real problem, the real threatfulness is not the thing itself,

but it's the effect that thing will have on our lifestyle, our reputation. I was in the supermarket the other day, and there was a young mother shopping, and she had a little boy about this old. What is that, about three, four years old with her? And little four-year-old boys, they love to go shopping with their mother. And I could tell that he was in the early stages,

you know, of I want to go home, I want to go home, I want to go home. And I noticed that he kept getting louder and the mother kept trying to hush him up and the more she tried to hush him up the louder he got and I kind of followed them around a bit I wanted to see what was going to happen and after a while that mother picked him up of course and put him in that basket and whatever and that boy just got louder and louder and louder and I could see that mother I could see that mother murder in her eyes.

I could see it. And finally she just jerked that boy up out of that basket and went out of the grocery store. Now why didn't she do that? She's heard that boy cry before. But in public, everybody watching, what kind of mother will people think I am if I can't control my son? Of course, you've never said that, have you?

Have you ever said, that kid over there, boy, I'd like to be his daddy for about five minutes. I would fix him good. Boy, those parents, what kind of parents are they? Drive down the highway, this was a few years ago, especially back during the hippie days, and you see a long-haired kid on the highway hitchhiking with a pack on his back, and you say, boy, those parents didn't do a very good job raising that boy. Our kid comes down in old blue jeans and tattered shirt and tennis shoes, and you say, where are you going?

Going to church. Not like that you're not. Oh, but dad, all the kids dress like this. What will people think of me if I let you Can you understand what I'm saying? Several years ago I was in Colorado. I'd been in this church two or three times. And one night a mother came to me and asked if she could talk to me for a few moments. And so we went over into a corner of the auditorium. Her husband had left her a number of years ago, and she was left to raise her teenage son, who had now turned about 16, if I remember. And he had dropped out and done that whole scene, you know, the hippie scene, the long hair, the drugs, all of that, and she

was just devastated. She needed some help and counsel, and I said, well, I said, you know, I'm not here but just for two or three days. You need to have somebody who's going to be here all the time and can help you all the time. I said, have you talked to your pastor? She said, oh yes, I talked to him. Well, what did he say?

He said that evidently I had not been the kind of Christian mother I should have been or he would never have done this. Well, I know that was a great comfort to her. I don't blame her for not wanting to go back to him. Could I just give you a word of caution? Be careful what you say about other kids. You'll eat your own words one of these days. The sad thing is that about three or four years later that pastor's son did the same thing. Now folks,

when that happens to you, it can affect you one of two ways. Number one, it can humiliate you, which is not good. Second, it can humble you, which is good. This pastor was humiliated. Humiliated, angrily humiliated to the point he quit the ministry and resigned the church. Now, take my word for it, I knew the man. I am not saying, I am not saying that he wasn't greatly burdened and grieved over his son's condition, but I am telling you today that the greater part of that man's concern was not what his son was into, but the effect that it was having on his reputation. It is hard to love your kids unconditionally without all the time worrying about what will people think of me. We do these things for ourselves. I had a revelation come to me not too long ago.

I'm a pussycat. I'm a pushover. I can't bear to see my kids have to do with that. I can't bear to see them hurt. And when they get a little tight, you know, they're grown. They're out on their own. But when they get tight and having a hard time,

I want to bail them out. I want to slip them a bill here or there. We'll take care of it. We'll buy the tires. We'll take care of that. Because I just hate to see them hurt. I'm not doing that for them. I'm doing that for me.

I don't want to hurt watching them hurt. It hurts me too much for them to hurt. I'm not doing it for them. I'm doing it for me. I'm doing it for my career, my lifestyle. One of these days we'll all die. One of these days our health will fail. As surely as we're here today, we'll lose our family, our parents,

and we will retire or be disabled. If all you've got is that, you're in deep trouble. Take that to the Lord, and then take this reputation, which is such a burden, and give it to the Lord. Oh, by the way, you know all three of these things have a promise attached. Well, all four of them have a promise attached to it, but this one has a special promise attached. Takes up a whole verse just to give this extra promise. Look at verse 6. And he shall bring forth thy righteousness as the light and thy judgment as the noonday.

What's he talking about? He's talking about vindication. You commit your reputation to me. You commit your lifestyle to me. You commit your career to me. Don't worry, I'll see to it. I'll see to it that your righteousness will be as bright and that the justice of your cause will be as noonday, the brightest time of the day. Don't worry about people, well,

they may not think I'm righteous. They may not think I'm doing the right thing. He says, don't worry about it. I'll take care of it. I will vindicate it. I will vindicate you. I'll make certain one of these days everybody can see how just and right you were as easily as they can see the sign. So you take that burden, you take that reputation, and you say, I'm not going to be burdened down with this thing any longer. I'm going to roll it off my shoulders. I'm going to put it on the Lord, and I'll trust the Lord to vindicate me. And that brings us to number three. Verse seven, rest in the Lord and wait patiently for him. I was afraid he was going to say something like that. I always do pretty good until I get to this one.

Rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him. Again, the word rest here literally means to be silent to the Lord. Now, I want to go back through these four things, sort of paraphrase them, sort of say it the way I'll say it. I hope it doesn't sound irreverent. I don't mean for it to be. But I think what the psalmist is saying is this. You got a problem? You got something worrying you, fretting over?

Hey, trust in the Lord. Delight yourself in the Lord. Roll this thing over to the Lord. Let Him handle it. And then shut up and give God a chance to work. Be silent unto the Lord. You've done all you can do. You've done all that God asks

you to do. You've done everything that you can do. Now, just be quiet. Settle down. Quit complaining. Quit whining. Quit telling God how badly you need this. And just give God a chance to do what He wants to do in this. Rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him. Oh, waiting, waiting. You know, I think God has a very ironic sense of humor.

Do you know what the word translated wait patiently means literally in the Hebrew? It means to turn in a circle. It means spinning around, twisting. It was used of women writhing and twisting in the pain of childbirth. I find that extremely interesting. That God, to express what it means to wait patiently, has this word that is used of a woman writhing in pain, giving birth to a child. I think God may be giving us a hint that waiting is a hard thing to do. Waiting, well, no, that's wrong.

Waiting is not a hard thing to do. I have news for you. If God delays, you're going to wait. The trick is not in waiting. the trick is in waiting patiently, waiting patiently. How in the world can I wait patiently? The writer of Habakkuk, later quoted by the writer of Hebrews, talking about dark times, terrible times coming, and he says, you wait for Him, for He who is coming will come and will not delay. In this crisis situation, Habakkuk says, you wait for it.

Hebrews says, you wait for Him. What is an it in the Old Testament is Jesus in the New Testament. He's saying you wait for him, he who is the coming one, he who is coming. Participle there literally means the coming one. It's a characteristic of him. It defines a part of his character. He is called the coming one. He is always in transit. He is always on his way. He's always coming. And so they say, wait, wait, wait. For he who will come and he who is coming will come and wait patiently for him.

Hebrews chapter 10, the last few verses. A few years ago, I was flying in from some northern city. Our house, we live about 10 minutes from the DFW airport, and it is tremendously convenient. We can leave our house and be checking in to any major airline within 10 minutes easy. And it's so convenient for when I fly in on late nights and my wife has to meet me, she doesn't have to get up and drive an hour and a half across town. She just gets there, you know, leaves the house about 10 minutes and there she is. Well, I was flying in from some northern city, it's supposed to be in at midnight, and she got there just a minute or two before, parked the car, went in and went to the gate and waited. Midnight came but the plane didn't, but that was an unusual,

no cause for alarm, and so she waited and waited until the plane was about 30 minutes late. And she went up to the man at the desk and she said, Listen, I'm here to meet flight 214. It's supposed to be in at 12 and it's not here. When are you expecting it? And the man said, Oh, it's going to be about another 30 minutes, about another 30 minutes. So she went over and sat down, waited, waited another 30 minutes. Still no plane. Hour late now.

Goes over to that man and says, listen, it's 1 o'clock. When are you expecting flight 214? He said, it looks like it's going to be at least another 30 minutes. Check back with us. So she waited another 30 minutes, still no plane, hour and a half late. She goes back to the man and she says, listen, it's an hour and a half late. When are you expecting flight 214 to come in? And for some reason, he said, I'm sorry, ma'am, but we can't give you that information. If you would just check back with us later. She thought that was kind of strange.

She went back and she said, listen, can you tell me when flight 214 left? Because she knew how long it would take Proxma to fly. She knew when it left and she knew it'd be in. She said, can you tell me when flight 214 left? He said, I'm sorry, ma'am, but I can't give you that information if you'll just check back with us later. But you know what she was thinking. You know exactly what had happened. That plane has crashed. They've lost that plane on radar and they're not telling anybody. Well, you don't do that to Kay. And she was, I mean, she had had it. She just has had it. Of course, she is scared to death and worried. You imagine all sorts of things that are happening. She went back up to that man who by now knew who she was and she said, she said,

she said, 2-14, 2-14, I do not want to know when it's going to arrive. I do not want to know what time it left, but can you tell me one thing, is it in the air? And the man smiled and said, oh yes ma'am, it's in the air. She said, thank you very much. She went over and she waited patiently because she knows in the air, he who is coming will come. And sometimes I've said, Lord, when is this going to end? When is this pain going to stop? And you'll say, I'm sorry, child,

I can't give you that information. Well, Lord, can you tell me when it started and what's it all about and what are you trying to do? I'm sorry, child, I can't give you that information. Well, Lord, can you tell me just one thing? Is it in the air? And he says, yes, child, it's in the air.

And then I can wait patiently for what he does. Threaten not thyself. Trust him. Delight in him. Commit yourself to him. And then just sit down and wait and see what he does.

The Lord bless you. Amen. Well, amen. Rhonda. The Lord bless you. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Well, amen. Rhonda.