We'll take your Bibles and turn
with me to Psalm 103. Psalm 103. This morning we'll be looking
at verses 5, 1 through 5. Psalm 103, verses 1 through 5. The
title of the message this morning is, Bless the Lord. Bless the
Lord. Psalm 103 and verse 1 says, Bless
the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless His
holy name. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and
forget not all His benefits. Bless the Lord. Bless the Lord. What does that mean to bless
the Lord? What does that mean to bless
the Lord? What does it mean when David
said, Bless the Lord, O my soul? If we are this morning to bless
the Lord, it is incumbent upon us to understand what it is to
bless the Lord. Well, I'm going to tell you what
it's not so I can tell you what it is. What it is not is not
the idea of us adding to God anything. To bless the Lord is
not to bless Him in a way that would add anything to Him. Now, we bless each other. We bless each other. And we add
to each other, don't we? If I were to give you a brand
new car, you would be happy, you would be blessed. I would
add to your joy to give you a new car. If I gave you a new house,
you would be blessed in the sense that your joy would be increased. You see, God is not in that category
with us, my friends. He is altogether in a category
all by himself in that God is and always was and always shall
be eternally happy. God is happy within Himself and
needs nothing or no one to add to Him anything. You see, I've
heard this, if I've heard this once, I've heard it a hundred
times at a funeral, well, heaven's a better place since they're
there. What a lie! What a lie! God does not need
you or me to be happy. He doesn't. He doesn't. God is Eternal in all of His
characteristics. That's why He said, bless His
name. His name means His character.
He is holy eternally. He is just eternally. He is merciful
eternally. He is happy and He loves eternally. You see, God is eternal in all
His attributes and we can, by our blessing God, add nothing
to Him. Add nothing to Him. And so when
we see bless the Lord, we're not trying to add anything to
God by blessing Him. Many times God has blessed us
and added to us, though hasn't He? Many times God has shared
His blessings with us, His happiness with us, His joy with us, His
love with us. He communicates His attributes
to His children, though in limited capacity, and God blesses us.
He blesses us. No man can add anything to God
who is eternally satisfied in himself. Therefore, the word,
the word bless, the root word for this word bless means to
kneel, kneel. As one would come before a king,
as one would come before a sovereign, David said, Oh my soul, kneel
down before God and bless His name. Kneel down before God and
bow prostrate before Him. That's what it means to bless.
It means to kneel and bow before the king. And so in our text,
David commands his soul to kneel before God, to bow down and give
Him praise that is worthy. You see, God is worthy of our
praise, isn't He? He is worthy of our kneeling
down before Him. He is worthy of everything we
can give Him. But again, even though we give
everything, we add nothing to Him. We add nothing to God. But yet, we should all here this
morning summon our souls, summon the most inmost being to bow
down before Christ the Lord. Worship Him to yield ourselves
as servants to the Most High God. and bless His holy name. Friends, let us recognize that
to engage our lips in the song service is not kneeling before
Him. Many will sing the songs of praise
and yet not bless the Lord. You see, we must call within
the most holiness, the most innermost part of our being and kneel down
before Him and the rest of the body will follow. Most men want
to start with the outward and work inward. It doesn't work
that way. All true worship comes from within a man. Jesus said
this, they that worship God must worship Him, how? In spirit and
in truth. That's it. That's the way you
want to worship God this morning. You want to bless the Lord. You
must do it in spirit and in truth. There is no other way. All of
the ceremony means nothing if a man is not worshiping God in
spirit and in truth from the innermost part of his being,
worshiping God. Worshiping God. The Lord, by
His grace, gives each soul here the desire and strength to kneel
before His throne and bless His holy name only by His grace. The only way you're ever going
to call on the innermost soul of your being to bow down before
God is if God in grace reaches his mighty hand down and touches
your dead soul and raises it to life by the blood and righteousness
of Jesus Christ. That's the only way any one of
us will ever worship him is if he gives it to us. All my friends
call on God to give you such grace. May I call upon the Lord
to give me such grace and command within my innermost being to
worship Him as He is worthy of. I want us to notice this. Look
at David's words again. And notice this in detail. Bless
the Lord. Kneel down before the Lord. Oh,
whose soul? Whose? My soul. Personal. Personal. David said, Bless the Lord, O
my soul. Friends, we should not and must
not forsake corporate worship. Corporate worship is intricate
in worshiping God. It is the means by which God
has ordained that His people should be fed and sinners should
come to Him, is by corporate worship. By man standing and
preaching the gospel. This is how God's primary form
of worship is that God has ordained. Yet, in corporate worship, in
this corporate worship right now, you yourself must bow down
and worship God. You yourself must bow down personally
and worship God in your own hearts. You see, so many times some people
are concerned with other persons bowing down. They're concerned
about other people. And they say, man, I sure hope
that so and so heard that. Oh boy, that should have really
nailed her. No. Bless the Lord, oh my soul. My soul. You see, Your bowing down before
God is not going to help me at all. And my bowing down before
God is not going to help your soul. You must bow. Bless the Lord, O my soul. Bless the Lord, my soul, I must
kneel before Him this morning, and my kneeling will not do you
any good if you personally do not kneel before God in worship.
This worship is and must be personal. You see, God commandeth everyone
everywhere to repent. And that means you. And that
means me. But again, because you belong
to a Christian family does nothing for your soul. You must bow down to God. You must. You must bow and worship
God. It is the only it is only when
a man kneels before Christ in submission to Jesus Christ as
Lord and Savior, that he is truly worshiped. Oh friend, my heart's
desire is that sinners would come and kneel before God this
morning. That sinners would come and see
the grace of God and mercy that is in Christ. Now, when David
said, kneel, bless the Lord, oh my soul, he gives us the reasons
for this worship. He gives us how we are to come
and kneel before God. You cannot see God, can you?
Yet, you know, we talk about kneeling before Him. And yet
God is omnipresent. He's everywhere at once. But
how does a man kneel before God? How does a man kneel before God? David tells us that a man will
kneel before God who has not forgotten his benefits. Read
that. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and
forget not His benefits. We that have come to the Lord
Jesus Christ, we who know Him as Lord and Savior, do we always
remember His benefits? Can you recall all His benefits
to mind instantly? At any one time, no, my friends,
we are broken cisterns. We are like leaky pots. We hold
water only for a little while and then it's gone and we must
be filled again. And this is why God has insisted
that we have corporate worship, that a man declare the gospel
to us, that we might be fed and filled with the gospel of Jesus
Christ. This is the reason God gave us
pastors and teachers. To bring our hearts again before
Him so that we might not forget His benefits. If you long to
kneel before God, my friend, you must not forget His benefits. A man that doesn't know the benefits
of God will never kneel before God. He doesn't know the benefits.
He doesn't know what it is to kneel before God if he doesn't
know His benefits. How? Now let us look then at the great
benefits which are in Christ by His blood and by His righteousness. First of all, He lists for us
the forgiveness of sins. Look at that in verse 3. Who
forgiveth all thine iniquities. Who forgiveth all thine iniquities.
Kneel before the Lord because He's forgiven all thine iniquities. Friends, there we were. We were
once lost and in our sins, dead to the things of God. We were
living only for the pleasures of this life, walking according
to the course of this world. We were following a God of our
own imagination, of our own making, insanely running against God. Madly! running and defying God. How insane is it to defy God? And yet there we were! We were
defying God to do His best against us. That's what natural man does,
and that's what you that are lost, that's what you're doing
every day. Even in this service, that's what you do. You defy
God! And I was there, I understand. We defied God and ran madly toward
hell as though it were heaven. And yet God in grace sent His
Son into this world to suffer for our sins. He came and willingly
took our sins in His own body on the tree. God the Father willingly
laid our sins on His own darling, precious Son. And he freely endured the wrath
of God for all who believe on him. You see, it was only by this
offering for sin, the blood of Jesus Christ, that God can and
does forgive iniquities. Notice the word here is in the
present perfect tense. He forgiveth. Remember what that
word means when it's present perfect tense. It means that
it always was, it always is, and it always shall be. God always
forgave my sins. God is always, right now, forgiving
my sins. And God shall always and forever
forgive my sins. Oh, bless the Lord, O my soul! For the Lord hath forgiven all
mine iniquities. Is that not a reason to bow down
Oh yes, it is. It is a glorious reason. It is
a wonderful reason. O believer, kneel before God,
who hath from all eternity forgave thy sins, and is doing so now,
and shall ever do so. Are we not even now in need of
forgiveness? Believer, do you need forgiveness? Sinner, sinner, do you need mercy? Come and bow down before God. Bless the Lord, O my soul, who
forgiveth all thine iniquities. And tell you this, my friends,
He is faithful and just to do it. He's right! He's right to
do it! He's right and just because Christ
has already paid it. And He's right to forgive us.
Number two, He healeth all thy diseases. Look at that in verse
3. Who healeth all thy diseases. Here's the benefit of healing
of diseases. This is not speaking of physical
ailments. Many times God does heal us of
our physical ailments, but this is spiritually speaking. This
is spiritually speaking. We all were diseased with the
sinful nature handed down to us by our father Adam. Scripture
says, "...whereas by one man sin entered into the world, and
death by sin, so death passed upon every man, for all have
sinned." Every one of us have this sin
nature wrought in us from birth. We do. So then every child that
is born is born dead in sins and full of wounds and bruises
and putrefying sores. You know how much I love my children.
But my friends, they were born dead in sin. And if God doesn't
save them, they have no hope. They were just like me. I was
born dead in sins, as was my father and his father before
him. And so every child is born dead.
The Scripture describes our sin like a disease, doesn't it? Like
a plague. You remember the plague of leprosy. I like this in Scripture that
it doesn't refer to leprosy as a disease. It refers to it as
a plague. You know, something God does, condemns a person. He plagues them. My friend, we
are plagued with sin. We are plagued with sin. plague
with the disease of leprosy, the leprosy of our sin. And if
you'll remember in Leviticus 13, the law of the leper, when
we read that, we see that if a man has even a spot of leprosy,
just a little dot, just a little flake of leprosy, what happens? He's put without the camp. He's
put outside the camp. In other words, there was worship
of God in the camp, but there was no worship outside the camp.
You couldn't approach unto God. You couldn't come into the temple.
And anyone who had a spot was cast out. And I'll tell you,
they lived out there. They lived out there from God
so long as they had one patch of good flesh left. You see,
leprosy, when it covered a man, if there was just one little
bitty flake of good skin left, he still was out there. So whether
you had one little spot of leprosy or you had a whole bunch of leprosy,
if there was one spot of your skin that was still good, you
still hadn't been cast out. But the law of the leper says
this, that if a man be covered in leprosy, From the top of his
head to the bottom of his feet, and they find no good flesh. Guess what? He's declared clean. A man like that is declared clean. And what is this picturing? What
is that picture? It pictures those who are rejected
and those who are cured. You see, if a man has somewhat
to please God, If he has some little bitty flesh left in him
to please God, he's cast out. He's a leper and he's not been
cleansed. If a man has somewhat a little
spark of life that God did all he can do and all man has to
do is just this one little thing, cast out. He still has leprosy. Oh, but if a man come full of
leprosy, A man come full of sin to Christ, if a man come that
way, God says, I will declare him clean. Isn't that something? He healeth all thy diseases. He will heal us, my friends,
if we come with nothing good in ourselves. You know, when those people shall
stand before God and God shall separate the sheep from the goats,
if you'll remember what the goats say, Lord, have we not done this
for you? Lord, have we not done many wonderful
works for you? Look at my flesh. I've got some
good flesh here. Look at that. And what is He
going to say to them? Depart from Me, you that work
iniquity, I never knew you. I never knew you. Oh, but to
all sinners who are diseased with sin, absolutely. Are you absolutely full of sin
in yourself? If you are, then hear what God
says to those, Come, you blessed of My Father, Come and kneel
down and find healing for your soul. There's healing there,
but only those who are covered. You got something good, don't
bother. But if you're absolutely covered
with sin, come and be made clean. That's what God has done for
us, hasn't He? Isn't that a benefit? Is that
not a benefit? That we were covered in sin,
and God says, you're clean every whit. You're clean every whit. He has healed us. He has healed
us. Those that have been healed,
we know that in our flesh still dwelleth no good thing. Isn't
that right? in my flesh dwelleth no good thing. But bless the
Lord, bless the Lord, O my soul, for He has imputed and imparted
to me the righteousness of His dear Son, and I am clean every
whit in the sight of God. He has healed all, all my disease
of sin." Therefore, I come and bless the Lord, O my soul." Number three, bless the Lord,
for He hath redeemed our life. Look at that in verse four. Here's
the benefit of redemption. The benefit of redemption of
life from destruction. Who redeemeth thy life from destruction. We who have come to Christ, we
have seen that God is just and must punish sin. I was speaking
with a lady the other day, and I was talking about the justice
of God. And I said, God is just, and
He must punish sin. And she said, yeah, but, you
know, as long as we do our best, we'll be okay. As long as we
just try. You see, what she missed is the
fact she doesn't know anything about the justice of God. To
a man that comes before Christ to kneel down before God, they
must see who God is. God is just and He must punish
your sins. He must. He cannot be just and
leave you alone. He must punish them. He must. We must see that we were under
the condemnation of the law of God and it demanded our death. Listen to me, you that are outside
of Christ, I don't want you to mistake this. I want you to hear
me. If you're outside of Christ, I pray that God would open your
eyes to see that you are a breath away from destruction. You are a breath away from destruction. everlasting destruction. Go to Psalm chapter 50 and verse
21. Go to Psalm chapter 50 and verse
21. Hear what God says about himself. Hear what God says about
you. Psalm chapter 50 and verse 21. Scripture says, These things
hast thou done, and I kept silent. Here we have the longsuffering
of God. There you are, out in your sin, rebelling against God,
and God says, I've kept silent. I've been longsuffering. Thou
thoughtest that I was altogether such an one as thyself. But I will reprove thee and set
thee in order before thine eyes. Now consider this. God says,
consider this. You better consider this. You that forget God, lest I tear
you in pieces and there be none to deliver. You better consider
this. lest God tear you in pieces."
Now, God said that, I didn't. My friends, hear what God says
about Himself. I am a consuming fire. God says, I will by no means
clear the guilty. That's what God says about Himself.
The soul that sinneth, it shall die. That's what God says. Consider this. You better consider
this. God's not like you are. God is
not like us. I can forgive you of your sin
because I'm a sinner. I understand what it is to sin
and I'm unjust. But God is not like we are. He
is just and He will punish sin. He will consider this. This is true, my friends. God
will and must do it. It's not like we are. He's just
and holy. And friend, if you forget God, it saddens my heart some of you
will look into the mirror of God's justice this morning and
you'll feel a twinge of guilt and you'll walk out of here and
forget what you heard. If you neglect the Word of God
and neglect to believe on His Son, He will destroy your soul and be right to do it. And to think those who love the
Lord, if we in glory see our children in hell, we'll praise
God for it. We'll praise God for it. Why? Because He's right. He's just. Bless the Lord while it's called
today. Come and kneel before Christ. He's the only hope for sinners,
lest He tear you in pieces. Yet all who come to Christ by
faith, this is the blessing, all who come to Christ by faith,
all who cling to the cross of Christ alone, my friends, He
hath redeemed your life from destruction. Is that not a wonderful
thing? We were there, we were brands
for the burning and He plucked us out. He delivered us. from the wrath of God. How? By
taking it for us. Remember, I told you God is not
like us. He must punish sin. How then
can He be just and justify us? Because He killed His Son for
our sins. Destruction that was meant for
me went to Christ because God laid on Him the iniquity of us
all. And by His stripes, how was He? By His stripes I was set free.
He endured the wrath of God in my place and He hath redeemed
my life." Rescued. Rescued from the wrath of God. You know, God rescued us from
Himself. Isn't that something? He rescued us from His own wrath,
His own justice. Does that not make you want to
bow down and bless the Lord? It should. It should make our
hearts long to bow before Him and bless His name. For He hath
delivered us from our sins and now then we bear them no more.
Remember that scapegoat? How that they anointed the scapegoat
and they put His hands on that goat and confessed the sins of
the people and then they took that goat away. And that's what
God has done in Christ. He bore my sins away and I bear
them no more. He redeemed my life. I bow down
before Him. He is my God, my King, and my
Savior. Oh, the bliss of this thought.
My sins, I bear them no more. Praise the Lord. Oh, my soul. And all that is within me, bless
His holy name." Praise God, he endured the winepress of the
wrath of God alone. He didn't need me. I had nothing
to do with that. He did it all by Himself. Oh, what a burden is lifted at
Calvary, isn't it? A burden of our sins, for Christ
has paid them in full. And God, having laid our sins
to Christ, He'll never lay them to our charge. Isn't that special?
Isn't that wonderful? Isn't that a benefit? That God
cannot charge my Savior and then charge me. Bless the Lord, O my soul. Number
four, bless the Lord, for He crowneth us and satisfieth us. Look at this in our text. Go
back over there to our text. Verse 5, "...who satisfieth thy
mouth with good things." That is renewed. I'm sorry, verse
4, "...who crowneth thee with lovingkindness and tender mercies,
who satisfieth thy mouth with good things." To those in Jesus
Christ, He gives us all. He gives us all of His love. Isn't that something special?
Not just part of His love. God has given us all of His loving kindness. He crowneth thee with loving
kindness and tender mercies. And my friend, this again is
present perfect tense. He has crowned you, He is crowning
you, and He always will crown you with His lovingkindness. No matter what we go through,
my friends, no matter how rugged our road is, or how rough the
path, no matter the pain, no matter the struggle that we are
enduring in this life, bless the Lord, O my soul, for He has
done this, whatever it is, for our good and His glory. Whatever
it is. My friends, your road is paved
by His loving kindness. So whatever happens is done in
loving kindness towards you. Now isn't that something? Isn't
that a benefit? That everything God does, He
does for your good because He loves you. That's a blessing. That's a blessing. When the enemies of Christ assail
us and the exercise of grace is low, When the rebellion of
the flesh is high, believer, let us come before the throne,
not the throne of justice, but the throne of grace, that we
may find help in time of trouble. You need help? My friend, He
crowneth thee every day with His lovingkindness. And He, by His Word, satisfies
our mouth with good things. Have you tasted to see that the
Lord, He is good? Isn't that the most satisfying
thing on the face of the earth to know that Christ is my Savior? Is that not satisfying? People
are looking. They say, well, you preach about
Jesus all the time and you preach about sin and righteousness and
judgment. Why can't you just preach on
something practical? Why can't you just tell me how
to walk tomorrow and how I should talk tomorrow? Give me a script.
Let me read it so I can read the prayers and I can do things
religious so I can feel good about myself. That doesn't satisfy God's people. The only thing that satisfies
God's people is Christ. To hear of Christ, to hear of
His great sacrifice, to hear of His great love, of His great
mercy, and it's by hearing these things that we have the strength
to walk in this world. Only by these things are we given
encouragement and strength so that we might stand in the day
of temptation and troubles and trials. Friend, if I gave you a script,
you wouldn't last three minutes out there. I tell you, look to Christ. In
Him, there's great satisfaction. And to the believer, we bless
the Lord with all of our soul for His Word satisfies us with
good things. It speaks of Christ and Him crucified,
Christ and Him risen again. Is there anything else? Scripture,
my scripture says Christ is all. Christ is all. If you need something
else, you might want to go somewhere else. Because I've got nothing
else but Christ. And my friends, this satisfies
God's people. It does. Every time. Every time. Are these not great benefits
by which we should bless the Lord? My friend, you're looking for
a reason to kneel before God? God gives us great and precious
promises. Now bow down. Bow down and bless the Lord. Oh, my soul and all that is within
me. And forget not all his benefits. I pray that God would bless this
to our hearts. Let's stand and be dismissed in prayer.