Psalm 119 verse 15. Here's one of those things that we, by God's grace, do with relation
to His Word. David said, I will meditate. I will meditate. I don't have any problem with
people that want to read the Bible through in a year. That's
great. Any reading of the Bible is good
reading. But may God give us grace to
meditate in his word and not just read it. Not just read it
fast, you know, fast as we can. I will meditate. It means to
put forth thought, to consider, to muse upon. And by God's grace, we muse upon
this, upon what it is to muse, to meditate. It means this, and this was interesting,
this is the definition of it, to talk to yourself about it. That's scriptural now, that's
scriptural, we'll see that in other scripture. What do we talk
to ourselves about with regard to the word of God. Do we talk
about what he meant by it? You know, the disciples did a
lot of that. He would say something and they would get, they would
kind of, you know, when they had a chance, they'd kind of
fade back and talk about what did he mean by that? And usually
he would, well, in the places where we have record of it, he
would so often explain teach them and open their eyes. And
that's, by the way, the title of the message, Open My Eyes.
We're going to see that in a minute. And really all through this,
open my eyes. They talked about, what did he
mean by that? But you know, the Lord, he teaches us what he means by
it. We usually don't have to think long on that. That's really
not what our meditation is about so much. Though there are passages
in the Bible that we just don't You know, I believe it was it
was the Apostle Peter that said some passages are hard to be
understood and many rest them and pervert those to their own
damnation. But the whole message of the
Bible is pretty clear. The gospel pretty clear in it.
We know whom we have believed by his grace. He's he he hadn't
he hadn't hidden these things from everybody. He's hidden them
from the wise and prudent. He's revealed them to babies.
And by his grace, we're persuaded of the truth of God. And so we
may meditate some on what it means, but really, I believe
this is more the subject of our meditation is how it applies
to me. What is it? What bearing does
it have on me? And I'll tell you why I say that.
It's not just speculation. How does the word of God affect
me? The Bible is not just something
to agree with. The Bible is something in all
of its teachings. It's something to do. Let me
show you that in James chapter 1. Look at it with me if you
would in James 1.16. Now you know what verse I'm going
to, but you're probably not familiar with the whole passage. And I
want us to look at this whole passage in James 1. and verse
16 James 1 16 let's kind of camp
here for a second we're talking about meditating in his precept
think talk to yourself about it and here's what I believe
we talk about more than what does it mean we talk about What does this have to do with
me? Think about this with me. Verse
16. Do not err, my beloved brethren. Well, how are we not going to
err? Well, understand this now. Don't err regarding this. Every
good gift and every perfect gift is from above. It didn't come
from your heart. It didn't come from your mama.
She didn't give you life and she didn't give you anything.
God gave it to you. Bless our mothers. Thank God
for a godly mother. But we don't praise any person,
any man, for what is due unto God, the honor that's due unto
God. Every good and every perfect gift is from above and cometh
down from the Father of lights with whom is no variableness,
neither shadow of turning. Of his own will begat he us with
the word of truth, that we should be a kind of first fruits of
his creatures. Now he said to Nicodemus, you
must be begotten again. You must be born. Well, how does
that happen? From above. That's what born
again means. It means born from above in John
chapter three. And here, that's pretty clear,
isn't it? Of his own will, he birthed you. And he did it with
the word. That's what we're talking about
tonight, is the word. I'll meditate upon my precepts.
Don't err, brethren, understand. Hear the word and follow it,
believe it, do it. That's what we're getting to.
Wherefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear,
and slow to speak, and slow to wrath, slow to tell what ye... This is all of us now. This is
me. I want to tell everybody how
much I know. Preachers can be guilty of that. Let's be swift
to hear and quick to shut up. Slow to wrath, for the wrath
of man worketh not the righteousness of God. He'll overrule our wrath
now and for his glory. But that doesn't mean our wrath
isn't contrary to Him. It's contrary to God. He just
overrules it anyway for our good and for His glory. Wherefore
lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness and
receive with meekness the engrafted Word. I want you to notice all
through this passage two threads that run through this whole thing.
The Word. The Word. The Word. And do this. Don't err. Lay apart the evil
deeds that you're prone to, and receive the engrafted word which
is able to save your souls now. But be ye doers of the word and
not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. For if any man be a hearer of
the word and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his
natural face in a glass, For he beholdeth himself, and goeth
his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was." Now
this is interesting because you look in the mirror and you
say, boy, I'm looking good today, you know. And then you go away
and you got to come back. You forget what you looked like.
That's what he's saying. So the word, I know we do tend
to forget, and we're going to talk about that in a minute.
We do tend to forget, but the word can't just be The only effect
that the Word has upon you can't just be you remembering it and
reacting specifically to the Word. The Word changes who you
are. God does that by His Word. You
see that all through this passage, don't you? It makes you wise
unto salvation. It's able to save your soul.
And you're a doer of the Word. It's what you are. And He's encouraging
us in this, just like all of the exhortations in the Scripture.
It don't mean you're going to do that on your own. He's exhorting
you to do what God is going to work in you. For he beholdeth himself, and
goeth his way, and straightway he forget. Well, you're going
to forget the word, too, unless it becomes part of what you are,
who you are now. That you don't forget. That you
don't forget. And we do have to be reminded.
I'm going to preach that in a minute. But we don't just completely
just go off the rails when we're not in the word. You see what
I'm saying? It's changed us by God's grace. And it's the power
of God that does it. We're a new creation in Christ
Jesus, but his word is integral to that, to that change. But whoso looketh into the perfect
law of liberty now, you look into a mirror, you'll forget,
but you look into the word of God with eyes to see. He being not a forgetful hearer,
but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed.
Oh, this is all by grace now. Everything's by grace, and everything's
by his power. He works in you both to will
and to do of his good pleasure. But this is the way he works,
and it's important we see it. If any man among you seem to
be religious, And brattleth not his tongue,
but deceiveth his own heart. This man's religion is vain.
You just act, you know, you act a certain way that has nothing
to do with the Bible, by the way. But you don't obey the Bible. You just made up, you just acted
religious. Pure religion and undefiled before
God and the Father is this, what he said. Be kind, love one another,
visit the fatherless and the widows in their affliction, and
keep himself unspotted from the world. You don't belong to this
world. You are Christ's. You remember
what he wrote to the Corinthians? The body is not for you. It's
for Christ. It is Christ's. And so that's what we meditate
on. That's what we think about. And this is all through the scripture
now. This is what we talk about with ourselves. We talk about
who God is, and therefore, because He is who He is, what manner
of persons ought we to be, the Apostle Peter said, in all holy
conversation and godliness. First Peter, Second Peter, 311.
We talk about what we are as revealed in God's Word, therefore,
how we must never have any confidence in the flesh. That's the Word. You see how that affects the
way we think and what we do? Don't do what you do in the confidence
of the flesh because you know by God's Word what you are. And
by His grace we have no confidence in our flesh. Therefore, in our
actions, in our decisions, seek Him and His will. We don't follow
our hearts as the world advises us to do because we know, not
the old one anyway, Because we talk about God's word with ourselves
and we say to ourselves, enlightened by the word of God, my ways are
not God's ways. I'm not going to follow my heart.
My heart is deceitful and wicked, more than I can ever even know.
You see how we talk to ourselves. We talk about God's salvation
and how that everything is in Christ. Everything that God has
for the sinner. besides wrath, is in Christ. And that, you could say that's
in Christ too because he's the judge. Christ is the judge. And we talk about how that Christ
is all in the scriptures and how that affects me. You remember
what Paul said? We reckon that since he died
for us, we ought to live for him. That's a paraphrase, that's
a shortening of it. That's what I meditate on. That's what I want to meditate
on. God's glory. We talk about to
ourselves, with ourselves, how God's glory can only be seen
in His face. So when we talk about who God
is, we meditate on Christ. We can only see the extent of
our own sinfulness in Christ crucified. So even when we're
talking about what we are, we're meditating on Christ. And how are you going to talk
about how God saves a sinner? With yourself or with anybody
else without meditating upon the Son of God who loved us and
gave himself for us. You see, it all goes back. It
all comes from him and it all goes back to him. the Lord Jesus
Christ. All of God's blessing and favor
for sinners is in Christ Jesus and his precious shed blood. Turn to Philippians chapter 4.
Meditating, we're talking about meditating upon the word of God. Listen to this now with regard
to that. Philippians 4 Be careful for nothing. That
word is anxious. It doesn't mean don't be careful
like we think of the word careful. Of course we're to be careful.
We're to walk, you know, circumspectly in this world as the word teaches
us. Be aware. Be wise as serpents and harmless
as doves, but be anxious for nothing. Quit worrying about
stuff that don't matter. That's pretty good advice for
me. But in everything, by prayer
and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known
unto God. And the peace of God, which passeth
all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through
Christ Jesus. Now I wanted to read those verses,
that verse there, those two verses, before we get to the key verse
to our text. Because I want you to notice
those last two were Christ Jesus. He keeps us through Christ Jesus.
And what is it, who is it we're thinking about when we think
on what's true and what's honest and what's just and what's pure?
We're thinking about Christ. Finally, brethren, whatsoever
things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things
are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, Who else can that be? Pure and
lovely, just and honest. That's our Savior now. We're
talking with Him. Because this book is about Him.
It concerns His Son from start to finish. So if you're meditating
on this book, you're meditating on Him. If you're meditating
about who God is, you're meditating on Christ. Only if you've seen
Him, you've seen the Father. If you're meditating on your
own wretchedness, you've got to be meditating on Him. You're
not going to see yourself as you are until you see Him as
He is. At least to the extent that we can in this flesh, see
Him as He is. And how God saves a sinner, are
you going to meditate on that? With Christ. Whatsoever things are lovely,
whatsoever things are of good report, if there be any virtue,
if there be any praise, think on these things, the things of
God in Christ. Think on them. Meditate on them. Talk to yourself about them.
Those things which you have both learned and received and heard
and seen in me, boom, there's our key word right there. That's
what I'm saying. That's what we're thinking about.
I want by God's grace to be a doer of his word, don't you? I don't want to just believe
in my head that salvation is by grace through faith in the
Lord Jesus Christ. I actually want to lay hold of
him by faith, by God-given faith, who was gracious to me from the
foundation of the world. Do it. Do it. That's what Mary
said at that wedding. Whatever he tells you, do it. If he says come to me, you come
to him. If he says shut up, you shut
up. If he says, if God says hear him, hear him, hear him. If he says stretch forth your
hand, I know you can't do that, but do it. Do it. and the God of peace be
with you, otherwise you wouldn't be able to do it. Let's look at verse 16. I will delight myself in thy
statutes Will not forget I Will not forget
now we talked about the word respect in verse 15 there There
was more to verse 15, but we saw that word respect and we
talked about that how that When we looked at verse 6 and we've
also seen in verse 14 Last week, I believe how that we rejoice
in God's ways there. They are delighted and are rejoicing
and But I want to mainly focus in this verse 16, on the last
part of the verse, because this reveals our tendency. This reveals
what we're prone to, and what we're to guard against. Scripture's
full of warnings, isn't it? He said, if you continue, if
you continue until the end, endeavor to walk worthy. We run in a race,
Paul said, and those that finish, those that run all the way, win
the race. So we have a warning here in
essence because what David resolves, he resolves because we're so
prone to do it. He resolves not to forget because
we so easily forget. How can we remember? I remember
lines from movies I saw 30 years ago. And I can't hardly tell
you what I preached on three days ago. How is that? It's just our nature. It's just
the way we are. That's just the way we are. Because as Solomon
said, vanity of vanity. We're vain flesh. But listen to this. Listen to
what our Lord said in Luke 22, 61. Listen to this. The Lord turned and looked upon
Peter, and you know the occasion upon which he did that. The Lord
had told the Apostle Peter, you're going to deny me three times
before the rooster crows tonight. Peter said, no, no way. These ones here, I don't know
about them. They may deny you, but I'm not fixing to do that.
All right. And the rooster crowed. But not
until Peter had denied the Lord Jesus Christ three times. And
the Lord turned and looked upon Peter and Peter remembered. What
are we talking about? How easy we forget now. Peter remembered the word of
the Lord. How he had said to him, this
is what's going to happen. Has the Lord not told us what's
going to happen? And yet, how easily we forget. It says in Psalm 103, 14, he
knoweth our frame, he remembereth that we're dust. Sometimes we
forget that. We forget that quite a bit now.
And when we forget that we're dust, we start to lean on the
arm of the flesh. We start to think that we're
pretty good folks. We start to have confidence in this flesh.
Remember, remember that you're dust. Remember that without Christ,
we can do nothing. No thing. That's what we're capable
of apart from our Savior. No thing. Don't forget that. When your sins weigh heavily
upon you, and maybe you are remembering that you're dust, and maybe you're
thinking, you know, Satan's right about me. I ought to go to hell,
and sure enough, if anybody's going to hell, it's gonna be
me. Remember that our Lord Jesus
Christ took my sin. He took my sin upon
Him now. He took my sins away. And I have
to remember this often. It's not my sins that are weighing
upon me when I think they are. We don't carry the burden of
our sin. He already carried that. He already took those. It's not
my sin that's weighing on me. It's my unbelief. It's my lack
of faith that I'm experiencing. Are you feeling guilt for sins
that God himself doesn't see in you? He hath not beheld iniquity
in Jacob. But boy, we sure do, don't we?
And when you do, and when you despair, because
every time you look at yourself and think, what? You know, that's
just self-righteousness is what it is really. It sounds like,
it wouldn't be, it sounds like humility. Oh, I'm so sinful.
No, you're judging your position before God based on what you
do. Don't do that! Remember! Remember, we're justified freely
by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. Justified! Remember that when you're burdened
with your sin, with thoughts of your own wretchedness. Remember when you're troubled
by some heavy trial. You have a thorn, a spear, a
sharp spear is what that word is, in your flesh. Remember how
that he said to the Apostle Paul, who had one just like it. Oh,
nobody's ever been through what I've been through. Oh, yeah,
we like to think like that though. Remember how he said to the Apostle,
my grace is sufficient for you. You didn't say, let my grace
be sufficient for you. It is. It is sufficient. His grace is sufficient for a
world of weary, suffering sheep. Does death threaten you? Remember
that he took its sting away. The sting of death is sin. And Christ has taken it away. first john 1 7 remember this
if we walk in the light as he is in the light we have fellowship
one with another you walking in his light do you believe trust in him stop
looking to yourself We have fellowship with God Almighty and the blood
of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleanseth us, cleanseth. It just keeps
on cleansing. You can say, you know, it washed
all of our sins away in that one offering for sin, or you
can look at it this way, it perpetually washed our sins away. It's all
true. His blood cleanseth us. from
all of us. It's already done in the, I don't
even know how to say, I don't even know how to talk about God,
do you? I started to say in God's experience, what is that? In the mind of God, it's already
cleansed, but in our experience, it's continuing. He paid for all of my sins, past,
present, and future. The sins I haven't even committed
yet are already washed away. Are you worried about your job?
A lot of people do that. Are you worried about how you're
going to make ends meet? That's one of the things. It
seems silly when I say it from the pulpit, doesn't it? It's
not silly. We worry about things like that,
don't we? David said, I've been young and
I'm not young anymore, I'm old now. And yet I have not seen
the righteous forsaken. Or his seed, Megan Brant. Remember. As God faithfully, you answer
this quick, talk to yourself about this. As God faithfully and graciously
supplied your every need for 50 years, And will you doubt
him for tomorrow? Will you do that? We know, but we forget. That's why Simon Peter wrote
what he did in 2 Peter 1. Look at it with me. I want you
to look at this. 2 Peter 1 verse 12. 2 Peter 1 12 Remember now what
we're talking about David said I will not forget I don't want
to forget I resolve To remember the Word of God the truth of
God the grace of God the love of God the glory of God that
he's taught me through the gospel of his son I will not. I just refuse. Can we say that?
I just refuse. And I know I will without His
grace. But this is how He brings it to pass. He causes us just
to say, I will not. Like Jacob said, I will not let
you go. I can't. I can't do it. I can't let go of the promises
of God. Can you? I know that's by His grace. But I just can't. I will not
forget. That's what he's saying, and
that's the spirit in which he's saying it. 2 Peter 1.12, look
at this. The apostle says, I will not
be negligent to put you always in remembrance of these things,
though you know them. That's what David's talking about. We
know, don't we? We believe, and yet, God must
help us. And this is how he does it, by
his word, by the preaching, by us talking to ourselves about
the word, and talking to others. You know, when I'm talking to
you about the Word, it's a lot like talking to myself. Because we're
of one heart and one mind in these things, by God's grace. Though you know them and be established
in the present truth. Some of you have been listening
to the Gospel for decades. Us together, for decades. You're
still going to have to be reminded of it. It doesn't mean we're all together
like the man that just beholds his face in the glass and then
forgets now. God has changed us, no question about it. It would be dishonoring to him
to say he hadn't changed us, because he has. You know, people
think they're being humble when they say, oh, God doesn't give
you a new nature. Well, how are you worshiping
him then? Is that your flesh doing that? You're bragging on
yourself and dishonoring Him if you say He hadn't changed
you, given you a new nature. You say you love Him. How? Did
your flesh come up with that? That's God's work. It's one or
the other, isn't it? Your flesh is either better now
that you worship and love Him and serve Him, or God did a work
in you as well as for you. Which is it? Him or you? Listen now he said in verse 13
Yeah, I think it is meat as long as I'm in this tabernacle in
this body to stir you up by putting you in remembrance Knowing that
shortly I must put off this my tabernacle even as our Lord Jesus
Christ has showed me it became more and more important to him
and I believe it is to me to More and more important as I
realize it's not gonna be long now And I'm gonna be long now Moreover, I will endeavor, I'm
gonna do everything in my power to make sure that even after
I'm dead, that you're reminded of these things. Oh boy. You see the importance of this?
We know we're established in the truth, but we still forget.
And this is what David's prayer, may our resolve be as David's.
Lord, I will not forget. I will not let you go in the
sense of your precious promises to me. Can't let them go. And
may the hope of our hearts be this now. Three things about that, about
not forgetting. May our resolve be, I will not
forget. May our prayer be, Lord don't
let me forget. And may our hope be that he don't
forget. I don't want to forget him, but
my hope is, my sure hope is, that he won't forget me. He said,
can a woman forget her sucking child that she should not have
compassion on the son of her womb? She might. Yet will I not forget you. Verse 17, deal bountifully with
thy servant that I may live and keep thy word. Now we already
talked about what it is to keep his word, so we won't go over
that again. It's to treasure and guard as
we would precious valuables, but I just want to point out
again how that in verse 2 where we talked about keeping his word,
we see that keeping God's word is a desirable thing. That's
the desired thing, to keep, to treasure it. And here in verse
17 we see how that happens. Oh Lord, the only way a sinner
will ever treasure and value the Word of God is if God deals
with that sinner in the abundance of His grace and mercy in Christ
Jesus. Lord, deal bountifully with me. He will be precious to us only
if we're precious to Him first. And we see the same cause and
effect in verse 18. Let's close tonight with verse 18. Open thou
mine eyes that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law. You see
the cause and effect there? God do something for me so that I may do something, so
that I may see. so that I may behold, so that
I might meditate, muse upon, talk to myself about, rightly, about the things of God. Now,
there are wondrous things in God's book, wondrous things,
but most will never see them. Most will never see them. That's why the prayer of our
heart is, Lord, oh Lord, open my eyes. The wonder of wonders
is this. We couldn't even begin to scratch
the surface of talking about the wondrous things in God's
book except to talk about the wonder of all wonders. That the
Son of God laid down his life for sinners to redeem them to
God by his precious blood. This is it now. You talk about
wondrous Could we with ink the oceans fill, and were the skies
of parchment made, were every stalk on earth a quill, and every
man a scribe by trade. To write the love of God above
would drain the oceans dry, nor could the scroll contain the
whole, though stretched from sky to sky. And yet, think about this, the
epitome of what man knows about the love of God is a lie. You think about that. The sum and substance of everything
this world knows about the love of God is this. God loves everybody
and it's a lie. What they know is a lie. You
see what we're saying? Open my eyes. Just because it's wondrous doesn't
mean you're going to behold it that way. Do you know anything by God's
grace of the electing, distinguishing, discriminating, persevering,
boundless love of God for his sheep? God. God said to Hosea, I'm going
to teach you something of my love for my people. And what
did he say to him? go and fall in love with Gomer,
the whore. And as God in that strange and
beautiful love story teaches us of his love for us, we see
that Gomer was indeed a shameful, despicable harlot. But we also see that she was
Hosea's wife. and he could not let her go.
He married her and bought her. Just as our Lord joined himself
to us in love before the foundation of the world, he said, Jacob,
have I loved? And he just as surely said, Jimmy, have I loved?
And then he redeemed us with his precious sin-atoning blood. And the more we see of the wondrous
love of God, for sinners in Christ. The more we say, Lord open my
eyes, that we may see. Open our eyes. I want to see more of that, don't
you? And a whole lot less of what
these eyes see without His grace. Two final thoughts from this
verse. Let's read it again so we can
Deal bountifully with thy servant that I, no, sorry, verse 18,
open thou mine eyes that I may behold wondrous things out of
thy love. Lord, you do something so that. Two final thoughts. If you see
anything wondrous in this world, And I'm not saying that there
aren't wondrous things by His grace because of Christ that
we behold even in temple things in this life as believers. Wondrous
things. In a sense, beautiful things. But if you're going to behold
anything truly wondrous, if you're ever going to be able
to say, I've seen something wondrous, you know where you're going to
see it? out of His Word. If you haven't seen the wonders
of Christ out of His Word, you haven't seen anything yet. In fact, you're not really going
to see anything the way it is until you see Him. It's all a mirage until you see
Him. Isn't that right? You're not
going to see anything right. Even temporal things. You're
not going to see them the way they are. Until you see Him. And you're
not going to see anything glorious. Ever. Unless it comes right out
of here. And the second thing is this
in closing. If we could just see. If we could see how much He loves
us. We don't have any idea, do we?
Though He's revealed it, and though He teaches us, He's gracious
to teach us. If we could see how much He loves
us, we would never be the same. If we could ever just see how
glorious He is, how precious, how faithful, how great, how
great, we would never be the same. And I don't know about
you, but I don't want to be the same. Lord, open our eyes. May that
be our prayer. Let's pray.