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[ Music ] [MUSIC] I do, don't you? I live by his favor.

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I do, don't you? For grace I am more than. I worship before Him, I love and adore Him. I do, don't you?

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[audience] Amen. We continue our consideration of the book of Psalms and we come to Psalm number 65, verses 9 through 11. Thou visiteth the earth and watereth it.

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Thou greatly enrichest it. The river of God is full of water. Thou providest their grain for so thou hast prepared it. Thou watereth its furrows abundantly,

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setting its ridges, softening it with showers. and blessing its growth. Thou crownest the year with thy bounty. The subject of the message, the river is full. I've known rivers, I've known rivers ancient as the

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world and older than the flow of human blood in human veins. My soul has grown deep like the rivers. I bathed in the Euphrates when dawns were young. I built my hut near the Congo and it lulled me to sleep.

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I looked upon the Nile and raised the pyramids above it. I heard the singing of the Mississippi when Abe Lincoln went down to New Orleans. And I've seen its muddy bosom turn all golden in the sunset.

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I've known rivers, ancient dusky rivers. My soul has grown deep like the rivers. Several years ago, I walked around in a certain part of Lake Travis. It was dry.

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There were stumps and other debris that could be seen. Ordinarily, all of this was covered by water. But now it was dry because of a prolonged drought.

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But our concern today is not about a source of water that dries up. What the psalmist says here, the river of God is full. metaphor is most meaningful in the context which the children of Israel lived because you see water was a problem.

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Oh they had the Sea of Galilee in the north, the Jordan River that ran through the land and the Dead Sea in the south and to be sure there were springs fountains here and there. But most of the land was an arid wasteland, a waterless desert that had occasional rains. So in the face of such conditions they were

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aware of the fact that water was indeed a precious gift. Battles were fought for water. The problem that Isaac faced with the Philistines that they were stopping up the whales and the scripture says and Isaac digged again the whales of Abraham his father. When the enemy wanted to take advantage he would down the river,

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poison the water supply, a seat to it that the people could not get to the water. And one of the constant problems that Jerusalem faced was a matter of water supply, water, water. And surely those who were in the desert places and there were many who dwelt in the southern part of the country, look

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forward to the time when the rain would come. They would take special efforts to preserve the water so it could last as long as possible. The wadi was something that was treasured in the desert, the little stream that would come down the mountainside.

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But here the psalmist speaks of a river. In a land where people wondered and worried about water, in a land where people often face the threat of famine because of the scarcity of water. We have a song that contains these words, "The river of God is full." This particular song was used in

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connection with the religious festival in the temple, the celebration of the goodness of God during the harvest. This is a good word for the people of God because it expresses the relation of the Creator, the creation, and the creature. You see God cares about us. We are sustained through his providence.

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Even before we arrived on the scene, God made special preparations for us. Created the heavens and then he created the earth and having created the earth it is said that he planted a garden eastward in Eden. A garden. This garden has a river that waters it. It's God's river, it's God's garden, it's God's river.

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It's not an accident, it's God's own doing and now we read here in the psalm that the river of God is full. Or there are certain characteristics of a river that we will do well to consider. A river runs, doesn't remain at a standstill, a river flows, it's a steady stream, it's moving, it's on a journey from place to place, a lake is localized,

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its waters remain within a given area, but a river is somewhat universal in a sense because it's constantly on the move from place to place. A river moves at its own pace and is governed by its own will. A river is ever fresh, it never remains the same, hence it does not become stale, stagnant, it's fresh.

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Heraclitus said, "One does not step twice into the same river, for other waters are ever flowing on you." The river of God is full. You see the river is there for everybody. No individual can lay claim to the river. It's available for the wider community and the river is always full of water it never runs dry. It's an

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expression of God's grace this word. It tells us really that God's grace is available to all the sinner, the saint, the just, and the unjust, the Jew and the Gentile, male and female, everybody. The river is God's gift. It's a sign that God visits this earth. There is a river and the river is always full. It's really

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the sign that that heaven is related to earth, that there is a river that flows in the garden of life and that river is the river of God and it's always full. It reminds us that it's a gift of God. It's not ours, we don't create the river. In other words, the river, you see, is an expression of that heavenly grace that comes down from above. You see, God causes the rain to

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fall upon the just and the unjust. He's just good to everybody. Whether we recognize it or not whether we praise him or not he's good and he still has the river there provided for everybody and the river is always full. Well it It tells us, I say, that God has visited this earth.

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I said it's a relationship. The very presence of the river is a reminder of the relationship of heaven and earth. It was a very popular song many years ago

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when I was a boy. Every time it rains, it rains pennies from heaven. Don't you know each cloud contains pennies from heaven? heaven. You'll find your fortune falling all over town. Be sure your umbrella is

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upside down. In other words, God has his own way. It's in his goodness and it's in his mercy that the river is always full. Grace of God is full. I say it's there for everybody whosoever will let him come. There is a river just one river God's river God's grace God's acceptance God's river is full. Now this river

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expresses the re-creative activity of God. I said earlier that the river is constantly flowing, that you never step twice into the same water, that it's always re-creating itself. God is at work, His grace never runs out. That the grace of God is at work within the human family, always recreating and making

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new. God's at work in you and in me. Recreating us. Making us what we ought to be and what He wants us to be and somehow no matter how many

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blunders we make, how we stumble and how we fall, that somehow his grace is always there. River is always for you, he never runs out. You know sometimes in a family where there's several children, one sort of feels maybe I'm neglected and sometimes there is some partiality shown toward one but that's not the case with God.

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There's enough room in God for everybody to receive as much consideration as you can avail yourself of. God loves everybody. Doesn't matter what color you are, doesn't matter how strange and how peculiar others may think you are, God loves us and God cares about us and his river is so full that there's enough

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there for everybody and it just never runs out. It's always full. You see the river is an expression of his mighty provision for his people. God provides for his people that's why the river is there. There's a river that runs in life that's a concrete expression of his bounty in caring for his people. Well

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Well, when you visit India, you see some rather strange things. In the book, The Pitiful and the Proud, the author talks about his experience in India, strange were some of the country scenes. And he speaks of seeing people at a body of water, they'd be drinking from the water, bathing in that water, the cattle drink the water,

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the cattle walk in the water. In fact, everything they wanted in connection with the water, they were getting at that same stream. Well many of us have problems with that as far as sanitary conditions are concerned but in a sense all of our needs are met from the water. We may purify it this way or that way but

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that's not necessary with God's river. We need to be cleansed, we get it from that river and the water of the river. We need food that needs to be prepared it must depend upon the river because there can be no garden without the water from the river. And when we need our flocks that cover the hills they cannot be

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cared for without the river. The whole life of the people of God depends upon the The river of God is full. That's good news. That's good news. Oh we we have great deal about the Graham-Rutman deal. How are we gonna have cutbacks in our government and how those cutbacks are gonna affect every fiber of

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our government, how Texas is gonna be affected and how the poor will be affected. The most necessary some of the most necessary social programs as many of us see it will be affected by it we say these reductions we read constantly about how state is being affected by all all is flooding the market and how

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that's going to affect education how it's going to affect the Texas budget all those things that's the way it is in our affairs we have our peaks and our valleys we have times when there is plenty and we have times when there is poverty and want. But not so with God. The river of God is always full, always full.

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That's good news. That's good news. There is a river that's always full. There are droughts, there are streams that dry up, but there is a river that is always full. there is discord, there is controversy and conflict, but there is a river, the streams whereof may glad the city of God. The earth may quake, mountains may move,

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heathens may rage, kingdoms may be shaken, but thanks be to God there is a river, the streams whereof may glide the city of God. That river gives us verdant meadows. That river makes the valley fertile. That river provides for cattle on many hills. And that river is there for every season of our lives, springtime and summer, autumn

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and winter, every season the river is there, the river is full, the river is full. Well you see that's that's a manifestation of the presence and the power of God. See God is the source, God is the source. You know if it were left to some people your blessings would be dried up. You wouldn't get any blessings except to some people.

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They would get all the blessings they could for themselves and they'd leave out as many people as they could because they feel it'd be more for them. But I love this word because it's a word for everybody. There is a river that's full. It's the river of God.

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River of God. And the Bible just talks about that, really. It starts at the very beginning, when you open the Bible in Genesis, it talks about the river.

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That God put a river into God. You really want to have happiness. You really want to have joy. You really want to live in Eden, have paradise.

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Yes, yes. you just draw from that river because it's always full. And Ezekiel goes on in the 47th chapter of Ezekiel, he talks about the river.

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They were facing exile. They were scattered here and there, but Ezekiel said, "I saw a vision of a river." You know, that's beautiful because you see,

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Jerusalem didn't have no river. You go to the city of Jerusalem today, even when I was there a few days ago, they were still talking about the water supply.

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been going on, that problem's been going on for centuries. But the prophet sees a vision of a river. It's a river of God in Jerusalem. That God has provided a new Jerusalem for all of his people

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and that river flows from the throne of God. And it's always full. And Ezekiel, in his vision, talks about walking that river.

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He said he walked. First he said it was ankle deep. And then he kept on. Waters kept rising. Then it became waist deep. Waters kept on rising and he said that they were deep enough to swim in. Yes Lord. Well the river of God is deep. Yes. You see how much of it you get just depends on your faith. but it's full.

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Some of us may just be ankles deep in the faith. Some of us may be waist deep, but oh, thanks be to God that you can swim in that river and you can float and it's always full.

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The river of God's always full. Yeah, Ezekiel talks about it. And then as you go on, come to the very last of the Bible, last book.

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After all of our sufferings, all the tribulations John envisions out there on the isle of Patmos, all of the fight between light and darkness, the demonic and the divine, he looks and he says, "And I, John, saw a river, a river flowing from the throne of God in that holy city. And he said, "As I looked and I saw on both banks of the river, I saw there the

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tree of life. And I saw twelve trees, one for every month of the year, bearing fruit in every season, for the river is always full." And he says, "And the fruit of that tree was for the healing of the nations." So whatever you need. We may have this kind of ailment, we may have arthritis, we may have this, we may have

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that to dampen our spirit, but just go to that river and that is the fruit that is for the healing of the nations. Everybody, everybody can benefit because the river of God is always full. Well, the peace of God is like that. There's a man who was separated from his family.

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He was going to join them later, and they were making a trip across the seas. Somehow, that was an accident, a catastrophe, and his wife and all of his children lost their lives. He was very depressed, but out of that night came a song that he wrote. It begins like this, "When peace like a river attendeth my way."

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God somehow in his river of joy, and in the midst of his sorrow, gave him a river of joy, A river of contentment, a river of power and strength. That's available. It's available for everybody.

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It's been there a long, long time and will be there for years to come because that river is eternal. And we invite you now to accept the one who is the source of this river, the eternal God himself who reveals himself through Jesus Christ.

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We invite you to come. [ Music ] [ Music ] [ Music ]

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♪ When sorrow's bright scene ♪ ♪ Millows grow ♪ ♪ But ever my heart ♪ ♪ Thou hast taught me to say ♪

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♪ It is well, it is well ♪ ♪ With my soul ♪ ♪ It is well, it is well ♪ ♪ With my soul ♪

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♪ With my soul ♪ ♪ He did well ♪ ♪ He did well ♪ ♪ With my soul ♪

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♪ Though Satan's the prophet ♪ ♪ Though darkness the prompt ♪ ♪ And lift not our children from the floor ♪ ♪ And close as we are ♪

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♪ Our helpless estate ♪ ♪ Have as stead ♪ ♪ Is the blood of my soul ♪ ♪ It is well ♪

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♪ With my soul ♪ ♪ It is well ♪ ♪ In my soul ♪ ♪ It is well ♪

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♪ With my soul ♪ ♪ In my soul ♪ ♪ It is well ♪ ♪ In my soul ♪

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[Music] [BLANK_AUDIO]