Verse 25. And now, O Lord God,
the word that thou hast spoken concerning thy servant, and concerning
his house, establish it forever, and do as thou hast said. And let thy name be magnified
forever, saying, the Lord of hosts is the God over Israel. and let the house of thy servant
David be established before thee. For thou, O Lord of hosts, God
of Israel, hast revealed to thy servant, saying, I will build
thee an house. Therefore hath thy servant found
in his heart to pray this prayer unto thee. And now, O Lord God,
thou art that God, and thy words be true. And thou hast promised
this goodness unto thy servant. Therefore now let it please thee
to bless the house of thy servant, that it may continue forever
before thee. For thou, O Lord God, hast spoken
it. And with thy blessing, let the
house of thy servant be blessed forever. Let's pray. Gracious
Father, thank you again for your word. David in his prayer exalts
your word and thanks you for your word and prays according
to your word. Praise that your will would be
done according to what you spoke. May your word be precious to
us Lord tonight. May we see in it the glories
of our savior and find in him all we need. In his precious
name we ask, amen. Verse 25, again, thou, O Lord
God, the word that thou hast spoken concerning thy servant. You remember this chapter started
off with David saying he wanted to build God a house. And he
had good intentions. He said, I live in a house of
cedar, a beautiful mansion, I'm sure. At the time, being the
most powerful man in the world, his house probably reflected
that. But he said, God's the Ark of
the Covenant and God dwells in a tent. And God, of course, as
we saw, rebuked him in that and said, I don't need you to build
me a house. And he went on to say, I'm going
to build you a house. And that's what David referred
to in the prayer where we just read. And David now is praying,
and notice how he says, oh Lord God, the word that thou hast
spoken. Concerning thy servant. We can
make promises to God and say things that we're gonna do for
God all we want to, but what's important is what's God gonna
do for me? Now that may sound selfish, but
guess what? He don't need us, we need him. And that's basically what he
told David, I don't need you to build me a house. The heaven
of heavens cannot contain God. He doesn't dwell in houses made
with hands like men do. But David wraps up this prayer
by saying what he really wants, what is important. And what all
of our hope hangs upon is that God will do what he has said
he will do. Now that's most important here. do according to what you said. That's our hope. This gospel
is our hope and this is the prayer of a man with faith in God. Think
about this. What he's simply asking is God
do what you said you'd do. Do we need him to do anything
more than that? Think about what he said. And
so having true saving faith. And I say saving faith because
there's different kinds of faith. You know we have a certain amount
of faith in one another. That's not faith that saves.
There's the faith that people believe because of the miracles
that the scripture talks to. But it says the Lord didn't commit
himself unto them because he knew what was in them. They were
just following him. He was doing miracles, not because they believed
on him. And then there's faith that God
gives. By grace are you saved through faith. And that's not
of yourselves, it's the gift of God. not of works, lest any
man should boast. That's the faith David had. And
it shows in his prayer. That's what I'm saying. And the
prayer prayed by a man with faith is God do what you said you would
do. And that's what faith is. Religion talks about how nothing
bad will happen to you as long as you believe enough. You have
enough faith. That's not faith. That's positive
thinking. It may be nonsense. You may be
off on the wrong foot. Let me ask you this, has God
told you nothing bad is going to happen to you? I seem to remember him saying
in this world you shall have tribulation. That's a promise
isn't it? It's almost the opposite isn't
it? It's that way with a lot of things religion says. It's
really just about the opposite. in this world you shall. Now
it's all going to work together for the good of his people, to
them who love him, to those who are called according to his purpose. But religion doesn't like to
talk about that called according to his purpose part. So they
don't mention that. But as far as the world talking
about good things and bad things happening, I can't say nothing
bad is going to happen to you if you have enough faith. That's
not faith anyway. Religion says if you have cancer
and you want to be cured of that cancer, just name it and claim
it. That's what they say. Why didn't Stephen just do that
when they were stoning him to death? You just name it and claim
it, you know. in Acts chapter 7. God has not
promised that nothing bad will happen to his people according
to what this world and we usually consider bad things happening. And faith is not believing that
God will do what you want him to do. Faith is believing that
God will do what he said he would do. That's what David's talking
about. Lord according to your word You
said you would bless me. That's what I want to happen.
That's all we need. The blessing of God is everything.
If you have God's blessing, His blessings are in Christ. And
if you're in Christ, you have all things. So faith is believing God, not
believing in God. The devil believes in God. Would
you say he has the faith that Paul was talking about when he
said, by grace are you saved through faith? Does the devil
have that faith, he's saved by faith? He believes in God. Faith is believing God. And listen, this is important
too now. Faith is believing that God will do what he said he would
do and it has to do with two things. His character, I believe
him because of who he is. And it has to do with ability.
Now turn to a couple passages of scripture with me and I'll
show you that. Titus chapter 1 Titus 1 verse 1 Paul, a servant of God and an
apostle of Jesus Christ according to the faith of God's elect. The faith that God gives those
he chooses. And the acknowledging of the
truth which is after godliness in hope of eternal life which
God that cannot lie. I believe God because he can't
lie. He's too holy, he's too good,
he's too righteous. because of who he is. God that
cannot lie promised before the world began, but hath in due
times manifested his word through preaching. That's why we're here.
Not to gather together and get a warm fuzzy feeling about ourselves.
We come here to find out what God said. And that's what this
passage is saying here in Titus. God has spoken to people, to
sinners. And he's done it through preaching,
which is committed unto me according to the commandment of God our
Savior. And we believe him. You know what? He can't lie.
He can't. Now, I can. You can. That's why
you've got to look, if you're going to listen to a preacher,
you better make sure what he's saying is according to the word
of God. Because men can lie. But if it's according to the
words of God's prophecy, it's because God's light is in them,
the scripture says. God has sent him. And you can
believe God. You believe God because of who
he is. We can lie because we're sinners. We're going to lie.
Listen to Romans 3.3. For what if some did not believe?
And that's what we're talking about, faith. David said, I believe
you, Lord. You've spoken concerning your
servant. You're going to bless me. You're going to bless my
house for years to come. Just do what you said you'd do. I
believe you. What if some didn't believe the Romans 3.3? Shall
their unbelief make the faithfulness of God without effect? Does that
really cast a shadow on God's veracity? God forbid, yea, let
God be true, but every man a liar. For it is written that thou mightest
be justified in thy sayings and mightest overcome when thou art
judged. In other words, everything that
God says can be trusted. He's justified in it because
he can't lie. So believing God has to do with
his holy character, but it also has to do with ability. Listen
to this now, Romans 4 20. He, Abraham, staggered not at
the promise of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith, giving
glory to God and being fully persuaded that what God had promised,
he was able also to perform. That's why we believe God. Because
we believe who he is. And because of that, because
of his character, he can't lie. He's too good to tell a lie.
Too holy. But also, he's God. He does what he wants to do. He does exactly as he pleases.
That's what David said. The heathen said unto me, David
said, where is your God? And David said, my God's in the
heavens. He hath done whatsoever he hath pleased. That's who he
is, that's where he is, that's who he is. He staggered not at the promise
of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith, giving glory
to God, and being fully persuaded that what God had promised he
was able also to perform. Now listen to this, Matthew 9,
27. When Jesus departed thence, two blind men followed him, crying
and saying, Thou son of David, have mercy on us. And when he
was coming to the house, the blind men came to him, and Jesus
saith unto them, Believe ye that I am able to do this? I love their answer. It was simple
and to the point. Yes, Lord. Not just yes. Yes, Lord. That's who you're
going to believe. God. If you're going to believe
anybody. If you're going to be saved now.
And listen. They said unto him, Yes, Lord.
Then he touched their eyes, saying, According to your faith, be it
done unto you. He said, According to your faith.
Why would he say that? Because what does faith say?
Listen to this. Psalm 119.41. Let thy mercies
come also unto me, O Lord, even thy salvation, according to thy
word. The Lord said, According to your
faith, be it so. That faith that he referred to
says, Lord, according to your word, be it so. That's why the
Lord can say that. Your faith is just, it's in him. Faith doesn't trust faith. Faith
trusts the Savior. And I know tonight I can stand
before you and say, I have a good hope. And it ain't like I hope
it don't rain tomorrow. It's hope based on the word of
God. Alright? God hadn't told me it
ain't gonna rain tomorrow. But I tell you what he has told
me. He said, you come to me and I'll give you rest. I'll save
you. And that's what these men trusted.
They said, have mercy on us. And their faith was not that
they came to him and, you know, God's done all he can do, you
know, now it's up to you. Nonsense. If he's done all he
can do, we're goners. He got to save us all the way
or we're not gonna be saved. Their hope All of their trust
was in His ability. And so is mine. And if yours
ain't, you ain't saved. If your faith is in anything
you did, you're a goner. Faith has one object. And it
is the holy, almighty, remember the two things we talked about?
His character and His ability. The holy, almighty Savior of
sinners, the Lord Jesus Christ. One object, faith. That's why
he could say according to your faith, because faith says according
to you. So David's prayer is consistent
with this in that it latched onto God's word. Do you see that?
And he knew that God could not lie and that God could not be
hindered. Who's going to stop God from
blessing David and David's house? I can't depend on anything really
that God has not revealed. If he's revealed it, I can bank
on it. And that's what David's saying,
Lord do what you said. Now God has not revealed the
specifics to us that he did to David in some certain things
concerning Solomon. So can we really pray that God
will do things for us that he's not revealed that he will do?
Of course we can. He may not have promised it,
but he said, make your request known unto me, right? But our prayer will still in
principle be according to God's word. Now think about this with
me. I don't know if God will have
mercy on specific individuals that I want him to or not, but
I can pray for them knowing this, that God delights to show mercy.
He's revealed that. How do I know that? According
to thy word, Lord. That's how. I could pray knowing this, if
he wants to, he can. He's revealed that. It says of Simeon in Luke 2.28,
the old man Simeon, God revealed to him that he wouldn't die until
he'd seen the Lord's anointed. And then in Luke chapter 2 it
says that Joseph and Mary brought the Lord according to the law
of Moses on the eighth day to be circumcised and old Simeon
was in the temple that day. And he saw Mary with that baby.
in her arms and it says he took him up in his arms and blessed
God and said Lord now let us thy servant depart in peace according
to thy word for mine eyes have seen thy salvation. Alright the
next verse, verse 26 and let thy name be magnified forever
The Lord of hosts is the God over Israel. They're not but
one. And let the house of thy servant David be established
before thee. Let that, okay, now look, look
at the order. Let thy name be magnified forever saying the
Lord of hosts is the God over Israel and bless me. We see this all through
the word of God. Now God has reasons that we don't
know about and specific things. Why did God do that? I don't
know but I know he did it. I don't always know the answer
but I know there are two overriding reasons why God does everything
that he does. It's all through the scriptures
for his glory. I guarantee you it will redound
to his glory. All of it will. He will be glorified
in his justice, in punishing forever those that hate him and
defy him. And he'll be glorified in his
grace and mercy. The riches of his glory will
be shown forth on the vessels of mercy. And so all is for his glory and
then the good of his people. And that's the right order. David
said your name be magnified and establish my house. The first
thing that has to happen is for God to be glorified. Now all
of his people have that attitude. He's going to give us that now.
He does give us that. We want him to be magnified,
whatever that means for me. We want him to be exalted and
worshipped and praised, whatever that means for me. And then as
long as it's consistent with that, bless me. And be specific
about it. And he may or may not, but you
can know. How many times have I said this? If you could have everything
you ask for, for the rest of your life, how would that make
you feel? But what we get from God is better
than that. We have everything we ask Him
for, minus what will be harmful to us, minus what won't glorify Him,
which ultimately we don't want anyway. We may think we do, at
times, but we don't. Lord, let thy name be magnified
and then consistent with that and subservient to that. Bless me. The beauty of the gospel
is this, that what glorifies God the most is saving wretched
worms like me. It's a good match, isn't it?
I just happen to be a worm that needs saving. And he just happens
to be a God that gets glory out of saving worms. Ooh, we're a
good match. I suspect that David knew that
the establishment of his house there that he refers to in that
verse had more to do with than just his children and
grandchildren and God blessing them. David's earthly house was
a mess. We know that because we know
the rest of the story, don't we? Listen to what David had
to say in 2 Samuel 23 5. Although my house be not so with
God, yet he hath made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered
in all things insure, for this is all my salvation and all my
desire. But it ain't that way with my
house. Now wait a minute, didn't God promise to bless his house?
Well, if you look at the beginning of the chapter that we're in
now, in 2 Samuel chapter 7, God promises to David only concerning
his son Solomon. Specifically, you'll see that
as far as temporal matters go, He said, I'm not going to forsake
him, even though he's going to sin against me. I'm not going
to forsake him like I did Saul. Well, that's a beautiful promise.
But also, This promise to David could only
have complete fulfillment in Christ. Christ, according to
the flesh, was a descendant of David. He's called David's son
throughout the scriptures. Blind Bartimaeus cried, Jesus,
thou son of David, have mercy on me. That's who he was. He was according to the flesh,
the son of David. The scriptures call him David
in several places because David was such a type of Christ. So,
so much that he set forth Christ and picture him that he's called
David in places. But listen, one of David, think
about that. One of David, King David, that
we just read his prayer. One of his earthly descendants
is sitting on the throne of the universe tonight. That's what
God was promising him, wasn't it? That's the only way it could
be fulfilled, the way he promised it. I will establish your throne,
how long? Forever. Who's going to be sitting
on the throne forever? The Lord Jesus Christ, that's
who. He's sitting there right now. And he ain't coming down. Oh my. So it's crying. And I'm
sure David had some inkling of that. I don't know how much he
understood about that. at the time but he knew it wasn't
just about his house and of course he learned just like us he had
more light the more he followed the Lord. God says he will establish
David's house and his throne forever and that's fulfilled
in Christ. Now did David understand? I don't
know but he trusted God and he wanted God to be glorified and
boy How is God glorified? Do you remember John 17? The
Lord Jesus praying his high priestly prayer. God, Lord glorify thy
son that thy son may also glorify thee. The hour has come. The hour of his crucifixion,
his resurrection, his exaltation. There's David's son sitting on
the throne. And that's going to magnify God. That's what David
prayed for. Prayer answered right there. Verse 27, For thou, O LORD of
hosts, God of Israel, hast revealed to thy servants, saying, I will
build you a house. David, you read, well, most of
you have been here for the last couple of weeks. David said,
I'm going to build God a house. And now David's just saying,
Lord, according as you've revealed, you've revealed
to me now. who it is that needs to do something
for who. You don't need me to do anything
for you but I sure need your blessing on me. Thank God for
revealing that to us. He said you've revealed that
and according to that Build me a house, therefore hath thy servant
found in his heart to pray this prayer unto thee. This is why
David is praying the way he is, because God spoke to him first. You remember when we said that?
When we first started studying this at the beginning of our
consideration of David's prayer, we said that if we're gonna truly
speak to God, he's gonna have to speak to us first. You don't
have to reveal himself. Isn't that what David said? You've
revealed it. And now I'm crying to you. How
are you going to know who you're even talking to unless God talks
to you first? The way some people presume to
talk to God, I get the strong feeling God ain't never said
nothing to them first. Because you don't address God
like that when you've heard from Him. He's not the man upstairs. And we're not going to have a
little talk with Jesus. We need to hear God speak. And he's God
and we're not. And we need to realize that.
David said, you revealed to me, you don't need me, but I need
you. And now I can pray. When you
find that out, now you can pray. You see that there? Therefore, that word therefore,
when you see therefore, see what it's there for. Therefore, because
you've revealed to me that you're going to build me a house. Before,
you know, David was popping off about doing something for God,
but not now. Not now. God must speak to us first, or
else who are we praying to? How will you pray according to
his word if you haven't heard his word? It bothers me when I hear people
who claim to believe in God, believe the sovereign God of
the Bible say, oh we need to get prayer back in the schools.
Really? Prayer is not something that
exists in buildings or doesn't exist in buildings. I tell you
what, if one of God's sheep is going to a school somewhere,
there's prayer in that school, I guarantee you that. Because
God's people are praying all the time. You ain't going to
stop them. And secondly, what they're talking about is let's
have public prayer. Really? Who's going to be praying? Who are they going to be praying
to? Just because they say God, don't mean they're talking to
your God. We don't want that. You teach
my children how to read and write. Teach them reading, writing,
and arithmetic. And I'll do the rest. I'll do that if you can't
handle that. Is that clear enough? David found in his heart to pray
for God to be magnified. That's not going to be your prayer
unless God speaks to you first. It's going to be all about you. What is that doing in the heart
of a sinner? We want God to be magnified, whatever happens to
us. Do you find that in your heart?
David said, I found it in my heart to pray. And what did he
pray? Oh God, be magnified. Is that
in your heart? You weren't born that way. If
that's in your heart, God put that in your heart. And God puts that in the hearts
of sinners by means of the preaching of the gospel now. Whereby we
see that he is worthy to be magnified. What are the angels singing?
Thou art worthy. Why? Because thou was slain.
Gospel. And has redeemed us to God. He
didn't try. He did it. He redeemed somebody. You've redeemed us to God by
your precious blood. You're worthy. That's the song
of the glorified saints and angels. The saints can say you redeemed
us to God. The angels can't sing that. But they're glorifying
Him too for the same thing. So you see how that happens. If you're going to magnify His
name, that's how you're going to do it. You're going to magnify
Him in the person of Christ. In Him crucified. And that's
the gospel. That's revealed to us in the
gospel. All right. Well, verse 28, we're going to,
we'll have time here. Let's see verse 28. And now,
oh Lord God, let's look at these two verses together, 28 and 29.
And now, oh Lord God, you are that God. We could talk about,
I could have just preached on just that one sentence tonight.
You're that God. What God? You know who he's talking
about. That God. That was there the
day Goliath went down. You're that God. This is David
talking now. You're that God. You're the one
who anointed me, who had your servant anoint me when everybody
else had passed me over. You're the one that said, David
is my servant. David is my king. When nobody
else wanted that, you're that God. You're the God that has mercy
on the weakest, the most foolish, the most vile
and wretched. And your words are true, he can't
lie. So we talked about already and
you promised this goodness under your servant. Therefore now let
it please you to bless the house of your servant that it may continue
forever before thee for thou oh Lord God has spoken it and
with thy blessing let the house of thy servant be blessed forever.
How many times is David going to say bless me, bless me, bless
me. You remember what Jacob said
when he wrestled with the Lord all night. And the Lord said,
the sun's coming up, let me go. And Jacob said, I can't let you
go. I will not, until you bless me. We need that. Some of you might think I'm crazy
for saying this, but all you need is God's blessing. That's
all you need. That's it. And you know what
God's blessing is? It's in Christ. We're gonna see
that in a minute. This is that blessed combination
that ought to thrill our hearts every hour of every day. You
think about this. Think about this combination. God has the
authority. He's God. You are O Lord God. O Lord God. You're that God. Okay? That's first. Think about
who He is. He has all authority. He does
what He pleases, when He pleases, with whom He pleases. You ever
hear somebody say God's trying to do something? They're not
talking about my God. He don't try. He just does it.
He just does it. All right, now he's got the authority.
He can be trusted because he's God. Your word is true because
you're God. You're that God. He's able because
he's God. None can stay his hand or say
unto him, what doest thou? And Remember that now, who he
is, his authority, his power, his veracity, his word, his ability. And what else needs to be true? For me to be saved. I know God's
able to save. He's that God. He's that God. I know he can save. He has the
authority to save. Listen to John 17, when these
words spake Jesus and lifted up his eyes to heaven and said,
Father, the hour has come. Glorify thy son that thy son
may also glorify thee as thou has given him power. That word's
authority. You've given me authority over
all flesh that I should give eternal life to as many as you've
given me. As many as you chose. and gave to your son in the eternal
covenant of grace. He's got the authority to save.
Jesus Christ said, I said what I did so you'll know I have power
on earth to forgive sins. That's who he is now. He has
the ability to save. He's got the authority and the
ability, not the same thing. He has authority from the Father,
from the throne of heaven to give eternal life to whoever
he wants to give it to. Alright, and he has the ability
to save that leper. He came down from the mountain
and that leper ran up to him and worshipped him saying, Lord,
if you will, you can make me clean. He's got the ability to
save. The only question left. is does
he want to save me? That's what I need to know. Does
he want to save me? I know he can if he wants to.
That's what that leper said now. If you want to, Lord, you can
save me. That's the truth. That's how
you come to him. Don't come to him making promises,
making decisions and say, look at my wonderful works. That don't
work out too well. You can, now listen, you can
make sinners clean, and you can make me clean. That's what's important to me.
Now I want to know, we can argue all night about whether God loves
everybody or not. He don't, because he said he
don't. We can argue about that, but you know what I need to know?
I need to know if he loves me or not. That's what I need to know. Lord,
if you want to, you can make me clean. Just because he can
doesn't mean that he will. God can save everybody, you reckon?
You think if he wanted to save everybody he could get that done?
I imagine he could. I'm pretty sure. He didn't say
in Romans chapter 9, I will have mercy on as many as I can. That's not what he said, is it?
He said, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy. Big difference. I'm going to save as many as
I can. That's not my God. That's not God's promise. I will
have mercy on whom I will. And I'll tell you this, David
acknowledges that here in his prayer. You're God. You'll do
whatever you want to do. Now Lord, let it please Thee. You see that in the prayer? Let
it please Thee to bless me. You want to know how to pray? That's how you pray to God right
there. Let it please Thee. If it don't
please Him, you're not fixing to get blessed. Those who believe God by His
grace could never say the Lord wants to bless you if you'll
let Him. That's not my God. It's just not. No. Those who know and believe God
say what David is. Ah, Lord, let it please Thee
to bless me. All blessing comes from You.
If I'm going to be blessed, You're going to have to do it. Is that
clear enough? That's our God. If he wants to
bless me, I'm blessed. And I know this, all of God's
blessings are in Christ Jesus. Every last one of them. Where is God's love? Romans 8
39, nothing shall be able to separate us from the love of
God, which is in Christ Jesus, our Lord. Don't take any comfort from religion
talking about God love and everything's gonna be alright cuz God love
no it ain't gonna be alright unless you get to Christ God's
love is in Christ You need Christ you must have Christ Redemption and forgiveness from
sin oh That's the blessing of God in it Colossians 1 14 in
whom we have redemption Through his blood even the forgiveness
of sins in whom don't ever miss that part That's Christ now All
spiritual blessings in heavenly places Belong to all of his people
where in Christ Jesus Ephesians 1 3 in Christ Now listen, I said
according to God's word that just because God can have mercy
on you doesn't mean that he will. And that's just the truth. But
also, I say this on the authority of God's word. We have this promise
from him. Romans 10, 13. Whosoever shall
call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. That old leper
said, Lord, if you will, you can make me clean. And you know
what he said, don't you? I will. He always says that when
a sinner comes to him that way. But how shall they call on him
in whom they've not believed? Whosoever calls on the name of
the Lord shall be saved. You remember how we started this
lesson? David started off by what? Exalting the word of God. According to your word, Lord.
All right. How are you going to call on
the name of the Lord? You can't call on somebody you don't believe.
And how are they going to believe in him of whom they've not heard?
And how shall they hear without a preacher? And it's going to
have to be a preacher that's preaching Christ. The only way
you're going to know God is by Christ. No man cometh unto the
Father in any way, form or fashion, but by me, Christ said. And how
shall they preach? How are you going to preach that
unless God sends you? How shall they preach except
they be sent? God's got to send somebody to
preach Christ and Him crucified. As it is written, how beautiful
are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace and bring
glad tidings of good things. That's how sinners are saved.
You call on His name, He'll save you. But you've got to believe
on Him if you're going to call on Him. And you've got to hear
about Him if you're going to believe on Him. And somebody's
got to preach Him if you're going to hear of Him. And God's going
to have to send them if they're going to preach Him. Otherwise,
they'll be preaching everything about man. It's all up to man.
Your destiny's in your own hands. It's all about you. Glorifying
man. You need to do this to be saved. Salvation is not you doing something.
Salvation is accomplished by Christ. And by grace through
faith, sinners come to him and say, Lord, have mercy on me,
a sinner. If you will, you can make me
clean. May God give us grace to call
on his name. Let's pray.