All right, tonight we are part two of Psalm 92. If you want to turn to Psalm 92, part two. Okay, one of the things I want to do is look at this psalm in the overview as we look at it tonight. So in that sense, I want to read the first five verses with you again.

It says in verse one, it is a good thing to give thanks to the Lord and to sing praises unto thy name, O Most High. I was thinking today, a lot of times I don't feel like praising the Lord. I just feel that the inward fires are cold. And so I realize, though, that God's word tells us it's a good thing. And faith doesn't have to have feelings, but he's going to describe the effects of faith in the verses that follow. Nevertheless, it is a good thing to give thanks to the Lord and to sing praises unto thy name, O Most High.

And the reason this is good, not only because God deserves it, this praise, all praise should go to Him and none should go to us. But verse two, he says, the reason that this praise is given is to show forth thy lovingkindness in the morning and thy faithfulness every night. So these two qualities of God, His lovingkindness and His faithfulness are prominent in our salvation. Loving kindness is another way of saying God's grace to us in Christ. And faithfulness, because what the Lord does for His people in their salvation is something that produces the results that God intends. We are His workmanship, and He will always fulfill the work He started. He's not going to stop.

And he says in verse 3 that this showing forth, this praising, thanking God and showing forth His loving kindness and faithfulness should be done on an instrument of ten strings and upon the psaltery, upon the harp with a solemn sound. And then he goes on in verse four and five and notice he says, for thou, Lord, hast made me glad through thy work. So the gladness of a believer is connected to the work of the Lord. We see his work for us in Christ and his work in us is what causes us to believe on the Lord Jesus and to enjoy that peace and joy that comes in believing him. So he says, Thou, Lord, hast made me glad through Thy work. I will triumph in the works of Thy hands. He will have this triumphant joy. because of the works of God's hands. So twice in this verse, God emphasizes the works, the works of God. So that the thanksgiving and the praise of verse one, and the instruments joining in verse two, like an ensemble coming together, I'm sorry, the instruments of verse three, and the showing forth of his loving kindness and faithfulness in verse two, all arise, they spring forth from the realization of the Lord's work. And that's what makes us glad, his work for us. It's in his work that we see his loving kindness and his faithfulness, isn't it?

He goes on in verse six, I'm sorry, verse five. Oh, Lord, how great are thy works and thy thoughts are very deep. This is an exclamation. This is this is said with a loud sound and emphasis in this verse. The works of the Lord are great. They are many and his thoughts are very deep. So God's thoughts have to be there because God doesn't do anything except what is done by the counsel of his own will. So whatever God does throughout all the time, the details of time, everybody on earth, the billions of people that have been born in this world, the purposes of God, how evil is turned by God into the good, not only for the praise of His name, but also for the salvation of His people. All those things require thoughts that are innumerable, and these thoughts are regarding God's saving work for His people in the Lord Jesus Christ. Both Christ and His people with Him are the object of God's deep thoughts, very deep thoughts, and many. because these words here that say, his thoughts are very deep, reflect not only the depth of the thoughts, the wisdom of God, but also the number of the thoughts.

All right, so those first five verses now describe the believer. You can see that this comes because of faith that has been given. No one would be glad because of the works of God unless God revealed by his spirit to them the spiritual nature of those works. the spiritual nature. It's easy to see great things in creation and people spend their lives worshiping creation and it's enjoyable. It fits our physical bodies so well just to go out in the sunshine and enjoy springtime and fall and even winter. We benefit from these seasons that God has created and his faithfulness in them. We can count on it. We can count on the seasons being warmer in the summer and cold in the winter, so we can prepare. And if it weren't for this faithfulness of God, we wouldn't be able to prepare and we would be caught off guard. And so that's why it's difficult whenever things like a cold snap hits the Midwest, when those Arctic airs come down and suddenly change the weather, it's because it's so sudden. And in days before, they didn't know that was coming. They might've had some sense of it, but so you can see God's faithfulness to this.

But all these things the believer looks at through spiritual eyes, and that's what faith is, seeing spiritual things. And so the believer is what the first five verses are talking about, the believer in the Lord.

But the next verses, starting with verse 6 and through verse 11, is talking about the unbeliever for the most part. Notice he says in verse 6, a brutish man knoweth not, neither does a fool understand this. So what does he not understand? What does a brutish man not know? What does a fool not understand? He doesn't understand how good it is to give thanks and to praise the Lord and to show forth. They don't even know his loving kindness. They don't know his faithfulness. They know that in creation, but not in a spiritual way. And there's nothing that gives peace and joy, but faith in Christ. Not true faith, not true peace. Nothing gives true peace and true joy, but faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. And that comes through the light of the gospel. God shines the light. The light produces life. The life produces faith, and faith brings that peace and joy to us in our experience. So first life by the light and then that life produces faith and faith enjoys the peace and joy of believing.

OK, of course, the light itself is from God and it shines in the gospel and that light in the gospel is because of the work of Christ. In fact, that's the light of the gospel is what Christ has done for us. And so a brutish man doesn't understand that, a fool doesn't understand that. And that means there's a difference here between the people, the groups of people being described in this psalm. The first five verses describe those who are believers, those who see and give thanks and praise God out of faith, which he also has given to them because of his works, his works in them, producing that faith to see Christ who worked for them. And so this is something a brutish man or a fool doesn't understand, verse six.

Verse seven says, when the wicked spring as the grass, when all the workers of iniquity do flourish, it is that they shall be destroyed forever. So when the psalmist is ascribing the wicked, the brutish man and the fool and the wicked, as he says here, the workers of iniquity, those are terms the Bible uses to describe a particular group of people.

God groups everybody throughout time into two groups. The first group is seen in the first five verses. Now we're seeing the second group, which are called the beast, the brutish man, the fool, the one who is wicked, the workers of iniquity. And notice their lives are described as grass. They spring up, they flourish. but it's so that they, it's to the day when they will be cut down and destroyed forevermore. So that's one group.

He says in verse eight, but thou, Lord, are most high forevermore. So the Lord himself does this. He's the sovereign. He's the most high forevermore, eternally. From beginning, from eternity past to everlasting ages future, God is God. All right, so these two groups are under the God's sovereign prerogative.

He says in verse nine, for thou, for lo, thine enemies, O Lord, for lo, thine enemies, notice it's God's enemies, thine enemies shall perish. All the workers of iniquity shall be scattered. So this is the second group. This is the unbelieving.

He says in verse 10, but my horn My strength, that part of an animal, animals who have horns like a bull, for example, or a moose or a caribou, these animals that have antlers and horns, a rhinoceros. That's the strongest part. They use that as a weapon. And so if you're going to overcome them, you have to overcome the strength they have in their horn. And a sharp horn with the force of an animal that big is formidable. You can't resist it. You can't stop a charging rhino, or even a charging deer for that matter.

But he says, my horn shalt thou exalt like the horn of a unicorn. He's talking about a big bull, not a mythical creature with one horn. He says, I shall be anointed with fresh oil. So now he's contrasting, the psalmist is contrasting the fact. that though the brutish man and the fool don't understand, though the wicked and the workers of iniquity are like grass, they flourish, but it's for them that the end of their flourishing will be that they're destroyed forever.

God is sovereign, verse 8, And he has enemies, and they shall be scattered. Verse 10 says, but my horn, in contrast to that, my strength shall be established. God will exalt my strength, and I shall be anointed with fresh oil. That's the spirit of God, isn't it? It's the Spirit of God who's compared in Scripture to the oil.

The oil that was poured upon the high priest and ran down his beard, even to his garments in Psalm 133. That oil is the Spirit of God, signified by the oil. Remember, it was the oil that was in the lamps that caused the lamps to burn. And that's the way, it was the oil that the five virgins had in their lamps, but the five foolish virgins didn't have in their lamps.

All right, so he says the Lord is going to renew his people. He's going to renew them. He's not going to allow them to be, in his faithfulness, he's going to renew the life that he has given to them. And remember what it says in Titus. It says in Titus, let me read that to you, in chapter three of Titus, in verse five, he says, He says, we were also, in verse 3 of Titus 3, we ourselves also were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another. But after that, the kindness and love of God our Savior toward man appeared, which was obviously when the Lord Jesus Christ came, not by works of righteousness, which we have done, but according to his mercy, he saved us.

What a plaque. Put that on our walls. He saved us. Notice, by the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, we were not only born of God by his Spirit, but he constantly renews and maintains our life. There's a refreshing, there's a constant. Faith is not a one-time act.

When I was a young person in an Arminian church, as they're called, a freewill works religion church, It was always taught that you had a one-time transaction, and that is what made you saved. You raised your hand, you made a decision, you made a commitment, and that was the thing that you look back to and say, when were you saved? Well, it was on this day in 19-whatever, and I remember I was at a meeting, and I went forward, I raised my hand, I talked to the pastor, they prayed with me. I made a decision, whatever that is. And so you look at that, that's the time that I was saved.

But that's not, that's not it. That's not salvation. Salvation is when God shines the light of the gospel into your heart. It's not a decision that you make, it's a decision that God makes. It's not your will, it's His will. Not your work, His work. And that's what this verse in Titus 3 is saying. It was by the washing of regeneration, it was by the renewing of the Holy Spirit, the Holy Ghost. And it says in verse 6 of Titus 3, which this washing and this renewing He shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior, that being justified by His grace we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life."

An heir of eternal life is a child of God, a child of promise. And here he's saying that because God shed His mercy upon us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior, and Christ justified us, therefore His grace is given to us through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, in order that we might be made by spiritual birth, heirs according to the hope of eternal life. And that the Spirit of God in us is what causes us to have this hope, He says that in Galatians chapter five and verse five, he says in Galatians five verse five, for we through the Spirit, through the Spirit, we wait. for the hope of righteousness that's waiting in expectation by faith. We look to what God has said from his word concerning Christ, and we stand upon the fact that because God accepts us for Christ's sake by his blood alone, therefore we have hope.

Our hope is that Christ is our salvation. He is the Savior. We have no other salvation, no other Savior. He's accomplished that work. That's our hope. And it's the Spirit of God that enables us through that washing of regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Spirit to have this hope.

All right. So back in Psalm 92, he says he is going to be refreshed with his fresh oil, anointed with his fresh oil, and that's referring to this renewing of the Holy Spirit. In verse 11 of Psalm 92, he says, Mine eye also shall see my desire on mine enemies, and my ear shall hear my desire of the wicked that rise up against me. So he's going to see, He won't be there with his enemies, but he'll see it. He'll hear about it. And so this is speaking of God's judgment on the unrighteous, isn't it? And he's going to see it. The righteous will see. Those who are described in the first five verses are going to see God bringing his judgment upon his enemy, and these are the enemies of the believer. The enemies of the believer are the enemies of Christ. Remember in Matthew 25, for example, when he says, if in as much as you've done it to the least of these my brethren, you've done it unto me. God's enemies are those who are the enemies of his people. Remember Satan in the garden? And it was Christ who would come and crush his head. The seed of the woman would bruise the head of the serpent. That's that crushing that Christ did at the cross.

He said in John chapter 12, now is the prince of this world cast out. He's judged. When he goes to the cross, he'll be judged. And so that's what the believer sees. Remember? He says in John chapter 16 that when the Spirit of God comes, He will convince the world of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment. Of sin, because they don't believe, and of righteousness, because I go to my Father, you see me no more. Of judgment, because the Prince of this world is judged. We hear about it, don't we? The prince of this world is judged in the death of Christ. He crushed his head. He destroyed the works of the devil. That's why the Son of God came into the world, was to destroy the works of our enemy, the devil, and death, and sin itself, our sins. This is wonderful that God would view our own sins and our sinful nature to be His and our enemy. So He liberates us, He delivers us, redeems us from our sin. Amazing grace, isn't it? And so He says, I'll see that. And we see it by faith, don't we, from God's word? And we'll hear about it. We'll hear it in the faithful preaching of the gospel. And there will be a day when it will actually occur, and we also will hear and see it then.

But notice in verse 12, the righteous, unlike the wicked and the workers of iniquity, they grow up like grass and they flourish like grass. They seem like there's, wow, look at them. They're just flourishing in the earth. Yeah, but it's going to be, they're going to be destroyed. So, but no, don't think that there's anything great about grass flourishing, because the next day it's going to be cut down and dry up and blow away.

He says in verse 12, the righteous shall flourish like the palm tree, and he shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon, a palm tree. They have different kinds of palm trees. Some of them grow dates, and those are famous for baking and sweetening things. Some of them grow coconuts. Those are great. They're supposed to be really healthy. I don't really care for them that much, but they are supposed to be very good for you, and people eat those. And then there are different kinds of palm trees. There's one I think has an acai berry. And there's another one. I can't think of it right now. But there's different kinds of palm trees. Palm trees produce good fruit, don't they? And what's interesting about the palm tree is that if you look at their trunks, they got this single trunk that goes up and has this foliage at the top. That's where the fruit is. And they're kind of the outer part of the trunk is all, you know, sharp and rough. You can't really climb it without getting all cut up. So but you can get up to there and get that fruit or it falls and is really good for you. Dates and coconuts and acai berries and other kinds of things are good for you that the palm tree produces. But all the fruit is at the top of the tree. Have you noticed that? And the green part of the palm tree also is right at the top. And if you've seen a palm tree in a hurricane, they bend over, and then after a hurricane, they're back up again. Amazing. They seem to thrive under trouble.

If you cut the top of the palm tree off, unlike another tree, if you cut, I have some trees in my backyard, if you cut the top of it off, it continues to grow at the bottom. It'll grow like a vase or some other shape. But if you cut the top of a palm tree off, what happens? It dies. It can't live without the top part. And so the palm tree reflects the believer, doesn't it? Christ is our head. Without our head, we die. Our fruit comes from Him.

It says in Hosea 14, verse 8, from me is thy fruit found. It comes from the Lord. He is our strength. He is the vine. We are the branches. And we only bear fruit because we're united to Him. And so it also is with the palm tree. And this palm tree is very fruitful. He says they flourish like the palm tree. He shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon.

Now, Lebanon was the place famous for the best cedar trees. Cedar trees grow tall and they're strong. They can survive a lot of wind too. perhaps not as much as the palm tree, but they're known for their stately height and the quality of their wood, and so the believer is compared to that as well. In 1 Corinthians chapter 3, the apostle Paul describes the results of good the good message of the gospel preached and those who bring a false message. The false message produces wood, hay, and stubble, but the good message produces gold and silver and these precious things, things that are stable.

And so the palm tree is like the good fruit-producing tree and the cedars that's stable. good-producing tree. And in any case, all of it represents the believer because of the grace of God given to them. And it contrasts the believer as the righteous with the wicked. And we're going to get to that here in a little bit more. He says in verse 13, those that be planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of our God. They didn't plant themselves, the Lord planted them.

And let me take you to a couple of verses on this. Look at Isaiah chapter 61. In Isaiah 61, in verse 1, it says, this is Christ. Now you'll recognize these words as the prophecy concerning Christ and his coming in his ministry. And he quoted these words in Luke chapter four, but he says this, the spirit of the Lord God is upon me, the Lord Jesus, because the Lord has anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek. He has sent me to bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and the opening of the prison to them that are bound. Those sound like wonderful things, don't they?

He says in verse two, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord, that's the year of jubilee, and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all that mourn. To appoint to them that mourn in Zion. This is verse three of Isaiah 61. Listen to this verse. To give them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning. The Spirit of God brings that joy, just like the psalmist in Psalm 92 is saying. the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise, that also was spoken of in verse one of Psalm 92, for the spirit of heaviness, and notice this, that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that he might be glorified. God is glorified because it's his work alone. And they're trees, like the palm tree and the cedar tree in Lebanon, and they're trees of righteousness. So it's a good tree, isn't it? It's Christ's righteousness, the righteousness of Christ imputed to them because of his sin-bearing death in answer to all of God's law for them. As 2 Corinthians 5, 21 says, he was made sin for us who knew no sin that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.

All right, but then in Matthew 15, In Matthew 15, another planting occurs here. He says in Matthew 15, in this chapter, the Pharisees were trying to accuse Jesus of allowing his disciples to eat without washing their hands first. And then Jesus tells them in the verses that precede verse 13, he says, it's not what goes into a man that defiles a man, it's what comes out of the man that defiles him. And that offended the Pharisees. And he says this in verse 13. He answered and he said, every plant which my heavenly Father has not planted shall be rooted up. Let them alone. They be blind leaders of the blind.

Okay, so this is talking about unless God the Father has planted, then it's not good, and it will be uprooted. So we can't plant ourselves. It's the Lord's planting. It's the planting of God the Father, whether it be us as believers planted by grace, in the field of God's fertile ground that he's plowed up and plowed our hearts and put the seed of the gospel in there, planted us, put us in Christ. He planted us in the Lord Jesus Christ by the gospel. And that planting was God's work. He did it before time. He did it in time by the Spirit of God. We come into the experience of being in Christ when we believe on him, see him, and then we learn of our eternal union with him from before the foundation of the world.

All right. So back in Psalm 92, we see that the trees that flourish are the trees of God's planting. And he says that in verse 13, those that be planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in that courts of our God, in God's place where the Lord meets with his people, the courts, where he shows himself to them and where he reveals how they're accepted in the Lord Jesus Christ to the high priest who goes into the inner part, the Holy of Holies, and provides a way for us to go into the presence of God by his blood.

All right, verse 14 of Psalm 92, he says, these people who have been planted and flourish in the courts of God, they shall bring forth, they shall still bring forth fruit in old age. So you see God's faithfulness here. First of all, his loving kindness that he planted them. Secondly, his faithfulness, that he continued his work. He didn't leave them after he began it. He shall perfect it. In Philippians 1, verse 6, he that has begun a good work in you shall perform it or perfect it unto the day of Christ Jesus. He says, they shall bring forth fruit in old age. I find that comforting, don't you? Even when we're old, the Lord will not depart from us. He will produce the fruit that he designed in his people. We are his workmanship. The fruit comes from him.

From me is thy fruit found. Remember Hosea 14, verse eight. He goes in, verse, here he says, they shall be fat and flourishing. There's not gonna be any lack. They're not going to be like those seven skinny ears in the dream that Pharaoh had or the seven skinny cows. They're going to be like the seven fat ones when there was plenty in the land of Egypt. It was just overflowing in the bearing of fruit to God. All right. He says, verse 15, to show that the Lord is upright. He is my rock. There is no unrighteousness in him." All right, so now I want you to go back to the overview of this psalm. Here we see a contrast between these two groups. There's two groups, clearly. There's the group which says in the first verse, it's a good thing to give thanks to the Lord and to sing praises to his name. to show forth his loving kindness in the morning and his faithfulness every night upon an instrument with ten strings, upon the psaltery, upon the harp with a solemn sound. And thou, Lord, has made me glad through thy work. I will triumph in the works of thy hands. O Lord, how great are thy works and thy thoughts are very deep. That's the song of the righteous. That's the new song. The song of the gospel has been put in their hearts and it's out of the heart. which the instruments represent, they signify heart praise, and I'll show you that in a minute.

But the first group here are the righteous, and in the second group, beginning in verse six, the brutish, or the beastly man, the fool, the wicked, the workers of iniquity, they all grow like grass, they flourish until the Lord brings them to judgment, and they're cut down. And these are the ones who are God's enemies. They'll be destroyed. He says they'll be scattered in verse 9. God is sovereign, verse 8, verse 10. But the horn of the righteous shall be exalted, and he shall be anointed with fresh oil. And the righteous will see and hear of the desire, God's desire, coming upon the wicked. So we can see these two groups.

So the question is, why? How did these two groups get created? Why are there some who are righteous? And sometimes we actually fall into the error of thinking that we had something to do with it. And that's a bad state of mind to be in. And every time you find yourself thinking or being inclined to think that way, It always should cause the hair on the back of our neck to stand up in fear and terror that we would think such a thought.

But the fact is that there are two kinds of cultures. There's two cultures in the world. There always has been. There was Cain and there was Abel. There were the seed through Seth and Enos and on down the line through Abraham, on down the line through Isaac and Jacob, to the Lord Jesus Christ, King David, the Lord Jesus Christ, and every believer. Because God's children are children of promise, not of works. Their inheritance is an inheritance of promise through the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. And so everything that the believer has is of grace.

Who makes you to differ? That's the question that's raised in 1 Corinthians 4 verse 7. Let me read that to you to bring that back to our minds clearly. 1 Corinthians chapter 4 and verse 7. Listen to what this says here. The Apostle is rebuking those who would boast in themselves. He says, For who maketh thee to differ from another? Who? And what hast thou that thou didst not receive? It was given to you freely. Now, if thou didst receive it, why dost thou glory or boast as if thou hadst not received it, as if you produced it, as if you earned it? That's what the elder brother of the prodigal son said, remember? Father, I've been with you all these years. I've never done this. Your younger son, he's the one who wasted your living on profligate riotous living. I didn't do that. I served you. You didn't bring me. You never had a party for me. You see, that's that attitude. I did this as a servant. I deserve something. and you didn't treat me right. It's unfair. Why are you giving these people who only work one hour a penny and gave me a penny too? True, I agreed for a penny, but you shouldn't be giving them as much as me. I know it's yours and you can do with yours whatever you please, but it just doesn't seem fair to me.

See, that's the attitude that thinks I made a difference and the Lord shuts that down. Remember, he declares universally, there is none righteous. No, not one. There's none that understandeth. Remember that verse that we looked at, verse six? The brutish man knoweth not, neither does a fool understandeth. There's none that understandeth.

Who makes you to differ then? How is it that some are given this grace and some are not? Because God made the difference. God made the difference. And we that's why we have this song. And when we say it is a good thing to give thanks to the Lord and to seek praises to thy name, O most high, to show forth thy love and kindness in the morning and thy faithfulness every night on an instrument with ten strings, on the psaltery, on the harp with a solemn sound.

The harp was designed for that. The sound that it is called upon to make is a solemn sound. We don't use lightness when we speak about the things of our sin and what it costs God in His grace to give His Son in Christ to suffer in order to save us from our sins and to establish for us a righteousness that God can accept us in. All these things are sobering thoughts and yet they produce this glad joy over God's work.

How does that come to us? It comes to us by grace, out of God's sovereign goodwill. And that's what he's trying to teach us. We deserved, we were as others, even as Ephesians chapter two says, we were even as others. But God, who is rich in mercy for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ. By grace are you saved. and hath raised us up together and seated us with Christ in heavenly places." His own right hand, God's own right hand. That's how far grace has gone.

From the depths to the heights, the breadth, the length. Who can describe the love of God? It passes knowledge, doesn't it? We were no different than others. We were unrighteous too. We all were like Titus chapter three, verse three, where we read just a minute ago, we were also sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving diverse lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another.

But after that, the kindness and love of God our Savior towards man appeared. You see, that's what this psalmist tell us. God made a difference that produces thanksgiving and praise that causes us to want to show forth the loving kindness and the faithfulness of God. He exalted my horn. He renews me with this anointing oil. I flourish because of grace given me in Christ Jesus.

The fruit that is produced is fruit from him produced by abiding in Christ, the one who is the vine. And so in verse 15, he says to show forth to show that the Lord is upright. He's my rock. There's no unrighteousness in him. When God justifies the ungodly, there's no unrighteousness because he does it on the basis of his own righteousness which Christ has established. When he condemns the just, it was right that he condemned the Lord Jesus Christ for his people because he made him to be sin for us. Christ obligated himself in that eternal covenant as a surety of his people to take the place of his people and to bear the charges that justice brought for their sins made to be his by God's doing. And this is the work of God. It's not unrighteous. It's upright and God is faithful. He's as firm and as stable and as immovable as a rock, an eternal rock, the rock of ages, the Lord Jesus Christ.

And yet, though we were also sometimes foolish, disobedient, though we were even as others, dead in sins, God has quickened us. All praise, all thanksgiving goes to Him. No credit goes to us. It was pure grace outside of us in God alone. Righteousness not in us, but in Christ alone. the Spirit of God given to us because of the righteousness of Christ established in His resurrection. Therefore, God sent His Spirit to us to know these things, to hope, to wait by faith on the Lord Jesus Christ to fulfill all the good pleasure of His will in our salvation.

All we can do is thank Him and praise Him and to show forth this loving kindness God made the difference, and it's not unrighteous. Though it is an abomination to God to justify the wicked and to condemn the just, it was not an abomination for God to make Christ sin for us in order that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him, who therefore can lay anything to the charge of God's elect. It's God who justifies. Who can condemn one for whom Christ died?

You see, God is upright. He is our rock. There is no unrighteousness in him. And that's what this psalm is concluding at the end of all of this. These two, these two groups of people, both of them equally deserve the justice of God. And yet God has chosen, he has adopted a people who were not his people until he adopted them before the foundation of the world and predestinated them to be made his children by Jesus Christ.

Christ died for us. He redeemed us from the law and He brought us to God and therefore He sent the Spirit. God sent forth the Spirit of His Son into our hearts that we might know our adoption, our redemption, and the birth that God has given to us by His Spirit through the gospel preached to us. And these things are wonderful, aren't they? So wonderful.

Let's pray. Father, thank You for this grace. Thank You for this song of praise. It's not a It's not a song of sorrow. It's a song of joy and gladness. And yet it is sobering. It's very sobering to think that we who deserved your wrath were made heirs of promise, heirs of eternal life, heirs of righteousness, heirs of glory, heirs of the kingdom that you prepared before the foundation of the world. How could it be that you would be so gracious? This causes us to want to, from our hearts, express in song to the Lord from the instrument of our hearts by your grace, through your spirit given to us, this song of praise, of thanksgiving for your goodness, your loving kindness and your faithfulness and your righteousness to make us, to plant us, to make us flourish and to give us this fruit even in old age.

Lord, we ask that you would do what you have said, what pleases you, For the Lord Jesus Christ's sake, for his honor, for his praise, and for our salvation, bring us to yourself, give us this eternal life that is by knowing you in him, and teach us to live according to this knowledge of Christ, that we would forgive one another and love one another according to your word. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.