Morning. I love that hymn. I'm certain
Fanny Crosby was thinking of Moses on Mount Sinai when she
wrote those words where Moses asked the Lord, show me thy glory.
And the Lord hid him in the cleft of a rock and covered that cave
with his hand. and cause his backside to pass
by. And the Lord said, I'll cause
my goodness, my goodness to pass by. That's our hope right now,
isn't it? That the Lord will pass by and
then he'll show us his goodness and that he'll hide us in Christ. We're going to be in 2 Samuel
chapter 22 again, this morning. Let's pray together. Our heavenly Father, thank you
for bringing us to this place today. Thank you for putting
in our hearts a desire to be here. Thank you, Lord, for the
promises of your word that assure us of your faithfulness to be
among those who are gathered in thy name. Lord, we're able
to speak and we're able to listen, but only by your grace can we
hear. Lord, we know that in order for us to worship you,
that you'll have to send your spirit in power. You'll have
to lift Christ up in our hearts. You'll have to open the eyes
of our understanding. You'll have to cause us, Lord,
to be still and to know that thou art God. Father, we pray that you would
do that now. Do it for your glory. Lord, for
our everlasting salvation, we ask it in Christ's name. Amen. You have your Bibles open to
2 Samuel chapter 22. I want us to look at one verse. One verse, verse 34. David is
offering a prayer of thanksgiving. It's toward the very end of his
life. And he makes this declaration. He, the Lord, maketh my feet
like hind's feet and setteth me upon my high places. The church, heaven, and the believer's
walk of faith in this world is often pictured in the scriptures
as a mountain, a mountain. We read often in the Old Testament,
particularly about the city of David being called Mount Zion. It's called the mountain of his
holiness. Solomon refers to the church
and heaven as a mountain of myrrh and a hill of frankincense. Isaiah calls it a high mountain,
a holy mountain, the mountain of the Lord, and then he says
there's a beacon in the top of that mountain. Now, reaching the summit of this
mountain is not an easy task. Matter of fact, it's impossible. It's impossible. Many have perished Many have
perished trying to climb this mountain in the power of the
flesh. This mountain has cliffs that are steep, rocky crags that
are sharp. The summit of this mountain,
the air is very thin. And the paths on this mountain
are very narrow and treacherous. And unless the Lord gives us
hind's feet, we'll not be able to climb this mountain. Not just
any animal can be found traversing this mountain. Only those animals
that have been specially gifted by God with hind's feet. You've seen it. You've seen pictures
of these mountain goats walking on little tiny ledges, and you
think, how can that be? That's the analogy here. That's
what David, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, is giving
us a picture of. And he's rejoicing that the Lord
has enabled him to be able to climb this mountain. but he's
also declaring that apart from God giving me hinds feet, it
would never be possible. Never be possible. The Lord Jesus said, wide is
the gate and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction and
many are they that go therein. It's the natural path. is to take the wide road and
the easy road. And then our Lord said, straight
is the gate and narrow, narrow is the way that leadeth unto
eternal life and few are they that go therein. I'm interested in that, in that
way. But I know, like David, tells
us, and like David knew, that if I'm to scale this mountain,
he's got to give me Heinz' feet. Heinz' feet. Many have proudly set out on
their own to climb this mountain, only to fall from its cliffs
or return quickly to that to that easy life in the valley. How oftentimes our Lord warns
us of the cost involved in the disciples' life. How needful we are that if this
if this price is to be paid, that the Lord's gonna have to
give us hinds feet. No part of the believer's life
is untouched by the gospel. When we're made willing in the
day of his power. It's not just a willingness,
but it's a rejoicing. It's a rejoicing. We don't come kicking and screaming.
He gives us a heart. This is the hinds feet that he
gives us. He gives us a desire to follow
him and to be a part of what he's doing on that mountain. When Christ is bowed to as Lord,
that is not to the glory of our commitment That's to the praise
of the glory of his grace, because if he didn't give us Hines' feet
and make us willing and give us faith, we would still have
our fists raised to heaven saying, I'll not have that man reign
over me. So David is saying, Lord, maketh my feet, maketh my feet
to be like Hines' feet. When we become too confident
in our ability to climb this mountain, the Lord often allows
our feet to slip. You've had that experience before. Perhaps you're on a ladder, you're
in a high place, and you have this loss of balance. and the
fear that strikes your heart immediately causes you to grab
on. And how oftentimes the Lord gives
us that experience when we forget our need for him to give us hinds
feet. We slip, we stumble. Turn with me to Psalm 72, Psalm
72. Now, David is the one that's
writing these words in our text in 2 Samuel chapter 22. And David is also the one that
wrote these words in Psalm 72. Psalm 72, beginning at verse
two, but as for me, My feet were almost gone. My steps had well
nigh slipped. For I was envious. I was envious at the foolish
when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. For there's no bands in their
death, but their strength is firm. David looked at the unbeliever
in their life and how how seemingly at ease they seem in the meadows
of the lowland. And here I am trying to climb
this mountain. And I took my eyes off of Christ
and forgot that he was the one that gave me hinds feet. And
I looked down into the valley and I saw I saw the wicked and
I saw the way in which they lived and that they didn't seem to
be bothered with this thing of sin. They didn't seem to be bothered
with the body of death like I have. They didn't seem to be bothered
with a need to have forgiveness of sin. They just went about
their way without any thoughts for God. And here I am, here
I am struggling in my daily walk on this mountain. He said, my feet almost slipped.
They almost slipped. The Lord let me stumble. The
Lord gripped my heart with that instant sense of fear when I
thought I was going to fall. He says in verse five they're
not in trouble as other men neither are they plagued like other men. Therefore pride can pass at them
about us with the chain violence cover them as a garment. They
just go about doing their own thing. Their eyes stand out with fatness.
They have more than heart could wish. They are corrupt and speak
wickedly concerning oppression. They speak loftily. They're so
proud. High-minded. They set their mouth
against the heavens and their tongue walketh through the earth.
Therefore, his people return hither and waters of a full cup
are wrung out to them. And they say, how does God know? Oh, faith rejoices, yes, but it rejoices
with trembling. It rejoices with trembling. We
delight and are thankful for what the Lord has done, but we're
always We're always conscious of our sinfulness and our need
for grace and mercy. Verse 12, behold, these are the
ungodly who prosper in the world. They increase in riches. Verily, I have cleansed my heart
in vain and washed my hands in innocency. This constant struggle that I
have in scaling this mountain with the flesh warring against
the spirit and the spirit against the flesh, they don't have that
experience. For all the day long have I been
plagued and chastened every morning. And then David says this, Here's
where we have to be careful, brethren. We read these words
from God's word. We're able to say, yes, this
is my experience. But when this is our experience,
let us be careful. Let us be careful not to burden. We agree. We confess our sins
and we confess ourselves to be sinful and needy. But when we get like this and our
feet start slipping and we begin to be like David, what does David
say? If I say, I will thus, I will
speak thus, behold, I should offend against the generation
of the children. We don't go into details confessing
our sins to one another. We confess ourselves to be full
of sin. We confess ourselves to be dependent. We sympathize
with the needs of our brethren. But we don't go around pouring
out our souls to one another. They do that in religion. and
it gives them a sense of, you know, they talk about having
accountability partners and they, you know, when they feel like
they've had some sort of cathartic cleansing whenever they confess
the details of their wickedness to one another, don't do that. I have people come to me sometimes
and they want to, you know, sometimes people will want to use a pastor
as a priest, you know, and think, well, I'm going to confess. No,
I don't want to hear them. I don't want to hear it. Don't tell me. You go into those kind of details,
it's going to become a stumbling block to me. That's what David
said. So where do I go? Where do I go when this kind
of Sin, it begins to grip my heart
and my feet are slipping on the mountain. Where do I go? When I thought to know this,
it was too painful for me. My unbelief was painful to me
and the fact that I had no one to go to and bear my soul to
and confess my sins to was too painful for me. Until, until I went into the sanctuary of
God, then I understood their way. Until I came together with God's people, heard what
God said, the Lord spoke to my heart, What did he do? He restored my hinds feet. He enabled me to stand upon that
rock. He kept me from falling off that
mountain. He let me slip, but only in order
to show me my weakness and my sin and my My unbelief as I try to compare
myself to other men. Anytime we compare ourselves
to other men, we get ourselves in trouble, don't we? You know, young people die, and
adults do. That's the problem with modern
day social media. It's just man comparing himself
to man. And it'll put you in this same
place where David was. You start comparing your life
to other men's lives. That's what, you know, and people
put that stuff out on Facebook and they're so prosperous and
they're so, you know, everything's wonderful for them. No, it's
not. They're lying. I remember a man
said to me one time, and this guy was, he was particularly, How should I say this? He didn't
have a lot of friends. It was just his personality. And I don't have problems. A
person's an introvert, and they don't have a lot. That's fine. The problem I have is when an
introvert starts blaming other people for being unfriendly.
You're going to have friends, you've got to be found friendly.
But some people are that way, and that's wonderful. You know,
they're comfortable there. Just don't accuse other people
of being unfriendly because you're an introvert. That's the way
this guy was. And he started telling me how
many friends he had. And he was so excited. And it
took me a minute to realize what he was talking about. He was
talking about all of his connections on Facebook. And of course, I
didn't say anything. But I'll say it to you, they're
not your friends. They're not your friends, okay? You know that, you already know
that. But if there's an example of what David's talking about,
that's where it happens, isn't it? Man comparing himself to
man. Peter did that at the Last Supper
when the Lord told them that they were all gonna forsake him
and Peter proudly stood up and he said, they might, but not
me. Not me, he was comparing himself to the other disciples.
And who was the one that fell that? Who was the one whose feet
slipped? Who was the one who lost his
footing on that rocky mountain? Yeah, it was Peter, wasn't it?
Nebuchadnezzar looked around at his kingdom and he thought,
look what I built. He compared himself to everyone
else and he thought himself to be somebody. and God made him
a nobody. And only when he realized that
he was a nobody that the Lord restore him, recover him. Moses had to spend, someone asked
me what's the significance of Moses killing the Egyptian to
protect the Israelite before he had to flee Egypt and go into
the wilderness. Well, he knew that he was an
Israelite and he was trying to take into his own hands. I mean,
here he was, the son of the most powerful king in all the world,
very well-educated, and he thought, I've got the ability. And he
was trying to deliver the children of Israel in the strength of
his own hands. And now 40 years later, on the
backside of the desert, he's a nobody. And God speaks to him
and Moses said, who am I? Lord, I can't do this. I can't
do this. Well, now you can, Moses. You
couldn't before, but now you can. Why? Because you're going to become
strong through your weakness. Brethren, this is the reason
why the Lord sends his children afflictions, conforming us to
the image of Christ, turning us again and again to God's word
for instructions, teaching us dependence on him, showing us
our frailty, enabling us to become compassionate toward one another
when our own weaknesses are exposed. Paul asked the Lord to remove
his thorn from the flesh and the Lord said, my grace is sufficient
for you. My grace is sufficient for you. What'd David say? He maketh my
feet like Hines' feet. Like Hines' feet. You know, by nature. Well, there's
a great illustration of what I'm about to say in Jacob's life. You remember Jacob went to Laban's
and Laban gave him a Rachel and Leah? And there was jealousy
between the sisters because Jacob loved Rachel and he didn't love
Leah. But Leah gives Jacob his first
son, his firstborn son. And she's so excited, she calls
his name Reuben. Reuben, Jacob's firstborn. And
Reuben translated says, means, look, a man. Look, a man. God has given me a man child. Now, many, many years later in
Egypt, when Jacob before he dies, is blessing his sons. And he identifies the nature
of each one of his sons and pronounces a blessing on them. And of course
he begins with his firstborn, Reuben. And he says of Reuben, Reuben,
you are as unstable as water. You are as unstable as water. Water always takes the path of
least resistance, doesn't it? And there's our old man. There's our fleshly nature. We're
not interested in the narrow road. We're not interested in
the rocky crags. We're not interested in the straight
gate. The flesh would just as soon
be as unstable as water and take the easy way, take the easy way. But when God gives us his spirit,
with that spirit, he gives us hinds feet and he puts us on
this mountain. And we're often reminded as we
as we scale to the summit of this mountain, that we're bearing
in our body a man of unstable, he's unstable. The Reuben, behold
a man, look a man, yeah, yeah. And David's saying in Psalm 72,
that the natural man who doesn't have the spirit of God doesn't
have a problem with his old nature. He doesn't have a problem with
the fact that he's a Reuben, unstable as water, that he's
just a man, that he's prone to, no, he's just indulging himself
in the desires of the flesh because that's all he has. The Lord gives his children Hind's
feet. And he causes them. He gives them afflictions. He
gives them a desire to have the flesh restrained. The child of God's desires, Lord,
restrain my flesh. whereas the unbeliever is just
gratifying the flesh. But the child of God, as he has
hinds feet walking this mountain, Lord, don't let my flesh cause
me to look down in the valley and see those other and be jealous
of them. Lord, keep my eyes fixed on the
summit of this mountain. Keep my eyes fixed on Christ
and give me hinds feet. Because if you don't give me
Heinz feet, I'm falling off this mountain. Lord, enable me to mortify the
flesh. Enable me to take up my cross
daily, to die to myself, to find my hope and my life in Christ.
This is a daily struggle. This is the believer's life in
this world. This world's not our home. We're
not part of this world. We're strangers in this world.
We're pilgrims and we're just passing through. And everything
that this world stands for is contrary to what we hold most
dear and most precious in our hearts. And yet we've got this
old Reuben who's unstable as water. who's constantly making
us stumble. There's another illustration
in the Bible. It's found in 1 Samuel chapter 14. You ought to turn
there. You remember when we were going
through 1 Samuel, Saul's son, Jonathan, takes his armor bearer
and, he and the armor bearer alone go up against a garrison
of Philistines. And the story is very specific
about their approach to this garrison of Philistines. They
were on a high mountain. and Jonathan and his armor bearer
have to crawl on their hands and knees on this little path
up this mountain. And the Bible says that there
was a sharp rock on their left and there was a sharp rock on
their right. And then the Bible goes on to
tell us that those two rocks had a name. I remember the name
of the sharp rock on one side was Bozaz. I forgot the name
of the sharp rock on the other side, but I remember what the
name means. Bozaz means glistening white. And the other rock, the
name of the other rock translated means thorny, thorny. Now, Jonathan and his armor bearer,
crawling on their hands and knees, going between a sharp rock called
glistening white and another sharp rock called thorny. And in this pass, this very narrow
pass, they make it to the garrison and God gives them victory. The
two men destroy the whole garrison. There's our life. There's our
life. In our hands and knees. Hind's
feet that the Lord's given us. And on one side, we have the
one who is himself glistening white. The one in whom we have
perfect righteousness before God. That new man. The one that the scripture says
is just like Christ. And there's our hope. And our
boldness in the day of judgment is that as he is, so are we. There's our hope, our union with
Christ, our being put in that rock. But on the other side, there's
another sharp rock and it's called thorny. And where do we first
find the reference to thorns in the Bible? Well, after Adam sinned and he
was cast out of the garden and God said, now you will labor
in this world by the sweat of your brow and it will produce
for you thorns and thistles. And God has made a way. I think it was Bunyan who said
on his deathbed, when I was young, I knew a lot of things. But now
that I'm old, I only know two things for sure. Two things for
absolute certainty, I'm a great sinner and Christ is a great
savior. There we are, between thorns
and the glistening white rock, all the way up. Always being reminded by those
thorns, Lord, you're going to have to give me hinds feet. I will follow the path of least
resistance. I'm carrying a burden of Reuben
around with me, and he's unstable as water. But Lord, you've put me in this
place. You've set me. I want to close with this. Look
at our verse one more time. He maketh my feet like Hines'
feet, and setteth me upon my high places. Now turn with me,
if you will, to Ephesians chapter one. Ephesians chapter one. I'll read a couple verses very
quickly. Look at verse three. Blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ. All blessing, all glory, all
honor, all praise goes to him for he has blessed us with all
spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ. Another place we're told to set
our affections on things above where Christ is seated at the
right hand of God. Look at Ephesians 1, verse 20.
Well, verse 19, and what is the exceeding
greatness of his power to us who believe according to the
working of his mighty power, which he wrought in Christ when
he raised him from the dead and set him at his own right hand
in heavenly places. He has given me hinds feet that
I might climb this mountain with all of its trials and troubles that I might achieve by his grace
to the summit. Look at chapter two of Ephesians. Verse four, but God, who is rich
in mercy for his great love for which 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 made us sit
together in heavenly places in Christ. How do we know that? Because
God said so. We're on this narrow path. We're climbing this rocky mountain. We're dependent upon Him to give
us hinds feet. We're between a sharp rock on
one side and a sharp rock on the other side. What do we have our eyes set
on? Heavenly places. our affections, not on things
of the earth, on heavenly places, where God has said to our sin
bearer, our savior, sit thou here at my right hand until I
make all thine enemies thy footstool. We come into this world at enmity
with God, raising our fist to heaven, saying with the rest
of the world, I'll not have that man reign over me, I'm gonna
live in the valley. God makes those who are by nature
at enmity with him. And what's he do? He makes them
to sit at his feet like Mary and to choose that one thing
needful, the word of God, the person of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And with our eyes fixed on him, for the rest of our pilgrimage
in this world. We're gonna need Hinds' Feet.
We'll need Hinds' Feet. He maketh me to have Hinds' Feet. And he setteth me upon my high places. I pray the Lord will do that
for each of us.