Alright, brethren, let's go back
to Psalm 31. Christ is truly the King of God's
Israel, who David typified. And Christ is truly the man after
God's own heart, who David typified. And Christ is the sweet psalmist
of Israel, who David was used to pen his Psalms. And that's what the Psalms are.
These are truly the Psalms of Christ. In one way or another,
whether we can see it or grasp it, all these Psalms are Christ
speaking. And we saw in Psalm 31 and verse
5, Christ's last words from the cross. He said to God his Father,
into thy hand I commit my spirit. Now this time we hear our substitute's
perfect faith in verses 14 and 15, and this is one of those
verses that is one of the favorites of God's people. He says here,
Christ speaking, I trusted in thee, O Lord. I said thou art
my God. My times are in thy hand. Deliver me from the hand of mine
enemies and from them that persecute me. My times are in thy hand. Now, just as Christ's times were
in the hand of the Lord God, His Father, the times of every
believer, of all God's elect, are in the hands of Christ. Now, we suffer, believers suffer
in this world and nothing comforts a believer Like that friend who
has suffered what we suffer, and even more than we've suffered.
That friend who's able to comfort you because he's been there.
That friend who you can trust. That friend in whose hand you're
absolutely, totally secure. And that friend, forever believer,
is the Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord Jesus Christ is God's
own Son and He came and took flesh like unto His brethren. He did it for a two-fold purpose,
the Hebrew writer tells us. He did it to make reconciliation
to God for the sins of His people. And also that He might Himself
in our flesh learn obedience, the scripture
says. The Hebrew writer said that he
took flesh that he might learn obedience. And what that means
is that he might himself, as a man, experience obedience to
the Father. And the scripture says, and he
perfected that obedience. He became perfectly consecrated
as our salvation, our head, our God-man mediator. He perfected
that obedience. And so He's that friend who has
suffered what we suffer and more. Now what times did Christ mean
when He said to the Father, My times are in Thy hand? What times
was He talking about when He said, My times are in Thy hand?
Well, turn to Ecclesiastes 3. To your right, just before you
get to Isaiah, Ecclesiastes 3. We know that all Christ's times
were in the hand of God the Father. When He humbled Himself and took
upon Him the form of a servant, became obedient even to the death
of the cross, all Christ's times were in the hand of God the Father. He trusted Him. All my times
are in thy hands, he said. And for the believer, all our
times are in his hand. Look here, Ecclesiastes 3.1,
we get an idea of times that we're talking about. To everything
there is a season, a time to every purpose under heaven, a
time to be born, a time to die, a time to plant, a time to pluck
up that which is planted. A time to kill, a time to heal. A time to break down and a time
to build up. A time to weep and a time to
laugh. A time to mourn and a time to
dance. A time to cast away stones and
a time to gather stones together. A time to embrace and a time
to refrain from embracing. A time to get and a time to lose. a time to keep and a time to
cast away, a time to rend and a time to sow, a time to keep
silence and a time to speak, a time to love and a time to
hate, a time of war and a time of peace. And believers can say
with Christ, all these times, right here, all my times are
in thy hands. But now, I want to ask this question.
In this Psalm, in Psalm 31, in the context, what specific times
was Christ talking about? What specific times was He talking
about? And if we answer this question,
we will see when we face these times as believers, we'll see
that just as Christ's times were in the hands of His Father, the
hand of His Father, our times are in Christ's hand enter into
these specific times. Alright, the first one we see
here is somewhat general, a time of trouble. He said back in verse
9, Have mercy upon me, O Lord, for I am in trouble. Verse 10,
For my life is spent with grief, and my years, all the years of
my life, with sighing. Now believer, do you experience
times of trouble? Is there ever a day that goes
by that a believer doesn't experience some time of trouble? When the
Son of God came down and partook of flesh and blood like His brethren,
His life, all His years were times of trouble. the whole of
his life. He says there, my life is spent
with grief and my years with sighing. Go with me to Isaiah
53. Isaiah 53. Look at verse 3. He is despised and rejected of
men. He is, not was, He is. despised and rejected of men,
but especially when he walked this earth, a man of sorrows
and acquainted with grief. We hid, as it were, our faces
from him. He was despised and we esteemed
him not. Surely he hath borne our griefs
and carried our sorrows. Yet we did esteem him stricken,
smitten of God, and afflicted. Now I'm certain that we don't
enter into the depths of how He carried our griefs and our
sorrows. We don't enter into the depths
of how our Lord Jesus Christ for His people as He walked this
earth representing His people, we don't enter into how profoundly
He was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. Can you imagine being
without sin, hating sin with a perfect hatred, hating wicked
sinners with a perfect hatred, and walking amongst sinners everywhere
you were. being despised and rejected constantly
by sinners. He says, My life is spent with
grief and my years with sighing. We don't enter into how that
affected Him either. You know, our Savior was only
33 years old when He was crucified. But you remember that time when
the Jews looked at Him and He was talking about Abraham and
they said, You're not yet 50 years old. The carrying of our griefs and
our sorrows affected him in the flesh to where he looked older
than 30 years old. They reckoned him to be around
50, close to 50. And yet in all the times of trouble
that he faced, in every time of trouble as he walked this
earth, all his days, all his years, all his times were in
God the Father's hands. They tried to lay traps for Him.
They tried to entangle Him. They tried to take Him over and
over and over again. And what did the Scripture say?
He would just go right out of their midst. Why? His time had
not yet come. All His times were in the hand
of the Father. Now, for all God's elect, for
all those that God shall save, those God everlastingly loved,
all our days, all our years in this life, is trouble. It's a time of trouble. Job 5.7
says, Man is born unto trouble as the sparks fly upward. When we were dead in our sins,
before we even knew our times of trouble, we were already in Christ's hands.
All God's elect were already, our times were already in Christ's
hand before as yet we even knew we had any time of trouble. Go
over to Ephesians 1. How could that be? I like to
think about this. Do you realize that before there
was ever time, before there was times, In eternity, God entrusted
all the times of His people into Christ's hand. So all our times
was in Christ's hand before as yet there was time. Look here,
Ephesians 1 verse 3. This is the Word of God right
here. Now listen to this. Blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us with all spiritual
blessings in heavenly places in Christ. According as He has
chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world that we should be
holy and without blame before Him in love. Having predestinated
us, He predetermined what our destiny would be. predestinated
us to the adoption of children by Jesus Christ Himself according
to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of
His grace. It was just because of His grace
wherein He made us accepted in the Beloved. And so, while we
were dead in our sins, all our times were in Christ's hand.
When we were living in rebellion, we come into this world, Scripture
says, we were conceived in sin. Meaning, our very substance,
our very nature from the beginning was sin. And so we came from
our mother's womb speaking lies and we dwelt in a land where
everybody around us was just the same sort of dead rotten
sinners we were. And yet our times were in Christ's
hand. keeping us, and He was protecting
us, and He was guiding us, and He carried us right to the place
where He would have us to hear the good news of what He had
done for us. And then He made us to see. He
made us to see verse 7, that in Him we have redemption through
His blood, the forgiveness of sin, according to the riches
of His grace. He made us to see He redeemed
us. And look at verse 11, He made us to see that in Him also
we've obtained an inheritance being predestinated according
to the purpose of Him who worketh all things after the counsel
of His own will. And He did it that we should
be to the praise of God's glory who first trusted in Christ. He trusted his people to Christ. And so since the day he's called
us now to faith in Christ, we've had many times of trouble. Now
we have troubles we didn't know we had before. Now we have troubles
we didn't even see before. Troubles with our sin. Troubles
with our worldliness. Troubles in our own house, like
Brother Scott just read and Micah. We have troubles now that we
didn't even know we had before. And yet, in all times of trouble,
our times are in Christ's hand. Just as real as they were in
His hand before we knew Him, before we even knew we were in
times of trouble and we couldn't yet worry about it and think,
well, how are we going to fix this time of trouble? We didn't
even care. We didn't even know. And yet
we were in Christ's hand and He fixed it. But now that we
know a little something about our times of trouble, we're still
in His hand. And He's still the only one that's
going to fix it. So remember that now, believer, in every
time of trouble, trust Christ, crying, My times are in Thy hand. In every time of trouble. Now,
here's the next one we see here in our text, and it's times of
weakness. Time of weakness. Verse 9. Dialing
in here now, we are going to see a little bit more what he
was talking about when he was talking about trouble. He says
here, my eye is consumed with grief. Yea, my soul is consumed
with grief and my belly is consumed with grief. Now, do you ever
experience, believer, do you ever experience weakness in your
flesh? Is that ever a time of trouble,
a time of weakness in your flesh? I'm talking about that old part
of you, that natural flesh due to your sin. Well, we're reminded
of Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane right here. all the way up to
the death of the cross. From the garden of Gethsemane
to the death of the cross, we're reminded of Christ when He says,
My eye is consumed with grief, yea, my soul is consumed with
grief, and my belly is consumed with grief. As the Son of God,
as the second person in the Trinity, He didn't have an eye or a soul
or a belly. This is talking about His humanity.
This is talking about Christ who came down, the Son of God
who came down and took flesh just like His brethren. And when
He did that, now He has flesh. He has flesh like His brethren. And we see that He condescended
and took flesh because He was consumed in grief in His flesh. His eye represents all the faculties
of the flesh. The seeing and the hearing and
the smelling and everything he could perceive brought him grief
at this point. His soul represents his life.
That's the life of a man. His belly represents his reins,
his innermost being, his strength. This was a time when our substitute
experienced the weakness of our flesh. You realize flesh is the weakest
thing there is? It is the weakest thing there
is. Christ took flesh, sinless flesh. He came down and knew
no sin. But this right here was a time
when Christ was experiencing being touched with the feeling
of our infirmities. He was experiencing right here,
being touched with the feeling that our sin causes in the flesh. He says in verse 10, My strength
faileth because of mine iniquity. You notice he says mine iniquity. Christ is speaking. This is the
same one who back in the prior verse said, Father into Thy hand
I commit my spirit. He says mine iniquity. Why did He come? Why did Christ
come? Why did God send forth His Son?
He sent Him forth to manifest the righteousness of God. That's
why He sent Him. So Christ had to be sinless.
He had to know no sin. And so he had to be born of a
virgin. He had to be born unlike any other man since Adam. And he, being the last Adam,
he's that holy thing in the womb of the virgin. Not corrupt, without
sin. So that's because God's just. He couldn't take the place of
a sinner if he was a sinner, and he was not a sinner. And
by the same token, because God is just, there is no way God
would pour out justice upon Him until the sin of His people,
until the Lord had laid on Him the iniquity of all His people. And when the Lord laid on Him
the iniquity of all His people, Christ was made sin. He was made sin in place of His people. And
He owned our iniquity to be His own iniquity. He didn't say there,
the iniquity of my people. He said, my iniquity. We're talking
about an absolutely just and righteous God. He will not do anything unjust.
He will not pour out wrath on an innocent person and He will
not spare a guilty person. But this was necessary to manifest
the righteousness of God. This had to be done before God
would pour justice out on Him and then that justice had to
be poured out on Him so that He could justify His people from
all our sins from which the first Adam plunged us into. And that's
exactly what He did. That's exactly what He did. That's
why He was suffering this. So when you feel the weight of
your sin, you who believe. Now if you don't believe on Christ,
that means your sin is still on you. Christ may have died for you.
I don't know if He did or not. But if you don't believe on Christ,
Scripture says the wrath of God abideth on you. But when you believe on Christ,
you that believe on Christ, when you are plagued with the weight
of your sin and you come under conviction over your sin, remember
this, the time of your justification was in Christ's hand, right here. When He was saying this, He was
suffering this in place of His people, the time of our justification
was in His hand. And He finished it. He reconciled
His people from our sins. He reconciled us to God. That's
what He did. But there was something else
Christ was doing. When the Lord laid on Him the
iniquity of us all, Christ who knew no sin Himself, entered
a time where He was experiencing being touched with the feeling
of our infirmities which our sin causes. And that's when He
said, It had an effect on him. You see this throughout the Psalms.
It had an effect on him. He said here, My strength faileth
because of mine iniquity. He said, My bones are consumed. Now, you want to see this, we
can see this, you just think about the Garden of Gethsemane.
And when he went to the garden, you know, it was the first garden
is where man, the first Adam sinned and fell. He disobeyed
God and he fell and he plunged all his race, all that he represented,
his whole house, he plunged them into sin and death. The last
Adam came and went to a garden. That's where the cross works
started, was in the garden of Gethsemane. He went there, the
spotless Lamb of God, without sin, to present himself to the
Father to have the iniquity of His people laid on Him. That's
what He went there to accomplish. And when He went there, in that
garden of Gethsemane, He was so grieved in His flesh. Why? At being made sin for His
people. At being forsaken of God in justice. He was being touched with the
feeling of our infirmities. And the Hebrew writer said, tempted
in all points like as we are. It was all so, so, what's the
word I'm looking for, condensed at that time in the Garden of
Gethsemane and throughout the cross of being tempted in all
points like we are. You and I are just tempted a
little bit here and there, you know, very slightly. This was
as much as could be tempted all at once and bearing everything,
being touched with the feeling of our infirmities, thinking
about justice and being forsaken of God the Father whom He loved.
And did it have an effect on His flesh? The Scripture says,
blood came out of His body like sweat. Blood. He sweat, as it were, great drops
of blood. His strength began to fail. His
bones began to be consumed. You see, this is why I'm not
trying to ever say Christ was corrupted in any way. I'm not
ever trying to say Christ became less than the holy faithful son
of God in any way. Nothing like that. But what I
do despise is these cold legal men who just say God just charged
him and treated him as if he was sinned. And it's all wrapped
up like that. Our Savior had to not only justify His people,
but while He's justifying His people, He's got to experience
what it is to obey God as in place of His people. And there's
something so profound in what Christ did because He didn't
just have to obey God in a perfect garden, in a perfect world. He
had to do it in a world of sin, bearing the iniquity of his people,
knowing in his own conscience that he's guilty before God.
When he owned it as mine iniquity, he's owning himself to be guilty
before God, deserving of this justice of God. Don't you know
that weighed on our sinless Savior? that he's bearing all the guilt
of all his people, the transgression of all his people, the iniquity
of all his people at one time? And he had to not only justify,
he had to experience that obedience to the Father and be touched
with the feeling of our infirmities and tempted in all points as
we are so that he can not only be a faithful high priest in
things pertaining to God, but in things pertaining to His people
to be able to minister to us. Because He knows what we've suffered.
He knows where we've been. Because He's been there. And
that's what He's doing there in the Garden of Gethsemane.
But when His flesh begins to fail there, you know what He
did? He cried. He fell on His face and He prayed
saying, Oh my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from
me. Right there. While I'm sitting
here, Father, and my bones are being consumed and my strength
is failing right here, right now, I'm not going to make it
to the cross. Let this cup pass so I can get
to the cross. but only if it's your will. What was he saying? Psalm 31,
14. I trusted in Thee, O Lord. I
said, Thou art my God. My times are in Thy hand. That's
what he was saying. When he was on his face in the
Garden of Gethsemane, he was saying, Lord, not my will, but
Thine be done. That's what he was saying. My time is in Your
hand. I trust You, Lord. My time is in Your hand. So believer,
this is what I'm getting to. When you experience the weakness
of our flesh, just know this, Christ already experienced it.
And He went through it perfectly. and experienced it without sin
of his own, casting all his care on the Father, crying, my times
are in thy hand. And so listen to me, when you're
experiencing that suffering, don't ever look to yourself and
say, well, I'm going to have to be stronger and I'm going
to have to put down my flesh. I hope you do put down your flesh.
I hope you do turn from your sin. I hope you do turn from
the weakness of your flesh. But don't ever think anything
about that is what's going to be your perfect faithfulness
before God. Because when Christ suffered
that, my time, this time I suffer where I'm failing and I'm fumbling
around and I'm full of sin and I'm not being faithful to God,
that time of my weakness of my flesh, that time was in Christ's
hand when He suffered it and He did it perfectly. He cast
His care on the Father perfectly. But not only that, not only is
He my righteousness, He also knows what that's like. And my times right now, as I
suffer it, are in His hands. One who is God, able to come,
and nothing stop Him from comforting me, and one who is man, who knows
exactly what I need, because He's been there. That's what
I'm talking about. The time of weakness, when your
flesh, you see the weakness, your sin, and you're failing
and your bones are being consumed. Go to Him like you went to the
Father. Lord, my times are in your hand. That's what we're talking about.
Now here's the last thing. The time of reproach. The time
of reproach. Verse 11. Psalm 31 11. I was
reproached among all mine enemies, but especially among my neighbors,
and a fear to mine acquaintance. They that did see me without
fled from me. Believer, have you ever suffered
reproach from those around you, from those who are your enemy?
Have you ever suffered reproach for the cause of Christ? What
about from your neighbor? What about from your closest
acquaintance? Our Redeemer suffered time of
reproach throughout His life. There were times of reproach
He suffered throughout His life. But more so when the time came
for Him to lay down His life. He said, I was a reproach among
all mine enemies. A reproach. They scoffed at Him. They mocked Him. They whipped
Him. He was a reproach. He knows what it is when you
who are His are reproached by your enemies for His sake. He
knows what it is to be reproached by His enemies. He knows what
you're suffering when you're reproached by His enemies. He
knows it. He suffered it. But even worse
than the enemies, He said, but especially among my neighbors.
You know your neighbors better than your enemies. Hopefully your neighbors aren't
your enemies. But the neighbor is somebody you know better than
your enemies. And then it gets even closer than that. And I
was a fear to mine acquaintance. They that did see me without
turned and fled from me. Nothing hurts worse than a friend
betraying you. It's hard to get over a friend,
somebody that's a really close friend that just flat out betrays
you. That's just near impossible to
get over. And it's hard when you have a
loved one that's your acquaintance, a loved one that denies you. But remember, your times are
in Christ's hand. He experienced it more. More
than we could ever experience that, he experienced it. Go to
Psalm 55.12. This is what he said concerning
Judas. Judas was his friend. Judas was
his acquaintance. Judas 55.12. He says, It was not an enemy
that reproached me, Then I could have borne it. Neither was it
he that hated me that did magnify himself against me. Then I would
have hid myself from him. But it was thou, a man mine equal,
my guide, mine acquaintance. We took sweet counsel together
and walked to the house of God in company together." And he comes into that garden
that night and Christ says, now come on, let's go forward. And
they came and Judas told all the soldiers, he said, they said,
how are we going to recognize Him? He said, He'll be the one
I give a kiss to. And he comes up to the Redeemer like a hundred
times before and kissed Him. And you know
what Christ called Him? Friend. Friend. And He was just betraying Him.
for 30 pieces of silver. And then the apostle Peter, who was his own
apostle, he was that apostle that had been so bold, that apostle
that had promised, they might forsake you but I won't ever
leave you, I won't deny you, denied him three times and fled. denied Him three times and fled.
Who else could this psalm be about, brethren? This happened
to Christ far worse and far more specific than it did to David. Christ said in verse 12, I am
forgotten as a dead man out of mind. Have you ever been forgotten? close friends, loved ones. It hurts just to be forgotten
in everyday conversation or just when there's something going
on at somebody's house. It hurts to be forgotten. But
left like a dead man, forgotten like a dead man. And that's what
it means. I was forgotten as a dead man
out of mind. Remember what those men were
saying on the road to Emmaus that day? We thought this was
going to be the Christ. He's dead out of mind now. That meant something to our Lord
Jesus Christ to have those men say that. That hurt to have those
men say that. I'm like a broken vessel. What
do you do with a broken vessel? Sweep it up, throw it in the
trash and get rid of it. That's what he means. That's how men
would guard me, just like a broken vessel. For I've heard the slander of
many, fear was on every side, while they took counsel together
against me, they devised to take away my life. Brethren, I have
friends who suffered so much reproach, so many things worse
than I've ever suffered. Some going through things like
that now. You want to do something for them. You want to help them.
You want to comfort them. You do anything, say anything that
if you could just give them some kind of comfort and help them. But I know somebody who can.
I know somebody who knows the time of reproach. who suffered
the time of reproach and whose hand His people are. Go to Christ like Christ went
to the Father. I trust it in Thee, Lord. Thou
art my God. My times are in Thy hand. Deliver
me from the hand of mine enemies and from them that persecute
me. He's the only one that can do it. He was the only one that
could deliver us from our sin. He's the only one that can deliver
us from reproach. from those that persecute. He
is the only one. So, believer, all our times now
are in Christ's hand. Go to Hebrews 2. Let me wind
this up. Hebrews 2. I just want to show you these
two things I've been trying to hit around on this message. Now, this Hebrews 2. First of all, our times were
in His hands when He suffered in our place in perfect faith,
trusting the Father and justified His people from all our sins.
Our time was in His hand. He made reconciliation and brought
in a perfect righteousness for us. Our time was in His hand. Hebrews 2.17, Wherefore in all
things it behooved Him to be made like unto His brethren.
We've been talking about these things He suffered in the flesh.
That's what He's talking about here. Why did it behoove Him?
That He might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things
pertaining to God to make reconciliation for the sins of the people. So
the times of our justification, the time of our reconciliation
is in Christ's hand. He accomplished it. He did it.
He did it. But also now, our times are in
the hand of our Redeemer when we suffer. as believers in this
life and we suffer for His sake. Remember this in that Garden
of Gethsemane. Let me see if I can illustrate this and then
I'm going to read it. In the Garden of Gethsemane,
after He experienced the weakness of our flesh, after He sweat
great drops of blood, after He was to a point where totally
dependent on the Father, His flesh was about to expire before
He could go to the cross because of what He was bearing. And so
he cried out, Father, not my will, but Thy will be done. I
trust You, Father. My times are in Your hand. And
so he experienced what God sent forth an angel and strengthened
him so he could go on to the cross. And he experienced that. He knows what that's like now
for his people because he knows what the weakness of the flesh
is. So when he comes out of the garden and goes and there's his
apostles asleep, they couldn't even pray with him for an hour.
He knew by experience. And he said, the spirit is willing,
but the flesh is weak. He knew that. He experienced
that. That's what he experienced himself.
And so that's what he said, and he was able to comfort them,
and so he is with us. Look at Hebrews 2.18, For in
that he himself hath suffered being tempted, he is able to
succor them that are tempted, to comfort them that are tempted.
Now skip over, it goes on a tangent here. Now go to Hebrews 4.14
and you'll read the rest of it. Seeing then we have a great high
priest that's passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God,
let us hold fast our profession, for we have not a high priest
which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities,
but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. He did it perfectly. Let us therefore
come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy
and find grace to help. When? in time. What time? All my time is in
His hand. Whatever time you need. Whatever
time you need grace to help, all my times are in His hand. So let us come to Him to find
help in time of need. He's been there. He suffered
it. He justified it. And He knows what it is to suffer.
And He can comfort you. Only He can. Amen.