Lift up Your Voice with Strength 1983

I'd like to read a verse that we often sing on Wednesday nights from Isaiah chapter 40, verse 9. Get you up to a high mountain, O Zion, herald of good tidings. Lift up your voice with strength, O Jerusalem, herald of good tidings. Lift it up.

Fear none of it. Say to the cities of Judah, Behold your God. A few weeks ago, at Liontail's Camp, at the men's retreat, Haman Cross of the Afro-American Mission, who was our speaker, was walking with a handful of us from the lodge to the dormitory at the end of the day.

And he shook his head, and he said, I keep praying that God will give me more power to say what has to be said. I get so frustrated because I need more power. I know I need something that I don't have.

It was a man who had just fed us with living bread and a rich message, spoke to us with great power, really. A man who's involved in a work that's faithful and solid, and which I believe is going to be standing long after many of the flashier, better-known ministries have been burned up by the fires of judgment. A servant of God who's crying out for a more effective message, for more power.

You know, we stand back and look at this man Haman Cross, and we say, I wish I could talk the way this guy does. I wish I had the liberty to say it the way this man says it. And yet Haman is right about himself and about us.

He feels it, and we feel it. This need for a word from God on our lips that is undistorted by us, that isn't messed up and twisted by our egos or our fears or whatever it is, and that cuts right through and causes the walls of Jericho to fall. We don't need more electronics or more printing presses to multiply our words.

We have too many words already, really. We talk much too much. What we need is a word from God, which is so clearly from God that this one person to whom we speak is touched by the spirit and life of God himself.

Jesus sat on the edge of the well, spoke to this one woman, and the words he spoke to this woman were so clearly from the Father that in a very short time her life was shaken, healed, transformed. And now she goes and gets the whole village and brings the whole town to the door of the kingdom of heaven. That's the kind of word we need.

It's a beautiful thing, a wonderful, something we really take much too much for granted, a gorgeous thing for us to be able to come together like this, you know, and draw near to each other and lay aside our resentments and all the other things that mess us up and come to the Lord's table and draw near and enter into his presence in the unity of the spirit. And I believe many of us felt that last Sunday was a particularly special day. It was as if the Lord just drew the veil back and enabled us to see glory.

You know, our hearts were just lifted up and we went on our way rejoicing. Yet who of us hasn't felt Haman Cross's frustration this week? You know, Lord, I've seen your glory. I felt the touch of your hand.

I've tasted your peace, yet when I try to speak of you to that wounded, bitter world, the words stick in my mouth. They come out weak, flat. I need a living word from you.

Oh God, I have to have a message. Each of us feels this. And the answer comes back from the Lord.

To every believer, I've already given you a message that is very, very powerful. And that message is on your lips and it's in your heart. I've given you a message, says the Lord, to every believer among us now.

I've given you a message that's so good, it will melt people's hearts, it will create hope in them, give them a fresh start, set them free from their chains, deliver them from their bondage. I've given you that message. All you have to do is get up on top of things and speak it without fear and clearly.

You will do that. People will be drawn. Heaven will respond and earth and hell will tremble with the word that I've given you.

Get you up to a high mountain, oh Zion, herald of good tidings. Lift up your voice with strength, oh Jerusalem, herald of good tidings. Lift it up, fear not.

Say to the cities of Judah, behold your God. Look at what I've given you, says the Lord. I've anointed you as a herald of good tidings.

Now you need to do three things. One, get up to a high mountain, get on top of things. Two, lift up your voice with strength, without fear.

And three, say to the cities of Judah, that is to the whole world, look at your God, behold your God. First, get you up to a high mountain, Zion, herald of good tidings. You have a message, get up on a mountain with it, get on top of things.

The message of the kingdom of God cannot be proclaimed from behind a bush or hiding under the bed. We have to come out in the open, get up on top of things. Now listen, we truly need to be humble.

We have to be poor in spirit. We have to be broken in spirit. We have to be humble.

We have to be meek, but never timid. Humble, but not timid. Get up on that mountain, get on top of things, which is the same as to say, be bold.

Acts chapter four, verse 29. And now, Lord, look upon their threats and grant to thy servants to speak thy word with all boldness. While thou stretchest out thy hand to heal, and signs and wonders are performed in the name of thy holy servant, Jesus.

When they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God with boldness. And you can be sure they kept on speaking the word of God with boldness when they got outside the building.

Lord, look upon their threats and grant us to get on top of those threats. And the Spirit fell, and by the power of the Spirit, they got up on the mountain. They got up on top of things.

See, when John Wesley would preach out in the open, as he did most of the time, as more and more pulpits and churches were closed to him, he would always look for a mound, for some rise in the ground, some higher place. Sometimes he'd get up on a chair, sometimes he would stand on a table, so he could be seen and heard. He had to get up on top of the situation.

So you have a message. And that message cannot be proclaimed from hiding behind a bush or mumbling under the bed. Get up on the mountain and shout it! Which brings us to the next point.

Lift up your voice with strength, O Jerusalem. Lift it up. Don't be afraid.

Speak up! You know how somebody says, but if I speak up at the wrong time or I get too loud, somebody's going to get mad. And that's true. You know, what are we afraid of? I mean, why is it that we're afraid somebody might be a little offended? All this pussyfooting around.

Listen to Jesus. Matthew chapter 10, verse 24. A disciple is not above his teacher, nor a servant above his master.

It is enough for the disciple to be like his teacher and the servant like his master. If they have called the master of the house Beelzebul, how much more will they malign those of his household? Yeah, but I don't want people to think I'm crazy. They thought he was crazy.

I don't want people mad at me. They were mad at him. So, have no fear of them, for nothing is covered that will not be revealed, or hidden that will not be known.

What I tell you in the dark, utter in the light. What you hear whispered, proclaim upon the housetops. What comes clear in the gathered fellowship, speak out there in the world.

And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. Are not two sparrows sold for a penny, and not one of them will fall to the ground without your father's will? Even the hairs on your head are all numbered.

Fear not, therefore, you are of more value than many sparrows. So, every one who acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge before my Father who is in heaven. But he who denies me before men, I will also deny before my Father who is in heaven.

So when the opportunities come, and they always do, to speak about Jesus, do we speak clearly? Or do we pussyfoot? Many times, there is a note of apology in our voice. You know? And it causes our word to come out weak, and timid, and hesitant. Are we ashamed of Jesus? Do we have to apologize because we're following him? Do we become embarrassed when people, who may be our close friends or relatives, find out that we're really serious? If that's not the case, then let's not mumble.

Let's speak up. Lift up your voice with strength. Lift it up.

Don't be afraid. What a liberating thing it is, when we finally come out of hiding, and take a stand. This is what I'm living for, the kingdom of God.

This is who I follow, Jesus. Now everybody knows. God knows.

Satan knows. Our relatives know. The world knows.

Finally, say to the cities of Judah, Behold your God. Look at him. There he is.

See, we're not bearing witness to our own experiences. We're pointing to the one who is now on the throne, and who is now on his way toward us, in an hour of judgment. Behold the Lamb of God.

He takes away the sin of the world. Behold him while you have a chance. Look to him and be saved.

All the ends of the earth. We're not pointing people to our church, our church, our favorite doctrines, our special spiritual experiences, which we want them to have. We're pointing people to Jesus.

Let the experiences that they have be different from ours. That's okay. We're just bearing witness to him.

Come and see him. Come and listen to him. Come and see a man who told me all I ever did is not this to Christ, we found the Messiah, Jesus of Nazareth.

Nazareth? Can anything good come out of Nazareth? Detroit? You mean Jesus is still around Detroit? Come and see him. And our only function is to be witnesses. That's all.

We're the real JWs. We're the Jesus witnesses. Amen.

It's surprising how many of us are afraid they're going to take us for JWs. You know, we're walking down the street, you know, and we got our tracts in our hand, and someone's going to think I'm a JW. What does that matter? Tell them who you are.

From Acts chapter 1, verse 6. And when they had come together, they asked him, Lord, would you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel? He said to them, It is not for you to say, It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has fixed by his own authority. But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you shall be my witnesses in all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth. We have received power.

The Holy Spirit has come, and we are his witnesses. And the one purpose of our life on this earth is to point to him. To proclaim to our neighbors and our relatives and our friends and our enemies and the strangers we meet along the way that Jesus is Lord.

We don't have to prove anything. God does the proving. You know, we don't have to manipulate people.

We can't engineer them into the kingdom of God. That's not our job. God doesn't even manipulate, but he'll work, he'll confirm to anybody who's seeking.

Our job is to speak it, and speak it clearly and boldly. If we will do that, he promises that he will confirm the truth of what we say to anybody who's honestly listening. Get you up to a high mountain, O Zion, herald of good tidings.

Lift up your voice with strength. O Jerusalem, herald of good tidings, lift it up, fear not. Say to the cities of Judah, Behold your God.

That powerful message we all long for is already near us. It's on our lips, and it's in our hearts. All we have to do is get up on that high mountain.

Get on top of the situation. Speak it clearly. Proclaim Jesus without shame.

And the walls of Jericho will fall, and the gates of death will yield to the power of the word of the Lord coming from our mouths. Now today, let's allow the spirit of the Lord to speak to us. He speaks in many ways, but one of his favorite ways is the voice of a gentle stillness.

Let's just be quiet for a bit before him, and allow him to show us those places where we've been hiding under the bed, and where we need to get up on top of the mountain, get on top of the situation, and be bold. Let's just wait upon him in silence.