The Ever Present LORD
“The Ever-Present Lord”, aka "When I Wake, I Am Still With Thee" Sermon by Rev. Peter Hoffman, Oct 16, 1960 Transcribed by [great-grandson] Justin Larue, 12-23-2007 Editor’s note: In August and September 1960, Rev. and Mrs. P.C. Hoffman visited their daughter and son-in-law in Denver, Rev. and Mrs. Donald and Phyllis Wolfram, on the occasion of the arrival of their fourth grandchild, Donna Wolfram. In early October they returned by automobile to their station at the Zarephath, New Jersey, headquarters. Rev. Hoffman preached at the Sunday afternoon service on October 16. After delivering the sermon below, he left the auditorium without waiting for the closing song and prayer. He was found outside the door, collapsed and unconscious, and died shortly thereafter. His last words on this earth were St. Paul’s victorious statement about Heaven: “Eye hath not seen, ear hath not heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man the things that God hath prepared for them that love Him” It was through the miraculous providence of God that the sermon was recorded. It was played for the shocked and grieving family who gathered at Zarephath for the funeral. Now, nearly fifty years later, the old reel-to-reel tape, which had been mislaid and had undergone all sorts of extremes of heat and cold, has nevertheless been miraculously preserved and has been converted to CD format by Barry Blue, to whom we are deeply grateful for giving us back this treasured heirloom. –Suzanne Wolfram, Christmas Day 2007 Rev. Peter C. Hoffman speaking: Now we're ready for the execution. [cough] I don't know why they wish to record this sermon, because I think it's already recorded, and now I think they're using it out west. I know I preached it out there before I left there, couple weeks ago. I want to speak about the ever-present Lord, and my text is found in the one hundred and thirty-ninth psalm, and the eighteenth verse. One hundred and thirty-nine, and the eighteenth verse. "If I should count them, they are more in number than the sand: when I awake, I am still with thee." I like to read two verses of context before my text. "How precious also are they, are thy thoughts unto me, O God; how great is the sum of them. If I should count them, they are more in number than the sand: when I awake, I am still with thee. Page 1 of 5 Surely thou wilt slay the wicked, O God: depart from me therefore, ye bloody men. For they speak against thee wickedly, and thine enemies take thy name in vain." I read the seventeenth, eighteenth, nineteenth, and the twentieth verses of the one hundredth and thirty ninth psalm: "The Ever-Present Lord." When I awake, I am still with thee. [male voice: amen] Now the religion of many of us is only an occasional affair. It seems rather shallow at times, because the recognition of God is all too seldom. What one feels about the psalmist is this: that he always sets the Lord before him, and it is this continual recognition - this unvarying practice of God's presence - which under all circumstances seems to kindle his faith, and his hope, and his assurance! It was because he lived with God and went to sleep under the wing of God that he took his pen and he wrote in deep sincerity: "When I awake, I am still with thee." Now this is a wonderful little text found here in the one-hundred and thirty-ninth psalm. You know, you can find these jewels scattered throughout the Bible. [laughing] If we *read* the Bible! If we take time to read it. I know that I find a lot of these little gems [cough] as I go along. Let us widen the thought a little bit and think of various awakenings which it is our privilege to find while still with God under His providences. Human life has many awakenings. In the first place, we might apply the thought to the waking of the child to maturity. It has been my great pleasure recently to spend some time with my little grand-children. Now I hope you'll pardon the personal reference. And I have [ahem] been interested again in child psychology, and child innocence, and the great pleasure that grown-up people can receive in association with little children. Is no wonder that the Bible says that a little child shall lead them! And Jesus said unless you become converted and be like little children, you can't enter the kingdom of Heaven. Now, one of my little four-year-old girls [i.e., one of my grandchildren, a little four-year-old girl: this was Charlene Wolfram] has asked me to make her a sign to post up on the grounds out there telling the birds - to tell the little birds that if they have a broken leg or a broken wing they should come in there to - to Sharon [missionary home in Denver, home of the Wolframs] , and get fixed up. Now, isn't Page 2 of 5 that wonderful? Isn't it wonderful what great imaginations little children have? And I'm going to do it! I'm going to set that sign for the sign for the birds, so the little birds can read it. And when they read it, they'll know that there's a, there's a place out there. There's a, there's a hospital for birds. The world of a child is not the actual world in which we live; they live in a dream world, and what an awful awakening when these little children awaken to the grim realities of life, and to maturity. And when with the passing of years there comes experience, and the unveiling of what is grim and stern, is like an awakening out of a sleep. And when we awake, what then? What then? What we gonna do with these children, when they awake from their dream life. Are we prepared to receive them? And direct them? And to teach them? Much of our youthful dreams is gone for us. We have put away childish things, as the apostle Paul puts it. When I was a child, I thought as a child; I spake as a child, but when I became a man, I put away childish things. Put 'em away! Put 'em away forever! [ahem] But the comfort of it all is that, that we can look to God - in the crushing out of happy, childish things, and say with the psalmist, when his sleep was over, "When I awake, I am still with thee." God is with us in our heaviest duties and sorrows of life, and burdens of life. God is with us in our humblest tasks if the task is a faithful task and well-done. Again our text has a deep application - when we think of the awakening to new knowledge. Has it not always seemed when knowledge broadened as if God were to be driven from a field? What is it that saves us in such a feeling? Well, it is the presence of God. "When I awake I am still with thee." I remember my childhood. My young manhood. My student days in college, and in the seminary. I remember when new thoughts were brought up. I remember when I was shocked at the theologians in their mumbling of theological thoughts. Uncertain as to whether Jesus is the son of God or whether He isn't. Whether He is divine, or just a human being. I remember these days. But, advanced knowledge does not change the hunger of a person's heart. [coughs] You may get new knowledge - ah, strange knowledge, we might say. Strange ideas. Strange philosophies and psychologies. Strange theologies that tend to unsettle the fundamental student. Page 3 of 5 But, my friends, through every increase and advance of knowledge, the heart still hungers for the living God. We never outgrow that; no matter what we learn, we never get beyond it or above it. The heart and God were made for each other. There is an affinity between God and the heart of man. That's why he says "My son, give me thine heart." Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with *all* thy heart. God wants the heart of a person, because God and man were made for each other, and that communion is their sweet rest of soul and peace of mind. Once more this text is full of meaning, when we think of the waking from spiritual lethargy. [coughs, "pardon me"] There are seasons for most of us in our spiritual life where we are little better than asleep. Sometimes, I think people like that are backslid. Our prayers, how cold and formal they become. They're just the semblance and mockery of prayer, and the Bible loses its freshness and its dew. It doesn't leap to meet us when we come to it, and there settles down a deadness on our spirits. Did you ever get in that position? Do you know anyone in that position? Who has not known such seasons of desertion of God? And how has, and who has not known the gladness of it all when the spirit is quickened into life again? We're able to lift our heads and say "When I awake I'm still with thee." My friends, when you are converted, you remember that great enlightening experience; you remember how the leaves of the trees clap their hands. You remember how the world seemed to be dancing with joy and happiness. That is the spiritual awakening of the soul. I think too that we should bear our text in mind in view of any time of crushing sorrow. We who are older have had these experiences, such as the passing away of church leaders [or] great political leaders, and the passing of loved ones; father or mother, sisters or brothers, neighbors and friends. In all great sorrow there is something numbing. Insensibility, like sleep. We go to sleep, as it were. Is, it is...it is when a man awakens from that sleep - slowly and heavily, through dreary days - it is then that he can lift his heart to God and say, "When I awake, I am still with thee." [male voice: praise Him, praise Him] Life in its bitterest and heaviest [coughs] woe can never outdistance God [coughs] through Jesus Christ our Lord. These things [coughs, "pardon me"] have been Page 4 of 5 experienced by many of us who are older in the world (worry?) And then in closing, does not our text apply to the last awakening? And I quote, "I shall be satisfied when I awake." Satisfied! Alma White wrote a song, ‘I'm Satisfied With Jesus”. Well, I'm satisfied with Jesus today. I shall be satisfied when I awake, and satisfied because I am with Thee. Eye hath not seen, ear hath not heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man the things that God hath prepared for them that love Him. [Editor’s note: 1 Corinthians 2:9]
posted by Larry @ 11:58 AM
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