Early Will I Seek Thee

by David J. Stewart | December 2016

Psalms 63:1, “O God, thou art my God; early will I seek thee: my soul thirsteth
for thee, my flesh longeth for thee in a dry and thirsty land, where no water is.”

       I was listening to a wonderful sermon today by Dr. Russell Anderson, Who Shares His Testimony And How God Has Used Him To Help The Churches. In the sermon he teaches the Biblical truth to “seek God early,” which I'll explain more in a moment. Brother Anderson was born in 1931 in Hunter, Kentucky. He started out poor (without two nickels to rub together), uneducated, a youth working in the coal mines, but God took him to the gold mines through hard work and Biblical wisdom. Dr. Anderson has given $40,000,000 to the furtherance of the Gospel worldwide. Dr. Anderson says, “Never take credit for what God does!” Brother Anderson was saved in 1959. You can hear all this in the preceding sermon.

There is what is known in the church world as the “prosperity gospel,” but Dr. Anderson tells a story of “Gospel prosperity.” There's a big difference between the two! The prosperity Gospel says, “God wants you rich!” Gospel prosperity is, “God wants His Gospel endeavors funded.” Dr. Russell gave away $30,000 per day in 1999. That totals $11,000,000 for the year! In 1999, he owned 457 houses and apartments. When he started out working in the coal mines in his youth he had nothing! In the following sermon, Dr. Anderson quotes one of his favorite Scriptures, from Psalms 44:8, “In God we boast all the day long, and praise thy name for ever. Selah” Do we boast in God all the day long? We should!

In this incredible sermon, Dr. Anderson testifies that his three spiritual mentors are Evangelist John R. Rice, Pastor Jack Hyles and Dr. Tom Malone. In the sermon, Brother Anderson says that he learned something from all three of these men... each day, SEEK GOD EARLY!!! I love that!

Again, the Psalmist says:

Isaiah 26:9, “With my soul have I desired thee in the night; yea, with my spirit within me will I seek thee early: for when thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness.”

Early will I seek thee. I want to share with you something that I've been doing lately, which has been such a spiritual blessing to me. I bought an MP3 set (3 disks) of Alexander Scourby reading the King James Bible. I copied all of the MP3s from the DVD to my computer in a folder. At night before I go to bed, I open the Windows Media player. I then go to “My Computer” where the King James Bible folders and files are stored. I select the folders (books of the holy Bible) that I want to hear, I click and drag them into Windows media player. They start playing. I set my options in Windows media player to “repeat” and “shuffle.” I then pause the player and go to sleep. I do all this before I go to bed, because when I wake up at 4 am, I'm half out of it! Each day, when I wake up around 4 to 5 am, I simply click play and listen to the books of the Bible I selected the night before. I usually fall back asleep, listening to God's Word. As I wake up, I hear phrases from the Scriptures, and truths stick on my mind. When I wake up, I lay there and listen to God's Word for awhile. Now, I live alone, so this works for me. If you're married, perhaps your spouse may not be able to sleep with the Bible being read. But this works for me, and this is how I SEEK GOD EARLY each day.

One thing that I've learned in my Christian life is that you cannot live on yesterday's manna (food). In the Old Testament, God fed the Hebrews in the Wilderness. He gave them water. God even fed them with quail. Because they disobeyed God by refusing to enter into the Promised Land, God made them wander in the Wilderness for forty years as punishment. Everyone 21 years and older never entered into the Promised Land. God in His love and mercy provided manna each and every morning in the Wilderness for the Hebrews. But God commanded them not to save any manna for the next day, lest it rot. If the Hebrews became worried about having food to eat in the days and weeks to follow, and saved some manna, God made it rot and spoil with maggots. This was to teach God's people that they needed to trust the Lord on a daily basis. God had promised to provide for them, and He did!

Likewise, today, we cannot live on yesterday's spiritual manna. Our sinful flesh and wicked heart need to seek God early on a daily basis. I have learned that the closest walk with God yesterday does nothing to help me live for God today. If I don't seek God early today, I will be carnally-minded all day. I don't care if you've heard thousands of sermons in the past. I don't care if you've memorized the entire holy Bible in the past. If you don't seek God early, today, you will be carnally-minded for the rest of the day. Seeking God doesn't just happen, you must make it happen! Nothing in the holy Bible is accidental, incidental or coincidental.

EARLY WILL I SEEK THEE! That's the key to the Christian life. If you don't seek God early, you won't seek Him at all. Most believers don't seek God as they should. God must get lonely. But you say, “God has plenty of children, others will seek Him early.” No, God created you unique. If you don't walk with God, there will be an empty place at the table. There is a voice in God's choir that only you can fulfill and sing. God made me and broke the mold. Of the 8,000,000,000 people in the world (and quickly increasing), each and every human being in unique to God. No two sparrows are alike. No two snowflakes are alike. No two raindrops are alike. No two leaves are exactly alike. I am unique and so are you! There is a place in God's heart, if you are His child, that only you can fill. If you are not God's child, why not? The choice is yours! Why not become a born-again Christian right now?

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“Every word in this Bible is inspired by God almighty!”
—Dr. Jack Hyles (a great quote from the classic sermon, “A Friend At Midnight.”)

Psalms 116:15, “Precious in the sight of the LORD is the death of his saints.”

“The only inspired Words of God are in the King James Bible!”
—Dr. Jack Hyles (an awesome quote —Dr. Jack Hyles (THE REAL BATTLE!”)

BATTLE OF THE AGES
(MP3 by Dr. Hyles, “The King James Bible crowd is going to come out on top!”)