a message from the Lord tonight. I think I'm going to have to
preach two parts to it, but we'll try to get as far as we can here
tonight. I'll read what I think we'll
be able to cover. Our title is Our Salvation and
Confidence. Our Salvation and Confidence,
and we get it right here in verse 5. By terrible things In righteousness
wilt thou answer us, O God of our salvation, who art the confidence
of all the ends of the earth, and of them that are far off
upon the sea, which by his strength setteth fast the mountains, being
girded with power, which stilleth the noise of the seas, the noise
of their waves, and the tumult of the people. Now, we read here,
brethren, natural earthly things. And the psalmist is using these
natural earthly things to declare spiritual heavenly things. God
is holy in His sovereignty. He's holy in His sovereignty.
It would be a frightening thing if He were just sovereign, but
He's holy. and sovereignty. That means everything
he does he's going to do in righteousness. He's going to be right what he
does. He's our salvation and he's our
confidence. Now that declares why he's our
salvation and our confidence. He's holy, sovereign God. He's holy God. If somebody asked
me to define sovereignty, I would simply turn them to Psalm 115.3. Our God is in the heavens. He hath done whatsoever He hath
pleased. That's God's sovereignty. He
does whatsoever He pleased. Whatever He purposed, that's
what He brings to pass. And what you see coming to pass
in the world today, He's God bringing to pass what He purposed
from the beginning. From the smallest little cell
to the grandest event that happens in the world. God's ruling everything. Everything. By God's sovereign
power, He not only causes His child to approach unto Him and
cast all our care on Christ. That's what we saw in the first
half of the psalm. But He not only does that, then our God
continues to protect and provide for His people all our days.
All our days. Now first of all, God sovereignly
creates reverence in the heart of His child and He sustains
that reverence in our hearts, reverence for God. He says here
in verse five, by terrible things in righteousness wilt thou answer
us, O God of our salvation, who art the confidence of all the
ends of the earth and of them that are afar off on the sea.
When you read terrible things in righteousness, now that has
a negative connotation for us because we're accustomed to the
word terrible meaning something negative. But here it doesn't
mean something negative. Terrible means fearful, reverent,
awesome things. God performs these things in
righteousness. And by these things, God produces
fear and reverence and awe in the hearts of His child toward
God. You see there, He said He does
it for us. And that's who He does it for.
He does this for His people, for His elect people. And He
sustains that fear and that reverence in our heart. He continues to
do these terrible things, and we behold these things, and we
hear him preach, and he continues to sustain that fear in the heart
of his child. Now the law of first mention
is that wherever words used first in Scripture, usually it means
the same thing throughout Scripture. If you go with me to Exodus 34,
we see the first place this word terrible is used. Exodus 34 and
verse 10. He said, Behold, this is God
speaking, Behold, I make a covenant before all thy people I will
do marvels such as have not been done in all the earth nor in
any nation. That's the terrible things he's
talking about. And all the people among which thou art shall see
the work of the Lord for it is a terrible thing that I will
do with thee. and then he speaks of it. Observe
thou that which I command thee this day. Behold, I drive out
before thee the Amorite, and the Canaanite, and the Hittite,
and the Perizzite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite. Usually, when
we read about these terrible things in scripture, they're
performed in conjunction with God's acts upon our enemies,
most often. Now go to Psalm 68, These acts,
these terrible acts, these awe-inspiring acts, these reverent and fearful
acts of God, they show us God's sovereignty over all creation. He's sovereign over all His creation
and over all our enemies. Read here in Psalm 68 verse 7,
O God, when Thou wentest forth before Thy people, and He's still
doing this, when Thou wentest forth before Thy people, when
Thou didst march through the wilderness, and we stop and think
about that because You think about God walked with them, leading
them through that wilderness in the midst of them, and He's
still doing that today. He's still doing that with His
people today. When He did, look what happened. The earth shook.
The heavens also dropped at the presence of God. Even Sinai itself
was moved at the presence of God, the God of Israel. Thou,
O God, didst send a plentiful rain, whereby thou didst confirm
thine inheritance when it was weary. That's one of his terrible
acts. He sent a plentiful rain. Look
down at verse 32. Sing unto God, ye kingdoms of
the earth. O sing praises unto the Lord. To him that rideth upon the heaven
of heavens, which were of old. Lo, he doth send out his voice,
and that a mighty voice. Ascribe ye strength unto God. His excellence is over Israel
and His strength is in the clouds. O God, Thou art terrible out
of Thy holy places. You're holy out of Your holy
places. You're fearful out of Your holy
places. The God of Israel is He that
giveth strength and power unto His people. Blessed be God. Young people today use words
like epic and awesome to describe things that are not epic and
not awesome. God's the only one that does
anything epic. And what he does is awesome.
And that's what we're looking at here, terrible things. I thought
it was interesting yesterday I was studying this and it was
70 degrees out, beautiful sunny day. and as I'm studying this
all of a sudden I start hearing it just thunder and lightning
and I mean everything was dark out and that storm came through
and it knocked down trees all around Ewing and all the emergency
workers was out and I thought he does speak with a mighty voice.
A mighty voice. He can shut man down just like
that. Well first and foremost we see God's terrible, reverent,
awe-inspiring works performed in righteousness on the cross,
on the cross. Nothing is as holy and reverent
as when Christ suffered that living death as the substitute
of his people, crying out, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken
me? Those were terrible things, holy
things. the earthquake, and the rocks
rent, and the sky went black, and the veil in the temple ran
in too, and people were terrified at what took place. And all of
that was just a natural showing of those terrible things that
were taking place between God and the Lord Jesus Christ. In
it, we see the strictness of God's holy, reverent righteousness. When sin was found on our substitute,
God spared not His own Son. That's strict righteousness.
That's perfect righteousness. That's holy and reverent righteousness. God unsheathed the sword of justice
on His Son because shall not the judge of all the earth do
right? It was right. He was bearing the sin of His
people. And when He bore those sins, they became His sins. He owned them as mine iniquities. And God was just to unsheathe
that sword of justice and plunge it into His own darling Son. In righteousness, every guilty
elect child of God was crucified that day. in Christ our substitute. That's a terrible act. That's
a holy, reverent, awe-inspiring act. All our sin, our old man
of sin was crucified that day and our sins put away. The righteous
government of God, now you just think of that, the righteous
government of God fell entirely on the shoulders of our Lord
Jesus Christ. And what He was doing on the
cross was honoring that government. He was upholding that government
in perfect righteousness, and at the same time, justifying
His people from all our sin. That's God's terrible act. That's
His awe-inspiring act. But that's not all. Then, by
His terrible acts performed in righteousness, God comes and
makes us cry out for mercy. when He makes us see our iniquities
prevail against us. We saw that last time back up
in the Psalm, verse 3, iniquities prevail against me. And God's
gonna, if you're praying to God, if anybody hearing this is praying
to God, really praying to God for the first time, what God
is gonna do is He's gonna give them spiritual discernment to
hear the requirements of His holy law. He's going to make
them hear and see something of God's holiness and see something
of their sin and their ruin and how they deserve nothing but
condemnation. This has got to be done in us,
brethren. We've got to be brought down.
We've got to be brought to submit to God. And the only way a proud,
hard-hearted sinner will be brought down to quit blaming everybody
else is when God makes them see you're the sinner. You're the
sinner. Then there'll be submission of
heart. Then there'll be a begging for mercy from that sinner to
God. And that's a terrible act performed
in righteousness for His child. God creates reverence and fear,
a broken and a contrite heart in His child, and He causes us
to approach unto God through the blood and righteousness of
His dear Son. Job 37.22 says, With God is terrible
majesty. Touching the Almighty, we cannot
find Him out. He's excellent in power. and in judgment and in plenty
of justice. And listen to this, he will not
afflict. How can he be powerful in judgment
and plenty in justice and not afflict his people? Because he
afflicted his son in our place. Men do therefore, now listen,
because of his terrible majesty, men do therefore fear. And it's the same word as terrible.
Men fear him. He respecteth not any that are
wise of heart. Wise in ourselves. Think we're
smarter than God. He won't have a thing to do with
us. Go look at Psalm 66. There the next Psalm over. Verse 3. Say unto God how terrible
art thou in thy works through the greatness of thy power. That's what we're talking about.
shall thine enemies submit themselves unto thee. You and I, who God
saved, and every elect child God saved, we were enemies in
our minds by wicked works. And you know what? He's seated
right now till all his enemies be made his footstool, and all
shall. Whether they're his elect, who
are enemies in our minds by wicked works, or they're the rebel who's
an enemy of God, all are gonna be brought to the feet of our
Redeemer. And he brings us there in grace and makes us submit
ourselves to him. Look, all the earth, he's talking
about his elect, shall worship thee. That word worship means
bow down. We'll bow down to Christ. And
shall sing unto thee. Give him all the glory. They
shall sing to thy name. Come, see the works of God. He's terrible. He's holy, he's
reverent, he's awe-inspiring in his doing toward the children
of men. And here's an example. He turned
the sea into dry land. They went through the flood on
foot, and there did we rejoice in him. And that's just a picture
of the cross. Our Lord Jesus Christ dried up
the sea of justice for His people so we could go across on dry
ground. And that same sea of justice
flooded all His enemies and destroyed them on the cross. And God keeps
this holy fear in our heart. He keeps this holy fear in our
heart so that He's the God of our salvation. That's what our
text says in verse 5. By terrible things in righteousness
with thou answer us, O God of our salvation. When he's done
this work, the true believer looks nowhere else for salvation. That's just so. If people are
looking somewhere else for salvation, they have not experienced the
terrible acts of God performed in righteousness. Because when
you behold the holy and reverend God of creation and God of salvation,
He'll create fear and you'll submit and He will become the
God of your salvation. That's when you find out, as
we saw last time, He chose us and caused us to approach unto
Him. Christ purged our sin and He
intercedes with the Father on our behalf. He made us satisfied
with the goodness of His house so that we're pleased to sit
under the gospel all the rest of our days. He's the God of
our salvation. And therefore, it says He's the
confidence of His people. He's the confidence of His people
throughout all the ends of the earth and of them that are far
off upon the sea. His people, His chosen people
who He's put fear in our heart, wherever they are in this world,
He's all their confidence. Do you have confidence in anybody
else or anything else than God? If God's answered you by terrible
things, you don't. Listen to Proverbs 14, 26 says,
In the fear of the Lord, and that's the same word as terrible.
In the fear of the Lord is strong confidence. and his children
shall have a place of refuge. Psalm 118.8 says it's better
to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man. Now, the rest of the things we
see here are more of these terrible things that God performs in righteousness
for his people. And we'll look at a couple of
more here while we have time. Secondly, God's sovereign power. by His sovereign, terrible, majestic
power. God makes His child to be immovably
set on Christ. Immovably set on Christ. Verse
6, which by His strength setteth fast the mountains, being girded
with power. Now you think about the mountains.
We've all driven through the mountains. You think about the
mountains. How immovable they are. They're just immovable. But brethren, the strength of
God set the mountains. The strength of God did it. They're
girded by God's power. By God's power. And it's by God's
strength. It's by His power that He makes
His child to be immovably set on Christ the rock. He makes
us immovably set on Christ. Christ our righteousness. By God's power, He girds us about
and keeps us immovable. We can't be moved away from Christ. That's so of everybody God works
this in. Absolutely so. But you know,
as immovable as the mountains are, we're talking about the
Alps and we're talking about the Rocky Mountains, these giant
mountains, as immovable as they are, God makes His child even
more immovable from Christ than those mountains. Look over at
Isaiah 54. Look at verse 10. For the mountains shall depart.
One day they're going to depart, brethren. And the hills be removed,
but my kindness shall not depart from thee, neither shall the
covenant of my peace be removed, saith the Lord that hath mercy
on thee. You see, this power we're talking
about, it's not only God's sheer sovereign power and strength,
It's the power of His covenant. It's the power of the covenant
of God. Christ's covenant is established
in Christ. God's covenant of peace is established
in Christ's blood. It's established in righteousness.
And because God's holy, couple that together with Christ's righteousness
established for His people, and God will never allow us to be
moved away from Him. Because God's glory He's at stake
here. He'll never allow it. Paul said,
nothing shall separate us from the love of God in Christ. Let's
read that. Go to Romans chapter 8. Listen
to this. Romans chapter 8, verse 35. Who shall separate
us from the love of Christ? Is somebody going to move us
from Christ, from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation do
it? Are you going to have such a bad trial that you're just
going to fall away? Nope. Or distress or persecution? We're about to look at persecution.
Is that going to make us move away from Christ? Famine? Nakedness? Peril or sword? As it's written, we don't have
any strength. We did sheep, killed like sheep
at the slaughter all day long. But no, in all these things we
are more than conquerors through him that loved us. For I'm persuaded
that neither death nor life nor angels nor principalities, nor
powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor
depth, nor any other creature shall be able to separate us
from the love of God, where is it? Which is in Christ Jesus
our Lord. Psalm 55, 22 says, he shall never
suffer the righteous to be moved. That's a dogmatic statement.
Look at Psalm 112, verse 6. He's talking about the good man. That man
born of God's grace that he's made the good man. Surely he
shall not be moved forever. Psalm 112 6. Surely he shall
not be moved forever. The righteous shall be in everlasting
remembrance. Who's remembering us? God is. Christ our righteousness is.
That's why we won't be moved. That's why we're the righteous
and that's why we won't be moved. We're in everlasting remembrance.
He shall not be afraid of evil tidings. You know, you and me
both know that's not of us, don't we? Because you let the least
little thing happen and evil tidings and we get afraid real
fast, don't we? But God says we won't be afraid.
He can keep us Steadfastly set on Christ. His heart is fixed. Fixed where? On Christ. Trusting
in the Lord. His heart is established. And
he shall not be afraid until he see his desire upon his enemies. You know, sometimes, you know,
we don't ever justify sin. Sin is wrong in all of us. It's
just wrong. You know, God could take us all
out of the way and remove our sin from us and cause us not
to be overcome by it just like that. But don't you find that
the sin that so easily besets you is what keeps you at Christ's
feet begging Him to save you. Begging Him to sustain you, begging
Him to keep you fixed on Him and to keep you immovable from
Him. And sometimes we ask God, Lord, remove this from me. Just
take this from me. Sanctify me. Separate me from
this. And God will do that. He will
answer us. And He'll answer us in terrible things. Reverent,
fearful, powerful things. And you'll think you're going
to die. It'll hurt so bad, you'll think you're going to die. God,
I want you to remove me from the sin. I want you to kill me.
But it'll never be for our harm. It'll only be for our good. And
He will accomplish that. He will subdue our flesh and
overcome all our enemies. And He'll never let us be moved
from Christ. We'll come out more fixed on
Him, our hearts more established on Him, and He will not let His
people be moved from Christ. Now thirdly, let's look here,
this will probably be our last point. By His sovereign power,
God protects us from all our enemies. By His sovereign power. Verse 7, which stilleth the noise
of the seas, the noise of their waves, and the tumult of the
people. Now God literally stills the
natural sea. We saw that when Christ walked
this earth, the sea was raging and his disciples were afraid
and he spoke, peace be still, and it was a calm. He can physically,
literally calm the sea. But a greater display of power
is seen in that the noise of the seas and the noise of their
waves is the tumult of the people. That's what he's talking about.
He's talking about our enemy. who speak against His people.
Go to Psalm 124 and I'll show you this. Psalm 124 and look at verse 1. Now listen to what this says.
If it had not been the Lord who was on our side, now may Israel
say. He said, now let's repeat that.
If it had not been the Lord who was on our side, when men rose
up against us. Then they had swallowed us up
quick when their wrath was kindled against us. Then the waters had
overwhelmed us. The stream had gone over our
soul. Then the proud waters had gone
over our soul. See how he's comparing these
enemies to the proud waters and the waves. Blessed be the Lord
who hath not given us as a prey to their teeth. Our soul is escaped
as a bird out of the snare of the fowlers. The snare is broken
and we are escaped. Our hell is in the name of the
Lord who made heaven and earth. One more place, look at Psalm
89 and verse 8. Verse 8, O Lord God of hosts,
who is a strong Lord like unto Thee, or to Thy faithfulness
round about Thee, Thou rulest the raging of the sea. When the
waves thereof arise, Thou stillest them. Thou has broken Rahab. He's talking about Egypt and
Pharaoh. You broke Pharaoh. He was the
raging sea. You broke him. You broke him
in pieces as one that is slain. Thou has
scattered thine enemies with thy strong arm. He says, The heavens are thine,
the earth also is thine. As for the world and the fullness
thereof, thou hast founded them. He says, the north and the south,
thou hast created them. Thou hast a mighty arm, strong
is thy hand, high is thy right hand. Look, justice and judgment
are the habitation of thy throne. Mercy and truth shall go before
thee. See, God has worked mercy and
truth. He's worked justice and judgment
on behalf of his people in Christ on the cross. And when he did
so, he conquered powers and principalities. He crushed the devil's head.
And he's not going to allow the devil to conquer his people.
And he's not going to allow the devil's seed to conquer his people.
When proud men speak against us, God will subdue it. He will
protect his people. Now when we're on land, we feel
pretty strong. But you let a man go down to
the depths of the sea and a great storm comes and he finds out
just how weak and how helpless a creature he is. And so do we. Whenever the sea of proud enemies
rage against us with their noisome waves, that's when you find out
how helpless you are. When we become too proud and
we become too strong and we get to thinking too much of ourselves,
all God has to do is say to the devil, have you considered my
servant Clay? That's all he's got to do. You know, I'm going to preach
on this one day, but last week when I was studying on that altar
of incense, I mean on that ransom money, that atonement money,
I've studied on that. You know the scripture says when
David numbered Israel. Scripture says in 1 Chronicles
it says the devil moved him to number Israel. But then you go
read in Samuel and it says the Lord moved him to number Israel. How can that be true? Because
the devil is the Lord's servant. The devil just does what the
Lord bids him to do. Why did the Lord move David to
do that? Now listen to this terrible act. Listen to this majesty right
here. God had all against the children of Israel because they
had sinned against God and he was going to destroy them. But
at the same time, he was going to bring his servant David down
from his pride and humble him at his feet. And he's going to
accomplish both of these by moving the devil to move David to number
Israel and not give the ransom money. And God killed 70,000
Israelites. And as soon as it was done, you
know what God did? He smoked David in his heart
and David said, I've sinned against God. Do you see the wisdom in
that? God executed His judgment upon
people that had sinned against Him, that were His enemies, and
at the same time, And he used his elect redeemed child to do
it. To cause it to come to pass.
So God would be just to do it. And he brought him down to Christ's
feet and taught him something in the whole process. You see
how terrible, the terrible acts of our God? And how He's able
to use our enemies to teach us? All He's got to do is say, have
you considered my servant Job? And what does He do? He makes
you see your sinfulness. Oh, you wouldn't justify yourself.
You've heard that preached. You know better than that. You
wouldn't do that. Let the enemy speak against you
and watch you. Rise up and justify yourself
like a fool. You see your sinfulness. You
see, you hear and you see and you find out you're defenseless. You can't defend yourself. You
start trying to defend yourself, it just gets worse and worse
and worse. You have no defense. He makes you see you're less
than nothing and vanity and you have no strength at all. That's
me and that's you. And it tells you, He brings you
to commit it unto the Lord and trust in Him also, knowing He
shall bring it to pass. He shall bring forth our judgment
as the light and our righteousness as the noonday. Wait on the Lord. He's our refuge and He's our
strength. Now this past week we've seen
the tumult of the people. We've seen riots in the streets
and busting out windows and all those things. God has power to
still the tumult of the people in an instant. I thought yesterday
when that mighty storm came through, I thought if God would have sent
that one night in Minnesota, it would have shut that right
down in a heartbeat. He can still the heart. He can
do it in the heart of His enemy. But even more especially, He
steals the enemy when they speak against His people. The only
thing God has to do is speak. Listen to Psalm 46, 6. The heathen
raged. The kingdoms were moved. He uttered His voice and the
earth melted. All He's got to do is speak.
Brethren, if somebody professes to be a child of God, somebody
professes to be a child of God, never speak against them. Never
do it. I don't care what you think, the reason you
have for doing so is just don't ever do it. Don't ever do it. It's a dangerous game to speak
against one of God's people. It's dangerous. God said, touch
not mine anointed, and do my prophets no harm. Christ said,
woe unto the world because of offenses, for it must need be
that offenses come, but woe to that man by whom the offense
cometh. But here's something else. While
God is stilling the heart of our enemy and making them to
cease from their raging waves billowing over us while he's
doing that, He also steals that raging, roaring, sinful sea of
your flesh at the same time. Because it's got to be subdued
too. We've got to be brought down. You know that demon possessed
man in Gadara? He's a picture of us. And he
was a tumult. He was a riot. He was just raging,
foaming waves. That's all he was. And that's
all we were. by nature. That man was constantly in a
tumult. He was naked all the time. He
was living in the graveyard. He was cutting himself. They
couldn't bind him with chains. He would break the chains. We couldn't be bound. The chains
of religion and all their rules and regulations couldn't bind
you. But our Lord Jesus Christ came to where he was and all
he did was speak. And when he left there, that
man was clothed and seated and in his right mind. He can subdue
our flesh. He can subdue our flesh. Go with me. I want to end with
Isaiah 43. This is a favorite of God's people right here. I
want you to listen to this. Now thus saith the Lord that
created thee, O Jacob, and he that formed thee, O Israel, And
that's you and me. We're Jacob in our flesh and
Israel in the new man. And God created us. He formed
us. What does He say to you? Fear
not. That's the same word as terrible.
By God's fearful acts, He puts fear in your heart. Reverence.
And He says to you, Fear not, for I have redeemed thee. I've
bought you. I've called thee by thy name.
Thou art mine. How did God get that? Christ
redeemed you. He paid the price of His precious
blood. You belong to Christ. You think anybody is going to
steal you away from Him? When thou passest through the
waters. See, we are going to go through
the waters. We are going to pass through the waters. There are
going to be raging waves that come against us. But look at
this, I will be with and through the rivers, they shall not overflow
thee. When thou walkest through the
fire, thou shalt not be burned, neither shall the flame kindle
upon thee. How come? For I am the Lord thy
God, the Holy One of Israel, thy Savior. I gave Egypt for
thy ransom, Ethiopia and Seba for thee. He said, I gave whole
nations of people for you. You realize this brethren, when
you look through the scriptures and you see these mighty nations,
Babylon and Persia and all these empires that once existed and
they're not there now. Why? God gave them for you and
me, they're sitting right here today. They had to be given up
to work all things together for good for them that love God to
them who are the called according to God's purpose. That all had
to happen. He gave up nations for his people. Since thou was
precious in my sight thou has been honorable and I have loved
thee. Therefore will I give men for
thee and people for thy life. That's the promise of God. That's
the promise of God. The God of our salvation and
our confidence. He is our salvation and He's
our confidence. Amen. Our great God, we thank
you for this word and thank you for comforting the people and
making us to fear not. Lord, make us behold your terrible
acts on the cross. Make us behold what you've done
for us in grace and how holy and reverent and how high and
mighty and powerful these acts were to bring some wretched sinner
like us to you to clothe us in Christ's righteousness and make
us complete. Lord, in whatever we face, whatever
we face, whatever the trial be, let us remember that the fire
is not even going to make a smoke. It's not even going to kindle
upon us. The waters are not even going to make us miss a breath.
No harm is going to be done to us because we have eternal life
in you. It's only going to be for our
good. It's only going to be to purge
our troughs and refine the gold. Lord, sit as the refiner and
work your works in terrible majesty. Work your works in terrible power. Work your works so that it creates
reverence in our heart. Make us put our hand over our
mouth. Make us see you holy, holy, holy. And make us see ourselves as
a sinner undone, dwelling in the midst of a people of unclean
lips. And keep us looking to our salvation
and our confidence Christ Jesus our Lord, will you do this for
us Lord? Will you do this for your people
everywhere? This is our need. This is our need. In everything
we think's a need. We just want to get our job back. We just want to get out of the
sickness or whatever. That's not our need. Our need is to
see you have us. You're holding us. You've bought
us. You've purchased us. We belong
to you. You're the holy God who's working
everything for our salvation. You are our salvation and our
confidant. Lord, don't let us forget this.
Forgive us of our sins. Forgive us for turning into a
raging sea ourself. Keep us subdued. Keep us begging
mercy at your feet, worshiping you. In the name of our salvation
and our confidence, we ask it, Christ Jesus, amen.