Seeking for the help of the Lord,
I direct your prayerful attention to Psalm 34 and reading for our
text, verse 5. Psalm 34 and verse 5. They looked unto him and were
enlightened, and their faces were not ashamed. Psalm 34 and verse 5. We read the two portions we have
this evening. The first portion was what David
was going through when this psalm was written or immediately after
it. We have that reminder over the
top of the psalm, the psalm of David When he changed his behavior
before Abimelech or Achish, he drove him away and he departed. David was in fear of his life.
He'd actually got the sword of Goliath in his hand and he'd
gone to the Philistines and they recognized him and he knew that
he could easily have lost his life at that time. And this is
what then was going on in his soul, this poor man, pride, and
the Lord heard him and delivered him and saved him out of all
his troubles. He proved this, the angel of
the Lord encampeth round about them that fear him and delivereth
them. And it is a reminder that in
the book of Psalms we have the experience of the harm. What
is going on inside God's children while they are walking through
things outwardly. We might see someone and we see
what they're going through outwardly, but we cannot tell what's going
on in their hearts. We cannot tell their fears, their
prayers, their cries, but God can and God does know. And we
know that the Lord has joined all things to work together for
good to them that are the called according to his purpose. And
those all things are the things in providence outwardly. In David's
case, it was what he was going through then. It was used to
bring about this deliverance and bring about this psalm. And if we are the Lords, we will
notice this and should notice and watch providence and watch
how our hearts are in these things. We read in Hebrews 12 that those
that are chastened, no chastening for the present seemeth to be
joyous, but grievous, nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable
fruit of righteousness to them that are exercised thereby. There
are things that outwardly, and the mark is put on those that
is affecting them inwardly. And really we should be concerned
if we go through troubles and trials and things that go wrong,
things even that go right, blessings and things that should be caused
to make us truly thankful for what the Lord has done, and it
doesn't touch us. It doesn't change our prayers. How much do our prayers change
with the things that we are going through? Or we just go through
life and we always have the same prayer, irrespective. And the Lord says, I know what
I've done to this person. I know what trials they're going
through. I know what things I'm touching, but it's not changing
their prayers. They're not seeking me. They're
not crying unto me in their trouble. In Psalm 107, in all of the changes
through that psalm, and each time they fell down, there was
none to help them. They cried unto the Lord in their
trouble. and he delivered them out of
their distresses. Then they praised him. This is
one of David's troubles. And he cried unto the Lord, and
the Lord delivered him. Another thing in this psalm,
it's a case of where one has been blessed, and he's pointing
others to the same blessing. One has been through a trial,
a trouble, and been delivered, and he wants others to know this
as well. He says, his soul, my soul, make
her boast in the Lord. But then he says, oh, magnify
the Lord with me, and let us exalt his name together. In other places we read, come
and hear all ye that fear the Lord, and I will tell what he
had done for my soul. The day that the Lord rose from
the dead, we heard many reports, those who had seen him, went
back to the disciples and told what they had seen. The two on
the way to Emmaus, they told what was done in the way and
how Jesus had shown himself to them. And this is what we term
a Christian experience, when those things that we're passed
through in our lives, it brings us to the word of God, it brings
us to prayer, it brings us to have deliverances and blessings
that we want to pass on to others and others to hear of. The Lord did not send angels
to preach the gospel, he sent sinners. The apostle Paul was
chief of sinners, he called himself, and he was called to preach and
to preach to sinners. Peter, who denied his Lord those
three times, it was the angel that did. Cornelius to send to
Joppa that he would come and speak to him words whereby all
his house would be saved. The Lord has ordained that those
that tell to others also first know those blessings in their
own souls and their deliverances and able to point with an absolute
certainty that we have known this blessing And we have received
of the Lord this blessing, not by report, not by reading it,
but by personal experience. And that is what David is walking
in here, and he's desiring others to know it as well. In our text,
we read, they looked unto him. Who looked unto him? I believe
he's pointing. to those humble ones. In verse
two, my soul shall make a boast in the Lord, the humble shall
hear that of and be glad. What he has to say is to be good
news for the humble ones. We'd remember that one of the
chief sins is pride, the pride of man, the pride of our first
parents, the pride of Eve that would say, well, though Satan
is coming to me, And Adam is my head, I will manage this myself. The pride of man that would say
we know better than the Lord, we will believe Satan and we
will walk in his ways. Depart from us, man says, we
desire not the knowledge of thy ways. But the Lord, when he would
teach and he'd reprove his disciples when they were questioning who
was the greatest in the way, He takes a little child and He
sets them before Him and He said, whoso shall humble himself as
this little child, the same is cheapest in the kingdom of heaven. And so the ones that are prepared
to hear this blessing and what has been done for David and what
the people of God have to say, they've been made ready for that,
humbled, and brought low. You know, sometimes we have nice
ideas of what it is to be humble. You think, well, that's a blessing.
I'd like that blessing. But you know, when it is in practice,
it's very real things that we've said wrong, done wrong. We're
utterly ashamed of them. And even before men, maybe we,
like with Peter, He said before all of those round about him
and before the Lord, though all men forsake thee, yet will not
I. But he had to prove it was him,
and he denied his Lord. And that's very, very humbling
to be brought down in that way. And it is those, though, that
are ready to receive salvation on God's terms and to listen
to those who have been delivered All the while that we can deliver
ourselves and save ourselves, we won't look for someone else.
If something goes wrong in our homes, if something went wrong
with our car, if we were mechanically minded, we'd say, I will fix
that. We won't go to a mechanic. If there was something that we
needed doing, if we could do it ourselves, we'd never seek
to someone else. And it is with salvation all
the while that we are sufficient in our own eyes, we've always
got some strength, some answer, some goodness to plead, something
to stand by us we will never seek unto the Lord. And so the
ones that he is speaking to here is those that are the humble
ones. They looked unto Him and were
enlightened and their faces were not ashamed. Well, I want to look at three points this evening.
Firstly, who it was they looked unto. They looked unto Him. Who? Who was it they looked unto? The second thing is the effect
on them. We read, they looked unto him
and were lightened and their faces were not ashamed. It had an effect. And then thirdly,
some of the characters who, from David's day, from this day, looked
unto him. Some characters through scripture
where we see in a practical way But firstly, who was it that
they were looking unto? Well, this psalm itself is a
messianic psalm. It's a psalm that speaks of our
Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. We have in verse 20, He keepeth
all His bones, not one of them is broken. Many of the Lord's
dear people have had their bones broken. One of the thieves that
the cross did. We have in the verse prior to
that, many are the afflictions of the righteous. The Lord delivereth
him out of them all. Now it is true, the Lord's dear
people are counted as righteous in the Lord. But there is only
one truly righteous one. There is none righteous, no,
not one, says the scripture, as pointing to men and of their
own. But the Lord Jesus Christ is
he that is righteous and has a righteousness to give to a
people that have none. It is Jehovah the Lord that is
spoken of through here, and it is Jehovah who has provided that
remedy and salvation, right from the very first promise of the
seed of the woman to bruise the serpent's head, they were looking
unto Him to provide that promised seed and that redemption from
death. Already they were under the sentence
of death. Already each one of us, as we
come into this world, already we are condemned to die. Our
bodies must die. We are spiritually dead. We are
under that curse and under the sentence of death. And so it
is looking unto the Lord Jesus, it's looking unto God's provision. Our Lord said of Abraham, Abraham
saw my day and rejoiced at it. There were those that said of
our Lord, thou art not yet 50 years of age, and hast thou seen
Abraham? And Lord said before Abraham
was, I am. But Abraham, he saw the provision,
he was able to say by faith to Isaac, when Isaac said, behold
the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?
Abraham said, my son, God will provide himself a lamb for a
burnt offering. And Abraham saw that as substitutionary. It was a literal ram caught in
the thicket by his horns. to preserve it so that it would
be spotless and worthy of the sacrifice. But also Abraham saw
past that, and he saw Christ's day. The Apostle Paul said the
promise that was given to Abraham at that time was unto his seed,
not of seeds which is many, but his seed which is Christ. All
the promises of God are yea and amen. in the Lord Jesus Christ. Dear Job was another one of those,
before David's day, that looked unto Christ. In his deep trials
he says, I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand
at the latter day upon the earth, and that after my skin worms
destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I seek God for myself
and not another. had very clear views of His Redeemer,
very clear views of the coming Messiah. So did Solomon after
David, how that he viewed Him and saw Him in the temple, in
the type of the temple, and coming to fill the temple. The heaven
of heavens cannot contain Thee, how much less this house that
I buildeth, that will God in very deed dwell upon the earth. They were looking for Him to
come, looking and expecting the promised Messiah, expecting the
Redeemer, the seed of the woman. You have in Hebrews all of that
long list of those that lived and that died by faith, a long
cloud of witnesses. And we are told that they died
not having received the promises that God providing some better
thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect.
They died looking for, believing in the coming Messiah, the Lord
Jesus Christ, and walked by faith in Him. And many examples are
given of faith here, Beautiful, concise description of true saving
faith is in verse 13 to 16. Those are the really the most
important verses in that chapter that apply to each one of us.
These all died in faith, not having received the promises,
that is, Christ did not come in their lifetime, they didn't
see him come, but having seen them afar off. and were persuaded
of them and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers
and pilgrims on the earth. These are the ones, they looked
unto Him, they looked unto Him that was coming. The preparation
in their hearts, they were strangers, they are pilgrims on this earth.
This earth was not their rest, but they were seeking that which
was to come. And so we read there, for they that say such things
declare plainly they seek a country. And truly if they had been mindful
of that country from whence they came out, they might have had
opportunity to have returned. But now they desire a better
country that isn't heavenly, wherefore God is not ashamed
to be called their God, for he hath prepared for them a city.
And they're all looking. unto Him. The expectation is
from Him. The hope of redemption was from
Him. Perhaps to use an illustration, say if your children were wanting
to go to university and you couldn't pay for university, but someone
said, we will pay for you, we will give you the money to have
all of this training. Then you'd be looking to that
person to provide what you knew was the difference between able
to go to university or not. That need was there, the person
was there who said they'd provide that need, and you'd be looking
for that. If someone is ill, someone is
unwell, and there's an expectation. They hear about a surgeon, they
hear about a doctor, and they have to wait for the appointment,
maybe a couple of months. But they're looking, their eye,
their mind, their thoughts are on that person. They might not
have seen them. They might not have met them.
They've heard their name. They've heard their reputation.
They've heard what they've done for other people, and so all
the time they're looking unto that person, expecting that help
from them. Some of the Lord's dear people
have walked that path, and when they've gone to that person after
they've had a long time of waiting, maybe had years of affliction,
and that person hasn't been able to help them, they've realised
that they've really been looking to man. and not looking to God. And sometimes we need to be careful
like that. But for the illustration, if
we have a need of our soul, if we know that we are sinners,
if we know that every sinner, the soul that sins, it shall
die, and that we're all under condemnation, we think of the
beautiful way Romans 8 starts, there is therefore now no condemnation,
to them that are in Christ Jesus. But without, not in Christ Jesus,
we are under condemnation. And it is a looking unto Him. They looked unto Him. There is none other name given
among men whereby we must be saved. It is a name which is
above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should
bow. This is the one, the only one,
that those who are mindful of their sinness, mindful of their
danger, must look unto. And this is the testimony. They
looked unto Him. We have a beautiful picture with
the children of Israel going through the wilderness. When
they had sinned against the Lord and provoked the Lord, He sent
fiery serpents amongst them. And they bit the people, and
many people were dying. And God said to Moses to raise
up a brazen serpent, and that they should then look to that
brazen serpent. You know, that was a big camp.
Some 600,000 just men, much more than that. There must have been
some that just saw it in the very distance. Hardly any shape
at all, but they looked. unto him. They looked to that
raised up which was setting forth the Lord Jesus Christ made sin
for us. Our Lord is very clear as Moses
lifted up the serpent in the wilderness even so must the Son
of Man be lifted up that whosoever believeth in him should not perish
but should have eternal life. It was a beautiful time and it
centers in what is in our text, they looked unto him. And he would say, well, you've
got to do this, you've got to do that. But here is a poor sinner
looking for everything from the Lord, that he would do everything
for them. Again, Romans 8, what the law
could not do in that it was weak through the flesh. God sending
his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin. condemns
sin in the flesh. Talvation is of the Lord and
those that are looking for Him are looking for Him to do everything
for them, to appear for them, to save them from their sins,
save them from the power and dominion of sin here, to put
them feelingly in the covenant, to make them believers, to bring
them to trust in His name, to give them faith, and to give
them a part with the people of God. How shall I be amongst the
children? Well, it is bound up in the Lord
Jesus Christ, that he gathers his people together unto him,
shall the gathering of the people be. And as they are gathered,
they come unto him. And the Lord says, no man cometh
unto me, except the Father which sent me draw him, and I'll raise
him up at the last day. For those that are coming, they
first look, and they come. And even when they come, then
as the apostle said, let us run the race that is set before us
looking unto Jesus. You won't get past that looking
unto the Lord. And the Lord has so ordered it,
that when he had died and risen again, then he ascended up into
heaven. He says, I must need to go away.
If I go not away, the Holy Spirit, the Comforter, will not come
unto you. But if I go away, I pray the
Father, and he'll give you another Comforter, which shall abide
with you forever. If the Lord was in some place,
in some city, in some nation on Earth, then the people of
God would be looking on Earth, and they'd be looking to this
particular city or land, but the way the Lord has ordered
it, they do not do that. They are to look unto him where
he is in heaven. And it's so abundantly clear
that he arose, he ascended up into heaven, he sat on the right
hand of the throne of God, the Lamb as it had been slain in
the midst of the throne. And when Stephen, the first martyr,
was dying, he looked up, he saw the Lord standing to receive
him in heaven when he was being stoned. The Lord has so directed
him that his bodily presence, the very bones and flesh that
hung upon the cross glorified are in heaven, they're not on
earth, not in any tomb, they're in heaven. And the Lord shall
come with power without sin at the last day, power and great
glory And the people of God are looking for Him. But the Lord has given the promise,
Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world, with
His people, by His Spirit and by His grace. Great is the mystery
of godliness, God, manifest in the flesh. The Lord Jesus Christ,
very truly God. everywhere, omnipresent, knowing
all things, is everywhere, all-powerful, the Lord Jesus is. But his bodily
presence in heaven and his presence as God, always, everywhere in
this earth, and special promises where the people of God are gathered
together in his name. I, if I be lifted up above the
earth, will draw all men unto him. They looked unto Him, they
looked unto Him whom they had pierced. They shall mourn for
Him and be in bitterness for Him. And in the Gospel, we lift
the Lord Jesus Christ up on that pole of the Gospel. And the effect
then, when the people of God look unto Him, is shown in our
second point. I hope it is when we come into
the house of God, that we're looking unto Him. As you might
say, we're looking unto a minister. Look past the minister, and it
may be that you see Christ, no man, but Christ only, on the
Mount of Transfiguration. That's what's said of the disciples. No longer Moses, no longer Elijah,
but Jesus only. May we be like the Greeks, as
we would see Jesus. We would look unto Him for our
soul's salvation. Look unto Him to save us from
our sins. Look unto Him to deliver us from
our temptations. Look unto Him to work salvation
in our hearts and former people for His praise. I hope that is what we have to
be, looking unto Him. But then secondly, we have the
effect. The effect of seeing Him. They
looked unto Him and were lightened, and their faces were not ashamed. The burden that they had was
gone. The darkness, the bondage, was
gone. The effect. You know when I was
thinking about this, and my mind went to when the Lord was first
working in my heart, and I thought, what a wonderful token this is
actually. The effect is a wonderful thing. You might be able to say, well,
I'd like to say, well, this text was blessed to me, And that verse
was blessed to me. Sometimes you might not have
any verse, or any text, or any sermon, but you remember the
effect. Paul is able to tell when the
Lord met with him on the Damascus road, and yes, you can hear the
words that the Lord said to him, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou
me? You think of the effect, the
effect on even those that were traveling, the effect on Saul. What a different man he was before
and after that time. Festus, when he is told about
that experience, he says, Paul, you're mad. Much learning doth
make you mad. And he can despise what Paul
is selling about the vision, But he couldn't undo what had
happened in Paul's life. So that instead of persecuting
the people of God, now he was with the people of God. He was
calling on the same name as what he was persecuting people for
calling upon. A new creature in Christ, a new
birth, a change. He mentioned Bunyan this morning.
When He came upon the cross, up to that time, He still had
the burden of His sin. But when He looked upon that
cross, that burden rolled off His back. It is through the Lord
alone that sin is removed. He is the sin bearer. You know,
I thought back, and I thought back of some of the blessings
that I had. You know, one of them, One of
the first ones, no words at all. And I'd gone days and days under
temptation, the sins and wickedness of my heart. And I was at my
desk at home studying. I was in the early 20s. And I
just bowed down on that desk. I said, Lord, take it all away. Deliver me from these sins and
these evils, this evil heart and these vile things within.
And Lord, in a moment, He took away and there was such a quietness. You know, I got up from that
desk. It was like the sky was more blue. Everything was lightened,
a burden from off me. The change, I can remember that
so very, very clearly. And I thought as I read this,
how clearly that describes it. They were lightened. Their faces
were not ashamed. Another blessing I had in that
way, and some of you here have heard me say it before, again
in early 20s, 23, starting a new job and the Lord beginning Lord
working in my heart, and I felt I should, when in the common
room at work, bow down my head and ask a blessing on the food.
In the midst of all of these that were ungodly people, but
you know I was too ashamed. I couldn't do it. And day after
day I went home, so ashamed, crying to the Lord to forgive
me for denying Him. and not being able to overcome
the fear of man. And that went on for nearly three
months. And then the Lord came and he
blessed my soul. And you know, the next day, I
went into that room. I never worried about what man
thought or what said. I bowed down my head, I asked
a blessing, and then I started bringing my Bible. and bringing
in the religious magazines, and those were blessed times in that
lunchroom, in the midst of all the people round about. And I
never forget the effect of the blessing that I had was to make
me not ashamed of the Lord. It took away the fear of man.
The fear of man bringeth a snare. And you think of Peter. Even
a maid, he could not stand before a maid, he had to deny the Lord. And we are the same if left.
And the difference of just having the light of the Word, the light
of the Lord upon the Word. You know, another time reading
of Jacob wrestling with the angel, there wrestled an angel with
him, to the breaking of the day. I will not let thee go except
thou bless me." He blessed him there. It said, they wrestled
a man with him. And that time that I was reading
that, the Lord shone upon that word man. That was the Lord Jesus
Christ before he became incarnate. That was one of those pre-incarnation
appearances. Why? Why was he given the name
of Israel? Thou hast wrestled with God and
with man, and hast prevailed. And Jacob had a lust, he went
halting on his thigh. And what's more, the blessing
that he had when he saw, he saw, and he saw was peaceable to him,
he said, I've seen thy face as the face of an angel. Why? Because he saw the answer to
his wrestling, his prayers, he got what he wanted, what he needed
from the Lord. They looked unto Him and were
enlightened, their faces were not ashamed. The blessing of
the Lord maketh rich, and He addeth no sorrow with it. You
cannot think that the Lord would visit a sinner under the burden
of sin, troubled by sin, and bless that soul and deliver them
from that burden, and show that burden laid upon the Lord Jesus
Christ. He had laid on Him the iniquity
of us all. and leave that person untouched. Our text is so true that those
that look upon Him and truly see Him as their Saviour and
their Redeemer say like dear Thomas, my Lord and my God. Doubting Thomas, unbelieving
Thomas, as soon as he saw the Lord, all of his doubtings, all
of his unbelief, all the way. He didn't need to put in his
finger to the Noah Prince. He didn't need to thrust in his
hand to his side. He has seen the Lord. We have
seen the Lord, they said. And in the end, in that upper
room, them were the disciples glad when they saw the Lord. They looked unto him and were
lightened, their faces We're not ashamed. At baptising services, often
it is the custom in our churches to sing that hymn, Ashamed of
Jesus. Yes I may, when I've no sins
to wash away. And each one of those lines of
that hymn, it speaks of that. Not being ashamed. And the blessing
of the Lord. it will make one not ashamed
of the Lord. I want then to look at a few
of those characters that are set forth in the Word that they
looked unto Him, they looked unto the Lord, and it was in
times of trouble. We think of Godly Jehoshaphat
and You can read that in 2 Chronicles and chapter 20. And he had those
of Moab and Mount Seir, those are the children of Ammon, came
against him, a great multitude against Judah. And Jehoshaphat
we read in verse 12, O our God, wilt thou not judge them? For
we have no might against this great company that cometh against
us. Neither know we what to do, but
our eyes are upon thee. They did know what to do. They
were looking unto him, but they did not want to know what to
do in anything else. And that's a good word, isn't
it? We approve this as well. things in Providence, things
in our souls, many times in a position, like we said in Psalm 107, they
fell down, none to help, none to help, here. But their eyes
were unto the Lord, and what happened? The Lord spoke to them
through the prophet Jehaziel, the son of Zechariah, told them
they would not need to fight in that battle, And they went
forth, they believed, they went forth singing the praises of
the Lord. What a contrast! One moment crying
unto the Lord, we have no might, we don't know what to do, and
the next moment we have the word given from the Lord and Jehoshaphat
is encouraging the people and strengthening them to go forth
and to praise the Lord Jehoshaphat, he says, as they
went forth, Hear me, O Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem.
Believe in the Lord your God, so shall ye be established. Believe
his prophets, so shall ye prosper. And they went forth seeing praise,
and the Lord said, Every man's sword against each other. And
they were delivered. They did not need to fight. They
saw the wonderful appearance of the Lord. The salvation is
of the Lord. We look upon what the Lord has
accomplished, what the Lord has done. He's finished work at Calvary. His work of redemption. So Jehoshaphat
was one of those characters that looked unto the Lord. Another
one was the godly Hezekiah. You know Hezekiah? He not only
had Assyria going against him, but he was also sick at that
same time, sick unto death. And the prophet Isaiah, he came
to him and said that he would just set his house in order because
he would die and not live. In Hezekiah, we read this in
Isaiah 38 and verse 2, in Hezekiah turned his face toward the wall
and prayed unto the Lord. in the Kings of Chronicles, but
the writing of Hezekiah, king of Judah, when he had been sick
and was recovered of his sickness, I said, in the cutting off of
my days, I shall go to the gates of the grave. I am deprived of
the residue of my years. I said, I shall not see the Lord,
even the Lord in the land of the living. I shall behold man
no more with the inhabitants of the world. Mine age is departed. and is removed from me as a shepherd's
tent. He goes through all of what is
going on in his soul. You can read these things in
Isaiah 38. But then he says in verse 16,
O Lord, by these things men live, and in all these things is the
life of my spirit. So wilt thou recover me and make
me to live. God uses sickness, trials, troubles
to make the souls of His people live. You might think if you
had a nice life with no sin to trouble you and no enemies and
no trials and troubles, you'd be a good Christian. You wouldn't,
you know. You wouldn't have a need of the Lord. You wouldn't seek
Him. Whatever Him say, sinners can say none but they, how precious
is the Saviour. For Hezekiah, he proved that
blessing that not only gave him life, and one of Hezekiah's burdens
of course would have been, if he'd have died at that point,
there was no line to Christ. Those 15 years that were added
were 15 years in which Manasseh was born. And those that were looking for
Christ, looking for the promised seed that knew the line that
it was to go through, would have been very concerned, very burdened. Then we have Jonah. Jonah, the
unwilling servant, the runaway servant. The Lord provides the
fish when he's thrown into the sea. He swallows up Jonah, a
prepared fish. But what a position that he was
in. How could he deliver himself from that position? We read of his prayer in the
Wales Valley. Cast out of the sight of the
Lord, I go down to the depths of the sea. Weeds are about my
head. And as he cries unto the Lord,
he says, salvation is of the Lord. And the Lord spake unto
the fish and vomited him out on the dry land. He looked unto
the Lord. What does he say in his prayer?
Yet will I look again toward thy holy temple. Not just the
literal temple, no, looking unto what it set forth, looking to
the Lord Jesus Christ. And so in that, he's similar
to Daniel. With Daniel, they had sought
to find occasion against him. They said, we won't, except in
the matter of his God. And so they deceived the king
into making a law that if any man for 30 days would pray to
any other but him, they should be cast into den of lions. Daniel, he knew, when he knew
that writing was signed, He just continued doing what he always
did. And I've said this many times.
But, if we would be prepared for times of persecution, we
have now, when we don't have persecution, have a routine,
a life, that when persecution comes and you ask yourself, what
should I do now? The answer is, do exactly what
you've always done. Because that's what Daniel did.
Daniel went and prayed three times a day as he always did. He didn't say, well, I used to
pray in my closet, but now just in defiance, I'm going to open
my window so everyone sees me and I'm going to pray towards
Jerusalem. No, he'd always done that. And he did exactly the
same as he'd always done. And it's good for us to do that.
You know, if it was said that there was a law made that we
were not allowed to pray or not allowed to go to the house of
God, would it be that we'd have to say, well, we better start
going to the house of God because, well, how can it be persecution
if I don't even go? And so we should think on this
to set for ourselves in a time of peace a pattern, a way, a
path that we would continue even in time of persecution. But Daniel
was looking, looking to Jerusalem. But Daniel, the temple is destroyed. It's a mass of rubble. It's burnt.
Why are you looking there? But he was looking to what it's
set for, looking. to the Lord Jesus Christ, looking
to that time that the 70 years finished and the temple to be
rebuilt again. Daniel was one of those that
looked unto him. And what a wonderful deliverance
he had. The Lord sent his angel and shut
the lion's mouths. And of course, we have those
in the New Testament, the woman with the issue of blood, 12 years.
suffered much at the hands of physicians, and yet she comes
to the Lord, if I may but touch the hem of his garment. As soon
as she touched, made whole. The woman with her sick daughter,
the Canaanitish woman, coming, and yet though put off, and though
discouraged even by the disciples, and the Lord himself tries her,
she comes, Lord help me. And the Lord says, great is thy
faith. be it unto thee, even as thou wilt. Those that looked
unto him, they looked unto him and were lightened, and their
faces were not ashamed. May we be amongst them. May we
join this number of they looked unto him. That we be able to
say this describes us, And we can join in some of the other
cries in this psalm. This poor man cried and the Lord
heard him and saved him out of all his troubles. The angel of
the Lord encampeth round about them that fear him and delivereth
them. How many times have we walked
in the Psalms and said, David, you're saying, come and magnify
the Lord with me? And we can. And we will, and
we desire to do the same. And you say to the Church of
God, come and hear all ye that fear God, and I will tell what
he hath done for my soul. In a way, that is what David
is doing here. So may this be us bound up in
this verse. They looked unto him and were
enlightened, and their faces were not ashamed.