Yesterday, I talked to Laura, John DeBrine's
daughter, sometime, I guess, in the morning. And she said
he'd had a difficult night, and she did not really think
that he would last the day. And I went to see him. He was, if you spoke loudly to
him, he would respond some, but I spoke to him a little bit and
visited with the people, with the ones that were gathered there,
all his children and many of his grandchildren were there.
And as I was leaving, Laura asked if I would come back in the evening.
And I said, sure. So later I texted her and. She
said, but seven o'clock would be okay. And she said, that'd
be good. I got there maybe five after seven. And I was going
to read this chapter, but, um, John was, uh, he was
breathing steady, but a lot of the rattling down in here and,
uh, was not responding to much. So I hadn't read anything. And then, rather suddenly, he
passed away. I say rather suddenly, it's not
like he just slowed down little by little. Just all at once they
noticed that his breathing changed and within three or four minutes
he was gone. So I never did get a chance to
read this psalm to him. and to the others, but I thought
it would make a good scripture for us to think about this morning. In particular, I want to look
at verse 15. Precious in the sight of the
Lord is the death of his saints. Now when we think of death, the word precious is not likely
to come to mind. About the only time that we might
attach any kind of positive word to death is when death ends someone's
suffering. You know, there are those who,
as they approach the end of life, whatever disease may be taking
their lives from then, there's a lot of pain, a lot of struggling. And when that person finally
leaves, they said, well, his suffering's over. That's good.
That's about the only time we ever think of death as something
good. Rather, we think of death And
I am speaking here according to the natural way of thinking.
We speak of death as the worst thing there is. Death brings
an end to all in which a worldling might hope. Everything that he
has gathered in an attempt to make his life better is forfeited
upon his death. And the world, of course, is
very afraid of death. Even believers can have a significant
amount of fear because it involves some matters of the unknown,
and also because it involves matters which are known to us,
not only by what the scriptures say, but what we know in our
hearts. It's a point when a man wants
to die, and then those next words. After that, the judgment. All
men know that. All men have an intuitive sense
of those realities and that makes us resist death by all means
available to us. But it says here that the Lord
regards the death of some people as precious. Precious. Now this word translated precious
and that's That's a good translation of it because we use it in this
way also. We talk about precious jewels. And the word means to be rare, splendid, weighty, of great value. And so our Lord, it says here,
he counts the death of his saints to be a valuable to be a weighty
matter and a splendid thing. And so here we have this group
of people described as God's saints, and it is written of
him that in the eyes of the Lord, their death is a precious, splendid,
weighty matter. And this also tells us something
about the special regard that these people have from God in
this world as compared to how he views others, because the
deaths of other people are not precious. They're not weighty.
They're not splendid. They're not of much consequence
to him. Now, we don't say that as though
the death of the ungodly is inconsequential to us. If our loved ones die,
no matter what their situation before God may be, their death
is an important matter to us because their life is an important
matter to us. But when God looks on this world,
he sees those that are his And he sees those that are not. And
the death of his people is a weighty and significant matter to him. And the rest of the world is
just something that happened. How blessed to be among the people
of God that our death means something to him. Now, who are these saints? Precious in the sight of the
Lord is the death of his saints. Now, the word here is not the
one that you would normally associate with the word saints or the word
holy. If you remember, certainly in
the New Testament, nearly every time you find the word holy or,
you know, in any of its forms or sanctify, in any of its forms,
or saint. It's all a translation of a single
Greek word, and it means someone set apart. And the Hebrew has
a corresponding word for that, and it's used in Isaiah chapter
6, where it's written, holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty. But that's not the word used
here. Interestingly, this word, to describe saints, can have
meanings like kind, or godly, or pious, something like that. And I mean pious in the positive
sense of the word. I don't think we hardly ever
use that word in a positive sense anymore. We think, well, that
guy's just overly pious, isn't he? Because it's someone that
holds themselves aloof from everybody else. But it just signifies someone
devoted to the Lord. Now that's the people spoken
of here. Their death is a precious thing
in His sight. But here's something important
to notice. It does not say their deaths are precious in His sight. It
says their death. One. One singular death. It doesn't even say the death
of each of his saints is precious in his sight. Because there you
could use a singular word and by adding the word each, it would
distribute that word to all of them. You can speak of the deaths
of his saints, for each of us dies our own death. But here
it says, the death of his saints. And so there, he's not speaking
here, saying that each time one of God's people passes from this
life into his presence, that it is a precious thing in his
sight. Now, I'm not denying that that's
true. There's a sense in which this
could apply to the death of each one of us as we depart this life
to be with Christ. That would be a precious thing
to God in as much as it would be a desirable thing. For he
saved us for the very purpose that we would be with him. And
that's the means by which we are brought into his presence
without fault and full of joy. And so it could be applied to
us, each of us, in our own experience of death, but that's not how
it's written here. One death. One death. Look back here at Psalm 16. Now we read over there, precious
in the sight of the Lord is the death saints. Now we're going
to find this same word translated saints over in Psalm 116. Now
we're going to see it in Psalm 16 and in verse 9 we're We read, therefore, my heart
is glad, my tongue rejoices, my body also will rest secure,
because you will not abandon me to the grave, you will not
let your Holy One see decay. And Peter, on the day of Pentecost,
applied this scripture to the Lord Jesus Christ. He is God's
Holy One. God's saint. And so as we look
at this death, we say it's written in the singular here. It's one
death applied to all of his saints. And we find back in Psalm 16
that there is one called by the same name, though it's translated
there as Holy One. And then look down here at verse
16 of Psalm 116. Oh Lord, truly I am your servant. I am your servant, the son of
your maidservant. You have freed me from my chains. Now, here we have something interesting or unusual. The writer
of the Psalm speaks, or the one who's speaking in the psalm,
he says, I'm your servant, the son of your maidservant. Now,
it was common in those days that a person did, when speaking of
his ancestry, he didn't address who his mother was. You know,
you look at the genealogies in the Bible and it would be so-and-so
was the son of, and it'd be, you know, a man. We know our,
Peter, whose Hebrew name was Simon bar Jonas. And that word
bar means son of, and Jonas, that's another way to say the
name John. And so he was Simon, son of John. They didn't refer to themselves
very often as the son of a woman, but it says, I'm your servant,
the son of your maidservant. And then we come over here to
Luke chapter one. Luke chapter 1, verse 34, the angels just announced
to Mary that she's going to have a child. And in verse 34, she
says, how will this be since I am a virgin? The angel answered,
the Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the Most
High will overshadow you. So the Holy One to be born of
you will be called the Son of God." So our Lord, he was Jesus,
Son of God. Even Elizabeth, your relative,
is going to have a child in her old age, and she who is said
to be barren is in her sixth month, for nothing is impossible
with God. Mary responds, I am the Lord's
servant. Now, our translation could have
been a little more accurate on the word servant. The word servant
normally appears as a masculine noun, doulos. And when Paul would call himself
a bond slave of Christ, he would use the word doulos. And so that's
the masculine form. Here it's doulet. It's the feminine
form. And your older translations,
nearly all of them, put the word handmade or maidservant. And so here in Psalm 116, verse
16, the one speaking here says, I am your servant, the son of
your maidservant. And what, a thousand years later,
Mary says, I am the Lord's maidservant. He is the Holy One. There is
only One who is the Holy One. There is only One who is the
Servant of God, the true Servant of God. We might call ourselves
Servant of God in one sense, but we know there's only been one faithful
Servant of the Lord, and He is called the Son of God's made
Servant. And so far as I know, Mary is
the only one in all the Bible referred to as the Lord's maidservant. And she gave birth to this Holy
One, this Holy One who would not see corruption, this Holy
One whose death is precious in the eyes of the Lord. We'll see why that death was
precious in God's sight here in a few minutes. But first,
let's notice it says, precious in the sight of the Lord is the
death, this singular death, of his saints. We know, we have seen from scripture,
this is the death of a particular one of God's saints, a particular
one of God's holy ones. And yet this death is distributed,
as it were, to all of his saints. How can that be? Look over here,
Colossians chapter two. In Colossians chapter two, verse
20, Paul writes this. since you died with Christ. So how do we have a singular
death applied to multiple saints? We were in Christ and we died
with him such that his death is counted to be our death, the
death of each one of us. And in as much as this death
is attributed or applied to each one of God's holy ones, all the
value of that death is applied to them, the very preciousness
of it. This word precious over there,
another way it's translated is rare. Yes, this death is very
rare. There's only one of them, only
one. That's as rare as anything gets.
One death, and yet this one death becomes the death of a multitude
of people, because by the grace of God, they were in him when
he died. And then you look at Colossians
chapter three, verse three. Well, let's just start in verse
one. Since then you have been raised with Christ, set your
hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right
hand of God. Set your minds on things above,
not on earthly things, for you died, and your life is now hidden
with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life,
appears, then you also will appear with him in glory." Now, if you
came up to someone and said, well, you know, you died, that
would be a big surprise to them. Here I am, I haven't died yet.
If you're in Christ, you have. You have died a death which is
precious in the sight of the Lord. A thing that is honorable,
a thing that is weighty, and a thing of great value. I believe this is one of the
reasons that our Lord could say to Martha, as he was making his
way to their house where Lazarus has been dead now for four days.
And she comes to him and she says, Lord, if you'd have been
here, he wouldn't have died. She's right, and that's why he
didn't go. If he'd have been there, Lazarus
wouldn't have died, but Lazarus had to die to make a point. And so the Lord says to Martha,
your brother will live. And she says, Lord, I know that
he'll be raised again. The last day, he'll arise in
the resurrection. And the Lord said to her, I am
the resurrection and the life. Notice he did not say, I bring
the resurrection or I cause the resurrection, he says, I am the
resurrection. Therefore, it can be said of
everyone who's in Christ, they have already raised from the
dead. I know that we've yet to experience
it within our timeline, but from the viewpoint of God, this is
a thing already done. For all of God's people, there
is one death, there is one burial, there is one resurrection from
the dead. There is one ascension to the
right hand of God. It's Christ's. And all of us
participate in that through the grace of God. Now, the death of Jesus Christ is
the central event of the gospel of Christ. Now, there's nothing that was done by Christ that
was not essential to the work he was sent to do. There were
no idle words, no idle actions. Everything Christ did from the
moment he was conceived within the womb of Mary, and even now
as he sits at the right hand of God to make intercession for
us, everything is necessary to the
gospel. However, the scriptures always
point us to his death. Paul said, for I determined to
know nothing among you other than Christ and him crucified. And then Paul said in Galatians,
may it never be that I would glory in anything other than
the cross of my Lord Jesus Christ. Now we know that in some sense
Paul was including everything under that, and yet that's the
point that we're always turned to. This death, this precious
death. This death which was of consequence
in the sight of God, of weighty concern. Why then is the death of Christ
a precious weighty matter to God? Well, I'd say the first
reason is because it's the death of his son. You know, lots of people die every day. And most of the people who die
It's really not of any consequence to us. I mean, there's millions
of them. I mean, we never even knew they
existed. And then have you ever noticed
that when you read the newspaper and you hear about
some disaster and the first thing you do is know, well, where did
that happen? Oh, that was over on the other side of the world.
I mean, that's just a normal thing. Now, if it was a disaster
that, you know, like it happened here in the United States, like
when 9-11 happened, okay, the deaths of those people carried
more weight to us than maybe the deaths of people on the other
side of the world. Now, we didn't, probably didn't
personally know anyone who died in the events of 9-11, and yet
we count them to be part of us because they are our countrymen.
And the closer they get to us in relationship, the more significant
their life and death is to us. And I cannot imagine that there
would be a death that was more weighty and significant to anybody
than the death of one of their children or their spouse. because there are none in all
the earth who are closer to us than those with whom we have
been made one flesh and those who have come forth from that
one flesh. And when our Lord Jesus Christ
died on the cross, that was the death of God's own Son. It was said to Mary, the thing
which is in you will be called the Son of God. I don't know about God, you know,
and his experience of emotions and things like that. Particularly
when we think of God existing outside of time and space, but
then again, he enters time and space. I don't know how to unravel
all that, and I don't think we need to. Nonetheless, it is written,
for God so loved the world, he gave his only begotten son. And so the scriptures do reveal
to us the special, tender, and close regard that God the Father
has for his son. Therefore, the death of his son
was a weighty matter to him. It carried great significance
for him. And I'm certain of this, I don't
think I have any problem, any danger of God refuting me on
this matter. In as much as that was the death
of his son, God is going to see to it that whatever purpose was
designed in that death shall be brought to pass. I doubt that any of you would
give one of your children to save a hundred of anybody else's.
And I don't blame you, I probably wouldn't do it either. I know
we send our sons and daughters off to war, to risky situations,
but risk is a different thing than a certain death. Our Lord
Jesus Christ came here not to risk his life, but to give it. But if any of us were to have
given up the life of any of our children for the accomplishment
of some goal, I am sure that the death of our child would
be to us such a weighty matter that we would do all within our
power to see to it that that goal was accomplished. And I know that the father loves
the son. and that it must have meant unimaginable,
unimaginable sorrow, if we can speak of God in those terms,
to him, to see his son die. And I'm certain that whatever
was intended by that death, God, who can do anything, will see
to it it comes to pass. was weighty because it was the
death of God's Son, it was a weighty death because it was in fulfillment
of a vow. It says here in verse 18, I will
fulfill my vows to the Lord in the presence of all his people. Jesus Christ came here having
entered into covenant with his Father to bear the sins of his
people, yea, to bear them in his presence, to, as it were,
secure them within himself as Noah and his family was secured
within the ark, and to go through the judgment of God, experiencing
the fullness of the judgment of God, while at the same time
protecting them from it. He made that promise. He said,
shall I ask my father to not do this? Shall I ask my father, let's
change the plan? He said, no, it was for this
very reason I came into the world. He promised the father, and yes,
he did say in the Garden of Gethsemane, if there's any other way, this
cup can pass from me except I drink it. And then, you know, it's
kind of like if you'd written it down, you'd have put three
dots because you don't write the rest of that sentence. Then
the Lord simply said, but not as I will, but as you will. You
see, our Lord never really asked the father not or to stop that
process. Why? Because that's exactly why
he came. And he will fulfill his promise.
Thirdly, the death of the Lord Jesus Christ was precious in
the sight of God because it was a satisfaction of God's righteous
anger. Now, we call precious stones
precious because of their value. Oh, what value in the death of
the Lord Jesus Christ. Why, billions of people have
died and it never accomplished anything of real consequence.
It certainly never accomplished anything in the putting away
of sin. Those who die in their sins remain
in their sins forever. Their deaths do not satisfy God
with regard to their sin, much less could it satisfy God in
regard to the sins of a multitude. And yet it is written of Jesus
Christ, he shall bear the sin of many. By his knowledge, he
will justify many. It says that, that he gave himself
as a ransom for many. Jesus Christ was such a person
and of such great value to God, his father, that when he died,
his death was sufficient to put away the sin of a multitude no
one can number. God's anger towards them, his
righteous anger, not like God was just lost his temper, This
is a righteous, just anger against us because of our sins. And his
son's death satisfied that anger. That's what's meant by atonement.
A price paid to put away anger and bring two parties together
back in a friendly, peaceable relationship. Christ's death
did that. Fourth. The death of the Lord
Jesus Christ was precious in the sight of God because it's
the only death that has ever really happened. You say, wait a minute, lots
of people have died. Lots of people have started dying.
No one but the Lord Jesus Christ ever finished dying. He says at the end of his Life
here on earth, it is finished. When he was on the Mount of Transfiguration,
Moses and Elijah were talking to him about the death he should
accomplish. The Bible says that the eternal
destiny of the ungodly is eternal, everlasting death. Why is that?
It doesn't mean they just die and stay dead. It means an everlasting
process of dying, which they never get done. Why? Well, they're not precious. They're not valuable. Therefore,
their deaths don't accomplish anything. But Christ, he died. a full and complete death, such
that for the first time and the only time, death was perfected. And then his death was precious
in the sight of the Father because his death proved his great love,
his love of the Father, his love of the church. proved His righteousness,
for none but a righteous person could die the death He died.
And it demonstrated the glory of His Son. Now, precious in the sight of
the Lord is the death of His saints. And here we have, in
much of this psalm, a description of their experience. holy ones of the Lord who have
all participated in a single death, which is precious to the
Lord. In verse one, I love the Lord
for he heard my voice and heard my cry for mercy. Who are these
holy ones who participate in the death of the holy one? The
ones who sought his mercy. I've said it many times, but
I'm gonna say it again because it's an important point. Our
God has never said no to a real plea for mercy. No matter who it came from, no matter how great their sin,
no matter how desperate their case. I think of Barnabas sitting
by the road, a blind man, an insignificant man in the world,
and Jesus is passing by, and there's people crowding around
him, and you can imagine the noise, everybody crying out,
Lord, do this for me, Lord, I can't walk, can you help me, Lord,
could you heal my child? Everybody pressing into him.
And the impression I get, he is, he's touching them and he's
healing them by the scores. And then blind Bartimaeus says,
Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me. And a noise that
no one else paid attention to. And says he kept crying, that
word mercy pierced through all of that noise and got the Lord's
attention and he stopped. And he says, what do you want?
And he said, I want to see. Lord said, okay, you can see. And we, like Bartimaeus, we cry
for mercy. We cry that we might see, we
might see his glory, that we might see the suitableness of
his sacrifice. We cry that we might walk, that
we may come to him, that we might hear with a spiritual ear to
know the gospel. We cry for the mercy of forgiveness
of sins. And then in verse 3, the cords
of death entangled me, the anguish of the grave came upon me, I
was overcome by trouble and sorrow. Then I called on the name of
the Lord, O Lord, save me. Who are these holy ones, these
saints, these godly ones? The ones who have cried out to
God, save me. In that religion I was raised
in that always had, you know, they talk about the sinner's
prayer. Pray after me. I always come up with a prayer
that's longer than that. O Lord, save me. And they are those who, verse
7, says they've entered rest. Be at rest once more, O my soul,
for the Lord has been good to you. And then they can say this. For
you, O Lord, have delivered my soul from death, my eyes from
tears, my feet from stumbling, that I may walk before the Lord
in the land of the living. What has God done for us? He's
delivered our souls from death by granting us a participation
in the death of Christ. These bodies will go the way
of nature. But as the Lord said to Martha,
he that believes in me will never die. And he that lives and believes
in me, even though he dies, even though this body goes, yet shall
he live. Yesterday, our dear brother,
he did what the world would call die. But the truth is he died
2000 years ago and his death was precious and weighty in the
sight of God. And yesterday, as his body took
its last breath, and death came to claim him before death could
touch him, God said, that's precious in my sight. He's mine. He did not die. Though his body
stopped, John did not die. And neither will anyone who belongs
to him. Precious in the sight of the
Lord is that singular death of all God's saints in the death
of His Holy One. And we are so privileged to be
among those who have already died, whose death has been accounted
as enough, and by that death we've been set free from our
sins. Just as the Lord was set free
from the chains of death, so were we.