Let's turn again to God's Word
and turning to that Psalm. I'm sure it's a portion of Holy
Scripture that we're not, any of us, unfamiliar with. Psalm
130. And I direct you in particular
to the verses 5 and 6. Psalm 130 verses 5 and 6, I wait
for the Lord my soul doth wait and in his word do I hope my
soul waiteth for the Lord more than they that watch for the
morning I say more than they that watch for the morning waiting
upon the Lord and of course isn't that the primary purpose of our
coming together tonight that we might wait upon Him with our
prayers that we might come as those who would desire to take
with us words and to turn to the Lord and to seek grace that
we might utter before Him believing prayers. to wait upon the Lord. Three things then as we come
to consider the content of these two verses in the psalm, verses
five and six. First of all, that in the context
here we see that there should be a real motivation to us as
we come thus to pray, as we come to wait upon the Lord. We see
our This waiting very much centers in God and centers in God as
he has revealed himself. The Swami says, I wait for the
Lord, my soul does wait and in his words do I hope. And so this waiting has to do
with hoping and that hoping that centers in the word of the Lord. What is the word of the Lord?
Well, we can think of scripture. This is the word of God. We hope
in the word of God. We come to pray to God and we
look to his word and we read here, of course, those exceeding
great and precious promises. Here we have every encouragement
to pray to Him because He has promised that He will hear the
prayers of all those that thus come before Him. The Lord Jesus
says, Ask, and it shall be given you. Seek, and you shall find.
Knock, and it shall be opened to you. And the Lord God does
not say to the seed of Jacob, Seek in My face in vain. We have the promises of God and
In these we can hope, but we have also the precepts of God. You think of the Apostle Paul,
as he writes in those various epistles, and time and again
as we come to the practical aspect of the epistle, the closing part
of those epistles, we find those exhortations, and many a time
he exhorts us to pray, to be careful for nothing. but in everything
by prayer and supplication with thanksgivings to make our requests
known unto God. We are to pray, he says, without
ceasing. In everything we are to be those
who are giving thanks. Or we are to come then waiting
upon the Lord as those who would hope in his word, his precepts
and his promises and of course ultimately that promise centers
in the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ that one
who is God and God incarnate. Can we not understand then the
expression here at the end of the fifth verse in his words
that is in the word incarnate in the Lord Jesus Christ do we
hope as that one who is the great mediator between God and man. Here is the motivation then.
that God has given us his word and God in his word has revealed
himself. And here, in this psalm, we do
discover something with regards to the very character of God.
Three things we see in particular. First of all, we discover that God is a merciful
God. Look at the middle of verse 7.
For with the Lord, it says, there is mercy. Always a mercy for
God. And so as we pray, can we not
come and make that prayer of the publican of whom the Lord
Jesus speaks in the Gospel, make that prayer our prayer. There in Luke 18, the Lord speaks
about those two men go to the temple at the hour of prayer.
The one was a publican, the other a pharisee. And now the Pharisee
comes full of himself. Oh, I thank thee, he says, that
I am not as other men are, extortioners, adulterers, unjust, nor as this
publican. I give tithes of all that I possess. I fast twice a week, he says. He comes speaking of himself.
commending himself as he were to God, thinking himself to be
so superior and one whom the Lord God must surely hearken
to. But how the Lord then draws the
contrast and speaks on the other hand of that poor publican, one
so despised in Israel at that time, a tax gatherer, working
for the occupying forces of Rome, and the Lord speaks of him standing
afar off He cannot lift up his eyes to heaven, he smites upon
his breast. And what is his prayer? God,
be merciful. God, be merciful to me, a sinner. Or God, be propitious. That's
the word that he uses, really. To be merciful, to be propitious. And what does that mean? Well,
it's asking God that he would forgo his anger, his indignation,
Oh how the Lord Jesus Christ has come as that one who is the
propitiation for our sins. John says here in his love not
that we love God but that he loved us and sent his Son to
be the propitiation for our sins. That one who comes to bear in
his own person all that wrath of God. That one who comes to
satisfy the holiness and the justice of God. and to come and
to pray for mercy is therefore to acknowledge what we are as
sinners we need the mercy of God and God is that one who is a
merciful God and that mercy you see is is covenant mercy there
in verse 7 the Lord as you will observe is in capital letters
it's Jehovah It's the great I am that I am. It's the God of the
covenant. Oh, it is in that covenant of grace that God has demonstrated
His mercy, that provision that He has made in laying help upon
one who is mighty and able to save to the uttermost. Oh, then
here is the motivation to come and wait upon such a God as He
is. I wait for the Lord's. And there in verse 5 again it's
the covenant name. My soul doth wait and in his
word do I hope. But as God is a merciful God,
so he is also a redeeming God. Look at how he continues in verse
7. With the Lord there is mercy and with him is plenteous redemption. and he shall redeem Israel from
all his sins." The merciful God, the God also of redemption, and
it is the Lord Jesus Christ himself who has come and paid that great
redemption price. He has paid the debt that is
owed to the holy law of God. He has paid that ransom price
that God's holy, just, and perfect law demands. The wages of sin,
death. The soul that sinneth shall die. And the Lord Jesus Christ has
paid that price. He has died. And He has died,
of course, for the unjust, to bring sinners to God. This was the purpose of His coming.
as we see there in Galatians 4, when the fullness of the time
was come, God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under
the law to redeem. Oh, it was in order to redeem
them that were under the law. He's not simply the seed of the
woman. He is not made of the woman. He has no human father, we know
that. the promise of God that we have there in the very chapter
that records the fall of our first parents, the entrance of
sin, that the seed of the woman is to come to bruise the head
of Satan. He is the seed of the woman,
but he's not only made of a woman, he's made under the law. And
he will answer, and he has answered all that the holy law of God
demands. He has fulfilled all righteousness.
Oh, we are familiar with these things. He has honored the law
by that life of obedience to every commandment and every statute
and every precept. And He has not only answered
the law in living but also in dying for there is not only the
precept to be honored but also the penalty. And He has borne
that penalty, that punishment of sins, As we read the Lord
God Himself saying there in Job 33, deliver him from going down
to the pit, I have found a ransom. Oh, what language is that when
God utters it, when we feel that we are those who are only worthy
to go down into the pit. Out of the depths have I cried
unto thee, says the Psalmist. Deliver him from going down into
the pit, into those depths. Why? Because God has found a
ransom. He has provided that ransom in
the Lord Jesus. And of course, that ransom price,
that redemption, is bound up with the propitiation that we
spoke of, the mercy. It's bound up also with the way
in which God justifies the sinner. Look at how these things come
together. There in Romans 3, 24 and 25 being justified freely
through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus whom God has
set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood. There we have those great gospel
truths, those blessed doctrines we have justification, we have
redemption, we have propitiation being justified, freely, free justification, and how is
that free justification accomplished? Through the redemption that is
in Christ Jesus, whom God has set forth to be a propitiation,
a mercy seat, through faith in His blood. Or Christ has paid
the debt, Christ has satisfied God's holy justice. And so this
is the character of God that is unfolded to us in this psalm. This is why David can plead with
God to hear him. Lord, hear my voice, he says.
Let Thine ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications.
What is the basis of his confidence? It's the character of God, a
merciful God. redeeming God, and so also a
forgiving God. A forgiving God. Verse 3, If
thou, Lord, shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who shalt stand? But
there is forgiveness with thee, that thou mayest be feared. Oh, that is filial fear that
is associated with the full forgiveness of God.
It's not a fear that has torments. There is forgiveness with thee
that thou mayest be feared. Doesn't the Bible reveal this
God to us? He is a sin-pardoning God. And we see it in that gift. He does not withhold His Son,
His only begotten Son. but He delivers him up for sinners,
that sinners might know the pardon of all their sins." The language
that we have there in the book of Micah. And there right at the end of
Micah in chapter 7, those tremendous verses, "...who is a pardoning God like
thee, or who has grace, so rich and free, the hymn that's based
on this portion, that lovely hymn, it's not in Gadsby, it's
a beautiful hymn of Samuel Davies. who was an American pastor, who
is a god like unto thee, that pardoneth iniquity, and passeth
by the transgression of the remnant of his heritage. He retaineth
not his anger for ever, because he delighteth in mercy. He will
turn again, he will have compassion upon us, he will subdue our iniquities,
and they will cast all their sins into the depths of the sea. They will perform the truth to
Jacob, and the mercy to Abraham which they were sworn unto our
fathers from the days of old." Oh, He is a God of pardons, a
God that delights in mercies. Again, look at the language that
we have in another prophet there in the 50th chapter of the book
of Jeremiah, verse 20. In those days and in that time,
saith the Lord, the iniquity of Israel shall be sought for,
and there shall be none, and the sins of Judah, and they shall
not be found, for I will pardon. I will pardon them whom I reserved."
There are a people. And God in that eternal covenant
of grace has appointed to be pardoned, to know the forgiveness
of sins. what a blessing it is if we are
those why he says as far as the east is from the west so far
has he removed our transgressions from us burying them in the depths
of the sea this is the God you see that the psalmist is speaking
of here in this 130th Psalm there is every motivation for us to
wait upon such a God as this surely we will not wait in vain
I wait for the Lord my soul does wait and in his word do I hope
my soul waiteth for the Lord more than they that watch for
the morning I say more than they that watch for the morning is
that how we wait seems to speak in some way of the the mariner
in the midst of a great storm, in the midst of great darkness,
the storm raging through the night, fearing shipwreck, longing
for the morning to appear, for that person who is on a bed of
sickness, so restless, tossing, turning through the night, longing
for the appearing of another day. This is how we come to wait
upon the Lord. Well, let us, in the second place,
consider something more with regards to the manner of this
waiting. I wait, he says, for the Lord,
my soul doth wait. And then again, my soul waiteth
for the Lord. There's such an emphasis here
upon waiting. But what is this waiting? Well,
it is certainly not a slothful thing. It is that waiting which
is really so much holy activity, so much exercise in the depth
of this man's soul. The hymn writer says, sloth is
a dangerous state and he that flees and he that sleeps cannot
be said to wait. If we're waiting upon the Lord,
we're not sleeping, we're not slothful. Woe to them! that are at ease in Zion, it
says. We're not at ease if we're those
who are waiting upon the Lord. With waiting there is that watching,
and there is that longing, and there is that expecting. What is the manner of this waiting
upon the Lord that is being spoken of here then? Well, we see quite
clearly how it is a waiting in hope. Again, verse 5, I wait for the Lord, my soul
does wait, and then it says, and in his word do I hope. It is to wait then in hope that
the Lord will appear. And again it is, remember, that
one who is the God of the Covenant. That God who has not only given
his promise but is also sworn by himself in confirmation of
that promise. He could swear by no greater
when he gave promise to Abraham, therefore he swore by himself.
And Christ now has come and has sealed all that covenant with
the shedding of his precious blood. All the covenant, the
testament stands why the testator himself has died and sealed it
all with blood. Waiting in hope then, And again,
the language that we find in Romans, the Apostle Paul speaks
there, he says, We are saved by hope, but hope that is seen
is not hope. For what a man seeth, why doth
he hope for it? But if a man waits for that that
he seeth not, then with patience will he wait for it. Now, this
hope, you see, is associated with patience, endurance, waiting
upon the Lord. But isn't that the pattern that
we have in Father Abraham? Or are we those who are Abraham's
seed? If we're of faith, we're the
seed of Abraham. And what of Abraham? We read
of him who against hope believed in hope. He staggered not at
the promise of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith. giving
glory to God and being fully persuaded that what he had promised
he was able to perform. There's Abram's hope that the
God who was promised is the God who can perform and so he doesn't
wait in vain, he waits in hope in his word do I hope Nor the
manner then of this waiting upon the Lord. It's a waiting in hope
and it's a waiting in prayer. And that's what we have in the
second verse. Lord, he says, hear my voice. Let thine ears
be attentive to the voice of my supplications. That's the significance of that
sixth verse, is it not? My soul waited for the Lord more
than they that watch for the morning. I say more than they
that watch for the morning. As we just said, it's like that
poor person who seems to be languishing on the borders of death, on that
bed of sickness. And there he is with his tossings
and his turnings. There he is, throughout the night,
so restless, sleepless, seeking to cry to the Lord, longing for
the appearing of the day. Oh, this is how we are to wait
upon the Lord in prayer. And when we wait in that fashion,
it's not that we're coming always with wonderful prayers in which
we're able to articulate something of what our needs are. Maybe
we cannot really find words adequate. And we have to come with our
sighing and our crying, our groanings. But these things are not hid
from God. But don't we have to be those who in prayer would
wait and watch? The Lord Jesus says to his disciples
what? Could you not watch with me one
hour? Watch and pray that ye enter
not into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing
but the flesh is weak. Or do we not prove that? At times we feel our spirit is
willing but at last our flesh is so weak and the flesh seems
to prevail. But it will not ultimately prevail
in the life and the experience of the child of God. We feel
sometimes we'll be overwhelmed by our old nature. We know that
the elder is to serve the younger, the new nature, that divine nature
that we've received when we're born again by the Spirit of God,
that must prevail. That must prevail. And isn't
that what the Apostle comes to at the end of Romans chapter
7? He sees all his hope ultimately in that faith that centers in
the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. So we're to watch
and wait with expectation. All that exercise of sought out
of the depths have I cried unto thee, O Lord," says the psalmist
here. And so, what do we have really
in the psalm? We have the man of God, as it
were, mounting up to heaven. Oh, how his soul is, as it were,
stretching out towards God who is in heaven. His soul mounting
up, that's what prayer is. It's that longing after God. It's those desires that are in
the hearts of those who are the people of God. David could say
it. or my desire is before thee,"
he says to God. My groanings are not heard from
thee. Is that how we come into a service,
a prayer meeting such as this? We have a desire, a longing,
a yearning after God. Now, there is significance, of
course, in the title of the psalm. It's a song of degrees. Or as
he might say in the margin, a song of ascents. or a song of steps. Now, from
the 120th through to the 134th, we have a whole series of psalms
that bear this title, Songs of Degrees. And as we've said before,
Many say that these were the Psalms that would have been sung
by the children of Israel or the males as they were making
their journey up to the tabernacle bit at Shiloh as it was originally
and then taken of course to Jerusalem when David took Jerusalem from
the Jebusites and pitch the tabernacle there upon Mount Zion and then
ultimately his son Solomon builds the temple of the Lord. But the
children of Israel were told back in Deuteronomy 16 that they
must go up to that place where God had set his name, the Tabernacle,
the Temple, three times every year for those great Jewish festivals. Passover and Weeks or Pentecost
and the Feast of Tabernacles. And as they were journeying up
to Jerusalem to worship God, they would sing these various
songs of degrees. But here we are to recognize
the spiritual significance of those journeyings as they're
making their way up to the place where God dwells. What is the
spiritual significance here? Well, it's the ascendings of
prayers when the child of God is in the depths. Now, what are
the depths here? Well, there are those difficulties
that come into the lives of the children of God. In the world
you shall have tribulation. That's what the Lord Jesus Christ
himself has told us. In the world you shall have tribulation.
Be of good cheer, I have overcome the world. And the Apostle echoes
that. We must, he says, through much
tribulation. enter into the kingdom of God.
How are we going to ascend before God in our prayers? It's as we
are brought out of those difficulties that God in his wisdom appoints
for his children. The depths, difficulties, but
also sometimes desertions. There are those occasions when
God hides his face, when God seems to be at a distance from
us. Sometimes maybe sin is the cause
of that desertion. Your iniquities have separated
between you and your God. Your sins have hid his face from
you, says Isaiah. But we know that God's ways are
so strange and so mysterious. But there are those depths. And we think of the language
that we have there in the 107th psalm which speaks I suppose
really of God's providences but we know there's a spiritual significance
also to those events and those experiences of life that are
being described in that psalm there in verse 23 of the psalm
we read of those who do business in great waters. They that go
down to the sea in ships, that do business in great waters,
these see the works of the Lord and His wonders in the deep.
For He commandeth and raiseth the stormy wind which lifteth
up the waves thereof. They mount up to the heaven,
they go down again to the depths. Their soul is melted because
of trouble. They reel to and fro and stagger
like a drunken man and are at their wits' end. Then they cry
unto the Lord in their trouble, and He bringeth them out of their
distresses. He maketh the storm a calm, so
that the waves thereof are still. Then are they glad, because they
be quiet, so He bringeth them unto their desired haven." Oh,
what comfort, friends, to those who are in the depths. We can
find here in the Word of God the spiritual significance of
those words there. A man who is in the depths. The
guy in the psalm, he says, thou shalt bring me up again from
the depths of the earth. Now, we know that there is a
man in scripture who is such a vivid example of the experience,
what it means to cry unto God out of the depths of the earth,
I think in terms of the prophet Jonah. And Jonah, of course,
is one who knew what it was physically to be in those depths. But it wasn't just a physical
experience when he was followed by the great fish. It was a spiritual
experience. He was in the depths in his soul
as well as in his body. And we see that in his prayer.
We have these portions of God's Word where prayers are recorded. Daniel 9 comes to mind. A remarkable
prayer. But here is Jonah's prayer. in
the second chapter of his book. Then Jonah prayed unto the Lord
his God out of the fish's belly and said, I cried by reason of
mine affliction unto the Lord and he heard me. Out of the belly
of howl cried I and thou heardest my voice for thou hast cast me
into the deep in the midst of the seas Well, you see, it wasn't
those mariners who'd cast him overboard. No. He acknowledges
the hand of God. Thou hadst cast me into the deep
in the midst of the seas, and the floods compassed me about,
all thy billows and thy waves passed over me. Then I said,
I am cast out of thy sight. Yet I will look again toward
thy holy temple. The waters compassed me about,
even to the soul. The depth closed me round about,
the weeds were wrapped about my head. I went down to the bottoms
of the mountains. The earth with her bars was about
me forever. Yet hast thou brought up my life
from corruption." Oh Lord my God, he's praying. He's in the
belly of the great fish. He's still in the depths of the
seas and yet Here we have what they call the prophetic perfect. Yet hast thou brought up my life. He is so confident that God will
yet do it. Thou hast brought up my life
from corruption, O Lord my God. When my soul fainted within me,
I remembered the Lord. Then my prayer came in unto thee,
into thine holy temple. They that observe lying vanities
forsake their own mercy. But I will sacrifice unto thee
with the voice of thanksgiving. I will pay that that I have vowed.
Salvation is of the Lord." And that's the end of his prayer.
That's the end of his prayer. What a note to finish on. Salvation
is of the Lord. But see, out here, he must be
looking to the Lord Jesus Christ. Twice he speaks of the temple. Verse 4, I will look again toward
thy holy temple. Verse 7, my prayer came in unto
thee, into thine holy temple. Now, surely this man was altogether
disorientated. He hadn't got a clue where the
temple was. He didn't know where he was.
He's in the depths of the sea, he's enclosed in a fish's belly,
and yet he is looking towards God's holy temple. That's not
something that is in any way physical, it's a spiritual looking,
and he's looking to him who is the great anti-type of the temple,
the Lord Jesus. He says to the Jews in John 2,
destroy this temple. In three days I will build it
again. And they didn't understand he
was speaking of the temple of his body, that human nature. That is the fulfillment of all
that was typified in the temple. Jonah is looking to the Lord
Jesus Christ as that one who will deliver him. And what does
God say in another psalm? I will bring my people again
from the depths of the sea. Oh God is that one, you see,
the God of deliverances. He does bring His people out,
and Jonah does not pray in vain. The Lord spake unto the fish,
we're told, and He vomited out Jonah upon the dry land. And then God's Word comes to
him again at the beginning of chapter 3. He was a rebellious
man, seeking to run away from the commandment of the Lord.
But how merciful God is! He comes to that rebellious man,
that sinful man, again. But what a mystery in the ways
of God when he brings his people into those situations and those
dreadful circumstances. So hard for us to envisage what
he could have meant for a man to be enclosed, shut in, just
as Jonah was, out of the depths have I cried unto thee, O Lord. The mystery. The mystery of the
ways of God, the God that we are to wait upon in our prayers. Again another psalm says, Thy
way is in the sea, thy path in the great waters. Thy footsteps
are not known. And yet this is that God who
has revealed himself, thank God for that. He has told us something of his own
character as we've sought to show tonight from the psalm.
What sort of a God is this? He's a merciful God. He's a redeeming
God. He's a forgiving God, a pardoning
God. And we need to search his words
and seek to discover him and pray to him that he will come
and disclose himself to us. and that we need as we search
His Word to be those who are seeking His face, those who would
wait upon Him, because we will not wait in vain. You will not
wait in vain. I wait for the Lord. My soul
doth wait, and in His Word do I hope. My soul waiteth for the
Lord more than they that watch for the morning. They say more
than they that watch for the morning. What earnestness in
this waiting! And again, Psalm 62, Truly my
soul waiteth upon God. Can we say that? Truly my soul
waiteth upon God. From Him cometh my salvation. May the Lord be pleased to bless
His Word. Now let us, before we come and
wait on God in prayer, sing the hymn 1056, 1056, the tune Blockley,
304. See a poor sinner, dearest Lord, whose soul,
encouraged by thy word, at mercy's footstool would remain, and there
would look and look again, how oft deceived by self and pride,
as my poor heart's been turned aside, and Joan alike has fled
from thee, till thou hast looked again on me." 1056 See a poor sinner, dearest Lord,
Her soul encouraged by Thy Word, At mercy's footstool would remain. day has my And Joan alike has fled from
thee, Till thou hast looked again on me. Ah, bring a wretched wanderer
home, And to thy footstool let me come And tell thee all my
grief and pain And wait and look and look again Take courage then, my trembling
soul, One look from Christ shall make thee whole. Trust thou in Him, tis not in
vain. And look again