Psalm 89. The title of this message,
Covenant Mercies Described. While in my study a little while
ago, going over these notes, I thought, it's one thing for
someone to say, they were going to leave you something. If they
tell you that, it wouldn't stand up in court, but if they told
you that, that would give you some hope, wouldn't it? Of receiving what they said they
would give you. But to have it written down,
to have it in writing, That'll stand up in any court. When it's
written out and it's signed, that'll stand up. And it just
struck me that I'm standing here this evening, and I'm not just
verbally giving you some promises that I have heard and the person
that told me heard it. I'm giving you something this
evening that's written that God Almighty who can't lie. It's
like their last will and testament. And we have this evening covenant
mercies given to the Lord Jesus Christ and given to us in the Lord Jesus Christ. Whatever
is given to Him is given to us. You know that? All things are
yours in Christ. You know why all things are yours
in Christ? Because all things are His. The Father has turned
everything over to the Son. And whatever belongs to Him belongs
to me and you who believe. And here in these verses, we
have the covenant promises given to our Lord And we ought to read
this with great interest. We ought to read this with great
interest. Because this covenant is very real, and it's in force
right now. It's in force. Our Lord died
that it may be in force, and He's risen to enforce it. He enforces His own will. that's
written to us. Now we see in verse 19 that Christ,
and I touched on this last week, We see that Jesus Christ, and
we know that David here is just a type of Christ, it's really
written to Christ. I mean, it had some reference
here to David, and there were some promises fulfilled to David
in this covenant called the sure mercies of David. But the true
fulfillment of it, the spiritual fulfillment of it, is to Jesus
Christ and His church, His children. And we see in verse 19 that the
Lord Jesus Christ is the Chosen One. chosen of God. God the Father chose him to be
the Messiah before creation. Now, that's good news to those
who believe. But to those who don't believe,
it's not good news. The Jews said, we will not have this man
to reign over us. It was not good news to them.
They didn't find it to be good news, but a lot of us Gentiles,
And a lot of Jews, after our Lord died and rose again and
went back to glory, there was as many Jews saved at that time. But we find it to be good news
that the Son of God is our Messiah, our Savior. We need a Savior. We need a Savior. Christ is said to be in the Scriptures,
the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world. God the Father entered into a
covenant before anything existed. The Father called His Son into
a covenant. And they made this covenant.
And this covenant had to do with His glory and our good, our salvation. That's what it has to do with.
He is the One who is able to save to the uttermost. then that
come unto God by him, seeing he ever lives to make intercession
for them, but he's able. This one whom God chose is said
to be mighty. I've laid help upon one that's
mighty, one that's chosen out of the people, one like us, a
brother, not near a kinsman, and he's able to save unto the
uttermost. There's no one, I tell you what,
as a preacher of the gospel, I could speak to anyone on this
earth knowing that Jesus Christ is able to save them. He's able
to do it, if He will. That leper said, Lord, if You
will, You can make me clean, if You will. But I know this,
He's able, He's able to do so, Jesus Christ is the Lamb slain
before the foundation of the world. He is able to save them
that come to Him. He is the Lamb of God, and He
is the Lamb of God's providing. God provided this one man here,
this one person upon whom He laid hell, this one mighty one.
God has provided him. Listen, God provided him for
Himself, and God provided him for us. You know that God the
Father, and I say this carefully, but God the Father needs Him,
as far as in saving us, God the Father needs Him as much as we
need Him. He needs His blood for our cleansing. He needs His righteousness. Because
we don't have any. And God's not going to save us
without righteousness. We're not going to stand in God's
presence without righteousness. And we have all that in Jesus
Christ. It is only through Jesus Christ
that God can be a just God and a Savior. He cannot be a just
God and save me or you in any way, shape, or form. He can't
do it. It's an impossibility apart from
Jesus Christ. But in Jesus Christ, He can receive
us. He can save us and be a just
God in doing so. He can honor His own law and
save a wretch like me. That ought to go to hell. Really. The whole work of salvation was
laid on His shoulders. He was made the Mediator. He
was made the surety of this covenant. He's made the surety of God's
people. It's on His shoulders. Aren't
you glad that it's on His shoulders? Aren't you glad that He's responsible
to bring you home? I'm glad it's not a cooperative
effort between me and Him. I'm glad that God laid the whole
responsibility of bringing this center. And sometimes I look
at myself and I think about this as if I'm the only one center
on this earth. And he's responsible to bring
me home. But now listen, he's not just
going to bring me home. He's going to bring me home spotless,
blameless. That's how I'm going home. That's
how I'm going to be presented. That's how you're going to be
presented. Spotless, without blame. Holy. That's unimaginable right now,
but it's so. It's true. It's true. God the
Father anointed Him to be the Messiah, to be the Lamb slain,
to be the Mighty One. He said there in verse 20, I
have found David My servant, I have found My servant Jesus. That's what God calls Him, a
servant. Behold My servant. Isaiah 42, Behold My servant.
He shall not fail. He shut up and fell. I have found
My servant Jesus. I have anointed Him with My Holy
Spirit. He had the Spirit without measure. The whole Godhead dwelt in Him.
And then in verse 21, God not only promises to be with
Christ as Mediator, but that he will be successful, listen,
with whom my hand shall be established. He shall be successful, the pleasure
of the Lord shall prosper in his hand, all the purpose of
God shall be established by him, You know, that's what's being
done today, you know that? I'm not really wondering what's
going on. We know what's going on right
now, the war. But I'm not really wondering
what's going on because I know this, God's eternal purpose is
being established. It's being brought to pass. Nothing's out of control. There's
absolutely nothing out of control. He said here in verse 21, "...with
whom my hand shall be established, my arm also shall strengthen
him." I'm with Him. I want to be with the one whom
God's with, don't you? This is my Son in whom I'm well
pleased. Hear ye Him. Listen to Him. Hear what He has to say. With whom my hand shall be established,
mine arm also shall strengthen him. And listen, the enemy shall
not exact upon him, nor the son of wickedness afflict him. The
enemy here is the devil. There is a war. There is a war
going on that we cannot see with these eyes. There's a greater
war going on than just what the flesh is, just the flesh going
against each other. Satan is going about seeking
whom he may devour. That's what he's doing. The enemy is the devil and it
was promised to our Lord Jesus Christ that the devil would not
conquer him. You go all the way back to the
Garden of Eden, And God gives this promise that the seed of
the woman is going to bruise Satan's head. He's going to destroy
his power. But he says Satan's going to
bruise his what? His heel. That's his human nature. That's his human nature. But
he says Satan, that Satan's going to bruise his heel, but the Lord
Jesus Christ is going to bruise his head. He's going to destroy
his power. And Satan can do no more than what God has purposed
for him to do. He can't do a thing. I mean,
he can't even bark at you, unless God allows him to. He can't even
bark at you. He can't even look at your direction without permission. He's not
out there running loose. Now He's going to and fro up
and down the earth, He said when He was there in the book of Job,
but He's on a chain. He's like a pit bull on a chain.
That's what He is. And He's not going to allow,
listen here, He said, "...the enemy shall not exact upon Him,
nor the son of wickedness afflict Him." Men couldn't do any more
to him than what was allowed. Herod said, don't you know that
I have power to crucify you and I have power to release you?
And he said, you don't have any power. You know, he was quiet
up until that time. He didn't speak. He was just
silent. But when old Herod took it upon himself to claim to have
power, he said, hold on now, hold on. You just stepped over
the line. You just stepped over the line.
You don't have any power, you little peanut. You have no power
at all against me, except God give it to you, not Satan, not
Satan, except my father give it to you. And men couldn't do any more
to him than what was allowed. How many times did they seek
to kill him? But he said, mine hour has not yet come. One time
they sought to kill him. They were going to kill him.
And you know what it says? He walked through the midst of
them. It's like, guys, don't you realize
who's walking past you? The guy you're wanting to kill.
I mean, the man you want. I don't want to say it that way. But
the man you're wanting to kill, there he goes, walking right
past him. They couldn't touch Him. They
could not touch Him. Nor the Son of Wickedness afflicted
Him. And I'll beat down His foes before His face, and I blessed
and plagued them that hate Him. You know the things that go on
on this earth. We live in this world, we live
in a body of flesh, and we look at things so often in a fleshly
manner. One of the reasons why is we
don't get into the Word of God very much. If we would saturate
ourselves in the Word of God, we'd have a different view on
things, I think, more than we do. But the things that are going
on in the world is fulfilling God's purpose. But listen, I'll
beat down your foes. I'll beat down your foes and
I'll put a plague on them that hate you. I don't know why, who
knows why COVID came? I don't know. Maybe God sent
it as a plague to those who hate him. I know, I mean, even though
we get it too. We live in this body and flesh.
But now this world's his and he's orchestrating it. But what he's saying here, I
think in verse 33, "...the gates of hell shall not prevail against
him." And what we see here is assured
victory of the Lord Jesus Christ. This is assured victory. He said,
I'll beat your foes down. And I'll plague them. I'll plague
those who hate you. God the Father promised to afflict
all who believe not on Christ, either in this life, listen,
or that life to come, in judgment. Ah, afflict them. You know, one
of the greatest, I think, terrors that could grip a person in judgment
is they're going to stand before this one they didn't believe.
Because he's going to be the judge of the quick and the dead. They're going to stand. You know,
I think of these false religions when they die. Guess what the first thing they
realize? That Jesus Christ is real. That he's real. And this gospel
message is real. And they turned their back on
him. And now they've got to deal with him. And then in verse 24, But my
faithfulness, my faithfulness to Him, my faithfulness to the
covenant, my faithfulness to my people I have chosen in Him,
my faithfulness and my mercy shall be with Him. Now, do you
want mercy? Do I want mercy? Or where do
you think we ought to go? We ought to go to the one it's
with. My mercy is with Him. It is with Him. It is always
on Him as He walked this earth as a man. But it's with Him. All mercy comes through Him.
If we ever receive mercy from God, we're going to receive it
through this man, Jesus Christ. He says here, "...but my faithfulness."
The faithfulness of God was with Christ, and it's with Christ
in performing the promises made to Him concerning His work, and
the promise and faithfulness of God given to Him that He would
strengthen Him as a man, and that the glory that should follow would
be His. He will be honored. Jesus Christ
will be honored. He will be magnified. And I'm
telling you this, you mark this down, every knee, from the first
one to the last one, however many billions that is, is going
to bow to Jesus Christ. That man, Jesus Christ, that
God-man, but a man. And every knee, every knee, is going to bow. I mean, can you imagine looking
over at sea of people and they're all on their knees? And they're
all bowed to one person. Jesus Christ. I thank God He
made me bow now. I thank God He enabled me to
bow now. And not with that group that I was with that didn't want
to bow. But they're going to. They're
going to. Thank God He made us willing
to bow. Because one way or another, everybody's
going to bow to King Jesus. Everybody. And all this that is promised
to the Lord Jesus Christ in this covenant, all of it now is also
promised to us in Christ. All of it. My faithfulness and
my mercy shall be with him, and in my name shall his horn, that
is his power, his honor, his glory, that's what a horn, you
know, that's what a horn represented in the Old Testament, be exalted,
be displayed. He's been given a name, it says,
that's above every name. That at the name of Jesus, every
knee is going to bow. Every tongue is going to confess
that He's Lord. We will not have this man to
reign over us. I bet they ain't saying that
now. I guarantee you they're not saying that now. They're
confessing Him to be Lord even if they don't like it. They don't
like it in hell, but they're still confessing it. They're
still confessing He's Lord. But that's too late. That's too
late. And then verse 25, And I will set his hand also in the
sea, and his right hand in the rivers. I will set his hand,
he will be the governor. He's the governor. His government
shall be over all the earth. From the sea and His right hand
in the rivers. That's what runs through the
hills. That's what runs through the
valleys. That's what runs to the ocean. All that's saying
is He's going to have dominion from one end of this earth to
the other. He has dominion over it. I'll set His hand. He will rule. He will rule with authority.
He will rule with the authority of heaven behind him. He shall cry unto me, Thou art
my father. They said, we know you, you're
the carpenter's son. Oh, no, no, no, no, no. Aren't you glad you got it right?
You know whose son he is. He's God's son. You know, there's
a whole world out there right now that still don't believe
that. They don't believe He's God in the flesh. They don't
believe He's God's Son. But I do. And you do. That's right. God's His Father. Listen here
in John 5.18. Therefore the Jews sought the
Lord to kill Him. Because He not only had broken
the Sabbath, but said also that God was His Father, making Himself
equal with God. Well, you know, they said God
was their Father. Didn't they? They said that. They said God was their Father.
But they knew, they knew that when He said it and the way He
said it, that he was making himself equal with God, that he was saying
that he's God. And that made him mad and he
wanted to kill him for it. But he shall cry to me, and he
did many times, many times. Many times he prayed. As a man,
he prayed. And he called God his Father
and he called God his God. And He looked to Him as a rock
of His salvation. In other words, He totally depended
on this man, Jesus Christ, as a mediator, as a man, completely
dependent on God the Father to take care of Him, protect Him,
and keep Him. He did that. Also, I'll make Him my firstborn,
higher than the kings of the earth. I'll make Him my firstborn."
Well, you and I know from the Old Testament that the firstborn
got the double portion. That the firstborn was the priest
of the household. He became the spiritual leader
of the house. He's our firstborn. He's God's
firstborn. He's God's firstborn. He's the
leader. He gets the double portion. It
all goes to Him. It all goes to Him. And you and
I say, Amen, don't we? We say, Amen. Give it all to
Him. And my mercy will I keep for
Him forevermore. Oh, my mercy will I keep for
Him forevermore, and my covenant, my covenant, this covenant I
made with Him, my covenant shall stand fast, firm." You know when
something stands fast, it's firm, isn't it? It's not wishy-washy.
It's firm. It'll stand fast. It's sure.
My covenant is sure. That's why it's called the sure
mercies of David. We can call it the sure mercies
of Jesus Christ. God's favor will always be on
Him and all who are in Him. And the covenant being made with
Him as the head and representative of His people, it will remain,
it is sure, it's firm, and it's immovable. It's immovable. And the blessings of it are yay
and amen in Him. And here's a promise. Now listen,
He's been speaking here of the Lord Jesus Christ. And these
promises to Him are to us also. But He's promising here this
covenant made between Him and the Father would keep Him and
help Him. And now He comes here to verse 29. His seed. You know I have the privilege
and the responsibility of preaching to His seed every week. Every week I have preached to
God's children, born of God. His seed also will I make, and
don't you like that? I'll make them to endure." Now
if God can make you do something, you can do it. His seed also
will I make to endure forever. The seed of Adam is not going
to do that, is it? The seed of Adam is going to perish. But
the seed of Christ is not going to perish. Oh, I'll make it to endure forever.
Here's the perseverance of the saints. Right here in this verse.
We have the perseverance of the saints. God said, I'll make them
to endure forever. And His throne, the throne of
the Lord Jesus Christ as the days of heaven. He's talking,
you know, and you know, He uses the heavens and the moon and
the stars and the sun and He uses these things as examples
of his faithfulness and his ability to keep, because it's been here
for thousands of years. You and I come and go, but I
tell you what, if every one of us die tonight, that sun's still
coming up in the morning. It ain't gonna stop. You know
this, when someone dies, nothing stops. The day ticks on, the
night, day, another one dies and the day ticks on. It just keeps on going. And he's
saying here that his throne is as sure and as stable as the
heavens are. But, he says here, he says here, Now boy, this ought to get our
attention. Are you a child of God? Are you
a seed of Christ? If His children forsake My law
and walk not in My judgments, though saved, yet we are sinful. If His children forsake My law,
that's like over in 1 John, if any man sin, it's really when? When His children forsake My
law and walk not in My judgments, because it's going to happen.
It's going to happen. He's the only one that did not
forsake the law and walk in God's judgments. He's the only one.
And if they break My statutes and keep not My commandments,
then they will. They will. Just as sure as they're
living, they will. That's how sinful we are. Here's
a promise, I'll visit their transgressions with the rod and their iniquity
with stripes. I will. I'll do this. He says, listen, I'll visit their
iniquities with stripes as a good father would do. A good father
would discipline his children, wouldn't he? If he loves them,
he will. You know, in all trials, I believe
this, in all trials, there's a form of discipline in it. I
mean, I've realized this as I've grown up. To me, when it comes to sin,
it's like pick a day, pick a sin. That's how sinful we are. And I realize that all the trials
that I'll ever go through, they have a form of discipline in
them. But He says here, here's a promise,
that His children, His seed, if His children... I like that. Don't you like that? Called His
children. How many... The Lord called Him
His children. Little children. That's what
He said to His disciples, little children. If they forsake My law, and walk
not in My judgment, and break My statutes, and keep not My
commandments, and they will. I'll discipline them, I'll chasten
them. Nevertheless, nevertheless, my lovingkindness, my lovingkindness, over my margin
it says, I will not make void from him. Nevertheless, my lovingkindness
will I not utterly take from him. Do you notice, he's talking
about his children, And now he's saying, if they do all this,
I'll chase them, but I will not remove my lovingkindness from
Him. Him. Because for God to destroy anyone
He died for, it would be removing His lovingkindness from Jesus
Christ. He said, I've made a covenant
with Him. And even though His children sin because He died
for a bunch of sinners, and there are sinners all the way home,
There's never a time we quit being a sinner. There's never
a time we quit sinning. I wish we would, but not in this
life. It ain't happening. Nevertheless, my lovingkindness
will I not utterly take from him, nor suffer my faithfulness
to him, and my faithfulness to the covenant, and my faithfulness
to his children. It will not fail. It will not
fail. It will not lie. Over in my margin
it says it will not lie. My faithfulness will not lie. God can't lie. Once He swears,
He can't do it. Because listen, my covenant,
my covenant will I not break. I won't break my covenant. You
and I are a bunch of covenant breakers. We are covenant breakers. I guarantee you there ain't a
person in this room that hasn't broken a covenant. You've not
given your word and not broken it throughout your lifetime.
That's just not possible. I'll be there at 8 o'clock. Well,
you show up at 8.01, guess what? You just broke your word. That's
how strict God is, I'm telling you. If you're here at 8 o'clock
and one second, you just, with God, you broke your word. But
you know what? If God says 8 o'clock, it'll
be 8 o'clock. Because that's his word. He says,
my covenant will I not break nor alter. I will not change
the things that's gone out of my lips because circumstances
have changed. We're going to have to make some
amendments here. They're always trying to do that to the Constitution. Always trying to make amendments.
They'd like to burn it if they could, but some. But he's saying here, I won't
alter the things going out of my lips. I will not make an amendment. I'm not gonna do it. Don't need
to. Don't need to. Now, I have to admit there's
some things we do, we have to make amendment to it because
we're not perfect. We missed it the first time. If you miss
it the first time, don't be arrogant and proud. Go ahead and make
an amendment. But God doesn't need to. He says, I will not
alter the thing that's gone out of my lips. Once have I sworn
by my holiness. I don't need to do it again.
God doesn't need to swear over and over and over and over. Once have I sworn by my holiness
that I will not lie to David. I swore by my holiness. That's
God's chief attribute. That's God's chief attribute.
You can take all the attributes of God. Now I want to say this
carefully. Take all the attributes of God. If you take away the
holiness, you can just trash them. Right? You can just throw
them in the trash if you take away God's holiness, because
they don't mean anything. And that's why he said, I swear
by my holiness, the chiefest of his attributes, that which
is absolutely sure, he swears by his holiness that he would
not lie to David. He said, I will not lie to Jesus
Christ. He didn't lie to his son. What
he said to his son, he's going to do. His seed shall endure
forever in his throne as the sun before me. His seed. You
know what we have coming. We have a great day coming. You
and I are going to live forever in God's presence in real paradise. in real paradise. "...and His throne as the sun
before Me." You know, just look at history, and right now history
is happening right before us. History happens every day. One
second goes by, that's history. And that's how fast history happens.
But history, you know, history is... if you look at history, Egypt at one time was the greatest
nation on Earth, wasn't it? Rome was at one time. Rome took
over a huge part of the world. It was a quarter part of it or
something. Where are they at now? They're no power.
Egypt's no power. Egypt's not going to threaten
the world. But I tell you, there is one
throne that's going to endure forever. When kingdoms come and
kingdoms go, His kingdom is forever. And that's the kingdom of our
Lord. And that's the kingdom we are in. That's the one we
are in. His seed shall endure forever
in His throne as the sun before Me. It shall be established forever
as the moon." Notice how He brings this up, the moon, the sun, the
star, everybody's afraid about all this green stuff. I'm sure glad it's God's earth.
It'll be established forever as the moon and as a faithful
witness in heaven. Now, Selah, go home and think
about this. That's what I wrote down. Go
home and think about this. Pause, meditate on this, think
about it. Think about the covenant for
a while. Think about it. When you go home, I tell you
what, I guarantee if somebody left the last will and testament,
it has about $10 million in it, I know what I'd be thinking about
tonight. I know what I'd be, I know myself,
I know. If somebody left me $10 million
and I heard about it, I'd be... I've got a greater thing left
to me, I've got greater riches left to me than that. I got life. I have life. You don't have anything
if you don't have life. If somebody left you $10 million, But, and you're gonna get it,
you're gonna get it, what's the day? What's the day, Thursday?
You're gonna get it Saturday. But the doctor said you're gonna
die tomorrow. That really doesn't mean anything, does it? That
$10 million is, shit. But you know what we have? We
have life. We have eternal life. We're not gonna die. He said
they're gonna live forever. Thank God for the covenant. Thank
God for the cabinet. All right.