I am happy that we have the opportunity to study Gods word together this morning and I would like to talk especially this morning to a single group of people, but I have divided it up into three parts because they have the same situation for different reasons.

The first group of people are those Christians who are young physically. Most young people believe that people that are over thirty are over the hill. Oftentimes young people feel that they are not trusted. They cannot figure out why their parents think that they do not have as good judgment as the older person.

If you are in that situation and you cannot figure out why your parents do not trust you to have good enough judgment there are some things that you will not learn until you are over the hill yourself But young Christians today have a problem. The majority of people in the world, young or old today, are not Christians in the true sense of the word.

To be a Christian means to be Christ like. A Christian does not live, act and talk like anybody else in the world. They are different because they are following the Lord. They are trying to live the way Jesus lived. They are trying to learn to talk the way He talked; to act the way He acted. When you make that decision, it sets you apart from a lot of other people so that you end up feeling alone.

Loneliness is a universal problem with young Christians today. The Bible deals with it and has a lot of stories concerning people who have had this experience.

Joseph was sold as a slave when he was still a teenager. As he was riding on a camel, he passed a place where he could see his fathers tents off in the distance. But he knew in his heart and mind that he would never see those people or be in that place again because be was going as a slave alone to Egypt.

But young people are not the only Christians who have a problem with loneliness. There are Christians who are babes in the truth that are not young. The Bible refers to them in 1 Peter as baby Christians. These people have a tremendous problem with loneliness, too. I remember a man that was baptized many years ago when! was a young pastor. He told me later how he had lost all of his friends because his friends all wanted to do things that he did not do anymore.

This man told me, "My friends want to party on Friday night. I used to party on Friday night and! lost all my friends." Another thing that happens is that very often when a person accepts Jesus as his personal Saviour not everybody in the family does that at the same time.

This happened on both sides of my family. My grandmother on my mothers side became a Christian and followed Jesus, chose to believe the Bible and live according to what the Bible said. Her agnostic husband decided not to do it! He gave her all kinds of trouble. He did not believe in the inspiration of the Bible. In fact, he spent a lot of time trying to prove that she was foolish for believing the Bible. My paternal grandmother decided to become a Christian and her husband fought it.

Both of those men eventually decided to believe the Bible and follow the Lord, too, after they had fought the truth for several years. It is something to live with somebody who is fighting the truth. They may be converted next month or next year, but right now they are not. The young Christian is often alone. There may be people all around but they are alone.

The third group are those that the young people say are over the hill, the older people. Somebody says, Pastor John, why should they ever have a problem with being alone? This is another one of those things that, until you have been there, you cannot understand it. So I would not expect the young people to understand what I am going to say now.

Very often older people are living a life of regret. What they are saying is, If I just had not done this or that, I would not be in the situation I am in now. There is a lot in the Bible about that, too. The Bible deals with all manners of human problems. There are many people that appear to be happy and successful and having a vibrant Christian experience, and you do not know that they are living a life of regret because they have troubles that you do not know about.

Jacob had a problem with being alone. 'Then Jacob was left alone." Genesis 32:24. Jacob was not a young man at this time and part of the reason he felt so alone and so crushed was because he was living a life of regret.

What was he regretting? He had made a bad mistake. Some of us have made mistakes because when we were young we would not listen to anybody. We thought we knew it all, so we were going to do whatever we thought was right and we ended up making a bunch of mistakes. Then later on in life we regret those mistakes.

Jacob was not exactly in that situation. Jacob had listened to counsel. In fact, he got the counsel from his own mother. As a general rule, your mother is a very good person to take counsel from. But unfortunately Jacobs mother gave him some bad counsel. She advised him to do something that involved breaking the ninth commandment

Let me tell you, friends, young or old, it does not matter whom it is whether it is your mother, your father, your wife or your husband. Anybody that gives you counsel that involves breaking the law of God, it is not good counsel. No matter how much they love you or no matter how much you love them, it is not good counsel! If you follow this bad counsel, you will pay the consequences. In Jacobs case his mother paid the consequences, too.

If somebody gives you counsel that involves breaking the law of God and you follow that counsel, you will pay the consequences. The other person may not pay any consequences at all. So Jacob had been living a life of regret for twenty years. He thought to himself thousands of times, if I only had not done that! But he had. And he got into trouble.

This mistake followed him all through his life. Look at what he said just before he died. When Jacob briefly reviewed his life he recalled only one thing. "As for me when I came from Paden, Rachel died beside me in the land of Canaan on the way when there was but a lithe distance to go to Ephrath and I buried her there on the way to Ephrath, that is Bethlehem." Genesis 48:7.

And he grieved over that for the rest of his life. He grieved over Joseph for twenty-two years but then he saw him again. He lived a life of regret. There are many other people in the Bible besides Jacob and Joseph that had to cope with the problem of loneliness. There were no other "Christian" people around them so they were all alone.

Sometimes when they accepted the truth the result was that they lost members of their own family because they were faithful to the truth and others were not. Abraham is a good example of that. Abraham had to leave home and never came back. Moses had a similar experience. In fact, Moses was herding sheep all by himself for forty years. The man be was herding sheep for had seven daughters, so he gave him one of his daughters for a wife and when Moses had a son, he named him "A stranger in a strange land." That is the literal translation. That sounds like somebody is having an experience of loneliness. That was Moses experience.

Loneliness involves danger for all ages for several reasons. A first reason why loneliness is so dangerous is because when you are alone, it is much easier to become afraid than if you are with a group. Fear is dangerous because it can cause any person to do irrational things and make an even worse mistake than they are already in. Have you ever seen somebody that is in a bad situation and they got so afraid that they got themselves in a worse situation than they already were in?

When Jacob prayed to the Lord be said, "Lord, I am afraid. I fear my brother. I am afraid that he is going to come and kill my wives and my children and my cattle and me and everything (See Genesis 32)." This is a first danger but there are several others that are just about as dangerous as fear.

Another danger of being alone is illustrated in the experience of David in 1 Samuel 27. David was at this time alone. He was a fugitive. Now he had four hundred men that were following him, but he was alone, He was cast out, he was a fugitive and he had to flee for his life. He did that for about ten years, Notice what happened to David.

David made a very serious mistake and notice why he made the mistake. "And David said in his heart, 'Now I shall perish someday by the hand of Saul. There is nothing better for me than that I should speedily escape to the land of the Philistines; and Saul will despair of me, to seek me any more in any part of Israel. So I shall escape out of his hand." I Samuel 27:1.

What was Davids problem? David was discouraged. He had been running so long that he lost hope that God was going to save him. Now God had promised David that he was going to set him on the throne of Israel. Had God already promised him that through a prophet? Yes, but David had been in such a terrible situation for so long that he got discouraged.

And I want to tell you that discouragement is a tool that the devil uses constantly on Christians and when you are alone, very often it is most successful. The devil tries to get you discouraged when you are alone. David got discouraged. He got so discouraged that he despaired that God would ever fulfill His promise to him. We will not read the rest of the story there, but as a result of his discouragement, he got himself in an even worse situation than he was already in.

Just like with fear, discouragement works the same way. You often get yourself in a worse situation than you were before.

But if you yield to discouragement, something even worse happens. Eventually your discouragement becomes depression. That is, a person despairs and they say, Nothing is ever going to work. It is hopeless. Have you ever met somebody that just feels like his or her situation is absolutely hopeless? Do you know what people do sometimes when they feel that their situation is absolutely hopeless? They commit suicide. It is very difficult for a human being to live and keep going if there is no hope.

If they cannot see any possibility of anything ever turning out good or right, it gets so bad that they say, "There is no use for me to live any more." There are lots of experiences where people went through that in the Bible. Turn to the New Testament to look at a couple. The disciples of Jesus even had this problem. Some people have more trouble with doubt, fear and discouragement than others do anyway. Interestingly enough, if you were around a person that was having trouble with doubt, what would you do?

Well, I want to read to you what Jesus did. Now this is amazing. Do you know what Jesus did when He had a disciple that had trouble with doubt? He sent him some trials. Imagine that! Here is one. Now here is a person who has trouble believing and is inclined to doubt. Jesus had two disciples that had this special problem. One of them was named Philip. But this happened to Philip.

'Then Jesus lifted up His eyes, and seeing a great multitude coming toward Him, he said to Philip, 'Where shall we buy bread, that these may eat? But this He said to test him, for He Himself knew what He would do. Philip answered Him, 'Two hundred denarii worth of bread is not sufficient for them, that every one of them may have a little." John 6:5-7. What was He doing? He was sending Philip a trial, a test (they are the same thing.). He said this to send him a trial, to test him. Oh, why would Jesus ever do something like that? This man is having trouble believing anyway.

It is something to think about. Pastor John, I am having trouble believing now and now I have this trouble in addition and lam already struggling with doubt! That was Philips problem. Here he is, he is already a person that has to struggle with doubt and unbelief and Jesus sends him a test.

Two hundred denarii of bread is about the amount of food you would be able to earn as a working man working for about ten months. Take ten months of your salary and it still would not feed this crowd, Philip said. There was a big crowd there, fifteen or twenty thousand people.

Depression. You keep unbelieving; you keep having trouble with doubt; then you get discouraged and the discouragement leads to depression. New Christians and young people wonder and sometimes old people who are living a life of regret run to the very same thing. With all the struggles I am having, why did God allow this to happen to me?

Look at one more in the gospel of John. Turn over to chapter 11. Here is when your doubt has taken such great control of your mind that you have become a victim of depression. Now this time it is Thomas. He was the other one that had a problem like this among the disciples. John 11. Jesus said, Let us go to Judea again. The disciples said, Well, We cannot do that because if we do, we will all get killed. The Jews are trying to stone you, why do you want to go there again? You can read that in verse 7 and 8.

Then after Jesus told them that He did need to go to Judea, notice what Thomas says in verse 16. "Then Thomas who is called The Twin, said to his fellow disciples, 'Let us also go, that we may die with Him." Let us go, too, nothing good is going to happen. We are all going to get killed, but let us just do it anyway. So what? We will all die together. That is a person that is a victim of depression.

If you are having trouble with fear, discouragement and depression, one of the easiest things to happen as a result of that is that you lose your hold on God and you lose faith. That is what Philip did. Philip was not thinking about what Jesus can do, he was just thinking about what he could not do. He lost his hold on God. Lost faith and courage.

The Bible time is not the last time that has happened to people. Have you ever read the story of Cranmer? Cranmer was the leading clergyman in the nation of England. He was the Archbishop. That is the chief Bishop or minister. When political fortunes changed, do you know what Cranmer did? He actually signed a document renouncing his faith. He lost it because it looked like he was all alone and he got afraid and became discouraged, depressed and he lost his hold on God. He lost his courage and he signed a document to save his life.

It did save his life--in this world. But later on as he thought about it, he remembered that Jesus said, "If you save your life in this world, you are going to lose eternal life. But if you lose your life in this world for His sake, you are going to gain eternal life." As he thought about it, he said, "This is not a good deal." It would be better for me to lose my life here and be faithful to the Lord.

So he went back to those people and he said, I am going to reverse my decision. I am not going to recant. They said, if you do that, we will burn you to death. He said, I am still going to be faithful to the Lord. So they did burn him to death. And when they lit the fire, do you know what he did? He held his right hand in the fire and he said, "That is the hand that I signed the recantation with and that is the hand that is going to bum first." He got his courage back again.

I want to tell you, friend, if there is somebody here and you are suffering from discouragement because you are alone, because you are afraid, because you are depressed. You say, Oh, Pastor John, I already had enough trouble and then I got this. That is what happened to Philip. He was already struggling with discouragement and lack of faith and Jesus sent him one trial after another.

Why did Jesus send him those trials? if you are going to overcome the problem with fear and discouragement and depression and lack of faith, you are going to have to have an opportunity to develop faith. And how are you going to have the opportunity to develop faith? You did not want to hear that? I want to read to you a few statements about why God allows trials and troubles that come to people that are already in trouble. They are already alone. They already have trouble being afraid and discouraged and they are struggling to maintain their faith and then something else happens.

God led the Children of Israel out there in the desert and they went on a lonely trip through the wilderness. They were enduring hardships. In fact, the hardships got so great that they started murmuring and complaining. Then things got worse. The more they murmured and the more they complained the worse things got. Why did God allow them to get into a situation where they would murmur and complain in the first place?

Let me read it to you. "God permitted these lonely travels through the wilderness so that they might obtain an experience in enduring hardships and so that when they were in peril, they might know that there was relief and deliverance in God alone. And that thus they might learn to know and to trust God and to serve Him with living faith."

Why does God allow you to get into a situation where you are alone and you are in trouble and you are discouraged and you are depressed? You are fighting to hang on to some faith, yet not totally discouraged. Why does God allow you to get into a situation like that? Because He wants you to learn where to go for help. He wants you to learn where the help is.

I meet people all the time and when they tell me their problem, I realize immediately that there is nothing I can do to solve their problem. I met several this past week. I feel very sorry that they are in this problem. I thought to myself, Oh, if I could do this or that, I could solve their problem. But I cannot do it. I cannot solve their problem. But there is somebody that can solve your problem. If there is no human being that can solve it, that does not mean it cannot be solved. Whether your main problem was with loneliness or whether it is being fearful or discouraged or depressed or whatever the problem in your life is that is causing all this trouble for you, God wants you to learn to go to Him for help because He can help and He has promised to help you. In fact, the Lord says to His people, "You call on Me in the day of trouble."

The Bible says that God is a very present help in trouble. There is another reason God allows these troubles that sometimes you do not like to think about and that is, your character determines your eternal destiny. Now I did not make that up. That is in the parables of Jesus and the teachings of the Bible over and over again. You read the parable of the rich man and Lazarus. You read the parable of the story of the sheep and the goats in Matthew 25. You read the Sermon on the Mount. Over and over again Jesus taught that your character determines your destiny. How are you going to develop a character so that you will be ready for eternal life?

Here is how it happens. I will read from the book, Education, 57, 151. "A noble character is the result of self-discipline, of the subjection of the lower to the higher nature--the surrender of self for the service of love to God and man." Then page 151. "All who in this world render true service to God or man receive a preparatory training in the school of sorrow. The weightier the trust and the higher the service, the closer is the test and the more severe the discipline."

Have you ever thought of the fact that if you are really in big trouble, it means that God has really big plans for your future? We do not usually think of it that way, do we? We are like Philip and Thomas. When the trouble gets big enough, it seems like it fills all time and space, as one person said it. When it seems to you that your problem fills all time and space, you cannot see around it or past it. But God can.

If God has allowed you to get into really big trouble, that means that He has something really big in mind for your future. We do not usually think of it that way. It is hard for us to see things the way God does. Then there is another reason that God allows us to get into these troubles where it seems that we are going to lose all of our faith and we are going to doubt, be discouraged and depressed and nothing is going to work out.

Incidentally, Ellen White wrote one time that if we never had any troubles or trials, do you know what kind of a problem we would all develop? Some of us have this problem already. We would become self-confident. Do you know that the Bible teaches that one of the major dangers of human beings in this world is being self-confident, trusting yourself and not trusting the Lord? Just read your Bible.

I do not want to be the harbinger today of real bad news for you, but I will tell you this. If you are self-confident and you are a Christian, you are going to have troubles because the Lord is going to take that out of you. God allows us to have troubles and trials so that we will learn to have faith and trust in Him.

Let me read this. This was written in 1876. It says, "The Lord frequently places us in difficult positions to stimulate us to greater exertion. In His providence special annoyances sometimes occur to test our patience and faith. God gives us lessons of trust. He would teach us where to look for help and strength in time of need. Thus we obtain practical knowledge of His divine will which we so much need in our life experience. Faith grows strong in earnest conflict with doubt and fear." Testimonies for The Church, vol.4, 116,117.

How is your faith going to grow strong? When you are in conflict with doubt and fear. Is your faith going to grow strong while everything is working out just marvelously and beautifully and there is not a problem in the world? No, and so God allows His children to go through troubles. He allowed Joseph to go through it. He allowed Jacob to go through it. He allowed Moses to go through it. He allowed David to go through it. He allowed Daniel to go through it and He allowed His disciples to go through it because He is in the business of getting a people ready for heaven. He is in the business of helping people to develop a noble character so that they can be given eternal life.

He wants to help you to have perfect faith and trust in Him. When you come to a problem that you cannot solve and nobody in your family can solve it, none of your Mends can solve it. The pastors and elders in the church cannot solve it. Your employer cannot solve it. The physicians cannot solve it. Nobody can solve it and when that problem gets solved, are you going to know Who solved the problem for you?

Have you ever had that happen in your life? You had a problem that you could not solve. Nobody in your family could solve. The people in the church could not solve it. The people where you work could not solve it. Nobody could solve it and you prayed about it and someway that problem got solved. Have you had that happen?

Well, maybe there is somebody here saying, Pastor John, I am not there yet. My problem has not been solved yet and I am in trouble and I need help. What can I do? Here are three things you can do. First, do what Jacob did. Jacob had a problem that he could not solve and there was no one in this world that could solve it. So Jacob went all the way across the brook Jabbok and he began to pray. How long did he pray? He prayed all night.

Now maybe there are some young people here who have not gone over the hill yet and they are saying in their minds, How could anybody pray all night? The reason you do not understand how anybody can pray all night yet is because you just have not had that big of a problem yet. Let me tell you, if you get a big enough problem, you will not have any trouble praying all night. Jacob had that big of a problem.

Pray! In the sixteenth century there was a great reformation that shook the world. People are still studying about it today. It is even written about in the Catholic Catechism. What was it that shook the world in the time of the Reformation? There were some people that went to their closet and they began to pray. Martin Luther said one time, if he got real busy, he still took three hours a day to pray. That is what shook the world in the time of the Reformation.

Would you like to hear one of Martin Luthers prayers when he was in trouble? Martin Luther was to appear to give his final answer to the diet. It looked like he was going to be martyred and it looked like everybody that believed like he did was going to be killed. So here is what happened. He was all alone. There was no human being in the world that could deliver him. So here is what he did.

"In anguish of spirit he threw himself with his face upon the earth and poured out those broken, heartrending cries, which none but God can fully understand. 'Oh, Almighty and Everlasting God, he pleaded, 'how terrible is this world! Behold, it openeth its mouth to swallow me up, and I have so little trust in Thee . . . If it is only in the strength of this world that I must put my trust, all is over . . . My last hour is come, my condemnation has been pronounced . . . Oh, God, do Thou help me against all the wisdom of this world. Do this, . . . Thou alone; . . . for this is not my work, but Thine. I have nothing to do here, nothing to contend for with these great ones of the world. . . But the cause is Thine, . . . and it is a righteous and eternal cause. 0 Lord, help me! Faithful and Unchangeable God, in no man do I place my trust. . . All that is of man is uncertain; all that cometh of man fails. . . Thou hast chosen me for this work. . . Stand at my side, for the sake of Thy well-beloved Jesus Christ, who is my Defense, my Shield, and my Strong Tower." The Great Controversy, 156, 157.

I want to tell you something. That was not the first prayer that he prayed. If you are going to be able to deal with loneliness and fear and discouragement and depression and the troubles people are struggling with today, you are going to have to learn how to pray. Do you know what will happen if you persevere in prayer? Martin Luther said to the Lord, Lord, help me. Did God hear that? Did he send him help? Just read the rest of the story. A miracle happened.

A miracle can happen in your life, too. I do not know what kind of a miracle you need. Different ones of us in this room need different kinds of miracles to happen in our lives. But if you pray and you keep praying and surrendering your heart to the Lord and say, Lord, I am Yours. I have chosen to follow You and now I am in this trouble. Show me what to do. The Lord will hear because at all times and in all places; in all sorrows and in all afflictions when the outlook seems dark and the future perplexing and we feel helpless and alone, the Comforter (the Holy Spirit) will be sent in answer to the prayer of faith. Circumstances may separate us from every earthly friend, but no circumstance, no distance can separate us from the heavenly Comforter. Wherever we are, wherever we may go, He is always at our right hand to support and sustain, uphold and cheer.

Wherever you are, wherever you may go, David said, ff1 should take the wings of the morning and I am dwelling in the uttermost part of the sea, You will still be there, Eddie Rickenbacker and his companions were in a little raft out on the Pacific Ocean for twenty-one days. They found out that was so. When they reported their story, they said, We thought we heard the angels sing.

God knows exactly what your problem is. I say this reverently, but God deliberately allows you and me to get into problems and troubles that we cannot solve so that we will learn where the help comes from. If we could always solve our problems, what would happen? We always would solve it. Then we would eventually think we can solve anything.

How much help is God going to give you? All that you need. He has provided divine assistance for all the emergencies to which our human resources are unequal. So the first thing to remember if you are in trouble, you are alone, you are fearful. You have trouble with discouragement, depression and you am struggling to maintain courage and faith and trust in God, the first thing to remember is to pray and keep on praying. If you have a bigger problem, you need to spend more time in prayer. Jacob had such a big problem that he prayed all night.

Secondly, in addition to praying (praying is not enough), you have to do whatever you know your duty is. You have to start to do your duty as best you can. Now Paul was in a situation like this. He was all alone, too. Turn in your Bibles to 2 Timothy 4. Look what he says here starting in verse 10. "Demas has forsaken me, having loved this present world, and has departed for Thessalonica--Crescens for Galatia; Titus for Dalmatia. Only Luke is with me. Get Mark and bring him with you, for he is useful to me for ministry. And Tychicus I have sent to Ephesus. Bring the cloak that I left with Carpus at Troas when you come--and the books, especially the parchments. Alexander the Coppersmith did me much harm. May the Lord repay him according to his works. You also must beware of him, for he has greatly resisted our words. At my first defense no one stood with me, but all forsook me."

Was he alone? He was alone. Was he in trouble? What was ahead of him? Ahead of him was getting thrown to the lions. That is what was ahead of him and he was all alone. What would you do if you were all alone and your future was to get thrown to the lions? Do you know what Paul did? Paul said, I have a responsibility. I may get thrown to the lions this afternoon or tomorrow, but I have a responsibility, I have a duty. My duty is to communicate the gospel. Had God given him a commission to communicate the gospel to the nations?

Paul knew that he had a duty and he said, I am going to do my duty even if I get killed for doing it. So what did he do? It says in verses 17, 18: "But the Lord stood with me and strengthened me, so that the message might be preached fully through me, and that all the Gentiles might hear. Also I was delivered out of the mouth of the lion. And the Lord will deliver me from every evil work and preserve me for His heavenly kingdom."

Paul decided that he was going to do his duty--even if he got killed for doing it. And when he made that decision he preached the gospel to Nero, one of the most known wicked men in the world, actually that has ever lived. Paul said, The Lord stood with me. I want to tell you friend, if there is somebody here and you are all alone and there is no human being that can solve your problems; maybe there is no other human being in the world that even understands your problem. That happens often, by the way.

Maybe even the people in your family do not understand how you feel. There is Somebody Who does understand. You know, there was a Christian one time and he said, The only thing lam afraid of is that either I might not know my duty or that I might not do it. If you are doing what God has asked you to do, you do not need to worry even if you are the only person in the world. Do you believe that?

That is what it looked like for Paul. It looked like he was all alone. He said everybody had forsaken him and that he was all alone. But he decided that he was going to do his duty--what God wanted him to do--and when he did that, not only did the Lord stand with him but He also strengthened Paul. The Lord will do the same for you. The Bible says that He is no respecter of persons.

The first thing to do if you are in trouble is to pray.

The next thing to do is to say, Lord help me to be faithful in doing my duty.

There is one more thing. The third thing has to do especially with the mind. This third thing is so interesting to me. I do not claim to understand it, but I am trying to figure it out. I am trying to understand it and experience it. This third thing that you can do is a secret that Moses had. The Bible specifically talks about Moses. Moses, of course, was a man that first of all had experienced great loneliness for forty years. He named his son a stranger in a strange land.

Then he had to lead over a million people out of Egypt, people that were undisciplined. Have you ever tried to be a leader of people that are undisciplined? I cannot think of anything that would try anybodys patience more than that. When I study the story of Moses, I never can get over it. I do not know how he could endure it. If you are an orderly person yourself--and Moses was because he had been trained in military science--and you have to lead people that are not orderly and not disciplined, let me tell you, there are not many things that could try your patience more.

And how did he endure this constant murmuring and complaining all the time? In fact, they murmured and complained so much, sometimes they wanted to kill him. Have you read that in the story of Moses? He told the Lord one time, They are just about to stone me. Here is how he endured all that. Turn in your Bibles to Hebrews 11:27. "By faith he forsook Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king; for he endured as seeing Him who is invisible."

What does that mean? He could not see God, but as he was walking there through the wilderness and all these people were murmuring and complaining, sometimes wanting to stone him, in his mind he knew that God was walking right beside him. Now we are not going to develop this idea, but it is something for you to meditate on and think about. This will help you with whatever trouble you are in.

When you begin to realize, if you have given your life to Christ and chosen to follow Him, Who is walking beside you as you walk through life? Pastor John, God is up in heaven. How can that be? Oh, no, God is not just up in heaven. The Bible says, God says I fill heaven and earth. And so Moses prayed to the Lord. In fact look in your Bibles at Exodus 33.

Exodus 33:14, 15 "He said (This is the Lord speaking), 'My presence will go with you and I will give you rest. Then he said to Him, 'If your presence does not go with us, do not bring us up from here." Moses said, I am not willing to walk through this wilderness with these people unless You are going with me. Did the Lord say He would go with him? Look at verse 17. "So the Lord said to Moses, 'I will also do this thing that you have spoken; for you have found grace in My sight, and I know you by name."

Did the Lord promise to go with him? And the same God that promised Moses that He would go with him, that same God is willing to go with you--if you endure as seeing Him that is invisible. Now Moses would not go to places where God would not want to go with him. Moses was careful in his thoughts and his speech so that his life was pleasing in Gods sight because He knew that Gods presence was right beside him.

That was the way Moses endured a type of a trial that very few if any other human beings have endured, going through the wilderness. He developed faith in the unseen. Here is a letter Ellen White wrote about Moses experience. She said that he believed that God ruled his life in particular. He believed that God would help him because he needed His help. He knew that he could not do this without the help of God for he had a perverse people to deal with. The presence of God he knew was strong enough to carry him through the most trying positions that a man could be placed in (See 5T, 651).

What did Moses know? He knew that as long as the presence of God was right beside him that His presence would be strong enough to take him through any kind of a situation that he could get in. Oh, friend, that is the experience that you and I need. Do you realize that that is the real solution to the prob1cm of loneliness and being alone? Jesus said to His disciples the night He was betrayed, You are all going to flee and leave Me alone, but I am not alone because the Father is with Me.

It is written - there is a Friend that sticks closer than a brother. Proverbs 18. And He has said, I will never leave you or forsake you. Hebrews 13:6. If there is somebody here that is having troubles with being lonely or discouraged or depressed and you are struggling to maintain your faith that is what you need. You need the One that will never leave you nor forsake you. You need to know that His presence is right by you and that He will stay with you.

Do you want to commit your life to Him and ask Him to be by you and help you to realize that He is with you and that His presence will sustain you?

Let us do that before we sing our closing song. Let us kneel as far as possible.