Good morning. Let's open this
morning's service with hymn from the hardback, hymnal number 442. 442. Praise him. Praise him. Let's all stand together. We have a power outage here,
Greg. All right, I hope this thing
remembered. Well, let's try this. Praise Him, praise Him, Jesus
our blessed Redeemer. Sing, O earth, His wonderful
love proclaim. Hail Him, hail Him, highest archangels
in glory. Strength and honor give to His
holy name. Like a shepherd, Jesus will guard
His children. In His arms He carries them all
day long. Praise Him, praise Him, tell
of His excellent greatness. Praise Him, praise Him, ever
in joyful song. Praise Him, praise Him, Jesus
our blessed Redeemer. For our sins He suffered and
bled and died. He our rock, our hope of eternal
salvation. Hail Him, hail Him, Jesus the
Christ. His praises, Jesus who bore our
sorrows, love unbounded, wonderful, deep, and strong. Praise Him,
praise Him, tell of His excellent greatness. Praise Him, praise
Him, ever in joyful song. Praise Him, praise Him, Jesus,
our blessed Redeemer. Heavenly portals, loud with hosannas
ring. Jesus, Savior, reigneth forever
and ever. Crown Him, crown Him, prophet
and priest and king. is coming over the world victorious,
power and glory unto the Lord belong. Praise Him, praise Him,
tell of His excellent greatness. Praise Him, praise Him, ever
in joyful song. Please be seated. Good morning. I was rejoicing in singing that
hymn because I knew that that hymn spoke of the message that
I wanted to try to preach this morning from Psalm 105, make
known his deeds among the people. And in the last verse of that
song, it spoke of the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ and
then the second hour I hope to bring a message from Acts chapter
1 on the second coming of Christ. So, it's amazing how the Lord
just knits everything together, doesn't it? Florence has been
admitted into Altamont Hospital, is that right, Jim? With the
flu and Oh, is she getting better? She is OK, good good. I would
want to pray for Florence. Florence, 89 years old and. She was here Wednesday night
and I guess you all went to the hospital on Thursday, yeah? Alright,
let's let's ask the Lord's blessings on our time together. Our merciful, gracious, and glorious
Heavenly Father, thank you for putting into our hearts a desire
to praise you, to come here and to worship you. Lord, we confess
to you that We have no ability. To do what you've. Call us to
do and what you've given us a desire to do. Lest you meet with us. Give us your spirit. Cause us
to. To believe on Christ and to look
to him. Lord and. If you don't open your
word and. Open our hearts and open the
windows of heaven. All that we do here will be in
vain. And so, Lord, we ask that you be pleased this hour and
the next to make yourself known and to bless us with thy presence.
We pray for Florence, and we ask, Lord, that you would draw
near to her heart in this time of sickness and give her spiritual
hope and strength. And we pray for your hand of
healing to be upon her body. We ask it in Christ's name. Amen. Will you open your Bibles with
me to Psalm 105, Psalm 105. We've been looking at this Psalm
for the last few Wednesday nights. And I've titled this message,
if you look in verse one, make known his deeds among his people,
the people. Every time we come together,
we come together in order to make known his deeds. Nothing thrills the heart of
God's people more than to be reminded of who he is and what
he's done. Nothing motivates us more in
the life of faith than to be reminded of his deeds and his
works of grace. Nothing makes us happier than
to glorify and to worship the Lord for the great things that
he has done. Nothing inspires us more than
to be told of the work of God. We just want to hear what he's
done. Let the Let the self-righteous and the religious glory in themselves
and in their works. The child of God glories in his
deeds. And Psalm 105, beginning at verse
17, he sent a man. Now we know that the physical
history of Israel in the Old Testament is a type of the spiritual
history of New Testament Israel. Everything that God did in terms
of his deeds for his people are symbolic. They are representative. They are a type or a shadow of
the works of grace that he does spiritually in our hearts. And
so in Psalm 105, he begins by speaking of Joseph. Joseph. and how the Lord used Joseph
to bring the children of Israel down to Egypt. And later in this
Psalm, he speaks of Moses and Aaron and how he uses Moses and
Aaron to bring the children of Israel out of Egypt. There's no clearer picture and
more glorious type of the Lord Jesus Christ than Joseph. He
was sold as a slave into Egypt. Turn to me to Genesis chapter
45. Genesis chapter 45. These are his works. And they are typical of the work
that he is doing right now, right this very minute among his people.
Look at Tom. Look at Genesis chapter 45 at
verse five. Now, therefore be not grieved
nor angry. Now Joseph has just revealed
himself to his brothers. Joseph has been elevated to the
position of prime minister of Egypt. And in the providence
of God, Joseph's going to relieve the fears of his brothers by
telling them you meant it for evil. But God meant it for good. They are scared. Well, in verse
three, you see the last part of verse three where it says,
for they were troubled at his presence. That word troubled
is the word terrified. They were terrified at the presence
of Joseph. They thought, surely he's going
to kill us because of what we did. And Joseph said unto his brethren,
verse four, come near to me, I pray you. And Joseph being
a type of Christ, our sin sold him into slavery. He went into
the bondage of death for us. And he says to us, come near
to me, come near to me. The spirit and the bride say,
come, I pray you. And they came near. And he said,
I am Joseph, your brother, whom you sold into Egypt. Now, therefore,
be not grieved nor angry with yourselves that you sold me hither.
For God did send me before you to preserve life. Be not grieved, child of God.
Be glad. that God sent his son before
us to preserve life for us. For these two years hath the
famine been in the land, verse six, and yet there are five years
in which there shall neither be earing nor harvest. And God sent me before you to
preserve you a posterity in the earth and to save your lives
by a great deliverance. God sent his son into the world
to preserve his people and to deliver them from death. So now it was not you that sent
me hither, but God. And he hath made me a father
to Pharaoh and a Lord to all the house and a ruler throughout
all the land of Egypt. Everything that that happened
in Egypt, Joseph had to say so over it. When they came to Pharaoh
and wanted food in the famine, Pharaoh said, go see Joseph.
He's got the keys to the storehouse. He's the only one that can open
the storehouse. He's the only one that can provide
bread for starving souls. And and so now when the Lord
recounts his deeds. He's not just recounting some
historical events that took place thousands of years ago. He's
telling us about what the Lord Jesus Christ has done. May not
grieve with yourselves. God sent me. God sent me before
you. You hated me without a cause.
You sold me into slavery. You were jealous of me. And yet
it was all in God's purpose. It was all in God. You remember
what Peter said on the day of Pentecost when he preached, he
said, you with your wicked hands have crucified the son of God,
which God hath ordained beforehand should come to pass. So yeah,
we're responsible for the death of Christ, but God ordained it
for what? For a deliverance, for salvation.
Children of Israel never would have survived Egypt had it not
been for Joseph. You and I will not survive this
Egypt that we live in if it is not for Christ. Go back with me to Psalm 105
and look at verse 17. We are making known his deeds
among the people. Nothing thrills the heart of
a child of God more than to be reminded of his deeds. Notice in verse 17, he sent a
man, a man. The Lord Jesus Christ is the
God man. He was made, yes, in the likeness
of sinful flesh. And the scripture says, a body
thou hast prepared for me. He was born of a woman. God,
the second person of the triune Godhead, was given a body and
made a man. And the scripture says, for there
is one God and one mediator between God and man, the man, Christ
Jesus. There's one mediator between
us and God, only one. There's no way for us to enter
into the presence of God apart from the mediatorial work of
the Lord Jesus Christ. If he doesn't serve as our advocate,
if he doesn't serve as our sin bearer, If he's not our substitute,
if he's not all our satisfaction before God, there's no way you
and I can approach the presence of a holy God. But in Christ,
there's a man. God sent a man made in the likeness of men and
being found in the fashion as a man, he humbled himself and
became obedient even unto death. God had to be made flesh and
dwell among us in order for him to bear our sins in his body
on the tree and satisfy the demands of God's justice. We've got a
man in heaven, a mediator interceding on our behalf. And he says to
us what Joseph said to his brothers, come near to me, be not afraid. God sent me. to preserve life
for you. Romans chapter 8 says what the
law could not do and that it was weak through the flesh God
sent his son in the likeness of sinful flesh to redeem them. To redeem them. Notice Notice in our text in
Psalm 105 verse 17, he sent a man before them, even Joseph, who
was sold as a servant. You remember what happened. Joseph
was sent out to find out the state of his brothers by his
father, Jacob, and his brothers were jealous of him. And so when
they saw him coming, they plotted to kill him. And they would have
killed him, but Reuben stepped in and said, let's don't kill
him, let's put him in a pit. And Reuben was determined to
come get him out of the pit and send him back home to his father.
Only problem was that some Midianites came. Some merchants came along
and Judah thought, well, let's just sell him as a slave to these
Midianites. And we'll be rid of him that
way. We won't have blood on our hands.
And so they conspired together and agreed that yes, that's what
we'll do. And they sold him for 20 pieces of silver and he became
a slave, a servant. How much was the Lord Jesus Christ
sold for? 30 pieces of silver, which was according to the law
of God, the price of a slave. The scripture says if you owned
an ox and your ox killed your neighbor's slave, that you had
to pay your neighbor 30 pieces of silver in order to redeem
the life of that slave that your ox killed. And that's exactly
what the Lord Jesus Christ was sold for. And he was sold into
slavery and he became a servant. not our servant, a servant unto
God. Behold, my servant, mine elect, the one whom I uphold. He thought it not robbery to
be equal with God, but made of himself for no reputation and
became obedient unto the father, even unto death. The Lord Jesus
Christ was doing business with his father on Calvary's cross
and he willingly was sold into slavery, became a servant to
his father. Judas, his familiar friend, the
scripture says, sold him for 30 pieces of silver. And they
did to him what they did to Joseph only in its fullness. Look what
the scripture says happened to Joseph. Joseph who was sold for a servant,
whose feet they hurt with fetters, and he was laid in iron. Now, in the margin of my Bible,
it says his soul came into iron. In other words, his soul was
bound. God made his soul an offering
for sin. When the Lord Jesus Christ bore
our sins in his body upon the tree, he was fettered. He was fettered with iron and
his soul was bound to that cross. A willing sacrifice. His feet, they hurt with fetters. The feet of our Lord, you and
I can't stand. We're like Mephibosheth, aren't
we? We're crippled in both of our feet. We're crippled from
a fall, from our birth, as a result of the inheritance, if you will,
or the imputation of our Father Adam's sin, we were born spiritually
dead, unable to stand in the presence of God. And yet the
Lord Jesus Christ was wounded for our transgressions. What
our feet could not do, his feet were wounded for. They drove
spikes through his feet. And he was fettered with iron
to that cross, willingly making himself a sacrifice to the father.
Now, I grew up feeling sorry for Jesus. I really did. Every time I came into church,
I saw a picture of what was supposed to be him hanging on a cross.
And the motivation in my childhood was to feel sorry for God and
to, well, just feel sorry for him. And I love what the Lord
said when he was going to the cross and there were those women
that were weeping for him. And he looked at them and he
said, don't weep for me. Don't weep for me, weep for yourselves
and for your children. That's who we need to weep for,
isn't it? And so we're not recounting the fetters of the Lord Jesus
Christ that we might somehow feel sorry for him. He laid his
life down willingly for the sheep. He was doing business with his
father. We need to weep for ourselves. We need to be broken for our
own sin and realize that we mourn after him as one mourneth for
his only son, for when the spirit of grace and supplication is
poured out on the house of Israel and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem,
they shall mourn after him whom they have pierced. It was our
sin that pierced the Lord Jesus Christ, whose feet they hurt
with fetters, His soul was laid in iron. Look at verse 19. Until
the time that his word came, the word of the Lord tried him. Now you remember what happened
to Joseph. Joseph was put in prison by Potiphar. Potiphar's
wife had wrongly accused Joseph and he was thrown into prison.
Potiphar had the authority to have Joseph put to death right
there on the spot if he'd wanted to. And under normal circumstances
he would have. I don't know if Potiphar knew
that Joseph was innocent. He knew his wife. Maybe he had
to present a sham of defending his wife when he knew she was
the one that was guilty. I know this for certain, that
God restrained him and Joseph was put into prison. And the
prison guard ended up giving Joseph total authority over it.
The scripture says, and whatsoever they did there, he was the doer
of it. The Lord Jesus Christ has complete
authority over all those who are bound in the prison of their
own sin. He came into captivity. to set captivity captive, to
make us free. He stormed the gates of hell
in order to deliver us out of it. And you remember there was
two men that had a dream when Joseph was in prison, the butler
and the baker. And Butler came to Joseph and
told him his dream, and Joseph said, in three days, you're going
to be delivered, and you're going to be restored back to your rightful
place. And the baker got bold, and he thought, well, maybe my
dream will have a good outcome as well. And the baker goes to
Joseph, and Joseph gives him the interpretation of his dream,
that in three days, he'll be killed. His head will be taken
from him, and he'll be hanged in a tree, and the birds will
eat the flesh off his body. It's what Joseph said to him.
And three days later, exactly that happened. It was Pharaoh's
birthday and Pharaoh celebrates his birthday and Joseph words
comes true in the scripture. Joseph told the butler, he said,
when you delivered, remember me. And the scripture says at
the end of chapter 43, I think in Genesis, he said, and the
butler forgot him, forgot all about him until Pharaoh later
had a dream and nobody could interpret Pharaoh's dream. And
the butler remembered, there's a guy in prison that's able to
interpret dreams. He's able to prophesy. And you
know the rest of the story. Pharaoh went and sent for Joseph
and Joseph came and interpreted the dream of the seven days of
famine and the seven days of plenty, and it's a picture of
the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the only one that can interpret
the scriptures. All the word of God and all the
promises of God are yea and amen in Christ. Joseph, as a matter
of fact, when they came to him, throws three times, he said,
God alone can interpret dreams. God alone can tell you what the
future is going to be. And the Lord Jesus Christ as
God knows all our future, doesn't he? And he interprets all the
truth. And he says, and at that time,
look at verse 19, until that time, until his word came, the
word of the Lord tried him. Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation,
a stone, a tried stone, a precious stone. I'm hoping by next Sunday
that, yes, the walls that you see out here are the floor level
of our new building. And I'm hoping by next Sunday
the plumbing will be in and the concrete for the slab will be
poured. That's the plan. If it doesn't happen by next
Sunday, maybe by the next. That concrete that they put in
those footers and the concrete that they put on the slab, actually
they test it. It has to pass a test and it
has to be resilient up to 3,000 pounds per square inch in order
to be able to hold up the building. and they've actually put some
in a machine and make sure that it's mixed properly before they
pour it. Otherwise, it would crumble and
the building would fall. The most important part of that
building is what we're seeing right now, the footers and the
foundation. Holds it all together, doesn't
it? And the Lord Jesus Christ is that stone. He, God has made
him the head of the corner. He's the cornerstone of this
church upon this rock. I shall build my church. And
the scripture says he is a tried stone. What was he tried by?
It was tried by the law of God. The law of God inspected every
thought that he had, every word that he spoke and every deed
that he performed, and the law of God was satisfied that everything
he did was according to the perfect law of God. And then he was tried
on Calvary's cross for his obedience. He was obedient unto the Father,
even unto death. Now the old writers used to call
his life his act of obedience and his death his passive obedience.
But the point is that his obedience culminated at the cross. He was
obeying the father when he went to the cross. He was tried and
he was proven to be faithful when he was perfect in his obedience
to God. And consequently, that rock is
able to hold up his church. And he's able to hold up you
and me, isn't he? Scripture speaks of the man who builds his life
on a rock. And when the winds come and the
storms fall, he's not just talking about the difficulties of this
life. Yes, the Lord will sustain you in those things and give
you hope to know that all things work together for good and that
he's sovereign and in control of all of our circumstances.
But the real storm hadn't come yet. The storm of God's judgment,
it is appointed unto man once to die. And after that, the judgment,
that's the real storm. How are we going to escape that?
How are we going to escape the wrath that is to come? Only if
Christ is the foundation. Only if we're standing on that,
otherwise it's all shifting sand, isn't it? Until the time, look at verse
19, that his word came, the word of the Lord tried him. And the king sent, verse 20,
and loosed him, even the ruler of the people, and let him go
free. Now what's that a reference to?
It's not just a reference to Joseph coming out of prison.
It's a reference to the resurrection. The Lord Jesus Christ was tried. He was proven faithful. He was
put into the tomb. And the king, the father, could
not allow his Holy One to see corruption. And God the Father
was obligated to raise Christ from the dead, proving that everything
that the Lord Jesus Christ accomplished, the Father was satisfied with.
That's what Joseph's a picture of. These are the deeds that
are being declared among his people. It's not about Joseph
and Israel and Egypt and Pharaoh. It's about me and you, and it's
about Christ. The king sent and loosed him,
even the ruler of the people and let him go free. He made him Lord of his house
and ruler of all of his substance. God, the father has given the
Lord Jesus Christ preeminence. The scripture says over all things,
he has made him ruler over the people. Because of his obedience,
God has declared him to be Lord. Lord over the living, that's
the believer, and the dead. Spiritually dead, that's the
unbeliever. People say, well, I'm not going to bow to him. You may not, but he still reigns
sovereign over you. One day you will. One day every
knee will bow and every tongue will confess. Don't talk about
making Jesus Lord of your life. God's already done it. He's already
done it. He's Lord. Just as Pharaoh said
to all the Egyptians, that man right there, he speaks for me. Whatever he says is what goes.
So God the Father has said of the Lord Jesus Christ, that man,
the God man, He has preeminence over all men and all things,
and no one can stay his hand, and no one can say unto him,
what doest thou? Oh, what a blessing it is to
be made willing, to bow willingly to the sovereign God. The Lord
Jesus Christ is ruler over the people. He made him Lord over
his house and ruler of all his substance. Now that word substance
is possession. So he's Lord over his house and
his children and his people delight in calling him Lord, but he's
ruler over all possessions. Well, what are all the possessions?
What does God own? What does God have? Everything.
That's right, Don. Everything, everything, everything
in this world, the cattle on a thousand hills and the hills
too. I mean, he just, he owns everything, doesn't he? And God
has given him preeminence over all the possessions of the King. Look at verse 22. to bind his princes at his pleasure
and teach his senators wisdom. All men, all men are either bound
in the prison of sin and their own unbelief or they are bound
to Christ. No one's free. No one's free. No one is free. Not in the sense
that men talk about freedom as if they can willy nilly do whatever
they want when they want. All men are subject even to their
sin or to Christ as their savior. The Lord Jesus Christ came into
the prison of man's sin to set captivity free. to set the prisoner
free. He stormed the gates of hell. He went in and received each
one of his children and took them out. And what does he do? Notice in
our text, to bind the princes at his pleasure. Oh, I want to
be bound to Christ, don't you? I want to be in, you see, you're
either under the yoke of your sin or you're in the yoke with
Christ. And if you're in the yoke with
Christ, he's going to teach you wisdom. And when he teaches you
wisdom, all he's doing is revealing himself to you, for he is the
personification of wisdom. God has made him to be for us
all our wisdom, all our righteousness, all our sanctification, and all
of our redemption. God would get all the glory.
And James says, if any of you lack wisdom, and that little
preposition, if, is often translated sense. And in that text, I think
it'd be better sense. Since you lack wisdom, ask it
of God and he will give it to you liberally and he will upbraid
if it not. Oh, Lord, give me Christ. Give
me Christ. I want more of him. I want to
know him. God's made him to be our wisdom. That's why Joseph was put in
the place that he was put in to bind the princes, all the
princes and all the governors and all the elders and all the
senators of Egypt were subject to Joseph. And so it is today
to teach them wisdom. Israel also came into joy onto
Egypt verse 23. Israel came into Egypt, and Jacob sojourned in the land
of Ham. That's where we are right now.
We're sojourning in the land of Ham. You know, just like this
world is typified by Babylon, so it is by Egypt. But God made a distinction between
the Egyptians and the Israelites. And though we live in Egypt,
we're not subject We're not subject to Egypt. Um, when the Lord tells
us in Galatians chapter five, stand fast in the Liberty with,
I have made you free and be not entangled again with the yoke
of bondage. He's talking about going back
to Egypt. Don't you're not, you're living in Egypt, but you're not
a slave to Egypt anymore. You've been delivered from that
slavery. And he increased his people greatly and made them
stronger than their enemies. He made them to differ. Now,
child of God, I'll close with this. We know who made us to
differ. And if the Lord makes us to differ,
then there can't be any pride or arrogancy or self-righteousness
or looking down our nose at others. Uh, we, we, we, we don't, we
don't live our lives that way. There's a spirit of grace and
humility. Now that all having been said,
we know the truth. We look at the values and the,
and the things that this world holds so true. And we think how
silly, how, how, how. How contrary to the truth is
this world? Child of God, we're not intimidated
by this world. The Lord says we're gonna stand
in judgment of this world. And we stand in judgment now,
not with arrogance, but we're able to make righteous judgments.
We're able to discern the truth between the difference between
what's true and what's not true. And everything in this world
is contrary to the truth. And God's people walk through
this world with their eyes open. We don't have to be intimidated
by this world. We don't have to be sucked into this world.
Look at this, what this verse means. Look at it again. He increased
his people greatly and made them stronger than their enemies. Your strength is in that you
know the truth. And the truth has set you free.
That you don't have to get caught up in all the things that the
enemies of God get caught up into. The Lord made you to differ. The Lord made you to see. Make known, if you do see and
if you do differ, it's because God made it to be so, isn't it?
And he gets all the glory for it. Make known his deeds to the
people. All right, let's take a break. Okay.