I believe I'm going to have to
preach on that psalm soon. The Lord enabled me to. That was a blessing to my heart.
Let's turn now to Psalm 27. Psalm 27. Psalm 27. We're told now here in the heading
that this is a psalm of David. David penned this psalm. David,
as we know, experienced much trouble, experienced probably
many things that were going on here, like you and I experience
things as a child of God. But this psalm is the words of
our Lord Jesus Christ. These are the words of the Lord
Jesus Christ. And I am persuaded from what
He says in this psalm that this was the heart prayer of our substitute
during the three hours of darkness on the cross when he was forsaken
of God and surrounded by his enemies. I think you will see what I mean
by that. Look down at the last two verses. He tells us this
was a time when he was suffering death. He was believing, but
he was suffering death, longing to see the goodness of God in
the land of the living. Look here at verse 13. I had
fainted unless I had believed to see or believed that I would
see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. The
land of the living is where we live. Truly, it's where God is. It's in glory with God. It's
to be alive. So what he's talking about here
is this was a time of suffering death. On the cross, in that
darkness, when Christ was bearing the sin of His people and satisfying
divine justice, the wages that we deserved was eternal death.
And He was bearing death on that cross. He was bearing that worm
that for us would never die on that cross. He was bearing separation
from God. And He says here, I had fainted
unless I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord, Jehovah,
God my Father, in the land of the living. Verse 14, He was
communing this whole time, this whole psalm you're going to see,
He's communing with His own heart. That's what he's doing. He's
crying out to God some, but then he's communing with his own heart
some. And here's what he's telling himself. He's saying, wait on
the Lord. Be of good courage. He shall
strengthen thine heart. Wait, I say, on the Lord. He's
saying this to himself. Christ Jesus, now, I want to
help you understand this. Christ is the Son of God. He
is God. He's the second person in the
Trinity. second person of the Trinity,
equal with God. But now when He came down and
took flesh to do for His people what we can't do for ourselves,
when He came down to do this work, He took the form of a servant. That meant He was to serve God
as a man dependent upon the Lord Jehovah for everything. It will help us to see it if
we think about Adam. Adam is the first representative
head. And God made him in the garden and made him a servant.
And Adam's responsibility in the garden was to submit to God
and depend on God for everything. That was his responsibility. And he represented all his household,
all his family in doing that. So when he rebelled and did not
continue submitting to God, took matters into his own hand, he
sinned and we sinned in him. Well, Christ is the last Adam.
And when He took flesh, He took the form of a servant, just like
Adam was in the garden, to submit to Jehovah, capital L-O-R-D,
to submit to the Lord God, the covenant God, to serve Him and
honor Him in perfect faith and fidelity, representing His people. A man, I know He's the God-man,
but He's a man representing men. He's the Son of Man representing
the sons of men. That's what He was doing. That's
what He was doing. And so, in this Psalm here, Christ
was obedient. And on the cross He was obedient
unto the death of the cross. Even when He was hanging on that
cross, He was obedient. Even when He was bearing the
sin of His people and justly having the justice of God poured
out on Him like a guilty criminal, yet in His heart He was holy
and faithful to God. He never wavered in His faith.
Both were required, absolutely required, to justify us and make
us holy. He had to bear our sin and our
judgment and he had to be holy and just and look to God at the
same time. Both were absolutely necessary.
And he said, I had fainted unless I had believed to see the goodness
of the Lord in the land of the living. Turn to Galatians 2. I want to show you what this
psalm is showing us before we get into it. Galatians chapter
2. This psalm is showing us the faith of Christ. It's showing
us the faith of Christ as He hung on the cross. The faith
of Christ. You see, the faith of Christ
is how the believer is justified. This is how He justifies His
people. When we believe, we're not believing in our faith or
in anything we've done. Our faith is relying on the faith
of Christ and what He did by that faithfulness. We've seen
this, Galatians 2.16, knowing that a man is not justified by
the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ. It's not faith in Jesus Christ,
we're talking about Christ's faith. We're talking about the
faithfulness of Christ, the faith of Jesus Christ. That's why he
says even we have believed in Jesus Christ. We're not justified
by anything we do, but by the faithfulness of Christ. that
we might be justified by the faith of Christ and not by the
works of the law. For by the works of the law shall
no flesh be justified. And not only this, it's the faith
of Christ by which we begin to believe and by which we continue
to believe. It's the faith of Christ. Look
down at verse 20. I'm crucified with Christ, nevertheless
I live. That was what he just talked
about. I'm justified. I died to sin in Christ and now
I live in Christ, yet not I. but Christ liveth in me. That's how I'm alive. Christ
lives in me. And how do you continue living?
How do you do the things you do in that body of death? How
do you continue believing on Him? The life which I now live
in this flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God. The same way I was justified,
that's how I'm sanctified and that's how I continue believing.
By the faithfulness of Christ working in me, the same One who
loved me and gave Himself for me is working in me by that same
faithfulness by which He loved me and gave Himself for me. So
let's go through Psalm 27 and I want to point out a few things
here concerning the faith of Christ. And as we do, we'll try to look
at how our faith is sustained by the faith of Christ working
effectually in us. So we are looking at two things
here. We are looking at how the faith of Christ, the faith of
Christ by which we were justified as He hung on that cross, and
then we are going to look at how the faith of Christ keeps
us trusting Him only as we suffer our much, much, much lighter
afflictions. Alright, first of all, the faith
of Christ even obedient to the death of the cross. The faith
of Christ was in no other confidence but the Lord Jehovah. No other
confidence but the Lord Jehovah. He looked nowhere for anything
He needed but to the Lord Jehovah. Look here now. As He hung there
on that cross, don't you think about this. Scripture says the
world went dark. Thick darkness. You couldn't
see your hand in front of your face. Total darkness. When God
turned His back on the Redeemer, the sun didn't shine. That was
God teaching us something about what was happening there. The
sun refused to shine. And to the natural eye, if you
looked at that, you would think that one hanging on that cross
will perish. He's perishing. Knowing us, knowing
our faith, we said no man could bear up on that. He's going to
perish. And if you looked at that, you would think the flesh
is so weak, there is no way. But I want you to look here now,
even when Christ was bearing that, this is what He said. This
is the faith of Christ. Verse 1, The Lord is my light
and my salvation, whom shall I fear? The Lord is the strength
of my life, of whom shall I be afraid? He is saying it doesn't
matter if my light right now is dark. It doesn't matter if
my circumstances are dark. It doesn't matter if I can't
see my light right now. My light is not in any of those
things. My light is not in my circumstances.
My light is not in what is going on around me. My light is not
even in my sight. Where is it? The Lord is my light. Even when I can't see. Even when
it doesn't appear I have any light. Faith says the Lord is
my light. Not the Lord gives me light,
the Lord is my light. Now that's pure, perfect faith
of Christ on the cross in that darkness to say the Lord is my
light. When it looked like it was natural, I saw Him perishing,
He said, The Lord is my salvation. When He was experiencing the
total weakness of our flesh, He said, The Lord is the strength
of my life. The Lord Jesus Christ did what
we talked about Thursday night. You know, we talked about when
you are brought into a present affliction. Faith remembers those
tenses of salvation. We remember He hath saved us
from so great a death. And so we know He will save us
now and we trust He will save us in the future. As Christ hung
on that cross, He remembered what the Lord Jehovah had just
done for Him. He says there in verse 2, when
the wicked, even mine enemies and my foes came upon me to eat
up my flesh, they stumbled and fell. You recall after Garden
of Gethsemane when his foes came to arrest him, to eat up his
flesh. He said, who do you look for?
And they said, Jesus. And he said, I am. And they went
backwards and fell down. That never happened to David.
That didn't ever happen to David. But it happened to Christ. He
is remembering how the Lord is his light and the Lord is his
salvation and Jehovah is the strength of his life. And so when our substitute then
looked back at that deliverance and then he looked from the cross
down at that angry mob gathered around him and gnashing up on
him with their teeth, he could say this, verse 3. Though a host
should encamp against me, my heart shall not fear. Though
war should rise against me, in this will I be confident. What? What he just said. The Lord is
my light. The Lord is my salvation. Who
shall I fear? The Lord is the strength of my
life. Of whom shall I be afraid? Brethren,
let me ask you something. None of us ever suffered anything
like Christ was suffering on that cross in that darkness.
We can't even really comprehend it. But let me ask you this. How much less would it take for
you and me to waver in faith? All it took for the Apostle Peter,
and I'm not blaming Peter, this is me and you, all it took for
the Apostle Peter was a little maiden standing by a fire and
he wilted. He wilted. This right here is
perfect faith. This is the faith of Christ. Had no competition. His faith
had nothing else competing for His affection. He said, the Lord
is my light, the Lord is my salvation, the Lord is the strength of my
life. I don't fear any of this. I'm not going to fear it. The
past two days, and really it's been going on a couple of weeks,
but the past two days I have been experiencing the worst darkness
I think I have ever experienced It seems like every enemy is
very near and God is very far. But, something strange is happening. In the middle of it, I have had
a confidence. I can't really explain it, but
I don't feel like I have any light. I've questioned, am I
saved? I've wondered if I'm just going
to wilt. And yet, nothing around me, nothing
I'm looking at, nothing I can see or feel or anything is giving
me this confidence that I have a confidence that the Lord is
my light. The Lord is my salvation and
He's the strength of my life. Even though I can't see it, How
do you have something like that? You must have some mighty strong
faith. No? Our faith and our confidence
in Christ is sustained one way. Just one way. The life I now
live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God. That same faith who loved me
and laid down His life and bore that darkness and never wavered
in His faithfulness toward God. That's how I have faith. He never
wavers in His faithfulness to keep me trusting Him. That's
the only way. The only way. The only way. Now secondly, let's look here.
The faith of Christ desired and sought for uninterrupted communion
with Jehovah. His faith never wavered in desiring
and seeking uninterrupted communion with Jehovah even when He was
temporarily denied that communion on the cross. Look here in verse
4. He says, One thing I have desired
of the Lord, and you can be certain And when Christ desired this,
it was perfect faith. It was a perfect desire. There
wasn't anything competing with it. One thing have I desired
of the Lord, that will I seek after. He didn't just say, I'm
going to desire it. He said, I'm going to seek after it. And
he was seeking after it while he hung there on that cross.
He said, this is what it is, that I may dwell in the house
of the Lord all the days of my life to behold the beauty of
the Lord and to inquire in His temple. The very reason that
the Lord Jesus Christ came down and took flesh, it was to secure
for His people the everlasting, unbreakable communion between
us and God. That's what He came to do, to
secure that for us. See, the first Adam wasn't made
immortal, I mean, wasn't made to where he could not fall. He
could fall. The last Adam came And He is
the God-man, so everything He does is eternal. Everything He
did as a man made it eternal by being the God. And so He came
to make us have everlasting, unbreakable communion with God. But to accomplish that, He had
to satisfy justice. To accomplish that, He had to
justify us. And to do that, He had to take
our sin, and when He did that, God had to turn his back on Him
on the cross. When he speaks in this psalm
of believing he would once again see the goodness of God in the
land of the living, when he says, I would have fainted if I hadn't
believed to see the goodness of God in the land of the living,
he's saying that and having perfect faith when he says that while
he sees nothing but the wrath of God in a land not inhabited. dying that living death on the
cross. He doesn't have communion with
God while that's going on. I can't even try to imagine to
explain that to you. All I can say is believe. It's
what we believe. It was necessary. Forsaken of
God to be condemned and do away with that condemnation for His
people. He had to bear that separation. And so, when he did that though,
the perfect faith of Christ never wavered. It never wavered. He kept reminding himself of
the Father's covenant promise. He kept remembering that covenant
promise that Lord Jehovah made with him. He said in verse 5,
For in the time of trouble he shall hide me in his pavilion.
In the secret of his tabernacle shall he hide me. He shall set
me upon a rock. even when he's cut off, even
when he's sitting there separated from God. And he's sitting there
with that one desire, that one thing he's seeking after, to
have that perfect communion with God. That's what it is to dwell
in God's temple. It's not this house. It's to
dwell in that constant communion with God, never to be broken.
And while he's desiring that constant communion with God,
he doesn't have it right now. Because He's having to satisfy
justice to give it to us. And so while He's bearing that,
in the midst of bearing that, He's thinking about how God the
Father promised to raise Him from the dead when He had finished
satisfying justice. I desire one thing and that's
what I'm seeking. Why do you see me hanging here
in this darkness? Why do you see me bearing this
darkness and bearing this separation from my Father? Because I have
one desire, and it's what I'm seeking right now by what I'm
doing, is to be in constant, everlasting, unbreakable communion
with God my Father and all the people He's given to me. Because
God's promised me when this work is finished, He's going to lift
me up to that secret hiding place at His right hand where I'm going
to be with Him forever, on a rock, unmovable, never again to die
under sin. He died under sin once. and my
people will never have to die unto it again." That's why he
was hanging there, to effect that everlasting communion for
us, to secure it for us, for his people. And he not only desired
that communion, he sought it, brethren, by being made sin for
us and bearing that separation and believing God perfectly while
he bore it. Kevin, when you get through today,
go back, y'all read that psalm you just read after you've heard
this message, and read it hearing Christ say it. That's Christ
saying He's a very present help in time of trouble. And when
it looked like He was getting no help, that there would never
be any more help from Him, from God the Father toward Him at
all on that cross, bearing hell on that cross for His people.
When it looked like He'd never hear have any more communion
with God on that cross. He considered it that God would
fulfill that covenant promise and lift him up to sit in that
secret place in just a very little while, in a very present help
He'd give it to him. Look here at verse 6. He said,
Now, now shall mine head be lifted up above mine enemies round about.
Therefore will I offer in His tabernacle sacrifices of joy. I'll sing praises unto the Lord.
And at last, when He satisfied justice, God honored that pure
faith of our Redeemer. He raised Him. He raised His
head up above all our enemies. Scripture says far above all
principality and power and might and dominion and every nameless
name, not only in this world but also in that which is to
come. But He is sitting there now by Himself waiting on that
to happen. In that darkness, thinking of
that covenant and saying, even right now, it will be just a
little while. And even thinking about it right now, He is lifting
my head up just thinking about it. And it will be just a little,
in a present help, He is going to lift me up far above all and
give me a place in His secret pavilion to sit with Him for
eternity. with my people." Now brethren,
when we feel cut off, we are never cut off because Christ
perfected obedience and put away our sins forever. We feel like
we are cut off sometimes, but we are not cut off. Christ perfected
our obedience and we will never be cut off. He is our righteousness. That means this is our righteousness. We're seeing it right here. It's
a person and we're seeing what he's doing right here. He's so
faithful to God even while he's bearing justice. That's remarkable. He's working out the positive,
perfect, obedient righteousness to God while he's bearing our
sin and bearing the sword for not being obedient. Because we
weren't. That sin is making... You see
what I'm saying? He's being actively obedient
and bearing judgment at the same time. Oh, how often though... He don't
forsake us, but how often we'll forsake Him. If left to ourselves,
we'd forsake Him in a heartbeat. He says, I'll never leave thee
and I'll never forsake thee. But boy, we would forsake Him. Why don't we forsake Him? Because
this faith of Christ that we're looking at right here in this
psalm, the life I now live, I live by that very same faith of Christ.
He keeps working that same faithful work. He worked faithfully to
me to keep me trusting Him and keep His people trusting Him
and believing Him. That's what He keeps on doing.
That's why. You think about this, brethren. It's only by that that He makes
us desire Him and long after Him and seek after Him. You remember
when you didn't know the Lord and we were like the rich young
ruler. We thought we were good boys
and girls and we had always kept the law from our youth up. And
that rich young ruler came to Christ and he said, I have kept
all the law from my youth up. What do I lack? You know what
the Lord said to him? Christ said right here, there
is one thing I desire. Communion with God. Communion
with Him. To be accepted of Him. To dwell
in His house of prayer. That is one thing I desire. One
thing I am seeking after. That rich young ruler said, what
do I lack? Christ said, one thing. There's
one thing thou likest. And that was us. We were that
rich young ruler. We were thinking we had kept
God's law or at least we were thinking, well, I'm not as bad
as somebody else. My goods are going to outweigh my bad. And
how did we come to see that was just flat wrong? The life I now
live, I live by the faith of Christ. He came to us and He
said to us what He did to that rich young ruler. There's one
thing you're missing. There's one thing that you don't
desire, and that you're not seeking, and that you don't have. One
thing. Sell everything you've got. And
give it away and follow Me. And then you'll have Me to be
your treasure. I'll be your treasure in heaven
then. And that rich young ruler went away sorrowful. And Christ
made us sorrowful with that word too. because our riches was our
law-keeping and our riches was our so-called goodness. And He
made us to see your covetous for the honor that belongs to
Christ. He is the only law-keeper. and
your coverages for the honor of saying you brought yourself
to God by your works and your coverages with all your earthly
things. You desire all these other riches
in the world far more than you desire me, the Lord said. That's
what He said to you and me. He was faithful to us, wasn't
He? He told us the truth. He did it through the gospel.
He told us the truth and when He told us that truth, He made
us to sell everything we had. He made us to forsake everything
and follow Him and have our riches in Him. He made us to say, there
is this one thing I am desiring now. That is Christ. And one
thing I am seeking after, I want to be in Christ and be found
in Christ and have communion with Christ and be in Christ
my temple. That is where I want to be. And
then we went on a little while after that You know, we thought,
well, everybody is going to rejoice in this. I want to tell everybody
about it. So we went and told our religious friends about it,
or we went and told our so-called worldly friends about it. Did
you get any opposition when the faith of Christ first came and
when He first came made you believe Him? Did you get any opposition
from your friends and religious folks? Remember that blind fellow
he came to and he gave him sight? Boy, they came around and he
started telling them about Christ and they said, oh, it offended
them. Who is this fellow that gave you sight without our permission?
Who is this fellow that gave you sight? He didn't grow up
in our school. He wasn't in our denomination. He wasn't in our circle of friends.
Who is this person that did this? And they began to... You are
going to teach us, they said? As knowledgeable as we are, you
are going to teach us something? Oh, we would have wilted under
that. We would have fell away under that. We would have perished
under that. Our faith wouldn't have held out if it was up to
just us sustaining our faith. The life I now live, I live by
the faith of Christ. And Christ came to us just like
He came to that blind man. He came to us in spirit and He
made us say this. One thing I know. There is just
one thing I desire. One thing I am seeking after.
One thing I know. I don't know. I can't splice
and dice doctrine like you can and I can't tell you all the
ins and outs of it and all that. I don't know any of that. One
thing I know, I was blind and now I see. And I know who did
that. Who worked that in you? Who made
you be able to stand up and not wilt under that opposition, being
just a little old baby, like a little old deer with wobbly
knees? The faith of Christ. Been doing
it ever since. Well, then we go off and, you
know, we say, well, I'm on one thing I desire is Christ. I'll
never not be just seeking Him only. Next thing you know, we
get out working and we're trying to serve the Lord and we're thinking
about doing things for Him and how we want to do to honor Him
and serve Him and we just start getting bitter because nobody's
helping us, nobody's doing what they ought to be doing to help
us. We get bitter. You say to the Lord, Lord, does
that not care? My sister, my brother, they're
not helping me? They're leaving me alone? Bid them to help me. I'm working
harder than everybody. Oh, we'd fail. We'd fall away
if it was up to us to keep that faith. And the Lord comes to
you. We don't even know what's wrong
with us. We still think we're just desiring one thing by that
when we're in that mess. And the Lord comes to you and
He says so tenderly, He says, Clay, Clay. Now we're careful and troubled
about many things. You got your affection set on
many things. You're not desiring one thing.
But one thing is needful. Now choose that one thing and
really desire that one thing and seek that one thing. Because
that one thing is not going to be taken away from you. How do
we get to that spot? How do we come to know that?
How do we turn from all the many things we're looking at and be
brought back to that one thing. The life I now live, I live by
the faith of Christ. He won't let me go after those
many things. He just keeps coming to me and saying, there's just
one thing needful. Follow me. Follow me. Oh boy,
we get along, get going along and we get to thinking that we
can stand, you know, and think we've attained. And we start
looking back over our life. And then we start seeing how
unfaithful we've been. And we start getting down. And we would surely fall away.
But the faith of Christ comes to us. He comes to us in that
perfect fidelity to us. He comes to us and works in us
and turns us back around. He makes us say, I count not
myself to have apprehended. But this one thing. It's just
this one thing I do, forgetting those things that are behind.
I'm pressing toward that one mark for that one prize, for
that one high calling of God in my Lord Jesus Christ. We'd
never keep our focus on that one desire. We'd never have that
one desire and seek that one thing, communion with Christ,
to be found in Christ. We'd never seek it. if it wasn't
for the faith of Christ abiding in us and keeping us turned to
Him. Well then lastly, I want you
to see this now. Go back to Psalm 27. The faith of Christ never ceased
calling on the Lord. You know, that's something we'll
do. We'll stop calling on Him. in perfect faith of Christ, never
ceased calling on the Lord Jehovah, even when the only answer that
he received was the silence of divine judgment. He never ceased
calling on Jehovah in perfect faith, trusting the Lord will
answer him. He never ceased calling even
when the only answer he received was the silence of divine judgment. Look here in verse 8. I'm sorry,
verse 7. He said, Here, O Lord, hear when
I cry with my voice. Have mercy also upon me and answer
me. He said, verse 8, When thou saidest,
Seek ye my face, my heart said unto thee, Thy face, Lord, I
will seek. Now, O Father, hide not thy face far from me when
I call on you. You see that? You see that? He
said, When you said, Call on me, I called on you. And now
I'm calling on you. I'm saying, Lord, have mercy
on me and answer me. Lord, when you said, seek me,
I said, thy face I seek. Now don't hide your face from
me. He could plead His perfect obedience. He could plead and
say, when you said seek me, when you said obey me, when you said
go work my will in the earth, Lord, I did it. I did it. I'm here now doing what You've
given me to do. I'm here in this darkness, bearing
this suffering because it's what You've given me to do. I'm seeking
Your face, Lord. And He called to Him, have mercy
on me in the midst of this. Call out to let me know, Lord,
God my Father, that You're there. No answer. Justice can't answer
mercy until justice is satisfied. Hide not thy face from me. Put
not thy servant away in anger. Thou hast been my help. Leave
me not, neither forsake me, O God of my salvation. Look down at
verse 11. Teach me thy way, O Lord. Lead
me in a plain path. Show me that resurrection and
that ascension. Show me that way. Lead me in
that way. Raise me in that way. because
of my enemies. Do this, open heaven and raise
me up because of my enemies. I don't want my enemies to say,
aha, we told you so. Look at that. I don't want my
enemies to think they've triumphed, Lord. That's a perfectly faithful
thought for our Redeemer. And then look at this, verse
12. Deliver me not over unto the will of my enemies. What
was their will? For Him to perish forever. That's
what he said. Lord, don't let me perish forever.
That's what my enemies want. False witnesses have risen up
against me and they breathe out cruelty against me. And you know
that speaking of Christ on the cross. But like He did when He
cried, you remember back there when He said, My God, My God,
why hast thou forsaken Me? A little while later, he vindicated
God. In perfect faithfulness, he answered
it, why God had to forsake him. He said, I am a worm and no man,
and thou art holy. He does the same thing right
here. He calls on Him to answer him. And then in perfect faithfulness,
he declares that God is Nothing but full of faithfulness and
just judgment. He vindicates God for not answering
him. That's what I'm saying. Look at verse 10. He said, When
my father and my mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me
up. Then He'll teach me His way.
Then He'll open heaven and He'll raise me. Then I'll ascend to
my Father just like He promised. There's two things that are declared
here. The first is what we always have said when we looked at this
verse, or at least what I've always thought. The faithfulness
of God. He declared the faithfulness
of the Lord Jehovah. He said, when the two that have
raised me in this earth, when they forsake me, the Lord
will faithfully Take me up. He won't forsake me. He's faithful. He won't forsake me. So he justified
God for not answering him. He's faithful. I know He's not
forsaken me. But when everybody else does, including those two
that reared me from the infant and raised me up, when they've
forsaken me, He won't forsake me. There's something else He's
saying right here. There's something else He's saying
right here. Don't you just reckon that Joseph and Mary They loved him. He was... I mean Joseph was not his father,
but he raised him like he was his son. And you know, you adopt
a child and you love that child like they're your own. And Mary
carried him in her womb. Don't you reckon they were the
last ones to turn their back and say, he's dead. There's nothing we can do. Don't
you reckon that as long as he suffered, either peering back
or looking or just trying to get a glimpse wherever they were,
trying to just see. And they were probably the last
ones that said they left Him for dead. And when that happened, He said,
when those that love Me most here are the last ones to forsake
Me. That when all this time has passed,
when God is fully justified, when God is fully satisfied,
then He'll answer me and He'll take me up. He's vindicating
God. He's declaring the faithfulness
and the just judgment of God. He's saying, Lord, I know why
you can't answer me. Justice has got to be satisfied.
And it's not until when that long period of time that my father
and my mother, so they are the last ones to say that justice
will be satisfied, then the Lord will take me up. Then the Lord
will raise me. And that's what He did. That's
exactly what He did. Christ declared the judgment,
the justice of God. On that cross He made His people
righteous, He made His people holy, and He honored God to the
highest. He honored God to the highest.
And he said, and God won't answer me until I finish that work.
But then, He will. He'll lift me up. By the faith
of Christ, He makes us witnesses of Him after He's chastened us.
After He's put us through a little bit of affliction, He makes us
witnesses of Him. By the faith of Christ, you go
tell somebody what you learned by what you suffered. And that's
the purpose. He wants you to. He's going to
have you do that. And that's what He makes you
do by His faithfulness. So I'm going to tell you what
Christ taught me these past few weeks and these past couple of
days. Verse 13. I had fainted unless I believed
to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. And I learned that the only way
I believed is by that One who said that when He was in the
land of the dead. He hung there on that cross suffering
judgment and still by His faithfulness said, I would have fainted if
I had not believed I would see the goodness of the Lord in the
land of the living. That One is the One who kept
me trusting Him. Believe Him. And this is what
He said and this is what He taught me to say. to myself when I'm
suffering. This is what He said to me. This
is what He teaches me to say while I'm suffering. Verse 14,
wait on the Lord. Be of good courage even when
it's dark, even when you appear like you're not going to be saved,
even when it appears like you're going to perish, even when there's
no light, even when that one desire, you feel like you don't
have that communion, you're separated from it, even when He won't answer. Just wait. Just wait. And I'll tell you the way you'll
do it, one way, the faith of Christ will keep you waiting.
Wait on the Lord Jehovah. That word Lord means covenant
God. Wait on Him. Be of good courage. He shall
strengthen thine heart. How? With who? With what? The
Lord My Lord Jesus Christ, the strength of my life, He is going
to strengthen your heart. Wait, I say, on the Lord. That just gives different meaning
to that psalm, don't it? That gives different meaning
to what it is to wait on the Lord. If Christ had to wait on that
cross, Whatever little light thing I'm suffering, I believe
I can wait, don't you? Wait on the Lord. Now that, brethren,
is the faith of Christ. We're not justified by our works.
Men, you've never done anything remotely as honoring to God as
what He did. We're sinners. It's mixed with
everything we do. We're not even saved by our faith
without the faith of Christ keeping us and sustaining us. He's the
faith of Christ that justified us and it's the faith of Christ
that sanctifies us and keeps us trusting Him. So no matter
what, seeing what He accomplished for us on that cross, He said,
I won't leave you and forsake you. You can wait on Him. He
will strengthen you soon. Just wait on Him. Alright, let's
pass out the elements now. We'll serve the Lord's table.
Let me say a word before we do this.