Alright, we're going to begin,
and we're going to be in Psalm 40. Psalm 40, and we're going
to be looking at the entire Psalm, so I want to get moving on it,
because it'll take us every bit of our time here. So this is
a psalm of Christ, and it declares and speaks to us of what Christ
has accomplished in the salvation of his people. It's a blessed
psalm, and if all we see is something for ourselves, then we miss Christ. And there is things here for
us to see and to understand, but first it's Christ. Psalm
40. Psalm 40. And our title is, He
waited patiently. He waited patiently. Now the
first phrase that we read in this psalm, in verse 1, is, I
waited patiently for the Lord. And thinking of us, often when
a person is struck, suddenly struck with concern for their
soul and what's going to happen to them when they die, patience
isn't something that abounds in a person when they first come
under conviction and have concern about their sin and God and their
creator and judge. And a dead professor in religion
they can be quite active in religion. We know when we look at our own
selves and how we were before we knew the truth, we could see
just how motivated we could be. by fear and concern and the things
that we would do and what we would start doing when we thought
about it. How we would suddenly pick up
our Bibles and start reading and maybe be more perfect in
our attendance and more on time and sit more straight in the
seat or whatever it was that we thought would recommend us
to God and soothe our conscience, that's what we would start to
do. that fear and that concern, it
can be a powerful motivator and lead us to do many things that
we think in our own imagination are going to help us and speak
well for us. The things that we did, they
appeared religious. They appeared like things that
we should be doing, and we should read the scriptures. We should
pray and thank God and ask Him for wisdom and guidance. When it's just done in the flesh,
that's all that it is, and people can do a lot of things in the
flesh. Romans 8.8 says that they that are in the flesh cannot
please God. So if we're doing something in
the flesh, even though it appears religious, and we're hoping and
looking to those things and having some confidence in those things,
it's of the flesh. But a true child of God, The
Lord, He gives us life. And in that life that we have
in Christ, he gives us repentance. He works repentance in us. And
that repentance, in religion, all we ever thought of was, I
stop doing this, and I start doing this thing. I stop doing
this thing that I know is sinful, and I start doing this thing
that I know is righteous and good. But really what repentance
is, that God of repentance is, he turns us from looking to and
trusting and believing these works that we're doing, even
religious works, are the things that save us and earn us a favor
with God. He grants us repentance from
that to see My trust in those things is just Dead Works religion,
and he gives us faith and hope in the light of Christ so that
our confidence and trust is put into Christ, who was given of
God to be the very salvation of his people. So we're granted
repentance from Dead Works. and were given faith where it's
supposed to be, not in our works, but in Christ and resting there
in him. And the apostles, they did speak
and teach this when Paul said, for example, in Acts 20, 21,
testifying both to the Jews and also to the Greeks, repentance
toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. But what I
want us to see about this psalm is that it is speaking of Christ. And the church will benefit and
be blessed and taught from what's written here, but we first must
see Christ, because without Christ, if you miss Christ or just blow
right on by Christ, you don't see that. Without Him, we have
nothing. We have nothing. We have no standing before God.
Nothing we do can make us accepted and righteous before holy God. So, this psalm here, verse 1,
it speaks of Christ's willing humility. When He took upon Him
the form of a servant, and He took upon Him the likeness of
this sinful flesh, yet He came without sin. He came in perfection. It says there in Psalm 40 verse
1, I waited patiently for the Lord, and he inclined unto me
and heard my cry. So that we understand from that,
Christ himself waited upon the Father. He trusted the Father. He trusted Him and waited upon
Him. for all things, as the Hebrew
writer says in 5.5, so also Christ glorified not himself to be made
in high priest, but he that said unto him, thou art my son, today
have I begotten thee. So Christ waited upon the Father,
and we see him in his life being obedient in all things, so that
when he came and when he took upon flesh, he yielded up, having
all authority and power and ability to do whatsoever he wanted when
he wanted, he gave that up and waited and trusted the Lord so
that he willingly was obedient to his earthly parents. He listened
to them. and he waited for the coming
of John the Baptist who would come in the wilderness and make
a straight path to the Lord and after he was baptized he was
tempted of Satan and was remained righteous and faithful to the
Father, and he suffered the insults of religious people who were
his own creatures, his own creation. But he did all this to show himself
to be perfect among the people. He was perfect in all things.
Peter described him as a man approved of God among you by
miracles and wonders and signs which God did by him in the midst
of you." And we often read of him, right, he departed, he went
off into a mountain alone and prayed. So we see him always
praying to the Father. He didn't trust in himself, he
didn't have confidence in his own self-sufficiency, but he
prayed to the Father for all things. And so for this cause,
we also read at the end of verse 1 that, that God inclined unto
me and heard my cry. He heard my cry. And we see what
this cry is a little bit further in Psalm 40 verses 11, verses
11 through 13. He says, withhold not thou thy
tender mercies from me, O Lord. Let thy lovingkindness and thy
truth continually preserve me, for innumerable evils have compassed
me about. Mine iniquities have taken hold
upon me, so that I am not able to look up. They are more than
the hairs of my head, therefore my heart faileth me. Be pleased,
O Lord, to deliver me. O Lord, make haste to help me."
And we know from the scriptures that His cry was heard, the Father
heard him, because he is faithful in everything he did, and he
pleased the Father well, and the Father heard him. As it says
in Hebrews 5, 7, who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered
up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears
unto him that was able to save him from death, he was heard
in that he feared. So the Lord does teach us patience. We do learn patience from the
Lord, but our learning and our growth is all in the light of
Christ and seeing Him who is faithful to the Father in all
things and who has obtained and accomplished our salvation and
has given us life whereby we see Him and look to Him for all
things, and we trust Him. We are taught to trust Him and
wait upon Him, knowing that all things that are happening to
us, all things that are going on in our lives, are for our
good. They're for our good and our
benefit. And without Christ, we who have
been awakened to what we are before the law by nature, that
we're dead in trespasses and sins, we'd be in anxious, and
a fearful bunch just waiting for the hammer of God to fall
upon us were it not for Christ. And so looking to Him and having
faith to see what He has done for us, it's a comfort and it's
a rest and it does help us to be patient in waiting upon the
Lord because whatever happens, we know that He is our inheritance
and that shall never ever change for our benefit and our good.
Christ by the Spirit, he will grow us in the gospel, under
the gospel, he'll feed us and nurture us, giving us faith to
lay hold of these things and to understand that salvation
is of the Lord. And he has saved me. And so what
we do isn't to earn a righteousness or to earn favor with God, but
it's in joy and gladness, being thankful for what God has done
for us. And he turns our heart to be
fixed on on a desire and a willingness to serve him and serve our brethren
rather than a motivation by fear. Now verse 2, it says, He brought
me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and
set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings. Now we
We even with a certain depth of experience, experiential faith
where we come to know and have a certain understanding of what
we are and what we've done. to offend God, and we have this
to varying degrees, the understanding, but even those of us who have
gone into dark places looking at ourselves and thinking of
our sin, even we don't fully comprehend and understand what
Christ did for us, what he went through and what he endured for
each of his children, and laying down his life for us. We have a certain understanding
We come to a certain knowledge of the plague of our own heart
as we're grown in grace, as we saw last week, that as the Lord
grows us in grace, we're grown in humility, and we see what
we are and what he is, and that he's our hope. But Christ knows
what he did to deliver us because he was made what we are. The sins of his people was laid
upon him that He might make satisfaction for them, that He might satisfy
the justice of God in putting away, once and for all, forever,
our sins from us. And the guilt, and the punishment,
and the cost of those sins, Christ paid that. And He put that away
by His own work. And the shedding of His blood,
He purged us of our sins. He worked to put those sins away
and to remain faithful to the Father in all things. And that
pit there, it says it's a horrible pit, and that pit is used often
in the scriptures to describe a dungeon or a prison whereby
you would hold a person, a criminal, you would put them in maybe a
cistern carved out of a rock to hold them there. And that
became a filthy, vile, horrible place to be. And that's how it's
described here in the scriptures, that often it's described as
the grave. That word is used as sheol to
describe the grave, and sometimes it's translated hell, because
that's where death hold you, you're held there by death, and
none of us can break out of that, and only by the willingness of
Christ that held him for a time, but he couldn't be held because
he's glorious and almighty God and wonderful. and he made satisfaction. But when he was made sin for
the people, he was there laid in that grave and gave up his
life for us to put away our sin. And it says that miry clay, which
is a good description. You can think of in Zechariah,
it speaks of the high priest, Joshua. who stood in behalf of
the people. And there's a picture of him,
a view of him standing before God on his throne. And Satan,
the accuser, is there next to him, accusing him. And he's standing
there in filthy garments. Filthy, polluted garments. And it's by the power of God
that suddenly you see him standing in clean garments, in that which
is righteous and holy and cleansed garments. And that's what Christ
does for us. He stood in our place as our
substitute and bore those filthy garments in our place and suffered
the wrath of God that we might stand before God cleansed and
righteous and perfect, without spot, without sin and without
shame. I would never say this, but had
Paul said it, it says in Galatians 3.13, Christ hath redeemed us
from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us, For it is
written, cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree. And that
word, and that word pit there, they put the word horrible in
front of it. And that word horrible describes a noise, a noisiness,
a certain noisemess. It's a noisy thing as though
you're there and all of a sudden a flood of rushing waters just
comes in upon you and just overwhelms you. And it's loud, and it's
frightening. And you realize, I'm facing death,
I'm going to die, and it's all just coming in upon me. And that's
what you see there. You can see the flood of accusations,
and the guilt, and the sin, and the shame all coming in upon
our Savior when He was overflowed. with the sin of His people coming
upon Him, with the insults being hurled upon Him of wicked men,
with the fiery darts being thrust upon Him by devils and just that,
all that, and then He had to stand before God in our shame,
and He stood before Him who is holy and righteous in everything
He does, and God poured out his justice upon him. And Christ
did that. He stood in that place as the
surety for his people, so that he knows what he delivered us
from. He understands it because he was acutely aware of every
filthy, vile, wicked thought and deed that we've done. He
put that away for his people. If you turn over to Psalm 69,
verses 1-4, they describe, this is Christ again speaking here
and crying out, and he says in Psalm 69 verse 1, Save me, O
God, for the waters are come in unto my soul. I sink in deep
mire where there is no standing. I am come into deep waters where
the floods overflow me. I am weary of my crying. My throat
is dried, mine eyes fail while I wait for my God. They that
hate me without a cause are more than the hairs of mine head.
They that would destroy me being mine enemies wrongfully are mighty. Then I restored that which I
took not away, so that there Christ, in the midst of that,
in the midst of his Laying down his life as the sacrifice and
the surety for his people, to put away their sins once and
for all, to make them righteous and holy, Christ restored that
which he took not away. He didn't do anything wrong. He didn't sin or offend God in
any way. He did nothing wrong. He's righteous
and perfect and holy and pleased the Father well in all things. And yet he restored that which
he took not away, that which we committed, what we did and
what we deserved, he bore the price of that to make us righteous
before holy God. the scriptures declare that He
raised up Christ. It says in Psalm 40, verse 2,
He brought me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry
clay, and set my feet upon a rock and established my going. So
that Christ was raised from the grave and ascended to the Father.
And the Father has set Him on His throne where He rules and
reigns and fulfilling all the Word and the will of God. in
the earth, right? He received the book and he opens
those seals establishing the will of God in the earth because
his kingdom is an everlasting kingdom. So even now then we
see in the psalm how Christ sings triumphantly and he teaches us
this song. He's the one who puts this song
of praise and gladness appreciation for what He has done for us. It says in Psalm 40 verse 3,
He hath put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto our God. Many shall see it and fear and
shall trust in the Lord. Christ is declaring and he sings
to us, he's teaching us this gospel of what he's accomplished
for us in putting away our sin and he declares it to the great
congregation. He brings it forth through the
gospel to his congregation that you might know what he's accomplished
for you. how he has brought you out of
darkness, how he's delivered you in spite of your works, how
he's brought you into his kingdom, how he loves you and has cleansed
you in his blood and has given you his spirit whereby you understand
now the things of God. And you're not dead to these
things or confused by these things, but you understand. I'm nothing,
but Christ is my all. And he's fixed your hope and
your faith in him, that faith which he's given to you. So all
the blessings you have are in Christ and he sings these and
teaches you these things in the heart because he's given you
his spirit. And so it says in, actually turn
over to Psalm 22. Psalm 22 and go to verse 22. And here's Christ, the Chosen
of the Father, Psalm 22, 22. He says, I will declare thy name
unto my brethren. In the midst of the congregation
will I praise thee. And here's the song. Ye that
fear the Lord, praise him. All ye the seed of Jacob, glorify
him and fear him. All ye the seed of Israel. For
he hath not despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted.
That's Christ. He was afflicted. For our sakes,
neither hath he hid his face from him, but when he cried unto
him, he heard. So Christ was heard, and he's
declaring, I have accomplished your salvation. You're free,
prisoner. Come out of the darkness. Come
out, be released of the bonds of death holding you. in that
darkness and in that fear and that ignorance, come out my people. And he draws us out with love
and giving us that faith to know he has accomplished. The afflicted
was afflicted for our sake and God has heard him and he purged
us of our sins and he's delivered us from the death that we were
held in and we are now God willingly calls us his children, and he's
adopted us and brings us into the family of God through the
blood of Christ. And even though we didn't earn
it or deserve it, but Christ earned it and has given it to
us freely as our inheritance in him. So we have that hope
and that assurance in Christ our Savior. Even through that
fearsome and that horrible noise and the flood of all that came
upon him, he remained faithful to the Father. He never turned,
he never sinned, he never doubted the Father. He remained faithful
and God is pleased with him because he's perfect and holy and just
and beautiful and wonderful. And that's what he's accomplished
for us, his people. And he says in Psalm 22, 25,
my praise shall be of thee in the great congregation. I will
pay my vows before them that fear him. So that's what he's
doing. He's teaching us and he's bringing us to know these truths
of what he's done for us and settles us in him, so that we
continue to walk by his spirit, not looking to ourselves, even
though when our eyes get taken off and we think, uh-oh, I better
fix this, and he shows us, don't go back to the flesh, look to
me, trust me, stay with me, and I'm your hope, and I'm your salvation,
I'm your joy, I'm your rest, and he keeps us ever looking
to him and ever coming to him, And He's doing all that. He's
the one working that and fixing us to Himself. Alright, Psalm
40 verses 4 and 5. Blessed is that man that maketh
the Lord his trust, and respecteth not the proud, nor such as term
aside to lies. We don't go back to the flesh.
Many, O Lord my God, are thy wonderful works which thou hast
done, and thy thoughts which are to us word. They cannot be
reckoned up in order unto thee. If I would declare and speak
of them, they are more than can be numbered. So when you consider
what God has done for us, when you really see and understand
how he's taken us out of that wheel of just man-made religion,
constantly trying to purge ourselves and make ourselves right with
God, when he delivers you from that and fixes your hope and
your peace and your joy in Christ, It's wonderful. That's a wonderful
work that he gets all the praise and the glory and the adoration
for. It's beautiful when he keeps
bringing you back to see that and to lay hold of that by his
strength and power. That's what Christ did for us,
and next what he does is he teaches us. As we saw, he's singing that
in the congregation so that he teaches his people. Those whom
he brings to grow up and to hear these things,
he teaches them the gospel. He doesn't leave them in darkness.
It pleases him to teach us the gospel that we might know him.
and understand these things. And so we see now in verse 6,
Psalm 40 verses 6 through 8, you see Christ pulling back the
veil of religion and he's exposing to us the failure of just that
outward religion. And he's showing us that God
isn't satisfied with just a form of outward religion. It's the
heart. And the way he captures the heart
is he gives us a new heart which is made and given to us by Christ
and put in us. And it says, verse 6, Sacrifice
and offering thou didst not desire. Mine ears hast thou opened. Christ
knew it, he understood it, and he makes us to know and understand
it. Burnt offering and sin offering
hast thou not required. And then here it is, Christ says,
Then said I, Lo, I come in the volume of the book it is written
of me. In the beginning, from the very
beginning, the foundations of of God's Word. It's written of
Christ. That is, Christ said, I delight
to do thy will, O my God. Yea, thy law is within my heart. And so he's showing us and teaches
us that the great offense is thinking that by our works, the
pride of man is to think that by something we do can earn a
righteousness with God. And there's a lot of self-made
men and women in this country, and they think that God is impressed
and pleased by their doing, and all they're doing is just heaping
up their offenses against God because they're saying, no, God,
I won't look to the salvation you said is perfect and that
you've provided. I won't glorify your son. I'm
going to try and glorify myself with my own works. And God hates
that, and he'll destroy those who continue in that path. And so you see constantly, you
see how Cain slew Abel right in the beginning. Why? Both were
religious, but one knew the truth and came with the blood of a
lamb looking to the coming Christ, looking to Christ. The other
came in the works of his own hands, maybe brought the best
of the fruit, who knows, the vegetables and whatnot. He brought
that forth of his own works, of his own hands, of the cursed
ground, and thought to make himself righteous with God, and God wasn't
impressed, and his face fell, and he slew his brother, because
God loved Abel and we received his sacrifice but not his. And
then you see it in the Tower of Babel. The Tower of Babel
where it's a physical manifestation of the outward attempt of man
to reach God, to achieve a godliness by his own works and his own
worship of God. And the Lord despised it and
he came down and dispersed it to set man back a long time that
he might have mercy toward usward to bring about that salvation
to slow down the achievement of man. But you see these pyramids
and these towers all over the world because man went out in
his vain religion and just built these things up everywhere he
went. And it's just perversion of man
to think that he can achieve godliness by the physical means. The apostle captured it and made
sure that we knew and understood this psalm is of Christ. It's
of Christ. Because he wrote in Hebrews 10
verse 4, it's not possible that the blood of bulls and goats
should take away sins. These outward sacrifices are
what make us clean. Our being here doesn't make us
clean. Our reading the scriptures and
singing hymns, these don't make us clean. They don't communicate
grace to us. Christ and Christ alone makes
us clean, and Christ alone communicates grace to us. We could come here
and be wide awake and receive nothing, or we could come here
worn out, weary, and tired on a midweek service and think,
I'm going to get nothing, and the Lord Just catch your ear,
just open your ear and help you to hear it and to receive some
morsel of grace and some crumb and be thankful for it. But look at verse 5, Hebrews
10, 5. It says, Wherefore when he cometh into the world, he
saith, Sacrifice an offering thou wouldst not, but a body
hast thou prepared. me, a body made like unto sinful
man, but without sin, a fit shorty to take the place of his people. And he was perfect in all his
ways that he might be a fit sacrifice, acceptable and well-pleasing
unto God. In burnt offerings, he says,
in sacrifices for sin, thou hast no pleasure. Then said I, lo,
I come. In the volume of the book, it's
written of me to do thy will, O God. And so Christ is saying,
for our benefit and our understanding, that we might know, though all
other sacrifices, though all other works cannot please God.
As Paul said, if there had been a commandment that could have
been given that would have worked righteousness for the people,
then God would have given it. But there isn't one. And therefore,
Christ said, I'll go. I'll go and save my bride. I
will lay down my life and bring her to myself, cleansed and washed
and perfect and beautiful, adorned with the gifts of my grace upon
her." And she's lovely because he's done that for his bride,
for his people, to make her lovely and precious. And Christ said,
in Isaiah 53 verses five and eight, it says, but he was wounded
for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities,
and the chastisement of our peace was upon him. And with his stripes,
we are healed. Isaiah 53, eight, he was taken
from prison and from judgment, and who shall declare his generation?
For he was cut off out of the land of the living, for the transgression
of my people was he stricken. Isaiah 53, 11 and 12. He shall
see of the travail of his soul and shall be satisfied. By his
knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many. for he
shall bear their iniquities. Therefore will I divide him a
portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoiled with
the strong, because he hath poured out his soul unto death, and
was numbered with the transgressors, and he bare the sin of many,
and made intercession for the transgressors. Christ accomplished
this work of salvation and it pleases him to make it known
to his bride and to declare to her the gospel, the good news,
that she may rejoice even now in what her Savior, her Lord,
and her God has done for her, for her benefit. It says in Psalm
40 now, verses 9 and 10, We see this declaration of the gospel.
He says, I've preached righteousness in the great congregation. Though
I have not refrained my lips, O Lord, thou knowest. I have
not hid thy righteousness within my heart. I have declared thy
faithfulness and thy salvation. I have not concealed thy love
and kindness and thy truth from the great congregation. So he's
not keeping it to himself, but it pleases him to make this known
to his people. That's why we declare and teach
that through the preaching of the gospel, through the foolishness
of preaching, it pleased God to save them that believe. That's
why he teaches us the gospel, because it pleases him. And he
wants to make it known to us. And so for us that he brings
forth from the womb He'll cause us to hear that gospel. He'll
bring us to hear it. That doesn't mean that children
and infants that are killed in the womb or that die before they
come forth, he can save them. He does that as well. We know
that from David. When David said, I'll see this
child again that died at seven days old, he sees them again. But we see that those who grow
up and are raised up, the Lord is pleased to save them and teach
them the gospel, that they might know the truth. As it says in
2 Thessalonians 2, 13 and 14, we're bound to give thanks always
to God for you, brethren, beloved of the Lord, because God hath
from the beginning chosen you to salvage him through sanctification
of the spirit and belief of the truth. whereunto we called you
by our gospel to the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus
Christ. So this psalm is a blessing to
the people of God because it shows us what Christ has willingly
suffered for us in his faithfulness to the Father when he faithfully
laid down his life for his sheep. And he gives us sight to see,
he gives us ears to hear, he gives us a heart to believe and
to and to lay hold of that which He's done for us and to willingly
be drawn in and enter into that kingdom of light which He continually
blesses that we might know these things. In Psalm 69, I'll just
read it, Psalm 69 verses 6 and 7, He has great concern for the
church. He doesn't want us to be ashamed. He wants us to know
and to have confidence in him. And he said, Let not them that
wait on thee, O Lord God of hosts, be ashamed for my sake. Let not
those that seek thee be confounded for my sake, O God of Israel,
because for thy sake I have borne reproach, and shame hath covered
my face. But because Christ was successful,
He declares that all who trust Him and all who look to Him,
they're not going to be ashamed. We're going to rejoice in Him,
and we're going to know Him. The Scriptures say, whosoever
believeth on Him shall not be ashamed. But our psalm that we're
looking at here, it closes with these words. In contrast to we
who hope in Him and trust in Him, we won't be ashamed. But
those who don't, it says, Psalm 40, verses 14, And 15, it says, let them be
ashamed. Let them be ashamed and confounded
together that seek after my soul to destroy it. Let them be driven
backward and put to shame that wish me evil. Let them be desolate
for a reward of their shame that's saying to me, aha. Aha, that
is that they're saying you're getting what you deserve. They're
accusing him, and he's saying, let them be ashamed, and they
will be ashamed. But in contrast to that, verses
16 and 17, let all those that seek thee rejoice and be glad
in thee. Let such as love thy salvation
say continually, the Lord be magnified. But I am poor and
needy, yet the Lord thinketh upon me. Thou art my help and
my deliverer. Make no tarrying or don't delay,
oh my God. And so God showed his approval
of his son. He showed that he accepted the
work of the son because he raised him from the dead. He's not still
in the grave. He's been raised up by the power
of God out of that grave because he's accomplished our salvation. Now, which one are you? Do you believe Christ? Do you
believe him? Are you of those that are not
condemned already because you have believed on the name of
the Son of God that he has provided to save his people? Or are you
of those that are condemned already because you don't believe and
don't trust in the Lord Jesus Christ? My prayer is that the
Lord and would make us all to know and to rest in the light
of His salvation in Christ Jesus, our Lord and Savior. Let's pray. Let's go to the Lord and seek
His face for this. Lord, we ask, Father, we thank
You, Lord, for Your salvation in Your Son, Jesus Christ. Lord,
we ask that You would take this word, bless it to our hearts. take away the darkness and the
corruption that is ours by nature, and bring us into the light of
Christ, that we may know Him, that we may know the things which
are freely given to us by our God in the Lord Jesus Christ,
that we might rest in Him and gladly serve our God and serve
one another. We pray this, Lord, because without
You we can do nothing. We pray this in Jesus' name,
our Lord and Savior. Amen.