Date: November 8, 2018 ()

Bible Text: |

Series:

Today we are talking about God’s timing. Last week we talked about waiting on God; waiting, waiting and waiting. I had the picture of the man sitting in the waiting room all by himself. I know you know that feeling. We all know it. Sometimes we get to thinking that it is the only way God works. However, sometimes God works in exactly the opposite way. Suddenly. He moves out of the blue when you are not even expecting it. It is so exciting to walk with God. You never know what is going to happen next. Why is that? It is because He is running the show and we are not. No matter how much you think you are in control of your life, you are not. Ultimately, God knows what is going on.

What is the problem? It is letting Him have control and be the boss. You are not the boss. It goes a lot smoother if you do that. There is a lot more happiness, a lot more peace. I hope you do not go your whole life running your life yourself, because you can come to the end of days and suddenly your time is up and you missed it your whole life. You missed the big thing because you got preoccupied with the little things.

There are a lot of verses on waiting in the Bible. There is a great website called www.biblegateway.com to read up on verses and do searches on particular words. I had done a study previously on waiting on the internet. I decided to try typing in “suddenly” to do a new search. I was amazed at how many important times in the Bible the word suddenly appears. We are going to look at those today.

Have you ever had God startle you and something happened quicker than you thought it would? You were thinking, “I do not know if I am ready or not.” God is saying “Yes, you are.” I have a friend whose wife was pregnant and the baby was not supposed to come for another month. It was their first baby. They were not ready for the baby yet. All of a sudden, the woman said, “I am having the baby. We have got to get me to the hospital.” They were going as fast as they could to get her to the hospital and she kept saying, “I think the baby is coming in the car. I think it is coming.” They called the doctor. The doctor was telling them what to do. They got to the hospital. The doctor said, “It is going to come fast. You better get ready.” But the baby was breech. All of a sudden the baby did not come and they had to do a C-section. In a matter of minutes that baby was out of her stomach, on out crying. God can move very suddenly, very quickly.

One time my husband and I were waiting and waiting and waiting on God to show us what his perfect plan was for us next. We knew God had something. Nothing we did could make it happen. Nothing. Just when we thought, “How long are we going to have to wait,” suddenly God was ready to move. All of that time He had been working on a man on the other end. That man was trying to get his life in order to do what he wanted to do with his life, and we were waiting on it. When that man made up his mind what he was going to do, made his choice, which was actually to move back to Panama, then what we were looking for in a clinic for my husband opened up so fast we thought it was the devil. Is that not funny how you can do that? When something wonderful happens you think, “Oh my goodness, this must be the devil.’ Wow. Crazy thinking. Within a three week period, after waiting a year and a half for God to move and to tell us what to do; suddenly we found out about the job, put our house on the market and sold our house in a matter of days. We found a place to rent here, bought the clinic, my husband was working and we were living in the house. All in a matter of three weeks, bam, it happened.

I have a friend who was a pastor at my church. I went to a party and his wife said, “Something is up. God is doing something new. I do not know what it is, but I can feel it in my spirit. Something new is coming.” We all said, “Do you know what it is? She said, “No idea at all.” A couple of weeks later we had a prophet come to our church and he looked at this pastor and said, “God has a brand new call on your life and it is going to happen quickly.” Did you know within one week he had moved? This was a man who had been a member of our church for over 25 years. I thought he would be there forever. When God was ready to move, suddenly it happened so fast we were all in shock.

(Look at this picture. See this sign about suddenly. Danger. Watch Out. Be Ready.) It can happen quickly. Sometimes God sends you a sign and tells you. He might give you a vision. He might give you a dream. Even in the dream it can happen quickly. That is God telling you to get ready because He is going to move fast.”

Look at this first Scripture in Genesis 37:5-7. “One night Joseph had a dream and when he told his brothers about it they hated him more than ever. Listen to this dream, he said. We were all out in the field tying up bundles of grain and suddenly my bundle stood up and your bundles all gathered around and bowed low before mine.” There was God coming to Joseph in a dream and telling him what was going to happen and that it was going to happen quickly. There is another one in Ruth 3:8. It is talking about Ruth and Boaz. Ruth was a Moabite. She was not a Jew and yet she followed her mother-in-law back to the home land. She said, “Where you go, I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God.” Ruth wanted to be married again. Her husband had passed away. There was a wonderful man named Boaz that the mother-in-law said, “Here is who you need to go for and let me tell you how to do it.” They had a plan, but for Boaz, he did not know this plan was going on. Listen to what it says about him. “In the middle of the night, the man was suddenly startled and he sat up, surprised. The woman was asleep at his feet.” What startled him and made him sit up suddenly.

The second Scripture in Daniel 8:15. Daniel had a lot of unusual visions. Some things have not even happened yet. He says, “While I, Daniel, was trying to make sense of what I was seeing, suddenly there was a human-like figure standing before me.” That human-like figure began to talk to Daniel. I have heard people talk about an angel appearing to them and how suddenly there was somebody there. I have even had it happen to me, so I know it can happen. Why does God do that? Why does He move like that? I do not know. It is just how God chooses to move.

In Malachi 3:1 while they were waiting for the Lord to come, He said, “Look I am sending my messenger and he will prepare the way before me, then the Lord you are seeking will suddenly come to His temple. The messenger of the covenant whom you look for so eagerly is surely coming says the Lord of heaven’s armies.” In the end times, Jesus says you better get ready. Do not be found sleeping. Make sure you have oil in your lamp, because when I come it is going to be so fast. That is the way it was with weddings in Israel. They never knew when the bridegroom was coming. But when he came, everything went into high gear and it took place. Are you ready for Jesus to come back? Have you got your lamp ready, your wick trimmed? Are you living for Him? Make sure you are not living a life that would not please the Lord or that you would even be embarrassed about. What if the Lord came suddenly, right this minute? What are you doing right this minute? Is it something you can look up and say,”Oh Jesus, I love You and I am so glad I was doing this.” Or is it like, “Oh Lord, forgive me. I am sorry. I am going to get ready.”

God can come suddenly even when your enemies are in opposition to you. You may feel like, “I am out here. I am all by myself. I do not know where God is. I do not know why He is not showing up. I feel abandoned.” And yet, God can come suddenly and rescue you. An example of God coming suddenly and rescuing in the Bible can be found in Numbers 16:42. It involves Moses and Aaron. Moses had such a big job guiding millions of people to the Promised Land. Over and over and over they would get so disgusted with Moses, with what was going on, the lack of food, the trip and everything. He constantly had to work with this. Sometimes they would gather as a group against him. Look at this one in Numbers 16:42. It says, “But when the assembly gathered in opposition to Moses and Aaron and turned toward the tent of meeting, suddenly the cloud covered it and the Glory of the Lord appeared.” I have had that happen, not with opposition, I was just talking with a friend in a car, sitting outside of a Church’s Fried Chicken. We were just talking about Jesus and suddenly that very thing happened. The cloud came in the car. The Glory of the Lord appeared and filled the whole car. You say, “Can that really happen?” It happened to me. I was not expecting it, was not looking for it and actually did not know it could happen. Suddenly, it was there. What a glorious thing! I think God does it just to keep it on your toes, surprise you, excite you and thrill you with how He is.

God is always moving, moving and moving. He is never dull and boring. In fact, the Bible says the back- slider’s life is boring and the Godly man’s life is exciting. If your Godly life is not exciting, you need to get with the program and say, “Lord, mine is not exciting. It is dull and boring. I must be backslidden and not even know it. Tell me what to do.” There are times that you can be worshipping God in praise and worship, and suddenly God moves in. You can feel it happen. You can feel the Holy Spirit move in. One time I was speaking at a women’s conference in a hotel. All of a sudden we all knew Jesus walked into the room. Jesus was in everybody there, but this was some kind of a manifestation. We knew He walked into the room and we all got on our knees. That is how we knew that He was there. It was holy feeling and everybody got on their knees because they knew the Lord of Glory had entered the room suddenly. In Psalms 18:28 David says, “Suddenly God, you flood light my life. I am blazing with Glory, God’s Glory.” There are times that God’s understanding and insight suddenly hits you. It can be with the supernatural gift of the Word of Knowledge where all of a sudden you know exactly what needs to be done or what is going to happen. You know it. God sent it to you suddenly.

Sometimes there can be a major move in the life of your church. God moves sovereignly and everybody is caught off guard and they are hustling trying to catch up, trying to figure out what is going on and how to handle it. Sometimes when God is moving like that, things can be kind of chaotic. Everybody is questioning, is this God? Is this really God? You see things happening and you think, “That is not God. Is this God?” It is just because people are trying to figure out what is going on and everybody is trying to get in place, doing what they need to be doing.

In the third Scripture there is another suddenly. In Acts 2:2 it says, “Suddenly, there was a sound from heaven like the roaring of a mighty windstorm (like a tornado) and it filled the house where they were sitting. Then, what looked like tongues or flames of fire appeared and settled on each one of them and everyone present was filled with the Holy Spirit and began speaking in other languages as the Holy Spirit gave them this ability.” Think about it, those 120 people had obeyed Jesus. He said to wait until the Spirit comes. You are going to get power to be my witnesses to people. They were waiting. What were they doing while they were waiting? That is really interesting. They were praising, reading the Bible, encouraging one another, probably somebody was preaching and they had an expectation in their heart.

Do you have an expectation in your heart that God is going to move suddenly in your life at different times? It is okay to have that expectation. You need to have it, because God delights when you have that kind of faith. It is almost like a childlike faith.

God can come in warfare against your enemies in very concrete ways. In Joshua 11:7, “So Joshua and his whole army came against them suddenly at the Waters of Merom and attacked them.” God gave them a battle plan and He said this is what I want you to do. When I tell you to do it, do it. In Isaiah it describes what God will do to the enemies of Jerusalem. When you read about end time prophesies and what is going to happen in the end times, you see that God says there is coming a day when I will move and it will be powerful and nobody will be able to stand against the Lord. Will that not be a great day? Is that not something we all look forward to? When God is ready to do it there is a designated time and Jesus said, “I do not even know when it is. The angels do not know when it is. Only God knows the final time. When He is ready, it is going to happen suddenly.” Suddenly, a bunch of us are all going to be missing. What is going to happen then? What do you think people will be saying? Do you think they will try to find a natural explanation for it? Do you think it will be so chaotic that they do not even notice who is gone because there is too much chaos going on? It says, “In the twinkling of an eye.” That is suddenly. That is about as suddenly as you can get. Now watch me, I am going to blink. I just blinked, but that is not even as fast as a twinkle. The twinkling of your eye is just when your eye kind of dances. In the twinkling of an eye, suddenly, we are all going to be gone. Wow, that is exciting!

Look at this Scripture number four in Isaiah 29:5-7. “But suddenly your ruthless enemies will be crushed like the finest of dust. Your many attackers will be driven away like chaff before the wind. Suddenly, in an instant, I the Lord of Heaven’s Armies will act for you with thunder, earthquake and great noise, with whirlwind and storm and consuming fire. All of the nations fighting against Jerusalem will vanish like a dream. Those who are attacking her walls will vanish like a vision in the night.” I see this happening in Africa especially with these evil rulers that they have. Suddenly, God says, I will attack your enemies.

There are some of you watching right now and you feel like your enemies are winning. You are on the run and you are crying out to God for mercy, for help, for Him to come quickly. You feel like your enemies are going to win. God says, “You trust in Me, and suddenly you will look around and think, what happened to them Lord, they are gone.” That is the Lord rescuing you like that. Look at that. It says, “Those who are attacking her walls will vanish like a vision in the night.”

What is another way that God comes suddenly? It is with angels. Angelic visitations come so fast that you do not even know what to think. You are still trying to figure out, “Who is that? Is that a man? Is that an angel? What did I just see? Was that it?” I want to show you many times in the Bible that one of God’s favorite ways to come suddenly is with angels. Luke 2:9 is when the shepherds were out in the field. They were just tending their flocks. It was just an ordinary night on the job. It was quiet. The sheep were kind of quiet; nothing going on. No danger was going on. Some of them were drifting off to sleep probably, some of them having a hard time staying awake. “Suddenly, an angel of the Lord appeared among them and the radiance of the Lord surrounded them. They were terrified.” That is a pretty normal reaction. What would you have done? It is quiet and then BAM! They were terrified. In Luke 2:13 it happened again in that same situation. “Suddenly, a great company of the heavenly hosts appeared with the angels praising God and saying Glory to God in the Highest and peace on earth to men.” First, suddenly the angel appeared and then suddenly the heavenly hosts appeared. It does not say singing. We always have it where the angels were singing then. It does not say that. They were speaking what they wanted to say about God. They wanted men to hear it.

Where else do we hear about angels appearing suddenly? It was at the resurrection of Jesus. Look at Matthew 28:2. “Suddenly there was a great earthquake.” Have you ever seen an earthquake come? Have you ever heard about one on television that did not come suddenly? Yet, there had been great planning in the earth because I am sure that deep, deep down it was beginning to show and rumble. Nobody knew it. “Suddenly there was a great earthquake because an angel of the Lord came down from heaven and rolled aside the stone and sat on it.” In Luke 24:2-4, it says, “They found that the stone had been rolled away from the entrance.” First you have an angel coming and rolling aside the stone and sitting on it. Later they find that it is rolled away and they went in but they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. They are trying to figure out what happened. Where is His body? As they stood there puzzled, two men suddenly appeared to them clothed in dazzling robes. Then they began talking to them.

Where else do you see an angel doing something? It was in the resurrection in Acts 1:9-10. “After saying this, He was taken up into a cloud while they were watching and then they could no longer see him.” They were looking up and then He was gone. There was nothing there. As they strained to see Him rising into heaven, two white robed men suddenly stood among them. They looked like normal men. Even after Jesus went up into heaven, there were still angels appearing suddenly. There are angels appearing today suddenly.

Acts 10:30 says, “Cornelius replied, four days ago I was praying in my house about this same time, 3 o’clock in the afternoon. Suddenly, a man in dazzling clothes was standing in front of me.” Suddenly. I had that happen to me about a year ago. I was painting the steps in my basement. I was turning my basement into my office. The men had worked on it for so long. It had gone on and on and on and on and I was very frustrated. I was tired of the mess. You know how it is when you are remodeling your house, it drives you crazy after a while and you just want to get it over with. I thought that I am going to paint these stairs. I am going to get this done. I do not care if it is late at night. I had on these warmups that had paint all over them. My hair was not done. I was just frustrated. I was painting these stairs. I was using one of those little squares with felt to paint with. You dip it into a little paint and then you rub it on the stairs. I was doing that and the little felt piece kept popping out because I did not have it put in properly. Every time I would try to push it back in there because I had paint all over it, I would get paint all over me again. It was all over my hands and I got even more frustrated. I was sitting there thinking, “Betty, you can either keep doing this until midnight or you can get up and go to Home Depot and get a paint brush.” I did. I was frustrated and as I went through the light I heard somebody right beside me say, “How are you doing tonight.” I thought, “Who is that?” I said, “Fine, now that you are here.” I thought, “Why did I say that? Who is that?” That same suddenly startles you. God and Jesus are with me. The Holy Spirit is with me all of the time. Who is over there that I cannot see and they say how are you doing tonight, and I say fine now that you are here? Who am I talking to? I knew there was an angel there. It was my guardian angel suddenly appearing to help me when I am so frustrated.

Allow God to do the “suddenlys” in your life too. They are exciting.

QUIET TIME QUESTIONS

1. Why don’t we know what is going to happen next?
2. How does praise and worship work to bring about the “suddenly’s?”
3. How can you tell when God is moving suddenly?
4. When God acts suddenly on your behalf how does he show himself?
5. What scripture from this lesson speaks to you about God’s timing?
6. Are you ready for God’s suddenly’s?

Topics: