Simon took us through the book
of Joel last week and we saw how Joel presents our God as
being faithful, faithful in stripping, faithful in wounding, faithful
in declaring His promises to His people, and faithful in sending
the Holy Spirit to build His Church. And it's a remarkable thing to
ponder that after all the stupendous activities of our great God and
Saviour, three and a half years of manifesting the glory of God
on this place, revealing God in all of His character, in His
faithfulness to His covenant promises, in His faithfulness
to His people, His faithfulness in healing and restoring those,
the broken-hearted, His faithfulness in declaring salvation, His faithfulness
to the very end, And now the Blessed Holy Spirit is poured
out. God the Holy Spirit is poured
out. He takes the things of the Lord
Jesus Christ and He reveals them to men. And look at the means
that He uses. A Galilean fisherman, who by
the testimony of these learned people, in Jerusalem not only
had a very serious problem with his accent, but they were unlearned
men, unskilled, untutored in any of those things. It is a
remarkable thing that the declaration, the declaration to this world
of the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ is left to the Church. This is an activity of God's
church. It's a great song we sang, wasn't
it? The church is one foundation. It is, in the eyes of this world,
a weak and frail organisation. And yet within that vessel of
clay, within that fragile, that fragile, easily dismissed group
of men is the treasure of eternal life for your souls. It's a remarkable thing, isn't
it? And I love how Peter is led by the Holy Spirit, and I trust
But as he moved the hearts of 3,000 people that day and continued
to move the hearts of people throughout the Book of Acts,
the sermons don't need to change. In Acts 2 verse 40 we see that
this, with many other words, did he testify and exhort. This is a summary, but this is
God the Holy Spirit's summary of this sermon. May it be the
basis of every sermon we ever hear. And may God bless it to
our hearts as he did to others. Save yourselves, Peter says,
save yourselves from this untoward generation, this crooked, bent,
twisted generation. Save yourselves from this religion
of this generation. May God do in our hearts today
as he did in the hearts of those people. Let's pray. Our Heavenly Father, we come
before you. Dependent, we come before you
as beggars, our Father. We come before you to openly
and clearly acknowledge that, as the Lord Jesus said, without
Him we can do nothing. We praise you, Heavenly Father,
that you have promised that your Word goes forth Out of your church,
out of Zion, your word comes from heaven and goes forth into
this earth, and it never returns to you without having completed
your wonderful works. And Heavenly Father, we pray
that that might be our portion this morning, that you might
be the one that speaks to our eternal souls. and that we might
be found among those who call out upon the name of the Lord
and are saved." What a glorious thing. Salvation is of the Lord. Salvation is in the Lord Jesus
Christ. Salvation is in the declaration
of the Gospel that's laid out before us. We pray that that
might be our portion, Heavenly Father. We do again pray for
our brothers and sisters who are absent from us and we pray
for your church around the world and your preachers around the
world, Heavenly Father, that your words would go out and that
your people would find themselves comforted. comforted by the declaration
of who the Lord Jesus Christ is and what He has done and what
He is doing right now. We commit ourselves into your
hands, Heavenly Father, asking your blessing that you might
honour your word to the souls of your people today. For we
pray in Jesus' name, Amen. As we have seen, the Gospel is
so, this Gospel declaration is so unlike the Gospel declarations
that we have heard about in religion and so unlike what the Jews thought
was their Gospel. It is radical. When Peter calls
upon these people to repent, he's asking them to turn aside,
to change their mind about everything in Judaism, about absolutely
everything that they thought Everything that they thought
was for their salvation was actually just contributing to their damnation. The Gospel is a declaration. As we read through Acts, we see
that it is Peter just declaring things. He declares the Old Testament
prophecy, and then he declares the history of that prophecy
fulfilled in their very hearing, and then he declares more prophecy,
more testimony of the Lord Jesus, and then he declares the history
laid out before them. And then he declares more prophecy,
and he declares that history laid out before them. And then
he declares the conclusion to it all. God has made, verse 36,
God has made this same Jesus whom you have crucified, both
Lord and Christ. It's a declaration. It's not
an offer. It's not an appeal. It's not
a call from God who tries to save everyone because He loves
everyone and He can't get them saved. It's a declaration of
a reigning, supreme, sovereign King. It's a declaration of a
successful God Almighty, it's a successful a sovereign, successful
father, a sovereign and successful God, the Son, and now a sovereign
and successful God, the Holy Spirit. They ask no permission
of man to do their wonderful works, and they are not thwarted
in any way by man's activities, no matter how obstinate they
are, no matter how much they publicly mock and persecute them. No matter how personally offended
they are, it's the declaration that goes out. It's a declaration
of God who holds man in His hands. And He can do with every one
of His creatures as He sees fit to the praise of the glory of
His grace. It's a declaration, most particularly,
isn't it? It's a declaration of the person,
the character, which is what it is to have the name, isn't
it? Everyone shall call on the name of the Lord Jesus. It's
to have his character set forth as it is in the Old Testament
Scriptures. The Old Testament Scriptures,
in every page and in every act, bear witness to the Lord Jesus
Christ. And it's a declaration that those
scriptures are fulfilled. They are manifestly fulfilled
in history, a history which is laid out evidently before, a
history which once established doesn't have to keep being re-established. It's a history that these men
were aware of. It's a history that these men
were witnessing that very day and nothing has changed. Our God has not changed. It's a declaration, as we saw
some little time ago, that the events of the Passover were under
the direct rule and purpose of God Almighty. The great transaction
of the cross is a transaction between the members of the Trinity. It was according to the determinate
counsel and foreknowledge of God. put determinate counsel
and foreknowledge. I love how he just speaks as
a sovereign over and over again. Isaiah 46.10 says, God says,
my counsel shall stand and I will do all my pleasure. and God's
people are pleased with the pleasure of the Lord. He says, I call
a ravenous bird from the east, the man that executed my counsel
from a far country, yea, and listen to this God declaring,
I have spoken it, I will also bring it to pass, I have purposed
it, I will also do it. As Nebuchadnezzar had to admit,
all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing. And he
doeth according to his will in the army of heaven and among
the inhabitants of the earth, and none can stay his hand or
say unto him, What doest thou? He is. He is the Messiah, as
Daniel 9 prophesied. These 70 weeks are determined. These 70 weeks are determined.
And it talks about the troublous times, that after three score
and two weeks, the Messiah will be cut off, but not for Himself. And then it says, He shall confirm
the covenant with many. And all that's determined will
come to pass. Shall a trumpet, says Amos 3.6,
be blown in a city, and the people be not afraid? Shall we be evil
in the city, and the Lord has not done it? There is, as the
Gospel has declared, a trumpet blown in the city. Our great
God, who is of purer eyes than to behold evil, and He cannot
look upon iniquity. He has all things and all people
in His hands. It is a declaration that this
eternal covenant, these promises of God, the extraordinary promises
of God fulfilled and written in the Scriptures fulfilled so
gloriously, they are now complete and they are publicly witnessed
to. It is extraordinary, isn't it?
We talk much of the Eternal Covenant because God speaks much of the
Eternal Covenant. We speak much of the Eternal
Covenant because God's ministers, according to 2 Corinthians 3,
are made to be ministers, servants of that eternal covenant. You
just think as you look through Peter's sermon, and you look
at the transactions of the three members of the Trinity. We have
the Spirit poured out in these last days, but it's God who pours
out the Spirit. God the Father pours out the
Spirit. The Lord Jesus Christ is shed
forth. In Acts 2.33, He's being exalted
to the right hand of God, having received the promise of the Father,
the promise of the Holy Ghost, He has shed forth this. God the
Father has sent the Holy Spirit to declare the wonderful works
of the Lord Jesus Christ. God the Son has sent forth the
Spirit. and he shed forth what these
people saw and heard. Our great God, our Saviour, who
is a man approved of God by miracles, signs and wonders, that God did
through him. When they saw the miracles of
the Lord Jesus, they were seeing the hand of God the Father. They were seeing the hand of
God the Holy Spirit. They were seeing the hand of
God the Son. As I said earlier, the events
of that week of the crucifixion, that Passover week, were all
of the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God. Nothing
happens by accident. There is no such thing as chance,
happenance of any way in God's Kingdom. And the resurrection
of the Lord Jesus Christ, He was raised All three members
of the Trinity were involved in the raising of the Lord Jesus
from the dead. The Father raised Him, the Spirit
raised Him, He said He raised Himself. He is the Holy One of
God. His resurrection is proof that
sins have been put away forever. He is risen again to new life
and he said to his people, because I live, you also shall live. Our life is hidden with Christ
in God. We are intimately children of
God, bound up in the wonder of this eternal covenant. God the
Father has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and
Christ, exactly as God the Holy Spirit had promised in all of
the Old Testament scriptures. These men, with wicked hands,
had done what they willed to do, and they are held responsible
before God. So the Gospel is a declaration
of where the Lord Jesus Christ is right now. He was crucified
with wicked hands, he was dead and buried, and he was raised
from the dead by the Father, and now he sits, now he sits
enthroned in heaven. And it's a declaration that His
work is an ongoing work. What He was doing on the day
of Pentecost is the work that He will be doing until the last
of His blood-bought children, the last of those who the Father
gave Him in all eternity, the last of those for whom He took
full responsibility to remove their sins and to robe them in
righteousness, the last of those is born, the end will come. It's a declaration. It's a declaration
that his enemies shall be made his footstool. It's a declaration
and it makes it so abundantly clear that if anyone is ever
going to speak of God with any reference to the God of Abraham,
Isaac and Jacob, if they are going to speak of Him, they must
do so with reference to the Lord Jesus Christ as He is portrayed
in the Scriptures and as He is declared to be in this sermon. And any talk of any God that
doesn't exalt the Lord Jesus Christ is a non-existent God
that cannot say, and cannot help immortal souls in any way. In the Old Testament it's the
God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. In the New Testament it's the
God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. So all this talk of God
which doesn't talk about the Lord Jesus Christ is just meaningless
nonsense according to what we have laid out here before us. As I said earlier, this sermon
is a glorious declaration. It is the foundation upon which
the Church is built. It is the beginning of this Church.
It's the testimony of the Lord Jesus Christ. And as I said earlier,
it's a simple declaration, isn't it? It's a simple declaration
and a simple expounding of scriptures and history fulfilled. May the Lord teach us and guide
us as we proclaim the Gospel that
we wouldn't be moved ever from what is declared in these verses. The only conclusion is the conclusion
that Peter comes to. The history of the scriptures
and the history that was manifestly evident in their very lives is
that now This Lord Jesus, that same Jesus of Nazareth, is both
Lord and Christ. He is God. Jesus Christ is God
Almighty. You call his name Jesus. because He will save His people
from their sins. This glorious Gospel doesn't
declare something that might possibly happen. It doesn't declare
something that is in any way dependent on man. I'm so thankful
for that. This is a declaration of God's
salvation. It is a declaration of the transaction
between the three members of the Trinity, fulfilling all that
they had promised. These people were waiting for
a Messiah. The scriptures that we are going
to look at, Psalm 110, was written a thousand years before the Lord
Jesus Christ came. Psalm 16 was written a thousand
years before the Lord Jesus Christ came. The Jews had had the testimony
of God for all of those years. They'd had 400 years of silence
while they waited for Daniel's prophecy to be fulfilled. And
here it is. It's fulfilled in the Lord Jesus
Christ. It's poured out. It's poured
out. on these people on that day. See it was that message, it was
that message that cut these people to the
heart. Three thousand souls were wounded
in their hearts 3,000 souls called out pleading with God, what must
we do to be saved? What must we do to be saved? It is the only salvation, the
only way that God can save any people ever. You'll save them
through the preaching of this Gospel. It is the power of God
under salvation. The question that lies before
us again and again, isn't it, is what? What is it to call upon
the name of the Lord? What is it to receive that great
promise. As we saw last week, Joel is
a remarkable testimony of God about how he strips as a sovereign
God and sends his army to strip. What is it in Joel to call upon
the name of the Lord? What is it? when God words, when
God takes away, when God sends a plague, a devastating plague
upon people because of their sin and iniquity. I'll just read
some of what Joel says about what it is to call upon the Lord. It's more than just stating a
name. the mob that meets him here on
Friday and hounds out lunch and tells people how wonderful Mother
Teresa is, will talk about the Lord Jesus. Now talk about the
Lord Jesus Christ, and yet If you went to them and defined
him as he's defined in these books of the scriptures that
we read, they would be absolutely horrified. And if you defined
Mother Teresa, whom they worship, as she is defined by this book
of God, they would be absolutely horrified. God's people call
out upon Him. To call out upon Him in Joel
1.9 is to mourn, for the ministers to mourn. The meat offering,
the sacrifice, the meat offering and the drink offering, the sacrifice
is cut off. It's to mourn. The Lord's servants,
the Lord's ministers mourn. In 1 verse 11, Be ashamed, O
ye husbandmen, How, how, they give iron dresses for the wheat
and for the barley because the harvest of the field is perished. In 113 the priests again are
called upon to lament. It is a spiritual activity that's
going on. How, you ministers of the altar,
come and lie all night in sackcloth. It is to call out to the Lord,
to lie all night, because the meat offering and the drink offering
is cut off, when there is no evident sacrifice, there is no
evident worship of God, and God has done it in judgment. In chapter 1 verse 14, Call the
solemn assembly, gather the elders, all the inhabitants of the land
into the house of the Lord your God and cry, cry unto Him, Mr. Call, unto Him. Verse 19 of Chapter 1. O Lord,
to Thee will I cry, for the fire has devoured the pastures of
the wilderness, and the flame has burned all the trees of the
field. All I see in all of what has
happened in my religion is devastation and destruction and judgement
from God. 11. The Lord utters his voice. He shall utter the voice of his
army, for his camp is very great, and he is strong in it that executes
his word. For the day of the Lord is great
and terrible, and who can abide it? To cry upon the name of the
Lord is to know that there is a day of the Lord, a day when
He reveals His sovereignty and reveals His majesty, and you
can't abide it. You can't abide it. To cry upon
the Lord is to seek a place of refuge and a place of hiding,
a place of His provision. Which is why in 2.13 it is, Therefore
says the Lord, turn even to me, turn you to me with all your
heart and with fasting and with weeping and with mourning. That's
what it is to call upon the Lord. With fasting and weeping. And 2.13 it's a spiritual activity.
There's so much religion wants men to do fleshly things. This
is a spiritual activity. Rend your heart. Rend your heart
and not your garment and turn to the Lord God. Turn to the
Lord your God, for He is gracious and merciful. In the midst of
this destruction, in the midst of this wasting away all that
the flesh of men and the religion of men is proud of, He is gracious
and He is merciful. You turn to Him because, and
you cry out to Him because of His character as it is revealed. He is gracious and merciful. It is to cry out, is to heed
the Prophet's words to the people, isn't it? Blow the trumpet in
Zion, sanctify a fast call, a solemn assembly. Gather the people,
2.16, that sanctify the congregation. Gather the children, those that
suck at the breast. Let the bride for him go forth
of his chamber and the bride out of her closet, even at the
times of the deepest pleasure of human flesh. Go out from there. Go out and come to a solemn place. Let the priests, the ministers
of the Lord, weep. That's what it is, to cry, weep. And they cry out to God. To cry
out to God is to say, spare thy people, O Lord, and give not
thine heritage to reproach. It is this heritage of God is
reproached among the nations. Our Saviour's name is reproached
among the nations. And we weep and we say, We call
out, don't let your heritage, don't let your name be a reproach. Magnify and glorify your name. And why should they say, why
should the people say, where is their God? That's what these
people were saying, where is their God? That's what they said
to the Lord Jesus Christ on the cross. Where is his God? He cries out to God, where is
his God? If God's his God, why hasn't
he saved him? Oh, how wonderfully the gospel
was proclaimed by the enemies of God. He saved others, and
he couldn't save himself. And the response of our God,
isn't it? The Lord will be jealous. Verse 18, Lord will be jealous
of his land for his land and he'll pity his people and he
will send blessings as you remove and he removes the northern armies
and he says, fear not. Fear not, O land, be glad and
rejoice, for the Lord will do great things. And then he says
in verse 23, after all of this has come upon them, he says,
Be glad, children of Zion. Rejoice in the Lord your God,
for he has given you former rain moderately, and he will cause
to come down for you the rain, the former rain and the latter
rain in the first month. He will bring the rain that will
bring the harvest complete and perfect and into His barns. And the barns will be full of
wheat. All His blood-born children will be brought in. He brings
this destruction. He brings this wasting. He strips
and He wounds. He kills. that he strips to clothes,
and he wounds to heal, and he kills to make alive again. And you shall eat, verse 26 is
wonderful, you shall eat in plenty and be satisfied, and praise
the name of the Lord your God, who has dealt wondrously with
you. He's dealt wondrously with you,
brothers and sisters in Christ. You look back upon your journey
through this world and you will say, He's dealt wondrously with
me. He's dealt wondrously with me. Again and again and again
you'll say, He's dealt wondrously with me. Amazingly. And my people, he says, he says,
my people shall never be ashamed. My people, this little band,
this little band in Jerusalem, this little group of 120 people,
they'll never be ashamed. They will go into Jerusalem led
by my Spirit. They will go to the very epicentre
of man's self-righteous, legalistic religion in this world. They'll
go to the very heart of their enemies. They'll grow to their
throne room. and there they will declare these
things, and there they will triumph, not because of anything in them. Just imagine what it must have
been like for some of those people in that crowd as they looked
out on this Galilean fisherman, that they could mock for his
accent, they could mock for his clothes, and also some of them
there, Some of them there might have said, when they saw Peter
proclaiming to those people, he's the fellow I saw at the
fire at Caiaphas' house. He was the guy who denied the
Lord Jesus three times. He's the fellow who swore and
cursed, as if by his foul language he could prove that he didn't
belong to the Lord Jesus and had nothing to do with Him, to
save his skin. And he skulked away like a coward.
I saw him running away in the garden. I saw that other mob
there. They all ran away in the garden.
And here they are, taken to that place by God. My people shall
never be ashamed, says the Lord Jesus Christ. They might be ashamed
of all the things of their flesh, they'll never be ashamed. They'll
never be ashamed before God. They're His people. As we read
through it, you'll see again and again He talks about My people,
My people, My people. And then in verse 27 he says,
and you shall know. There will be a knowing, there
will be a knowledge. You shall know that I am in the
midst of Israel. I am in the midst of my spiritual
nation Israel. I am the king over my nation
Israel. I reign over my kingdom. I reign as an absolute sovereign
monarch. I reign to do great things to
them. I reign to deal wonderfully with them. And I, I love what
he says, isn't it? That I am the Lord your God and
none else. And none else. I am the Lord
your God and none else. He owns his people, doesn't he? He owns his people. They're his
from eternity. He created them, he redeemed
them, he bought them, he restored them. They're always been his
people. There have always been these
people, brothers and sisters. And then, that's why, all that
leads up to what Peter speaks of in Joel 28. He will pour out
His Spirit and He will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth,
blood and fire. The sun shall be turned to darkness.
It was when the Lord Jesus was crucified. And then He makes
this amazing promise. And it shall come to pass that
whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be delivered. For in Mount Zion, in Jerusalem,
shall be deliverance as the Lord has said." And it's fascinating,
if you look at Joel 2.28, you'll see that Pepita does not finish
the sentence. That's all of the sentence he
says. He does finish it. He does finish
the sentence, but he finishes it after he's declared all those
things that have happened. They, his people, they shall
know that the Lord dwells in Zion. He dwells in His church,
which is why when the Lord Jesus meets Paul on the road to Damascus,
He says to Paul, why have you persecuted me? You touch one
of my little ones and you touch me. You touch one of my little
ones and you must deal with me. You must deal with me as a sovereign
monarch. The Lord dwells in Zion, and
Jerusalem shall be holy. The Jerusalem above, the church
of our Lord Jesus Christ, will be holy. As I said earlier, Peter does
this wonderful thing where he quotes these verses, and the
people he quoted them to knew them. They knew them off by heart. They knew that these were messianic
promises. And in that heightened atmosphere,
they were excited about Messiah coming. They were excited about
Messiah coming and restoring them to the position of preeminence
they had under King David and Solomon, removing the Romans
from them. They thought the Romans were
their enemy. They had absolutely no idea that the religion of
Jerusalem and their own self-righteous wickedness was their enemy, a
far greater enemy than Rome. Don't fear him who can kill the
body. Fear him who can cast body and
soul into hell. And he quoted them, didn't he?
This man is approved of God. Then in Acts 2.25, he speaks
of David. He says in 2.24, Acts, whom God
has raised up, having loosed the pains of death, for it was
not possible that death should hold him. And then in 225, he
says, for David speaks concerning him. He says, I foresaw the Lord
always before my face, for he is on my right hand, that I should
not be moved. Therefore did my heart rejoice
and my tongue was glad. Moreover, my flesh shall rest
in hope, because thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, neither
wilt thou suffer thine Holy One. to see corruption. Thou hast
made known to me the ways of life. Thou shalt make me full
of joy with Thy countenance." It's a great promise, isn't it? Psalm 16 is a great promise.
Let's go back and turn in your scriptures to Psalm 16. It's
a glorious psalm. It begins with a prayer of faith.
It then has a declaration of that faith, it has a contentment
resting in faith, and then it finishes, as Peter quoted, with
the joy, the confidence of faith into the future. It's called,
as I said earlier, a Michtam of David, something that might
be hidden, something that might be secret, something that might
be a mystery. And like so many of the Psalms,
it begins with prayer, it implies trouble, and it abounds in holy
confidence, and it finishes with songs of assurance. Just like
the journey of the Lord Jesus Christ. through this world is
the journey of his people. And listen to the prayer of faith.
Preserve me, O God. Keep me, guard me, save me. Preserve me, O God. For in thee do I The word God there is L, it means
the omnipotent one. It's a declaration of the character
of God. You preserve me, O God, for in
Thee do I put my trust. You cannot truly call upon the
Lord unless you believe. Unless you believe, Unless you believe that He is
and that He is able to save, to call upon the name of the
Lord is to call upon Him as His character. These words are on
the lips of the Lord Jesus Christ, aren't they? They are to some
about the Lord Jesus Christ. When He says, Preserve me, O
God, He is saying, Preserve me and all of my body. Every last
little bit of my body, every last member of my body is to
be preserved. And his preservation is a preservation
in terms of his covenant with his people. In Isaiah 49 verse
7 and 8 he says, Preserve thee and give thee a covenant for
the people. You see, the wonderful thing
about this declaration, isn't it, is that our faithfulness
before God is the faithfulness of the Lord Jesus Christ. He
lived by faith every moment of his life on this earth. perfect
faith in God. He lived by faith. You see, to
live by faith is to look out from yourself and look to another,
and that's exactly what the Lord Jesus Christ did. He looked out
from another, another to preserve him. And he says, O my soul,
thou hast said unto the Lord, and when you see the word L-O-R-D
in capital letters, it's that name Jehovah, for thou art my
Lord, Adonai, for thou art my Lord. O my soul, thou hast said unto
the Lord, Thou art my Lord, and then he speaks words which are
just extraordinary. He says, My goodness extendeth
not to Thee. All of the works of the Lord
Jesus Christ added nothing to the inherent glory of our great
triune God. Job puts it so well, doesn't
he, in Job 35.7. If thou be righteous, what do
you give him? If you're righteous, what do
you give to God? How do you add to him? Well, what does he receive
from your hand? The redemption was accomplished
and it disclosed and displayed all the glorious attributes of
our God. If you want to find any of the
attributes of our God and study them in detail, you go to the
cross and on the cross you'll find out about the love of God
and the sovereignty of God and the grace of God, the mercy of
God and the love of God. All those attributes are on display,
and it added nothing to his essential being. But, there's a lovely
but, isn't there? But, to the saints, to the holy
ones that means, isn't it? To the holy, the saints that
are in the earth. And look how he describes the
saints. The excellent. What a great declaration of God's
love for His people. The sanctified ones are made
holy not by anything that they have ever done, they are made
holy by His word and His work. They are here. Someone said the
poor believers are God's receivers, those that call out to Him and
cry out to Him. And it was. It was to the joy
set before Him. What's the joy that's set before
the Lord Jesus Christ? It's the glory of His Father's
name, but it's the glory of His Father's character. in the saving
of his people, the accomplishments of that. That's the joy that
was set before him, that took him to the cross. And then he
says these strong words, and the people that heard Peter speak
on that day would have recited these words in their hearts,
brothers and sisters. But their sorrows shall be multiplied
that hasten after another God. Their drink-offerings of blood
will I not offer, nor take up their names upon my lips." See, Peter, when he's calling
on these people to repent, when they're cut to the heart, What is exposed is the high crime
of idolatry. It's the high crime of idolatry. They hasten after another god. They run and run and run. They are busy chasing after their
other gods. They put the children of God
to shame often with their zeal chasing after another god. The Lord Jesus came to destroy
the works of the devil. He didn't come to patronise them.
He didn't come to be allied to them in any way whatsoever. When
the demons declared who He was, He never acknowledged it. Someone
said, and I can't quote who it is, I'm sorry, but he said, it's
a very, very dangerous thing. to eat at the devil's table,
no matter how long the spoon is, the handle on the spoon. You get the picture that he's
dangerous. The Lord Jesus never did it.
He calls his people to come out from among them. He calls on
those people that day to forsake Judaism completely. every last little tiny bit of
it. You come out from among them.
His call to people is exactly the same today, isn't it? Wherefore
Jesus also that he might sanctify the people with his own blood
suffered without the gate. That gate, that camp, that he
speaks of is the camp of Jewish religion. It can be nothing else
in that day. He says, let us therefore go
out to him. You go to him, unto him. Where is he? He's not in the
camp anymore. He's not in that camp. You go
to him without the camp and you might bear his reproach. that
God's people will never be ashamed. You'll bear the reproach of men
and the smile of God all at the same time. We're not to have
anything to do with them. Their sorrows shall be multiplied.
The Lord, can't wait to go back and talk about the Lord. The
Lord is the portion of mine inheritance and of my cup. Thou maintainest
my lot. He supplies all of our necessities. Think of Psalm 23. Our cup, He
supplies all of it. My lot. He speaks of His lot,
doesn't He? What's His inheritance? His inheritance
are His children. His inheritance is His bride. And he says, the lines have fallen
to me in pleasant places. Yea, I have a goodly heritage. The lines of God's providence,
the lines of God's covenant have fallen to me in pleasant places.
He says, doesn't he, Lo, I come in the volume where the book
is written of me. I delight to do thy will. O my God, yea, thy
law is within my heart. The lines of electing love, the
lines of covenant grace and mercy, His portion, His people, His
blood-bought people, the children the Father has given Him, all
the lines of providence have fallen to Him in pleasant places. All the lines of providence,
the boundary lines of providence, have fallen in pleasant places
for all of God's children. These verses, verse 7, I'm sorry. It says,
I will bless the Lord who has given me counsel. There is praise
to the Lord from the lips of our great God who has given me
the counsel. My reins, my inner man instruct
me in the night seasons. as night seasons when he comes
to his own, in his own communion with Him, away from the business
of the day. And now verse 8 of these words
that Peter quoted. He says, I have set the Lord
always before me, because He is at my right hand. He was saying,
wasn't he, that God the Father was at the right hand of the
Lord Jesus through all that happened. and is now at the right hand. They are at that hand of power,
that hand of authority. I shall not be moved. If God
is with you, you will not ever be moved. You will not be moved
from your course. You will not be moved from his
faith. You will not be moved from his
reward. He will not be removed from his
bride. God's children are kept by the
power of God through faith. We're kept by God. Therefore,
therefore my heart is glad and my glory rejoices. And these
verses speak of his death, don't they? They speak of his death
and his exaltation. My flesh shall rest in hope.
That body that they put in the grave shall rest in hope. His death separated his body
and soul, for thou wilt not leave my soul in hell. He suffered
all of the hell of God's furious wrath against the sin of all
of his people. He suffered that on Calvary's
tree and he was dead. The law had its answer, it had
its death. And then he says, neither wilt
thou suffer thy Holy One to see corruption. There's no way in
the world the body of the Lord Jesus could be corrupt in any
way at all. It is sin that brings death and
corruption. And if sin is gone and put away,
there is no corruption. Thou wilt show me the path of
life. In thy presence is a fullness
of joy. not here in the things of this
earth, in the presence of God. At Thy right hand are pleasures
for evermore. Heaven's joys are without measure. There is no end to them. Heaven's
joys are full. in every way. It is a fountain
overflowing. Heaven's joys are constant. It's
at God's right hand and protected by His omnipotent power. Nothing
can take His people out of His hand. And the pleasures of heaven
are forevermore. Forevermore. And Peter just reminds
them, doesn't he, in Acts 2.29. Patriarch David, this is speaking
about David. Patriarch David, he's both dead
and buried in his tombs here in our midst today. And he was
therefore being a prophet. All this was prophetic of the
Lord Jesus Christ. Knowing that God has sworn an
oath to him that the fruit of his loins according to the flesh,
that he would raise up Christ to sit on his throne, He, seeing
this before, spoke of the resurrection of Christ, that His soul was
not left in hell, neither did His flesh see corruption. This Jesus has God raised up,
whereof we are all witnesses. Therefore, being at the right
hand of God exalted and having received of the Father the promised
Holy Ghost, he has shed forth, he is not inactive in heaven,
he has shed forth that which you now see and hear." And then
he goes on to Psalm 110. And what a remarkable blessing
Psalm 110 is. Why don't you turn there in your
scriptures. Peter says, For David has not ascended into heaven,
but he says himself, The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou at
my right hand. If you remember one of the last
debates, discussions that the Lord Jesus Christ had with the
Pharisees, in Matthew 22, was about this verse. The Pharisees were always gathered
together to mock him and to trap him. And Jesus asked them, What think ye of Christ? Whose son is he? And they said
unto him, The son of David. He saith unto them, How then
does David in spirit call him, Lord, saying, and he quotes this
psalm to them, The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou at my
right hand, until I make thy enemies thy footstool. And then
he asked the question of the Pharisees. They had always come
to question him, and now he questions them. If David then called him
Lord, how is he his son? And no man No man was able to
answer Him. Neither did any man from that
day forth ask Him any more questions. It was the end of questions for
them. It was the end of questions and
the beginning of plotting to destroy Him. You see, when you
meet the Lord Jesus Christ, two things must happen. You must
either bow or you be enraged. bow or be enraged. Let's quickly
look at Psalm 110. The Lord said unto my Lord, Jehovah
said to my Lord, the Lord Jesus Christ, you sit down here, you
sit at my right hand until I make thine enemies thy footstool. These people have made themselves
by their wicked acts the enemies of God. a footstool. We don't have footstools,
do we, much these days, but the kings had a little tiny low stool
they put their feet on when they sat on their thrones. It's just
a little thing that can be moved around wherever you like. It is a declaration of the absolute
and certain victory of the Lord Jesus and in His victory the
absolute and certain defeat of His enemies. It pictures, of
course, Him sitting When someone sits, he is at ease in victory. His work is done. To be sitting
is to be in a place of order, where justice is done and seen
to be done. It is his place of rest and his
place of triumph. And then he speaks prophetically
about what was happening that day. The Lord shall send the
rod of thy strength out of Zion. He'll send the rod of his strength,
he'll send his word out of Zion. The rod of his strength is his
church, isn't it? It's his word out of Zion. It's maybe translated the scepter
of his might. The rod of his strength. Moses
had that rod, didn't he? He went back to Egypt to a superpower
and he had a word from God and a stick. And he defeated a superpower
with a word from God and a stick. That rod, Moses' rod, was the
rod, the rod of the law, wasn't it, that smithed the rock. And
out of that rock flowed those living waters. And the Lord Jesus
Christ is struck by the law of God and smitten that well of
water That Spirit flows out to dead sinners as he calls it in
John 4 as a well of water springing up to everlasting life. The rod of thy strength out of
Zion. You see the Church is established all around looks like it could
crush the church in a heartbeat. The Lord sets His church there,
just like He sets every individual member of His body in a place
where we are so, so feeble. And in the strength of our own
activities, in our flesh, we can be defeated in a heartbeat.
And yet we are sustained by a power like the Church is sustained
by a power that comes from outside of itself and rules and reigns. Thy people, Psalm 110 verse 3,
Thy people, We read in Joel about thy people
again and again. The Lord speaks of a people that
belong to him. Thy people shall be willing in
the day of thy power. As the Gospel goes out, doesn't
it? Thy people are willing." Three
thousand souls were made willing that day. They didn't have to
be coerced or cajoled. The Spirit of God worked in their
hearts. They came running, didn't they? They came running. In the beauties of holiness from
the womb of the morning, thou hast the jewels of thy youth. It is a great description, isn't
it, of the perfect finished work of the Lord Jesus. It's refreshed
and sustained. The dew comes in a way that seems
almost mysterious. We know the science of it, but
it just comes and it waters the grass and it refreshes it. And so the Church is refreshed.
God admires holiness. Isn't that remarkable? The beauties
of holiness, how wonderful it must be. The new covenant is
new because it's new every morning. The blessings of God's children
are new every morning. And here we have this declaration
in Psalm 110 verse 4. The Lord has sworn and will not
repent, thou art a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. It's a remarkable thing when
God the Father makes an oath, a solemn oath. It's a remarkable
thing when God the Father makes a solemn oath and then says He
will not repent, He will not turn back from it. This is a
declaration of who the Lord Jesus Christ is. He'll art a priest
forever after the order of Melchizedek. At your leisure, go home and
read some. Hebrews chapter 7 about this
Melchizedek. You see, the Lord Jesus Christ
is both a king and a priest. He's God's king. He's king over
this universe and He's God's priest and He operates as God's
priest now. And He operates like Melchizedek,
doesn't he? Melchizedek came mysteriously. He had no lineage. He had no
birth date. He had no death that was mentioned
at all. And he blesses Abraham and shows
himself by Abraham giving him a tithe that he is greater than
Abraham. He was seen just once in the
Scriptures. He was seen just once physically,
and yet by the very presence of who he was, he is esteemed,
remarkably esteemed. In the hands of this king and
this priest and this prophet, we are a secure, in our salvation
as he is secure in the Lord's swearing him to be the priest.
The Lord at thy right hand shall strike through kings in the day
of his wrath. There will be a day, as Joel
talks about, a day of decision, a day of God's judgement. The
first coming of the Lord Jesus and His return in resurrection
glory and His second coming are as one in the scriptures. They are not to be divided. They might be divided in time,
but He will. He will deal with His enemies.
They'll be His footstool, won't they? they will be dealt with
on the day of His wrath and everyone will understand that the heavens
do rule. Yield or be crushed is what Psalm
110 is saying. Like Psalm 2, kiss the sun, kiss
the sun while there's opportunity. He shall judge among the heathen,
He shall fill the places with dead bodies, He shall wound the
heads of the many, Countries, all the rebellious enemies of
his gospel will be destroyed. The Lord Jesus will reign and
they must perish. As he says in Genesis, he says,
my spirit will not always strive with men. He shall drink of the
brook in the way. The brook that's spoken of there,
you can read about it in Isaiah 15, 51. It's the brook Kidron,
through which all the blood and sacrifices, the off-scouring,
that brook that he crossed on his way to Gethsemane, that brook
that he crossed on his way to the cross. He shall drink of
that brook. He'll drink of the wrath of God. and he'll drink it until it's
gone, and he shall lift up his head. He'll lift up his head
in triumph." God's children call out call out to the name of the
Lord. They call out to Him in the character
that's revealed in these verses before Him. They are made willing
in the day of His power. What a glorious thing, the day
of His power, the day of His great power revealed in the hearts
of His people. When He takes Sovereignly removes
the heart of stone and puts the heart of flesh in there. And
he moves the hearts of his people and they are willing to repent.
They are willing to believe. They don't have to be asked to
serve. They're wondering how they can
serve. They're more concerned that the
Lord hasn't put them to service than they are about the service
they do. They're willing to believe. They're willing to be baptised.
They're willing to be numbered with the church. They're willing
to be numbered with Him. And they're willing to be separated
from man's religion, no matter what it costs. No matter what
it costs. He's worth it, brothers and sisters.
Let's pray.