This sermon from Psalms 2 emphasizes the importance of trusting in God's sovereignty amidst societal challenges and the need for the Church to be a restraining influence against evil. It calls for a return to a deep relationship with God, acknowledging our weaknesses and allowing Him to work through us to counter the darkness in the world, just like God did with Abraham, Gideon, Esther, and Moses. The message encourages believers to bring their weaknesses to God, seek His power, and be willing vessels for His work on earth.

Psalm 2, please, if you go there. Psalm 2. Get ready to laugh with God. Get ready to laugh with God. Psalm 2, beginning of verse 1. Why do the nations rage, and the people plot a vain thing? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against his anointed, saying, Let us break their bonds in pieces, and cast away their cords from us. He who sits in the heavens shall laugh. The Lord shall hold them in derision. Then he shall speak to them in his wrath, and distress them in his deep displeasure. Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion. I will declare the decree the Lord has said to me. You are my son. Today I have begotten you. Ask of me, and I will give you the nations for your inheritance, the ends of the earth for your possession. You shall break them with a rod of iron. You shall dash them to pieces like a potter's vessel. Now therefore, be wise, O kings. Be instructed, you judges of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the son, that means embrace him with a truthful embrace, lest he be angry, and you perish in the way when his wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all those who put their trust in him." Now you and I are today undoubtedly living in a season in this nation where those in authority and those who approve of their rule are trying to cast away the restrictions on their behavior. Restrictions that have been in place because of the history of God and God's people among them. You have to understand that the only restraint against evil in the world is God, the presence of the Holy Spirit, and the people of God, the Church of Jesus Christ on this earth. If that restraining influence is ever broken, then all of the lawlessness that's in the hearts of humanity will cause this world to spiral down into something that's almost unthinkable to the natural mind. We have the examples of Scripture where this has happened. Sodom and Gomorrah, for example, were one. Noah's day, when the thoughts and intents of men's hearts were just evil continually. In other words, the capacity for good was gone. Men had been given over to depravity of mind to the point where God says, I can't continue. This cannot exist any longer. And you have to understand, and I have to understand, that there are flashpoints with God where a nation can only go so far in its wickedness, and finally it has crossed the line. And God says, you've gone as far as you can go. The ungodly feel emboldened by the collective belief that victory is at hand. And, of course, the victory they seek is to cast off all of the restraint on their behavior. They want to do what they want to do, and they want the thought that it might be evil cast out of the collective thinking of society, and they want that the cords, as it says, let's break their bonds in pieces. Let's break this collective thought that's been part of our society. Let's shatter it and cast it away from us so that we can have the license to do what we want to do the way we want to do it without consequence. Even though they feel emboldened by this collective belief that their victory is at hand, the Word of God tells you and I something that they cannot see. For don't forget, those without Christ are children of darkness. But we are not children of darkness. We are children of light and of the day. And there are things that ought not to be hidden to us, things that are clearly revealed in the Word of God. For example, for just an explicit example, the book of Isaiah clearly talked about Jesus Christ coming as the Messiah and how he would come, but yet those who chose darkness over light, the scripture says, couldn't see it, even though it was plainly declared. They couldn't see it, and those who marginally did probably made the choice not to believe it. The scripture tells us that God himself will laugh at their foolish thoughts, that they're their own and ultimately answerable to no one. The Supreme Court in this nation believes that they're the highest authority, but I have news for them. And to our president, if this ever should reach your desk, I had hope in my heart one day that I could call you a brother in Christ. For you said you loved Jesus, but I see no evidence in your life, in the things that you do, in the things that you embrace, in the things that you speak, that you've ever had or still do have a living relationship with the Son of God. Remember Jesus himself, that you said you loved, said these words, not everyone that says, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father which is in heaven. And so I encourage you to gladden my heart and gladden the hearts of many. If you do love Jesus, then don't be ashamed to be counted in with those who walk with him. Gladden my heart. I want to be able to call you my brother in Christ. I do honor you as the president of this nation, but a higher honor than that is that I could say with honesty, you are my brother. May God bless you, sir, and give you grace and strength for the days ahead. At a certain point in history, God will, in his displeasure, he will speak concerning those who have thought they could transgress his ways. They thought they could enter the fields of the fatherless, although it's clearly written, if you enter the fields of the fatherless, God said, I will arise and defend them. Thought they could craft any kind of a viewpoint that they wanted without consequence, but at a certain point, the Lord says, in his displeasure, he will speak concerning them and he will cause something or someone to stand in their way and cause them to be deeply distressed as their plans fail before their eyes. Says, he who sits in the heavens shall laugh. The Lord shall hold them in derision. In other words, a confusion, a confounding of their objectives will come and he will speak to them in his wrath and distress them in his deep displeasure. We're not the first people to experience this type of moment in history. Remember the people of God. Says, if we've trusted in God in Psalm 2 verse 12, we too are blessed as they once were. Says, blessed are all those who put their trust in him. There have been people throughout history that trusted in God and it's through these people that God has kept the testimony of his presence and his truth alive in every society. Galatians 3, 8, and 9 gives us this promise that in you all nations shall be blessed. Now that was God speaking to Abraham, but Paul goes on and says, so then those who are of faith are blessed with believing Abraham. Now the blessing on Abraham was that God said, I will multiply you. I will multiply your influence. I'll multiply your descendants to the point that all the world will be blessed through you. Now you have to understand that's the purpose of your life and mine. The world is to be blessed through your life. Your neighbors, your friends, the people you associate with, and even beyond should the Lord decide to use you in a more public way. This world is to be blessed through your life by turning it from its course and turning people, men and women and children, back to the knowledge of who God really is. But the presence of God that was on those who came before and was to bring glory to God was to be a restraining influence, and if that restraining influence is gone, if you've lost your place in the body of Christ, if you've lost your purpose on the earth, you might be the only thing left that's stopping darkness in the lives of people around you. And when the church of Jesus Christ loses its collective understanding of this truth, it steps aside and lets humanity plunge itself into very deep and horrible darkness. These early people of God, the children of Israel, forgot their divine purpose on the earth, and they turned inward, and they settled for a lesser form of religious practice over relationship, and that is the problem that every generation faces. We forget that this is a relationship. We forget that we have a divine purpose to be a blessing on the earth. And Proverbs 29 18 says, where there's no revelation, the people cast off restraint. In other words, here's what it really means. Where there is no real sight of the divine presence of God, where there's no visible manifestation of who God is among the people, the people become undisciplined, unbridled, they cut loose, they become lawless, and they start to run wild. Those are the definitions right from the original text. Where there's no revelation, hence we have the lament of God's own people in Isaiah chapter 59 beginning at verse 9. Listen to what God's people, these people who are called to be a blessing on the earth, therefore justice is far from us, nor does righteousness overtake us. We look for light, but there is darkness. For brightness, but we walk in blackness. We grope for the wall like the blind, and we grope as if we had no eyes. We stumble at noonday as the twilight, whereas dead men in desolate places. We all growl like bears and moan sadly like doves. Verse 11, we look for justice, but there's none. For salvation, but it seems far from us. For our transgressions are multiplied before you, and our sins testify against us. For our transgressions are with us, and as for our iniquities, we know them. In transgressing and lying against the Lord and departing from our God, speaking oppression and revolt, conceiving and uttering from the heart words of falsehood. Justice is turned back, and righteousness stands afar off, and truth has fallen in the street, and equity cannot enter. So truth fails, and he who departs from evil makes himself a prey, like the young lady who was sent to jail this week for simply refusing to issue a marriage license that she considered violated her conscience. People who want to walk in truth become preyed upon by a society that is bent on eradicating everything that has formerly brought restraint to their thought and their behavior. If we're going to know an awakening in America today, the church countrywide in America, we must have the courage to ask ourselves some honest questions. It can't be a fearful thing. I think it's more fearful not to ask these questions. We have to have the courage. You have to have it. I have to have it. Each one of us must come to the Lord, and just as he says to Isaiah, come let us reason together. God is not against us. God is for us, and so God is for us, and if he set before us an open door, we're wise to say, what must I do that I might go through that door, and what must I do that I might find your divine purpose for my life, and how do I get to a place where the power of God is so evident in my life that it pushes back darkness around me? Not talking about an angry testimony, we're talking about people who so represent the Christ who went to a cross that conviction comes into the hearts of those who can still hear the voice of God, and they begin to turn from their ways. We're supposed to be a blessing to this nation, but have we been? I'm speaking collectively to the church in all of America. Have we been a blessing, or are we just an argument trying to contain the behaviors of the ungodly while we enjoy our vacation? Which is it? Have we really been a blessing? Have we been abandoned to the purposes of God, or we just laid in a hammock and shouted over the fence and tried to tell people how they should live their lives? Have we been cast underfoot as worthless and irrelevant, and if that's true, why? Jesus said if salt has lost its savor, if salt is not creating thirst, if salt is not preserving, if salt is not healing, then men take it and they cast it underfoot and count it worthless, and is that so? Are we a worthless testimony to this society? Is there anything of value left in the house of God that the unregenerate want to come in? Are there churches in America where people are lining up down the street trying to get in because the presence of God is there among his people? Are we truly salt, or have we been cast underfoot as irrelevant? Have we tried, like Abraham did, to craft our own victories? Have we fallen into the trap of thinking that through human effort we can be godly? Through human effort we can win the battle? Oh, the tragedy, the foolishness of what we have done in this country. We threw out the evangelists and we brought in the strategists, and we crafted surveys and invented all kinds of foolish things thinking this is going to fill the house of God, and in some cases it actually worked, but what did we fill the house of God with? That's the next question. Why are the societies around not changed by the churches? We can have churches in the tens of thousands, but yet the vicinity around them is just as ungodly as it always has been, and those of us who have tried to stay on the side of truth, what contrast to the ways of this world have we presented if we're going to be honest about it? How deep have we been willing to go? How much sacrifice have we been willing to make? Have we really gone into the prayer closet and said, Lord, not my will but thine be done? If we're willing to admit our need, then what will God do? If we carry on in Isaiah 59, we have the answer beginning in, it says, Then the Lord saw it, verse 15, and it displeased him that there was no justice. And he saw that there was no man and wondered that there was no intercessor. Therefore his own arm brought salvation for him, and his own righteousness sustained him. For he put on righteousness as a breastplate and a helmet of salvation on his head, and put on the garments of vengeance for clothing, and was clad with zeal as a cloak. According to their deeds, accordingly he will repay, fury to his adversaries, recompense to his enemies. The coastlands will he fully repay. And so shall they fear the name of the Lord from the west and his glory from the rising of the sun. When the enemy comes in like a flood, the spirit of the Lord will lift up a standard against him. And the Redeemer will come to Zion. And to those who turn from transgression in Jacob, says the Lord. God says, I will come to those who are willing to turn from everything that has hindered you from God's purpose for your life. I will come to you. I'll come to you in strength. I'll come to you in power. I'll come to you in deliverance. I'll come to you in victory. I'll raise you up no matter how weak you might think you are, no matter how hopeless your testimony has been, no matter how dim your future might seem in the natural. God says if you're willing, if you're willing to turn from that which is hindering you, from being a testimony of who I am to this world, to this generation, I will come to you. I will raise you up. You will be the standard of God that is raised against this flood of evil that's coming upon our nation. I will put words in your mouth. I will put bounce in your step. I will put determination in your heart. I will give courage to your character. I will be a voice to you that says this is the way, walk in it. I will stretch out my hands through you and healing will begin to happen everywhere you go. I will give you knowledge and wisdom and courage so far beyond any of your natural ability that even your enemies will stand back and say, where did this man, where did this woman get such wisdom and such knowledge? They have not learned what they're speaking. The only thing we can say is by their testimony they have been with Jesus. They have been with the one that we've tried to cast away from our society. Abraham was just like we are. Listen to me. He was called to be a blessing. He was called to bless the earth. He was called to be the father of the people who are going to bring glory to God, would cause sin to be pushed back, would cause the nations of the world to take wonder at who God is. But he came to a place in his life where he knew he could not produce this testimony by himself. He tried and he failed. He was a hundred years old. The odds of producing this blessing were down to literally zero. But the God who laughs was about to make him laugh. Remember the scripture says he who sits in the heavens shall laugh and hold them in derision and distress them. Talking about when a society tries to push away everything that represents God and godliness in a nation. God is about to make us laugh. God was about to make Abraham laugh. Listen to Genesis 21 verses 3 to 6. Now Abraham called the name of his son who was born to him who Sarah bore to him Isaac. And the name Isaac means laughter. Then Abraham circumcised his son Isaac when he was eight days old as God had commanded him. Now Abraham was 100 years old when his son Isaac was born to him. And Sarah said God has made me laugh and all who hear will laugh with me. The scripture says remember Psalm 126 says when the Lord turned away our captivity we were like them that dream. Then was our mouth filled with laughter and our tongues with singing. When it looked hopeless. When it looked like we were captivated. When it looked like Babylon was too strong. When it looked like the journey back was too long too hard. We lacked the resources to do it. When all of our plans and our strategies and even our false hopes that we had embraced through false prophets. When all of that was gone then suddenly out of nowhere a king issues a decree telling us we can go home. Not only telling us we can go home but we can rebuild when we get there. Not only telling us we can rebuild but giving us protection along the journey. Not only giving us protection but giving us materials to rebuild when we get there. To rebuild the testimony of God and the earth. And they said we were like those who dream. Our mouths were filled with laughter because that's what God always does. Do you understand that? When the enemy comes in like a flood the Spirit of the Lord raises up a standard against it. Rome was a dominant empire. Rome thought its ways and its intellect were superior to everything around it. Rome conquered by force and violence and threat. And so what would God do to counter such a force that was even threatening the future and the existence of his own people? He took a hundred and twenty failures just like you and me. People who knew they were weak. People who knew the promises of God would never be fulfilled through them unless God himself chose to do it. And they went into an upper room and they began to pray and I don't know exactly what they prayed but it was probably something like this. God you've given us such great and exceeding promises and you've told me that my life is going to be a blessing on the earth but oh Lord all I can see is failure and frustration and I realize oh God that without your power I will never be what I'm called to be. And so I simply lift my hands to you and say Lord if you can use this empty vessel come and fill it oh God and glorify your name on the earth. And when the Lord turned their captivity I see in my mind's eye if there's such a thing as a video room when I get to heaven I want to see this one. I can see that hundred and twenty coming out of that upper room and bursting into the marketplace. And in the marketplace there are three thousand people who are probably quite content to have Christ eradicated because he was interfering with their religious practice and their belief system. But nevertheless they walked out into that marketplace with their mouths filled with the glory of God. Their tongues confessing a power that was greater than their own and they were doing it with the first evidence of supernatural power speaking to men of other nations and languages and tongues about the wonderful works of God the power of God and the blessing of God. They were the fulfillment of the promise of Abraham and that's where you and I are today. We can hunker down and try to survive the onslaught of godlessness and hope that the trumpet sounds and takes us all home. Or we can go back to where the power of God is and we know it is. We go to that place the ungodly know nothing about. We go into that place not in our strength not with a plan but in our weakness. We come to the throne of grace and say Lord God my life is supposed to be a blessing and I am not content that it be anything else than what you have decreed in my life is supposed to be. And so I lift my empty basket up to you God and I ask for your power your grace and your glory to fill my life one more time and make me a presence on the earth that has to be reckoned with. He who sits in the heavens shall laugh and one more time he takes those of us who desire him those of us who are weak those of us who are living in impossible places in our lives and one more time he shares with us the power of his resurrected life. He who sits in the heavens shall laugh. Yes he laughs at the foolishness of the ungodly but I'm sure he laughs with delight at how he counters it proving to this world that he is God. He is God and he lifts up the weak and the wounded one more time the frail the nobodies the nothings. That's why Paul says consider your calling brother not many mighty not many noble not many wise not many of royal birth but God has chosen the foolish things of this world to confound the wise God has chosen the weak things to confound those things that are mighty God has chosen the things that are nothing to bring to nothing everything that exists by its own strength in its own reason that no flesh can glory but in the presence of God. So God one more time comes and asks the question are you ready to laugh with me yet? Because realistically it is laughable when God uses us. It is. Are you ready to laugh with God? Are you ready to say Lord here I am? Gideon the least of the least in the least of the least house in the least tribe the least family the least resources here I am Esther I've not even been asked into the King's presence in 30 days here I am Moses all I've got is a stick and a stammering tongue are you sure? God says I'm sure. I have such hope in my heart. Now there are people who will simply choose to live by what they see and think and know in the natural and they will miss out on what God wants to do but there are always Gideon's and Esther's and Moses in every church age who just say I'm in I'm in I got less than the boy with three fish or a couple of fish and some biscuits but I I'm in I'm in all the way with God and so Lord I'm asking you to take my life and make me laugh with joy for what you will do God who sits in heaven will laugh I hope you can see this and so my other call is very very simple today where are you the weakest? I can I can hear it now some people saying everywhere do you want me to start with number 10 down to 1 or so get ready to laugh with God I'm serious about this let him take your life now and make you everything that he destined you to be if you are serious about this you will be met with the power of God in a way that you've never dreamt you could you'll be released from captivity the things that the thoughts that hold you in bondage that the hellish things that were spoken over your life that told you that you'd never amount to anything or the things that weren't spoken over your life and left you trying to figure out what life is even all about you'll take you in the deepest places of weakness and that will become his strength and you will laugh you will rejoice you will be just like those in Psalm 126 says then our mouths were filled with laughter and our tongues with singing Oh God God truly you you still do it the way you always did we turn to colleges for our strategy but you turn to people always have and always will and so I want to give an older call today here at Times Square Church in the Annex as well as a North Jersey God bless you there in North Jersey and those that are listening at home get ready to laugh with God I want you to bring to God your weakness not your strength bring him your weakness today bring them those areas of your life that you know that without God you're never going to get free you're never going to change bring him your fearful heart let him put courage in it bring him your record of unfaithfulness let him change that record bring him your prayerless life and let him give you the power to pray just bring it to him bring it all to him bring him your condition if you're far from him like the wayward son was the gospel of Luke just get up and come home and just bring the whole mess to him remember there was a party after he get up to come home there must have been lots of laughter at that party as well enjoy just bring him your weakness we're going to worship for a little while the joy of the Lord has been here this whole service you know you notice that so as we stand I want you to bring your weakness to God everybody here struggling fearful terrified just come as prophet Isaiah said you has no money and no price come come get what you need don't you don't need to plea bargain with God you just come bring them what you need we're going to worship for about 10 minutes and think about these things when you come to this altar today hallelujah I was somewhere in my middle 20s and I'd come to Christ and I was deeply frustrated that my inability my own inability to to serve God to be a living witness for him and and plus things in my life that I wasn't free from and one night in my kitchen I just called out to God I said Lord if if you will set me free I'll give you the rest of my life and I'll live for you I had a lot of fear in my life a lot of anger had a lot of stuff and no ability at all but I had a divine encounter with God that night he met me and that's what we have always needed that's where the strength of God is so don't count yourself out count yourself in count yourself in among those that God will use throughout history that have acknowledged their need of him and made that commitment Lord you you give me the gifts and the ability I'll go but I won't go to represent you you have to represent yourself through me that's the way it works I'm not going to go and just talk about a God who's not in my life you have to show people and that Lord says I'll raise up a standard and that's always been the standard of God it's always been people just like you and me and most often the weakest of the week just the heart that has faith and says God I'll give it all to you whatever you give to me I'll just give it to you now father I thank you for my brothers and sisters thank you Lord that this word today has gone deeper than just just an agreement with something it's something that's stirring and will keep stirring in every heart and may we not be able to let it go or lay it down until we have had that encounter with you each of us have found out what it is that you would have us do and Lord you never call without equipping never ever and the equippings of God are divine they're supernatural and so Lord God we ask you to shake the place where we are give us boldness to speak your word and stretch your hand out through us to heal to heal the sin-sick generation that we live in thank you Lord God thank you in Jesus name amen