Alright brethren, let's go now
back to Psalm 32. Psalm 32. Now we read at the very beginning,
it says, A Psalm of David, Maskel. That word Maskel means to give
instruction. To give instruction. This is
a psalm to give us instruction. We need Christ to instruct us
of these things in the heart. That's how we'll understand them
and know them. He says, Blessed, the word means happy. Happy is
he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed
is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity, and in
whose spirit there is no guile. Our subject this morning is a
blessed conjunction. We all learned what a conjunction
was in elementary school and watching Schoolhouse Rock on
Saturday mornings. In this case, a conjunction connects
two statements. That's what a conjunction does,
and the conjunction here is and. Did you notice this blessed conjunction? Blessed is he whose transgression
is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man unto whom
the Lord imputeth not iniquity, and in whose spirit there is
no guile. In order for God to save a sinner,
in order for the sinner to be truly happy, blessed, That which
is declared before the conjunction and that which is declared after
the conjunction are absolutely necessary for Christ to perform. Both are necessary and He performs
both. The reason I had us sing Rock
of Ages, did you see in the very first verse what the songwriter
said? The water and the blood. from Christ's wounded side which
flowed, be of sin the double cure, save from wrath and make
me pure. Before the conjunction is the
blood of Christ, the work of righteousness accomplished for
His people. After the conjunction is the
water. It's the work of sanctification
accomplished within His people. Both are necessary and both are
by our Lord Jesus Christ. I want to first look at our problem.
And then secondly, look at Christ's work of righteousness. And then
thirdly, Christ's work of sanctification. First of all, our problem. Now
before the conjunction, we see what our problem is. If you look
there in that first section of verse 1 and 2, He speaks of transgression,
sin, and iniquity. Now there's our first problem.
Sin, transgression, and iniquity. And then after the conjunction
we see our problem is death. Gal, a spirit that is Gal, deceitful,
a lying spirit. And both of these came from our
first head, Adam. Go back to Romans 5. And I want
you to hold your place there. Mark it. We'll come back later.
But Romans 5. The reason I read this often
and preach on this text often is we are not going to be able
to enter into what Christ did and what Christ accomplished
for His people unless we can take our place right here in
what Adam did for all whom he represented. Now look here, I
said our problem is sin and death. That's what our passage is saying. We need to be saved from our
sin and from the guile of our dead spirit. Now look here, both
came by Adam. By one man sin entered into the
world. There's sin and death by sin. See the conjunction? Sin entered
and death by sin. And so death passed upon all
men for that in Adam all have sin. Now our text speaks of our
sin in three ways. It says it's transgression. Transgression
means trespass. It means rebellion. If you came
to a sign in a field and there said, no trespassing, and you
just ignored it, the moment you step past that sign, you've trespassed,
you've transgressed what belongs to another. And that's what we
did. We trespassed, we transgressed,
we rebelled against God. In the garden, in Adam, and then
all our days. And then it says sin. That's
missing the mark of God's law. Missing the mark of God's law. In Adam we broke God's law and
all we ever do in our sinful flesh and sinful nature is break
God's law. That's all. Our chief end is
to glorify God, but we've missed the mark. For all have sinned
and come short, missed the mark of the glory of God. And then
where it says here, iniquity. This has to do with our good
works. What we thought was good works, what we thought commended
us to God, Iniquity means it's not equitable. It's not equal. It doesn't equal the righteousness
God demands. And so all our good works that
we thought were good works were just false balances and false
measures which God hates. Iniquity. In addition to that
though, that's not our only problem. In addition to that, our problem
by Adam is spiritual death. We have a heart of guile because
of being born of Adam's corrupt seed. Peter describes what guile
is. He defines it for us in 1 Peter
2 verse 1. It's all malice and all guile
and hypocrisies and envies and all evil speakings. That's guile. Christ said that which a man
speaks comes from where? His heart. And so this is what
our heart is. Our heart is guile, it's evil
speaking, it's malice, it's envy, it's hypocrisy. God saw after
Adam failed, it says He begot a son in His image, that fallen
depraved image. And it says God saw that the
wickedness of man was great in the earth and that every imagination
of the thoughts of His heart was only evil continually. only evil, continually evil,
and unable to do anything but evil. That's the heart that's
in a man. By nature, we deal deceitfully
and dishonestly with our own selves. We try to say we're better
than we really are. We try to deceive God, but all
we really do is deceive ourselves. That's from a deceitful heart.
The heart's deceitful and desperately wicked. Who can know it? No sinner
can know it, not unless God makes him know the heart, and that's
not unless God makes you see you've deceived yourself. So
God says our sinful man is so corrupt that it can never be
improved by us, and it will never be amended by God. It has to go back to the dust.
Now, I want you to understand that this sinful spirit we're
talking about here is in sinner and in saint. It's in the unregenerate. That's all He is. But it's also
still in the saint. Christ is speaking in this psalm,
but He's speaking through David. And David experienced the things
he's talking about here as a believer. As a believer. As a believer. after he committed sin with Bathsheba
and he killed Uriah, her husband, he went for well over a year
using guile and deceit trying to cover his sin. So this sinful
guile, this spirit of guile is still in a believer as well. So how then can we be just with
God? How can we be just with God?
How can this first problem be taken care of? First of all,
it's by Christ's work of righteousness for His people. Verse 1 says,
Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man unto whom
the Lord imputeth not iniquity. Now sinner, do you want to be
happy? Everybody in this world wants
to be happy. We all want to be happy. But will you be happy
by hearing Christ's instruction. And heed His Word in where He
says true happiness is. This is true happiness. This
is the only real happiness there is. This is lasting happiness
right here. Just as all who Adam represented,
just as everybody Adam represented were made sin by Adam's offense,
all who Christ represented are made righteous by Christ's obedience. Now go back to Romans 5, 19. Look again. Romans 5, 19. For as by one man's disobedience
many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many
be made righteous. That verse right there cuts out
all our doing. It takes away all our doing.
It says we are made righteous by the obedience of Christ. His
obedience. For all who believe on Christ,
brethren, this is true happiness. God our Father sent His only
begotten Son, the spotless Lamb of God, the only fit one to lay
down His life, the just for the unjust. And that's exactly what
Christ did. Concerning our transgression,
Scripture says, for the transgression of My people was He stricken. He was stricken by the heavy
weight of the transgression itself. And then He was stricken by the
heavy hand of God, pouring out justice upon Him in place of
His people. And now for all who believe on
Him, brethren, Scripture says, blessed is he whose transgression
is forgiven. You know what that means, that
word forgiven? It means Christ literally lifted up off of us
our transgression and bore it away for us. Remember the scapegoat
who took all the sin and transgression and took it away into a land
not inhabited? That pictured Christ. That's what He did. That's
why Christ says to you, are you weary and heavy laden? You see
now what He's talking about. Are you heavy laden with your
transgression? Come unto Me, He says. and I'll
lift that transgression off. You'll find I've taken it away. And then concerning our sin,
Scripture says, He hath made Him sin for us who knew no sin,
that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. The old English
preacher Thomas Bradford pointed out what I always point out to
you. He said, not merely a sin offering, but sin itself. Christ
bore our law breaking. He bore the law-breaking of His
people, and then He bore the punishment for that law-breaking. This is what Christ bore. And
by His obedience, Christ established the law for His people. Christ
made the law honorable for His people. Christ made us the righteousness
of God in Him, and totally put away our sin. And so now, for
everybody who's cast their care on Him, they're happy. They're
happy because the Scripture says, happy is he whose sin is covered. We sing about Christ, our mercy
seat. Christ is the mercy seat. Get
the picture that God was painting for us with the mercy seat. Here
you had the Ark of the Covenant, and then in that Ark you had
the broken law of God. The law we broke, brethren, but
over the top was a mercy seat. And the high priest went in there
once a year alone with the blood of a lamb and he sprinkled that
blood on that mercy seat so that blood covered all the sin of
us breaking that law. That's the picture. Christ is
the mercy seat. Christ is the high priest. Christ
is the Lamb who shed His own blood. And brethren, at God's
mercy seat, His blood covers over all our sin, all our coming
short of keeping the law of God so that we're just and righteous
before God and God remembers our sin no more and will never
again bring them up. Our sins have been blotted out
by the blood of Christ. There's an illustration I read
about where they used to write and they would take stones shaped
like a piece of paper, but it would be a stone, and they would
put wax over that and they wrote on that. And so when they messed
up in writing, what they did is they took wax and they put
more wax over that and completely covered up what they had already
written. So you couldn't see the mess up. That's the covering. Christ has covered our sin with
His blood. He's put it away out of God's
sight so God can't see it. They all know God can't see it.
Brother Popcoff, he said, God knows all things and can see
all things, but the one thing God can't see, He can't see through
the blood of Christ. He can't see our sin through
the blood of Christ. Concerning our iniquity, Scripture
says, All we like sheep have gone astray, we have turned everyone
to his own way, and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity
of us all. All the things that we thought
was goodness, and right, and equal, and God would be pleased
with it, God said it was all iniquity. He didn't measure up
to God's righteousness and He took it all and laid it on His
Son for His people. God imputes what's fact. God
imputes what's fact. God imputed sin to us because
Adam made us sin. We just read that. Well, for
the throne of God, by Christ's obedience, we have no iniquity
for God to impute. It's not as if it is real, brethren. We have no iniquity before God
because Christ put it away. And therefore, blessed is the
man to whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity. Now understand,
I want you to turn to Romans 3. Understand me now and hear
this. You may have never heard this
before. I hope today God makes us hear it in our heart. We establish
the law and are made righteous, not by our works, but through
faith in Christ. Listen to this. Abraham is held
up here as an example. He established the law 430 years
before the law was given. I love that. I just absolutely
love that. How can you establish a law that
hadn't even been given? Through believing on Christ.
Look here in Romans 3.31. Do we then make void the law
through faith? God forbid. Yea, we establish
the law through faith. What shall we say then that Abraham
hath found? For if Abraham were justified
by works, he had whereof the glory, but not before God. For
what saith the Scripture? Abraham believed God, and it
was counted, imputed unto him for righteousness. Now to him
that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt.
but to him that worketh not. But believeth on him that justifieth
the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness, or righteousness
is imputed to him through faith. Verse 6, Even as David also described
the blessedness of the man unto whom God imputeth righteousness
without works, saying, Blessed are they whose iniquities are
forgiven, and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to
whom the Lord will not impute sin. Brethren, Christ is teaching
us through David that this is true happiness. David knew this. He experienced this. He experienced
being made sin and he experienced forgiveness. And he is telling
us this is happiness. But I am going to tell you something
else. Christ knows this better than any of us know it. Christ
was without sin. There is no doubt about that.
He was without sin. He knew no sin. And God would
not impute sin to him. But when Christ was made sin,
He bore our sin. And God then imputed our sin
to Him. He charged Him with it. And until
He justified His people, He waited on God to justify Him, which
God did. And so Christ knows. Remember
He said, He is near that justifies Me. Now understand, Christ was
justifying His people. But as he did so, he didn't say
himself, that's enough, it's over. No. He died unto sin until
God said, I'm satisfied. He waited on God who was near
to justify him and raise him without sin and make him to live
unto God forevermore. So he knows, brethren, he knows
what it is to be made sin and to be brought out from under
it. And He not only justified us,
you see Christ here in this psalm is teaching this to you and me.
This is what true happiness is. He knows it. He knows it. He's the preeminent blessed man.
Christ is. Christ gets the preeminence in
everything. Everything we encounter, He's
already been through it. And He knows it. Now, let's go
now to the next thing. You know, some stop with this
work of Christ for His people. Some stop here. But since our
sin nature is guile, we have to go on to this part that comes
after the conjunction. We need Christ to sanctify us.
Look here. I'm thankful for this blessed
conjunction. Christ is our righteousness and
He is our sanctification. Psalm 32, 2. And in whose spirit
there is no guile. Don't you love that song, The
Water and the Blood? Be of sin the double cure? We've
got a double problem. Righteousness and death. And
so He saves us from wrath and He makes us pure. Every priest
had to be washed. You know, when they were to come
and go into God's tabernacle, in that place there was a holy
of holies, and there was the holy place and the holy of holies.
And even just to go into the holy place, the priests had to
be washed. Ceremonially, they had to be
made pure. That was the picture, the picture
of regeneration. They couldn't go into God's holy
presence without that. Well, brethren, we can't The
Scripture said, He said, Aaron and his sons you shall bring
to the door of the tabernacle of the congregation and shall
wash them with water. Then and only then they could
go past the door of the tabernacle and go inside. Well brethren,
we have to be washed in regeneration through the Holy Spirit Christ
and that's through the blood of Christ that comes to us by
His grace. So that then we're made priests
unto God, holy unto God, and we can enter into God's holy
presence. Listen to the Scripture I just read to you. Having therefore,
brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus.
Let us draw near with a true heart. That's a heart that doesn't
have guile anymore. A true heart. In full assurance
of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and
our bodies washed with pure water. but we defile ourselves. Now
that work, when He cleanses us and cleanses us of all our sin,
purges us of all our sin inwardly, that brethren, it's a once for
all time thing before the judgment seat of God.
But you know, we walk through this world and we defile ourselves
constantly by our walk. And that's what Christ was saying.
You know, when He washed the saints' feet, and Peter said,
well, wash me all over. He said, you don't need for me
to wash you all over. He that I've washed is clean
as a whip. You just need your feet washed.
See, that's what he said. When He's brought this home to
you and brought you to faith in Christ, the righteousness
of Christ is imputed to us so that we know we're righteous
before the throne of God. But we need a continual cleansing
as we walk through this life. We need Christ to wash our feet
continually. Continually. But no sinner. Absolutely no sinner. Even a
believer. No sinner will nor can he submit
and cast all his care on the Lord. He can't wash his own defilement
and cast his care on the Lord as long as the Spirit of God
is reigning over us. We can't do it. We can't do it. David said this in verse 3. This
is David the believer. This is David the man after God's
own heart. He said, when I kept silent,
that year and a half or more that he walked around and tried
to conceal the fact that he had committed adultery and killed
a man, killed her husband. He said, while I kept silent,
My bones, he said, my bones waxed old through my roaring all the
day long. For day and night thy hand was
heavy upon me. My moisture is turned into the
drought of summer, Selah. That means you give this some
serious, long thought. David was a believer. He was
a believer. But for more than a year, the
spirit, that old nature that was in him was ruling and reigning
over him. And so the Lord used a heavy
hand on him that whole time to turn him from hypocrisy. I was
just talking to Will this week and I was trying to illustrate
this by what happens when a young person disobeys their parents
rather than submit to their parents. You know, whatever the disobedient
thing is that you commit, It appears like it's going to be
really sweet to you, like it's going to just be so pleasurable. But the moment you commit it,
in your conscience you know you've disobeyed your mother and your
father immediately. We know when we've sinned against
God. You know it. God brings a strong hand and
makes you understand, you've sinned against me. And if that
child tries to use guile and deceit and lie and cover up his
sin, it's worse and worse because now his conscience is burning
even more. It's not worth it. Whatever the sin is, it's not
worth it to sin against your parents who love you. And that hand being upon... He said, my bones waxed old through
my roaring. He said, my moisture's turned
into drought. You know, when you have a guilty
conscience and you're walking around with this burden, it wears
you out. It makes you physically tired
from being under it. It really does. It dries up the
moisture of the spirit. It causes a burning that's so
hot in you and it just dries you up. You have no joy and no
rejoicing because you know you're guilty. You're just hoping nobody
finds out. That's what David walked around
with for over a year and a half. But God, our Lord Jesus Christ,
in the natural man now, that's just simply a guilty conscience.
But in God's people, that's God's hand heavy upon you, turning
you from hypocrisy back to Christ. Listen to verse 8 down here.
Christ said, I'll instruct thee and teach thee in a way which
thou shalt go. I will guide thee with mine eye, be ye not as the
horse or as the mule which have no understanding, whose mouth
must be held in with bit and rattle lest they come near unto
thee. Christ is saying, we can do this the easy way or we can
do this the hard way. That's what He just said. So
be not as the stubborn mule. Submit. Christ knows how to deal
with us because He experienced this on the cross too. Listen
to this. Now I know fully. He knew no
sin and Scripture says there was no guile in His mouth. He
didn't try to defend Himself with a spirit of guile like we
do. That's not what I'm saying. But He bore our sin and for a
time He opened not His mouth. He opened not His mouth. That's
what He says here, when I remain silent. Christ is speaking there,
first and foremost. When I remain silent. When He
opened not His mouth. When He was experiencing that,
we saw it last week in those hours of darkness. God's hand
was heavy upon Him. Look over at Psalm 22, 14. He finally cried out in verse
1, Psalm 22, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Why
art thou so far from helping me and from the words of my roaring? Verse 3, But thou art holy. He
vindicated God. Thou art holy. And he said, in
verse 6, but I'm a worm and no man. He came to a point where
he owned our sin. He's teaching us that confession
and glorifying God is where we're going to find relief. That's
what happened. As soon as he did that, the darkness
was gone. Christ had justified His people
and God was satisfied and God brought Him out. But now listen
to this. Listen to this, verse 14, but
while he was silent, look what he said, verse 14, I am poured
out like water, all my bones are out of joint, my heart's
like wax, it's melted in the midst of my bowels, my strength
is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue cleaveth to my
jaws, thou hast brought me into the dust of death. And why I
point that out, because I'm telling you Christ here is instructing
us and Christ knows. He knows. He knows the time when
to send the Spirit of God and regenerate the dead sinner that
He has redeemed. And He knows how to put His hand
upon you and I as believers and apply just the pressure we need
to turn us from our hypocrisy back to Him. He knows. He suffered
it. He knows. He knows the heart,
brethren. You remember Nathaniel? The Lord
had not met Nathanael face to face. Nathanael never met Him
face to face. And while Nathanael was walking
to Him, the Lord said, There is an Israelite indeed. There
is a true Jew in whom is no guile. There is a true Jew in whose
heart there is no guile. There is a new spirit in Him.
There is no guile in Him. He knew his heart. Well, he's
an Israelite indeed. You remember Jacob? Jacob, the
supplanter. Jacob, the deceiver. Jacob, full
of guile. What did Christ do? He came to
Jacob. And don't get this twisted, brethren. Jacob wasn't wrestling Christ.
Christ came and wrestled Jacob. And He pinned him down. And he
subdued that old sinful flesh of Gile and he put a new spirit
in Jacob. He made Jacob call out for mercy
and confess his sin and declare that only the Lord could save
him. And that's how he prevailed with God. And so Christ changed his name
to Israel. He gave him a new heart. He gave
him a new heart, a new spirit. He made him a true Jew in his
heart. And then Jacob was honest. He
was honest with God. And so Christ said He knew Nathanael's
heart. That's what He was saying. And
Nathanael was astonished. Nathanael was, how do you know
me? And he wasn't saying that he
thought what Christ said was true. He was just saying, how
do you know anything about me? We've never met. But what Christ
was saying is, He said, when you were under that fig tree,
I sawed you. and I knew you." And you know
what he was saying? He was saying, I saw your heart
and I knew you are an Israelite indeed in whom is no God. You
know what Nathanael was doing under that fig tree? He was praying. He was being honest with God,
asking God for mercy, and confessing that God alone could save him
in Christ Jesus. How do you know that? Because
Christ said, when you was under the fig tree, I saw you, and
I know you are an Israelite indeed. I know you have a spirit with
no God. He knew what was in his heart. He knew what was in his
heart. Turn over to Romans 2. That's
why Christ commended him. That's what he was doing when
he said, an Israelite indeed. He was commending Nathanael. Who does God commend? Who does
Christ commend and why? Look here in Romans 2. Romans
2. Romans 2 and verse 28. It says, He is not a Jew. He is not an Israelite indeed
which is one outwardly. Neither is that circumcision
which is outward in the flesh. You're just doing your deeds
outwardly like we saw this morning. That's done as a sacrifice and
that won't please God. That's not what makes a man an
Israelite indeed, a true Jew. But he's a Jew. He's an Israelite
indeed which is one inwardly and circumcision is that of the
heart in the Spirit and not in the letter whose praise, whose
commendation is not of men, but of God. That's why Christ said,
there is an Israelite indeed in whom is no guile. Christ had
put a new spirit in him. Christ had given him a new heart.
He had sent the Holy Spirit. He had been regenerated and he
had a heart in which there was no guile now so that he could
pray honestly with God and can lay his heart out and confess
what he is, a sinner, and confess who God is, the Holy One that
can save him. That's what it is to have a heart
with no guile, to be regenerated, to be circumcised in the heart
by God. That's where you'll find God's
commendation. That's how you'll prevail with
God by the work Christ has done in our heart. A new heart also
will I give you, He said, and a new spirit will I put within
you. And this is not by works of righteousness we've done,
Paul said in Titus 3.5, but it's according to God's mercy. He
saved us by the washing of regeneration. That's that first for all time
done deal. When He washes you in regeneration.
You don't need to be washed again in that way. And renewing of
the Holy Ghost. That's what He continually does.
He continually renews our spirit inwardly. He continually renews
the strength of that inward spirit that has no guile. So He'll reign
over that flesh That's full of guile. That spirit
is full of guile. And this He does, He says, through
Jesus Christ our Savior. He sheds this on us abundantly
through Jesus Christ our Savior. So that being justified by His
grace, there's Christ's righteousness. There's what came before the
conjunction. Being justified by His grace, we should be made
heirs according to the hope of eternal life. There's Christ's
work of sanctification which comes after the conjunction.
That's why we're washed. Remember that? He said He came
and redeemed us from the curse of the law that those that are
children might receive the Spirit of promise. We might have life. Go back to Romans 5. I want you
to see this. Romans 5. Look there. It says Romans 5 in verse 10. No, I'm sorry. I've lost my mind here for a
minute. Hold on. Romans 5 verse 19. So by the obedience of one
shall many be made righteous. There's Christ's work that came
before the conjunction, His work of righteousness. Now look at
verse 21. That as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace
reign through righteousness unto eternal life. by Jesus Christ
our Lord. There's the work of sanctification,
giving life that came after the conjunction. So both of these
works, brethren, are Christ's. Now, if I preached Christ's sanctification
and preached this work He does in the heart, but I didn't preach
that Christ is our righteousness, I'd leave a sinner believing
that once you're born of God, then you have to work out your
own righteousness. And that's false. You don't.
But also by the same token, if I preach only Christ's righteousness
and don't preach this part about Christ's working sanctification
in the heart, then I leave the sinner thinking that being born
of God and given a new spirit is something He does. So we preach
both. We shut the sinner up and show
him that both is all by Christ who does it. And now in this
new spirit, I want you to see this, back in Psalm 32, Christ
makes us honest with God. He makes us honest with God.
David came confessing his sin and glorifying God. He said in
Psalms 32, 5, This was the fruit of his hand being upon David.
I acknowledge my sin unto thee, and mine iniquity have I not
hid. I said, I'll confess my transgressions. You'd see him
owning this, my sin, mine iniquity, my transgressions. I confess
them. And thou forgave us the iniquity
of my sin. For this shall everyone that
is godly, everyone that's been given this new heart, This is
what they'll pray unto thee in a time when thou mayest be found.
Surely in the flood of great waters they shall not come nigh
unto thee. And look what else he did. He
glorified God. Thou art my hiding place. Thou
shalt preserve me from trouble. Thou shalt compass me about with
songs of deliverance. See, when Christ has given you
a new spirit, Now you quit trying to deceive and lie and but, but,
but, but everything that God declares to you through the Gospel.
Now you become honest with God. You become honest with God. You
go and confess your sins to God. And you glorify God. That's what
Christ did when He was silent. He experienced that drying up
in His body. But when it came time, when He
was satisfied justice, He cried out to God. And he vindicated
God. He said, the reason I'm suffering
is you're holy and I'm a worm. He was saying what he said here,
I need you to deliver me. What you're doing is just and
right. And he did that to show you and me, brethren, the necessity
of us being brought to confess to God the sins we have committed. He didn't commit those sins.
He was bearing them for His people. But He brings us to see the sins
we've committed. We've got to confess our sin
to God. We've got to glorify God in saying God's the only
one that can save us from our sins. And this is where He brings
you to. He brings you to that point so
much so that you ask Him to search me, Lord, and save me from sins
I don't even know about. You open your heart so much to
Him. And I'm going to tell you something. When He's given you
this Spirit that's without God, That's when He makes you to see
that you're without blame before Him, before the throne of God. When He's done that, you can't
continue anymore in deceit and in lies and in craftiness. You just can't do it. Listen
to this from Romans 14.5. In their mouth, talking about
His saints, in their mouth was found no God. Why? What was the cause? Because they're
without fault before the throne of God. See? When you're made to see that
Christ has made you without fault, there's nothing else to do. There's
no other offering to be made. Christ has finished the work
when He does that. You can't continue in God. You
just can't continue in lies anymore. You don't want to hear lies.
You can't speak lies against Him. And you don't want anybody
else speaking lies against Him. Why? Because you see you are
without blame before the throne of God. You would be a fool to
go back into lies after that. Oh, now listen to me, sinner.
Be honest with God. Here is one. Be honest with God.
Believer, be honest with God. God only saves honest sinners. That's right. That's what this
psalm is telling us. He only saves honest sinners.
He has to bring you to be honest with Him. But He brings you to
the place of that publican, smiting upon your own breast, owning
your own sin, saying, God, be merciful to me, the sinner. God, be merciful, You're the
only one that can. I'm glorifying You, Father. All
I am is the sinner. And I'll tell you something,
He said if we confess our sins, He's faithful and just to forgive
us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. But
if we say we have not sinned, we're calling God a liar and
His Word's not in us. Because His Word's not in us,
you know what we're doing? We're speaking guile. We have
a heart full of guile. Let me tell you this, there's
no greater happiness anywhere in this world to be found. than
knowing I am without fault before God. God will never again lay
a charge to me and He'll never allow anybody else to. That's
true of every believer. And because He's put a new spirit
in us, brethren, this is happiness. You can be honest with God. You can lay on your bed at night
and speak to God things that you won't tell that dear loved
one that's laying by your side. That's happiness. To have a friend
that sticks closer than a brother. I pray God make you a happy man. A blessed man. That's what we
are brethren. I pray God do that for us now. you