Psalm 62. Let's read this entire
Psalm. It's not very long. My soul finds
rest in God alone. And I might say this to you.
Your soul will not find rest till it finds rest in God alone.
God plus anything else is not a good place for rest. God alone
is the rest of the soul. My salvation comes from Him. He alone is my rock and my salvation. He is my fortress. I will never
be shaken. How long will you assault a man?
Would all of you throw him down this leaning wall, this tottering
fence? They fully intend to topple him
from his lofty place. They take delight in lies. With
their mouth they bless, but in their hearts they curse. Find
rest, O my soul, in God alone. My hope comes from Him. He alone
is my rock and my salvation. He is my fortress. I will not
be shaken. My salvation and my honor depend
on God. He is my mighty rock, my refuge. Trust in Him at all times, O
people. Pour out your hearts to him, for God is our refuge. Low-born men are but a breath. The high-born are but a lie. If weighed on the balance, they
are nothing. Together, they are only a breath. Do not trust in extortion or
take pride in stolen goods. Though your riches increase,
do not set your heart on them. One thing God has spoken, two
things I have heard, that you, O God, are strong, and that you,
O Lord, are loving. Surely you will reward each person
according to what he has done. Now David was often in trouble. Some of it Much of his trouble
came from those outside of him, those who were jealous of his
position. Saul was jealous of him. David had actually saved Saul's
skin, saved the entire Jewish army, and thus the Jewish nation
when he alone was willing to take on Goliath and bring him
down, which he did. And therefore Saul was able to
lead the forces to kind of do the mop-up work of taking care
of all the regular-sized guys. And David was brought into Saul's
household because Saul would be put in these bad moods. We'll not try to figure it out
psychologically, but you know, the Bible says an evil spirit,
but I do not know that that necessarily means some personal spirit invaded
him. We know that the word spirit
can be used about a person's attitude or state of mind. And
from time to time, Saul would get in these very angry moods
and his jealousy would rise up against David. Because he saw
that the Lord's hand was on David and he knew because of his sin
the Lord had left him. And so Saul became an enemy of
David. And when Saul died many of the
household of Saul, his sons, Whatnot became enemies of David.
There was enemies like that. There was the enemies of the
Philistines and the other nations around them. There were even
enemies like this from his own household. His own son, Absalom. Absalom. Father of peace is what
his name means and how poorly he was named because he was a
son of war. And he sought to take his father's David had lots of troubles from
the outside, but you know, his worst troubles, in all honesty,
were the ones he brought on himself. We often refer to that situation
with David and Bathsheba. There were others. There was
the time that in pride he numbered the people and brought disaster
on the whole nation because of his pride about the size of the
nation, its prosperity, and the size of the army. David did a lot of things to
bring trouble on himself. Therefore, David often spoke
of the Lord's salvation. Why? He'd experienced it a lot. He'd experienced it a lot. Let
me ask you this. Do you take note in your mind
how often the Lord has saved you? I realize we're expanding
this, we're not just talking about that eternal salvation.
But how many times has God delivered you from the troubles of your
life? Some troubles that you had nothing
to do with, they just showed up. Enemies that had no right
to make an enemy of you, but they did anyway. Or just circumstances
that fall on you, or those many troubles you brought on yourself
by your own sinfulness and stubbornness and willfulness. How many times
has the Lord saved you? How many times has he delivered
you from the natural consequences of what should happen to a person
who's done the things you've done? Oh, what a, if we would
pause and think about that, I tell you, it increased the level of
thanksgiving in our heart. Salvation, deliverance from trouble. David is called the man after
God's own heart. And whatever else that phrase
may signify, I believe it's saying this, that it was in the heart
of God to save David, and it was in David's heart to pursue
that salvation. God and David were in agreement
about salvation. And you know something that's
true of every believer? It is in the heart of God to save every
one of His people. This is the will of Him who sent
me, said the Lord Jesus Christ. This is the will of Him that
sent me, that all that He has given me, I won't lose a one
of them, but I'll raise them up in the last day. It is in
the heart of God to save His people. And God will work all
things and send His Spirit to each one of his people to make
their heart like his in this matter and as he desires to save
them so will they with all their hearts desire to be saved by
him. Now what kind of salvation is
David speaking of? Well the specific case here is
told to us In verse 3, how long will you assault a man? Would
all of you throw him down this leaning wall, this tottering
fence? They fully intend to topple him from his lofty place. They
take delight in lies. With their mouth they bless,
but in their hearts they curse. Now this sounds to me like intrigue,
possibly intrigue within the court. Because it says, with
their mouth they bless, but in their hearts they curse. These
were likely men who were pretending to be the friends and helpers
of David. But it was in their heart to
bring him down. You know, we see this in politics
all the time, don't we? It's been going on, you know, it isn't
new with our generation, believe me. Wherever there's a collection
of power, there are people who want that power, and they will
come and do whatever they think is necessary to lay hold of that
power. And these were people who drew
near David with their mouth, but their heart was far from
him. Now, let's step away from natural David for a minute and
talk about the son of David. Was that not true of him? Did
not the Lord say directly in the Old Testament, these people
draw near me with their mouth, but their hearts are far from
me. And that was proven when our Lord Jesus Christ came, because
all of those Jews went right on talking about how much they
loved the Lord and how much they went to temple and how good they
were and they were obeying the laws. Their mouths were drawing
near to him, but their hearts, how far away. But there was intrigue, and they were doing all they
could to bring him down. And David calls himself this,
he said, or at least this is how he describes himself, would
all of you throw him down this leaning wall, this tottering
fence? Now, I don't know exactly how
to take this from David. There's two ways you can take
it, and both of them are profitable. First of all, we could take it
that he is mocking them. That is, they thought he was
a tottering or leaning wall and a tottering fence. So even though they drew near
him with their mouths, he had heard what they were saying to
other people. And here's the kind of thing they're saying,
you know, and maybe this is when David was old and was getting
kind of weak. And they said, you know, the
old man ain't going to last forever. He's getting kind of weak. He's
not the man he used to be. Now's the time to strike this
leaning wall, this tottering fence. Let's just knock him down. And what they didn't know, what
they did not take into account, that while David was indeed in
himself a leaning wall and a tottering fence, the Lord was his salvation. And if the Lord holds up a leaning
wall, it won't fall. If the Lord braces up a tottering
fence, It will not fall, no matter who comes against it. So he could
have been mocking their words. And then in a similar spirit,
he might've been saying it this way, you all think you're some
kind of big deal because you think you can knock me down.
Look at what I am. I'm nothing. Anybody could push
me over. Don't get up on your high horse
and think you're going to accomplish some great thing if you topple
David from his lofty place. But keep this in mind. This leaning
and tottering man was set on this lofty place by God himself. And I may be leaning and tottering,
but I will not fall. For God is my salvation. He is
my refuge in time of trouble. He is my mighty rock from which
I cannot be overthrown. Now you and I do not have positions
like David did. We are not kings of countries.
So we don't likely have as vicious an enemies as David did. At least not enemies in the flesh
so vicious as David's enemies, but we have enemies in the spirit,
don't we? Enemies in the spirit that know
how weak we are. And they come after us. And we may say with the confidence
of David, how long will you assault me? Yeah, I'm a leaning wall. I'm a tottering fence. But I've
been set in the heavenly places with Christ Jesus, a lofty place. And weak and frail as I am, you
can't knock me from that place. But even if we don't have as
serious and natural enemies as David does, probably all of us
have some enemies, and some of them try to cause us trouble,
and they are nothing but agents of Satan to test and prove our
faith. He wants to topple it, he's not
going to be able to get it done. Now, what I'm about to say to
you, I'm not even going to pretend that I understand or apprehend
one one-hundredth of it. But I know it's true. When we
face trouble from others, you know how we ought to look at
it? Instead of getting all bent out of shape, we ought to say,
okay, here comes another agent of the devil to cause me trouble. And I'm going to wait and see
just how the Lord brings glory to himself out of this. because
the Lord will deliver me. And the Lord's going to get himself
some glory in this. I might lose some things naturally. God might glorify himself by
defeating the enemy before he ever gets to me or is ever able
to bring to fruition his designs, or the Lord might get glory for
himself by giving the devil leash enough to cause me serious trouble. Yet in all of that, hold me up
and make it so I don't fall. And once Satan has thrown all
the rage he can at me, I'll be standing, I'll be standing in
the grace of God. It will bring glory to my Redeemer
and it's okay with me." Now that's how we ought to look at trial.
It's not normally how we do it. We get scared, we get angry. But know this, every trial that comes the way
of a believer is sent by God for two reasons. First, to get
glory for God himself. And secondly, to prove the love
and faith of his people. Now if when such trials were
coming your way the Lord were to come to you in a visible form
and with an audible voice say to you, so and so, I just want
you to know in two weeks you're going to lose everything you
got because Satan came before me and challenged me about you
and said that you're just phony That the only reason you worship
me is because I've built a hedge around you and don't let him
get at you So I'm going to give him some leech But don't you
worry? I'm gonna take care of you. I'll
be there the whole time. It'll be painful, but you'll
get through it I'll make you stand up and when it's over I'll
Well, I know the way that you're going to go. When you come out,
you will, you'll be like gold. You'll come forth as gold. Now,
if the Lord came and told you that, you'd say, okay, Lord.
All right. I'll do whatever you say is fine. You know what? It's right here
in the Bible. No matter what comes your way.
You know the troubles that come your way the Lord It's as though
the Lord came to you and said now I'm going to do this. I'm
going to let this happen This is my purpose. Don't worry about
it. Whatever it is It's gonna hurt Because it won't accomplish
anything if it doesn't hurt But know this it comes from my hand.
I'm gonna be there the whole time And I will get myself glory And
I will prove you and vindicate you in the face of your enemy. Just be patient. Someone once said, if you want
to have God speak to you, or if you want to hear God, read
your Bible. If you want to hear God speak
audibly, read your Bible out loud. Brethren, all these promises
are in this book. And we can face every aspect
of life in the full confidence that whatever comes our way was
sent by our God to get himself glory. And even though it may
look like we're going to sink and go under and never come up
again, it will not happen. I will never leave you. I will
never forsake you, he says. And you said, but I'm such a
leaning wall and such a tottering fence. Doesn't matter. Doesn't
matter. But I'm sure I'll crumble. Well,
if God were to leave you, you'd crumble for sure. But God won't
leave you. He is your salvation. He is your
rock. He is your refuge. There are
those troubles caused by other men. There are those troubles
we face. Troubles of circumstance, things that happen to us. I've
seen some of our brethren go through trials, I don't know
how they, well, I won't say I don't know how they survived it, I
know how they survived it, but looking at it from the flesh,
I don't know how they endured it. I remember back when I had that
serious bout of depression, I got news that somebody in one of
the other churches there, son had been killed in a work accident. Just all at once, he's there
and then he's gone. And I remember thinking, how does anybody live
with that? How do you deal with something like that? When I lived
back in Owensboro, I did a roofing job for a family
and their son was having some troubles and they thought it
was muscular dystrophy. Turns out a little later, young
boy had brain tumor. And they watch their 12-year-old
boy just wither away and die. I think, how do people deal with
that? I hope I don't ever have to find out. Really, I'm not
looking. I'm not saying, bring it on,
Lord. No, but I know this, whatever path he puts you on, He walks
that path with you. He doesn't send you anywhere.
He takes you places. And even though it's He that
brings you by His providence into great distress through the
whole thing, He is your salvation. And He will bring you out at
the proper time. There are those things, I know some of you here,
you've got illnesses to deal with. That's tough. Illnesses, it won't
go away. It's remarkable the age we live in, the medical advances
they have. Bonnie and I sometimes, we like
to watch these shows about, you know, the 1800s. And you
think, you know, you look particularly when they have some kind of medical
problem, and I'd say, you know, something, they didn't have anything
they could do about that. We just watched the other day
a show, and I mean this was a true story, about John Adams and his
daughter got breast cancer. And they did a mastectomy without
anesthetic. Imagine that. All the advances
of medicine, but you know something? Medicine's never going to catch
up with death, is it? No matter what wonders they come
up with, so far as this natural self is concerned, death is going
to win. Right? But don't let it bother you. However near to that time you
are coming, and none of us know really what it is, but no matter
how near you are to that time, the Lord is with you. Ever since one of our brother
preachers was going through the great grief of losing his wife,
I've had that scripture on my mind. Even though I walk through
the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil for you are
with me. And I remember thinking upon
that and realizing for years I had in my mind that yes, when
we die, the Lord will meet us there. No, he won't. He goes with us there. He's always
been there. The only thing that death will
do with regard to our relationship with our Lord Jesus Christ is
we will be able to see that He was there all along. He was at our right hand. that
not a step we took was ever taken apart from the Lord's presence
with us. In fact, even before we confessed His name, when we
were still yet rebels and in sin, refusing to bow the knee
to Him, yet He was with us. He guarded us because we were
His, the Father had given us to Him. And He had taken responsibility
for us. And he kept us safe. Kept us safe so that at the appointed
time, we would hear the gospel and the spirit would give us
faith and we would believe. And he knows the appointed time
of our departure from this world. And he's not gonna leave us.
He's with us. He is our salvation. And then
brethren, there are those troubles that we bring on ourselves. And
I don't know about you, but sometimes I think they're the worst sort.
Bring on ourselves because of our foolishness, bring on ourselves
because of our sin. You know, what we get taught
as children never completely leaves us, does it? And I remember
somehow or another picking it up. in the religion of my childhood,
God will save you from those things that happen to you that
are not your own fault, but you don't know what he's going to
do about the things that you bring on yourself. Is that so? Is that the way it
is? If it's an accident, okay, God
will take care of it. If it's something I couldn't
foresee or something that I couldn't have known about ahead of time,
now the Lord will take me. But if I cause trouble, If I
sin, hey, I'm on my own. My friends, if that's the way
it is, then we might as well close this book. We might as
well use our Sundays for trying to do something fun, because
at the end of this life, there's not going to be any more joy. If the Lord is not my salvation
in all those troubles that I bring on myself because of my own wickedness
or my own foolishness, my own stubbornness and willfulness.
If he's not going to cover those two, then he might as well not
cover any of them. Because I tell you this, more
of my troubles come from me than anywhere else. I am my own worst
enemy, but thank God. I have a Savior equal to the
task of saving me from me. Now, the verse that I wanted
to focus on, and we'll look for a few minutes here, verse 7. My salvation and my honor depend
on God. He is my mighty rock, my refuge. Now our translation, what it
says is true, but I believe it narrows it down a little bit.
Actually what it says is my salvation and my honor or glory is in God. In God. First of all, our salvation
is God, isn't it? He has become my salvation, says
the psalmist. My salvation is not a plan. I'm
not saying there's no plan to it, but it's not a plan that's
given to me, and I perform the plan, and I'm saved. That was
the way that they did evangelism back in my youth. They'd say,
well, have you shown anybody God's plan of salvation? And
to them, the plan was this. It was like selling insurance,
you know. And God has this plan, well,
you're a sinner, so I sent my son to die for you. And if you'll
sign on the line, if you'll make your decision, if you'll believe,
you'll be saved. Here's your part in the plan.
Well, there's no doubt God's got a plan of salvation. The
thing is, there's nothing in it that involves me doing something.
Really. That is, the performance of my
salvation does not at any point depend upon me fulfilling some
point of God's plan. God's plan is to save me through
Jesus Christ. And because that's His plan,
He's going to fulfill it. And part of that plan is awakening
my soul sometime in my life, giving life to my spirit, and
I believe Him. But my believing did not fulfill
the plan of God. That is, it did not bring it
to pass. It did not initiate it or finish
it. No, me believing, was just part
of the plan that God worked. He is my salvation. He is the
source of it. The only source of it. That's
why it says my soul finds rest in God alone. When Todd asked me to preach
at the conference this coming weekend, He said, I'm asking
everybody to preach a message on this subject, what is the
gospel? And I'm pretty sure what I'm
already, what I'm going to preach. But as I looked at that, I thought,
you know, I can say the gospel in one word, alone, alone. You know, that's what divides,
generally speaking, what divides real Christianity from all the
phony versions of it that's around. All your phony versions of Christianity
say you need God to save you. All your phony versions of Christianity
says that you need Christ. What they forget is to add the
word alone. The book of Galatians is dedicated
to that very principle. There wasn't anybody in Galatia
that thought you didn't need Christ, but there were some of
them that didn't think Christ alone is all you need. I tell you, we can't get too
radical about this. Sometimes I wish, you know, that
I had that spirit that I could get all cranked up and yell and
jump up and down, because sometimes that's just how I feel about
this. But I cannot drive home the point, I cannot be overbearing
on this point. Brethren, it's not just Christ,
it is Christ alone that is our salvation. And the moment you
add something to him, he's no longer any part of it at all.
That's how serious this business is. I don't care what you add. The moment you add something
to the salvation recipe, something other than Christ, it's like
Christ jumps out of the bowl. He's not gonna be mixed with
anything. It is from beginning to end a
work of God through his son. I say this in order to sober
us. I say this in order to glorify
the Son in this. I say this so that you and I
can rejoice in the fact that if it's all of Christ, it's none
of me. In verse 5 it says, Find rest, O
my soul, in God alone. Isn't that something? Oh, that's where we find rest.
Come unto me, said the Lord Jesus Christ. And I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn
of me, and you'll find rest." Well, there were some who would
come to him, but they wanted to keep everything they brought
with them. They said, we'll come to you as an add-on to our Judaism. No, no. Coming to me involves
leaving everything else behind. In fact, the only time that I'm
aware of that the Lord told them to bring something along is when
he said, take up your cross and follow me. That's the only thing
he ever told us to bring along. Christ alone is rest to the soul. Christ plus anything is nothing
but an inward agitation and confusion of mind. He speaks here of the salvation
of the circumstance, salvation from the circumstances of our
life, salvation from the things that we bring upon our salvation,
excuse me, upon ourselves, and salvation from life itself. Now that sounds strange. Why
would I wanna be saved from life? Because what we call life really
isn't life at all. This existence you and I now
experience in the flesh is nothing but a long drawn out death. But know this, the Lord God saves
us from it. I guess the older I get, the
more I think about this, but I'm trying to get my mind to
grasp this concept. that when we die, that is salvation. Now, the flesh looks on and says,
oh, that's destruction. No, it's salvation. When we die,
that's the Lord coming to us and all the weariness of living
this life and the conflict within us and the conflict with the
world. And he said, okay, that's enough. You can come on home
now. You can come on home. You can see the things you've
only believed so far. You can take possession of the
things you can only hope for so far. Your hard service is done. The day of work is over. Come on home. I know that that's not the natural
way for us to think about it, but brethren, that's what it
is. That's why Paul could say, for I desire to depart and be
with Christ, which is far better, far better. He didn't look at
death as the end of something good. He looked at death as the
time when he would be delivered from this body of death and finally
have full experience of that salvation for which his heart
had longed all or ever since the Lord had called him. My salvation
and my honor are in God. Not only is my salvation in God,
my salvation from sin, my salvation from God himself is in God. Someone
once said, God saves you from himself, by himself, for himself. And that's true. Just tuck that
away in your mind and think about it for a while. That's a pretty
important point. He saves us from himself. by himself, for
himself. But David goes on and says, my
honor depends on God. My reputation. I think of that
with regard to this life. I think of how God has been so
gracious that He doesn't let the world know what I am. Now
maybe all of you feel that way. But I know that I feel that way
about me. God protects me from the rightful contempt the world
would have for me if they really knew what I am. If they knew
what I was capable of. People look at me, I had a woman
come to me in a restaurant one time and she Maybe he called
me by name and he goes, oh, I mean, Reverend Terrell, is that what
they call you? And I said, not anybody that knows me. I says they're fully aware that
that word just doesn't fit. Oh, the grace of the Lord. To give us a reputation in this
world that we don't deserve. And now I'm talking about the
lower blessing right now. But that's a good one. I'm glad
people don't know me like I know me. I'm glad people don't know
me like God knows me. I'm glad that my honor in this
world and my reputation, it's in God. But more than this, my
glory, the glory hoped for, the eternal glory with which I hoped
one day to be clothed is in God. John said, children, or dear
ones, now are we the children of God. And it's not yet been
revealed what we shall be. But we know this, when he is
revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is.
My glory is in him. My honor, whatever honor may
be bestowed upon me in eternity came from him. It's his honor,
his glory bestowed upon me as a gift of his grace. In verse nine, it says, low born
men are but a breath and high born but a lie. If weighed on
a balance, they are nothing. Together, they are only breath. Well, lowborn men are a breath,
just a vapor, you know, and we know that. We can see that, can't
we? Those, the poor of this world
who barely get by, and particularly if you go outside this country,
see how people live in some of the third world countries, we
think, you know, they're just a breath away from death. There's
nothing to them. Every day they get up and it
takes everything they can do to find enough, enough food to
ward off death for one more day. The low born, they're just a
breath. But what about the high born? Well, it looks like they're
taken care of, doesn't it? Well, they live in a fine house,
they got money in the bank, they got food in the pantry. They
got a fine car, they got it all. They got investments in the stock
market. They may have some physical silver or gold down the safe
deposit box in the bank. They got it all. It's a lie. They got nothing. They're no
better off than the poor. Oh, they're experiencing this
life better than the poor do. But you know something, you can
have all of that and it can be gone in a moment. Or more importantly, you can
have all that and then you be gone in a moment. Then who shall
have all of that stuff that you gathered? The low born, the high born,
you put them all on a balance, they weigh nothing. They're like
the dust on the scales that they didn't even bother to brush off
because they knew it wouldn't make any difference. Together,
they are only a breath. Well, then what's the exhortation
to us who are his people? Trust in him at all times, verse
eight, O people. Pour out your hearts to him,
for God is our refuge. Trust in him at all times. In
times of trouble, trusting. In times of plenty, trusting.
If the Lord gives you a time of plenty, don't trust the plenty
he gave you. Trust him. It's very easy for us to begin
to trust the blessing and not the blesser, isn't it? That's why I think that for the
most part God doesn't let his people get a whole lot in this
world. Because it's just too great a temptation for us. Makes
it too easy for us to think about what we've got and how that's
gonna take care of us and that we're beyond trouble. And the
Lord feels compelled, as it were, to take it away from us, lest
our hearts be entirely removed from Him. No, trust in Him at all times,
because at all times, you're in need of Him. Trust in Him
at all times, O people. Pour out your hearts to Him. And people say, I don't know
how to pray. Yes, you do. There may be somebody that told
you there's a specific way to pray and you don't think you
can do that. But God never told you a form to follow other than
when our Lord gave that disciple's prayer. But He didn't tell us
to recite that. Do you know what prayer is? It's
just opening your heart toward God. I know we think of it as
making a list of requests, you know, and so often our prayers
do sound like a Christmas list, don't they? Lord, do this. Lord,
do that. Prayer, oh, if we could just
learn to get honest with God. It's not like he doesn't already
know. We come to God in our prayers, and we've got our heart carefully
covered up, because we think there's stuff we don't want him
to know. And we say something, you know, we give some word of
praise, and it's almost like the Lord's saying, okay, now
what? And then we come up with something
else, okay? And finally we get around to what we've been trying
to hide. And he says, okay, now we're
starting to pray. Pour out your heart, son. Tell me what's on
your heart. And let me tell you this, it
doesn't matter what's on your heart, tell him. Say, well, I
just feel silly pouring out my heart to him. These things seem
so petty to me. I probably shouldn't even be
bothered by these things. Well, whether or not you should be,
you are. Pour your heart out. Maybe just in pouring it out
to him, you'll find relief from it. Maybe the very reason you
have that problem is because you've been closing up your heart
to him and he's gonna pry it open one way or another. Pour
out your heart to him, for God is our refuge. Now here's something I like about
the way David puts this. He doesn't say God is the sword
in our hand. He doesn't say God is the shield
we carry. He said, God's our refuge. He's
where we run and hide. That's what he means. We think
we're going to be so valiant and champions for the Lord. No,
we get in trouble. Run and hide. Run to the Lord. In him is your salvation. In
him is all your glory and none who put their hope in him will
ever find their hope disappointed. He will be their salvation. He
will bring it about and it will be a good salvation and it will
be an eternal one. Well, the Lord bless it to your
hearts.