Good evening again Let's open
our Bibles together to first Peter chapter 1 for our scripture
reading tonight first Peter chapter 1 And while you do that Remind
you that Not this Sunday, but the next Sunday, we're going
to have baptism service and lunch together after the service. So,
look forward to that. We've got some of our brethren
from Sarasota that have asked to be baptized. Lord willing, I'm going to bring
a message this Sunday on baptism. So we'll look forward to that. Samantha Pena left today, headed
to Tallahassee for school. Is the volume not up? Oh, I got it. I'm a little slow. Let's read from God's Word, 1
Peter chapter 1. Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ,
to the strangers. That's what we are. We're just
strangers. Have you ever felt like a stranger
in this world? If you're a believer, you do. scattered throughout Pontus,
Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia. Elect according to
the foreknowledge of God." You know, I was reading that this
afternoon and I thought, what did I think about that for so
long? You know, it's just right there. that this Word is written
to those whom God has chosen Himself before the foundations
of the world according to His own foreknowledge, according
to His own grace. Elect according to the foreknowledge
of God the Father through sanctification of the Spirit Unto obedience
and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ, grace unto you,
and peace be multiplied. Blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy
has begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus
Christ from the dead. when the Lord Jesus Christ rose
from the dead all those for whom he lived and died rose with him
and the Lord saying that his resurrection as the firstborn
among many brethren sanctified us before God to an inheritance incorruptible
undefiled nothing in this world is incorruptible nothing in this
world is undefiled except the inheritance that God has reserved
for his people, for his church. And that fadeth not away reserved
in heaven for you." Now admittedly, turning 60 years old in a couple
of months has caused me to reflect more on the brevity of life and
on the hope of salvation but that admission is to my shame
because we ought not to have to be 60 years old to believe
what God has already said and I pray that whether you're
16 or 60 or 80 God will give you the faith to believe that
you're a stranger in this world and that there's a place reserved
for God's people in heaven kept by the power of God through faith
unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time wherein you
greatly rejoice this is the hope that the believer has that we'll
see him as he is and be made like him Though now for a season,
if need be, you are in heaviness through manifold temptations,
that the trial of your faith, being much more precious than
gold, the faith that God gives to His children to believe Him,
is more precious than all the riches of this world. For the
things of this world perish, But faith is tried, is tried
with fire that it might be found unto praise and honor and glory
at the appearing of Jesus Christ, whom having not seen, you love. In whom, though now you see him
not, yet believing, you rejoice with joy unspeakable and full
of glory. This is the rejoicing of the
believer's heart. The hope that the Lord has assured
us of our salvation with Him. Receiving the end of your faith,
even the salvation of your souls. Strangers, that's what we are. Let's ask the Lord to bless his
word to our hearts. Our Heavenly Father, we're so
very thankful for the hope of salvation that the Lord Jesus
Christ has secured for your people. We thank you for the blessing
of your Holy Spirit that gives to us the faith to believe what
you've said. We ask, Lord, that you would
forgive us for our unbelief and that you would increase our faith,
that you would give us ears to hear, and Lord, that by hearing,
our faith would be made true and real and effectual to our
hearts. We ask that you would enable
us in our sojourning here in this world, to set our affections
on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of
God. We pray for our brethren from
Sarasota. We ask, Lord, that you'd give
them safe travels this week and, Lord, that you would bless the
services in their return and particularly their baptisms.
We ask it in Christ's name. Amen. Let's stand together again. There's a passage of Scripture
that I've had on my heart for some months now. You'll find
it in Psalm 39. Psalm 39, if you'll turn with
me there. I've titled this message, Me
and My Substitute. And as we've seen time and time
again, God has written His Word in such a way that These Psalms
are the prayers of the believer's heart, and at the same time,
and at a deeper level, are the reflections, prayers, and accomplished
work of our substitute, the Lord Jesus Christ. You may hear some
people talk about messianic psalms, psalms that obviously refer to
something relating to the Lord Jesus Christ. We believe that
the whole of Scripture is messianic. We believe that in the volume
of the book it is written of me. And beginning with Moses
and the prophets, the psalms and the prophets, all these things
were written in order to expound on the Lord Jesus Christ. So what a great comfort we have
in reading these Psalms as prayers that the Lord gives us. And I
hope tonight that the Lord will put the words of this Psalm on
our hearts to utter them in faith. Prayer that to be effectual has
to be given to us from God. Prayer is not something we work
up. It's just like faith. Faith is the gift of God and
the only way, the only thing God accepts is that which He
provides. And so my hope tonight is that
the Lord will provide us with the faith to be able to utter
the words of this psalm from our hearts to God, believing
that if He does, He'll answer this prayer. The other side to it is that
the Lord would enable us to see how the words of this psalm were
fulfilled in the life and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. So
what we'll do is we'll take one verse at a time and we'll look
first at me and we'll look second at my substitute. We'll look
first at you and then we'll look second at your substitute. In verse 1, I said I will take
heed to my ways that I sin not with my mouth. James said that the mouth is
a world of iniquity. The tongue no man can tame. And how we have found that to
be true in our own lives. The first thing we do is speak
foolishly. We speak to defend ourselves.
We speak out of anger. We speak just so many things
that we ought not to say. And though no man has the ability
to tame his own tongue, the Lord does. The Lord does have the
power to tame the tongue. And if the tongue is tamed, then
the whole man is tamed. That's what James said. And so
our prayer is, Lord, I take heed to my ways that I sin not with
my tongue. Oh, we sing so much more by what
we say than by what we do. I will keep my mouth with a bridle
while the wicked is before me." Lord, would you put a bridle
in my mouth? Would you put a guard over my
lips? Would you control the fiery iniquity of my tongue, particularly
when I'm in the company of the wicked? That I not shame thee? That I not blaspheme thee? Colossians chapter 4 verse 5
says, walk in wisdom towards them that are without. Walk in wisdom before them that
are without. Redeeming the time. Redeeming
the time. Now I just feel sure that when
Paul wrote those words in Colossians chapter 4 that he was thinking
about Psalm 39. because the bulk of this psalm
has to do with redeeming the time that we have. In verse 6
he goes on to say, let your speech be always with grace and seasoned
with salt that you might know how you ought to answer every
man. And so here's our prayer, Lord
I've got a I've got a fiery tongue. I've got a muscle in my mouth
that I can't control. Lord, I'm in need of your grace.
I'm in need of your help. I'm in need of you to remind
me of your ability to tame this world of iniquity. Put a bridle in my mouth, particularly,
Lord, when I am before the wicked. Now, this is a prayer that was
answered by the Father to the Lord Jesus Christ. For when our
Lord was brought before Caiaphas, Caiaphas, the high priest, said
to the Lord, when they had made accusations against him of blasphemy,
he said, answer thou me not in indignation. The Lord, standing
before the wicked, refused to answer him. And the scripture
says that Jesus held his peace. He would not speak. When Pilate
was interrogating the Lord, he became frustrated, did he not?
And exploded with that foolish accusation against the Son of
God that he thought he had the power to crucify Him or to let
Him free. That frustration came because
the Lord refused to answer his questions. and finally said to
him the only power that you have is that which given to you from
my father which is in heaven. I said I will take heed to my
ways that I sin not with my mouth I will keep my mouth with a bridle
while the wicked is before me. I'm so thankful that our Lord
fulfilled that prophecy and that he went as a lamb to the slaughter
and opened not his mouth. He didn't seek to defend himself. He didn't seek to justify himself
or to find some way of escape. He stood there as a lamb. in
charge with the sins of his people and one of the reasons why he
why he didn't speak is because he's guilty he was guilty not
with his own sins but with the guilt and the shame of the elect
his people I was dumb look at verse 2 I was dumb with silence
I held my peace even from good and my sorrow was stirred You
know, here's every believer's experience when the Lord brings
the conviction of sin to their hearts. Paul said in Romans chapter
3 verse 19 that the law shuts every man's mouth that the whole
world might be guilty before God. There was a time when we
thought we could somehow satisfy some, at least, demands of the
law to some degree. And when the law came, we died. And our mouths were shut. We
had no defense. And now we can't speak to God
and say, but Lord, I've done this and I've done that. I've
done many wonderful works in Thy name. No, our mouths are
shut and our hearts are silenced before God because we're guilty
before God. I was dumb with silence. I held
my peace, even from good, and my sorrow was stirred." When
the Lord brings the conviction of sin to the hearts of His children,
He shuts our mouths and He increases our sorrow, doesn't He? He burdens
our hearts with the shame of what we've done against Him.
We're not just having a guilty conscience because
of what, but no, we realize that when the Spirit of God brings
the conviction of sin to the heart, that we say with David,
against thee and thee only have I sinned and done this evil in
thy sight. We realize that our sin is against
God. And so we're silenced in in contrition
before the Lord. Certainly this was true of the
Lord Jesus Christ as He hung on Calvary's cross, was it not?
His sorrow. He felt, you know, we feel to
some degree as the Spirit of God enables us the guilt of our
sin, the Lord felt the full impact of it. We're so accustomed to
sin that sin doesn't bother us much, does it? It's like one brother said, the
thing that bothers me most about my sin is how little it bothers
me. And the Lord's the one that has
to bother us over our sin, doesn't he? Otherwise we wouldn't be.
But the Lord Jesus Christ, when He was charged with the sins
of His people, He felt the full burden of that sin. He experienced
all the evil and all the wickedness of it, like you and I have never
experienced. He knows sin like we don't know
it. He knows the fullness of it.
He knows the darkness of it. He knows the evil of it much,
much better than we do. His sorrow was stirred within
him. What did he cry? My God, my God,
why hast thou forsaken me? He knew that the real consequence
of sin was alienation from God. We're so accustomed in our lives
to be alienated from God and to go about our lives without
any thought of Him that it doesn't bother us much. But the Lord
Jesus Christ had enjoyed perfect fellowship with the Father for
all eternity. And what happened on Calvary's
cross when the sky was blackened and the Father forsook Him was
something that had never ever happened before. And the Lord
felt the full brunt of that. whatever all that means. My heart was hot within me while
I was musing the fire burned then spake I with my tongue.
Oh that we would be silenced before men that we might speak
to God. Turn with me to Isaiah chapter
41. Here's what silence does. God said, be still and know that
I am God. Our lives are so filled with
activity and distractions, it's just very little time to be still,
isn't it? And yet it's this musing, it's
this meditating, it's this reflecting, it's this being still before
God that enables us to hear what He has to say. He's not going
to holler over the television. He's not going to scream over
the radio and over all the noise of the city. He's going to speak. He's going to speak in a still,
small voice. Look what he says in Psalm 41.
Keep silence before me, O islands, and let the people renew their
strength. That's where our strength is
renewed. Just like the sleep of the body renews all the energy
of the flesh, so the resting of the soul and the quieting
of the mouth before God is what restores the soul with its strength. Let them come near. Let them
speak. Let us come near together. to
judgment. To judgment. When we come before
the Lord, we are coming in order to acknowledge the fact that
God has judged our sin. That's the only way. That's the
only way to come before Him. There's no entering into the
presence of God apart from knowing that we have a throne of grace
and we have a high priest that we can draw near with full assurance
of heart to find help and mercy in our time of need. That God
satisfied His divine justice. When the fire of His wrath...
What did we just read? Look at verse 3 again in Psalm 39. My heart was hot within me. What a picture of the sufferings
of the Lord Jesus Christ when the fire of God's wrath fell
from heaven and consumed the sacrifice. The Passover lamb,
God told the children of Israel to burn every bit of it. Don't leave any of it. burn the
bones, burn the hair, burn the hooves, burn all the meat, whatever's
left over, consume it with fire. Why? Because that picture, that
lamb was a picture of what happened when the Lord Jesus Christ went
to the altar of sacrifice, and was consumed with the fiery wrath
of God's justice, and judgment was executed, and God was satisfied,
and our sins were put away once and for all. There's nothing
left to be done. It's done. So here's our prayer. Lord, cause me to be quiet before
Thee. Cause me to hear Thy voice. And here's the Lord Jesus Christ
saying, before the Father, my heart was hot within me while
I was musing the fire burned. Then I spake with my tongue. Oh, the hot sword of justice
pierced the heart of the Lord Jesus Christ until he cried out
in agony. My God, my God, why'st thou forsaken
me? God had made Him who knew no
sin to be sin for us that we might be made the righteousness
of God in Him. And then He declares that glorious
truth. It's finished. It's finished. The fire was quenched. Yes, the
sacrifice was consumed by the fire and the sacrifice consumed
the fire. So that now the Lord is speaking
to us and to the Father in hope that there's no more condemnation. No more condemnation. David said when convicted by
sin that the bones which God had broken Lord, don't let me
just be unaffected by my need for You. Lord, would You stir
this fire in my heart? And thank You for stirring it
in the heart of the Lord Jesus Christ. Look at verse 4. And I'm ashamed to say that this
is the verse that has become so real to me of late. And it is to my shame that I
didn't feel the weight of this like I should have younger. May God give our young people
the faith to believe this. and to pray this and to know
that this is true. You know, we're so much like
the two-year-old who acts as if five minutes is an eternity,
you know, or the 20-year-old that thinks that 40 is old. And
it really is a matter of perspective, isn't it? It's a matter of perspective. And for the child of God, regardless
of how old we are, if we stand on the other side of the grave
and stand in eternity, then we're able to look at this life from
that eternal perspective and believe what God has said about
it. Look at what he says in verse four, Lord, make me to know mine
end and the measure of my days, what it is that I may know, how
frail I am. Lord, would you do that for me?
He does. He afflicts our flesh. He reminds
us often with the death of others. He tells us in His Word, all
flesh is as grass, and the glory of man as the flower of the grass.
The grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away. So by God's Word and through
providential circumstances and by the conviction of the Holy
Spirit, He causes us to believe and to pray this, Lord make me
to know mine end. the brevity of my life to measure
my days that I may be reminded of how frail I am and Lord give
to me assurance of my end give me assurance of my salvation
and don't let me don't let me get that assurance falsely I
listened to a man preach yesterday who A lot of people thought he
used to preach the gospel and the whole message was you measure
the assurance of your salvation by the evidence of works in your
life. That was the whole gist of the
message and I was so grieved by it. An honest person, I mean
I don't know where this guy's coming from, but if he's honest
he knows that he can't do that. Just putting people under the
law Lord, make me to know my end in that the Lord Jesus Christ
is seated victoriously at Thy right hand and has accomplished
everything necessary for my salvation. Lord, would You enable me to
set my affections on Him and to put my trust and my hope in
His accomplished work and to believe that You're satisfied
with Him? to rest in Him. Faith is the assurance of salvation
and faith is looking to Christ. Lord, would you increase my faith? Lord, cause me to be reminded
of how frail I am. Oh, how frail we are. How frail
we are. But here in this verse we also
see our Lord Jesus Christ and what He accomplished. What was
His end? What was His end? Well it was
the salvation of His people. That's what His end was. Father
help me to see my end. Help me Lord to know that though
I'm Well, turn with me to Philippians
chapter two. I have to read this. Philippians chapter two. Look at verse six. Who being
in the form of God, and here we have the Lord Jesus Christ,
who is the Son of God, the second person of the Trinity, the fullness
of the Godhead bodily, and though he was in the form of God, he
thought it not robbery to be equal with God. He did not consider
himself to be blaspheming by declaring his equality with the
Father. he made of himself of no reputation,
and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the
likeness of men, and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled
himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the
cross. Wherefore God hath highly exalted
him and given him a name that is above every name. that at
the name of Jesus every knee shall bow and every tongue shall
confess to the glory to the glory of God the Father now what was
the end up of the Lord Jesus Christ it was the glory of the
Father he said in John 17 father I have glorified thee upon the
earth and that was his goal that was always his goal to bring
glory to the Father and the Father is glorified through the salvation
of those whom He chose in the covenant of grace before the
world began. And so the Lord Jesus Christ's
end, go back with me to Psalm 39 verse 5 or verse 4, Lord make
me to know mine end for the joy that was set before Him For the
joy that was set before Him, that was His end. His end was
that the Father was not going to allow Him to remain in the
tomb. That He was going to reward His
work, and raise Him from the dead, and set Him, as we just
read in Philippians chapter 2, at the right hand of God, and
give Him a name that is above every name. To the glory of God,
all this was going to happen. And so that was his end. That
was his goal. And he went to the cross believing
that God would be faithful. He endured the cross. He despised
the shame. And now he is set down at the
right hand of God. He was made in the likeness of
sinful flesh and made himself subject to death. in order that
he might glorify the Father through the salvation of God's people. That was his end. He went to
the cross with that end in mind. And what we didn't read in Philippians
chapter 2 was the previous verses to the one we started at which
says, let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus. Lord, would you enable me to
set my affections on my end? Well, that just puts everything
in perspective, doesn't it? And it makes sense of everything.
And it gives great peace in whatever circumstances we're in. If the
Lord enables us to believe our end. Look at verse 5. Behold, thou
hast made my days as a hand breath, and mine age is as nothing before
thee. Would you agree with me in saying
that wisdom is seeing things as God sees them? That's wisdom. Seeing things
as God sees them. How does God see this life that
you and I are living here in this world? He is the Ancient
of Days. He is the Eternal God. He is
from everlasting to everlasting. How does He see the few years
that we spend in this world? How does He see it? He calls it a vapor. He says
all flesh is as grass. It flowers for a while and then
it goes away. If the Lord gives us the grace
to pray this prayer in faith, and to ask Him to do this, we
don't have to be 60 years old. We can walk in faith, seeing
things from God's perspective as they really, really are. As they really are. That's the
way it is. You say, well that's the way
God sees it. That's the way it is. The way God sees it is the way it
is. We're the ones that have a distorted view of things. It's kind of like looking at
the sky from underwater. That's where we're at. We look
through a glass dimly now, don't we? Everything's distorted. But
He sees it clearly. And the eye of faith sees it
clearly as well. Look at verse 5. Behold, thou hast made my days
as a hand breath, and my age is as nothing before thee. Verily, every man at his best
state is altogether vanity. Every man at his best state. The best thing that you and I
can ever do is vanity. That's what God says. It's just
vanity. It's empty. There's no substance to us. All
the substance of reality and truth and life is in the person
of the Lord Jesus Christ. There's no substance in us. We're
empty. We're vanity. We can't produce
any righteousness. We can't save ourselves. We can't
do anything that's eternal. He's the only one that can do
it. Man at his very best state. Let man in his best attempts
push out his chest and boast himself all he likes. All it's
doing is one worm saying to another worm, hey, I'm better than you
are. There's nothing to us. There's
just nothing to us. Everything is in the Lord Jesus
Christ. Now, when the Lord Jesus Christ
on Calvary's cross was made sin, He became us. He became us. That passage we just read over
there in Philippians chapter 2, He made of himself no reputation. That word, no reputation, you
look it up. It's vanity. Vanity. He made of himself vanity. He emptied himself before God. He laid aside his deity and took
on the suffering of the sinner. and became the very best man
who was altogether, altogether vanity. He suffered the full wrath of
God. Why? Because he became us, the empty
ones. This man at his best state, and
his best state is seen in his obedience to the Father. Back
to Philippians chapter 2, he made of himself of no reputation
and became a servant and became obedient, what? Even unto death,
even the death of the cross. And so the death of the Lord
Jesus Christ on Calvary's cross is the pinnacle of his faithfulness
before God. And it's the completion of his
work of salvation for his people. That was his best state. And
at his best state, he became altogether vanity. And God has now given him a name
that's above every name. He's exalted Him on high. He's seated at the right hand
of God. That's where He's at. There's
our hope. He is our hope. He is our life. What else is there? What else
is there? It's altogether vanity. It's
a hand breath. It's a vapor. Lord, help me to
count my days. cause me to be reminded, help
me to know mine end, give me assurance that I have an advocate
with the Father, I have a Savior before Thee, and that this life
is not long. I'm but a frail, a frail sinner
that is at my best state, vanity." Verse 6, Surely every man walketh
in a vain show. Oh, the lust of the eyes is strong,
isn't it? I like what I heard one brother
said. He said, I don't have much trouble with pride until someone
else walks into the room. As long as I'm by myself, I don't
wrestle with pride much. But as soon as somebody else
walks into the room, Isn't that the way it is? What does he say? Every man walketh in a vain show. Oh, we want to present ourselves
so much better than we are, don't we? Don't we? But what we are,
what you are and what I am, is the person that we are before
God. Before God. And if the Lord's
given you grace to come before Him, You've come before Him completely
naked. You've come before Him exposing
yourself completely, all that you know, before Him. If He's
given you grace to come before Him. Every man walketh in a vain show,
surely they are disquieted in vain. Oh, how vain we are about
this world and about this life, and we lose sight of the fact
that we're pilgrims and strangers in a foreign land, and we don't
speak the language, and we're not accustomed to their customs,
and we don't have the same standards. Everything's different. Everything's
different for the child of God, and yet we get so caught up in
this world. This is why we need this prayer.
This is why we need God to put on our hearts this glorious truth. Lord, I'm a vain man. I'm more concerned about what
people think than what you think. I'm more concerned about accumulating
worldly wealth than I am laying up treasures in heaven. Lord,
how vain I am. How stupid I am. How short-sighted
I am. Is this true? And Lord, I get disquieted. You
know, the least little thing that doesn't go right. You know,
I plan my day and all of a sudden there's a... somebody's throwing
a wrench into the gears and I just become disquieted. And that's
a kind way to put it. Because sometimes it's a whole
lot worse than just being disquieted. Sometimes I'm out and out mad
and angry and I'm just, you know, I just, Lord just, why do I do
that? He heapeth up riches and knoweth
not who shall gather them. How many times I've seen people
work and save their whole life to accumulate money for their
retirement, to live just a few years, and then they die. And
they leave everything they've worked and saved for to their
ungrateful, irresponsible children. I mean, isn't that the way it
is? I remember a message that Bob
Coffey preached here from Genesis where he went through the begats in the book of Genesis
when they were living to be 600 years old, 900 years old and
at the end of each verse it says, and he died. And he died. And he died. Oh, that God would remind us
of that. And he died. It's coming. It's
coming! Make me to know mine end. Lord,
remind me of how frail I am that I would not become so disquieted
over the circumstances of my life, that I would believe. that you
took on my vanity and suffered the full fiery wrath of God's
judgment for all my sin, that I have an advocate with the Father,
I have a Savior who has succeeded. He has succeeded. He's accomplished
my salvation. It's finished. And He is my hope
of glory. That's what the scripture says.
Christ in you is your hope of glory. But we put so much hope
in this world, don't we? Verse 7, And now, Lord, what
wait I for? And that's what we do. We just got a few days to wait.
Just a few days. What wait I for? My hope is in Thee. All my hope. It's not Christ
plus my decision. It's not Christ plus my works. It's not Christ plus the evidence
of my salvation in my life. It's not Christ plus anything.
Lord, You are my hope. So what are we waiting on? Well,
we're waiting on Him. We're waiting on Him. We say
with John, come Lord Jesus, even now, come. You know, verse 6 is seen in its antithesis in
the Lord Jesus Christ. For His life was not a vain show. His life was lived in perfect
faith to the Father, right to the very end when he said, Father,
into thy hands I commend my spirit. His faithfulness before God is
the cause and hope of our salvation. And he wasn't disquieted. And he didn't heap up riches
not knowing what would happen to them. The riches that he heaped up,
he knew exactly what would happen to them. He knew that not a single
one of those for whom he lived and died would be lost. He knew
that the riches of God's glory and the salvation of God's elect
was going to be accomplished. He was fully confident of that.
Turn with me to Galatians chapter 2. We'll close with this. Well I lied. We're going to read
this verse and I want to go back and just read the rest of the
psalm. There's only a couple verses left. Look at verse 16. Knowing that a man is not justified
by the works of the law, not justified before God by anything
he does, but by the faith of Jesus Christ. the faithfulness. He wasn't disquieted in vain.
He wasn't fearful that somehow his work was going to be in vain,
that it wasn't going to accomplish. No, he knew that the Father would
reward him for his faithfulness. By the faith of Jesus Christ,
even we have believed in Jesus Christ that we may be justified
by the faith of Jesus Christ. Not by the works of the law.
For by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified. Now turn
back with me to Psalm 39. Verse 8. Deliver me from all
my transgressions. There's our prayer and there's
the prayer of the Lord Jesus Christ. Look at the last part. Make me not the reproach of the
foolish. Lord, guard my lips. Give me
the faith of Christ. I was dumb, I opened not my mouth,
because thou didst it." The Lord Jesus Christ didn't open up his
mouth. Why? Because God had charged him guilty. And when God says guilty, what
are you going to say? What are you going to say? Nothing. The same thing you're going to
say and I'm going to say when God charges you guilty. Nothing. Let's shut our mouth. Remove thy stroke away from me.
I am consumed by the blow of thy hand. It pleased the Father
to bruise him. Father, the bones which thou
hast broken are crying out now. That's what David said in Psalm
51. Psalm 53, the Lord was pleased to bruise, the Father was pleased
to bruise the Lord Jesus Christ. Verse 11, When thou with rebukes
dost correct man for iniquity, thou makest his beauty to consume
away like a moth, surely every man is vanity. Oh, Daniel said,
My comeliness was turned into corruption when I saw him. Isaiah
said, woe is me. Peter said, depart from me for
I'm a sinful man. Whenever the Lord's pleased to
lay his hand on you, you loathe yourself and you understand what
you are before God. And you find yourself looking
to the Lord Jesus Christ. Look at verse 12. Hear my prayer,
O Lord, and give ear to my cry. Hold not Thy peace at my tears,
for I am a stranger with Thee and a sojourner, as all my fathers
were. This problem with sin goes all
the way back to our original father. and not a generation
of the sons of Adam have been immune from it. Oh spare me that I may recover
strength. Lord you've slayed me now you're
going to have to raise me again. You've put my face down in the
dirt and you're going to have to enable me to look up. The
Lord Jesus Christ, when he bowed his head on Calvary's cross,
believed that God would not allow him to see corruption. Oh, spare me that I may recover
strength before I go hence and be no more. Oh, we're going to
go hence and be no more soon. Very soon. Young people, believe
it. It's sooner than you think. We're all like a bunch of two-year-olds
that think five minutes is a lifetime, but the way we look at a two-year-old
in their reckoning of time is the way God's looking at us in
our reckoning of time. Oh, how foolish and how slow
of heart to believe we are. Little children. That's how we
act, isn't it? Lord, help me to believe what
You've said. Let's pray together. Our Heavenly
Father, we're thankful for your word. Lord, we would be completely
consumed with the deceitfulness of this world if you did not
speak truth to our hearts. We ask that you would apply your
word gently and fully to our hearts tonight. We ask it in
Christ's name. Amen. All right, let's stand
together. We'll sing number 92 in the sawback
teminal.