Kingsport Sovereign Grace Church,
located at 2709 Rock Springs Road in Kingsport, Tennessee,
would like to invite you to listen to a message of sovereign grace
of their pastor, Gabe Stonica. For information and service times,
visit www.ksgc.church. And now, Gabe Stoniker. I will
be speaking to you today from Psalm 86. Psalm 86. And I have a glorious message
of good news. I truly do have some good news
for any sinner who needs good news. Let me bring your attention
to verse 5. Psalm 86 verse 5 says, four,
that means because, because thou Lord art good and ready to forgive
and plenteous in mercy unto all them that call upon thee." That's
good news, isn't it? For thou, Lord, art good and
ready to forgive. and plenteous in mercy unto all
them that call upon thee." This message is for every soul that
truly calls on the Lord, truly cries out to the Lord. And I
want to begin by saying that if a man or a woman truly does
cry out to the Lord, God is the one who made that man or woman,
cry out to the Lord. All men and women are born into
this world dead in trespasses and sins. A dead man or a dead
woman can't do anything. But God chose a particular people
to save. God elected some souls, particular
souls to save. And in his time, He will give
faith to those souls to see that salvation is completely and totally
of the Lord. They will see that they are helpless
and there is nothing they can do in themselves. They will turn
from the law because they will see they can't keep it. They
will realize they cannot satisfy God. They will be without hope
in their flesh, at their wits end, nowhere else to turn. They'll cry to the Lord. They'll
not be able to look to the flesh anymore. They will cry to the
Lord. God does that. God is the one
who teaches his children that and causes his children to see
that and to believe that. Romans 10 says, Whosoever shall
call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. It says, How
then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed?
God has to give faith. And when he does, a man or a
woman will see Christ, will believe on Christ, will call out to Christ,
will come to Christ. John 6, 44, our Lord said, no
man, no woman can come unto me except the Father which sent
me draw that man or woman. That's what has to happen. I
want us to establish that. God gets the glory. God gets
the credit. All right now, to every soul
that calls upon Him, to every soul who has no hope in themselves,
to every person who realizes, I'm not a good person. I'm a
sinner and that's all I think I can be. I don't think I have
the ability to obey this book like it commands me to. To every
person who sees that and desperately not just with lip service, but
from the heart desperately cries out to the Lord. Here's a three
point outline for you. He is good. He is ready to forgive. Do you need forgiveness? Are
you sitting there smiting yourself crying? I'm sorry. He's good,
He's ready to forgive, and He is plenteous in mercy. That's good news. That's good
news. Now let's read the first four
verses right here. Verse one says, Bow down thine
ear, O Lord, hear me, for I am poor and needy. Preserve my soul,
for I am holy. And I have a center margin in
my Bible, which tells me that that translates one whom thou
favorest, one who you have set your favor on, one who you chose
to love. Verse two goes on to say, O thou
my God, save thy servant that trusteth in thee. Be merciful
unto me, O Lord, for I cry unto thee daily. Rejoice the soul
of thy servant, for unto thee, O Lord, do I lift up my soul. David made these four requests
to the Lord. He said, bow down your ear to
me and hear me. That's first request. And then
he said, preserve me, save me. And then he said, be merciful
unto me. And he said, give rejoicing to
my soul because, verse five, because, he said, you're good.
Do this because you're good, you're ready to forgive, and
you're plenteous in mercy. Now, we can hear the voice of
our Lord Jesus Christ in that from the cross. We see Christ
in everything. This is important to know. This
is important to remember. We see Christ in everything. We hear Christ in all of the
scripture. all of the scripture. These are
they. These scriptures are they which
testify of him. There's a story that's told of
a young man long time ago who was called on to fill in for
his pastor while the pastor was away. He was called on to fill
in in the pulpit one Sunday and the young man did. And after
the service was over, he walked up to one of the older men in
the congregation and he said, what did you think of my message?
And the older man said, I thought it was a very poor message. And
the young man said, poor? Why did you think it was poor?
Do you think my delivery was unclear? The older man said,
no, your delivery was fine. The young man said, do you not
think that I put in the time to study? The old man said, no,
clearly your notes were in order, very well organized. The young
man said, well, why do you think the message was poor? The old
man said, the message was poor because Christ wasn't in it.
It was poor because Christ was not in it. The young man said,
well, Christ wasn't in the text. The old man said, young man,
Christ is in every text. In every portion of scripture,
there is a road that leads to Jesus Christ and him crucified. And he said, our business is
to find that road and get on it. And that's so. That's so. In every portion of
Scripture, there's a road that leads to Christ. Every word that
we just read leads to Christ. And here's our on-ramp to that
road. In these words, we hear the voice of our Savior while
He hung on the cross, shedding His blood, dying for the sins
of His elect people, suffering the wrath of God, the horrible
wrath of God in the place of His elect people, crying for
them, pleading for them in agony. We know that our Lord hung there
in agony for His people. In His agony, we hear Him crying
out to the Father. Verse 1, Bow down thine ear,
O Lord, hear me, for I am poor and needy. I'm the one who's
poor and needy right now. Hanging in our place, in the
place of His people, He said, I'm the poor and needy one. That's
proof that He was hanging there in the place of His poor and
needy people. That's what we are. That's what
we are. Psalm 40 records this same cry
from our Lord on behalf of his people. If you wanna look at
Psalm 40, verse seven says, then said I, lo, I come in the volume
of the book it is written of me. This is Christ speaking. I delight to do thy will, O my
God, yea, thy law is within my heart. And it was in Christ's
heart. He said, I have preached righteousness
in the great congregation. 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 loving
kindness and thy truth from the great congregation. He said,
withhold not thou thy tender mercies from me. This is him
crying from the cross. Oh Lord, let thy loving kindness
and thy truth continually preserve me, for innumerable evils have
compassed me about. the sins of all of his people.
But he said, mine iniquities have taken hold of me. He took
the sin of his people and made them to be his own. The sinless
one was made to be sin for his people. So much so he owned them. He said innumerable evils have
compassed me about. Mine iniquities have taken hold
upon me so that I'm not able to look up. They are more than
the hairs of my head. Therefore my heart fails me.
Be pleased, O Lord, to deliver me. O Lord, make haste to help
me. 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. Let all those
that seek thee rejoice and be glad in thee. Let such as love
thy salvation say continually, the Lord be magnified. Let every
soul who loves the fact that Christ secured salvation for
his people say, the Lord be magnified. He said in verse 17, but I am
poor and needy. Yet the Lord thinketh upon me.
Thou art my help and my deliverer. Make no tarrying, O my God. Christ said that from the cross
in His agony. That's what he became in order
to hang in the place of his people. Poor and needy. Poor and needy. Do you know what he called himself
in Psalm 22? Now, clearly, Psalm 22 is Christ
speaking. It opens with, My God, my God,
why hast thou forsaken me? That's Christ, the prophecy of
Christ. And right there in Psalm 22,
he said, I am a worm. He called himself a worm. Why would he call himself that?
It's because that's what I am. That's what you are. That's what
his people are in their flesh. Worms. Earth worms. Dust to dust worms. It's incredible to think of what
our Lord had to become to take the place of his people. From
the cross, we can hear him cry, Father, bow down your ear and
hear me. And then we can hear his cry. Father, preserve my soul. Preserve
my soul. Look over at Psalm 16, if you're
following with me. Psalm 16, again, this is Christ
speaking. Verse 1 says, Preserve me, O
God, for in thee do I put my trust. That's where his trust
was. When he set his face like a flint
to go to the cross of Calvary and he bore that cross and he
bore that death and he bore that grave, his trust was in the Lord. And we see that right here. Look
at verse eight. Christ said, I have sent the
Lord always before me because he is at my right hand. I shall
not be moved. Therefore, my heart is glad and
my glory rejoiceth. My flesh also shall rest in hope. I'll lay here in hope and in
rejoicing. Our Lord endured the cross for
the joy that was set before him. He went on to say in verse 10,
for thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, neither wilt thou suffer
thine holy one to see corruption. He said, I believe in my soul,
you will preserve me through this, through this death of the
cross, through this burial in the grave. Verse 11, he said,
thou wilt show me the path of life in thy presence is fullness
of joy, at thy right hand there are pleasures forevermore. Bow
down your ear and hear me. Preserve me. And then we can
hear him say, be merciful unto me. Why would Christ ask the
father to be merciful to him? Why would Christ ask the father
to be merciful to him? It's because that's what his
people needed. That is what his people needed.
And therefore he cried that for them. as their substitute. Father, for my sake, in my blood,
this blood that's being shed right here, show mercy. That was his plea, that was his
cry. And in that mercy that through him was shown to his people,
we can hear him cry to his father, rejoice the soul of thy servant. Rejoice the soul in this great
transaction of deliverance, bring great rejoicing to me over this. I just quoted that, that's in
Hebrews chapter 12. Over in Hebrews 12 verse 1 says,
Wherefore, seeing we also are compassed about with so great
a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and the
sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience
the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author
and finisher of our faith. If we have faith, He authored
it, he finished it. He started it, he ended it, and
he did everything in between. He's the author, he is the performer. It is God which worketh in you,
both to will and do of his good pleasure. He is the author and
finisher of our faith. Verse two says, who for the joy
that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame,
and is now set down at the right hand of the throne of God. Why did he bear the cross for
his people? The rejoicing, the joy that was set before him.
Jude verse 24 says that Christ endured all that He did to keep
His people from falling and to present them faultless before
the presence of His glory with exceeding joy. That's why He
did it. And because He did that for us,
because we see and hear that He did that for us, This is our
response, okay? This is our response to him.
If you look now at Psalm 86, one more time, we can still hear
the voice of the Lord Jesus Christ in this, but we can also hear
our voice in this. Every chosen, redeemed, called,
saved soul, can hear the Lord's voice in this and can hear his
or her own voice in this. If we hear the Lord's voice continuing
on, he gives the grounds for his request. He cried, Father,
do these things because you're good, you're ready to forgive
and you're plenteous in mercy. That's the foundational reason
why we have received everything that we've received in Christ.
And that's our response to everything we've received in Christ. That's
all we can say about it. When we see his grace, when we
see his abundant goodness and mercy, that's all we can say,
Lord, you're good. That's the believer's response,
not, well, I did this and I did that and you owe it to me. Lord,
you're good. That's the only response. We
are not actually. We're not good. A man came to the Lord one time
and said, good master. And he said, why do you call
me good? There's none good, but God. There's none good. No, not
one. In sinful man, only God. We're
not good, but he is. That's the only response a child
of God can have to everything that has been given to him or
her in Christ. You're good. You're good. You're gracious. We're so undeserving, we're so
unworthy because we're so evil. Did you know that all men and
women in the flesh are evil, sinful, wretched? The song says, amazing grace,
how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me, a sinner like
me. You're good. You're good. And that's where our hope comes
from. It's in the fact that you're good. That's where our hope comes
from. Aren't you so glad to hear that
the God of all heaven and earth, the sovereign over everything
is good. That's his character. That's
who he is. That's where our hope comes from.
It's in the fact that you're good and you're ready to forgive. Don't you wish we were all like
that? Don't you wish we were all just quick, ready, willing
to forgive? What a glorious character trait
in our Lord. For his own blood's sake, he
is ready to forgive. And that's how we ought to be
as God for Christ's sake has forgiven we ought to forgive
and God's people desire to that that's a character trait of his
people they desire to forgive. If Christ is in us then then
we will be ready to forgive. He's so abundantly forgiven.
What good news that is. You know, where there's no desire
for forgiveness, that's a bad sign. That's a bad sign. Ephesians 4.32 says, Be ye kind
one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as
God, for Christ's sake, has forgiven you. Are you a sinner against
God? If God has forgiven you, do you know why he forgave you?
It's not because you straightened up and flew right. It's not because
you turned over a new leaf. It's not because you decided
to stop sinning and decided to become a better person. It's
for Christ's sake. It's for the blood of Christ's
sake. There's one reason. For His sake. He is good and
He is so ready to forgive. That's the message of good news
that I have for both me and you today. He is so ready to forgive. And here's the reason why. It's
because verse five says he is plenteous in mercy, plenteous
in mercy because redemption in his blood was so abundant. He
has plenty of mercy, plenty and infinite amount of mercy exceeding
abundantly above anything we could imagine. And because it brings him so
much joy and rejoicing, he said he delights to show it. Isn't that good news? He delights
to show it. Do you need forgiveness? That's who I'm talking to right
now. A person who needs forgiveness, a person who is wallowing in
his or her misery. hating himself or herself for
who he is, who she is, what he or she has done. Do you need
forgiveness? Do you need mercy? Lord, I need
you to be merciful to me. Approach the throne of God. In
your heart, approach the throne of God, pleading the blood, plead
the blood of Christ, and you'll find it. You will find it with
God. You won't find it in your own
works, but you will find it in his blood. And it'll help you
in your time of need. It will help you so much. That's
how I want to end this message. I want to end it by acknowledging
that calling on the Lord for these things. Whoever calls,
every soul that calls in sincerity. I started by saying, if you call,
God's given you faith to call. because we're dead. So don't
take it for granted. Don't just say, well, yeah, I'll
call. Sure, why not? What can it hurt? You can't unless God
quickens you to life and gives you faith. This call is not the
cause of his goodness and the cause of his forgiveness and
the cause of his mercy. This call and cry is the evidence. It's the end result of everything
he's already done. If we cry out, Lord, be merciful
to me, that's the evidence that he was merciful to you. If we
cry out, Lord, I need your goodness, I need your grace, that's the
evidence that he has been gracious to you, kind to you, loving to
you, good to you. If we cry, Lord, I'm begging
and pleading, I need forgiveness. In the blood of Christ, I'm begging
for forgiveness. That's the evidence that you
have been forgiven in the blood of Christ. That's your evidence. No dead center can call on the
Lord. No dead center can cry out for
mercy and forgiveness and grace unless mercy, forgiveness and
grace has already been shown to that center. Without his quickening,
we cannot call. Not in truth, not in truth. You
know, anybody can give lip service. The life we live here, we're
spiritually dead. I know we have physical life,
but we're spiritually dead. And people say things and they
say prayers, but there's no soul, heart in it. We can't cry out
in truth. We can't cry out in God-given
life. But if he gives it to us, if
he puts that truth in us, if we truly, sincerely desire these
things from him, If we say, this is all I have, this is all my
hope. That is the evidence. That truly
is the evidence that we have already received all of these
things from him. And you know what that hearing
that, you know what that makes me want to do? It makes me want
to cry out. I pray it makes you want to cry
out more and more. God, please be merciful to me,
the sinner. Because you're good, because
you're ready to forgive, because you're plenteous in mercy, please,
every soul who cries will hear, I have, I will, I shall. To Him be all the glory for that.
Amen. You have been listening to a
message by Gabe Stoniker, pastor of Kingsport Sovereign Grace
Church in Kingsport, Tennessee. If you would like a copy of this
message, or to hear other messages of sovereign grace, you can call
or write to the number and address on your screen, or visit www.ksgc.church. Tune in at this same time next
week for another message of God's free and sovereign grace.