of these first two verses that
I didn't go any further. So we'll just take the first
two verses. Our subject is the Word magnified. The Word magnified. Now let's see, read these first
two verses again. I will praise Thee with my whole
heart. Before the gods will I sing praise
unto Thee. I will worship toward thy holy
temple and praise thy name for thy loving kindness and for thy
truth, for thou hast magnified thy word above all thy name. Now, the main point I think we
get from these verses right here is that when the Lord, the Holy
Spirit, gives us a new heart and makes you behold the Lord
Jesus Christ, you behold the Lord Jesus Christ magnifying
the Word of the Lord. You behold Him. He's the light
of the Word. The whole Word glorifies Him.
And you see He came. and He magnified the Word of
the Lord. He made it, He fulfilled it all. All the law and all the prophets,
all the promises. And when He does that and He
magnifies this Word to us, you have a revelation of God's name.
Everything God is, the way He saves, you behold it in the Lord
Jesus. And that's when you start praising
the Lord with your whole heart. You start praising the Lord,
giving Him all the glory with the whole heart. Now let's look
at this. First of all, The revelation
of our Lord Jesus Christ makes us no longer ashamed to give
God all the glory. It makes you no longer ashamed
to give God all the glory. He says here in the beginning,
He says, I will praise thee with my whole heart. Now first off,
you start praising only Him. When the Lord has revealed Himself
to you, you begin to praise only Him. Before, you were trying
to take some glory for yourself and thought that man got some
glory. When He's given you a new heart,
you begin to glory only in the Lord. To praise the Lord is to
give Him all the glory. And the only way you truly worship
Him and praise Him is to give Him all the glory. Now in the
true church, nobody's going to praise, we're not praising any
other but our triune God in Christ. He's getting all the glory. Now,
when I say the true church of God, who's the true church of
God? It's not everybody that's in so-called churches. It's not
even everybody that's in the church where Christ has established
His gospel. The true church is those that
the Lord Jesus, that God the Father has chosen in Christ before
the world was made. They're those that Christ laid
down His life for. They're those that He came and
gave a new heart and gave faith to look and behold that Christ
has justified us from all our sin and brought you to believe
on Him. The true church are those that truly do give Christ all
the glory. That's the true church. And in
the true church, we know we're kept by the power of God. We
know that He's all our salvation. And so we praise and we glory
in Him alone. In Him alone. We know salvation
is of the Lord. It's our Lord who creates this
praise in our heart. Only the Lord creates this praise
in our heart. I love over there, back in Psalm
27 8, it says, when thou saidest, seek ye my face. My heart said
unto thee, Thy face, Lord, will I seek." That's the effectual
word of our Lord. When He said, seek my face, that's
when His people seek His face, when He speaks. Turn with me
over to 1 Corinthians 1. I think we looked at this not
too long ago, but it bears repeating. There are no There's nobody in
the true church of the Lord that's glorying in their flesh. There's
nobody glorying in their works. There's nobody in His church
that's trying to give praise and glory
to others because the Lord has made you see what you are. Look
here in 1 Corinthians 1.19. He said, I will destroy the wisdom of
the wise, and I will bring to nothing the understanding of
the prudent. Where's the wise? Where's the scribe? Where's the
disputer of this world? Hath not God made foolish the
wisdom of this world? And that's what God does in our
hearts, in our own heart when he calls you, he makes us to
see we're not prudent, we're not wise like we thought we were.
Look down here at verse 26. For you see your calling, brethren,
how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not
many noble are called. But God hath chosen the foolish
things of the world to confound the wise, and God hath chosen
the weak things of the world to confound the things which
are mighty. And base things of the world are things which are
despised, if God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to
bring to naught things that are, that no flesh should glory in
his presence. But of Him, of God are you in
Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness,
and sanctification, and redemption. That's what Christ is to us.
So therefore, according as it's written, he that glories, let
him glory in the Lord. This is what the Lord works through
the preaching of the gospel in His church, in the hearts of
His people. He brings us to no flesh gonna
glory in His presence, we glory only in the Lord. By God's grace,
when you're quickened and He gives you a new heart, He gives
you a whole heart. He says here in verse 1, I'll
praise thee with my whole heart. God creates the whole heart.
We didn't have a whole heart by nature. Our heart was corrupt
and vile, the heart we come into this world with. But our Lord
creates in us a whole heart. There's no sin in a whole heart.
There's no defect. It's not halting between two
opinions. The whole heart that God creates
is whole. It's whole. And so, by the Spirit
of the Lord, we praise the Lord with our whole heart. We praise
the Lord with the entirety of our new heart. We praise Him
with all the ability He gives us. We praise Him. We praise
Him with all our power and all our affection by His grace, and
give Him all the glory. He said this, how do you know
that this is so? How do we know this is what the
Lord works in all His people? Jeremiah 24, 7, He said, I will
give them a heart to know Me, that I am the Lord, and they
shall be My people, and I will be their God, for they shall
return unto Me with their whole heart. And that's what His people
do. That's what God brings His people
to do. Now here's the main point of this. This is the main point.
When He does this work in your heart and reveals Christ in you,
we're no longer ashamed to confess Christ before men. We're no longer
ashamed to praise Him and speak of His glory before men. Look
here in verse 1. He said, Before the gods will
I sing praise unto thee. before the gods will I sing praise
unto thee. If you'll turn back to Psalm
82, Christ referred to the self-righteous,
men that do not know God, he referred to them as gods. Look
here in Psalm 82, in verse 1, and he calls them
that because remember the devil said you'll be as God's and man
in his corrupt nature thinks he is as God. He attributes to
himself things that only God can do. Making himself righteous
before God. Only God can do that. A man trying
to make himself holy before God. Only God can do that. Look here
in verse 1, God standeth in the congregation of the mighty. He
judgeth among the gods. Look down at verse 5. He says,
They know not, neither will they understand. They walk on in darkness. All the foundations of the earth
are out of course. I have said, Your gods and all
of you are children of the Most High, but you shall die like
men and fall like one of the princes. And when the Lord fulfilled
that, He said He stands in the congregation of the mighty, the
Lord fulfilled that. Our Lord Jesus came and He looked
directly at those Pharisees and He said to them, in John 10.34,
He said, is it not written in your law and your word that I
said ye are gods? Who said that in Psalm 82? Christ
said, I'm the one that said that. And then He looked at those self-righteous
Pharisees and He said, Did I not say you were gods? And they knew
what scripture he was talking about, and they knew that the
Lord Jesus was saying they were lost. They knew that. They knew
that. But you see, we're not afraid
now, we're not ashamed now to speak of Christ before men, before
the self-righteous and men who are religious without Christ.
We're not ashamed to speak of Christ before them now. And then
something else, kings and civil rulers are referred to as gods
in the scripture. In Exodus 22, 28, it says, thou
shall not revile the gods, nor curse the ruler of thy people. That's who he's talking about,
the rulers, the civil rulers, and judges, and presidents, and
senator, they call them gods, they rule among the people. And
of course he's speaking here of vain gods. Of course he's
speaking of gods that men imagine in their, you know, they speak
about when they speak of their Jesus. But here's the point is,
by God's grace now, he said, I'll speak of thee. I'll praise
thee before the gods while I'm amongst the gods. We're not ashamed
anymore to speak of Christ to whoever we come in contact with.
We're not ashamed anymore. And that's what the scripture
says will be when he's worked this work in the heart of his
people. Romans 9.33 said, as it's written, behold, I lay in
Zion a stumbling stone and a rock of offense, and whosoever believeth
on him shall not be ashamed. You'll not be ashamed. And if
you look in Isaiah 54, Isaiah 54, we're going to come
to this pretty soon, but in our study in Isaiah, look here. He says, you're not going to
be ashamed, nor be put to shame. You're not going to be ashamed
so that you will confess Christ before men, and you're not going
to be put to shame for trusting the Lord Jesus. Look here in
Isaiah 54. He says, fear not, for thou shalt
not be ashamed, Neither be thou confounded, for thou shalt not
be put to shame. Those are two different things.
You won't be ashamed to confess Christ, and you won't be put
to shame for trusting Christ. For thou shalt forget the shame
of thy youth, and shalt not remember the reproach of thy widowhood
anymore. Why? Because Christ put away
all our sin and made us righteous, and he's made you to know that.
Paul said, I'm not ashamed. I'm not ashamed of the gospel
of Christ, because it's the power of God unto salvation to everyone
that believe it, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. It's God
revealing Christ our righteousness in our heart that makes you unashamed.
So now, when we come in contact with men that think they're gods
and they deny the Lord Jesus Christ is God, there's a lot
of people in this world that say He's not God. We praise Him. We declare He's God. We preach
that He is God. He's the fullness of the Godhead
bodily. That's who He is. When men start preaching another
Jesus that came and laid down His life for everybody in the
world but didn't really accomplish anything, We gonna preach. the
particular redemption of his people that he laid down his
life for the elect and he accomplished redemption. He triumphed in redeeming
his people. We're not ashamed to declare
this now. We're not ashamed when men start
boasting and glowing in their will and saying they had something
to do with making themselves be born again or they had something
to do with making themselves holy. We're not ashamed now to
preach the Lord Jesus Christ that he is all in salvation,
A to Z. He's our wisdom, He's our righteousness,
and our sanctification, and our redemption. He's everything in
salvation. And you're not ashamed anymore
to confess this before men. If everybody around us, and this
is really so of God's people, wherever they are, whatever local
assembly he's assembled them in, we're surrounded by people
that think they're gods. We're not trying to be mean by
saying it, that's what the scripture said. And men think that they
contribute to the salvation, and they don't know God. They
don't know the true God. They don't know the true God.
But brethren, that gives you all the more reason to declare
the true God and for us to preach the true God and to glory in
the true God. When you see so many in this
world, it's been this way in every generation. You see, so
many that do not believe God. That magnifies His grace and
His mercy to you. It makes you see what a rare
thing it is that you know Him, that He came and revealed Himself
to you. That's what God said. He said,
He that glories, let Him glory in this, that He knows me. That
I'm God who works exercises loving kindness and
judgment and righteousness in the earth. For in these things
I delight, saith the Lord. Rejoice that you know Him, and
so we're not ashamed to speak of Him. Now, I want you to see
this second thing here. Everything is leading up to this
last thing that's said in verse 2. He's going to give us how
this is so and why this is so. But let's just look at the next
word here, verse 2. He said, I will worship toward
thy holy temple, and praise thy name for thy lovingkindness and
for thy truth. And here's why. Because thou
hast magnified thy word above all thy name. Now let's look
at each phrase in this verse right here. I will worship toward
thy holy temple. Go with me to 1 Kings chapter
8. 1 Kings chapter 8. This is Solomon's prayer. when he, after he had built the
temple, this is his prayer to God the Father after he had built
the temple, verse 29. Now read this, he says, he prays
to God and asks, verse 29, that Thine eyes may be opened toward
this house, toward this temple, night and day, even toward the
place of which Thou hast said, My name shall be there. that
thou mayest hearken unto the prayer which thy servant shall
make toward this house. He said, And hearken thou to
the supplication of thy servant, and of thy people Israel, when
they shall pray toward this place. And hear thou in heaven thy dwelling
place, when thou hearest forgive. And he goes on, and he keeps
giving you various scenarios. He says, If your people are at
war, and they pray toward this house. Lord, hear them. He said,
if they sin and you carry them into a foreign land, which we've
seen, that's what happened, didn't it? He carried them into a foreign
land. He said, if that happens and they pray toward this house
and they repent and they ask for mercy and for forgiveness,
Lord, forgive them. Remember when the Lord cast Jonah
into the sea. Scripture says, Jonah 2 verse
4 says, Jonah said, I'm cast out of thy sight, yet I will
look again toward thy holy temple. I'll look again. Go with me over
to Hebrews chapter 8. All eyes are on this temple.
God's eyes are on this temple. And His people's eyes are on
this temple. And we come into God looking to this temple. Praying toward this temple. Look here, Isaiah 8 verse 1. Hebrews is telling us all about
what the law means. He's declaring all the spiritual
truth of what the law of God meant. And he says right here,
here's what all of that meant that we just saw. Hebrews 8.1.
Now of the things which we've spoken, this is the sum. We have
such a high priest who sat on the right hand of the throne
of the majesty in the heavens, a minister of the sanctuary and
of the true tabernacle which the Lord pitched to not man. When Solomon He, in that word
over there in King Solomon, said, Lord, I've built this house.
This house that I've built for you. Christ is the one who came
forth and he raised his own temple. And he is the one who calls his
people and builds up living stones in his house. What do you mean
he raised his own temple? He told them, destroy this temple,
in three days I will raise it up. And the Jews said, it was
46 years this temple was in the building, and will thou raise
it up in three days? But he was talking about the
temple of his body. See, we're not looking to a building over
in Israel. We're looking to Christ Jesus, our sanctuary, our holy
place. That's where God's put His name.
That's what that temple pictured. God said, I'll put my name there.
His name's in Christ. And we're praying toward the
Lord Jesus Christ. God's eyes on that, on Christ. and his people's eye is on Christ. Christ is the mediator between
us and the Father. There's one mediator between
God and men, the man Christ Jesus. And that's what you have pictured
here. And so for the sake of his son, because Christ is our
righteousness, because Christ is the holiness who by the witch
will, he sanctified us forever by his one offering. Because
He's seated there at God's right hand. God's looking to Christ
Jesus. And He receives His people when
we come to Him through faith in His Son. And He receives us
for the sake of His Son. Now look there in Psalm 138,
look at verse 2 again. He's going to tell us why He
praises the Lord's name. I will praise thy name for thy
lovingkindness and for thy truth. Loving kindness, when you look
at loving kindness in the scripture, it includes God's grace, it includes
His mercy, it includes His love, it includes the peace He gives
His people. It's all the free blessings He
gives His people is included under the heading of loving kindness.
And when you read here, because of thy truth, that's God's holy
and just dealing. That's God's righteousness. That's
God's justice. That's God performing strict
justice. He said, I praise thy name for
thy loving kindness, for thy grace, and for thy truth. Who's
he praising? Listen, John 117. The law came
by Moses. But grace and truth. came by Jesus Christ. He just
said, I'm looking to Christ. That's who I'm looking to. He's
the temple. I'm looking to Him. And He says,
and I'm praising you because when Christ came, grace and truth
came. Your love and kindness and your
righteousness are manifest in the Lord Jesus Christ. That's
what Psalm 85.10 tells us. Psalm 85.10 says, mercy There's His loving kindness,
mercy and truth are met together in Christ. He declares righteousness
and peace. There's His loving kindness,
peace He gives His people. Righteousness and peace have
kissed each other. See, our Lord Jesus, we couldn't
keep that law, we couldn't fulfill that law, we sinned in Adam.
And then we were conceived in sin and came forth vile sinners,
guilty before God, the soul that sinneth must die. But in Christ,
we couldn't go to the law of Moses and save ourselves, but
Christ came forth. And by Him being the perfect
servant of God, by Him going to the cross and laying down
His life in the place of His people, He bore the full stroke
of God's justice. The truth fell on Him. God's
wrath fell on Him. His justice, His judgment, His
righteousness, it fell on Christ. Now listen, Christ did that for
somebody, brethren. He wasn't just arbitrarily laying
down His life. He did that for somebody. He
said, I lay down my life for the sheep. Ephesians 1 says,
it's those God chosen Him from before the foundation of the
world. That's who He laid down His life for. And when He laid
down His life, He accomplished something. He satisfied God's
justice and He made it so God can show His people mercy and
be just to do it. And be just to do it. And then
our Lord Jesus arose in the temple of God. He sat down at the right
hand of God. And now He's building up His
people as living stones to make His house. Now David declares,
that's why he praises the Lord alone. Look here. He says at
the end of verse two, for thou hast magnified thy word above
all thy name. Now, look now, he said there
at the beginning of verse two, he said I will praise thy name. I'm praising thy name. And then at the end he says,
for thou hast magnified thy word above all thy name. Word here
includes the whole written Word of God. It includes all the law,
it includes all the prophets, everything that was written by
God. It includes it all. And it includes Christ Jesus,
the incarnate Word. He's the incarnate Word. Christ
the Word magnified the Word. He magnified the Word. Turn with
me to Isaiah 42, verse 21. Isaiah 42. We know He's speaking
to Christ here. Verse 1. Behold My servant whom
I uphold, Mine elect and whom My soul delighteth. I put My
Spirit upon him. He shall bring forth judgment
to the Gentiles. He shall not cry, nor lift up,
nor cause his voice to be heard in the street. A bruised reed
shall he not break. You recognize that? That's repeated in the
New Testament. That's Christ He's talking about.
Now look here at what He says down in verse 21. The Lord is well pleased for
His righteousness sake, for Christ's righteousness sake. He will magnify
the law and make it honorable. David said, when I look to Christ,
when I look to the Lord Jesus Christ, when I look to the incarnate
Word, I see the one who magnified your law and made it honorable.
I see the one who fulfilled everything that's written. Scripture says,
the Word was made flesh. The Word, Christ's Incarnate
Word. You can't separate the written
Word from the Incarnate Word, from Christ, because all the
written Word speaks of Christ the Word. And we only understand
the written Word by Christ the Word speaking into our heart.
You can't separate them. And look, the Word was made flesh. The Son of God came down, the
Word was made flesh and dwelt among us. And we beheld His glory,
the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace
and truth. There it is again. full of grace
and truth. That's what He's saying. That's
what David's saying. You've magnified your law and
made it honorable. And you've magnified it so much
to me. And then He raised Christ. He
magnified the Word, the incarnate Word, in raising Him to His right
hand and exalting Him and giving Him a name above every name.
And listen, Acts 1.30, Peter said, David knew that God had
sworn with an oath to him that of the fruit of his loins, according
to the flesh, he would raise up Christ to sit on his throne.
David, that's what David was talking about in our psalm. So
when David says, I'm praising you Lord and I'm praising you
only because thou hast magnified thy word above all thy name. That's a strange thing, isn't
it? You've magnified your word above
all your name. Well, it doesn't mean that Christ
is above God. They're one. He is God. He's not above him. By Christ
magnifying God's Word, by Him coming and fulfilling everything
that's written in the Law and the Prophets, God's name is revealed
in a way it could not be revealed otherwise. His name is revealed
in a way it could not be revealed otherwise. Listen, John 1.18,
No man hath seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, which
is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him. The Word
came down and the Word manifest God the Father. That's how we
see Him, because Christ magnified the Word. He's the Word who magnified
the Word. Jesus said, He that has seen
Me has seen the Father. He magnified His Word. He showed
us God, the triune God, in a way we could not have seen otherwise.
in Christ dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. And the
Lord... Remember, go with me over to
Exodus 34. Where did the Lord put Moses?
Where did Moses see the glory of God? He put him in the cleft
of a rock, and that rock is Christ. That's where you see the glory
of God. Exodus 34, verse 56. I'm sorry, verse 6. Exodus 34, verse 6. Look. And the Lord passed by before
him and proclaimed, Here's the glory of the Lord. Moses asked
to see His glory. Here it is. It's seen in Christ. The Lord, that's who Christ is. He's Jehovah in a human body. The Lord God, that's the covenant
God. All the promises of God are yes
and amen in Christ. merciful and gracious, long-suffering
and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands,
forgiving iniquity and transgressions and sin. That's all that comes
under the heading of His loving kindness, His grace, His mercy. But now here's the truth. Here's
His truth. He will by no means clear the
guilty. He will by no means clear the
guilty. visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children
upon the children's children to the third and the fourth generation.
And when the Lord showed Moses this glory, Moses made haste
and bowed his head toward the earth and worshipped." That's
what he did. That's what all his people do
when he makes you see Christ, that revelation. The words magnify
it. For the first time, the word
makes sense to you. It was a jigsaw puzzle before
that. Now it all falls into place.
You see Christ. It all gets its light from Christ
and renounces to Christ's glory. And you see how God's magnified
His name. It's above all of His name, all
of His name. He's magnified Christ above all
His name. So every time you hear a name
of the Lord, think of Christ. When you hear Jehovah Jireh,
the Lord will provide, that's Christ. Christ magnified that
word, didn't He? When you hear Jehovah Nissi,
the Lord our banner, Christ magnified that word. When you hear the
Jehovah, pray for the Lord that healeth thee, Christ did that.
He magnified, He's the one who is the fulfillment of that name.
Jehovah Shalom, the Lord our peace, He reconciled us to God. Jehovah Raya, the Lord our Shepherd,
He's the one leading us and guiding us. Jehovah Sidkenu, the Lord
our Righteousness. Jehovah Imkadesh, the Lord that
does sanctify thee. Jehovah Shema, the Lord is there.
He's magnified the world so that we see God's name magnified and
exalted above all. We see His name. Now let me say
what I said at the very beginning. In closing, here's what I said
at the very beginning. This is what these two verses
are telling us. When the Spirit of God creates a new heart and
reveals Christ to us, it's Christ the Word, Christ the living Word
who magnifies the written Word to us. He magnifies it to us. We behold Christ fulfilled all
the law and the prophets. In Christ we behold God's holy
name. His holy character, His divine
attributes, how He saves, we behold His glory. And by beholding
Christ and how He's done all this, He makes you no longer
ashamed to confess Him before men, no longer ashamed to preach
His name, to bear witness of Him and what He's done. Anytime
the Lord gives you the opportunity, at your job or amongst family
or wherever you are, to get a chance to speak of Him. Now you're not
ashamed to speak of Him. And you're not ashamed to confess
Him in a believer's baptism. You're not ashamed anymore. And
you'll never be put to shame. Now I pray for those For our
children and for those that have never confessed Christ, I pray
that the Lord would make this revelation in their heart. That
He would come and show Himself and bring them to believe on
Christ. That's what He did in your heart. That's the only way
you know Him. Because that's what He did. He
gave you this heart to praise only Him. Because you saw Him
magnify the whole Word of God. All the name of God. And so for
you that have received this grace, you praise Him. You praise Him. And don't be ashamed to praise
Him before men. It might be that one that you speak the truth
of this Word to them, it might be one of His lost sheep. It
might be one of His lost sheep. That was a blessing to me, brethren. That's as far as I got, but it
just was a blessing to me to see that. And I didn't want to
nutty it up by going further, so I pray that made some sense
to you. Let's go to the Lord in prayer.
Father, we thank You for Your Word. The Word that magnified
the Word. Thankful that You worked this
work in our hearts and made us behold You, made us believe on
You, made us willing in a day of Your power. Lord, we praise
Thee. Our praise is feeble at best.
We do praise You with the whole heart, the heart You've given
us. But Lord, we ask You, receive us in Christ our righteousness.
Receive us in Christ in whom we're complete. Behold Your Son
and have mercy on us for His sake. Lord, we pray for Your
lost sheep that You'd be pleased to work this work in their heart
and call them. And Lord, give us boldness. Give
us the ability to speak of You before whoever. Give us the words to speak. Make
us study this Word, Lord, and be able to speak a word in season.
And Lord, we pray that you'd bless the word as it goes forth. Bless it to the hearts of your
people. Thank you, Lord. We pray in the name of our Lord
Jesus Christ. Amen. All right, Brother Greg.