Let us turn in our Bibles to
Psalm 119. Psalm 119. I'm going to read
seven. Verses, they're not all together
from this psalm this morning. Psalm 119, beginning first in
verse 16. I will delight myself in thy
statutes. I will not forget thy word. Verse 24. Thy testimonies also
are my delight and my counselors. Verse 35. make me to go in the path of
thy commandments, for therein do I delight. Verse 47, and I
will delight myself in thy commandments, which I have loved. Verse 70, their heart is as fat as grease,
but I delight in thy law. Verse 77, Let thy tender mercies
come unto me, that I may live, for thy law is my delight. And one last one, verse 174. I have longed for thy salvation,
O Lord, and thy law is my delight. I know that we're all familiar
with the fact that this psalm, the longest of all of the psalms,
is all about the written word of God. And I'm going to refer
from here on in the message to the Bible, because that is what
we have, the written word of God, the Bible. All scripture
is given by inspiration of God. But in this psalm, the word of
God or the Bible is referred to under seven different names
or seven different words, I should say. It is spoken of as God's
law, as God's judgments, as God's words, as God's statutes, as
God's commandments, as God's precepts, and as God's testimonies. In the seven verses that we just
finished reading, we have four of these words. I will delight
myself in thy statutes. Thy testimonies are my delight. I will delight myself in thy
commandments, which I have loved. The title of the message this
morning is The Delight of the Saved. Those who are saved, we
sang that hymn just now, saved by the blood of the crucified
one. And those who are saved, the
delight of the saved. As I looked at this word delight,
I saw that the word light, first of all, light, and then there
is that prefix, D, Latin prefix. Many times a word with that prefix
is a negative, decrease, detain. But sometimes when this prefix
is used with a word, it adds to the word, it augments the
word. And in the scripture, light is
a symbol of a number of things, but one of the things that it
symbolizes is joy. Light is a symbol of joy. And
this word delight adds to the joy that a believer has, that
he delights, that she delights in the word of God. And delight
is a more permanent pleasure than joy. Joy is something that
comes about by sudden excitement. But delight is something that
is settled, that is permanent. Now David, as a representative
of God's people in this psalm, he confesses seven times over,
we read each one of the verses, seven times he confessed that
his delight was in the word of God. And this is true of all
of the saved. God's people delight in the Word
of God, in the Bible. And I want to give us this morning
five reasons that I believe is true of myself. I'm sure it'll
be true of you. Five reasons why God's children,
why the saved people of God delight in the Word of God. First of
all, the saved delight in the Bible, for it reveals the Lord
Jesus Christ. The Bible is a message about
Christ. You know, in Proverbs chapter
19 and verse 2, we read this statement. Also, now listen,
that the soul be without knowledge is not good. That the soul be
without knowledge is not good. And for any person in this world
to be without the knowledge of Christ is not good. You see, creation testifies to
the fact that there is a God. Romans chapter 1, the apostle
Paul emphasizes that fact. that both the wisdom of God and
the power of God may be plainly seen in what we observe. You can't live in God's world
and not see that the Creator was wise. You know, I've often
thought, how can a person, just knowing what little bit we know
about our bodies, the anatomy of our bodies, how our bodies
work and function. How could anyone not believe
in a creator? How could anyone be so foolish
as to say that they are an atheist? that this body, and this is just
a little part of this creation of God, our bodies, but think
of all the universe and the order that's in the universe and to
remember that God, he spoke all these things into existence.
With his word, with his word, yes. Creation teaches all people
there is a God, and it teaches men that we are responsible to
that God. We're made in the image of God.
We are moral creatures. And man has a conscience he brings
with him into this world. Men know that lying is wrong,
that stealing is wrong. Men just have that innate knowledge. Their conscience testifies. People
say, well, let your conscience be your guide. No, you can't
do that. You can't do that because your
conscience can be, it can be seared even, but it can certainly
deceive a person. But man comes into this world,
he has a conscience, he knows the difference between right
and wrong, between good and evil. And yes, there is evil in this
world, and there's good in this world. But all these things,
my point is, they testify, and a man in the midst of a jungle,
never having had the Bible, never having heard a preacher or anything
like that, he knows there is a God. He may know there's a
God, but he cannot know God apart from Jesus Christ. That's what
he said. That's what our Lord said. This
is life eternal to know thee, the only true God, and Jesus
Christ whom thou hast sent. He said, I'm the way, the truth,
and the life, and no man comes unto the Father but by me. Men
may know there's a God, but to know God, we must know Christ. Notice in this Psalm, if you
look in Psalm 130, The psalmist said, the entrance of thy words
giveth life, giveth understanding to the simple. God has given
us his word, his written word, and when God blesses his word,
God the Holy Spirit blesses his word and gives us understanding,
this is the way we come to know God, through what he has revealed
to us about Christ, the only way to the Father. I want you
to keep your place here, but turn with me, if you will, to
Luke, just a moment, in Luke's gospel, chapter 24. What we're going to read here,
Luke chapter 24, beginning with verse 13, is the experience of
two of our Lord's disciples on the day of His resurrection.
On the day of His resurrection, two of His disciples, they leave
Jerusalem and are going to a village by the name of Emmaus. Let's
begin reading in verse 13, Luke chapter 24. And behold, two of them went
that same day to a village called Emmaus, which was from Jerusalem,
about three score furlongs. And they talked together of all
these things which had happened, and it came to pass that while
they communed together and reasoned, Jesus himself drew near and went
with them. But their eyes were holden that
they could not know him. And he said unto them, what manner
of communications are these that you have one to another as you
walk and are sad? One of them, whose name was Cleopas,
answering, said unto him, art thou only a stranger in Jerusalem,
and hast not known the things which are come to pass there
in these days? And he said unto them, what things?
And they said unto him, concerning Jesus of Nazareth, Now notice
what they say about Jesus of Nazareth. These are men who had
walked with the Lord for approximately three years, disciples, two of
his disciples. Concerning Jesus of Nazareth,
which was a prophet, a prophet, and he was A prophet. He is that prophet that Moses
wrote God would raise up to them. A prophet. And they said, we
believe that he was a prophet indeed and word. In other words,
a prophet not only in his words which he spoke, but in his deeds,
the miracles which he wrought. While we saw him, One day opened
the eyes of a man who'd been born blind. Can you believe that? Man who'd never saw the light
before. He was a grown man. And the Lord
Jesus Christ, he was a prophet mighty in word and in deed. No doubt about that. But now,
and how, let's read on. how the chief rulers, chief priests,
and our rulers delivered him up or delivered him to be condemned
to death and to have crucified him. But we trusted. Now think with me, these two
men. We confess he was a prophet. He was mighty in words and in
deeds. But we trusted, we trusted that
it had been he which should have redeemed Israel. Now, what has
been taught from Genesis all the way up to this point about
redemption? We trusted that he was the one
who was going to redeem Israel. What had been revealed about
redemption? Well, first of all, redemption
would be by blood. It would be by blood. God would
redeem his people by blood, by the blood of the crucified one. And number two, that blood would
be the blood of an innocent substitute. That was taught in the Garden
of Eden to Adam and Eve when God clothed them with coats of
skins. He had to take the skins from
animals. They had not sinned. They were
innocent. Their blood was shed that Adam
and Eve might be clothed. And that message has come all
the way until these two disciples. that the Bible had revealed that
redemption would be by blood and it would be by a substitute,
an innocent substitute. But they don't get it, do they?
They don't understand it. We trusted that it had been he
which should have redeemed Israel. And beside all that, beside all
this, think about this. And they think
they're talking to a stranger, someone they didn't know. We
trusted that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel, redeem
God's people, redeem God's elect. But how did they think he would
redeem God's people if it was not without blood? if it was
not without a substitute died in the place of those that he
redeemed. And not only that, they said,
but you know, certain women, today is the third day since
these things were done, and yea, and certain women also of our
company made us astonished. Boy, they came running in with
a message that just blew our minds. with this astonishing news that
he's alive. We know, we saw his body taken
down from the tree and placed in the tomb. But now here they
come and they say he's alive. They say they have seen a vision
of angels which said he's alive. And not only that, but certain
of them which were with us went to the sepulchre. They went out
there to the sepulchre where his body had been placed and
where Pilate had put a seal over that stone and put guards there. They went out there and what
they found was it was empty. It was empty. Then he said unto them, O fools,
O fools, He's not calling them fools as far as being uneducated
people. No, but not understanding, not
understanding the scriptures. Oh fools and slow of heart to
believe all that the prophets have spoken. Ought not Christ to have suffered
these things? The things you're just telling
me about. Didn't the prophets foretell that? Didn't Isaiah
plainly say he shall be bruised for our iniquities and the chastisement
of our peace shall be upon him? That he'll be cut off out of
the land of the living. Ought not Christ to have suffered
these things? Isn't that what the prophets
have been prophesying since the beginning? and to enter into
His glory? He wasn't gonna stay in that
grave. He's at the Father's right hand
with all authority and all power given unto Him, both in heaven
and in earth. He's the King of kings and the
Lord of lords. Isn't that what the prophets
foretold should happen? Yes, He would suffer, but He
would then enter into His glory. Now notice verse 27, and beginning
at Moses. Well, Moses wrote Genesis chapter
one and verse one. He wrote the Pentateuch, the
first five books of the Bible. And our Lord began there, but
he didn't just stay with Moses. He went through all, all, A-L-L,
all the prophets. He expounded unto them in all
the scriptures the things concerning himself. Why is it that believers
delight in the law of God and the word
of God? Because this book is a book about
Christ. It's all about Christ. It tells
us who he is. It tells us who he is. I heard
some men, it's been a couple of months ago now, but they interviewed
Elon Musk, who they said is the wealthiest man in the world.
I assume that may be true as far as things are concerned.
But I want to tell you something, a man, if he owned everything
in this world and he doesn't have Christ, he's a poor man. He's stricken in poverty. But
anyway, in their interview, they asked him what he thought about
Jesus. And like most people, he said,
well, I believe he was a good man. I believe he was a good
man. Well, they didn't allow him to
ask a follow-up question, which would have been, but he confessed
to be God. He confessed himself to be God. Now, if he was a good man, he
couldn't lie, could he? He couldn't lie about that and
be a good man. Who is he? This book reveals
unto us who he is. We're saying all hail to the
Father, all hail to the Son, all hail to the Holy Spirit.
I love to sing hymns that speak about the Trinity, the blessed
Trinity, don't you? And Jesus Christ is the eternal
Son of God, one in every way with the Father and with God
the Holy Spirit. He is eternal, He's infinite
as the Son of God, but in the fullness of the time He came
into this world, He assumed a body that was prepared, Him of the
Virgin Mary. a body that might suffer, a body
that might bleed, but yet God that might give that blood efficacy,
that blood, the power to wash away our sins, to save us. Who is he? This book is all about
him, who he is and why he came. He didn't come on a fool's errand. He came here to fulfill the Father's
will, to redeem the people which the Father had given Him. They're
called His sheep. And He redeemed each and every
one of His sheep. He laid down His life for His
sheep. He said, I'm the Good Shepherd.
The Good Shepherd giveth His life for the sheep. He came here to redeem His people. Just before he went to the cross,
he said, Father, I've finished the work which thou gavest me
to do. He finished that work, completed
that work. And then, of course, he died.
Why did he die? He died that God might be just
and the justifier of the ungodly. Here I am, here you are, ungodly. He said, I don't believe that.
Doesn't matter whether you believe it or not. It's true. By nature,
when we come into this world, we're ungodly. We're not like
God. God's perfect. God's absolutely
holy. We're ungodly by nature. How is God going to justify someone
like us? Through the redemption, through
the person and work of Jesus Christ and only through him.
You know, God's people, we delight. You know, when I thought about
this, when a person hears the gospel and they begin to feel
some compunction of conscience or maybe conviction of the Holy
Spirit, it seems like everyone has the same response. What can
I do? What can I do? And by doing,
how can I earn? Forgiveness. How can I merit
forgiveness? You know, God saved 3,000 men
on the day of Pentecost. And you know, when they were
pricked in their heart, their question was, men and brethren,
what shall we do? A rich young ruler came running
to Jesus one day and he said, good master, what good thing
must I do to inherit eternal life? And that Philippian jailer
that Paul and Silas spoke to, what must I do to be saved? Well, the message is to trust
in Christ. Trust and believe him. You say,
is that all? Well, if it's all that easy,
do it. If it's all that easy to do it,
do it. Surely you won't say, well, that's too easy. And you
won't even do that. Believe. You know, believing
is pictured to us by many different things that we do. It's pictured
by looking. I'm looking at my wife right
now. Didn't take it. I just looked. It's special about eating. When
we go home in a little while, we'll eat. Believe, look to Christ,
trust in him, receive him as your bread for your soul. He said, except a man eat my
flesh and drink my blood, he hath no life in him. How do we
do that? By faith. What shall we do? Realize it's already done. And
just look to Christ, just trust in Christ. We love the word of
God. We delight in the word of God
because it speaks to us of Christ. Let me give you a second reason.
The same delight in the Bible for the Holy Spirit uses this
word to comfort and guide us. Another verse in Psalm 119 declares,
this is verse 105, thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light
unto my path. Now when the Lord saves a person,
when the Holy Spirit regenerates, gives life to that dead sinner,
and gives him faith and repentance. At the same time, the Holy Spirit
comes to live in that person. He comes to indwell that person. And so the Apostle Paul said,
if any man have not the Spirit of God, he's none of his. Let
me read you that in Romans 8. So then they that are in the
flesh cannot please God, but you are not in the flesh, but
in the spirit, if so be that the spirit of God dwell in you.
Now, if any man have not the spirit of Christ, he's done of
his. When the Lord saves someone, The Spirit comes to indwell that
person, gives them life, gives them the gift of faith, the gift
of repentance, and He takes up His residence in us. And He's
in us to comfort us and to guide us. But what does God the Holy
Spirit use in comforting us and guiding us? His Word. His Word. Remember, our Lord
said this, he said, I will pray the father and he shall give
you another comforter that he may abide with you forever. And
then he went on to say, when the spirit of truth has come,
he will guide you into all truth. So the spirit of God comes to
live in us and he comforts us and he guides us as we go through
this world. But how does he comfort us? With
the word. How does He guide us? With the
Word, with His Word. I said, I think a week ago, I
told a friend that the truth of God's sovereignty is a great comfort to God's children. Where do we learn that God is
sovereign? I mean, if you listen to I'd
say 95% of what people say about God, they would have you to believe
he's some weakling, that he would like to do a whole lot if man
would just let him. That's not the God of the Bible.
God of the Bible does as he wills among the armies of heaven and
the inhabitants of the earth. Yes. The doctrine of God's sovereignty. Where do we learn that? We learn
that here in the Word of God. It's a great comfort. When you
find yourself in tribulation and trial of some kind, it's
not going to take away all the hurt. I understand that. God
takes your loved one and you're weeping over that? Sure, sure.
but just knowing that this didn't happen by accident. This was
God's purpose, and it was God's purpose for me. If I'm one of
his children, he purposed this for my good. He's too good to
do anything to me, to hurt me, and he's too powerful that anything
could happen without his permission, his knowledge. And God uses His word not only
to comfort us. Our Lord said, let not your hearts
be troubled. His disciples, they were troubled,
weren't they? They were troubled because He
said, I'm going away. I'm going to leave you. Oh, they
were troubled. They didn't understand at that
point that He was going to pray the Father and give them another
comforter who would be with them forever. Let not your heart be
troubled. You believe in God. Believe also
in me. In my Father's house are many
mansions. If it were not so, I would have
told you. And I go to prepare a place for
you, that where I am, there you may be also. And if I go and
prepare a place for you, I will come again. Yes, the comfort
that we need as we go through this world, God the Holy Spirit
gives it to us through his word. But don't forget this, not only
does he comfort us with his word, but he guides us with his word. He guides us through this world.
God will never lead you, God the Holy Spirit will never lead
you, will never lead one of his children to do something in opposition
to his written word. Now you just put that down as
fundamental. And when you're praying about
something, asking the Lord's will, if what you're contemplating
is contrary to the word of God, it's not God's will. It's not
God's will. He will never lead you to do
something contrary to His word. We pray when we seek the Lord's
will. We study his word. We look to
God's providence, yes. But we have his promise. Trust
in the Lord with all thine heart and acknowledge him in all thy
ways, and he shall direct thy paths. He will. He will guide
you, but he will use his word. The saved people, the saved,
we delight in the word of God, first of all, because it reveals
Christ to us. Second, because God uses his
word to comfort and to guide us in this, in this world. And
we delight in the word of God because the Bible speaks to us.
You say it speaks to us. Yes, it speaks to us. As we read
the word of God, God speaks to us. The Bible is God's letter
to us and our prayers are our letters to God. Yeah. We saved
the light and the Bible also, not only because it speaks to
us, but because it's always new. I doubt that there's a person
in this building today that's ever read the same book 10 times
other than the Bible. I've got a few books I've read
more than once, but I've never read any book, I don't believe,
more than three times. Why? Because they get old. I remember that. I read that
a year ago or five years ago. But you see, the Bible, it's
a living book almost. It's a living word. And it speaks
to us and it's ever new. You say, well, what do you mean
by that? Well, I read a passage of scripture
the other morning, John chapter 15, and oh, just two or three
words, and I think that first verse just blessed my soul. I've read that, I don't know
how many times I've preached from it, but I saw something
there I never had seen before. It speaks to you. God's word
speaks to a child of God. We can't do without his book.
I think, was it the Psalmist or Job 1 said, I've esteemed
thy words more than my necessary food. Yes. And third, the same delight in
the Bible for it strengthens and it protects us. This book
here is both It's both milk for babes. And when a baby is born
in this world, you don't put a T-bone steak up in the crib
with them, do you? You give them milk. Babies need
milk. This Bible here, when a child
of God is born of the Spirit of God, it has the milk of the
word. But babies don't stay on milk.
They start off on milk, then they advance, don't they? And
this Bible has strong meat, too. It does. That's the reason we
need a steady diet. You know, people say you are
what you eat. Have you ever heard that? Talking
about your physical being. You are what you eat. Well, that's
certainly true spiritually. You are spiritually what you
consume. And if you're like the prodigal
son trying to fill your spiritual belly with the husk that the
pigs eat, you're not going to grow. You're going to be malnourished,
malnutritioned. Need the word of God. A fourth
thing, the saved delight in the Bible, because we live in an
ever-changing world. We change. But look here in Psalm
119, verse 89. Psalm 119, verse 89. Forever,
O Lord, thy word is settled in heaven. Amen. Change. Thoughts change. You know, science
doesn't change. Not really. Science is truth,
isn't it? That's what the word is. That's
what it means, isn't it? Science is truth. Truth doesn't
change. Now, we learn more about the
truth. And men's opinions and thoughts
change. But not God's word. It's settled
forever in heaven. In fact, the Lord Jesus Christ
said, this heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall
not pass away. We live in an ever-changing world.
We're continually changing. Isn't it wonderful to have something
that's solid, something that's not going to change, never going
to change? The last thing I would say, and
I know there's many other things you could say while you love
the Bible, love the Word of God, delight in the Bible, but I'm
going to say the Bible, the same delight in the Bible, considering
what it has cost people. One of the things that I love
about church history is it gives you an appreciation for what
we have. Did you know, and this is history,
I'm not just making this up out of thin air, that one time it's
recorded that one leaf, one page, as we would say today, of the
letter of James sold for a cartload of hay, for a wagonload of hay. You say, well, what hay? If you'd
lived back then, You had to cut that hay by hand, put it up on
that wagon. Yeah, it was worth something.
But a man was willing to give a wagon load of hay for one page
of the letter of James. And I, of course, speak in English,
but this is true in almost every language where the scriptures
has been translated. But when you think of John Wycliffe,
what it cost him and William Tyndale, to get the scriptures
into English so we could have it, so those of his day could
have it. What the scriptures has actually cost people, people
have been burned at the stake for reading the scripture. And let me bring it closer to
you and I. We have a man who is a member
of our church, who's no longer able to come, Brother Cliff Heller. But he gave his life, literally, to get the scriptures
into the language of the tribe where he worked.
When he went there, they had no alphabet. I mean, that took some work, didn't
it? what it cost to get the word
of God into their language. And we could say the same about
us if we'd live back in the 1600s. What it cost. That's the reason
the printing press was such a blessing. Before that, every Bible had
to be copied by hand. Can you imagine? Would you like
to do that? Would you like to give yourself
that job to sit down and start in Genesis 1-1 and just copy
every word and make sure it's right too? Oh man, it paid a
tremendous price that we could have this book in our language
and read it. We prize him for it. We love
his word. We delight in his word. That's
what the psalmist said. I delight in thy law. I pray the Lord will bless his
word to all of us here this morning.