Now, this psalm, Psalm 50, since
it opens by speaking of God's judgment, most commentaries say
that this speaks of the great day of final judgment. But in
this psalm, God gives reproof to His people. He corrects His
people. And He teaches His people how
to truly worship Him. And He warns the wicked. Those
are not things that God's going to do in the final day of judgment. This psalm is a prophecy. It
speaks of that day when Christ came to His temple the first
time. And when our Lord Jesus manifests
the triune God in Himself, when God shined forth in Christ the
Lord, This prophecy declares what Christ began doing in that
day and what he continues to do in this gospel day. This is
what he does through his church. This is what he does through
the preaching of the gospel. I've titled this judgment now. Judgment now. Because the judgment
that he's talking about here begins right now in this day
of grace. It begins right now in the Lord's
house through the preaching of the gospel. Every sinner's sentence
in that final day of judgment will be determined by our response
to the gospel in this day. Everything that It will all be
settled in this day and determine what our judgment will be in
that day. God's judging now. Scripture says judgment must
begin at the house of the Lord, and He's judging now through
this gospel. First, it's through the church.
It's through the preaching of the gospel that Christ judges
His people right now. Through His church, out of His
church, through His gospel, Christ is judging all men right now. He says here in verse 1, The
mighty God, even the Lord, hath spoken, and called the earth
from the rising of the sun unto the going down thereof. Out of
Zion, the perfection of beauty, God hath shined. Our God shall
come, and shall not keep silence. A fire shall devour before Him,
and it shall be very tempestuous round about Him. He says there,
out of Zion, the perfection of beauty God hath shined. Christ's
church is Zion. You know from Hebrews 12, we
saw this, I believe, in the last Psalm, Hebrews 12, 22, you're
come unto Mount Zion. You've come to the general assembly
and church of the firstborn to God, the judge of all. And it
says there, our God shall come and shall not keep silence. It
was to Zion. It was to his temple. It was
to his church that Christ came when he first came. When he first
came to this earth, he came to his church. Malachi 3.1 says,
Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way
before me, and the Lord whom you seek shall suddenly come
to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant whom you delight
in. Behold, he shall come, saith the Lord of hosts. This is speaking
of God come in human flesh. And he says there, out of Zion
God has shined, the triune God. God the Father, God the Son,
and God the Holy Spirit shined in the person of Christ Jesus,
the God-man. He's the fullness of the Godhead
bodily. And God shined in Christ. Alikai 4.2 says, under you that
fear my name shall the son of righteousness arise with healing
in his wings, with healing in his rays, in his light. That's
Christ the light. Through the tender mercy of our
God, Luke 1.78 says, through the tender mercy of our God,
the day springs from on high hath visited us. The light has
come to give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow
of death to guide our feet into the way of peace. And Christ
is still shining out of Zion, out of his church. He's still
shining through the preaching of the gospel. Everybody here
that's a believer will say what Paul said in 2 Corinthians 4,
God who commanded the light to shine out of darkness has shined
in our to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God,
where? In the face of Jesus Christ. He's the light. But now, get
this, and I want every one of us here to get this, and I want
our young people to get this. You're not going to hear God
speak in some strange audible voice or some dream or something
like that. God speaks. through this word,
the preaching of the gospel, of his word, he speaks through
this gospel. This is the only way you're going
to hear God speak. Through the voice of his messenger
preaching his word. And when you hear his voice,
it won't be like you hear some audible voice, it'll be God opening
your heart and making you hear the words of this book. That's
what it'll be. Now, it's nothing to take lightly
when we gather here to hear the gospel preached. This is not
anything to take lightly at all because it's through this gospel
that's being preached that Christ is judging. Christ is judging
men. He's separating the weak from
the chaff, the true from the false through this word. He says
there in verse 4, He shall call to the heavens from above and
to the earth that He may judge His people. Christ says in verse
5, gather my saints together unto me. That is, all who profess
to be my saints, gather them all to me. Those that have made
a covenant with me by sacrifice and the heaven shall declare
his righteousness for God is judge himself. You remember when
Christ came, he said all judgments committed to me. And right now,
out of Zion, And through his local church, Christ gathers
his people. He gathers professing believers,
those that profess to be his saints. And through this gospel,
he judges whether a professing believer is true or false. This word discerns the thoughts
and intents of the heart. He judges. There he says, those
that have made a covenant with me by sacrifice." He said, the
heaven shall declare His righteousness. The Lord gathers His people and
He, through this gospel, He discerns and distinguishes whether a man's
sacrifice, the covenant he's made with God by a sacrifice,
whether it is Christ's sacrifice, Christ our righteousness wherein
he rests through faith or whether it is a man's own sacrifice which
is no righteousness at all. This gospel will discern the
difference. Christ will separate the true
from the false through this gospel for he is God and he is the judge
himself. Now think about this when Christ
first came. When he first came He came to
the children of Israel. You remember we saw in Exodus
they had made a covenant with God by a sacrifice. Remember
that? When Moses came down from the mountain and they sacrificed
those animals and Moses sprinkled the blood on the book and on
the people and on everything without the remission, without
the shedding of blood, no remission of sin. That's what he was declaring.
Now some of those who had been sacrificing, they saw Christ
in the sacrifice. They believed God. They trusted
Christ. They had been sanctified by God
and set apart by Him. But you remember there were some
others, the Pharisees and the scribes. They had just separated
themselves. They were false believers. They
were trusting their own sacrifices. And Christ came forth and spoke
the gospel And He made it obvious who were His and who followed
Him and rested in Him and who were trusting in their own works.
And He did it through preaching Christ and Him crucified. Listen
to this. It says there, a fire shall devour
before Him and it shall be very tempestuous round about Him. Christ comes forth and He is
the fire and His gospel is the fire. And He He comes forth as
a fire and He refines His people. He purges us of the dross through
this word, through the gospel, so that He effectually makes
His people come to God through faith in Christ alone. Go to
Malachi 3 and let's see this. Malachi chapter 3. Right before
Matthew. Malachi 3. This is where he said,
the Lord shall suddenly come to his temple. Look at verse
2. But who may abide the day of his coming? And who shall
be able to stand when he appeareth? For he is like a refiner's fire,
and like fuller's soap. He shall sit as a refiner and
purifier of silver, and he shall purify the sons of Levi. Those
were the priests. He's saying those that He's truly
made priests unto God, He's going to refine us. He's going to purify
us. Why? He's going to purge them
as gold and silver that they may offer unto the Lord an offering
in righteousness. that we might come to the Lord
through faith in Christ our righteousness alone. Not trusting anything
we've done, but Him alone. This is what He does for His
people. Then shall the offering of Judah and Jerusalem be pleasant
unto the Lord as in the days of old, as in former years. But now look at Matthew chapter
3. Just a few pages to your right there. This same fire, this same
gospel in Christ's hand. This is the fan in His hand.
And if a man's nothing but chaff, now you and I have a lot of chaff.
We believe on Christ, but we hold on to a lot of falsehood
and a lot of things that are of no value. And Christ is purging
us. He's refining us. He's making
us let go of what's not necessary and hold on to Christ only. But
now if a man's nothing but chaff, if he's nothing but trusting
the works of his hands, this gospel, Christ, and this gospel
gonna burn him up. Watch this. Matthew 3.11, John
the Baptist was that messenger that went before Christ. This
is what he said. He said, verse 11, I indeed baptize
you with water unto repentance, but he that cometh after me is
mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear. He shall
baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire, whose fan is in
his hand. That's the gospel of Christ crucified. This is in his hand. And he will
thoroughly purge his floor and gather his wheat into the garner,
his true people, but he'll burn up the chaff with unquenchable
fire. He's doing that right now. He's
doing it right now through this gospel. This very hour, as I'm
sitting here preaching the gospel to you right now, Christ is judging. He's judging. He's coming forth
with the fire and he's purifying his people. He's refining his
people. And those who are not his people,
those who are false professors who hear this word, he's going
to burn them up. He's going to burn them up. Remember
how the Pharisees, oh, they wouldn't. Those that were not his, those
who trusted in their work, they wouldn't receive his word. They
threw it behind their back and said we're not going to have
this man reign over us. That's why it was, and that's
why it still is, tempestuous around about Christ. It said,
a fire will go before him, and it will be tempestuous around
him. Wherever the gospel is preached in truth, if anybody enters in
who doesn't believe Christ, it's going to be a tempest for them,
and they're going to be burned up. Now, that's what's taking
place. That's why it's no light thing
to come hear the gospel, because Christ is working this twofold
work every time the gospel goes forth. Now, let's see this work. First of all, through the gospel,
Christ effectually reproves and instructs His people. Now, He's
going to teach you and I what He taught the children of Israel.
When He came, those that were His, that truly believed Him,
under that old covenant, the way they worshiped God was through
offering sacrifices. But many of them that truly believed
on Him were looking at those sacrifices too much. Those that
didn't believe Him, they only looked to the sacrifices. But
those that really believed Him, they were looking too much at
those sacrifices. Some of you and me, we get to
looking at things we do too much. And listen to what the Lord teaches
us. He teaches us what He taught them. He says in verse 7, Hear,
O my people. He's speaking to His people here
now. and I will speak, O Israel, and I will testify against thee."
Now, this is a reproving work. This is a chastening work he's
going to do here. And there, you know, as much
as we hear the gospel and he testifies to us and it's a comfort
to us, he also through this gospel refines us and testifies against
us to make us let go of things that need to be let go of. Watch
what he tells them here. I'm God, even thy God. Now this is who's speaking. He
says here, I'm God, even thy God. Now listen. I will not reprove
thee for thy sacrifices or thy burnt offerings to have been
continually before me. Now, some people think that this
should really read to not have been continually before me because I don't know which way it should
be, but they didn't always offer him the sacrifices they should
have. But then on the other hand, they were always continually
coming with sacrifices. But listen to what he said, I
will take no bullock out of thy house, nor he goats out of thy
folds, for every beast of the forest is mine and the cattle
upon a thousand hills. I know all the fowls of the mountains
and the wild beasts of the field are mine. If I were hungry, I
wouldn't tell you. For the world is mine and the
fullness thereof. Will I eat the flesh of bulls
or drink the blood of goats? All those offerings that God
commanded, they were all to picture Christ. He is the lamb slain
from the foundation of the world. Christ Jesus is the spotless
lamb of God who poured out his blood unto death and redeemed
his people from the curse of the law. That's who they all
typified. He's the only sacrifice that
God will accept. He's the one sacrifice for sin,
the one sacrifice that took away the sins of His people and made
us righteousness of God. He's the one sacrifice. That's
what all the sacrifices pictured. But if any sinner thinks, if
any professing believer thinks that he can indebt God by some
sacrifice he's made, he's badly mistaken. Don't ever think there's something
you can offer to God from your hand or my hand that's going
to make God receive us and accept us, or that's going to make us
righteous or going to make us holy. Don't ever imagine it. Because the truth of it is, we
can bring nothing to God that God doesn't already own. There's
nothing you can sacrifice that God didn't give you first. Isn't
that right? You talk men get all high and
mighty and think because they've, you know, they've put some money
in to build this or that for a church and they get their name
on a plaque and all that. They didn't give nothing to God. If you could get all the sacrifices
in Lebanon, God said, they wouldn't be sufficient to make a man righteous. God owns everything. Men want
to offer their silver and their gold and try to have their sins
absolved. God owns the silver and the gold.
He said the cattle on a thousand hills are mine. If I was hungry,
I wouldn't ask you. God receives nothing from us. If you do righteous, all you've
done is what you should have done. If you sin, it's not going
to change God. If we bow to God or if we reject
God, it's not altering God's purpose one bit. We're not adding
anything to God. We can't take anything from God.
God is God. That's who He is. He says, well,
I eat the flesh of bulls or drink the blood of goats. The blood
of those animals could never take away the sin of a man. Men sinned. We sinned in Adam. We broke the law in Adam. We
come forth speaking lies, breaking the law ourselves. The blood
of a bull or a goat couldn't take away our sins. The Hebrew writer said if they
would have purged our conscience, they would have ceased to be
offered. But every year they were offered, men were remembering
again and bringing to remembrance again their sin. That's what,
when a man's trying to sacrifice and sacrifice and sacrifice to
God, that might impress men. The Lord told those Pharisees,
He said, you are they that justify yourselves before men. But that
which is acceptable to men and impressive to men, it's an abomination
to God. But when a man's sacrificing
and sacrificing and sacrificing, you know what he's saying? My
sin is plaguing my conscience. My sin is plaguing my conscience.
My sin is plaguing my conscience. If he's doing it looking for
acceptance, that's exactly what he's saying. But Christ has come
forth. He's the sacrifice that took
away the sin of his people. He's the only way we can approach
unto God. Listen to this. Christ teaches
us through the gospel. True worship is in spirit. It's
from the heart. He says there, verse 14, offer
unto God thanksgiving. There's your offering. Offer
to God thanksgiving. Look at Psalm 51. Look at verse
6. Behold, thou desires truth in
the inward parts, in the heart. and in the hidden part thou shalt
make me to know wisdom." Look down at verse 15. Oh Lord, open
thou my lips and my mouth shall show forth thy praise. In other
words, you open my mouth and I'll praise you. That's when
God's given a man a new heart, out of the heart the mouth speaks.
And when he opens a man's mouth, he makes you do one thing, praise
God. for all aspects of our salvation. That's when you know a man has
been operated on by God. He'll start praising God for
his salvation and stop praising himself. He says, for thou desirest
not sacrifice, else would I give it. Thou delightest not in burnt
offering. God's not looking for you and me to sacrifice anything.
The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit. A broken and a contrite
heart, O God, thou will not despise. What does a broken heart do?
Go to Micah 6. I'll show you what a broken heart
does. Micah chapter 6, verse 7. He says, Will the Lord be
pleased with thousands of rams or with ten thousands of rivers
of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for
my transgression the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?
He hath showed thee, O man, what is good. What doth the Lord require
of thee? Watch this. To do justly with
thy God. A broken heart A contrite heart
is going to come before God, confessing our sin, declaring
God just. Against thee and thee only have
I sinned. That you might be clear when you judge, Lord. You're
right. He requires you to love mercy with thy God. Lord, I'm
not trying to sacrifice. I'm not trying to please you
with anything I've done. I'm asking you for mercy. That's what a broken heart does.
And to walk humbly with thy God. like a little child depending
on the Lord. That's what God requires. He
said in Hosea 14 to take with you words and turn to the Lord
and say unto him, take away all iniquity. Lord, you're the only
one that can do it. Please take away all my iniquity
and receive us graciously. Receive us by your grace. so
will we render the calves of our lips." Instead of offering
a calf, a physical calf, or some other sacrifice that we might
do in our day, he says, offer these calves of your lips. Thanksgiving
to God. What do we thank God for? Salvation. You know, when you talk to different
people, salvation means different things to different people. Wherever
they contribute, They're saying they don't need to be saved in
that aspect of their salvation. But you talk to God's people,
we thank God for choosing us before the world was made by
His grace because we would have never chosen Him. We thank God
for sending His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, who fulfilled the
law for us and purged our sins and made us the righteousness
of God because we couldn't keep the law. We praise Him for sending
the Spirit and giving us a new heart and giving us life and
faith and all things that pertain to godliness because we couldn't
give ourselves life. We praise Him for keeping us
every hour of every day because we can't keep ourselves. In other
words, We thank God for everything, A to Z. And then he says here,
he teaches us that true worship is living for the Most High. He says there in verse 14, and
pay thy vows unto the Most High. We ought never to vow to God
because you don't know if you can keep a vow to God. We do vow something. We vowed
before God when we married our spouse. We vow when we go into
a court of law and say we're going to tell the truth and keep
those vows. But here's what he's talking
about. And this is a vow that God's people make. When we were
baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, confessing Christ,
we vowed, we were lifting our hand to God, that we were consecrated
to Christ. that from then on we were committed
to Him, to honor Him, to walk before Him, trusting Him alone,
to live for Him in His honor, to hate sin and love righteousness. We were confessing that we would
never turn again to the law, never come back looking to our
works to try to make us accepted with God. We vowed to love His
people by sacrificing all that they might have the gospel of
Christ. These were things we, and he's saying, pay what you
vow. In other words, live unto the
Lord Jesus. And he says true worship is living
in total dependence upon Christ. Look at verse 15. And call upon
me in the day of trouble. I will deliver thee and thou
shalt glorify me. What's the day of trouble? What's
the day of trouble for a believer? It's every hour from the first
hour God taught you the gospel until you take your last breath.
We live constantly calling upon him, constantly depending upon
him. And he constantly delivers his
people. We're like those disciples in
the boat. When after the Lord sent that
storm and he said, why don't you have any faith? We don't
have any. unless Christ give it to us and
sustain it and keep us trusting Him, we don't have any faith.
We can't boast in our faith. We can't boast in our faith.
He keeps us every day continually, and that's what glorifies Him,
to live in dependence upon Him like a little child toward their
father. Now, by this same gospel, By
this same gospel, Christ judges and exposes false religionists
like he did the Pharisees. Same word he spoke to the Pharisees,
he spoke to those that followed him. Look what he says, but here's
what wheel workers, here's what lawmongers hear when they hear
this message you're hearing right now, when they hear Christ getting
all the glory and man getting none, when they hear that Christ
is the only one that fulfilled the law and man can't ever fulfill
it. Here's what they hear. Here's
what they hear God saying to them. Right here, verse 16. But
unto the wicked, God saith, what hast thou to do to declare my
statutes? Or that thou shouldest take my
covenant in thy mouth. He's saying, why are you preaching
my law? Why are you preaching my Ten
Commandments to people? That's what he's saying. Why
are you telling men to try to come to me by the Ten Commandments?
Seeing thou hatest instruction, and castest my words behind thee.
When thou sawest the thief, and thou consentest with him, and
hast been partaker with adulterers, thou givest thy mouth to evil,
and thy tongue frameth deceit. Thou, citizen, speakest against
thy brother. Thou slanderst thine own mother's
son. There's no love there, is it? Not even natural love. These things hast thou done,
and I kept silence. Thou thoughtest that I was altogether
such a one as thyself, but I will reprove thee and set your sins
in order before your eyes. The Pharisees had this outward
form of religion. They preached the law. They preached
the law, and they were hard toward everybody with the law, even
toward their own kinfolk. And they thought that they themselves
were truly keeping God's law. They really did. And not a one
of them ever kept it. Paul said, neither they themselves
who were circumcised keep the law, but desire to have you brought
under the law that they might glory in what they made you do. You know, that's what men who
preach law, that's what they're hoping We'll make them accepted
with God what they got other people to do. Isn't that what
Christ said? Didn't we preach in your name?
Didn't we cast out devils? We didn't let anybody that was
a sinner stay around your gospel. We cast them out. We wouldn't let the sick folks
in the hospital. He said, I say unto you, except
your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes
and Pharisees, you shall in no case enter into the kingdom of
heaven. What's the righteousness that exceeds the righteousness
of the scribes and the Pharisees? Christ Jesus, our righteousness. If you don't have Him, He's the
only one that ever kept the law. But lawmongers and will-worshippers
consent with thieves who believe and teach the same thing they
do, teach law. And by doing so, you know what
they do? They rob Christ of His glory. It was Christ's glory
to be the one who fulfilled the Law and the Prophets. He said,
I came to fulfill the Law and the Prophets. I didn't come to
destroy them. I came to fulfill them full so you can't add another
thing to them. And men who now say, but now
you got to keep the Law, they're robbing Christ of His glory.
That's Christ's glory. And not to mention, God's saying
right here, they also are thieves physically. They're robbing physically,
too. And they commit adultery, spiritual
adultery. They've turned from Christ and
played the harlot, going back to that first husband, the law. And they commit physical adultery. They don't keep that law. Christ
said you look upon a woman You've committed adultery. But see,
they're teaching it just as the outward thing. They don't teach
it as being in the heart. Being in the heart. They give
their tongue to speak evil against their own brother, particularly
Christ, our elder brother. When a man says, Christ, oh yes,
you're justified by grace through faith in Christ. But now, as
soon as they add that but to it, they start speaking evil
against Christ. saying he hadn't finished it all. He's not all. They speak evil against him.
Here's natural man's problem, verse 21, the second part there. Thou thoughtest that I was altogether
such a one as thyself. You thought the only righteousness
I required is that righteousness man requires. Oh, no. God has a much higher standard
of righteousness than you and I do. It's perfection. And we can't render to God perfection. That's the deceitfulness, though,
of the unregenerate man that thinks he's secure with just
an outward form of religion. He learned some doctrine. He joined the church. He was
baptized. He takes the Lord's table. He
goes through all the outward form, but his heart's never been
broken. His heart's never been made to
mourn over his sin. He never talks about what a sinner
he is. He never will, he never is broken
before God. He never is totally shut up to
Christ. He trusts something he's done.
But God's not like us. He said, you thought I was like
you. God's not like us. You know, you can't remember
all your sin. I can't either. We forget it.
God don't ever forget. Now, if you come right now and
you believe on Christ, you trust Christ, God says by the blood
of Christ, I'll remember your sins no more. But you meet God
outside of Christ, He don't ever forget. He said there, I'll reprove
thee and I'll set your sins in order before your eyes. God's
going to bring In the day of judgment, when men meet God without
Christ, He's going to set every sin before their eyes. Sins that they forgot, sins that
they didn't even know was sin, and condemn them. They're not
going to be able to speak. They're not going to be able
to say a word. And He does that to His people
now. and it makes you flee to Christ
the refuge. It makes you turn and confess,
I can't do anything to please God. I must have Christ Jesus
the Lord. And so Christ commands sinners
to repent now, right now. This is the judgment going forth
and He commands you to repent now. Verse 22, now consider this. Now, right now, this is the day
of grace. Don't wait till judgment. It'll
be too late to consider this then. Now consider this, ye that
forget God. So I'm going to go out of here
and forget everything that was spoken within 15 minutes. He said, listen you that forget
God, lest I tear you in pieces and there be none to deliver.
He's the only one that can deliver. We reject the deliverer, there'll
be none to deliver. Listen, Here he says it again,
whoso, don't you love that word whoso? That opens it wide open
now. God's not, he's not stopping
anybody from coming to Christ. He said, whoso offerth praise,
glorifyeth me. And to him that ordereth his
conduct aright, I'll show the salvation of God, I'll save him.
Whoso offerth praise, glorifyeth me. You do that by resting in
Christ by faith. giving God all the praise and
glory for every aspect of his salvation. And to him that ordered
his conduct to right by never going back to our works, never
going back to the law, by walking by faith, which works by the
constraint of his love. The motive now is love. You want to. You want to. You don't trust your work. You
just want to do whatever God will give you the privilege of
doing in gratitude to him. and you want to honor him. You
hate your sin. Every believer, you know what
every believer feels like when we hear this? When I started
reading out about the wicked, you started putting yourself
in that place and thinking, that's me. I'm wicked. I'm the biggest
hypocrite there is. And every believer feels that
way. And that's good. If you ever stop feeling that
way, you're in a bad spot because you're full of self-righteousness
and pride. That's how you conduct your steps aright, always needing
Christ. Now, how will you respond to
this gospel? Will you settle judgment now
by believing on Christ so that when you meet Him in that day,
you'll be with Him forever? Or will you cast His words behind
your back and reject Him and settle judgment for yourself
so that when you meet Him, He'll bring all your sins out and cast
you out forever. We're going to respond one of
two ways to this word. One of these two ways. He's judging
us right now. Day of judgment is not going
to be God bringing you forth now and trying to settle your
case and decide who did what. Oh, no, no, no. Judgment can
be settled right now in how you respond to this gospel. I pray
God make us right now consider this. Bow to Christ now. It's urgent. We don't know. We
just don't know. It might be over tonight. We
don't know. I pray God make you bow to Christ. Amen.