Alright, brethren, Psalm 119. The last section of this psalm
dealt with the Word being a lamp for our feet, for our walk. This section deals with the heart,
deals with our thoughts. This is where true holiness and
true godliness is without a new heart. Everything outward is
vain. This is the end that God accomplishes
in His people. This is where He brought you
at first, and it's what He keeps doing to grow you. I want you
to see the two-fold effect here in verse 120. He said, My flesh trembleth.
That word is bristles, shivers. Like your hair standing on end.
For fear of thee, and the word fear there means dread, terror. And I am afraid. This is inward. This is the heart. That word
afraid's a different word. It means I stand in awe. In loving
fear and reverence. I am afraid of thy judgments,
in awe, in loving fear of thy judgments, reverence. And these
two things is what God works in us when he upholds our inner
man and casts down our sinful flesh. He increases a loving
reverence for God, a filial fear of God and his judgments in the
new heart. And perfect love casts out that
legal fear, that terror and that bondage of the flesh. This is
that reverence and love for God our Father, reverence for Him
that He puts in a new man. Now let's go back up to verse
113 and we'll begin. First of all, By His Word in
the new heart, God makes His child hate vain thoughts. He
said, verse 113, I hate vain thoughts, but thy law do I love. Now our Lord Jesus, when He walked
this earth, He had no vain thoughts. Can you imagine that? He had
no vain thoughts. Everything He thought was holy,
everything He thought was directed toward God the Father and it
was in the pursuit of the business God had given him to do. There
was nothing vain in his thoughts whatsoever. It was all for God
and his glory and what God the Father had given him to do. He never had a vain thought.
But being the God-man, he knew the heart and the thoughts of
everybody around him. Everybody around him, he knew
their thoughts and he knew their hearts. He didn't guess about
it, he knew them. It's said several times in the
Scripture, he knew what was in their heart. Vain thoughts were all around
him. Sinners all around him, in those
that did not believe on him and in his apostles who did believe
on him. And he knew it all. He knew it
all. Can you imagine what it would
be like for him to go through this life having no vain thoughts
himself and yet knowing every vain thought in everybody around
him? We can hear him say this with
perfect hatred and perfect love. I hate vain thoughts, but thy
law do I love. Perfect hatred and perfect love. By God creating a new heart in
his people, every believer hates vain thoughts, and we love God's
word, but nothing like Christ did, not even remotely close
to how Christ did. Vain thoughts include every thought
other than thoughts of Christ and his word and his cause, and
whatever is honoring to him. Vain thoughts are what we are
in our flesh, the Lord knoweth the thoughts of man that they
are vanity. There are multitudes of vain
thoughts in the minds of men that we hear expressed all around
us. A multitude of vain thoughts.
We hear God's name taken in vain every day. Multiple times during
the day. We hear the vain thoughts of
men concerning who God is and how he saves. Vain, ambiguous
thoughts, light thoughts, no substance, opinions of men, unfounded
in God's word, the doctrines of men, superstition, vain traditions,
just vain thoughts. mostly set on the world, just
vain thoughts. Vain thoughts deny the total
ruin of sinners in Adam. Vain thoughts deny this. I pray
God won't let this just be a doctrine to us. We're totally ruined,
brethren. We're totally ruined. Men will
say, well, I think men are basically good, That's just a vain thought. It's not founded in God's Word.
God's Word says there is none good. Not one. No, not one. Vain thoughts about God Himself.
You know, some tragic thing will happen. A storm or something
comes through and people die. Or some terrorist act. And men
will say, well, God didn't do this. Or they'll say, why would
a good God let such bad things happen? You think of the pride
in that statement. We don't deserve for God to let
this happen to us. That's what the statement is.
Why would a good God let this happen? And if it was ended,
it would be to such good people like we are. That's really what
the thought is. God is absolutely sovereign in
providence. He works everything that comes
to pass. He said in Amos 3.6, shall there be evil in a city
and the Lord hath not done it? Vain thoughts of who God is and
how He saves. God's sovereign not just in providence,
He's sovereign in salvation. He won't share His glory. God
the Father chose His people freely by grace. No merit in us. No merit in us. Nothing that
can stop God from being gracious to His people because He didn't
base it on us one way or the other. It's free grace. And He
chose us in Christ before time began. And the Son of God accomplished
redeeming His elect people. He didn't die for everybody.
He just died for His people. And you know that because He
accomplished the redemption. He put away the sin of His people
forever. Forever. He said, I lay down
my life for the sheep. And have vain thoughts about
the Spirit of God. The ABCs of being regenerated
and of being sanctified. The Spirit of God regenerates
His people. He comes like the wind and no
man can resist Him and He gives life to His people. And it's
because God predestinated us unto the adoption of children
by Jesus Christ. It's all in Christ and by Christ. And so He sent forth the Spirit
of His Son into your heart so that this is how we begin to
cry, Father, Father, save me. And when He did this, by creating
a new man, He made you meet, He made you fit, He made you
right then prepared to enter into glory with His saints. Because holy in heart, by Him,
by Christ perfecting us for everybody's one offering. This is how we
know Christ is all and all flesh is grass. It says in him we also obtained
an inheritance being predestinated according to the purpose of him
who works all things after the counsel of his own will. It's
his purpose. He worked all things after the
counsel of his own will that we should be to the praise of
his glory who first trusted in Christ. All according to his
purpose and he brings his purpose to pass according to his will.
And it's so that we praise Him, we glorify Him, because He first
trusted Christ. He trusted Christ to do the saving,
and He will have all His people trust His Son to do the saving. So we have these vain thoughts
all around us every day, but it's not merely vain thoughts
of the wicked men around us that we hate. It's our own vain thoughts. It's our own vain thoughts. He
didn't say, I'm free from vain thoughts. He said, I hate them. I hate them. Due to our sin nature,
we have blasphemous thoughts. Blasphemous thoughts. It doesn't
have to come out of us. It's in us, brethren. Blasphemous
thoughts. Unbelief and distrust. Distrusting
God's providence. We wouldn't murmur against God
out and out. But we will in our heart. And
we will outwardly by murmuring against the second causes. The
things we see happening. This shouldn't be happening.
Why is this happening? But God's the first cause. and that's murmuring against
God, distrusting his providence. We have no reason not to be thankful
for everything God's doing. It is exactly how it should be
done, and it is for the good of his people, always, always. Proud thoughts. vainly glorying
in ourselves, conceited thoughts about ourselves, trusting self,
putting confidence in ourselves, vain thoughts, lustful thoughts,
sinful ambition to get more of the world, to elevate ourselves
in the world. Covetousness for the world and
for riches and for things of this world. Lustful thoughts,
lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes and the pride of life. Revengeful
thoughts. Envy, malice, evil surmising. The reason these things are spoken
of in the scripture and we're told to put them off is because
believers have these vain thoughts. Revengeful thoughts. We dwell
on a wrong, dwell on an offense, and it turns into wanting revenge.
And our carnal nature, our carnal mind loves that. That's sweet
to the carnal mind to think on. Revengeful thoughts. Impure thoughts. Just flat out
impure thoughts. In our new man, don't you long
to be free from vain thoughts? They just float in like the breeze,
like a fog that just comes in. You can be praying and all of
a sudden you're off here thinking vanity. You can be hearing a
message preached, your mind just be a thousand miles away on something
that has no significance, it's just vanity. But by God's grace
in the new heart, we love God's Word. This is in the new man
that God's given. We love God's Word. Thy law do
I love. God really does work this in
His people. Salvation is grace and it's God working grace
in us to make us see our vain thoughts while at the same time
you love the Word of God. His Word reveals the mind and
will of God. It's this Word He's made us to
know. It's how we know God works all things after His will. It's
how we know He purposed everything from the beginning. He's shown
us His will. The Law declares salvation is
entirely of the Lord. Everything about it, no merit
in the sinner. It's all of God's free grace
and of His unconditional love in Christ. We love God's law
because it gives all glory to Christ Jesus, our prophet, priest,
and king. This whole book's about Him.
He's our teacher. He's our priest that reconciled
us and intercedes for us. He's our king who's working all
these things for our good. We love the Ten Commandments
because they show us our sin. They show us our covetousness.
They show us our vain thoughts. They show us that in our flesh
there was no good thing. Not a thing. And then they show
us by getting some glimpse of how holy and just and good the
law is, you see something of how holy, just, and good our
Savior is. And that's how holy, just, and
good He's made His people in Him by what He's done. He's made
you fulfill the law entirely. He's made you righteous. He's
made you justified that know Him. That's what this book teaches
us. That's why we love His law. We
love the gospel precepts He gives us because they're light and
easy because of His power and His grace. Well, if we loved
them, why would David here be troubled about vain thoughts?
We love them in our new man. but we still have vain thoughts.
We still have an old man to contend with, but God's word in that
new heart is the cure for the vain thoughts of our old man.
This word in our heart, God speaking in our heart, bringing us to
his word to see what God says. This is the cure for our vain
thoughts of our old man. The only cure. So this is what He does and He
first starts making you hate vain thoughts and see and own
it that yes, I'm full of vain thoughts. But oh Lord, now I
love You, Lord. I love Your Word now. I love
Your Gospel. But then secondly, the Word of
God makes us take refuge in Christ alone. Look here now, verse 114. Thou art my hiding place and
my shield. I hope in thy word. This is why
we love the word of the Lord. This is why we love the law of
the Lord, because the cure for our vain thoughts is to behold
Christ. Thou art my hiding place. Thou
art my shield. I hope in thy word. When the
word is in the heart, effectually, by our Lord, by His grace, that's
when we see Christ as our hiding place. That's when we see Christ
as a shield for us. And so when vain thoughts come,
You know what God's going to do? We look everywhere to everything. We want to talk to everybody.
We want to do anything else to try to get rid of these vain
thoughts. God is going to end up bringing
us to His Word, under His Gospel, to Christ our hiding place, our
shield, because He's the only cure. That is the, if you suffer
anything in this life, I don't care if it's a little thing you
suffer throughout the day that turns you and kind of rocks you
a little bit, or if it's something major that happens. Everything
God's working for His people has one purpose. It is to bring
us to His word, to Christ Jesus, our hiding place, who is our
shield. When it says Christ is salvation,
that means in everything, at all times. The only cure is Christ. That's what we're learning. That's
what we're learning day by day. Please hear that. Please hear
it. Then, you know, you hear it and then we act like we never
heard it. What do you need in a hiding
place and a shield? It's got to be strong. A hiding
place and a shield has to be strong or it won't do you any
good. Christ Jesus is our strong tower, Scripture says. High tower,
the righteous runneth into it and it's safe. He's the rock
of ages. He is our mighty God. A hiding
place and a shield has to be, well a hiding place needs to
be high up. If it's high up, you'll be safe. Scripture says,
child of God, your life is hid, this is a hiding place, your
life is hid in Christ at God's right hand. That will cure vain
thoughts. When He turns you to see and
just like a sunbeam in your heart makes you know you are right
there with Him right now, that will cure your vain thoughts. A hiding place has to be secret.
If it's going to be a hiding place, it's got to be a secret.
The Lord Jesus Christ is the secret place that only His people
know that is hidden from this world by God on purpose. Listen
to the Scripture. Psalm 27 5 says, In the time
of trouble, He shall hide me in His pavilion. In the secret
of His tabernacle shall He hide me. He shall set me upon a rock. He said in Psalm 31.20, Thou
shalt hide them in the secret of thy presence. That's what
we're talking about. The secret of thy presence from
the pride of man. Thou shalt keep them secretly
in a pavilion from the strife of tongues. Psalm 91.1, he that
dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide
under the shadow of the Almighty. You remember what our Lord Jesus
said in Song of Solomon about the church, about his elect,
about you, he's hidden. You know what he says about her?
Oh my dove, thou art in the secret places of the stairs. You get
the picture of that, that little secret place under the stairs,
that little room. That's what Christ is to His
people. He's a safe room. People have safe rooms in their
house or a tornado shelter in the south. He's the safe room.
He's the tornado shelter that He hides us in. When vain thoughts
come from men without, or if it's the vain thoughts of our
own sin nature, there's only one cure. Go to Christ, because
that's what He commands us. That's what He commands us. Come
to Me, He says. He says this in Isaiah 26. Now listen to this. Listen now.
This is what He said. This is a word to every one of
us. If you believe Him, this is for you. And if you don't
believe Him, this is for you. You need to believe Him. Listen
to what he says now, Isaiah 26, 20. Come, my people, enter thou
into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee, hide thyself,
as it were, for a little moment, until the indignation be overpassed. Do you get the picture of a storm
shelter in that? What are you going to do when
a tornado comes? If you're down south, I've had them, they came
a mile north of my parents' house and a mile south of my parents'
house and left a swath of destruction. It just looked like somebody
just with giant fingers just drug them across the earth and
just destroyed everything in its path. When that's happening,
you need to get into, and they have storm shelters in the earth,
and you get in that storm shelter and you hide there until the
storm goes over. You don't come out until the
storm goes over. That's what Christ tells me and you to do.
Enter into Him and hide yourself in Him until the storm goes over.
Christ is our faithful hiding place and shield. He's our faithful
hiding place and shield. He won't turn one of His redeemed
over to the avenger. He will not turn us over to the
avenger. He laid down His life for us,
brethren. He bought us with His precious blood. He's not going
to turn you over out of His hand. He's not. Remember when David was running
from Saul, and he went to Keolah, and he hid himself in that city,
and he asked the Lord, will the men of Keolah deliver me? He
said, will they deliver me up? And the Lord answered and said,
they will deliver thee up. But Christ is telling me and
you, don't trust in man. That's the whole purpose. Don't
trust in man. He says, don't trust in the one
that lays upon your bosom. That's what he said. What's he
saying? It's not that you don't trust
your brethren and love your brethren. It's not that. Don't put confidence. You put confidence in a man,
you're going to be disappointed, but you can trust him always
and you will never be disappointed. That's the word of God. He's
our diligent hiding place and our diligent shield. What does
that mean? What do you mean by diligent?
You know, if a man's a watchman, that's what a pastor's, a watchman,
well, every other man's fallible, but this one, he's the preeminent
watchman. He's the preeminent guard on
the guard tower. That's the picture of what a
watchman is, sounding the alarm, saying, this is dangerous, flee
to Christ. But we sleep, and we slumber,
and we sin, and we fall, and we're just fallible men. But
not the Lord Jesus. He's diligent. He said in Psalm
121, He said, Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither
slumber nor sleep. He's awake all the time. His
eyes are always upon His people all the time. David knew he couldn't
win the battle against his vain thoughts. He knew that. He had
the Word of God, he loved the Word of God, and he knew from
the Word of God he couldn't win the battle against his vain thoughts.
He said, You're my hiding place and my shield. I'm hoping in
Your Word, Lord. We hope in His Word because it
declares Him. It declares His covenant promise
to us that He will keep us. Listen to Psalm 146.5. We hope in His Word because the
Word makes us hope in Him. Listen to this. Happy, blessed
is he that hath the God of Jacob for his help, whose hope is in
the Lord his God. That's not a vain hope. That's
a sure hope. Blessed is the man that trusts
in the Lord, whose hope the Lord is. See? If He's your hope, you
have nothing to be sad about. Blessed, happy is the man who
has the Lord for his hope. When vain thoughts come, you
run to our Lord Jesus. You come to this Word and you
seek the Lord. You go to His throne of grace.
He will hide you. He will be your shield. That
is real, Cheryl. That is a real promise that our
Lord makes. And He really works that for
His people. In your heart. Thirdly, by His
Word, He gives us strength to resist evil. Now catch how this
is done. Verse 115, He said, Depart from
Me, ye evildoers, for I will keep the commandments of My God. This was the spirit of the Lord
Jesus when He steadfastly resisted the devil in the wilderness.
He told the devil to go away. He relied on the Word of God.
He trusted in the Word of God. Every word he spoke concerning
the devil would tempt him, and every word he spoke was him hoping
in God the Father, declaring what God the Father would do
for him. trusting God the Father. Christ
gives us His Spirit. He gives us that Spirit He had,
and He commands us to resist the devil. Not like the world
tells you. The world says it with vain thoughts,
the way they say it. You know, you're just so strong,
you tell the devil, get out of here, you do this, that's not
how you're going to resist him. He said you resist him steadfast
in the faith. You resist him by running into
the hiding place. in your Christ, trusting Christ
to deal with him, trusting Christ to be your shield. That's how
you resist him. See, he just said, I'm hoping
in your word, I'm hearing your word, your law is my, what I
love. And he says, now, go away from
me, evildoers. I'm gonna keep the commandments
of God. What's that mean? I'm going to
flee into Him just like He told me to. I'm coming to Christ to
save me just like He told me to. I'm going to trust Him to
hide me just like He commanded me to do. I'm going to hope in
Him just like He commanded me to do. David certainly didn't want the
company of wicked men, but David's personifying his own vain thoughts
as the evildoers. They're working evil in you,
turning you this way and that way and the other way. There's
this inward battle between the flesh and the Spirit of God.
And when Christ sends the command, when He makes the Word, you hear
the Word, it makes you hope in the Word, He quickens you inwardly
to cry out, depart from me vain thoughts, you bunch of evil doers.
And how does He do it? He turns you to obey His commandment
to trust Him, look to Him, have your mind stayed on Him, and
He does it. He does the work, putting them
down. This is the only place in this
whole long psalm where the name God is used, right here in this
verse. And notice, it is my God. I'll tell you an example of how
this happens. Here's Thomas. having nothing but vain thoughts.
I will not believe unless I put my hand in his side and put my
hand in the nail prints. Vain thoughts. What did the Lord
do? He come to him and he commanded
him, Thomas, reach forth your finger. And when he came with
that word, just like that, what did Thomas say? My Lord and my
God. This is the only place that He
said that, but He gives this command and we flee to Christ
by faith and we're saved. And Christ promises, for the
oppression of the poor. Are you the poor? Are you the
poor? Are you the needy? He said, for
the oppression of the poor and the needy. The oppressed are
those that are pressed down and cannot cannot do anything about
the pressure. They can't get out from under
the oppression they're under. The needy are those that have
absolutely nothing with which to pay. No strength, no righteousness,
no nothing. Needy, poor and needy. Are you
the poor and needy? If you are, this is what he says
to you. Now will I arise, saith the Lord, I will set him in safety
from him that puffeth at him. The wicked is the devil, and
the devil puffs at his people. He's trying to stir up your vain
thoughts of your old man, and he puffs at you. It's like a
whole host of evil doers, and only the Lord can turn you to
Him. Now, if anyone questions if it's
Christ who saves us, if it's Christ who works this for us,
listen to the next word David said. This is where he brings
you when he does this for you. The next word, verse 116. Uphold
me according to thy word, that I may live, and let me not be
ashamed of my hope. Hold thou me up, and I shall
be safe, and I'll have respect unto thy statutes continually. Notice the Spirit made him resolve
to obey. He's resolved here that he'll
obey. But he knew he could not trust his resolve. His resolve
would be the result of the Lord upholding him. Respecting to the Lord's statutes
in the inward man, what do they do? They teach us to cast all
our care on Christ. And how are you going to be made
to cast all your care on Christ? For Christ to uphold you and
teach you to cast all your care on Christ. The only way is by
the hand of the Lord upholding us in the new heart, in love.
That's the only way. Spurgeon said this, David resolved
to keep the law of the Lord, but he first needed the Lord
of the law to keep him. That's what we're talking about.
This was how our Savior glorified the Father in this earth. He
lived in utter dependence upon the Father. He had to. He had
to. He had to live in perfect faith.
That's how He lived. He had to live in perfect obedience
to the Father, in perfect love to the Father. That means living
in utter obedience to Him, depending entirely upon Him. That's how
our Lord lived. So He's going to teach us to
live in utter dependence upon Him. You know what anything less
is? Anything less than depending
on Christ, us entertaining the thought that we can do something
ourselves. Vain thoughts. Vain thoughts. David knew he could not stand
without the Lord. He couldn't stand without the
Lord holding him up. He knew if God withdrew his hand
from upholding him, he'd fall. You know when you're going to
fall and there'll be no life in you and they bury you in the
ground? When the Lord stops upholding you. Can you stop that? Can a man say, well I got a little
strength in me, I can prevent that from happening. It's the same every day. It's
God's promise, it's His covenant word that He shall uphold you. He'll uphold His child. God made
this covenant promise to His Son and Christ makes this covenant
promise to us. Isaiah 41.10, listen to this.
Isaiah 41.10, this was the promise the father made to the son and
fulfilled, and this is a promise the son makes to his people and
he fulfills. Isaiah 41.10, fear thou not,
for I am with thee, be not dismayed, for I am thy God, I will strengthen
thee, yea, I will help thee, yea, I will uphold thee with
the right hand of my righteousness. That's His promise. That's why
David hoped in His Word. That's what he's talking about.
I hope in Your covenant promise You've made to me, Lord. Look
at Isaiah 42.1. This is the Word the Father fulfilled
to His Son, and this is the same Word the Son fulfills to His
people. Behold My servant, whom I uphold, Mine elect, and whom
My soul delighteth. That's His promise to us, brethren.
When He's begun a good work in us, He's going to perform it
all the way until the last day. That's His promise. Our hope
is in Christ, our righteousness. He's made us righteous by His
right arm. He's the right arm of God's righteousness.
It's His precious blood, so we cast it all into His hands to
present us to God perfectly righteous. And He's our sanctifier who separated
us unto Him and we're utterly dependent on Him to keep us sanctified. What's David saying? That's exactly
what he's saying. Lord, if you uphold me, I will
if you uphold me. We need God to uphold us. We
need Him to keep us looking to Him, keep us separated under
Him, our refuge, and God promises He will do this, and He promises
He will not make us ashamed for having all our hope in Him. Plead
this promise. It's good if He's promised you,
go to Him with the promise. That's what David's doing. Uphold
me according to your word. According to the word you promised
me, Lord, uphold me that I may live. And let me not be ashamed
of my hope. I hope in your word, he said,
I hope in your promise. Don't let me be ashamed for hoping
in you. Do you think if God really put that prayer in your heart,
do you think God's going to let you be ashamed for trusting him? Somebody said this, I forget
now which of the old writers said this, but he said, I thought
this was so good, he said, you know, people are always vain
thoughts, people are saying prayer changes things. And he said,
no, prayer doesn't change anything. He said, God puts prayer in our
heart to pray to Him to do what He's going to do. And here was
his point. So if you truly have in your heart to pray to God, for Him to uphold you. And you're
truly dependent on Him and you need Him to uphold you. He said,
God put that in your heart because that's what He's going to do. That's a good observation. Because
we don't pray unless God puts it in our heart to pray. But
if He's put it in your heart to pray it, it's a good indication
God's going to do it. Now there's a lot of things we
pray for if God's not going to do. But if it's according to
His promise, and you can really, truly pray that from your heart,
because that is all your hope and all your stay, He's going
to do that. Thou will keep him in perfect
peace, whose mind is stayed on thee, because he trusteth in
thee. Israel shall be saved in the
Lord with an everlasting salvation. You shall not be ashamed nor
confounded, world without end. That doesn't mean there won't
be a lot of things that me and you do that we'll be ashamed
of. It doesn't mean that at all. But it means When He's given
you faith to trust Him and have this good hope that He will save
you, He won't let you be ashamed for trusting Him. He won't make
you ashamed for trusting Him. He won't let you be ashamed for
trusting Him. He's going to bless the inward man so we know we're
safe by God's hand, and this way we'll have respect to the
Lord's statutes in the heart. That's what Paul said, trouble
works patience, and patience experience and experience hope. So as he works and he proves
to you he's good on all his word, he's going to do what he said
he's going to do, then experience has taught you to go straight
to him, and you patiently wait on him, and while you do it,
you have a good hope he will do what he's promised. This is
what He teaches you over and over by this work. Alright, fifthly,
by this work, He's going to keep us knowing Christ is the refiner.
He's the refiner. Verse 118, Thou hast trodden
down all them that err from Thy statutes for their deceitous
falsehood. Thou puttest away all the wicked
of the earth like dross. Therefore I love Thy testimonies. The wicked of the earth don't
necessarily know God's put them away. They grow great, they grow
prosperous. God said, behold, these are the
ungodly who prosper in the world. Psalm 73, 12. They are of the
world, they speak of the world, and the world heareth them, John
said. They disesteem God's people.
They call Paul the owl scouring of the earth. But the Lord says
they're dross. Christ has opened up the earth
and swallowed them up to keep his people safe. Don't be envious
of prosperous, wicked men. Don't be envious of people who,
you know, they just have everything that their heart could wish and
they go around with these vain thoughts of, you know, some of
them have how God's blessed them and how, you know, they've been
living right and everything. God's done all this for them.
Do you remember when the dragon, the devil, when he cast out that
flood in Revelation to destroy the woman, to destroy the church?
Well, one, God gave the church wings to fly into the wilderness
to her place. That's that secret place, that's
Christ. But he did something else. The earth helped the woman. The earth opened her mouth and
swallowed up the flood which the dragon cast out of his mouth.
Christ gives men false religion. The devil sends this flood of
all kinds of things that he's trying to destroy the church
with. And the Lord just makes it so that men have their worldly
religion, their works religion, they have the worldly riches
He gives them, and part of this reason is they swallow up that
flood the dragon sends. Why? To protect Christ's people,
to protect His church. You don't want to see folks in
false religion, but don't necessarily consider false religion entirely
a bad thing, because God's using it to protect His church. That's
exactly what that means. They're swallowing up the dragon's
flood just to protect the woman, the bride. What if God, here's
how Paul said it, what if God, willing to show his wrath and
to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels
of wrath fit for destruction? so that he might make known the
riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he has before
prepared unto glory, even us whom he has called." That's what
we're talking about. So rather than rejoicing, rather
than rejoicing that the wicked were swallowed up, rather than
rejoicing that God separated them, you know what it made David
do? It humbled him. It made him lowly in his heart.
It made him hit the dust in his heart. Why? He deserved to be
separated and cast out himself. He knew he had the same vain,
wicked thoughts and deserved the same thing, and yet God kept
him. Christ is the refiner. The Lord
Jesus is refining us from our vain thoughts, making us more
and more to trust Him alone and ourselves less. He treads down
our old man, He keeps the old man separated from our new man,
and He keeps separating us from anything that would harm us spiritually,
and that's what He's going to do. Don't you pray for God to save
you? Don't you pray for God to, Lord, Lord, teach me, guide me,
help me mortify my faith. Give me the spirit to mortify
my faith. Deliver me from my sin. Make me walk in paths of
righteousness. And then you see some awful thing
happen to your brother or your sister. That's what you ask for. You ask God to do that. A refining process is not a pleasant
process. It's fire. But He brings them
through the fire. Newer than they were. Renewed.
Unlike what they went into the fire with. And the result was
this. David said, therefore I love
thy testimonies. I love your witnesses to me.
I love your testimonies that you're going to do me right.
I see it now, Lord. You're keeping me separated into
Christ. and protect it. And what does
it make you do? When you see God's judgment upon
the wicked and you hear his words speaking concerning our own vain
thoughts and our own sinful flesh, my flesh trembleth for fear of
thee, and I, the new man, am afraid. That's a different word
than fear. I'm afraid. I'm in awe. I stand
in love and reverence of your judgments, Lord. You always do
what's right. I don't want to offend you. I'm
afraid of sin because it's sin. I'm afraid of sin because it's
against the God that's done all this good for me. This is what
you see through the fire. And in that new man, God casts
out that legal fear of our flesh, that terror and that torment,
giving us this loving reverence for God and His judgments, and
He shows us again and again His grace and mercy that He will
keep us separated unto Him. And this perfect love casts out
that legal fear. The great refiner separates the
precious from the vile. He's the only one that can do
it. He's the only one that knows it. And within our own persons,
He does it. separating the old from the new,
and he's growing us in godly fear and love. Here's why. Listen
to this from Luke 1.74. Here's why he does it. That we,
being delivered out of the hand of our enemies, the ones in our
own sinful nature, and whatever other enemies, devil, every enemy
we have, being delivered out of the hand of our enemies, might
serve Him without fear, without that legal torment, in holiness
separated into Christ, in righteousness made righteous in Christ, before
Him all the days of our life. That's what's going to keep us
doing, brethren. That's exactly what's going to keep us doing.
It turns you from vain thoughts to godly fear. I pray God will
bless that. All right, Brother Adam.