Good evening. It's good to see
everybody. Let's open tonight's service with hymn number 37 from
your Spiral Gospel Hymns hymn book, number 37. And let's all
stand together. Approach, my soul, the throne
of grace in every time of need. There's mercy for the needy one
who Jesus' name shall please. Though I'm a weak and sinful
wretch, I will approach the throne. I'll lean upon Christ's mighty
arm and plead His blood alone. The blood, the precious blood
of Christ has opened up the way by which I can draw near to God
and to my Father pray. Though Satan tempts my heart
to sin, I'll call upon my God. And if I fall, he'll lift me
up and cleanse me in the blood. The way is open, God will hear
my groans and cries of grief. Nothing can keep me from His
throne but my own unbelief. O Lord, my unbelief remove, and
turn my heart by grace. Compel me to approach your throne,
and there spread out my case. Please be seated. Evening. I like that line compel
me. To come before thy throne and
there spread out my case. Bid me to come unto thee, Lord.
That's our prayer tonight that the Lord would. Would. Call us and enable us to come
into his presence. Let's open our Bibles together
to Psalm 110 for our scripture reading tonight. Psalm 110. Very familiar. Passage of scripture
that's so encouraging as we. As we look to Christ, the Lord
said unto my Lord. Remember when the Lord asked
the Pharisees? Whom do you say this that Christ
is and they said he's the son of David and this is the passage
that the Lord quoted. He said if you'd be the son of
David, then why did David call him Lord? And the Lord. Said. Unto my Lord, the first
Lord there is a reference to God the Father, and the second
is the reference to Christ. The Father said to Christ, sit
thou at my right hand until I make thine enemies thy footstool.
The Lord shall send the rod of thy strength out of Zion, and
rule thou in the midst of thine enemies. Thy people shall be
willing in the day of thy power. In the beauties of holiness from
the womb of the morning, thou hast the due of thy youth. The Lord has sworn and will not
repent. Thou art a priest forever after
the order of Melchizedek. The Lord at thy right hand shall
strike through kings in the day of his wrath. He shall judge
among the heathen, he shall fill the places with the dead bodies,
he shall wound the heads over many countries, and he shall
drink of the brook. Remember that brook, Kidron?
That's the brook that he, the sewer that ran out of the temple. He shall drink of the brook in
the way, and therefore shall he, the father, lift up the head. Let's pray together. You all
know about I have a Lou, I'm sure most of you know her. We sent out a an email. But the
services are tomorrow or Friday morning at 10 o'clock or so. We wanted to go up there, but
I don't know if we're going to be able to under the circumstances,
but. Please remember to pray for Carl
Carl's. Carl's in very poor health and he's really struggling right
now. So, let's pray together. Our merciful heavenly father, we come into thy holy presence
thanking you that we can come with confidence knowing that
we have an advocate before thee, our sin bearer, our substitute,
our surety, thy dear son and our Lord and Savior, who stands
in our stead before thee, presents himself on our behalf. Lord,
how we hope tonight that you'd be pleased to open what no man
can shut, open the windows of heaven and come down and meet
with us. Open thy word, open our hearts, open our understanding. Enable us to set our affections
on things above where Christ is seated at that right hand.
Lord bless us with our presence and. Comfort us with your peace. Speak to us of Christ. Reveal
to us once again his glory. Increase our faith to rest all
our hope in him. The Lord we pray that same prayer
for our brother Carl. We know Lord that. All that you
do is right and perfect and well and. But our brother is. Is. Having a difficult time right
now and Lord you, your love for him is so much greater than than
ours could possibly be, and you are able to comfort him. In a
way that no man can give him comfort, we pray that you would
do that for Christ sake. Draw them unto yourself. We ask
it in Christ's name. Amen. Number 318. 318 in the
hardback terminal. 318. Let's all stand once again. Ahem. I need thee every hour, most
gracious Lord. No tender voice like thine can
peace afford. I need thee, oh, I need thee. Every hour I need thee. Oh, bless me now, my Savior,
I come to thee. I need thee every hour, stay
thou nearby. Temptations lose their power
when thou art nigh. I need thee, oh, I need thee. Every hour I need thee, O bless
me now, my Savior, I come to thee. I need thee every hour, in joy
or pain. Come quickly and abide, for life
is vain. I need thee, oh, I need thee. Every hour I need Thee, O bless
me now, my Savior, I come to Thee. I need Thee every hour, Most
Holy One, O make me Thine indeed, Thou blessed Son. ? I need Thee, oh I need Thee
? Every hour I need Thee ? Oh bless me now my Savior ? I come
to Thee Please be seated. Will you open your Bibles with
me to Psalm 109. Psalm 109. Psalm 108. Our text is right, in my Bible,
it's right near Psalm 109, but we're gonna be in Psalm 108.
If you'll look with me there. Verse 12. Give us help from trouble, for
vain is the help of man. Now this word trouble is also
the same word that's translated enemies in verse 13. Though God
or through God, we shall do valiantly for he it is that shall tread
down our enemies. The whole world right now thinks
that the coronavirus is their biggest problem. Oh, that they
could only know that the trouble that that's causing us is but
a minor inconvenience compared to the trouble that men really
have. We've heard the coronavirus being
referred to as a invisible enemy. And yet there is an invisible
enemy that's much more deadly, the consequences of which are
infinitely more significant than anything that this coronavirus
could cause. Now, I'm not suggesting that
this is not a problem in our world, it is. It is, but men
are doing a lot to try to help out, aren't they? And in a lot
of ways, men's help is not in vain. We're able to help in a
lot of things, one another. And we ought to do what we can
to help one another. May God give us the grace to
do it willingly and to not toot our horns for glory when it's
finished. You know what the politicians are all going to do when this
is over. stumbling over themselves, trying
to get to the microphone to take the glory for having saved the
world. And that's a help that we have
a need for, but it's not the greatest need we have. The need
that we have is an invisible enemy, and the need is the need
for the forgiveness of our sin. That's our greatest need. And that's what the Lord is referring
to here when he says. Give us help. From trouble. For vain is the help of man. Man cannot provide me any help
whatsoever. When it comes to my need to have
my sin taken away. To be able to stand in the presence
of a holy God. Without guilt. without charge,
without shame, undefiled in the presence of
God is something that no man can provide for us except one,
the God-man. He bore our sins, all the sins
of all of his people in his body on Calvary's cross and put away
by the sacrifice of himself the sin of his people. There's our,
there's our help. We have a great, what did the
book of Hebrews chapter four, let us come boldly to the throne
of grace in our time of need that we find might find help,
help and grace to help in our time of need. That's our, that's,
that's the one that we must come to. Vain is the help of man. The one thing that no one can
help us with is this problem that we have called sin. Now, the nature of sin, the real
nature of sin is that it is hidden. You say, well, I see the ugliness
of sin in my own life and I see it in the lives of other people
all the time. No, those are the symptoms of sin. That's all that
is. We're all to one degree or another
symptomatic when it comes to sin, but the real problem with
sin is the nature of sin, which is only seen by the microscope,
if you will, of the Holy Spirit, and it's only diagnosed by the
Holy Spirit, and it can only be exposed by the Spirit of God. This thing of sin, it's not a
It's not a behavioral problem, that's the manifestation of it,
isn't it? Sin itself is a hidden thing. Now let me tell you, let me share
with you the greatest example of that. The greatest example
of that is seen at Calvary's cross. When the Lord Jesus Christ
bore in his body all the sins of all of God's people of every
generation. Let me ask you a question. Was
there any manifestation of that sin seen in his life, in his
words, in his attitude? Did he show outwardly or express
outwardly in any way that sin? No. That goes to show me that my
problem is not a behavioral problem. My problem is my sin nature.
That's the sin that no man can help me with. If it was just
a behavioral problem, I could get some help for that. You know,
I could get some psychotherapy and make me, you know, feel better
about myself or I could get some, you know, some behavioral modification
therapy and help me change my life and fix things up and clean
things up on the outside. I could become religious and find some ways to, you know,
to mend my ways and correct my outward behavior. Men do it all
the time. But that's not the problem. You
see, the help of man is not vain when it comes to helping someone
change their behavior. But sin is not a behavioral problem.
That's just the symptom. That's just the manifestation
of it. We see the true nature of sin
at Calvary's cross. When the Lord Jesus Christ cries
out to his father, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Because God made him who knew
no sin, sin. That we might be made the righteousness
of God in him. He bore this thing called sin. in himself and suffered the full
wrath of God without ever expressing any manifestations or symptoms
outwardly of that sin. So, this thing that no man can
help me with, I'm sorry if I lose my, if I grimace a little bit
up here, please forgive me. I've got a pulled muscle in my
back and when I take a deep breath it's just about doubles me over.
But this, I forgot what I was going
to say now. This matter of Christ bearing
our sins has to be revealed by the Spirit of God. Because all
the natural man can see is the symptoms of sin. You know, just like this virus,
you don't know you have it until you start manifesting symptoms. And yet we hear that there's
a whole lot of people that have it that are asymptomatic. And so it is with sin. We've
got the virus, this contagious virus that we caught from our
father. The problem is that the death
rate for sin is 100%. It's 100%. Everybody that catches
this virus dies from it. And everybody that's born of
a woman has caught it. And so unless the spirit of God
reveals the real problem of sin to the heart, we'll be looking
to man for some help with our sin. We'll be looking to ourselves,
we'll be looking to someone else, we'll be looking to a program,
we'll be looking to a 12-step whatever. We'll be looking to
some way to correct this sin problem that we have until the
Spirit of God shows us that the real problem is not the outward
manifestation, it's the nature of sin that we're born with. And that's what Christ bore in
his body. So this problem with sin is,
number one, that it's hidden. It's hidden from the natural
man. Well, this scripture says we
walk by faith, not by sight. And unless the Lord gives us
faith to believe, what he tells us about our sin, we'll only
be bothered by those things that we're ashamed of. We won't be
bothered by the fact that there's nothing in us that measures up
to his glory. We won't be bothered by that.
We won't be bothered by the fact that we're dead in our trespasses
and in our sins, because that will be hid from us. Everybody
is able by their conscience to identify sinful behavior. Although our national conscience
is becoming more and more dull with every passing year, it seems,
as men call that which is good evil and that which is evil good. But people in their heart of
hearts know what's right and wrong. They know what's right
and wrong. And that's not being made a sinner. You see, the help of man is vain
in my trouble. So the question is, what is my
real trouble? My real trouble is that I have
a sin nature. My real trouble is that there's
nothing in me that can stand in the presence of a holy God
unless I have a sinless advocate standing in my stead and representing
me on my behalf, representing me before God. Unless I'm found
in Christ having his righteousness, not my own. Unless I'm found
in the beloved, I'll not be accepted before God. That's my, left to
myself, I'm hell deserving. Now that's a hidden truth that
can only be revealed through faith. And even when it's revealed
through faith, we can't see it, can we? You can't see how sinful
you are. You can't understand the full
gravity of your sin nature, but you can believe it. You believe
it because God said it. So being made a sinner doesn't
mean that you're just overwhelmed with shame and guilt over how
horrible your sin is. It's a whole lot worse than we
think it is. Being made a sinner is believing what God says about
our sin nature, that there is not anything good in me. That
standing in the presence of God, I'm vile. There's no good thing
in me. And none has done good. No, not
one. I have nothing to recommend me
to God. I am unrighteous. I am sinful. Why? Because God said so. I don't
understand that. I don't feel the full weight
of that as I ought, but I know this, the Lord Jesus Christ felt
the full weight of it, and he suffered the full wrath of God,
and he sorrowed for my sin like no man can sorrow, and God saw
the travail of his soul, and God was satisfied. You see, walking
by faith is not meaning that, you know, I feel the full burden
of my sin. It means that I've come to believe
what God has said. The help of man is vain when
it comes to my real problem. And my real problem doesn't have
anything to do with another person. It doesn't have anything to do
with whatever's happening in the world. It has to do with
me being a sinner. Lord, I have no righteousness
outside of Christ. I need Christ. And we cast all
our care upon him for all our hope of salvation. The help of
man is vain. It's vain. Give us help from
trouble for vain is the help of man. Not only is sin, the
true nature of sin, hidden. And in one regard, it remains
hidden. We have no idea what sin is. We can look and realize
that Christ bore the full burden of it, yet he never manifested
any behavior that showed it. They never showed any symptoms
for it. We know that in order for God to put our sin away,
he had to pour out the full fury of his wrath on Christ. to have
his justice satisfied. We believe that. We don't know
what that means. We can't feel the weight of that,
the burden of that. We just believe that Christ did
and that God's satisfied with Christ. And we've cast all our
hope on Him. You know, the second thing that
sin does, this is the trouble that we have that no man can
help us with. Our trouble is not, you know,
I'm not a doctor and I'm not intended to play a doctor in
the pulpit. But I know this about the coronavirus, it's the Lord. And whatever he does is right.
And it ultimately will be for his glory and for the good of
his people. That's all I know. We may have
some very difficult times in front of us, but it'll be Lord. Remember when Samuel, when the
Lord spoke to Samuel and God cursed Eli's family, particularly
his sons, Hophni and Phinehas. And Samuel didn't want to tell
Eli what God had said, because he didn't want Eli to know what
was going to happen. And Eli said, if you don't tell
me what God said, the curses that God gave you for me are
going to go against you. And Samuel told him everything.
What came out of Eli's mouth? It's the Lord. Let him do whatever
seems right in his sight. And that's our response to whatever
happens, particularly to this Crisis that's taking place in
the world. It's the Lord let him do whatever's
right in his sight He will provide He will provide somebody said
somebody said well, you know, I I'm Afraid that you know, I
might catch it and die if you do and you're a child of God
It'll be the best day of your life It'll be the best day of
your life Now that's just the truth in
it Does that mean we don't take precautions and we don't use? Our governing officials are trying
to help us right now and we ought to take their advice. I think
we should do what we can. But that's not our trouble. Our
real trouble is sin, isn't it? And that's what the world has
no answer for. That's what religion has no answer for. That's what
man has no answer for. That's what you can't do anything
about. Number one, it's hidden. Number two, sin hinders us from
being able to worship. You remember that passage of
scripture that says, in that while we were yet without strength,
Christ died for the ungodly. That word ungodly is the word
worship with the alpha in front of it. Which just, when you put
an alpha in front of a Greek word, it changes the meaning
of that word to the opposite of whatever that word is. Okay? So, in that why were we yet without
strength? Christ died for those who were
unable to worship God. Now, here's the truth, brethren.
This is so encouraging to me. We're still unable to worship
him. I mean, we're sitting here right
now, I'm trying to preach, you're trying to listen. How many thoughts
have passed through our mind? How focused are we able to be
in true spiritual worship? One day we will be. That's going
to be the glory of heaven. And we'll be able to worship
him without sin, unhindered. But right now, there's a part
of us that's still ungodly. There's a part of us that's still
unable to worship God as we ought, but here's our hope. Here's our
hope. The Lord Jesus Christ worshiped
God the Father perfectly. Look at, we're talking about
perfect faith. Perfect faith, okay? Our hearts,
We go from faith to fear, back to faith to fear. Lord, help
thou mine unbelief is our constant cry. We're not able to have the
kind of faith that we want to have. We go between resting in
Christ and then laboring, trying to make things better. We go
from hope to despair. We go from clarity on the gospel
to confusion. We're just a mess, aren't we?
And that's where no man can help us except the God-man who had
perfect faith. Look at verse 1 of Psalm 108. Oh God, my heart is fixed. Now notice, it's been a while
since we've been studying the Psalms that we saw one of the
Psalms of David, but this is the Psalm of David. Now who's
speaking here? Can you say before God, oh Lord,
my heart's fixed. I'm never distracted. I never
wonder. I never fear. I'm never confused. I have faith that's stalwart
and unmovable and my heart is fixed. We can't say that. Why? Because we've got trouble. We've got sin. But the Lord Jesus Christ was
able to say, Oh God, my heart is fixed. I will sing and give
praise even with my glory. Now who can say that other than
Christ? I'm going to praise the Father with my glory. I'm going
to lift up my glory, the only begotten of the Father, the one
who's full of grace and full of truth. The one who is the
fullness of the Godhead bodily, the very glory and essence of
God, the Lord Jesus Christ says, I'm going to lift up my glory
in praise and worship. And my heart is fixed on the
father. And when we look in faith to
Christ. God reckons his faith and his worship as ours. We think, oh, if I could just,
if I could just worship God. No man hath seen God at any time. The only begotten son, which
is in the bosom of the father, he hath declared him. No man knoweth the son but the
father, neither knoweth any man the father save the son, and
to whomsoever he shall reveal him. The revelation that God
has given us of Christ causes us to realize we have no righteousness. We can't worship as we ought.
Our faith is fickled at best. Lord, I need Christ. And we look
to him, we've got trouble that no man can fix. Man is vain when
it comes to fixing my sin problem. I can't fix it myself. I can't
decide, well, I'll just burn the bricks a little hotter and
get them a little harder and maybe they'll turn into rocks.
No, I need Christ as my rock. I need him to provide the water
of life. I need him to give me a place
to stand because my faith and my worship is, well, it's hindered. It's hindered by my sin. Scripture says that we are to
worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness. Now that just means
that right now, brethren. In all of our efforts and desire
to worship God and how and how how how difficult it is to be
able to enter into the presence of God as we ought and as we
want to. We're looking to the beauty of
holiness and we know that the Lord Jesus Christ worshipped
God perfectly. You remember in John chapter
four when the Lord was speaking to that woman at the well and
she wanted to know where man should worship, whether it be
at Mount Gerizim or whether it be in Jerusalem, and the Lord
said, the hour's coming and now is, and now is that the true
worshiper shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth. For the Father seeketh such seeketh
such to worship him. Now I looked up that word seeketh.
And I thought, well, what does that mean? The father seeketh
such. And I'll just give you a little
language lesson. It's in the indicative mood,
which means that, that the subject is the doer of the action. In
other words, the Lord is not looking around trying to find
somebody that worships him in spirit and in truth. It's the
Lord that enables us to worship him in spirit and in truth. It's the Lord that gives us his
spirit. What is his spirit? How do we
know we have his spirit? How do we know? Well, he tells
us, doesn't he? Very simple. It's expedient for
you that I go away for if I go not away, the spirit of truth
will not come. But when he comes, he will convict you of sin because
of your unbelief. How do you know you have the
spirit of God? Lord, I'm so full of unbelief. I can't believe
you like I ought. I can't worship you. I'm so thankful.
I'm so thankful that I have one. I have a savior who believed
you perfectly and worshiped you perfectly. of righteousness because I go
to my father, Lord, I have no righteousness outside of Christ.
I've got to have Christ standing in my stead at the right hand
of the majesty on high, representing me with a perfect righteousness
and of judgment because because the prince of this world has
been judged. Lord, I believe that what you did on Calvary's
cross was a finished work that you delivered from the very hand
of the devil, all of your people. God is spirit and they that worship
him must worship him in spirit and in truth. Lord, are you going
to have to? Spirit cries, causes us to cry,
Abba, Father. And he gives us words and groanings
that we don't even know. The Spirit intercedes on our
behalf. He's the one that worships God
for us. And we do it according to the
truth of the gospel. And the truth is that we can't
believe and we can't worship And we can't help ourselves,
and no one else can help us. We need Christ. We need Christ
as the only man that's able to help us. Look at our text. Give us help from trouble, for
vain is the help of man. Lord, I've got a problem. I've
got a problem. My problem is my sin. And I've
tried to fix it, and I've looked to religion to fix it, and I've
looked to the law to fix it, and I've tried to get other men
to fix it, and nobody can fix it. I've got a problem nobody
can fix but you. Lord help me. Go back with me to verse one.
Here's our sin problem. It's hidden from the natural
man, and it's hidden in many ways from us. We don't know what
sin is. We feel the guilt and shame of
sin, particularly repeated sin, but we don't really know what
it is. It hinders us from being able to worship God as we ought.
But we have Christ who felt the full burden of it and who worshiped
God perfectly. Look at verse 2. Awake, psaltery,
and harp. I myself will awake early. Oh,
how many times we read of the Lord. The disciple's getting
up. The Lord's gone. He's gone out in the wee hours of the morning
praying to the Father. Oh, what hope we have. We have
an advocate. who is ever interceding on our
behalf. You don't want to trust your
prayers for the hope of your salvation, do you? Lord, I'm in trouble. I can't help myself. I try to
pray, I try to worship, I try to believe, and I find myself
falling so far short of where I need to be. Thank you, thank
you. I have Christ to stand in my
stead who believed you perfectly, worshiped you perfectly, and
prayed perfectly. I will praise thee, O Lord, among
the people. I will sing praises unto thee
among the nations. The Lord Jesus Christ praised
his father, honored his father in every way. Look at verse four. For thy mercy is great above
the heavens, and thy truth reacheth into the clouds. It takes divine
mercy to deal with our sin, doesn't it? You remember that publican
that was in the temple? The Pharisee praying unto himself,
Father, I thank thee that I'm not like other men. What did
that publican say? God, be merciful unto me, the
sinner. Lord, if you're going to fix
this sin problem, it's going to take mercy. I can't, I can't merit
it. I can't earn it. I can't do anything
about it. Vain is the help of man. But
Lord, if you'll be merciful, I will be merciful to their unrighteousness
and their sins and iniquity. Will I remember no more? Our God delights in showing mercy. We see that most clearly in the
sacrifice that Christ made on our behalf on Calvary's cross. His heart was filled with mercy. Turn with me to Hebrews chapter
two. Hebrews chapter two. I wish that somebody would become
as concerned about their real trouble as they are with their
perceived trouble. You have your Bibles open to
Hebrews chapter 2, look at verse 17. Wherefore in all things it
behooved him to be made like unto his brethren that he might
be a merciful And faithful high priest and all things pertaining
to God to make reconciliation for the sins of the people for
in that he himself hath suffered being tempted. He is able to
sucker them that are tempted. You know what that word sucker
means. It means help. He's able to help them. He understands
the infirmities of our flesh. We have a high priest. Who was
tried and tempted in every way that we are yet without sin.
Now the Lord says he's a merciful and faithful high priest. We have a man in heaven that
helps us with this real trouble that we have. Our real trouble's
not financial, our real trouble's not medical, our real trouble
is spiritual. I will have mercy upon whom I
will have mercy, and whom I will, I'll harden. Lord, have mercy
on me. I'm a mercy beggar. That's all I can do. I can't
help myself. The sin problem I have is far
too great and far too deep. Go back with me to Psalm 108.
Be thou exalted, O God, Sin being all our fault, being
all our fault, yet it glorifies God. It glorifies God who humbled
himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the
cross. Wherefore, God has given him a name, which is above every
name, that at the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow and every
tongue shall confess that Jesus is the Lord to the glory of God
the Father. Sin caused that. Sin caused that. Being delivered by the determinant
counsel and foreknowledge of God. There's the beginning. God
delivered Christ to Calvary's cross. He was delivered by the foreknowledge
and determinant counsel of God. And you with your wicked hands
have crucified and slain. Look at verse five. Be thou exalted,
O God, above the heavens and thy glory above all the earth,
that thy beloved may be delivered Save, save. Now notice that next word is
an italics. Just scratch it out. This is
a prayer of Christ. He is praying to the father to
save him, save him. Now was the father,
was the father faithful to save his son? Was he? In saving his son, did he save
everybody that Christ died for? Listen, look at what the Lord's
saying. That thy beloved may be delivered, save thy right
hand and answer me. The Lord Jesus Christ is pleading
with the Father to save him and to answer him. Is it possible
that he could pray a prayer? Do you want to trust the hope
of your salvation on any prayer that you've ever prayed? on any
faith that you've ever had, on any expression of worship that
you've ever... No. You see, the help of man,
including your helping yourself, is vain in this trouble. We have a trouble that only Christ
can help us with. He's the only one that believed
God. He's the only one that worshiped
God. He's the only one who prayed a perfect prayer, and he's the
one that the Father saved. He saved him. How do we know
he saved him? He raised him from the dead.
That's how he saved him. He would not allow his Holy One
to see corruption. He delivered him from the grave
and from death. And in doing so, he delivered
everyone that Christ died for. The help of man is vain. You cannot help yourself. Nobody
else can help you. Christ did all this. He's our
only help and our only savior. Look at verse six, that thy beloved
may be delivered, save thy right hand and answer me. God hath spoken in his holiness. It takes the word of God to save
a sinner. It takes the spirit of God to
give us faith, to believe the word of God. of his own will
begat he us with the word of truth and this is the gospel
which this is the word of God which by the gospel is preached
unto you. The Lord doesn't save apart from
the preaching of the gospel does he? It is his word. Who else? We don't have anybody else's
word to rest our hope in or to believe on. We have the word
of God. God hath spoken In His holiness,
He has spoken. It's sin, this trouble, this
enemy that we have that causes us to depend completely on God
and His word. We just believe what God says,
don't we? 1 Corinthians chapter 1, I will
destroy the wisdom of the wise. I will bring to nothing the understanding
of the prudent. Where is the wise? Where is the
scribe? Where is the disputer of this
world? Hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? Has
he not chosen to use the foolishness of preaching to save them which
believe? You see God, that's what we're doing right now. God
uses his word to deliver us from our enemy and from our trouble. God hath spoken in his holiness. I will rejoice. I will divide
Shechem. and meet out the valley of Succoth.
Gilead is mine, Manasseh is mine, Ephraim also is the strength
of my head. Judah is my lawgiver, Moab is
my washpot, and Edom will I cast out my shoe over Philistia, which
is Philistines, will I triumph." Now, what's the Lord saying here?
Without us going into each one of these names of places, what
is the Lord saying? He is saying, I will have mercy
upon whom I will have mercy and whom I will all harden. I will
make a distinction between the Egyptians and the Israelites.
Who maketh thee to differ? Who maketh thee to differ? What
do you have that you have not received? That is what the Lord
is saying. He said, Edom is my washpot. Philistia, I am going
to triumph over them. Oh, but Judah, Judah and Ephraim,
those are my elect. Those are my darlings. Those
are the ones that I'm going to, I'm going to set. Gilead is mine.
Manasseh is mine. I'm going to claim mine for myself
and all the rest of them, I'm going to cast away. And the child of God says, Lord,
if you don't do something about my trouble, If you don't put
away my enemy, if you don't stand in my stead for faith and for
worship, if you don't give me your spirit to believe your word
and to rest all my hope on Christ, I'm still ungodly. I've still
got a sin problem. I see it every time. You know,
we sing that hymn. I need the every hour and how
many times we've seen, this is the hour when we need him most.
And why? Why? Because we have such a hard
time worshiping God, don't we? We have a trouble that no man
can help. Lord, give me your spirit. Show
me your truth. Show me the truth of who I am.
Show me the truth of who Christ is. And let me cast all my care
upon Him, believing that He cares for me. I'm in trouble. I'm just in trouble. All the
time I'm in trouble. And the more you grow in grace
and the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, the more trouble
you realize you're in, don't you? This is a problem that doesn't
go away. The coronavirus more than likely is not going to kill
us all. It's going, you know, a few months from now, it's going
to be a thing of the past and we'll look back on it and, you
know, and remember the inconveniences of it. But, you know, it's, it's,
it'll, it'll be, it'll go away like everything else that ever,
you know, ever, it eventually will go away. This problem never
goes away, does it? It just keeps getting worse and
worse and worse. And you can realize, Lord, there's
no man to help me. I can't help myself. I've got
to have Christ. Who will bring me into the strong
city? Or who's going to bring me to
heaven? Who's going to get me into glory? Christ, he's the only one that
can do it. I go and prepare a place for
you. Let not your heart be troubled. You believe in God, believe also
in me. Trust me for your faith. Trust me. I worshiped God. Trust my prayers. I prayed. I
know you can't. Look to me for everything. Now I'll get you into glory.
I'll come again and receive you unto myself that where I am there
you may be also. If it were not so, I would have
told you. I've told you I'm going to, I'm going to get you success.
I'm going to finish the work that I started. Just keep looking
to me. And you're going to have to look
at him more on your deathbed than you do now. Wilt not thou, O God, who has cast us off? Lord, my sin
has separated me from my God. That's my problem. Every time
I, every time I lose hope, every time I become fearful, every
time I get confused, it's because of my unbelief. It's because
of my sin. Has not my sin separated me from
my God? Lord, this is my trouble. This
is my trouble. Nothing else can separate you
from God but sin. And no one else's sin can separate
you from God but your own. Isn't that true? We get aggravated sometimes because
of other people's sin, but that's not the problem we have. Wilt not thou, O God, who has
cast us off, and wilt not thou, O God, go forth with our host? Lord, you're going to have to
go before me. You're going to have to fight my battles for
me. Our battle's not with flesh and
blood. We're fighting a spiritual warfare here, aren't we? And
the weapons of our warfare are not carnal. They're not carnal. They're not fleshly. They're
not from man. They're not from the wisdom of
man. They're from God. The weapons of our warfare, what
does that scripture say? The weapons of our warfare are
not carnal, but they are mighty through God to the pulling down
of strongholds and bringing every thought into captivity to the
obedience of Christ. The weapon of your warfare is
not for your obedience to Christ. How, when are we ever obedient
to Christ? It's looking to the obedience of the Lord Jesus Christ
for all my righteousness before God. He's the only man that can
help me. He's the one who had perfect
faith. He's the one who worshiped the father in a way that was
acceptable to God. And when God gives me the spirit,
to believe on Christ and the truth of my own unbelief and
his perfection before God and his finished work is because
God sought me out and made me so. Because apart from that, I'm
in trouble. I mean, I'm in trouble. And the
help of man is vain. Give us help. Oh, Lord, give
us help. Give us help from trouble, for
vain is the help of man. Through God, through Him, by
Him, through Him, and to Him are all things. Through God,
we will do valiantly. We'll persevere. We'll continue on. We'll believe
to the end. For it is he. And we not we ourselves,
it is he that will tread down our enemy. Put away our sin. Our Heavenly Father. We rejoice in being able to agree
with what you've declared, that we are a people in trouble and
that we can find no help from man. Oh, but how hopeful and how thankful
we are that we have a mediator, the God man, the one man who's
seated at thy right hand. As our righteousness, our faithfulness. Our sinlessness, our hope. All
our salvation. Thank you, Lord, for your spirit
enabling us to believe you. Thank you for the truth of the
gospel. We ask Lord that you would help us. This day. and every day in our time of
need. We ask it in Christ's name. Amen. 125, let's stand together. I hear the Savior say, Thy strength
indeed is small, Out of weakness watch and pray, find in me thine
all in all. Jesus paid it all, all to Him
I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain,
He washed it white as snow. Lord, now indeed I find Thy power
and Thine alone Can change the leper's spots And melt the heart
of stone Jesus paid it all, all to Him I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain,
He washed it white as snow. For nothing good have I, whereby
thy grace to claim, I'll wash my garments white in the blood
of Calvary's Lamb. Jesus paid it all, all to Him
I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain,
He washed it white as snow. And when before the throne I
stand in Him complete, Jesus died my soul to save, my lips
shall still repeat, Jesus paid it all. All to him I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain,
He washed it white as snow.