Psalm 111, usually we begin at
the beginning of these psalms and sort of work through verse
by verse, but tonight I want to start at the end of it. And
probably just look at the end of this psalm, and we may not
understand why until next week. But this is key in this passage
of scripture. Verse 10, the fear of the Lord
is the beginning of wisdom. a good understanding have all
they that do his commandments. His praise endureth forever. The fear of the Lord begins wisdom
because until you are in awe of God and actually care what
he says and actually realize that there
are consequences to disregarding what he says. And until you know that he's
always right in what he says, and that he saith and doeth all
things well, until you worship God, until you worship God, You're
not going to get any of the truths of his word. And this comes by
faith. When you believe God, you'll
fear God. And this priceless mine of treasure. Since the very beginning, sinners
have been coming aside. Coming aside from the world.
Checking out of the rat race for a while At a designated time
and place Looking into the word looking into what God has revealed
and worshiping him In the declaration of his truth And this as I said is a priceless
mine of spiritual treasure and treasure and in every real sense
of the word, but it will be nothing to you until you fear God. That's
what he's saying here. It's the beginning of wisdom,
to fear God, to respect Him, to be in reverence of Him. Holy
and reverend is His name, my brother read in the context.
You're not going to care until you fear Him. You're not
going to hear Him until you fear Him. If you don't have any respect
for me, you're not going to hear me. That's just true of anybody.
And how much weight you give my words will be directly proportional
to how much respect you have for me. If a person is a habitual liar,
if you just find out that through experience, through your dealings
with them, that you just can't trust what they say. Or they're just a selfish person.
Everything they do, it's all about them. Or unreliable. Can't be trusted. Then there's
no use in them even talking to you. There's no use in them even
talking to you. I've experienced that. You've
experienced that. I've had people call me and say,
Chris, I need your advice. And I say, I'm not going to give
it to you. I don't want to talk to you.
You know people like that. I know people like that. We are
people like that without God's grace. That's how it is with God. When
you find him to be utterly truthful in everything
that he wrote, when you find him to be perfectly reliable,
when you find him to be trustworthy in all that he said, in all that
he's done, then you'll fear him. And you'll
hear what he says. And you'll hang upon his word.
There's a difference now, though, between just trusting a person
and fearing them. Fearing God there's a difference
and I want you to listen to it in Luke chapter 12 verse 4 Our
Lord said I say unto you my friends. I think about who he's talking
to his disciple my friends I say unto you my friends not the world
in general My sheep my disciples my people my loved ones my friends
he said I say you don't be afraid of them that kill the body and
and after that have no more that they can do. But I will forewarn you whom
you shall fear. Fear him which after he hath
killed hath power to cast into hell. Yea, I say unto you, fear
him. The fear of God that results In learning his wisdom will in
turn result in doing You notice in the text, let's
look at the last verse again the wicked shall see I'm sorry. I'm I'm in 112 verse 10 of 111
the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and a good understanding have all
they that do. You see the progression of thought? In order to know anything about
God you've got to fear him. You're not going to listen to
anything that God said or anybody that speaks for God says until
you reverence God, until you care what he says. But then there's
something more than just knowing the Scriptures. The Pharisees searched the Scriptures,
but they wouldn't come to the one that the Scriptures pointed
to. You need understanding. You notice that the two words,
His Commandments, are in italics there. That means they're not
in the original text, and it's important here. that we see that
because we must connect the word do not with the Ten Commandments
when we see his commandments we think about the Ten Commandments
thou shalt not kill thou shalt not steal thou shalt not know
the gods before me thou shalt not bear false witness and so
on that's not what he's saying here a good understanding have
all they that do you fear You know, you understand, and then you do. And you praise. There's a distinct
progression here and it's very important to understand it. We
don't connect the word do with the Ten Commandments. The word
do is added here to the words fear, wisdom, and understanding. And here's the progression. I
pray, that we can take this to heart by God's grace now. This is of the utmost importance.
All of a sudden, the fear of the Lord will come
upon you. All of a sudden, God is not just
the man upstairs anymore. All of a sudden, God is not just
somebody to blame when things don't go our way. You know that's
what he is to most people? When something doesn't go right
with him. It's God's fault. All of a sudden, like the thief
on the cross, we find it unthinkable not to
fear God. You think about what he, that
thief, who only moments before was hurling obscene insults into
the Savior's face, all of a sudden like, It just happened kind of
suddenly, didn't it? All of a sudden, he's saying
to the other thief who's still spewing hatred into the face
of God's Son, the other thief said to him, don't you fear God? It was astonishing to him that
that man could do what he was just doing a few minutes ago,
or maybe hours, I don't know. in the same day now in the same
day he's blaspheming and then all of a sudden it seems incredible
to him that somebody could blaspheme the Son of God that's what we're
talking about tonight the fear of the Lord and that's the start
that's the start now all of a sudden But it may happen over many years.
But your experience of it may be quite sudden. Though God may
let you kick against his goading, he may goad you like a wild ass's
coat that we are by nature. That's what he did to Saul of
Tarsus and said, is it hard for you to kick against the goads?
He may goad you for a long, long time and you will all of a sudden
find yourself needing to hear from God. It didn't make a hill
of beans to you before, but now it means something. I need to
hear from God. You'll find yourself hungry and thirsty after His
righteousness. You'll find me that only the
bread of life can satisfy that you sure enough are unable to
live by this world's bread alone. What has happened is very simple. You've been born. You've been
given life from the dead. You were spiritually dead. Our
Lord said to Nicodemus, until you're born again, until you're
given life, new life, life you didn't get when you were born
the first time, hence, must be born again. Spiritual life, until
that happens, you can't see and you can't enter. You can't see
and so you're not going to fear. If you can't see God, you're
not going to fear God. That thief looked at that broken,
beaten, bloody man hanging on that cross next to him and saw
God and said, don't you fear him. The Holy Spirit of God has quickened
your dead soul to new life in Christ. And it's not so much
that you know more than you did the day before. Think about it. How much more did that thief
know, theologically, than he did moments or hours, minutes, whatever
it was before? How much more did he know? It's not so much that you know
more. The blind man in John chapter 9 didn't know much, did he? They
said, is this man a sinner? He said, I don't know. But here's
what I do know. I was blind and he made me see. Knowledge, wisdom comes later. What we're talking about right
now is the beginning. We're talking about the beginning.
Wisdom comes later. What has happened is not that
you learned a whole lot yet. Or certainly what has happened
is not that you resolved to do anything or did anything or willed
anything. What has happened to you when
you begin to fear God is two things. Two things have happened. You're alive. You're spiritually
alive. First of all, by the eternal
purpose and electing grace of God the Father. Now you think
about that. God the Father, God Almighty,
Jehovah God, willed before you were ever born that you'd be
born again. And I'll tell you what other
reason you're alive. You're alive by virtue of the
life-giving precious blood of God's Son. which has redeemed your soul
unto God. And by his resurrection power,
as firstborn from the dead, you are alive. And I'll tell you
what else reason you're alive. You're alive by the miracle working,
quickening power of the Holy Spirit of God, who came where
you were. Our Lord said to Nicodemus, he
goes where he pleases. And he was pleased to come to
you. If you fear God and he birthed you again, he created you a new
Just like the spirit of the lord in the beginning in the first
creation moved upon the face of the deep and everywhere he
touched life sprang forth He created a new you in righteousness
and true holiness this book says Created in Christ Jesus And that's all one thing you're
alive by the power and grace and love
and miracle working acting upon you of the triune God. You're
alive. If you find yourself fearing
God, that's what happened to you. God gave you life. The Lord
Jesus Christ said, as the father quickeneth whom he will, so he's
given me authority to give life to whomsoever I will. That's one thing. You're alive.
By the gracious and powerful operations of God upon you, by
eternal salvation, you're alive. And the second thing is this. The first thing that happens
when you have life. Think with me. Now that thief
didn't know a whole lot more, but he knew somebody. The second thing is this, your
relationship with God, your perception of God, your place and perspective
of God and before God have utterly changed because of that new life. Because you see now, because
you know him. And that's what our scripture
is talking about. Simply and scripturally put,
you fear God. You fear God. That's what's happened.
God has birthed you again, given you life, regenerated you by
his Holy Spirit, by his eternal purpose, by the precious blood
of Christ and by his Holy Spirit. And what's changed, and I'm not saying you don't
learn some things. That's going to happen. But what's changed
when God does that work in your heart and soul, in your spirit,
is your relationship to him changes. Instead of God and rebel, it's
father and son. Instead of somebody to blame, He's everything. I don't know
how else to say it. He's everything. That's what changes, your relationship
to Him. Now that's from your perspective.
You've always been a son of God to Him. You've always been His
child to Him. But we're talking about you Fearing
God that happens when life comes And all of a sudden Him and you
is a whole different thing now It's a whole different thing
instead of running from him hiding from him like Adam in the garden
Rebelling against God and all that he has said Instead of that
instead of running and hiding and rebelling I Now if God says
you're a dog and you don't deserve anything from me you say that's
the truth Lord That's the truth It wasn't like that before But
I'll tell you this that's not all you say When God calls you
an undeserving dog that ought to go to hell, you're gonna say
truth, but that's not all you're gonna say You're gonna say truth
yet I know I don't deserve a crumb,
God, but yet, I've got to have it. I've got to have it. Because a crumb from your table
is life. A crumb from your table is everything. If God has even the slightest
mercy on me, then He has all mercy on me. Now, Though I was dead in trespasses,
that you hath He quickened which were dead in trespasses of sin,
and walked according to this world, to the lusts of the flesh,
even as others, children of wrath by nature, even as others. Now
that I'm alive by His power and grace, if everybody walks away
from Him, if everybody turns their back on Him, if what He
says, if His word, is so despicable to everyone that they can't even
stand to hear another word. And they turn their backs and
walk away. And he says to me, why don't
you just go with them? You know what I'm going to say
now? Now from my heart, I cry, Lord,
where would I go? And more importantly now, to
whom shall I go? To whom? If I walk away from
you, I'm walking away from life. Your words are life. You see
what's happened? And I know the word relationship
doesn't do it. I know that doesn't cut it. I
know that there may be a very much better
way to explain it. But what's changed? is how I see him, how I think
of him, how I feel about him. What think ye of Christ? Who
is he to you? Is it nothing to you, all you
that pass by? That's the fear now. That's the
fear. And until that comes, you're
not going to know anything. You cannot know anything until
you know someone. And then wisdom begins. And then the word of God comes
alive before your very eyes. Christ is the key to the scriptures
now. The reason they searched the
scriptures and still didn't have life is because they didn't see
him. They hadn't come to him. They'd
come to a knowledge of doctrine. But they hadn't come to Him. And the thief, on the other hand,
he hadn't come to a knowledge of much of anything yet, and
never would in this life. But he came to Christ. Wisdom began. Christ is the key
to the scriptures now. Once you know Him, This book
is no longer a confusing and boring document. It's bread and
water. And you live by every word that
proceed from the mouth of God. You can't just live on this world's
bread. You've got to have God and his
word, and then you start to grow. That's where wisdom comes, living
things grow. They always do. And as you grow
in grace and in the knowledge, listen to what it says now about
that. You begin to grow. You grow in
wisdom because now you see. Now you
fear. Now you reverence. You know Him.
Faith has come. Life has come. And you reverence
God. And you begin to grow, you begin
to grow in knowledge and understanding. But first, knowledge. Listen
to 2 Peter 3, 17. Ye therefore, beloved, seeing
you know these things before, beware lest ye also, being led
away with the error of the wicked, fall from your own steadfastness.
Even though you know things in your head, you can still fall.
There's warning, there's exhortation regarding that. But here's what
we must do, grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord
and Savior, Jesus Christ. And then he said that to him
be glory, both now and forever. That echoes our psalm, doesn't
it? You fear, you know, you understand, you do, and then what? Praise. Grow in grace, to Him be the
glory. As you grow into Him, oh, and how we desire it, do
we not? By His grace, we'll begin to
glorify Him in everything. I must decrease, and He must
increase. And that happens As we grow,
as we learn. He said, take my yoke upon you
and learn of me. That's wisdom. In the beginning,
earth, life, and a change in who God is to you. And if God is teaching you, and
not just me, If God is teaching you now, if God is teaching you,
not just a man, any man, then understanding will come. And there's a great difference
between knowing something and understanding it. There's a knowledge of facts.
And then there is an embracing of that knowledge. And do you
know how you know if somebody understands something and doesn't
just know it? The next word in our text after
understand. Do. I know, let me give you one example.
I know you know that God is sovereign. And no doubt, I'm pretty sure
everybody in this room knows in their head that God is sovereign.
But do you get it? And I'm asking myself, do we
get it? Do we get that? Do we understand
it? If you know that God is sovereign,
you can answer the question correctly. Is God sovereign? Yes. But if
you understand, then you'll act like God is sovereign. You see
what David's saying here? Those that understand do. You
will live every moment of your life as before a sovereign God. That's different than just knowing
it, you know. You'll talk like he's sovereign. I know a lot of people that'll
say, God, I believe God's sovereign. But then when you listen to him, well, God is trying. Wait a minute.
I thought you, I thought you said God is sovereign. Well,
God wants you to, hold on a second. You see the difference between
knowledge and understanding? If you understand, then you'll
talk like he's sovereign, you'll think like he's sovereign, you'll
act like he's sovereign. When you understand, you're transformed. You're changed. Now you're transformed initially
by coming to life. That's a transformation right
in the beginning. And we don't get it better. It's
not about us getting better or holier. It's not our sanctification. We're sanctified by the precious
blood of Christ. It's what Paul was talking about
where we just read. Growing in grace and in the knowledge
And as you grow in knowledge, you begin to understand you begin
to experience what you know And then you understand You see we
don't just believe the scriptures to be true. We must live on Faith Is not just an acknowledgement
of facts. It's a way And all of this is by the grace
and power of God from start to finish. He's the Alpha and the
Omega. It's him that gives you life on day one and it's him
which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure. It's all his salvation. It's his work for us and it's
his work in us. It's his work. James put it this
way though, be ye doers of the word and not hearers only. That happens when understanding
comes. That's what David's saying. And
understanding have all they that do. That do what? Keep the Ten Commandments? Well
that rules all of us out. that do the fear of the Lord,
that act upon the fear and knowledge and understanding of the Lord. When you understand God's word,
here's what the doing is. It's just love for Christ. That's
what that thief had. He cared now. He feared and he
cared. It's more reverence for Christ.
It's a greater and greater need of Christ. It's all in relation
to Christ. That's the doing. It's not us
keeping the law. That's why Christ had to come
and redeem us, because we can't keep the law. But by his grace,
once he does, and once he gives us life, we want to follow him. He said, my sheep hear my voice,
and they follow me. It's not up to you. He has ordained
that we do so. It's love for Him. It's reverence
for Him. It's a greater and greater need of Him. You remember in
Luke chapter 4. Listen to this. Turn over there with me. I want
you to look at a couple of scriptures. I want us to see this progression
now about fearing the Lord the fear. That's the start right
there. You're gonna know who he is first Job said I've heard
of you now. I see Now I see Look at Luke
4 verse 40 Now when the sun was setting,
all they that had any sick with diverse diseases brought them
unto Him. And He laid His hands on every
one of them and healed them. Now you know all of the maladies,
all of the sicknesses, the dead people that He raised alive,
the leprous, all of these, picture our sin condition before God
by nature. We're diseased. We have the disease
of sin and it's unto death. And there's no cure for it. We're
going to take a miracle of God. But our Lord comes and he lays
his hand upon us. And he heals us. And the devils
also came out of many, crying out and saying, Thou art Christ,
the Son of God. And he, rebuking them, suffered
them not to speak, for they knew that he was Christ. And when
it was day, he departed and went into a desert place. And the
people sought him. Came unto him what I'm saying
to you tonight is this once he comes to you. You're gonna come
to him He's gonna come where you are the spirit blows where
it pleases You can hear the sound there. You can't tell where he
come from or where he'll go, but you can tell he's been there And he was pleased one day to
come where I was and give me life And I saw the glory of God
in the face of His Son. And I found myself like that
thief, saying to myself, don't you fear God. Don't you fear
God. He came to me and then they came
unto Him and stayed Him and said, Lord, don't go. Don't go. Don't
go. Don't go. Do you see that there? Don't ever leave me. Once He comes where you are and
gives you life, you're going to find out where He is and you're
not going to let go of Him. You're not going to let Him go.
But Chris, the Lord's not on this earth anymore. We can't
be with Him the way these disciples were. Well, that's true in a
sense. Look at Luke chapter 24. And verse 44, And he said unto them, These
are the words which I spake unto you while I was yet with you,
that all things must be fulfilled which were written in the law
of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the Psalms concerning
me. It's all concerning him. Then
opened he their understanding. He had already told them before.
He said that here. I've taught you these things.
You know these things. But now they're fixing to understand
them. Then opened he their understanding
that they might understand the Scriptures. And said unto them,
Thus it is written and thus it behooved Christ to suffer and
to rise from the dead the third day. And that repentance and
remission of sin should be preached in His name among all nations,
beginning at Jerusalem. And you're witnesses of these
things. You saw it happen. They had a knowledge, didn't
they? But this day, right here, they were given an understanding.
And if you're going to understand, if you're going to fear, if you're
going to know, if you're going to understand, if you're going
to do, it's going to have to be Him. And behold, I send the promise
of my Father upon you. But tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem
until you be endued with power from on high. And he led them
out as far as to Bethany, and he lifted up his hands and blessed
them. And it came to pass, while he blessed them, he was parted
from them and carried up into heaven. How are they going to
follow him? How are they going to go where
he is like these other ones did? Now their understanding is enlightened
and they know who He is. What are they going to do? And
they worshipped Him and returned to Jerusalem with great joy and
were continually in the temple praising and blessing God. That's how we follow Him now.
We will find out where God is worshipped, where God's Son is
lifted up. And we're going to continue there.
Worshipping and praising his holy name. That's what the doing
is now. That's what that's what you call
doing the fear of the Lord right there. Doing the knowledge of
God. Not having the person of Christ
with them bodily, they went to the place of his worship. where
everything, the temple of God, everything, and there was much
error there at the time, of course, but everything in that place
was about Him, though a lot of the ones there didn't know it. The more you understand the Word
of God, the more you understand. Knowledge may not result in that,
and I know you can take the word There's different meanings of
the word knowledge. Our Lord said this is life eternal, that
they might know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom
Thou hast sent. That's the kind of knowledge
we're talking about tonight. That's an understanding. That's
not just knowing facts. That's an intimate knowledge. The more you understand of His
Word, the more you're going to love Him. The more you're going
to want Him, the more you're going to need Him, the more everything
you do is going to be for Him. I want that. I'm a long way from
that, but I want that. Not for righteousness. You're
not ever going to do anything for God for righteousness, if
you know Him. Righteousness is in Christ alone.
If you know Him, you know that. You know that we can't do anything
that's acceptable to God, ever. Never will, as a believer, as
an unbeliever, never have, never will do anything that's acceptable
to God. By grace through faith in Christ,
we're righteous and perfect and spotless and pure in the sight
of God, in Christ. We understand that. So what we
do, we don't do for righteousness, not to be saved. We're way past
that in this program. We're way past that. When you
first fear, you say you were saved before you first feared
him. You wouldn't fear him otherwise. We're way past that. That happened
even before wisdom began. It begins, though, in your experience
with fear. And reverence for him. And it'll
result in doing. You remember what our Lord said
in Matthew 12? Let's turn over there together. Matthew chapter
12. Verse 46. Matthew 12 and verse
46. Look at this now. What's this doing? We're talking
about an understanding, have all they. A good understanding
of God and what he said. Have all they that do. And that's
what it says there, do. In reference to what he's already
been talking about, the fear and the knowledge of God, they
do. Those things are not just emotions. They're a way of life. to those he gives life to. So look at this, Matthew 12,
46. While he had talked to the people, behold, his mother and
his brethren stood without, desiring to speak with him. Then one said
unto him, Behold, thy mother and thy brethren stand without,
desiring to speak with thee. Now think about this. They're
in some kind of a building because it says they're outside. Your
mother and your brothers are outside. So they're in somebody's
house or some kind of a public building maybe. Somewhere where
they could get in out of the weather, out of the heat maybe.
And he's sitting there teaching them. It says he talked to the
people. So what are they doing? They're
listening. And they said, your mother and
your brother stand without desiring to speak with you. But he answered
and said unto him that told him, who is my mother? And who are
my brethren? And he stretched forth his hand.
Now you picture this. There's that man saying, they're
out there wanting to talk with you now. And he went like this,
here's some people in the building, listening to his word. And he
stretched forth his hand and said, this is my family right
here. They're doing the will of my
Father. You know what he said? What were they doing? Keeping
the Ten Commandments? They're just sitting there. Blessed
are they that hunger and thirst after righteousness. He said,
I'll fill them. I'll give you what you need.
And that's what he was doing there that day. Here are the
ones that are doing the will of my Father. This is my family
right here. They were doing the one thing
needful. One thing. You know what the
one thing needful is? It's in Luke 10 verses 38 through
42. I'm not even going to read it.
I'm not even going to have you turn there. Look it up if you
want to. If you don't already know what it is, look it up.
There's one thing in this life that's needful. If you're interested
enough, look it up if you don't already know what it is. And
I'll tell you this. If God's one thing needful, is to you, by his grace, the
one thing that's needful. And somebody said one time, very
truly, even your dog will be better for it. How you treat your dog will be
affected. Who you marry, what job you do, who your friends
are, where you live, it changes everything. When to you, one
thing is needful. Everything is changed. May God
give us grace. May he open our eyes that we
might see. Let's pray.