Aroma in Darkness

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Isaiah 50:10 AMP Who is among you who fears the LORD, Who obeys the voice of His Servant, Yet who walks in darkness and has no light? Let him trust and be confident in the name of the LORD and let him rely on his God.

  • There is nothing to look at
  • Nothing to hold up your faith
  • Except the promises of God and His character.

Yet who walks in darkness and has no light?

  • He will leave you at times in utter darkness.
  • Leave you without anything to sustain your hope or your faith
  • except your knowledge of his character.

And if God promised to hold the hand of Jesus when he walked on the earth,

  • you can be sure that he holds the hands of the Messiah’s disciples.

John 1:5 5 And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.

  • Who obeys the voice of His Servant, Jesus the Messiah

“So let him rely in the name of the Lord and rely on his God.”

  • Do that. Not trust in what you can see.
  • God will take away your feeling.
  • He will even take away the sense of His love from you.
  • He will sometimes leave you, and it seems completely barren.

Why is he doing it?

  • That you learn to trust in the nature, the character,
  • the word of your God!

Job and Abraham

Job feared the Lord.

  • You could say that he feared the devil.

Job 3:25 25 For the thing I greatly feared has come upon me, And what I dreaded has happened to me.

Job’s wife was not a believer in his faith.

Job 2:9 9 Then his wife said to him, “Do you still hold fast to your integrity? Curse God and die!”

  • She was in the family of a believer

Spiritually renewed?

It is possible to appear spiritually renewed without actually being so.

  • Some adopt Christian language and actions without a renewed spirit.

Friends sought justification in the righteousness they knew, only claiming the knowledge of spirituality without hearing from God.

  • One scolded Job for what he saw asself righteousness not fearing and trembling before God.

Job 16:2 2 “I have heard many such things; Miserable comforters are you all!

Job felt justified because he was confident that he was right with God.

  • The God asked some questions.

He just did not understand the reason he was going through this suffering.

He felt his wife and friends betrayed him.

Yet, he was willing to forgive and move on and enjoy God’s blessings trusting in the Lord.

Isaiah 50:10 AMP Who is among you who fears the LORD, Who obeys the voice of His Servant, Yet who walks in darkness and has no light? Let him trust and be confident in the name of the LORD and let him rely on his God.

Abraham

Romans 4:18 18 who, contrary to hope, in hope believed, so that he became the father of many nations, according to what was spoken, “So shall your descendants be.”

Can’t keep God’s healing.

  • Stomach ache – doctor’s visit
  • Faith vs Gift

Psalm 50:15-17 NKJV Call upon Me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you shall glorify Me.” [16] But to the wicked God says: “What right have you to declare My statutes, Or take My covenant in your mouth, [17] Seeing you hate instruction And cast My words behind you?

  1. Dead to the world but alive to Jesus
  2. Not totally dead, the world still holds a sway, but dedicated to the Lord, committed to Him, therefore requiring endurance.
  3. Faithless without denying Jesus, including sinning against Him, to them He remains faithful

Dead to the world but alive to Jesus

Galatians 2:20 I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.

  • The new me is not the old, unbelieving, selfish, self-reliant, world-worshipping me. It is the new trusting-in-Christ, enjoying-the-life-of-Christ-in-me person.

Not totally dead, the world still holds a sway, but dedicated to the Lord, committed to Him, therefore requiring endurance.

1 John 5:19 NKJV We know that we are of God, and the whole world lies under the sway of the wicked one.

Sometimes there is nothing to sustain your hope or your faith.

  • Faithless without denying Jesus, including sinning against Him,
  • to them He remains faithful.

Romans 8:28 And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.

  • Jealous God.

2 Timothy 2:11-13 NKJV This is a faithful saying: For if we died with Him, We shall also live with Him. [12] If we endure, We shall also reign with Him. If we deny Him, He also will deny us. [13] If we are faithless, He remains faithful; He cannot deny Himself.

If we sin, if we deny Him,

1 John 1:9 If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Unconditional Love

Ephesians 5:1-2 NKJV Therefore be imitators of God as dear children. [2] And walk in love, as Christ also has loved us and given Himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling aroma.

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