Please stand together as we recite the Shema.
The Shema
Hear O Israel!
The Lord is our God – the Lord Alone.
Love the Lord your God
With all your heart,
With all your soul,
And with all your might,
And love your neighbor as yourself. Amen.
Thank you, you may be seated.
1 Sam 23:26, And Saul went on one side of the mountain, and David and his men on the other side of the mountain; and David was hurrying to get away from Saul, for Saul and his men were surrounding David and his men to seize them.
	We have been considering the manner in which we can count on the Lord, no matter what is arrayed against us. The last time we dealt with the song of David, praising the Lord for the manner in which He was so faithful in protecting David from the vicious onslaught of King Saul. David was being very careful in the manner of his dealing with Saul because he did not want to do anything that would hinder what the Lord was going to bring into place. David refused to take matters into his own hands and try to bring about that which he thought would be the end result.
	Rather, David was willing to do what was needed in order to allow the Lord to bring into place that which was His design and will. Accordingly, rather than striking back at the one who was chasing, and often very close to catching him, David continued to seek refuge Jehovah while hiding in the wilderness and in the camps of the Philistines. This was instead of going on the offensive and taking the crown by force.
	David declared, again and again, just how much it meant to know that the Lord was surrounding him with all Jehovah’s protection and grace and mercy and loving-kindness. This was especially when those who would seek to destroy David were actively working to eliminate him with their vicious intents and deadly schemes. 
No matter how close the enemy might be, the Lord was closer and much more powerful every single time David was in peril. For that, David had to declare and thank and glorify the Lord of lords and the King of kings.
	Another, who found himself in a similar situation, surrounded by those who would destroy the very city of Jerusalem, was a later descendent of David and king of Judah, Jehoshaphat. He, as well, understood the fact that the Lord was the Defender of His people and the anointed king whom God placed on the throne of Judah. As the king over the people of The Lord, Jehoshaphat faced his fear of utter annihilation. He trusted in the Omnipotent protection of Jehovah to bring forth the salvation of His people.
	Please open in your Bibles to 2 Chron 20:5-13. We want to read this encouragement of Jehoshaphat to his own heart, as well as to the hearts of those to whom he was willing to lay down his very life for their protection. He knew where to turn when everything around him seemed to be on the brink of ruination. 
	2 Chron 20:5-13, Then Jehoshaphat stood in the assembly of Judah and Jerusalem, in the house of the Lord before the new court, and he said, "O Lord, the God of our fathers, art Thou not God in the heavens? And art Thou not ruler over all the kingdoms of the nations? Power and might are in Thy hand so that no one can stand against Thee. Didst Thou not, O our God, drive out the inhabitants of this land before Thy people Israel, and give it to the descendants of Abraham Thy friend forever? "And they lived in it, and have built Thee a sanctuary there for Thy name, saying, 'Should evil come upon us, the sword, or judgment, or pestilence, or famine, we will stand before this house and before Thee (for Thy name is in this house) and cry to Thee in our distress, and Thou wilt hear and deliver us.' "And now behold, the sons of Ammon and Moab and Mount Seir, whom Thou didst not let Israel invade when they came out of the land of Egypt (they turned aside from them and did not destroy them), behold how they are rewarding us, by coming to drive us out from Thy possession which Thou hast given us as an inheritance. O our God, wilt Thou not judge them? For we are powerless before this great multitude who are coming against us; nor do we know what to do, but our eyes are on Thee." And all Judah was standing before the Lord, with their infants, their wives, and their children. 
	Jehoshaphat stood before the people, in standing before the Lord and laid out the fact of what was taking place. He set before the Lord and the people the reality that they could not look for any human help to any man for deliverance! There would be no salvation for Jerusalem unless the Lord chose to intervene as He had for their forefathers. 
Everything was lost except for the fact that God had brought His people into this place for the sake of a witness before all the other nations. They were to show Who God was and all that The Lord God, Jehovah, would do to maintain His people in the land of His promise. The cry was unto the Lord! Their only hope was in Him!
	Judah was not strong enough, in weaponry and manpower to face the onslaught that was steady and unhindered in its approach to destroy the city of the Lord. The people were not going to Egypt for help. Everything of earthly means was utterly hopeless. If God, Himself, did not make known His Omnipotent protection, the nation would cease to exist.
	While we might not find this particularly encouraging, apparently the people with Jehoshaphat did. When the king, who was the one who was supposed to have all the answers to protect his people cried out to the Lord as the only means for survival, the people as well turned to the Lord. And all Judah was standing before the Lord, with their infants, their wives, and their children. 
The king did lead in the example of where the only hope was set. It was set in the Lord. Accordingly, he pointed the people, through his wise example, to turn to the Lord and to seek after Jehovah as the sole means of dealing with the fear and the anxiety and the imminent doom that was hurtling itself toward them. 	
	As we were reading this passage aloud, did one of the phrases ring very true and familiar to our ears? It is one that many of us, if not all of us have cried out unto the Lord. This is in our times of grief and despair and utter loss of any ability to go forward on our own power or in our lack of wisdom or in our feeble and foolish attempts to make a way where there was no way. 
Just as Jehoshaphat lamented before the Lord for all the people to hear and to understand that he could not be of any help, only the Lord could save them. For we are powerless before this great multitude who are coming against us; nor do we know what to do, but our eyes are on Thee. He made it very evident that he was counting on the Lord …our eyes are on Thee… That is where the king was looking and that is where he encouraged the people to look. That is precisely where the Lord, through this passage, invites us to look. It is to the Lord to be our salvation, no matter what we are going through, no matter how violent the storms and the gales that are battering us with all fury and vicious and biting force and teeth of ice and wind and sleet!
We all have come to the Lord with this lament in our hearts and in our mouths that we have no answers. We have no means of fighting off the powerful forces arrayed against us! They may be actual accusers and abusers, or it very often is those emotional forces that seek to camouflage the desperate accusations of our minds. It could be the lack of money in time of need, or anything else which pounds us mercilessly with doubt and anger and frustration and libelous intent and fury!
When we are on our knees because the weight of the universe has crushed our spirit and our strength and our will and our determination; when we are gasping beneath the forces that make even the ability to breath a desperate plight draining the very core essence of our focal attention; when our chests are heaving with the pressure as of herds of elephants pounding us into the dust of this earth; this is the cry of our parched and bitter lips! For we are powerless before this great multitude who are coming against us; nor do we know what to do, but our eyes are on Thee.
	If You don’t step in here, Lord, I am lost! If you don’t save me, everything that is of value in the witness of You in my life is forfeit! Lord, there is no one else to save me! Lord, there is no where else to turn! Only You hold the keys of life and release and peace and resuscitation! If You do not show Yourself mighty, all is lost and there will be no one to sing your praises in the gates of the city, lifting Your name up in praise and adoration before those who do not know You. 
Jesus, You Alone are the center of attention of this malevolent world power that is working so maliciously and vehemently and deviously to hide the truth of Your Victorious resurrection and free gift of salvation! If it isn’t You Who is seen in the deliverance that will save me and heal me and raise me up from the ash heaps of my own making and devices, then I am doomed! I will be sucked into the quagmires in which I am being dragged down by the weight of these worries and this strife which is lambasting me. 
	 This was the very physical attack and annihilation that Jerusalem was facing as King Jehoshaphat was crying out to the Lord on behalf of his people. It is the expressed despair that envelops us in those times of distress and tribulation. 
In every instance, the Lord makes Himself very real and very much the source of strength and wisdom and encouragement and protection to those whose hearts are set upon Him. He shows Himself glorious and faithful and true every time that we put our trust and our obedience and our contrite and humble faith in Him for the sake of His Honor and His Glory and His Testimony in the course of His Salvation. As King Jehoshaphat so absolutely declared before all the people and the Lord …but our eyes are on Thee. 
We are not looking to our own devices to save us, because they are false hopes and worthless. We are not looking to others to rescue us because none can help except You, the Living, True, Mighty, Glorious Lord God Almighty! To You, Alone, do we look for Your Salvation to be evident in the course of the manifested truth that it is Your witness and Your witness, Alone, which will be seen as You bring forth Your plan and Your purpose in us, Your people! In You, Alone, do we trust, and by Your will, Alone, will we be saved. Live or die, it is all unto You! Blessed be the Name of the Lord!
Accordingly, please read the response of The Lord to King Jehoshaphat and to all the people of Judah. This is as well His response to us in our times of stress and hardship and despair and desperation as we look to Him to see us through and to be our only source of salvation. We continue with the outcome of this account, then, in verses 14-19 of 2 Chron 20.
2 Chron 20:14-19, Then in the midst of the assembly the Spirit of the Lord came upon Jahaziel the son of Zechariah, the son of Benaiah, the son of Jeiel, the son of Mattaniah, the Levite of the sons of Asaph; and he said, "Listen, all Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem and King Jehoshaphat: thus says the Lord to you, 'Do not fear or be dismayed because of this great multitude, for the battle is not yours but God's. 'Tomorrow go down against them. Behold, they will come up by the ascent of Ziz, and you will find them at the end of the valley in front of the wilderness of Jeruel. 'You need not fight in this battle; station yourselves, stand and see the salvation of the Lord on your behalf, O Judah and Jerusalem.' Do not fear or be dismayed; tomorrow go out to face them, for the Lord is with you." And Jehoshaphat bowed his head with his face to the ground, and all Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem fell down before the Lord, worshiping the Lord. And the Levites, from the sons of the Kohathites and of the sons of the Korahites, stood up to praise the Lord God of Israel, with a very loud voice. 
	In the midst of this utter abandonment of themselves unto the Lord for His salvation, there was the response of Jehovah in all glory and in all victory. There was not an abandonment of hope, which we may often feel. They knew that the Lord was their only means of survival and they placed their complete and absolute trust in Him! He responded as He always so faithfully does when His people seek Him with all their hearts and minds and beings. Hope was not lost, because it was set in the fact that this was God’s people whom God had placed into this land, They were being faithful to the One Who was always and forever faithful to those who belong to Him.
	That is what we need to learn in our times of distress and trauma and fiery trials and tribulations when we lack of any other means of survival. We never lose hope in the Lord! We may find ourselves completely surrounded by forces which would crush the very life from our minds, and spirits, and bodies, but our hope is set, firmly and eternally in the Lord God, Jehovah! We belong to Him! Unto Him, we submit our every breath, be it the last one we might breathe. It is unto Him and for His glory. That is when we will hear that great proclamation as did the people of Jerusalem.
	….thus says the Lord to you, 'Do not fear or be dismayed because of this great multitude, for the battle is not yours but God's.
	We are not to be afraid or dismayed or defeated because the battle is the Lord’s to fight, and not our own. As is further stated for all of the Lord’s people to take to heart, 'You need not fight in this battle; station yourselves, stand and see the salvation of the Lord on your behalf, O Judah and Jerusalem.' Do not fear or be dismayed; tomorrow go out to face them, for the Lord is with you."
	The Lord is with us, no matter how many forces may be arrayed all around us. It matters not what the numerical superiority or the technological advancements, the political connections, the legal prowess, or the economic status of our enemies - the Lord is with us! He is the One Who fights the battle! He is the One Who sustains us in the midst of the greatest times of trial and persecution and tribulation!
	This should bring forth in us that which it brought forth in Jehoshaphat and all the people of Judah and Jerusalem. It should mean the very depth of our declaration that it is the Lord Who is the Victor over every foe and enemy! And for that, He, Alone deserves all the praise and the adoration and the worship and the glory.
	And Jehoshaphat bowed his head with his face to the ground, and all Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem fell down before the Lord, worshiping the Lord. Please recognize a tremendous and vital truth in this which firmly establishes that the people had not given up their hope in the Lord. They fell down in worship unto the Lord. Their adoration of Him was in place before the actual victory took place! This praise unto Jehovah was all before the enemy surrounding them was utterly destroyed by the hand of the Lord. 
This people knew that God would prove Himself glorious and mighty in His salvation, so before even one of those arrayed against them was destroyed, they worshipped and thanked and honored the Lord God, their Protector and their Defender and their Savior! They knew God would show Himself mighty! Therefore they, as should we, gave Him all the praise and the adoration for Who He is and all that He will surely do! So be it and Amen!

This morning’s benediction is Song 2:14. "O my dove, in the clefts of the rock, In the secret place of the steep pathway, Let me see your form, Let me hear your voice; For your voice is sweet, And your form is lovely." Amen.