Yeah. Yeah. Good morning. Let's open this
morning's service with hymn number 70 from your hardbacked hymnal,
number 70. Holy, holy, holy. Let's all stand together. Number
70. ? Holy, holy, holy ? Lord God almighty
? Early in the morning ? Our song shall rise to thee Holy,
holy, holy, merciful and mighty, God in three Persons, blessed
Trinity. Holy, holy, holy, all the saints
adore thee, casting down their golden crowns around the glassy
sea. Cherubim and seraphim falling
down before thee, which wert and art and evermore shall be. Holy, holy, holy, though the
darkness hide thee, though the eye of sinful man thy glory may
not see. Only Thou art holy, there is
none beside Thee, perfect in power, in love and purity. Holy, holy, holy Lord God Almighty
All thy works shall praise thy name In earth and sky and sea
Holy, holy, holy, merciful and mighty, God in three persons,
blessed Trinity. Please be seated. Good morning. Can't sing that hymn without
thinking about Isaiah 6, can you? In the year that King Uzziah
died, I saw the Lord. My hope this morning is that
the Lord will be pleased to reveal himself to us in our hearts and
we'll leave this place saying, saw the Lord, holy, high and
lifted up. We're gonna be in Psalm 97 this
morning for the first hour. There are 12 verses in Psalm
97, and I have 12 points to make. I've titled this message, But
for the Grace of God. But for the Grace of God. I could
title it, How Do We Differ? How do we differ? How does a
believer differ from an unbeliever? Paul asked that question rhetorically
in the book of Corinthians when he said, who maketh thee to differ? What do you have that you did
not receive? Well, the Lord does make his people to differ. And
but for the grace of God, we would be just as unbelieving
as the unbelieving world. And Psalm 97 tells us a little
bit about the difference. Between a believer and nonbeliever. I hope that will be an encouragement
to us. Let's ask the Lord's blessings. Our Heavenly Father. We come before thy Holy Presence. Thanking you that we have an
advocate. We have a substitute. A sin bearer. one in whom we find all our acceptance
before thee. Surely, Lord, your holiness would
consume us if you did not hide us in Christ Jesus. And so, Lord,
we pray that you would send your spirit. We pray that Christ would
be revealed to our hearts. We pray that you would open that
which no man can shut Open your word, open the windows of heaven,
open our hearts. And Lord, we pray for the gift
of faith that we might believe you and all that you've declared
and all that you've done. We ask it in Christ's name. Amen. Have you ever heard someone,
or perhaps you've said it yourself, I know I have in years gone by,
I try to be a little more careful about it now, when you see someone
who is in a self-destructive pattern of addiction of some
sort, and you say, but for the grace of God, there go I. But
for the grace of God, there go I. How is that any different than
what the Pharisee said when he prayed thus unto himself and
said, God, I thank thee that I'm not like other men. I'm not an extortioner, I'm not
an adulterer, and I'm particularly not like that publican over there.
And the publican would not so much as even look up, but smote
himself upon the breast and said, God have mercy upon me. I'm the center. I'm the center. See when the Lord teaches us
the gospel, when he reveals the glory of Christ to us, we can't
look at another person and say, you know, I'm glad I'm not like
that. Because the Lord shows us in
our hearts that to whom much is given, much is required. That
person may just be doing what's natural to them. We sin against
nature. We sin against the nature of
our new nature. And we sin in light of the love
of God. We sin in the light of Christ.
And no child of God can look at another man regardless of
how much he may have destroyed his life and say, well, but for
the grace of God, I'd be like that too. No, when I look to
Christ, I see that I am the chief of all sinners. I believe myself
to be worse than that man and believe myself to be in need
of God's grace as much or more than he is. There is one time
when it's appropriate to say, but for the grace of God, there
go I. And one time only, when we look at a person who doesn't
believe God, an unbeliever, one who is outside of Christ, one
who knows nothing of the grace of God, one who has not been
born again by the spirit of God, One who is lost in their sins
and in the darkness of their own unbelief, we can say, but
for the grace of God, there go I. It was God's grace that opened
the eyes of my understanding. It was God's grace that gave
me a new heart. It was God's grace that revealed
Christ to me. And if God had not been gracious
to me, I'd be just like that. I'd be just as unbelieving. And
just as lost and just as hell bound as is. That other person. So who make a theater differ? When the self righteous religionist
hears the gospel, they say, well, that's not fair. God's people
say, oh, I don't want what's fair. I don't want what's fair. self-righteous religionist looks
at the electing sovereign grace of God and says, why wouldn't
God save everybody? Why wouldn't God save everybody?
And the child of God said, Lord, why'd you save me? Why'd you
have mercy upon me? We sometimes stand in amazement
of how unbelieving an unbeliever can be in the clear light of
the gospel. Can't you see this? Have you
ever thought that? Have you ever felt that way?
You try to talk to people and you share with people. They come
and they hear, can't you see? No, they can't. And the more you think about
it, you come to realize, why did I see? The amazement is not
that they can't see. The amazing thing is that I can
see. The amazement is not that they
don't believe, that's just the way we all come into the world.
The amazing thing is that God has enabled me to believe. That's
the amazing thing of the gospel. All right, very quickly, we're
gonna try to go through these 12 verses. You have your Bibles
open to Psalm 97. What is the difference? Well,
for the child of God, The Lord reigneth. He reigneth. In nature, he reigns
as creator and sustainer of all things that are made. He upholds
all things by the word of his power. All things were made by
him and nothing was made that has been made without him. We see him reigning sovereign
over all of his creation. Not one molecule, not one germ,
not one speck is out of order. We see him reigning in Providence. You say, well, I know, I know
religious people that aren't, that don't believe the gospel
who believe God's sovereign in creation. I do too. At least
they say he is. We believe he reigns in Providence. We believe that he's working
all things together for his glory and for our good. We believe that the armies of
heaven and all the inhabitants of the earth are acting according
to his ordained will and purpose. And here's where the catch is
between a believer and an unbeliever. We believe he's sovereign in
salvation. We don't believe that our God has abdicated his throne
when it comes to the most important thing of all. Not the order of
creation, not the order of providence, but the order of salvation. We
believe our God reigns in election, that it was his purpose and his
will to choose a particular people. And that no man can stay his
hand or say unto him, what doest thou? We believe that he reigns
in redemption. We believe that the Lord Jesus
Christ successfully redeemed all those whom his father chose
in the covenant of grace. Our God reigns. He reigns in
regeneration. He gives life to whomsoever he
wills. He has mercy upon whom he will have mercy. And He makes
them willing in the day of His power because He reigns. And
we rejoice. Look at this verse. The Lord
reigns. Let the earth rejoice. Let the
multitude of the isles be glad thereof. We believe that His
dominion is an everlasting dominion and that His kingdom is from
generation to generation. We believe that all the inhabitants
of the earth, all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing. Nothing. Includes me. Includes you, doesn't it? You
see, the believer rejoices in their God because they believe
that he reigns. He reigns. He hasn't given up
any part of his reign to his subjects. Second thing that causes, that
God has caused the believers to differ in is found in verse
two. Clouds and darkness are round
about him. Now there's a difference between
clouds and darkness. Clouds mute the light. Clouds shade us from the full
heat of the sun. And living here in Florida, we're
glad for the clouds in the summertime, aren't we? We'd burn up without
them. And so it is. The scripture says
that no man can see God and live. You cannot look directly into
the face of God any more than you can look directly into the
noonday sun. Just as the noonday sun will
burn your retina, the glory of God would consume us. And so
the Lord shadows his glory with a cloud. And we look through
a glass dimly now. We know in part, we see in part,
and then in that day we'll see him as he is, face to face, and
be made like him. As long as we're in this flesh,
the Lord mercifully clouds his glory, lest we be consumed by
it. Flesh and blood cannot enter
into the kingdom of God. The corruptible must be made
incorruptible. This mortal must be made immortal. We can't enter into the presence
of God clothed in the flesh that we currently have. And because
we're in this body of flesh, the Lord is merciful. to cloud
the fullness of his glory. David said in Psalm 17, he said,
I will be satisfied when I awake with thy likeness. Right now,
we keep peeking through the clouds, don't we? We keep hoping that
we'll see a little bit more of his splendor. and will not be
satisfied until we are made fully in his likeness. The scripture says that we've
been called out of darkness into his marvelous light. Notice the
next part of verse two. Clouds and darkness. You see, as the believer might
be peering through the shade of a cloud, the unbeliever is
in total darkness. Total darkness. They have no
understanding of the gospel. They have no knowledge of God.
They have no understanding of who they are as a sinner before
God in need of God's grace. They have no understanding of
who God is or how it is that he's pleased to put away our
sin. They have no understanding of
who Christ is or what it is he's accomplished. They are in darkness. This is the condemnation. Light
has come into the world. But men loved darkness rather
than light because their deeds were evil. See the gospel offends
men's pride. It offends their dignity. It
offends their righteousness and they won't come to Christ. They
will not believe the gospel. And they, they, they love darkness. They just, I'll just stay in
my darkness. Scripture says that the light
shined in the darkness. but the darkness comprehended
it not. Comprehended it not. In Colossians 1, verse 13, the
Lord makes it clear that he made us to differ when he delivered
us from the power of darkness and has translated us into the
kingdom of his dear son. We have some light. We have the
light. light of the world and life is
in the light. God commanded the light to shine
out of darkness. In the beginning, Genesis chapter
1, let there be light. And had God not spoken, let there
be light, there would be no, the earth would be without form
and void and darkness would cover the deep of it. And that's the
physical picture of our spiritual condition. If God doesn't say,
let there be light, our lives will be without form and empty
and darkness will cover the deep of it. We won't have any understanding,
but God has commanded the light to shine out of darkness and
he has shined in our hearts the light of the knowledge of God
in the face of the Lord Jesus Christ. Everything we're going
to know about God, we're going to learn it in the face of the
Lord Jesus Christ. I and the Father are one. And we have this treasure, we
have this treasure in an earthen vessel that the excellency of the power
may be of God, not of us, not of us. We rejoice that our God reigns. We thank God for the light that
has shined through the clouds. You remember the children of
Israel when they were traveling through the wilderness, I'm sure
that this is a reference to that physical experience they had
when the cloud followed them by day. The cloud guided them,
the light Was too intense in the desert for them to survive
and so the Lord Protected them. So it is with us. He guides us
through this wilderness that we live in By the light of the
gospel And we thank God that we're not in darkness. Oh God,
thank you But for the grace of God there I would be I'd be denying
God his glory in his sovereign reign and salvation. I'd be in
complete darkness, but here clouds and darkness around about him.
Righteousness and judgment are the, and that word habitation
is the establishment or foundation. So righteousness and judgment
are the foundation of his throne. God's people, they understand
that they have no righteousness in and of themselves. All the righteous believe themselves
to be unrighteous and all the unrighteous believe themselves
to have some righteousness. We understand that righteousness
is the foundation of God's throne. And we take sides with God against
ourselves. We really do say, Lord, my righteousness,
amen. I'm a dog. My righteousness is
as a filthy rags. I need one who has a perfect
righteousness to represent me and to present himself on my
behalf before God. Christ is the end of the law
for righteousness to everyone that believe it, isn't he? And
judgment. Lord, I know that my sins have to be judged. I know
the law has to be kept, and I know that my sins have to be judged.
I know that I can't keep the law, and I know I can't make
up for my sins. So righteousness and judgment
are the foundation of His throne. And only through the Lord Jesus
Christ can righteousness be established and judgment be satisfied, only
in Christ. So we, we, we rejoice in that
fact. Unbelievers don't believe that
they really don't. Not, you know, I, Dignas Fianro. I'm thankful for those of you
that were able to be there. There were a lot of religious
people there. And I'm going to tell you exactly what they heard.
They heard. grace, they heard faith, they
heard Jesus Christ, they heard heaven, they heard righteousness,
and they attached to those words their own definition. And it's like trying to put a
square peg in a round hole. I mean, even a very, very young
child figures out real quickly that square peg's not gonna fit
in that round hole. But the religious don't know it. They're taking
the square peg of the gospel and they're pounding it into
their round hole of preconceived ideas about things and they have
no understanding, no understanding. Righteousness and judgment are
the foundation of God's throne. God, but for your grace, there
go I. I wouldn't know this if the Lord
didn't make me to differ. I didn't earn this. I didn't
do anything to deserve this. Look at verse three, a fire. goeth before him. Now what is that fire? Well, Jeremiah chapter 20 verse
nine says, his word was in my heart as a burning fire shut
up in my bones. And then in Psalm or in Jeremiah
chapter 23 verse 29 is not my word like a fire. His fire goes
before him. Lord, have you, had you not preached
the gospel to me? And the Lord does the preaching
a man, a man may make the words audible, but the Lord's the one
that has to make them applicable and effectual to our hearts.
Doesn't he? He's got the one that, Lord, had you not preached
the gospel to me? Had you not shut my mouth and
cause me to hear, had your word not gone out in power. I would
still be at enmity with you. I'd still be at enmity with you.
We come into this world at enmity with God, as enemies of God. And what's he do? He makes his
enemies to be his footstools. He causes them to sit at his
feet and listen to his word, just like Mary did. She sat right
there at the feet of Christ. Martha, you're encumbered with
so many things. Mary's chosen that one thing's
needful. What was the one thing that's needful? To sit at the
feet of Christ and listen to what he says. And now what is
he saying to us? A fire goeth before me and burn
up his enemies round about. Isaiah said it like this. Who
would set the briars and thorns against me in battle? I would
go through them and burn them all together. But that's what
we do, isn't it? We set up thorns and briars in
an attempt to try to stop. I mean, there's nothing more
flammable than dried thorns and briars and sticks. And yet we
put that up as a wall to keep God out. And God says, when I'm
ready to come, I'm just going to burn those things down. My
fire goes before me, my word will go before me, and you're
gonna believe me. You see, the unbeliever doesn't
know that faith comes by hearing and hearing comes by the word
of God. They think faith comes by something they do. or a decision
they make, or an experience they have, or a prayer they pray,
we understand that faith is a gift from God that only comes when
we're doing nothing. When we're doing nothing. Nothing
but listening. A fire goeth before me and destroys
my enemies. Makes them to be my friends.
Takes a fire to turn a sword into a plowshare, doesn't it?
It takes a fire to turn a spear into a pruning fork. You've got
to put that thing into a fire in order to be able to shape
it into something else. And that's exactly what God does.
When the fire of the gospel goes before him, our weapons of rebellion
against God are turned into farming tools. We now participate in
the planting of the seed of the gospel, don't we? Look at verse 4. Verse 3-4 is one point
actually. The fire goes before him, burneth
up his enemies round about him as lightnings enlightened the
world. The earth saw and trembled. The
hills melted like wax at the presence of the Lord, at the
presence of the Lord of the whole earth. When the heat of the gospel,
you know, the sun will either harden the
clay or it'll melt the wax on it. And that's the light of the
gospel. That's the difference Lord. You've
made me to differ. I'd be just as hard as clay I'd
be baked in an oven and and and you'd have to you'd have to Break
that pot with a rod of iron as the Lord said he will one day
all those clay pots That have been hardened against God are
gonna be broken with a rod of iron Lord if you didn't make
my heart to be a heart of flesh if you didn't melt it I The light
of the gospel would have the same effect on me that it has
on them. It would harden me. The gospel can never have a neutral
effect. Never. It will have one effect
or the other. It's a savor of life or a savor
of death. It's to be rejoiced in or it's
to be hated. You can't be neutral about the
gospel. No man really is. No man really
is. The Lord hears how you have made
me to differ. Look at verse six. How's the
Lord made us to differ? He causes us to give him all
the glory. The heavens declare his righteousness
and all the people see his glory. They see his glory. They know
that he gets all the glory for their salvation. They really do have some understanding
to that. They see, they see. Look at verse, look at verse
seven, confounded be all they that serve graven images. Now I looked up that word confounded,
it doesn't mean to be confused, it means to be ashamed. Ashamed. Those who are worshipping
a false god are confused, nothing more confusing than man-made
religion, nothing more contradictory, nothing more convoluted, nothing
more confusing than man-made religion. Everything about it,
they talk out of both sides of the mouth. You can't make sense
out of it. Can't make sense out of man-made religion. My daughter, Jennifer, was telling
me about some comedian she heard. He was being profane. But she
said, he said something so amazing. I guess it was on television
or something. And she said, you know, he was talking about all
the religions of the world. And he said, you know, I've investigated
all these religions and they're all attempting to worship God.
And he said, he said, they all have one thing in common. Every
single one of them have one thing in common. There's something
you've got to do in order to earn favor with God. And then he went on to say, if
that be true, then how is it that God is God? And then he
went on to profane God, never having heard the gospel. The
gospel of God's free grace is the only message of salvation
that allows God to be God. I heard a brother say to me recently,
he said, you know, when I first started hearing the gospel, He
said, he said, I wasn't sure if there was a God, but I knew
that if there was a God, that's what he had to be like. He could not be any other way
and be God. Oh, wow. That's pretty profound,
isn't it? That's so true. Our God is God. He reigns. We give Him all the
glory. He's done everything. He's not
looking to us to do something in order for Him to be able to
have His way. Only the believer believes that God is God. We don't rob Him of His glory.
But Lord, had you not made me to differ, had you not caused
me to see, Had you not given me faith to believe, had you
not melted my heart of stone and made it like wax, I'd be
just as stupid as the rest of the world calling God one thing
and honoring Him with my lips and dishonoring Him with my heart. And that's what idolatry is. It's just stupidity. This word confounded means to
be ashamed and the first time it's found in the scriptures
is in Genesis chapter 1 where the scripture says, and Adam
and Eve were naked and they were not ashamed. And what's the first thing that
they did? when they lost their innocency. What's the first thing
they did? They were ashamed of their nakedness.
They tried to cover up their nakedness with fig leaves. And that fig leaf is a picture
of man's idolatry, trying to cover, trying to atone for his
sins and trying to cover up his nakedness before God. We're not
talking about physical nakedness. We're talking about the fact
that God sees every thought and every word and every action and
every intention of the heart. Man looks at the outward appearance.
We've spent so much of our time and energy trying to impress
one another, but God looks at the heart. And we're naked before
him. And men scheme all sorts of idolatry
in order to try to cover up that nakedness. And it's nothing but
fig leaves. And what does the Lord say? And
the unbelieving world is not ashamed of their idolatry. They're
proud of it. They're proud of it. Somebody
was telling me recently that they went to a free will Baptist
church and they had free will on the sign. They said they're
publishing their idolatry. They're so proud of their rebellion
against God, they put it out there in big letters. You know,
men are, and they pride themselves in the decision that they've
made or work that they performed or prayer that they prayed and
they glory in their idolatry. Or they'll put a statue of a
man bleeding up on the wall and they'll point to him and be proud
of that. Men are just, whatever religious persuasion
they have, they're proud of it. And what does God say he does
in the heart of his children? He makes them ashamed of their
idolatry. God saves his people out of idolatry. And when he shows us the glory
of Christ, we become ashamed of what we used to believe. We
become ashamed of what we used to think, and we don't want any
part of it. I hear sometimes people say,
well, I believe the gospel, but I'm going to go to this false
church because I think I can be a persuasion. You're going
to go sit and listen to somebody tell lies about the one that
you say you love? You're not going to make a difference
over there. Come out from among them and be you separate, saith
the Lord. Don't be a part of that. The one thing that we're
most shameful of is manmade idolatrous religion. We don't want anything
to do with it. Who made us to be that way? There was a time
when we were proud of idolatry, just like the rest of the world.
We boasted in it. Confounded, ashamed. Look, you see that verse seven?
Here's what, here's what makes us to differ. And the idolatry that we still
see in our hearts, we're shamed of it, aren't we? Our pride,
self-righteousness, our unbelief, we're shamed of
it. Why? The Lord's made us to be
so. Ashamed to be all they that serve
graven on images. They boast themselves in idols.
Worship him all you gods. Worship him. And we do. Well. Said I had 12 points. I think
we got through six of them. Let's take a little break.