The God of the Impossible

[0:00] Well, our God is the God of the impossible, is He not? We're going to be in the book of Jeremiah this morning in chapters 32 and 33.

[0:11] And as we're looking at Jeremiah this morning, we see that Jeremiah had a tough task and he lived at a tough time. I would encourage you, we're not going to read through these two chapters, but when you get home, I would encourage you to take the time to read through chapter 32 and chapter 33.

[0:32] Jeremiah was a prophet and was asked by Zedekiah, the king of Judah, to prophesy. And often kings did that to hopefully see how God was going to work in the nation.

[0:49] But because Israel had sinned against God over and over and over again, the word that came through Jeremiah, to Jeremiah, through God was not good news.

[1:00] Zedekiah would be taken captive by Nebuchadnezzar and Judah and Israel will be taken captive by Babylon. It was bad news.

[1:12] As a matter of fact, his country was already under attack by Nebuchadnezzar and the Chaldeans. And Jeremiah had been given a very tough message to deliver.

[1:24] That's where we begin our story. That's where we begin the account in chapter 32 and verse number 1. And the message was, Zedekiah, your kingdom is going to fall to Nebuchadnezzar.

[1:40] His people would be, your people would be taken captive. And this was a hard message that was going to be delivered. So this is where we find ourselves during this time.

[1:52] And the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah, verse number 1. Verse 2, the king of Babylon's army had already begun besieging Jerusalem.

[2:04] And Jeremiah, the prophet, because of his message, had been shut up in prison, but not the common jail.

[2:16] It was literally the court of the guard, which was just outside of the king's palace, where he was allowed some freedom. But he was guarded, but had enough freedom to accept visitors.

[2:32] And he was more so considered a dissident. It would have been one who the king would have considered that had a dangerous message.

[2:44] And so that he would have been placed where political prisoners would have been placed. And so the king could kind of keep an eye on him. More so, not so much to punish Jeremiah, but to silence him.

[2:58] That's why he was placed in the courtyard or the court of the guard. And so this is where we find Jeremiah. But Jeremiah has a positive attitude while he is there.

[3:12] He is confident the Lord would deliver him. And we see in Jeremiah, a little bit later on, verse 17, that he prays to God.

[3:26] He was confident the Lord would deliver him. And he was given a guarantee by God that God would, in fact, deliver him. He was promised answers to his prayers.

[3:36] But as you read chapter 32, a little bit of an unusual thing happens. God says to Jeremiah, Jeremiah, your cousin is going to come and ask you to buy his field.

[3:48] Well, that was an unusual request. Because in Anathoth, where his cousin lived, Babylon had already taken it over. And so basically the property did not belong to them anymore.

[4:02] And so this was unusual. Why would Jeremiah use hard-earned money to buy a field that he couldn't use? So his cousin comes to him probably because maybe he needed food, because they had been besieged, because they had been taken over by Babylon, because of famine, because of pestilence.

[4:26] All of these things that were going on, maybe his cousin needed the money. And the way things were done, the money or the land could have been sold to a redeemer who was in the family.

[4:39] So a family member could have redeemed the property and kept it in the family. So God tells Jeremiah, your cousin's going to come. He's going to ask you to buy his property.

[4:51] So this is what Jeremiah does. He comes, he buys the property, he weighs out the money. 17 shekels, I believe it was. And he has the paperwork done. He has the paperwork notarized, it's witnessed.

[5:04] He has it sealed. And two copies, one sealed, the other not, put it in an earthen jar. And what we see is God telling, or God showing to Jeremiah, it might look bad now.

[5:19] The destruction might be complete of Jerusalem and Judah, but not final. One day you'll have access to that property.

[5:31] So Jeremiah had a God of the impossible. Let's take a look at Jeremiah 32, 17, where we see Jeremiah had confidence.

[5:43] Jeremiah had the confidence that God would take care of him. Jeremiah had confidence in verse number 17. He says, ah, Lord God, behold, you have made the heavens and the earth by your great power and outstretched arm.

[6:01] There is nothing too hard for you. Notice that's how Jeremiah approaches God. God, I know that you are in control. God, I know that you are powerful.

[6:13] You are so powerful that you were able to create the heavens and the earth. And so his estimation of God was, God, there is nothing too hard for you.

[6:28] The news is bad. There's going to be utter destruction of Jerusalem and Judah. But, God, I'm still trusting you to restore everything because there's nothing too hard for you.

[6:43] Creation had convinced Jeremiah of God's power. You made the heaven and the earth. There's nothing too hard for you. Genesis chapter 1, verse 1 proves that God can do anything because he can speak something out of nothing.

[6:58] He can speak the whole universe. He could speak everything out of nothing into existence. Because, you see, miracles are easy for God.

[7:11] We sometimes think that we have to pray so hard for God to work a miracle because God has to work himself up to doing a miracle. God literally just needs to speak it in order for the miracle to take place.

[7:27] Miracles are easy for the God of creation. Just one look at the star-filled sky ought to tell us that, that God can do it. We see that in Psalm 19, verse 1.

[7:39] The psalmist talks about the majesty of the universe and the stars in the sky and how God is so powerful. Verse 1, the heavens declare the glory of God.

[7:50] When we look at a star-lit sky, we see a manifestation of the glory of God and the firmament, the psalmist says, shows his handiwork.

[8:02] Our redemption ought to reveal the power of God that through the death of Christ on the cross, through the penalty paid on the cross of Calvary, that God would have the power to redeem us, buy us back from the slave market of sin, and give us brand new life ought to reveal to us or show to us God's power.

[8:24] Christ's death and Christ's resurrection guarantees that we can be a new creature, a new creation.

[8:34] This is all due to the power of God. Those who trust in Christ become new creations. 2 Corinthians 5, verse 17.

[8:45] We don't have to turn over a new leaf. We don't have to try very hard to be better or to do good because the Bible says God performs a miracle in our life.

[8:55] Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, if we've trusted Christ as our Savior and realize that Jesus is God, died on the cross, in our place because we're sinners separated from God, He is a new creation.

[9:11] The Bible says, old things have passed away. Behold, all things are or have become new. So, God responds to Jeremiah's question.

[9:25] Or God responds to Jeremiah's prayer. And his question of, God, is there anything too hard for you?

[9:36] After he continues on in verse 18, verse 19, he says, You show loving kindness to thousands. You are great in counsel, mighty in work. Verse 20, You have set signs and wonders in the land of Egypt to this day.

[9:50] Verse 21, You have brought your people Israel out of the land of Egypt with signs and wonders. Here is Jeremiah recounting all the powerful and the mighty acts that God had done.

[10:02] You've given them this land, verse 22, verse 23. They came in, took possession of it. But then he says, They haven't obeyed your voice.

[10:13] And there the full story comes out. This is why Judah and Israel is suffering at the hands of Nebuchadnezzar. And there were, you could just look out and see the siege mounds, as he says in verse 24, where they had built up and they had these mighty machines that they were using to take over.

[10:36] Verse 25, You said to me, God, he says, God, you told me to buy the land, buy the fuel for money and take a witness. The city has been given into the hand of the Chaldeans.

[10:48] And then the word of the Lord, verse 26, came to Jeremiah saying, So the Lord has a question that we will see in verse 27.

[10:59] Remember, verse 17, Jeremiah says, God, is there anything too hard for you? Somewhat of a rhetorical question, I believe, because I believe that Jeremiah had already listed out why he believed that God could do anything.

[11:14] But God takes up the challenge and he asks a question in verse 27. Behold, I am the Lord, the God of all flesh.

[11:29] Is there anything too hard for me? Is there anything too hard for me? Now, we ought to remember that question every day.

[11:40] Because if we know the answer to it, the answer is, there's nothing too hard for God. So whatever we may be going through, we may be going through something difficult. It may be relational.

[11:50] It may be financial. It may be physical. It may be whatever it is that we're going through that's difficult. We need to be asking ourselves that question every single day.

[12:01] Is there anything too hard for you, God? No, there's not. Is there anything too hard for you? God wants us to know that he can handle any problem that arises in our life.

[12:17] The Lord's question should produce unquestioning faith. Think about it. The Lord's question should produce within us unquestioning faith.

[12:30] God is saying, is there anything too hard for me? No, of course not. There is nothing too hard for God. That's why in verse 28, God is saying, I'm going to give you this city.

[12:44] It may not be now, but it will be eventually. Don't worry. There's nothing too hard for me. It may seem bleak now, but one day, everything will be better.

[12:57] I will restore. The Lord's question should produce unquestioning faith. As we consider Mary's question to Gabriel and his answer when the angel came to Mary, verse 34 of Luke 1, 34 to 37, then Mary said to the angel, how can this be?

[13:25] Since I do not know a man. And the angel answered and said to her, the Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the highest will overshadow you.

[13:36] Therefore, also, that Holy One who is to be born will be called the Son of God. Verse 36, Now indeed, Elizabeth, your relative, has also conceived a son in her old age.

[13:47] And this is now the sixth month for her who was called barren. For with God, what do we hear? Nothing is impossible.

[13:58] So God's question in Jeremiah 32, 27, Is there anything too hard for me? New Testament, we hear the angel saying there is, with God, there's nothing impossible.

[14:16] The question today is, have we put today's problems to the Lord's question test? What's the hardest thing that you're going through right now? and ask the question, Is this too hard for God?

[14:32] No. Something more difficult comes along. Is this too hard for God? We remember the angel Gabriel. With God, nothing is impossible.

[14:44] Remember, this question ought to produce within us unquestioning faith. And so every difficult thing comes into our, that comes into our life. We, excuse me, we put to, we put it to the Lord's question test.

[15:00] God, is this too hard for you? No. Because the Bible says there's nothing too hard for you. Our lack of faith, if we think about it, our lack of faith steals our peace.

[15:12] Our lack of trusting that there's nothing too hard for God, and when we begin to not fully believe that God can do something, then it will steal our peace.

[15:27] We simply need to, I know this is easier said than done, but we simply need to trust God and relax. Because that's what faith really is. Trusting God, knowing that He will come through and accomplish what He knows is best, and so we simply trust Him and relax, knowing that God will do what is best.

[15:52] So we trust God and relax. Difficult things going on in Jerusalem, in Israel, and Judah. Jeremiah was given a difficult task, a difficult message to give to the king, to give to Zedekiah, to give to the people.

[16:16] He was given a difficult task of spending money to buy a property that he wasn't going to be able to use, but God says, don't worry, I will take care of you.

[16:29] And then God spells out verses 30 and following why He's doing this, what Israel, what Judah has done. They have sinned. They have not followed Him.

[16:42] So our lack of faith steals peace of mind. We trust God and we relax and then we see in, as we go into chapter 33, the Lord, the word of the Lord came again.

[16:58] Moreover, the word of the Lord comes to Jeremiah a second time and we see this took place pretty near to the previous time because He's still shut up in the court of the guard and we see in verse 3 that God calls on Jeremiah and I believe God calls upon us to call upon Him.

[17:26] Verse 33, He says, call to me and I will answer you and show you great and mighty things which you do not know.

[17:42] This is a call to a man of God who is in prison. God says, call to me, pray to me, reach out to me and He says, I will answer you, I will show you great and unsearchable things, things that you do not know.

[18:04] That is what I can do, God says, when you reach out to me. Where we are doesn't limit what God can do. Here's a man in prison.

[18:15] Here's a man that people think, well, what are his options? He has very few options. When the king puts you in prison, there's no higher authority to which he could appeal because it would be the king and the king was the one who put him there.

[18:32] So no matter where we are, there is no limit to what God can do. Jeremiah was promised great and mighty things, great and unsearchable, great and inaccessible things in answer to prayer.

[18:45] Now as we look at that word mighty in verse three, your Bible might translate it mighty, your Bible might translate it unsearchable.

[18:57] What the word truly means is unsearchable, inaccessible. That's what literally God said to Jeremiah.

[19:08] Call to me, I will answer you and I will show you great and inaccessible things. Now what God is saying there is the idea of this is God's people or the idea is that God's people don't learn the hidden things of God by storming the gates.

[19:29] There are things that God has shut up and it carries with it the idea of a city that is a walled city. Excuse me. And so there are things that only God knows that God has shut up, that God has hidden, that are unsearchable by humankind, that are inaccessible to us.

[19:51] But God says, call to me and I will show you those things that the common man, that's not common knowledge, things that average people who do not know me have no access to.

[20:06] So he says, call upon me and I will show you great and unsearchable things. I will show you things that is not available to the common man. Call upon me. And he says, I will show you.

[20:19] So the idea is that we don't learn the hidden things of God by storming the gate or saying, you know what, I'm going to learn about this, I'm going to study and bone up on this and figure out how to do this.

[20:32] But we learn of those things by seeking him, by approaching him in prayer. Because Jeremiah asked the Lord to teach him, God showed him these hidden things.

[20:44] God showed him these things that related to the future of his people. I believe today that God wants to reveal to us things that are beyond our understanding, things that are beyond our comprehension, things that are only accessible through him, by knowing him, by trusting him, by having the faith that he will take care of it.

[21:14] So what are we going through today? What are you going through that is causing you pain, causing you to be frustrated, causing you hurt?

[21:26] Is there anything too hard for God? Ask him the question. Because if you know the answer, no, with God nothing is impossible.

[21:37] So God, is this thing too hard for you? No. Know that God will take care of it in his time and in his way. So as we bring this to a close this morning, what great and unsearchable things do you need this morning?

[21:55] Could be health, could be financial, could be relational, know, don't know what it is. Whatever it is that you and I are going through whenever we go through it, know that God says, call to me and I will reveal to you my will, my plan.

[22:15] I will show you great and mighty things. So as we think about this, this week, let's look in faith to the God of the impossible.

[22:30] I encourage you to read through chapters 32, chapter 33. I think it will bolster your faith. I think it will help you to see that God is a God of justice. God is a God who sometimes needs to put us flat on our back to teach us a lesson.

[22:48] That's what he was doing to Israel. That's what he was doing to Judah. They were going to go through a very, very difficult time. They were going to go through a tough time.

[22:59] They were going to be taken to Babylon for many years. But one day they would be restored. Although God's judgment was complete, it wasn't final.

[23:16] God says, look to me, I will show you great and mighty things. Things that you cannot comprehend otherwise. except through me. Let's take it to the Lord in prayer.

[23:29] Because we believe in a God of the impossible. Miracles are easy for God. So, God is able to do exceedingly, abundantly, above what?

[23:43] All that we can ask or think. What God can do can exceed our imagination. And some of us have pretty good imaginations. And so God can do even more than that.

[23:54] God is the God of creation. God is the God of redemption. God is the God of the impossible. Let's pray. Lord God, this morning we've come to you in faith, trusting that you can do above and beyond that which we think is able, and that above and beyond that which we are able.

[24:18] Lord God, we know that you are, in fact, the God of the impossible. We ask that you would bolster our faith, help us to trust in you and relax, knowing that you are ultimately in control.

[24:35] Be with us today. Father, help us as we may even this week have the opportunity to use this message in the life of someone else, someone who may be hurting, someone whose hopes maybe have been dashed.

[24:51] Lord, may we be able to encourage them and help them to call out to you. First of all, call out to you in faith, trusting Christ as their Savior. Lord, we thank you for what you're going to do, what you're going to accomplish in our lives.

[25:06] We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.

[25:17] Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.