Phil Beach Jr. emphasizes the necessity of trusting God amidst life's uncertainties and challenges, highlighting that true faith involves surrendering our pride and embracing humility. He explains that the deep things of God are not about intellectual understanding but about experiencing His love and mercy, even in our failures. The sermon calls for believers to recognize that their struggles are opportunities to grow in Christlikeness, urging them to bless those who curse them and to love the unlovable. Ultimately, Beach encourages the congregation to trust God fully, as this trust leads to a deeper understanding of His character and purpose in their lives.

How many here have sensed a growing capacity through the Lord's grace this morning to begin to trust Him over some things that you might have been faltering in? Yeah, everybody's head is shaking. Trust Him. Trust Him. Healing in the heart. Trust Him. It's wonderful. The patience of the Lord. It's marvelous, isn't it? The long suffering of the Lord. The fact that He doesn't find fault with us in our stumblings. Are you glad He doesn't find fault? Are you glad that one morning when you wake up, you don't hear Him say, I'm sorry, I can't deal with you anymore. I'm out of your life. My thoughts are not upon you anymore. My tender, loving kindness is no longer extended to you because you have just failed me too many times. You've used me. You've used my name. Wanting to further your own cause. You've cursed me. You've lied in my presence. But He doesn't do that, does He? He continues to love us. And now can I ask you a question? Listen very carefully. You see, God, the Lord really has to restore our faith. You know, the scripture says, suffer the word of exhortation. That word suffer means to permit. Our brother, Alan, gave an exhortation, an exhortation to trust Him. Because the journey that He has called us to walk on requires trust, much trust. This year 2000 is going to bring a lot of uncertainty into our lives. We're going to be brought into areas where we're going to have to trust God. Norman and I went out yesterday to pray for a couple hours and we both agreed that God was saying this year was going to be a year when we would have to look to the Lord for a deeper realm of trusting Him, trusting Him along a path that we're not familiar with, a way that we've not gone before. And when we walk this way, we are compassed about with many disappointments and many hurts and pains and misunderstandings. And things happen that we weren't expecting and were tempted at that time to stop trusting. That's why there was a word of exhortation, a lengthy word of exhortation. Why? Because it is imperative that we trust, that we look to Him. We need to look to Him this morning for the grace and the healing to restore us back into that posture of trusting Him. You remember last Sunday, Proverbs 14, 12. There is a way that seems right unto a man, but the end is the way of destruction and death. God has to teach us to distrust in that way that seems right unto us because the end thereof is destruction and death. You see, there's a way that seems right unto us. And do you know what that way is? That way is when somebody fails you or lets you down, you disown them. There's a way that seems right to us to disown that person, to get angry at God. But the end of that way is destruction and death. There is a way that seems right in our own eyes, and that is we love those who love us and we bless those who bless us, but when we're cursed and when people no longer honor us the way we think they should, we curse them. Oh, we're careful to keep our religious mask on so we don't curse them outwardly, do we? But in our hearts we're cursing them because we've closed our hearts to them. There's a way that seems right unto us. To love the lovable but avoid the unlovable. There's a way that seems right unto us. To seek to save our own life and our own pride and our own image. There's a way that seems right unto us. But when God begins to shake our world and we're subject to the discipline of Father, and your life begins to shake and your plans begin to crumble and your hopes begin to get dashed and circumstances arise, there is a way that seems right even during that time. It's the way of giving up. It seems right. It seems like the thing to do. But the end is destruction and death. And so why is God imploring and begging us with His love and mercy to trust Him? Because the end of distrust, the end of bitterness, the end of, Lord, I'll have no more you. The end of closing our heart to the Lord is destruction and spiritual ruin. Bitterness, defilement, dryness. The end is the way of death. And so the Lord is continuously seeking to encourage us and admonish us and to implore us to trust Him. Trust Him and let Him give you that peace that passes all human understanding. Now listen, beloved, okay, for a few moments. Listen carefully. There's no doubt that everybody in here at one time has prayed a prayer something like this. Something like this. Lord, I want to know the deep things of God. Who has prayed something like that? Nearly every hand has gone up. Lord, I want to know the deep things of God. Brothers and sisters, it would do us well to take heed to the word of exhortation. Because if we're to come to know the deep things of God, we've got to learn to depend upon God, to trust Him. Because the deep things of God are nothing of what we thought they were. And so for a brief time, as the Spirit of God enables, I'd like to begin to discuss what the deep things of God are that you will come to know if in fact God answers your prayer and my prayer. The deep things of God. First of all, I'd like for you to consider this. In 1 Corinthians chapter 2, 1 Corinthians chapter 2, the Scripture says, in beginning in verse number 6, how be it we speak wisdom among them that are perfect or mature, yet not the wisdom of this world, nor of the princes of this world that come to know. But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery. Even the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the world unto our glory, which none of the princes of this world knew. For had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. But as it is written, I hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have ever entered the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love Him. But God hath revealed them unto us by His Spirit. Now notice carefully these words. This is what we're going to be focusing on. For the Spirit searches all things, yea, the deep things of God. For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? Even so the things of God knoweth no man but the spirit of God. But now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God, that we might know the things that are freely given to us by God. Now, if we would refer to the deep things of a person, the deep things of a man or a woman, most likely it would not be to consider what they do, or the title or position that they hold. But rather, it would be a coming to know who they really are. You see, recently we have had a lot of political figures exposed. The deep things of who they are. And it seems that when the deep things of a person are made known, what position they hold, or what title they hold, or who they might think they are outwardly no longer matters. Because we've come to see the deep things of that person. You ever meet a person relatively quiet, but when you get to know that person you say, well, there's depths to that person that aren't quickly seen until you get to talk to that person. Well, this is what the spirit here is trying to say. The spirit of God not only reveals the things of God, but the spirit of God is searching out the depths of God, searching out the deep things of God. That is, the spirit of God is wanting to make known the very center and depths of who God is in his character and in his nature. Not just so that we might marvel and say, wow, God, that is incredible the way you are. But rather, the spirit of God is groaning for a people who will partake of those depths. And we see all that God can ever be wrapped up in the loveliness of his Son, Jesus Christ. And so the call of the spirit this morning to trust God as we were exhorted to do, and not to be overtaken by the situation we're going through, or the difficulty we're going through, or the crisis that we're in, is because God has an ultimate intention. And even though we're going through a difficult time, his intention is keep trusting him because he's doing something in your life and my life. And that something can be captured in wanting to reveal to us the deep things of God. The deep things of God do not consist in hard-to-understand revelations. Nor do they consist of revelation in the Scriptures. That's not the deep things of God. Hidden meaning of Scriptural truth unveiled. That's not the deep things of God. Some mystical understanding of the end days, the end times, that does not consist of the deep things of God. You ever meet someone who thinks they're deep in God because they can come up with a doctrine or a teaching that makes you scratch your head and say, what are you talking about? Well, this was revealed to me by God. This is deep stuff. Brothers and sisters, the deep things of God doesn't have anything to do with getting up and teaching on something so that everybody's clueless about what you're saying. That's not the deep things of God. The deep things of God, here's one of them. God loves you today even after you cursed Him and sinned against Him and loved yourself more than Him so many times and continually, consistently do it, failing Him. Seeking your own way. Murdering your brother. You say, well, I'm not a murderer. Oh, yes, you are. You're a murderer. If you look at your brother and you slander his character and in your heart you misjudge him and you gossip about him and then you sew that gossip into another person's ears about that brother or sister. You know what the deep thing of God is? The deep things of God, brothers and sisters, is after you do that, the next morning you go to prayer and Jesus draws you to Himself and seeks for you to talk to Him and seeks for you to come to Him and He still loves you. That's the deep things of God. And brothers and sisters, every single person here that is destined to know the deep things of God that's not going to bring you to some position where you stand in front of people and teach elegant things. That's not going to bring you to some position where you stand as a Bible teacher or you write a book on the deep teachings of the Word of God and you come up with all these kinds of crazy teachings. That's not the deep things of God. If you're going to come to know the deep things of God, you will have to walk the path of Jesus and be transformed by His power so that you'll have the capacity to do to others what God has been doing to you all along. And do you know what that is? Blessing those that curse you. Loving the unlovable. The deep things of God, brothers and sisters, is going to take our pride and smash it. The deep things of God is going to be a revelation of the person of the Lord Jesus and it's going to devastate us and bring us down, down, down, down, down, down, as low as we can get. And then we'll cry out and say, Lord, You alone are worthy and forgive me for trusting in my own righteousness. Forgive me for trusting in my own goodness. Forgive me for relying upon anything that's in me because all the loveliness is in You. All the loveliness is in You. You still want to know the deep things of God? Listen, why don't you see the circumstances in your life today have become God's divine opportunity to learn the deep things of God? You see, we get all angry and bitter and resentful toward the things that come into our life because they don't fit into our plan. But guess whose plan they do fit into? God's. And see, the reason we get angry is because we don't realize that God is after something oftentimes that we're not after. We're after something that'll benefit us. He's after something that'll benefit Himself. We're after something that we think will promote us. He's after something that will promote Himself. How could you learn how to bless them that curse you unless God allowed you to be brought in a situation where you are being cursed by someone? How could you love the unlovable unless God brings you in a situation where He's asking you to love someone that's unlovable? How do you think these things are going to happen? One night we're going to kneel down next to our bed and we say, Oh, Holy Father, make me like Your Son in Jesus' name, and then tuck ourselves in our comfortable little beds and have our world undisturbed and then wake up and say, Behold, I am like my Savior. Is that how we think it's going to happen? No, it won't happen like that. God is going to take you from the nest of your comfort and the nest of your security and the nest of your little clicky Christian world where you like to hang out with this person because they like you. That's why you like your friends, because they like you. But you don't even love those who don't like you. Oh, we love to be with the brothers and sisters because they think highly of us. But what about the ones that don't think highly of us? What about the ones that think we're crazy or that have gossiped about us? Can you hear God tell you to invite them over to dinner and serve them? Can you hear it? No, because we're not listening for that, are we? Huh? We're not listening. The deep things of God. You see, we want to be deep in God, but we don't want to see deepness in God as dying to self and becoming like Jesus. Yes. The deep things of God consist of Jesus having been hung and nailed on the cross, Gary, and saying, Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. Brothers and sisters, I know of nothing more deeply than to see Jesus cry out, Father, forgive them. Nothing more deeply than that. Are we prepared to come to know the deep things of God? You see why we had a word of exhortation this morning? Trust God. Don't give up. Don't get bitter. You see why? Because we've got to learn to trust God with our life. We've got to learn to trust God with our circumstances. We've got to learn to rejoice and to say, Father, I don't know what you're doing, but I know you do. And ultimately, whatever you're doing in my life today, it's giving me an opportunity to come to know the deeper things of God. That is, die to yourself and come by faith to receive more of the character of Christ, more of the love of Christ, more of the mercy of Christ, more of the patience of Christ. Can you thank God for everything right now going on in your life? If you can't, do you know what that means? Whatever you can't thank Him for, you're resisting. And you might be bitter against. You see, unthankfulness is the seed of bitterness and unforgiveness, which breeds anger and rage, which, when it's fully manifested, turns into murder. It all starts with unthankful hearts. We become unthankful because we fail to see why God is doing this or has allowed it to happen. We fail to see God's ultimate intention is not to orchestrate our life so that we get what we want. Or that the plans that we have made come to pass. That's not God's ultimate intention for your life this morning. God's ultimate intention is to produce in you the character of His Son. Alright, maybe it hasn't worked out the way you thought. I'll give you that. But are you seeing that in spite of that, there's an opportunity now to become like Jesus? To trust Him. Trust Him. Do you want to know the deep things of God? May I say to you as we close, if you do, you will learn that there is no good thing that dwells in you and everything has to come from Him. The Lord Jesus Christ has to come. Verse 10, chapter 4, 1 Corinthians. Beginning in verse 9. For I think that God has set forth us, the apostles, last. Listen carefully. Please, look up for a second. Last. Do you want to know the deep things of God? You're going to be last. God's going to put you on the bottom, not the top. You know what I sense? I sense there's some saying, not me, I'm not going to the bottom. Oh, now I know you're not saying it with your lips. But your actions are saying that. Yeah, your actions are saying that. You've resented the bottom place that God's wanted to put you in because you had your eye on the top. Yeah, yeah. That's what's happened. See, but God said the bottom. Oh, we want to know the deep things of God. But we don't want the bottom place. I know you haven't said it with your lips. Last, not first. Servant of all. Isn't that what Jesus did? Now watch this. As it were appointed to death, we were made the spectacle unto the world, angels and to men. We are fools for Christ's sake, but you are wise. We are weak, but you are strong. We are, you are honorable, but we are despised. Now notice these words, weak, fools, despised, dishonorable. Listen, let me ask this real quick. Where would we be with our faith and our trust as Alan exhorted? Where would we be with our faith and our zeal if God put us in a place where we become fools, filled with dishonor and a spectacle to the world, to men and to angels? The deep things of God. Jesus became sin and was spit upon. What if your brothers and sisters spit upon you after church today? Would you write them off? Would you write them? Deep things of God. Huh? Last, not first. Listen to this. Verse 11, Even unto this present hour we both hunger, thirst, and are naked. What if God put you in a place where you were hungry, thirsty, and naked with no clothes? Deep things of God. Would we still bless them? I will bless the Lord at all times. His praise shall continually be in my mouth. That's usually because we see something that we like. Right? That's usually because we see something that makes us happy. But what about the last? What about a spectacle? What about poor and naked, without a home? What about being misunderstood? What about your beard plucked out? What about the crown of thorns on the head? Deep things of God. You see how superficial our Christianity is? You see how it's all on the surface? But I'm telling you by the Spirit of God that God in this hour that we're living in is going to shake us and shake the church to the point where all of this superficial Christianity is going to perish and those that trust the Lord will trust Him all the way into the deep things of God. And we're going to be by the grace of God privileged, and I say it's a privilege, to come to the place where we die to self and we can love the unlovable. We can bless them that curse us. And it's not going to be our theology, Alan. It's going to be our practice that's going to prove the genuineness of our faith. Oftentimes we feel we're approved of God because we've got the theology down, Norman. But God says, oh no, oh no, oh no. It's not your theology, but it's what you're going to do when God entrusts you with the opportunity. Verse 12, And labor, working with our own hands, being reviled, we what? One more time. Being reviled, we what? Oh, come on. Being persecuted, we what? I'm out of here. I'm not serving God anymore. I'm tired of being persecuted. Being defamed. What does it mean to be defamed? Slandered. What do we do? We entreat. You know what that Greek word is? Encourage. We, huh? Console, comfort. Listen, we comfort and console those who slander us. Hmm. When was the last time you did that? Or did you slander them back? Did you, in your heart, fight them? These are the deep things of God, brother. And you know what we're describing? The person of Jesus Christ, aren't we? Because this is what He did. And guess what? We're called to become like Him. God will not be satisfied until the church demonstrates these qualities among themselves and then in the world. What did Stephen do when he was stoned? Father, I pray You'll bring down the severest judgment upon these redneck Pharisees because they don't know who You are and they're full of bitterness. Father, forgive them. Into Your hands I commit my spirit. Hmm. Being made as the filth of the world and the offscoring of all things unto this day. And I close. I write not these things to shame You, my beloved brothers and sisters, but to warn You. And I speak not these things to shame anyone, but to warn You. If you hear God's Spirit in this hour that we're living in, you're not going up. You're going down. And you're going to find the way to life is death and the way to become like Jesus is going to be being subject to the cross of dying to self. But I have good news. God's grace is sufficient. Let's bow our hearts and pray, please. Father, thank You for Your presence and thank You for the Holy Spirit and thank You for challenging the depths of our heart this morning, helping us to see that You're calling us to trust You, not to give up, but then helping us to see why. Why are we called to trust You? Because You have an end. You have a purpose. And that purpose, You want to see the qualities of Your Son expressed in us. Lord, we come to You. We say, Lord, here we are. We have nothing in ourself. Give us humility and grace to submit to Your hand of child training and make us like Your Son. We pray. Thank You for the blood of Christ that cleanses us from all our sin. Do the work, Lord, we pray. In Jesus' name. Hallelujah to God.