I was glad when they said unto
me, let us go into the house of the Lord. I'm always especially
glad when they say in Almonte, Michigan. I thank the Lord for
you. I thank him for your kindness
to me and to my family. And I appreciate you and your
pastor and his family is not worthy of such gifts of
God's grace. I want you to turn with me tonight
to the book of Romans. Romans chapter 4. Tim read that Psalm, the Psalm
of David. And I want to talk to you about
the God of David. Everywhere I go, it seems if I ask someone how they
are, It's become a worn phrase for them to say, I'm blessed,
blessed. But I'm afraid that most of them
are talking about things that can be seen and driven and lived
in and worn and eaten. That's what they call David was blessed. And by the Spirit of God, the
Apostle describes here in verses 6 through 8, the truly blessed
person, the blessed man. He says, David, in the same case
as Abraham before him, also describeth the blessedness of the man under
whom God imputeth righteousness without works, saying, Blessed
are they whose iniquities are forgiven and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to whom the
Lord will not impute sin." You see, the Apostle Paul is
actually quoting from Psalm 32, where David says exactly that. Verse 2 of Psalm 32, he says,
or verse 1, Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose
sin is covered. Blessed is the man unto whom
the Lord imputeth not iniquity, and in whose spirit There is
no God. That actually begins with something
like this, O the blessedness of that one to whom the Lord
will not impute sin. And I don't know if you notice
it, but both David and Paul say that the truly blessed are blessed
or happy because of something God has done. Blessed because of something
God has done. That's the God of David. But men and women by nature hate
the God of David. And the reason why they hate
the God of David is they hate Him because they hate grace. They talk a lot about grace.
sing a little about grace, but mark this down, all men and women,
all the fallen children of Adam, by nature, hate grace. They hate the idea that God purposed
to save David and therefore all his elect all of them being great
sinners, all of his free grace. Paul says in Ephesians 2, For
by grace are ye saved, you are being saved through faith But
that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of works,
lest any man should boast. And boast we would and do. But salvation is the boast of
God alone. It was said of Noah that Noah
found grace in the eyes of the Lord. He found grace in the eyes
of the Lord, and therefore grace found him and blessed him. But most think, when they think
of David, they think of what they view as his great sin. which we might call the Bathsheba
affair. As he committed adultery with
her, arranged the murder of her husband Uriah, and when we stop and think about
that naturally, self-righteous, sinful, religious flesh repels
the notion that God did not in some way punish David for these
things. Actually, He did not punish David
for any of his sins. Is that right? He did not deny his sin? He did not sugarcoat his sin. He did not condone his sin. As a matter of fact, he chastised
him severely, but he didn't punish him for his sin. You see, the reason is because
God did not impute David's sin to him. If you turn back over
in 2 Samuel, when Nathan the prophet came
to David, and he was not He was looking
for David because God had sent him. David was not looking for
him. David, I'm sure, thought just
like we all do about all of our sins for the most part, that
if we keep this thing quiet, everything's going to be alright. But God's grace reigns in righteousness. And when Nathan comes down to
David, and it's amazing here how self-righteous we are about
the sins of others, when the sins of others are the same as
our sins. Nathan says to David in his little
parable, he talks about the man who had only one little ewe lamb,
And the man who had more than he could use came and took away
that one little ewe lamb that this poor man had, and David
just flew into self-righteous indignation. He said, just tell
me who he is. You just tell me who this rotten,
lowlife scandal is, and I'll see to it that he pays fourfold
for what he took." And Nathan says, you're the man. A man I know once said that a lady in the congregation
where he preached, told his wife, she said, you
know, sometimes I think that your husband is talking about
me. That's what the Bible is talking
about. You and me. Thou art the man. But look in verse 13 and listen
to what David says, and then listen to what Nathan says to
him. And David said unto Nathan, I
have sinned against the Lord. And Nathan said unto David, the
Lord also hath put away thy sin, thou shalt not die. Isn't that something? Isn't that
something to tell a man who has just committed such awful, grievous,
blatant sins? Nathan, you call yourself a representative
of God? You call yourself a prophet of
God? And you come to this man who
has arranged the murder of a man, who has lied, who has committed
adultery, who has done all these things, and this is what you
tell him? The Lord hath put away your sin. You are not going to die. You see, God did not forgive
David because he repented, though he did. But David repented because God
forgave him in the only way a sinner can be forgiven, and that is
by grace in Christ crucified. As a matter of fact, in our text
it tells us so clearly and so concisely what grace is all about
in just a few verses wherein it states three things, three
sovereign acts of God. Verse 6 says, that God imputed
to him and to all the Lord's people righteousness without
works. It says in verse 7 that he freely
forgave and that he covered all their sins. And then it says in verse 8 that
he did not impute his sins to him. And those are not things that
are any way done in us. All of them are done outside
of us. by these sovereign acts of God,
by God's will and God's purpose of grace to his people, he does
them. And obviously, since his whole
purpose on earth and eternity is bound up in this, this must
have been an early thing he did. In other words, if everything
that is to work to the praise of the glory of God, which it
says in Ephesians 1 that the triune God is doing all things
to that end, than that decision to not impute the sins of His
people to them, to freely forgive and cover their sins, and to
give to them a righteousness outside of themselves to be found
in another, I'd say that determination was
made a long time ago. And you and I weren't there. So you could say, and rightly
say, you could say that God saved His people by grace before they
ever were. He saved them, and He did so
by not imputing their sins to them, and by imputing to them
righteousness in the Lord Jesus Christ. What does that mean? Well, if I am honest, if I use
any definitions, that if language means anything, then this word
impute means to reckon or to account or charge. In the case negatively, he did
not account or charge them with their sins. Positively, he did
charge to their accounts, hold in his sight them righteous in
the Lord Jesus Christ. Is that right? So men can pontificate over whether
it's a legal term or an accounting term, but the truth is, it's
a biblical term. It's a biblical term. And that's why I use it. That's why I believe it. That's
why I delight in it. And although I may not be able
to explain everything about it, I look to this word and it says
that this is what God did. And it's what he does to everyone
that he blesses. You know, we can stand back and
we can say, well, God wouldn't be just if he did this, or God
would be just if he did that. But listen, the only way we know
what just is, or justice is, is in what God says, and most
especially in what God does. That's pretty arrogant, isn't
it? to stand back for me, a maggot
on the earth, to stand back and to say that God wouldn't be just
if He did that and He would be just if He did that in this matter,
when all the time the Bible is saying to me and to you, this
is what He's done. And the thing that really, really
is at the core of all these matters is that it involves this idea
of whether or not righteousness has to do with how we are in
ourselves, or come to be in ourselves, or by a work of God in us, or
whether or not salvation is by grace. I mean grace. I'm sure of this, David, if you
want a poster child for grace, David is him. David is this man who could not
be saved any other way but by grace. But I've got news for
you, he ain't the only one. the man, the woman. If you are saved, it has to be
by grace. And this is exactly what God
is saying again and again and explaining it to us in such really
simple terms that we take and try to complicate Because we are not too sure about
this notion of grace. You see, if you look over in
Romans 6, down at verse 11, before we get too deep into what
imputation means, Listen to what he says in verse 11, because
that second word is the same word. If I was a Greek scholar, I probably
couldn't pronounce it for you, but I'm not even going to try.
But I do know this, it's the same word. In other words, he's
saying to believers, He is saying to God's people that we are to
do the same thing that God has done. Listen, he says, "...likewise
reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but
alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord." Now, there's nothing I can do
in that except what he enables me to do by faith, which is really
to believe what he says he's already done. Does that make
sense? He says we are to reckon ourselves
to be in that state in Christ that we have been brought into
by the grace of God who has not imputed our sins to us, but laid
them on Christ and imputed to us his righteousness. Or as it
really says, the righteousness of God in him. There is no righteousness. outside
of the Lord Jesus Christ. If God saves you and reveals
Christ to you and enables you to believe in your heart of hearts
and trust Christ alone, You are as righteous in Him at that instant
as you would be if you lived a hundred years, was faithful
to the church, faithful to the gospel. You wouldn't be any more
righteous a hundred years later than you were right then because
it's in Christ. It doesn't even say there, you're
made the righteousness of God by Christ. It says, in Christ. That's why Paul is saying there
in Romans 3, he's saying, I don't want to be found in my own righteousness,
which is by works of the law, which is really no righteousness
at all. It's filthy rags. It's self-righteousness. But I want to be found in Him. I want God to view me in Him. I want God to give me grace to
live better. I want God to give me grace to
help me to pray and to be faithful. I want all those things, but
I don't want Him to ever view me in those things. I want Him to view me in the
Lord Jesus Christ. Lord, if you regard iniquities,
and there is iniquity in everything we do, At our best state, we're
vanity. If you regard iniquity, who can
stand? Don't interrupt the judgment
with me." You see, he laid David's iniquities
on Christ, and Christ put them away. I don't know all that that means,
do you? That's a deep well. That's a transaction within the
Godhead. But it says that he did not suffer
often, but it says, now once in the end of the world he hath
appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. Do you think that's just an ordinary
sacrifice? He's talking about the sacrifice
of his unique self. He's talking about the sacrifice
of his wholly sinless self. He's talking about offering himself
without spot to God. He's talking about suffering
the just one for the unjust. And Christ is David's surety. As David's substitute, he bore
the penalty of all David's sins in his own body on the tree. And David is forgiven of all
his sins, and God counts him as righteous in Christ, all of
his grace in Christ. You say, well, that's grace for
him to forgive him of such things as adultery and murder and all
that kind of stuff. So what did he do? Did he say, David, now, buddy,
you blew it this time. What you've done was awful. That's
so vile. That's so selfish and covetous
and immoral and ungodly. And I'm going to forgive you
this once. I'm going to be gracious to you
this one time. The Bible says he gives more
grace. I don't know about you, but that's
what I need. I need more grace. And more grace. And more grace. James says he gives more grace,
wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but he gives grace
unto the humble. We need more grace. Well, that's bad, wasn't it? Yeah. But not only did he forgive
David of his sins, if you can believe this, not only that,
but he brought also a further demonstration of his grace to
David. When that first child died, he
gave David another son by Bathsheba. Alright, David, you're stretching
this now. He gave David another son. He gave Bathsheba another son. He was born of that woman who
had been the wife of Uriah. Turn over to 2 Samuel again,
that twelfth chapter. And look down at verse 24. It says, And David comforted
Bathsheba his wife, and went in unto her, and lay with her.
And she bare a son, and called his name Solomon. And the Lord loved him. How could he love that child
born in such a relationship as that, because he was going to
show grace to him. And he sent by the hand of Nathan
the prophet, and he called his name Jedidiah because of the
Lord. You know what Jedidiah means?
For Jehovah's sake. He blessed him. And he kept on blessing him.
Gave him more grace. And later on, David would show
mercy to Mephibosheth. It says, for Jonathan's sake. Jonathan meaning whom Jehovah
gave. He saves every sinner he saves
for Christ's sake. You see, over in chapter 5 of
Romans, it says in verse 20, moreover the law entered that
the offense might abound. Like we've got all these speeders
running up and down the highway outside. And there's no speed
limit sign. Put the speed limit sign up,
and if it's 55 and they're doing 75, that just shows what violators
and lawbreakers they are. But it doesn't save them. Listen to what he says. But where
sin abounded, grace did much more. abound. That as sin hath reigned unto
death, even so might grace reign through righteousness." That's
what kind of grace God's grace is. Righteous grace. I was preaching one time and
I used that term. I spoke about God's grace being
righteous grace and a fellow came to me afterwards and he
said, where did you get that term at? It said right there
in verse 21 of Romans 5, "...even so might grace reign through
righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord." And not only that, not only did
God do this and that and the other, He also listed Bathsheba
in the official genealogy of Christ. And Jesse begot David the king,
and David the king begot Solomon of her that had been the wife
of Uriah." That is in Matthew 1, the genealogy of Christ. You read that genealogy and you
also read about Rahab the harlot. And another woman who is involved
in incest. Can that be? Paul said, this is a faithful
saying and worthy of all acceptation that Christ Jesus came into the
world to save sinners. Do we really believe that? And listen to how God describes
David. Before David's fall to Saul,
who was then king, it says in 1 Samuel, he says, But now thy
kingdom, he says to Saul, shall not continue. The Lord hath sought
him a man after his own heart. And the Lord hath commanded him
to be captain over his people, because thou hast not kept that
which the Lord commanded thee. Paul, he quotes the same thing,
basically in Acts 13. It says, when he had removed
him, he raised up then David to be their king, to whom also
he gave testimony and said, I found David, the son of Jesse, a man
after mine own heart, which shall fulfill all my will. This was the will of God. I can't understand that. Don't
try to. This is what it says. Because
when we say we can't understand that, what we're actually saying
is we imagine ourselves to be above such things as this, that
that could never happen to us, or that that has never happened
to us, when in truth we're everyone, David. You say, well, I've never committed
adultery. I've never killed anybody. I'll
bet you have in your mind. I've just about bet my entire
$13 life savings on that. I bet you have. Let's get you
up here. Let's just get you up here in
front of the whole congregation with a lie detector, and let
me ask you just those two questions. In light of what Christ said,
if you lust after one in the other flesh, you've committed
adultery in your heart, and if you hate somebody, you're guilty
of murder. I bet you have. We're all Davids. If you had never wanted to kill
anybody, you hadn't got an ex-son-in-law like I've got. I'm just telling you the honest
truth. I can just think about what I
know he did to my daughter, and most especially to my granddaughter, and if nobody was lucky. Do you
ever think like that? If nobody would find out, if
you could be sure nobody would find out, I want to stop thinking about
it right there. We're all Davids. It doesn't matter whether it's
you or me. Somebody can say, well, preacher, I believe I'm
as good as you are. That's a super low standard. I am a sinner. And the only way
I could ever be saved is by the grace of God in Jesus Christ. When Paul writes to those Corinthians,
he gives that long list of fornicators and liars and murderers and all
that. He says, you know that none of them are going to enter
into the kingdom of God. Then he says, and such were some
of you. But you are washed. You are sanctified. You are set apart unto God's
grace in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit
of God. You see, that's what the church
is, just a hospital and a refuge for sinners. Grace. would rather to preach on so-called
holy living, or practical godliness, or marriage, or the family life,
or tell people how to live, all these things. Why? Because they
hate grace. I'm telling you. They hate grace. And they know that those that
they preach to by nature hate grace. And they're going about
to establish their own righteousness. They're going about to make some
kind of restitution for their own sins. And so these preachers
set them to doing and giving and living right, when all the
time what they need to find out about is grace. They say, well, we preach the
gospel. Not if you don't preach the gospel of grace. Not if you do not attribute salvation
wholly, 100%, to Jesus Christ and that cross death, that righteousness
which He wrought on that cross, outside of the sinner, you don't know anything about
grace. Grace is not simply God helping you to live good enough
for Him to accept you. Paul said in Ephesians 1 there,
when he talked about us being made accepted in the Beloved,
you know what that means? It means He graced us. That's what that literally means.
He graced us in the Beloved. That's what I want. That's what
I've got to have. if he did not determine in grace
not to charge me with my sin, and at the same time determine
to charge me as righteous without any works performed by me. by
taking my sins and laying them on Christ, holding Him accountable
for them, and making me the righteousness of God in Him. If He did not
in grace do that, I don't have any hope." What is hope? The good hope of
grace. An old writer said, Such an idea
of grace rouses the ire of a vile, self-righteous, neighbor-judging,
blind, grace-ignorant, impenitent world. Now, I've preached some things
that I wish I hadn't have preached
long ago before the Lord saved me, a few since then. But I never find anything that
actually offends men and women naturally. Especially religious
people. Any more than when I preach the
free, clear, unqualified grace of God. That's right. Because that means
that all that little pile of works that you've been accumulating
over the years, all those years as a Sunday school teacher, all
those years as a tither, all those years of this, that and
the other, it doesn't mean doodling squat in salvation. A lady asked
me one time, she said, you mean that we don't have anything to
do with our salvation? I said, well, not exactly. I
said, you did the sinning. God will have due to save him.
He saves only by grace. You mean to tell me, preacher,
that when David lay in the arms of Bathsheba, he was under the
grace of God? Absolutely. You mean when he
took to hand that pen that wrote that note when he folded it up,
that paper, and put his seal that was not to be broken except
by the one to whom the message was sent, a letter of condemnation,
a death sentence to this man Uriah who had done him nothing
but good. Yes. And that is so contrary to us because we think ourselves to
be more. than we are, better than David, when the truth is we're just
like him or worse. And God kept heaping grace on
him. You can't wear out the grace
of God. No, you just can't. And I know
what people say. All that much grace preaching,
that will just make people go out and sin. No, that's what
they're doing right now. They need grace. Grace of God
in the Lord Jesus Christ. And I'll tell you this, if God
ever shows you who He is, And if He ever shows you who
you are, you'll be like old Isaiah, woe is me. Lord, save me by grace. I wrote an article one time about
growing in grace. Bill Clark published it in E.T. It just had been years ago. And
one of the things I said in Growing in Grace is the fact That the
more we grow in grace, the more we see our need of grace. The more we see that all grace
is in Christ, the more we see that the only
way we could be saved is by grace. I had a preacher in England. And
a preacher in the United States, when they read that, they wrote
nice long letters telling me how lax such preaching and writing
was, how it would prone to lead men into wickedness or condone
wickedness and all. They hate grace. They hate grace. God said, I'm David's God. He also said, I'm the God of
Jacob. He also said, I'm that God who's the God of all grace. He's the one who said, Lot, you're
righteous. A lady told me once after I was
preaching on Lot, and I said, God called him righteous She
came to me after the service, she said, I just do not see any
way that Lot could be called righteous. And I thought to myself, I bet
you don't. But God shows one way a sinner
can be righteous in his sight, and that's in Christ. That's when He saves you by His
grace, from A to Z. He tells us of a parable that was spoken
to a crowd who were Pharisees. This is how he described who
he spoke this parable to. It says he spoke this parable
to certain that trusted in themselves that they were righteous and despised others. Paul said, I do not frustrate
the grace of God. For if righteousness come by
the law, then Christ is dead in vain. Everything but grace
makes Christ's death to be for naught. Well, someone always says, you know,
what you're saying is, sin what you want to and God will just
give you more grace. Listen to Paul in Romans 6. Paul
says, what then? Shall we sin because we are not
under the law but under grace? God forbid. Do you hear that? Don't you go out of here saying
that I've made little of sin. Mine is not to make little of
sin. Mine is to make much of grace,
and that grace is only in Jesus Christ and Him crucified. That's righteous grace. God is
right to be gracious to every sinner that Christ died for. Every sinner that He brings to
believe on Christ. That's David's God. Thank God
He's my God. Amen.