Good morning. Let's ask the Lord's blessings
on our time together. Our merciful Heavenly Father. We've been brought. By your grace. To this place. To worship thee. Lord, we are as dependent upon
you to enable us now as we were to ever desire an interest in thee. Lord, we pray that you would
send your Holy Spirit in power, that you would give us a spirit
of grace whereby we could set our affections on things above,
where Christ is seated at thy right hand. Lord, we confess
that our affections are far too often set upon the things of
this world, that we walk by sight. And Lord, we thank you We thank
you for the work of Christ that forgives us of that sin. Lord,
might we rest in him this day for we ask it in his name. Amen. We're going to be looking at
a passage of scripture in 2 Samuel chapter 22. in a few moments
if you'd like to turn with me there in your Bibles. I've titled this message, In
His Sight. And if you'll look at verse 25
of 2 Samuel 22, at the end of that verse, we find those words,
in his sight. God-given faith is always saving
faith. And when the Lord gives, by the
miracle of His grace, saving faith, we are enabled to believe that
the way God sees things are in fact the way they really are. Even though What the Lord sees
is often completely contrary to what we experience, what we
feel, what we're able to see in our experiences and in our
circumstances. Saving faith always brings us
back in spite of all those all those feelings and all those
experiences, God-given saving faith brings us back to believe
that the way God sees it is in fact the way it is. And we're able to rest in the
revelation that God has given us of how it is that he sees
it. Now this saving faith is not
a groundless feeling of aimless wandering. It is settled in the
promises of God. We have the revelation that God
has given us as to what he sees. And when the Lord gives this
miracle of faith, we look to his word. And we agree, we're
able to rejoice that the way he sees it in every part is in
fact the way it is. The way God sees it is often,
usually, contrary to what we're able to see with a natural eyes
and the natural feelings and natural experiences. We've been in John chapter 11
on Wednesday nights for a couple of months now and that's the
chapter dealing with Lazarus and Mary and Martha and when
the Lord gets to Bethany and he reveals himself as the resurrection
and the life to Martha And then he asked Martha, the grieving
sister of Lazarus, he's been dead four days, and he commands
the men to remove the stone from the tomb. And Martha immediately
objects. Martha says, but Lord, he's been
dead four days, his body stinks, don't do this. What the Lord
was doing was contrary to her experience. And the Lord looked
at Martha and he said, Martha, did I not say unto thee that
if you would believe, then you should see the glory of God? Believing always comes before
seeing. When we look through our natural
eyes and through our natural experiences, what we see is contrary
to what God says that we are to believe. But when the Lord
gives saving faith to believe what he has said, then and only
then are we able to see the glory of God. when God gives saving faith and
we're able to see and believe what he sees, the sight of that eye of faith
is much more sure than anything that we could see with our natural
eyes. Let me prove that by asking a
question. How many of you, who of us, would
hang the hopes of our salvation, would hang the hopes of the eternal
destiny of our immortal soul on something that we saw with
the natural eye? or something that we experienced
in the flesh. Our experiences and even our
sight is subjective, is it not? Plenty of eyewitnesses have been
proven to be unreliable witnesses in the court of law. You can't
trust what you see. Not with the natural eye, we
may have being confused about something, we may have been hallucinating,
we may have, you know, we're not going to risk the salvation
of our souls on what we see with the natural eye. And Peter makes
that clear when he talks about the experience that he and John
and James had on the Mount of Transfiguration when they saw
with the natural eye the veil of our Lord's humanity taken
away and they heard in the natural ear the voice of God Almighty
speak from heaven. And Peter recounts that experience
and he says, we did not bring to you cunningly devised fables. We handled the word of God. This
was our experience. And then in the next verse, he
says, but we have a more sure word of prophecy. You see, faith
does hang all the hopes of its salvation on God's Word. And when God gives faith, we
read what God says, we hear what God says, they shall hear my
voice and they shall follow me. We're taught of God and we're
able to rest. How does God see things. Another thing Peter says in second
Peter chapter one, he says, whereby are given unto us exceeding great
and precious promises that by these you might be partakers
of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is
in the world through lust. We look not on those things which
are seen, for the things which are seen are temporal, temporary,
earthy. But we look on those things which
are not seen, for the things which are not seen are eternal. In his Sight. What God calls on us to believe
cannot be evidenced or proven by our experience or by what
we see. It's proven by the word of God.
It's proven by what God says. You remember that Syrian, he
was the commander of the greatest army in all the world. His name
was Naaman. and he was a leper. And he heard
that there was a prophet down in Israel that could cure him. And so he went down with an entourage
of gifts and chariots to visit with the prophet Elisha. And
Elisha would not so much as even come out of his little cabin.
He sent his servant out. And he told Naaman to go down
to the muddy Jordan River and to dip himself in the river seven
times. And the scripture says that Naaman
was wroth. He was angry. He said, I thought
that he would come out and call upon the name of his God. and
that he would look up and raise his hands and perform some ceremony. What was Naaman's problem? I
thought, I thought. And he goes on to say, we have
better rivers back in Damascus, which is where he was from, than
the Jordan. The Jordan's an old muddy river,
and he names a couple of the rivers back in Damascus. He said,
if it was just dipping myself in water to cure myself, I could
have done that at home. Been better water than this. His servant says to him, what
if the prophet had told you some great thing to do, would you
not have done it? And Naaman goes to the river
and he comes out with skin like a baby. What the prophet was, what God
was calling on him to do and to believe was contrary to his
experience, was contrary to what he thought and what he saw. And it's always that way. We
walk by faith, not by sight. When God gives saving faith,
we believe that the way God sees it is the way it is. That's just
how, that's what saving faith is. When the Lord in John chapter
six has those 5,000 men, not counting the women and children,
following after him and he looks to his disciples and he says
to them, what are we gonna feed these people with? And the disciples look around
and they find this little boy who's got his lunch with him
and one of the disciples sheepishly says, well, there's a lad here
and he's got five loaves and two fishes but what is that among
so many? How are we going to take care
of the needs of these people with such a little, such a, he
was almost embarrassed that he even suggested such a thing.
I'm sure he was. And the Lord said, sit them down. And the Lord blessed the bread
and the fishes and fed them in 12 baskets of fragments left
over. You going to believe what you
see? Or are you going to believe what I say? And because the disciples obeyed
the word of God, that story ends with they saw his glory. They saw his glory. The 5,000
that were fed didn't see it. They continued to follow the
Lord saying, we just want more bread. We want you to feed our
flesh. We saw the loaves and the fishes
and that's what we want. But the disciples believed the
Word of God. When God spoke to Abraham, who's
called the father of the faithful, God said to Abraham, take thy
son, thine only son, whom thou lovest, and take him to Mount
Moriah and offer him up as a burnt offering. Now Abraham was over a hundred
years old and Abraham had waited until he was 100 for the birth
of Isaac. And now Isaac's probably around
12 years old and Abraham's thinking, Lord, you promised by my seed
that you would make me a father of many nations and now you're
asking me to sacrifice my only son? Now we know that whole story
is a picture of what the father in heaven did with his son when
he went to the cross But the point that I'm trying to make
right now is that what God was calling on Abraham to believe
was completely contrary to everything that Abraham could see. And the Bible says that Abraham
believed God and it was counted unto him for righteousness. There's no righteousness, there's
no salvation apart from believing God. And believing God is believing
what God says in terms of what God sees. And what God sees is
not what we see. Moses is bringing the children
of Israel out of Egypt and they got to the Red Sea and the Egyptians
were behind them and the Red Sea was in front of them. And Moses started crying out
to God and God said, Moses, why are you crying to me? You lift
up your staff. He couldn't see a way out, but he believed God. He lifted
up the staff and the sea was divided and they walked across
on dry ground. In his sight, brethren, And my
dear friends, the way God sees things is the way it is. There's just no exceptions about
it. The way God sees it is the way it is. And faith is believing
that what God sees is what's true. And it's believing
what God sees. Jairus came to the Lord, pleading
the Lord to come to his home to heal his daughter who was
on her deathbed. And on the way to Jairus' house,
the Lord agreed to go. And on the way, there was a divine
interruption. God appointed that woman with
the issue of blood to interrupt The Lord going to Jairus' house,
so by the time the Lord finished dealing with the woman with the
issue of blood, the servants of Jairus show up and they say,
bother the master no more, for thy daughter is dead. She's gone. No more hope for her. And the
Lord Jesus looked at Jairus and told Jairus, do not be afraid. Only belief. Only belief. And the Lord went to Jairus'
house and raised that little girl from the dead. This is always what God calls
on us to do. To believe Him. To believe Him. And he's revealed in his word
how he sees things. He has. When all my experiences and all
my feelings and all of my circumstances is pointing in one direction,
God's pointing in the other direction. I'm at a crossroad. I'm at a
crossroad. What am I gonna believe? I believe
what God says? I believe what I think, what
I think. Oh, may the Lord give us the
faith to believe Him. What does God say about our natural
state apart from the Lord Jesus Christ? Because what he says
about that and what he sees concerning that is what I must believe. It is what I must believe. And the scriptures are clear.
He's clear. All have sinned and come short
of the glory of God. Everything in my life falls short
of his glory. You see, coming to Christ as
a sinner, is yes, there is an experience
that the Spirit of God gives us when he causes us to see a
glimpse of the glory of Christ and come to the conclusion that
there's nothing in me like him. There's nothing in me like him.
Everything about me falls short of his glory. I'm a sinner. And
there is some sorrow and there's some feeling of separation from
God as a result of our sin and there's some shame as a result
of our sin. but is it the depth of shame
and sorrow and is it the pain of separation that really convinces
us that we're sinners? You know, the Mormons, the Puritans
had morning benches and you came in the service and you knelt
and you stayed there and wept and prayed until God gave you
sufficient repentance before you could be saved. No. No, we can never sorrow to
the depths that God requires. The Lord Jesus is the only one
that ever did that. We can never experience separation from God
as God requires. The Lord Jesus is the only one
that ever did that. We can never suffer shame for
our sin as the Lord Jesus did. And that's what God requires.
So how is it that we come to the conclusion that we're sinners? Because God said so. Because
God said so in his sight. He looked down from heaven and
he saw that every imagination of the thought of man was only
evil and that continually. That's what God saw. When he
looks down our throats, into our hearts, he sees an open sepulcher
full of dead men's bones. That's what God sees. Yes, there is, as I said, some
spirit of repentance and sorrow but Here's true repentance is
to have our minds changed. We look at ourselves and we can't really see how, God
shows us a glimpse of our sin, just a little bit of it. If he
showed it to us as he sees it, we'd never show our face in public.
We wouldn't be able to look in a mirror. We'd cower in shame
and no, no. We know that we're sinners because
God gave us faith to believe what he sees, what he sees apart
from the Lord Jesus Christ, outside of Christ. Jeremiah put it like this, the
heart is deceitful and desperately wicked. Who can know it? Now you accuse me or my wife
accused me of not doing, I'm gonna justify myself. I was like,
well, you know, I didn't mean it. My heart was right. You know, I wanted to do, here's
what God sees. agree with God, if I've got saving
faith, I agree with God. Before God, my heart is deceitful. Before God, my heart is desperately
wicked. Before God, I can't know my heart. People talk about following your
heart, don't follow your heart. Proverbs says that it's a fool
that follows his heart. Your heart's not Reliable enough
to follow. You gotta follow Christ. You
gotta follow Christ. And so coming before the Lord
as a sinner is just believing what God says about my condition
apart from Christ. It's believing that in me, that
is in my flesh, there's no good thing. There's no good thing. If God's given me saving faith,
I take sides with God against myself. I agree with God. I say,
God, however you see it, that's the way it is. That's the way
it is concerning my natural state. Now you still have your Bibles
open to 2 Samuel 22. We'll get to our text. Because I cannot see, I cannot
see how it is that I can stand in the presence of a holy God
and be perfectly righteous. I can't see that. I look at myself,
all I can see is my sin. How am I gonna stand in front
of, in the presence of a holy God? Now let's read our text. We'll begin in verse 21. The
Lord, David speaking, now you remember King David and Bathsheba
and Uriah and Absalom and all the things. I mean, David did
some horrible things. Yes, he was a man after God's
own heart. Yes, he believed God. But I want you to remember that
when he's making these declarations about himself before God, He
clearly is not talking about all the activities of his life. The Lord rewarded me according
to my righteousness, according to the cleanness of my hands
hath he recompensed me. For I have kept the ways of the
Lord and have not wickedly departed from my God. For all his judgments
were before me. And as for his statutes, I did
not depart from them. I was also upright before him
and have kept myself from mine iniquity. Therefore, the Lord
hath recompensed me according to my righteousness, according
to my cleanness in his sight." In his sight. If I'm found in Christ, Not having my own righteousness
which is of the law, but that righteousness which is by the
faith of the Lord Jesus Christ and by his faithfulness. You
see, who David's describing is Christ. And his position before
God in Christ. What am I gonna believe? Am I
gonna believe what I see in myself? Or I'm gonna believe what God
sees. Who am I in his sight? John put it like this, this is
our boldness in the day of judgment for as he is so are we in this
world. Now I got to have saving faith
to believe that. God's got to do a work of grace
in my heart and cause me to see things as he sees them and to
hang all the hopes of my salvation on what God sees because what
I see is contrary to what God sees. God sees that my sin has been
put away. God sees that my sin has been
covered by the blood of Christ. God sees that my sin has been
separated from me as far as the east is from the west. And God
says, I remember it no more. God sees that it's been buried
in the depths of the sea and sewed up in a bag. Oh, that's
what God sees. And the only hope that I have
is to believe what God says, to believe what he says about
my sin, to believe what he says about my righteousness. This
is saving faith, believing God. What about my circumstances in
this world? When Jacob's sons came back from
Egypt and said that the man down in Egypt who kept Simeon as a
deposit said, don't come back without Benjamin. Benjamin was
Jacob's youngest child, the apple of his eye. As far as Jacob was
concerned, Joseph was dead and now Simeon is gone and Jacob
responds to his sons by saying, Simeon, Jacob says this, Joseph
is no more. He's gone. I'll never see him
again. Simeon, he's gone. And now you want to take Benjamin
from me? And Jacob makes these statements. these things are
against me." What was Jacob doing? He was doing what you and I do,
he was looking at his circumstances and thinking everything's against
me, everything's against me. When in fact God had ordained
Joseph's arrest, Joseph's prison, Joseph's Joseph's now as a prime
minister, he got the keys to the storehouses. He's been set
up by God to save Israel during the famine. And the best 18 years
of Jacob's life were going to be in Goshen. He was going to be the father
of the prime minister of the greatest nation in the whole
world. And Jacob says, all these things are against me. What does God say? And you know
that all things work together for good for them that love him
and those that are the called according to his purpose. Saving
faith is believing that God is on his throne and that he is
sovereignly ordained the circumstances of my life for my good, for my
good and for his glory. And though I can't see it, and
though I'm often tempted to say with Jacob, these things are
against me, God says otherwise. And in his sight, I'm hanging
all the hopes of my salvation on what God sees and how God
sees it. How he sees me, how he sees me
in Christ, how he sees my circumstances. Turn with me to Isaiah chapter
43. Isaiah 43. Let's read verse one and down
a few verses. But now, but now, thus saith
the Lord. It's what God says, it's what
God sees. The Lord that created thee. O Jacob, and he that formed
thee, O Israel, fear not, for I have redeemed thee, I have
called thee by thy name, and thou art mine. This is what God
sees. When thou passeth through the
waters, I will be with thee. And through the rivers, They
shall not overflow thee. When thou walkest through the
fire, thou shalt not be burned, neither shall the flame kindle
upon thee. Oh, those four Hebrew children. And one of them was like unto
the Son of God. And they were thrown into a furnace, heated seven times its normal
temperature. And they didn't come out with
a hair on their head singed or the smell of smoke on their clothes. For I am the Lord thy God. The Holy One of Israel, thy Savior,
I gave Egypt for thy ransom, Ethiopia and Seba for thee, since
thou wast precious in my sight. Thou hast been honorable, and
I have loved thee. Therefore will I give men for
thee and people for thy life. Fear not, for I am with thee. I will bring thy seed from the
east and gather thee from the west. I will say to the north,
give up, and to the south, keep not back. Bring my sons from
afar, my daughters from the end of the earth. for everyone that
is called by my name, for I have created him for my glory, I have
formed him, yea, I have made him." What am I going to believe? What am I going to believe? Am
I going to believe what I see? Am I going to believe the desperation
of my circumstances? Am I going to believe the things
that seem so out of order? Or am I gonna believe God? By God's grace. That's what saving faith does.
It believes God. Lord, you said it. You said,
Lord, I know the thoughts that I think toward you. Thoughts
of good and not of evil to bring you to your expected end. Lord,
you said you would never leave me nor forsake me. Martha, did I not say that if
you would believe, you should see the glory of God? See, the natural man says, I'll
believe what I see. Faith says, I see what I believe. What do we believe? What God
says. You believe the Bible, you're
a believer. I know there's a lot of people
who say, well, I believe the Bible. Do you? Do you? Brethren, when you find yourself
in the midst of the storm, Luke tells us when those disciples
were in the midst of the sea and in the storm and they thought
they were going to die that the Lord was three miles, three and
a half miles away on a mountain and he saw them. He saw them. And he came unto them walking
on the water. Oh, our circumstances are never
a trouble for him. He's the one that stirred up
the trouble, but he walks on them. And what did he say? What did he say to those disciples? Be not afraid, it is I, it is
I. How oftentimes the Lord has to
say to us, don't be afraid. Believe me, believe me. When I lose sight of Christ,
I have the hope of knowing that he never loses sight of me. When the heavens become like
brass and my prayers don't seem to get any higher than the ceiling, I have the hope of knowing that
I have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous one,
whoever lives to make intercession for me. God's word. God's word is what
I believe. Feelings come and feelings go. Feelings are deceiving. The word of God. The word of
God. is my only hope. None else is
worth believing." Oh, that's where we rest. Faith just believes
that the way God sees it is, in fact, the way it is. God the Father said to his Son,
When he ascended back into glory, sit thou here at my right hand
until I make all thine enemies thy footstool for I have made
you to be a priest forever. A priest that intercedes, a priest
who offers himself to God as the atoning sacrifice for the
sins of his people. We have a savior. You can't see
him with the natural eye. But when God gives sight to the
eye of faith, what we see is better than anything that we
could experience with our natural eyes. And faith hangs all the
hopes of its salvation on what God sees. The Lord Jesus said, well, the
scripture says, when we believe not, yet he remaineth faithful
for he cannot deny himself. If I'm part of the body of Christ,
Christ is my husband, I'm united with him in a covenant of marriage
that goes back to eternity past. I have a, I'm part of the body of Christ.
He cannot deny me. Our heavenly father, forgive us for walking so often
by sight and cause your word Lord to be made effectual to
our hearts. cause it to be a two-edged sword. One side would slay us, cause
us to die to ourselves. Another side that would make
us alive and heal us in Christ. We ask it in his name, amen.