All right, we're in Psalm 84
tonight. Psalm 84, this is a new chapter. We haven't been here, so I want
to read through this Psalm with you and see if the Lord can use
this to help us to understand better His provision for us. in this world and the blessing
in the world to come. Alright, Psalm 84. It says in
verse 1, How amiable are thy tabernacles, O Lord of hosts! My soul longeth, yea, even fainteth
for the courts of the Lord. My heart and my flesh crieth
out for the living God. Yea, the sparrow hath found an
house, and the swallow a nest for herself, where she may lay
her young, even thine altars, O Lord of hosts, my King and
my God. Blessed are they that dwell in
thy house, they will be still praising thee, Selah. Blessed
is the man whose strength is in thee, and whose heart are
the ways of them, who, passing through the valley of Baca, make
it a well. The rain also filleth the pools. They go from strength to strength.
Every one of them in Zion appeareth before God. O Lord, God of hosts,
hear my prayer. Give ear, O God of Jacob, Selah. Behold, O God, our shield, and
look upon the face of thine anointed, for a day in thy courts is better
than a thousand. I had rather be a doorkeeper
in the house of my God than to dwell in the tents of wickedness. For the Lord God is a sun and
a shield. The Lord will give grace and
glory. No good thing will he withhold from them that walk
uprightly. O Lord of hosts, blessed is the
man that trusteth in thee. Now that last verse really nails
it down, doesn't it? Doesn't it? Blessed is the man
who trusts in thee. So this seems like a psalm that's
difficult to understand. I look at this psalm, I've read
it, I don't know how many times now, and I still find it difficult
to understand. And partly that's because it
talks about things that are not so familiar to us. And secondly,
the way it uses those things in the psalm, it's not clear
how they're connected to one another and how they're connected
to us. So I want to just start with
an overview of this psalm. It says in the psalm, if you
look in your Bible, I have this in my Bible, not all Bibles have
this, but there's a part that's inspired that precedes the first
verse. And it says, to the chief musician
upon Gitti, or Gitti. I'm not sure exactly how to say
that. I looked up the pronunciation. I think it's like G-I-T-T-E-E,
but I could be wrong. A psalm for the sons of Korah.
Now Korah was appointed by David as the song master. I don't know
what else to say. But he would give the songs.
that mostly David penned, the lyrics to which he penned, and
he would put them to music and they would be sung by the sons
of Korah, by those who were appointed by David among the Levites to
sing to the Lord as part of the worship. And so this was given
to him, and we don't know for sure if David wrote it. It's
most likely that he did. But the word giti here in the
beginning, as I understand it, it has to do with a kind of an
instrument that was played, and if the BLB, the Blue Letter Bible,
is accurate on this, it was played in connection with the Feast
of Tabernacles. That's helpful, I think, in understanding
this psalm. That's the reason I mention it.
So there's a song, and the words to the song, and the instrument
on which it's played, is to be a song of joy, and great joy,
in fact, because it's the celebration of the Feast of Tabernacles.
Now, in this very first verse, he says, How amiable are thy
tabernacles, O Lord of hosts! Lord is Jehovah. Lord of hosts
is Jehovah of the armies of heaven, the armies of his saints. In
Revelation 15, in verse 3, it says Jesus is the King of saints. So he is the Lord of hosts. So is God the Father and God
the Holy Spirit. The triune God is the Lord of
hosts. But because this giti, or whatever
this thing was, this musical instrument that they used in
connection with the Feast of Tabernacles and this first verse,
it shows us that this psalm has to do with the Feast of Tabernacles
historically. Historically it does, but spiritually
it has to do with what that points to. If you remember the Feast
of Tabernacles, it was appointed by God through Moses. The children
of Israel were to keep it. And the first time they kept
it was when they first came out of Egypt. God delivered them
from Egypt and he made them dwell in booths, B-O-O-T-H, booths,
or little shelters, tents, if you will, tabernacles. And that
was in the beginning of their sojourn through the wilderness.
And then at the end, they were also to keep the Feast of Tabernacles. So it was a picture of dwelling
in Christ, who is our tabernacle, who is our refuge. And it also
has to do with the fact that that God was with Israel throughout
their sojourn in the wilderness, and he was the one they looked
forward to as their inheritance in the land of Canaan. So these
things have a spiritual parallel, don't they? Because the Lord
is the one who is with us in this world, and he's the one
we look forward to in glory. God is our refuge and strength,
the very present help in trouble. So he's our refuge in the troubles
of this life. He's our refuge through this
life. In Psalm chapter 90, a couple of Psalms ahead of where we are,
he says this in verse one, he says, Lord, thou hast been our
dwelling place in all generations. So, dwelling place is a tabernacle,
and it has to do with the fact that God himself is our dwelling. He's our dwelling place. And
so back in Psalm 84 now, if we understand this as written of
David or some other saint, I'm just going to stick with David
here. He says in verse 1, how amiable are thy tabernacles and
amiable is just a word that means well-loved and beloved. It's a word of strong love for. How lovely, how desirable, how
beloved are thy tabernacles, O Lord of hosts. It's not a And
every day, yeah, I kind of like them. This is a very intense
love for them. It's an intense desire. Look
at verse two. He says, My soul longeth, yea,
even fainteth for the courts of the Lord. My heart and my
flesh crieth out for the living God. So these tabernacles, these
dwelling places, And these are the things which David longed
for. He even fainted for them for
the courts of the Lord and his heart and his flesh. He had a
great desire to be with the living God because that's where God
was. A tabernacle is of God. The Lord's tabernacle is where
God dwells. That's where God is. That's where
he's found. And we'll talk more about that
in a minute. So let me go on to verse three, since we're just
going through this in an overview. He says, yea, the sparrow hath
found a house and the swallow a nest for herself, where she
may lay her young, even thine altars, O Lord of hosts, my King
and my God. So picture David now. He's not
at the tabernacle. He's far from it. And he has
possibly been away from it for a long time. And this is where
God had designated of his worship. This is where the altar was. This is where the sacrifices
were made. This is where prayers were made by the priests. The
priests were always in the tabernacle. That was 24-7. There was someone
in the tabernacle all the time of the priests. always doing
the service of God, and there were sacrifices offered, and
there were the different compartments of the tabernacle, which I'm
not going to talk about right now, but remember the last one,
the one separated, only the high priest could go into once a year,
was called the holiest of all, or the holy of holies. So all
of that was in David's mind when he speaks of his strong desire,
his great love for, his intense desire and longing for the Lord's
dwelling places where God himself dwells. Now these were places
where God also made himself known to his people. That's where he
met with them. So he says in verse three that
the sparrow found a house and the swallow a nest there. They
themselves have laid their young in this place. And think of it
this way, you go outside and you find a bird outside your
house, maybe building a nest in a tree or in the under eaves
of your home. And that bird has found a place
to raise up its babies. And they will, they're diligent,
they will spend a long time, mama bird and papa bird, bringing
little scraps of whatever they can find to build that nest.
Just wear themselves out and then they'll have their eggs
will be laid in that nest and they'll tend to those eggs. And
then their babies will be born and they will stay with them
until they're old enough to fly and all that goes with that.
So that's what David observed. Long way away he had seen, and
perhaps he had seen this even where he was, a swallow and a
sparrow building its nest, and he remembered that they had built
nests there at the altar at the tabernacle. What a place for
a sparrow to build its nest in a swallow. Verse four says, blessed
are they that dwell in thy house. So this place, this tabernacle,
is God's dwelling. It's his house. They will still,
they will be still praising thee. Those who have the high Privilege
of being in God's house are always praising him all the time. This
is their highest privilege This is their greatest blessing to
be praising the Lord and so he says Selah stop and pause and
think about this a lot has been said we need to think about that
and then in verse 5 he says blessed is the man whose strength is
in thee in whose heart are the ways and in the King James Version
in italics of them and and also who, in the next verse is italics,
passing through the valley of Baca, make it a well, the rain
also filleth the pools. Now Baca is not, if you look
it up in the King James Version, there's no other place in the
King James Version you'll find these letters B-A-C-A or I don't
even know B-A-K-A is in there, but I couldn't find it. But the
meaning of it has to do with a place of weeping and where
there's no water. It's dry and arid, so there's
no water there. And yet, there it says here,
they pass through the valley of Baka, this weeping, valley
of weeping, and make it a well. The rain also filleth the pools.
So, verse five and six are going together. If you read them together,
without the italics and without the period between these two
verses, it says, blessed is the man whose strength is in thee
and whose heart are the ways And you could put Anantalaks
who passing through the valley of Baka make it a well, the rain
also fill up the pools. So here there's people who are
blessed because their strength is the Lord. And that's true
of everyone whose strength is the Lord. They're blessed. And
these people are described as passing through this valley.
that is a valley of weeping, and yet it's filled with pools
of water. This rain indicates a blessing,
and so even though it's a dry place of weeping and sorrow,
it's filled with pools as these people, whose strength is the
Lord, pass through it. And then in verse seven it says,
they go from strength to strength. Every one of them in Zion appears
before God. To appear before God, we often
think about that as a very intimidating event. But here it's celebrated. It's not something to be intimidated
by. He says, every one of them Every one of them in Zion appeareth
before God. So we want to understand what
that means, because they were looking forward to it. They appear,
obviously, in the Feast of Tabernacles. So the shadow of the truth of
this appearing was given then. But the reality of it, that's
what's going to be the most exciting thing to the people of God. Verse
8, O Lord God of hosts, hear my prayer, give ear, O God of
Jacob. And it's significant that he
says God of Jacob, because remember, Jacob was chosen. Jacob was the
one, he says, I'm the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He
named him when he named himself, God did. And Jacob was the one
the Lord wrestled with. Jacob is the one whose name was
changed to Israel. And Jacob is the one who had
the children, who were the seed of Abraham, and they were the
ones brought into the promised land. So there's much we could
say about Jacob. His name also means cheat or
supplanter, someone who tricks in order to get things. And so
he's a deceiver. And that's what Esau had an issue
with the way he got the birthright and the blessing, even though
Esau gave it up. by right. So God is the God of
Jacob, and that's who he's praying here to. And so in verse 9, Behold,
O God, our shield, and look upon the face of thine anointed. In
scripture, God's anointed is always referring to Christ. That's
his name. That's what Christ means, the
anointed. And so he's praying now, and in his prayer, where
he says all these things, his great longing to be in the tabernacles
of the Lord, and noting how the sparrow and the swallow found
their abiding place there and even raised their young there,
and how those who dwell in God's house were blessed because they
are always praising him, and their strength is in the Lord.
They pass through this valley of weeping, and yet it's filled
with rain. And the Lord is the one, he pleads
to hear his prayer, and he pleads with him as the God of Jacob.
And then he says in verse nine, behold, O God, our shield, and
look upon the face of thine, and look upon Christ, and consider
him. In all of his prayer, look to
the Lord Jesus Christ and see him. That's who God has told
us to look to. Look unto me and be ye saved,
all the ends of the earth. He says in Isaiah 43 and verse
22, for I am God and there is none else. And then in verse
10, he says, for a day in thy courts is better than a thousand.
I had rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than to
dwell in the tents of wickedness." The tents of wickedness, you
think about tents as being a place where you can't see what's going
on inside. They're kind of humble dwelling
places. And yet the wicked, they suggest
there's something going on there you need to be part of. You're
missing out. You need to come to these tents,
these places where the wicked do what's pleasurable, what is
praiseworthy from the mouths of the wicked, and all that goes
with it. It's the world, isn't it? And
he says, no, a day in God's courts is better than a thousand elsewhere,
and he would rather be the lowest doorkeeper in the house of God,
just at the threshold, than to be in all the tents of the wicked. And then in verse 11 he says,
for the Lord God is a sun and shield. The sun gives light,
And the sun also gives life, and a shield defends us, protects
us from the darts that would put us to death. And he says,
the Lord God is our light, our life, and our shield, our protector,
our defense. He will give grace and glory.
No good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly.
And to walk uprightly has to do with our walk. How do we please
God? Well, it says in Hebrews 11,
6, without faith it is impossible to please Him. So they walk in
faith and verse 12, O Lord of hosts, blessed is the man that
trusteth in Thee. This is true of all of God's
people. They're trusting in the Lord. So we want to look at these
things now and I want to go through some of this psalm with you and
to understand these verses better. First of all, at an overview
level, since this has to do with this instrument and the song
that goes along with it, this psalm that we're reading of the
Feast of Tabernacles, then we understand that there's two places
where God meets with his people in their sojourn in this world.
The first place is where he meets with them in this world. And
the second place is where he meets with them in glory. Remember
what Jesus said in John 14 as he was about to go to the cross?
And we might not think of it this way, but this is precisely
how it's supposed to be understood. He says in John 14, let not your
heart be troubled. You believe in God, that's the
one who trusts in Christ and trusts in him as God. You believe
in God, believe also in me. In my father's house, God's dwelling,
in his household, his family, in my father's family, in his
household where he dwells, are many mansions, many dwelling
places, booths, tabernacles, places for every one of God's
people to dwell. If it were not so, I would have
told you, I go to prepare a place for you. So Christ is going to
the cross. He's going to do the work. He's
going to prepare. He's going to perform all necessary
to bring us to this place, which is his father's house, his father's
house, his father's family, where he himself dwells, where God
dwells. And this is what Christ is doing.
He's going to perform what's necessary to prepare the place
and to prepare us for that place. He prepares the place when he
offers himself to God and God is propitiated. God receives
his blood and God is at peace with us by the blood of Christ.
And we also are at peace with God by the blood of Christ. because
we receive testimony from God that our sins have been removed
from before God in the blood of his son, and that gives us
peace. There's nothing that is more
unsettling, nothing that's more unsettling than to think I would
stand before God in my sin. There's nothing more shameful,
nothing more that would cause me to flee away and hide from
God, from myself and be so easily deceived. There's nothing that
would create greater fear than to think that my sins would be
remembered by God and he would hold me accountable for them.
whatever they might be. Things I might think are small
may be the worst. Things I might think are big
may not be so big. But whatever they are, they're
sins against God, and God will not be mocked. God will be satisfied,
or he will not receive anyone. So God is going to demand that
justice is served. and he's going to demand obedience
is rendered. That's what the Lord Jesus Christ
did. That's how he prepared that place. He offered himself to
God. That was an everlasting righteousness
in his obedience, offering himself to God. And he also put away
sins by the satisfaction he made in his own offering of himself
in blood. That's how he did it. And that's
the place he prepared for his people in God. In God there are
many places. God is able to provide for all
of his children as if they were his only children. There's nothing,
we don't, you know, we turn on the lights and the lights go
dim because there's a power surge. the lights might be on, you know,
you click on something else, you see the power surge. There's
no power surges with God. He can provide all of the energy
needed to power all of creation, and it doesn't dim His power
at all. But more importantly, He can
save all of His people, and by the Lord Jesus Christ to the
uttermost, because He offered Himself. He paid all the all
that was heaven's riches, he paid already. And so he's purchased
ourselves, he's purchased our body, soul, and spirit from sin
and death, from the curse of the law, and from everything
our sin brings. So the Lord did that, and he says, if I go and
prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to
myself, that where I am there, you may be also. Those are tabernacles,
aren't they? That's dwelling places. That's
where God is. That's where God makes himself known to his people.
Now, in Psalm 84, the tabernacle that David would have been alluding
to was which tabernacle? Well, it would have been the
tabernacle on earth as he pens this psalm. But in his thoughts,
he's not thinking merely of that tabernacle, but nevertheless,
we don't understand the spiritual tabernacle unless we understand
the physical one. And what do we know about that
physical tabernacle? Well, first of all, there was
only one. No one on earth, anywhere on earth, I don't care if you
lived in Alaska in the days of Christ, or if you lived in America,
or if you lived in Russia, China, there was no other place on earth
before the Lord came where men could meet with God except in
that tabernacle. And so it was the place where
God was met, God met with men. And Solomon prayed in 1 Kings
8, verse 27, he says, will God indeed dwell with men on the
earth? Behold, the heaven and the heaven
of heavens cannot contain thee. And Solomon was referring to
the fact that God is not going to occupy this tabernacle that
I've built. Yet he is. It's like he's trying
to describe the wonder of what that tabernacle pointed to. But
David had only that tabernacle on earth because there's only
one way, only one way that we can come to God. Jesus said,
I am the way, the truth, and the life. And that was right
there in John 14, where we were just reading. I am the way, the
truth, and the life. And that he told his disciples
that. They might have been wondering,
where are you going? How do we get there? We don't know where
you're going. And he said, I am the way. I am the way, the truth,
and the life. No one comes to the Father but
by me. So David uses that same truth, referring to the earthly
tabernacle, but in reference to the real tabernacle, because
he's saying there's no way to get to God except in the Lord
Jesus Christ. It's through Him. It's in Him.
It's by Him. It's in His obedience and in
His blood. It's in His intercession. It's
in His victory over sin and death and hell and in answer to God's
holy law. It's everything that Christ is
by the appointment of God for His people, all that He's done.
And so when we think of it that way, then What we're hearing
here in these words, how amiable are thy tabernacles, O Lord of
hosts. My soul longeth, yea, even fainted for the courts of
the Lord. My heart and my flesh cried out for the living God.
David is thinking in terms, or he's writing in terms of a physical
earthly tabernacle because what it symbolized is uniqueness. The only way to God was there.
The only place God met was there. And yet, and the fact that there
the offerings were offered according to God's provision for men to
meet with Him and His condescension. Think about the fact that it
was just a tent, a tent. Solomon built this fine house
and still it was too small. It might have seemed glorious
because of all the gold and the things. It took years and who
knows how many billions of dollars it took to build that small place. And yet it wasn't still adequate
for the Lord. It wasn't worthy of Him. And
so when Solomon prayed, will God indeed dwell with men on
the earth? Even though right then and there
in history there was this temple that he had built, this house
for the Lord, yet he was looking forward to the Lord Jesus Christ
himself, in whom all the fullness of the Godhead dwells bodily.
And so that's what he had reference to. And David, in praying this,
is speaking here as a child of God, looking at the truth that
God meets condescending as in a tent. Here he meets with men
in this humble, lowly, outward form. And yet the eternal God
who fills heaven and earth, who has to humble himself in order
to even look upon and consider the things on earth and in heaven. this is God, this is his condescension. And so when he thinks about the
uniqueness of this tabernacle, where God dwells, the only dwelling
of God, and that it represents Christ and him crucified, and
the only way to come to God is by him, and that the Lord Jesus
would prepare this place for his people, then while on earth,
in this life, David longed to be in the place where God met
with his people. And he did meet with them then.
He met with them there in a physical place. At least in some measure. And so the psalm then, at an
overview level, is talking about the place God meets with us.
And there's two places primarily, as we think about it, in the
progress of our lives. The first place is here on earth.
where the Lord meets with us in spirit and in truth, where
He meets with us in believing Him. We don't see. I mean, if you wanted to get
a hold of God, if you wanted to touch Him or see Him or hear
Him, you can't do it with your senses, can you? If you do, then
you're on the wrong track. You're deceived. The only way
God is seen and known and heard and felt is through faith. And faith is the substance of
things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen. And faith
is not a quality that we're born with. It's a spiritual grace
given to us in the new birth where God gives us what we cannot
have except by grace. And so in believing Christ, we
walk through this world and therefore we dwell upon, we hang upon,
we live upon, we're constantly looking at and hearing, and we're
in the presence of God by faith, by faith. And so look at this
in Hebrews chapter 10, so that we get grounded here in what
this psalm is teaching us. In Hebrews chapter 10, you see
how the language overlays so beautifully with what's said
here. He says in verse 14, Hebrews 10, 14, For by one offering he,
the Lord Jesus, hath perfected forever them that are sanctified,
those that God set apart for himself in eternal election that
he gave to Christ That's the reason Christ died for them.
God the Father commanded the Lord Jesus Christ to lay down
his life for the sheep. Those for whom Christ died were
those sanctified by God the Father. Jude 1 verse 1 says, sanctified
by God the Father, preserved in Christ Jesus. So he says,
for by one offering he hath perfected forever them that are sanctified. This verse should be emblazoned
upon our hearts. Christ, by his one offering,
one time, forever, his offering completely accomplished this,
forever perfected, forever perfected those God gave him to die for. That's the gospel. The Lord Jesus Christ accomplished
this. This is the preparing of us for
the house in glory. He perfected us forever. And
so he says in the next verse, we're of, of these things, he
says the Holy Ghost also is a witness to us. So now he's bringing in
not only the fact that God the Father has sanctified us, Christ
has died for us, but the Spirit of God had already promised these
things in scripture. He says, for after that he had
said before, verse 16, this is the covenant that I will make
with them after those days, saith the Lord, I will put my laws
into their hearts, and in their minds will I write them. He's
talking about the law of Christ, the law of liberty, the law of
the gospel. and their sins and iniquities
will I remember no more." Because they're not there. Christ put
them away. God's memory is perfect. But
he doesn't remember what Christ made satisfaction. There's no
record in the book of God of the sins of his people. Christ
blotted it out even before the foundation of the world. He's
the lamb slain before the foundation of the world. So their sins and
their iniquities will I remember no more. That's the prophecy
the Spirit of God gave in reference to what Christ would do. That's
what he's saying here. Now verse 18. Where remission
of these is, which is by the blood of Christ, his one offering,
there is no more offering for sin. Why? There's no sin. The
offering that perfected forever, the one offering, has taken away
the need for all other offerings. Verse 19, having, now listen
to these words, having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into
the holiest by the blood of Jesus. This is God's dwelling. the dwelling
of God. God, in the presence of God,
in all of his holiness, every person who is accepted there
comes by one way only. And this way is all sufficient. There's no need for anything
else, because by one offering he has perfected them that are
sanctified. He says, perfected them forever.
So he says here, having therefore brethren boldness, because it
doesn't depend on anything else. It doesn't depend on me. It depends
only on what God received and thinks of Christ. So he says,
this is our entrance, entrance into the holiest by the blood
of Jesus, the blood of Jesus. This is one of my favorite verses.
If it's the blood of Jesus only, then why would I have any doubts? Only if I doubt the efficacy
of his blood, only if I think that I need to add something
to it. And God forbid that I should ever think that. Even though
sinfully, in my unbelief, I have such thoughts, and I don't realize
it until I find myself depending on something else and holding
back. in my praise, in my thanksgiving,
in my love to the Lord. The reason I hold back, the reason
that I have any reluctance. to come to him openly and confessing
all my sins or having confidence in Christ is because I doubt
that his blood is sufficient. But here we have the very words
of God interpreted for us from the Old Testament and from what
Christ did. And he goes on in verse 20. He
says, brethren, we have boldness to enter into the holiest by
the blood of Jesus by a new and living way. which he hath consecrated
for us through the veil, that is to say, his flesh. So Christ
is alive. He's made the way through the
body, through his body. He died, rose again. We're justified. Verse 21, and having a high priest
over the house of God, who is also Christ. I like how Jesus
is all, don't you? He's the sacrifice that was offered. He's the one who perfected us,
took away our sins, made entrance for us into the presence of God
in all of his holiness, his blood, and now he's the high priest
over the house, the house of God. That's his household. That's where God dwells, in his
house. And he says in verse 22, what
are we to do then? By faith, by faith, he says,
let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith. Why wouldn't we have full assurance?
Since it depends on Christ. Do you think he's able? Do you
think that he had any sin of his own? Do you think he fulfilled
all righteousness when he offered himself to God without spot?
and bore our sins, do you think he took them all? Do you think
there's any sin that he didn't die for, that he died, or do
you think that he could die and not yet pay for sins, that we
have to do something to make his death work? The answer to
all those things is Christ by himself has purged our sins,
Hebrews 1.3. He prepared for us a place with
the Father in glory, in his house when he went to the cross. And
so he says, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance
of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our
bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the profession
of our faith without wavering. Why? For he is faithful that
promised. You see? It directs us, and this
is the nature of God's gift of faith, it directs us away from
our helpless and hopelessly sinful selves to Christ, who is holy,
harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, made higher than
the heavens, because he accomplished all of this. All right. So, that's
the way. Now, we live in this world, we
have this desire to be with God. We see that it's through Christ
alone. And so, how do we live our lives
in this world? We live in the dwelling place of God through
faith in Christ's blood. Faith in Christ. Faith in Christ. He's the way, the truth, and
the life. No one comes to the Father but
by Him. Okay, so now we can see now how
David, looking at that place that God designated as the only
place he would meet with men, a humble abode, a place that
looked like an ordinary tent on the outside, but on the inside
was all this glorious, holy, meeting place with God. And what
David is saying, I need to be there. I want to be there. I
love to be there. And what is this place where
God dwells? Well, it's in the hearts of his people, by faith,
but it's also in the gathered assembly of God's people. The
church, that's what we're talking about. The gathered people of
God is called the church. God dwells among them. Look at
Matthew chapter 18. Matthew, just one place. We won't
have time to do this. We're going to have to do this,
another part of this song, because I don't want to just rush through
it. And I don't know how to make things concise without just rushing,
so I'm not going to do that. So, Matthew 18, look with me
at this. He says in verse 15 of Matthew
18, moreover, Jesus says, if thy brother shall trespass against
thee, go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone. And
if he shall hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother. So if someone
has sinned against you, you go tell him, brother, you sinned
against me. But if he will not hear thee,
then take with thee one or two more, that in the mouth of two
or three witnesses every word may be established." So what
he's saying here is that the word needs to be established. So first, you go to him. Second,
if he doesn't hear you, then take two or three. But he goes
on, and verse 17, and if he shall neglect to hear them, the two
or three. Tell it to the church, the gathered
assembly. But if he neglect to hear the
church, let him be unto thee as a heathen man and a publican. He won't hear the church. Why
is he a heathen man or a publican if he doesn't hear the church?
Because it's the gathered assembly of Christ's people. It's where
the Lord dwells. The next verse says it. Verily
I say unto you, whatsoever you shall bind on earth shall be
bound in heaven. Whatsoever you shall loose on earth shall be
loosed in heaven. Again, I say that if two of you
shall agree on earth as touching anything that they shall ask,
it shall be done for them of my Father which is in heaven.
For where two are three... Now he's talking about the church,
isn't he? This is the assembly. This is where every word's going
to be established. This is where Christ speaks. This is where God's presence
is on earth. He says, where two or three are
gathered together in my name, notice, there am I in the midst
of them. So not only is the word established
by first two or three, then the whole church, but now Christ
himself is going to establish it because he's in the assembly
of his people, where two or three. And this says a lot about the
fact that it doesn't take a large gathering of his people to make
a place where Christ dwells with his people. And also it has the
same authority as the Lord Jesus himself because of this authority
given here like this. So this is showing us that the
Lord dwells with his gathered people. And look at this other
word. Look at Romans chapter 1. I want
to show you this and we're going to have to quit. Here, this is
the next verse, but I just want to show you this, the way that
God has developed this for us. We know it's true in our experience.
If you're a believer, you know this is true, but the way the
scripture speaks of it, it brings it home with force. He says in
Romans 1, verse 16, I'm not ashamed of the gospel of Christ. Why
is he not ashamed of it? And if I could shout right now
to drive it home, I would, but it won't do any good, so let
me just say emphasis. For it, the gospel, is the power,
the dynamite of God unto salvation. It's the almighty power of God.
The gospel is. And in 1 Corinthians, in 1 Corinthians
chapter 1, he says it this way. He says, In 1 Corinthians, let's see,
I've got to get my place here. Hold on. Oh yeah, 18. That's not actually, well let
me read 18. 17th verse, he says, For Christ
sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel. So the gospel
is the power of God. And the Lord Jesus sent Paul
to preach that gospel, not with wisdom of words, lest the cross
of Christ should be made of none effect. For the preaching of
the cross is to them that perish foolishness, but to us which
are saved it is the power of God. You see that? So he says
here in verse 21, for after that in the wisdom of God, it pleased
God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. There's
that power of God unto salvation. The gospel of Christ, the word
of God that tells us what Christ did, who he is, and what he did,
where he is now. how he accomplished the work
he was sent to do, and how his people are saved by it. That
gospel, the preaching of that gospel, is the way God saves
sinners. That's power. That's the power
of God. released, if you will, or exercised
through his word concerning Christ. Just like in creation, God spoke
and it was done, much more so in the gospel when the gospel
of Christ is declared and the Spirit of God blesses that preached
word. In the hearts of sinners, God's
power is exercised for their salvation so that they believe
it. He says in verse 23, we preach
Christ crucified to the Jews, a stumbling block to the Greeks,
foolishness, but to them which are called, both Jews and Greeks,
Christ, the power of God and the wisdom of God. He says, I'll just keep reading,
because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, the weakness
of God stronger than men, for you see your calling, brethren,
how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not
many noble are called, but God hath chosen the foolish things
of the world to confound the wise, and God hath chosen the
weak things of the world to confound things which are mighty, and
base things of the world, and things which are despised hath
God chosen, yea, and things which are not. to bring to not things that are, that no flesh
should glory in his presence." Alright, so here we see that
it was by God's designated means, the preaching of the gospel,
that we would hear it, and it would be God's power to save
us. because it would declare to us
the truth of who Christ is and what he did, so that we would
have no possibility of boasting, since it's all about him. And this is the tabernacle. On earth, this is where God meets
with his people. And it is in this context where
the gospel is preached, where two or three are gathered, and
David says, I need this. I must have this. I long, my
flesh and my soul faints for this. And as a fulfillment of
the Feast of Tabernacles, it's showing us that what we live
upon in this world and how we live upon it by faith, we live
upon Christ through the gospel, that in the second level, when
we receive our eternal inheritance, then we will dwell in the house
prepared for us by Christ in that heavenly tabernacle. And
then we will be with the Lord, we'll see His face, and he will
make himself known to us and we'll be satisfied when we awake
in his likeness. Let's pray. Father, thank you
for this psalm, this song of celebration for the Feast of
Tabernacles, which your people would use to praise and thank
you looking to Christ who is our tabernacle in whom God dwells
who has declared to us the gospel that he finished the good news
of our salvation how he by his one offering perfected forever
all those given to him to save and that through his blood we
now have entrance into the very holiest of all in the presence
of God and all of his glorious holiness without shame but in
boldness because we're there by the blood of Jesus. We're
not just there with some kind of a pretend righteousness, but
we're truly made the righteousness of God in Him. We're in Him who
is our salvation. What a glorious truth this is,
and we live upon it. We long for this, Lord, cause
us to truly, in our hearts, 100% to live upon Christ by faith
now and rejoice in Him together with His people. In His name
we pray, amen.