Good morning, everybody. Boy,
this is a big improvement over last week, isn't it? I need you to find a passage of
scripture in your Bibles, in the book of Psalms, and it
is Psalm 130. 130. These songs, several of them,
are called a song of degrees. And it has been... Some people believe this and
some people don't. These are songs that were sung
as they went up to the temple, which was a pretty steep climb
as you come into the city of Jerusalem. So whether that's
what it is or not matters nothing. This is the Word of God, for
that we're sure. Let us pray. Lord, we thank and praise you
that we have a place to worship you, which is not tainted with
all of the destructive teachings of the present day among professing
Christians. Everybody and his brother has
got a different way to do it. Lord, we beg that you would continue
and further deliver us from ever being able to even so much as
read, let alone speak and preach and teach these things that now
we know to be absolutely wrong. Without you, we can do nothing.
We thank you for letting us gather in this place this morning. We
pray that you would set Christ before us in all of his glory
and all of his splendor, for in him is life itself. He is the way, the truth, and
the life. No man comes to the Father but
by Christ. We beg for your mercy. Open our
minds and our hearts and help this poor preacher to tell the
truth, to tell the truth. We ask in our Savior's name,
Amen. Now in Psalm 130, it is considered
to be a Psalm of David, and it is one of those songs of degrees.
And here's what it says, it's only eight verses in length. Out of the depths have I cried
unto you, O Lord. Lord, hear my voice. Let your
ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications. If you,
Lord, should count or mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand? But
there is forgiveness with you. that you may be feared. I wait
for the Lord, my soul doth wait, and in his word do I hope. My soul waits for the Lord more
than they that watch for the morning. I say more than they
that watch for the morning. Let Israel, let God's true spiritual
Israel, in the Lord, no hope in ourselves. Let Israel, spiritual Israel,
hope in the Lord. For with the Lord there is mercy,
and with Him is plenteous redemption, and He shall redeem Israel from
all his iniquities. Now going back to read again
verses 3 and 4. This is our text for this morning. If you, Lord, should count iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand? But there is forgiveness with
you that you may be feared. Those are the words of David
and we take those that third and fourth verse as our text
for this morning. The Bible can be read in dozens
of ways, I suppose, but there are very few that can be read
with any kind of proper respect and
bowing to the truth of what we read, whether it's in Genesis
or Revelation or anywhere in between. Seeing the glory of
God in the face of Jesus Christ, this is vitally, vitally important. Now here is a play on words that
I hope will help us move through this section and take a clear
route in regard to the Word of God. Here are the key words in
this part of our study. Seeing the glory of God in the
face of Jesus Christ. Seeing the glory of God, when? That's the other key word. Seeing
and when? When we see what happened in
the garden. What happened in the garden?
God created two holy, upright, the first members of the human
race. And lo and behold, before long, Eve was persuaded to take of
the forbidden fruit, and Adam did as well. But when
Eve partook of the fruit, the same consequence did not happen. Oh, but when Adam sinned. Why
is that? How come her sin doesn't count? Do you know? It's because Adam
is the federal head of the human race. If only Eve had sinned, we would
not have an evil nature at birth. But we inherit this in Adam. And it's all over the scriptures,
especially in the book of Romans, in the New Testament. So when
we see what happened in the garden, then it is that we are enabled
to see the glory of Christ's condescension in becoming a man. A man. Never been a man like him when
he came. through Mary's womb in Bethlehem
and laid him in that manger. Then it is that we see the glory
of Christ's condescension in becoming a man. Second when and
then is when our utter, complete, Desolation on our part in regard
to God. Utter inability. It's not that we need a little
help. We don't need a little shove. We need life. And if you don't find life in
Christ, it ain't to be found. Then, when we see How needy we
are that we don't have anything that God can use, nothing, nothing
at all. We're just poor sinners spending
a certain number of years on this earth and leaving it, and
then someone comes right behind us. When we see our utter inability,
THEN we see the glory of God's electing grace in Christ. In Christ. Oh, preacher, you
don't believe election. It ain't got nothing to do with
what I believe. It's in this book, ain't it?
It's all over the place. Try reading Ephesians 1 and see
if you can get through it without choking. It's a pretty healthy hitter.
Without the new birth, You and I are completely doomed and damned. There's no hope for us. The only
hope for us is in the Gospel of Christ. Let me read you a statement out
of Ephesians 1. Blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with all spiritual
blessings, in heavenly places in Christ, according as He has
chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should
be holy and without blame before Him in love, having predestinated."
Most people think that word ain't in this book, but they're wrong. Having predestinated. Oh, there's something about that
word I don't like. That's because I'm still stupid.
But if I ever see the truth, I'll love that word just as much,
if not more, than if it had the name of Christ Himself. Having
predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to
Himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, to the
praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he's made us accepted
in the beloved." That comes out of Ephesians chapter 1, verses
3 through 6. Then we chime in at Romans chapter
3 and catch another short quote from the scriptures. being justified
freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ
Jesus, whom God has set forth to be a propitiation through
faith in His blood, to declare His righteousness for the remission
of sins that are passed through the forbearance of God. To declare,
I say it this time, His righteousness that we might be just, that he
might be just and the justifier of him that believes in the Lord
Jesus. Those are some powerful statements
indeed. Here's another play on that when
and then. When God's justice exacts the
strictness of God's law, then the glory of Christ's obedience
unto death as our substitute will be honored and rejoiced
to see. We've read that scripture in
Romans 3, 24 through 26, verses 24, 25, and 26. So if you want
to just note down the passage, you can read it for yourself. Here's the next when and then.
When utter sinfulness and corruption of my best deeds. Utter sinfulness and corruption
of my best deeds. Not my worst ones, my best ones. Then the glory of Christ, obedience
unto death, as our substitute comes plainly before us, whom
God has set forth to be a propitiation through faith in His blood to
declare His righteousness for the remission of sins that are
passed through the forbearance of God. Then we come when the utter sinfulness and
corruption of our best deeds Then the glory of Christ imputed
righteousness. This is found in Isaiah. But
we're all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are
as filthy rags, and we all do fade as a leaf, and our iniquity
like the wind has taken us away. Oh my goodness, what a need we
have for this imputed righteousness of our Lord Jesus Christ. Here's
a couple of other references to that same end and effect. In his days Judah shall be saved
and Israel shall dwell safely and this is his name whereby
HE SHALL BE CALLED THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS. That came out of Isaiah 64, 6,
if you're writing this down. Now I go to Jeremiah. Just one
statement, two statements out of Jeremiah in regard to Christ,
in regard to His being our righteousness. In His days, Judah shall be saved
and Israel shall dwell safely. And this is His name whereby
He shall be called. This is God telling me what to
call my Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. You know what it is,
the Lord my righteousness. Christ is our righteousness,
my soul. How many places in the Bible
this is addressed and people hate it with a passion. just
like we did in our old religion. And we may still have some of
it clinging to us, you as well as me. Here's another statement. That was Isaiah 23, verse 6.
And in Isaiah 33, verse 16, this is the shocker. In those days
shall Judah be saved, and Jerusalem shall dwell safely, And this
is the name wherewith she shall be called. This is Jeremiah 33,
16. Now somebody, Christ is a male,
not a female. No offense intended. But here
it says, she shall be called. misses the Lord our righteousness. Same book, just a few chapters
apart, ten to be exact. In those days shall Judah be
saved and Jerusalem shall dwell safely. This is the name wherewith
she church of our Lord Jesus Christ, His children, His people,
His elect. And Jerusalem shall dwell safely,
and this is the name wherewith she shall be called the Lord
our righteousness." My goodness, what a... It's hard to fathom what that
means. It's just It's beyond what we think of in respect to
the human race. This is God demanding our holiness
and then giving it to us in Christ. Here's another when and then.
When we see our sin in its true character, then the glory of
God's Forgiveness through the blood of Christ is uppermost
in our minds. Let me read this to you out of
1 John. But if we walk in the light,
as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another,
and the blood of Jesus Christ, God's Son, cleanses us from all
sin. If we say that we have no sin, We deceive ourselves and the
truth is not in us. I'll never forget the Sunday
night many, many, many years ago, right here in this same
auditorium. And some guy came a little early
and he was spouting off, you know, and he said, did you know
there ain't a negative word in the whole New Testament? Not
a one? Oh, my soul. I don't know what I preached
on that night, but I have a feeling it might have had something to
do with that. That is idiocy. You know, there's enough knots
in the book of Matthew to deny that. This man was sitting under somebody's
preaching, and that's what they told him, and he's dumb enough
to believe it. We've all been right there, dumb
enough to believe what we're hearing. David owns his own sin. Especially in this psalm in which
we have addressed ourselves. If you, Lord, verse 3, should
mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand? But there is forgiveness
with you that you may be feared. And so it is. We're all sinners. I know it's not a nice Sunday
topic, but it's necessary. It's necessary. We think we're
kings and queens and we ain't a thing in the world but slaves
of sin. And here's a list of how we are
all sinners. First of all, It is by what is
called imputation. Now I deliberately did not print
this scripture out. I wanted to read it to you and
give you the chance to go with me to Romans chapter 5. Romans chapter 5 verses 12 through
21. Wherefore as by one man sin entered
into the world. Now it doesn't say by one woman,
it says by one man. Who is that? That's Adam in the
garden. And death by sin. And so death
passed upon all men, for that all have sinned. Well, how come
Eve's sin didn't count? She's not our federal head. So death passed upon all men,
for that all have sinned. We sinned in Adam, and we sin
in ourselves. For until the law, sin was in
the world, but sin is not imputed where there is no law. Nevertheless,
death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned
after the similitude or the same manner of Adam's transgression. Who is the figure? Adam is the
federal head and picture, and here he's called the figure.
of him that was to come, the real federal head of his body,
the church, the Lord Jesus Christ. And whatever he came to do, he
did absolutely perfectly with not one single solitary negative
aspect to what he said. Did I get down to verse 21? No. Verse 15, is that where I am?
Okay. But not as the offense, so also
is the free gift. For if through the offense of
one many be dead, much more the grace of God and the gift by
grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, has abounded unto many. Not as it was by one that sinned,
so is the gift, for the judgment was by one, that is, one man
to condemnation. But the free gift is of many
offenses unto justification. For if by one man's offense death
reigned by one, Much more, they which receive abundance of grace
and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one Jesus
Christ. Therefore, as by the offense
of one, judgment came upon all men to condemnation, even so
by the righteousness of one, the free gift came upon all men
under justification of life. For as by one man's disobedience
many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one many shall
be made righteous. Hallelujah. Moreover, the law
entered that the offense might abound, but where sin abounded,
grace did much more abound, that as sin has reigned unto death,
even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life
by Jesus Christ our Lord." Now you can't say it any plainer
than that, I don't think. Now we come, let's see, to another
printed statement Now I've already covered that
in regard to the Lord our righteousness. So let me jump down to to 1st
John chapter 1 verses 7, 8, and 9. 1st John, that's getting near
the book called the Revelation. 1 John chapter 1, verses 7 through 9. But if we walk in the light as
he is in the light, We have fellowship one with another and the blood
of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleanses us from all sin. If we say we
have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. That's true of me and you and
everybody else. If we confess our sins, He is
faithful I lost my place. If we confess
our sins, verse 9, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins
and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. David writes in Psalm 51, verse
5, Behold, I was shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive
me. We're born sinners, born that
way. How much more abominable and
filthy is man which drinks iniquity like water? How much, indeed,
how much? All right, let me change pages
here. How do we know that there is
forgiveness with God. How do we know it? Well, for
one thing, it's written in this book. But there's a lot of things written
in this book that we don't know about, and many that we do know
about that we avoid. We don't like what they say.
A little bit too demanding. telling us things we don't want
to know. We'd just soon go through this world spiritually blind.
But, let's see what the book of Matthew and Jeremiah and Luke
and Exodus have to say in these matters. How do I know there
is forgiveness with God? His dealings with the first sinners
He sought them out. Adam was the greatest genius as far as
his mind is concerned. And I'd tell you down to today,
nobody was even close to what that man had up here. But when
he fell, when he ate that fruit, it's gone. That's why we can
read this book and not get anything out of it. We must have God's
assistance and help through God the Holy Spirit. Adam and Eve sewed fig leaves
together to cover their nakedness from God. Now that's brilliant,
isn't it? No, it's stupidity. a fig leaf apron. God's very name is forgiveness. Exodus 34, 5 through 9. Now this is lengthy
and I have to start reading Well, we got a couple hours,
that's alright. Exodus 34, 5-9, And the Lord descended in the
cloud, and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the
Lord. Verse 6, And the Lord passed
by before him and proclaimed, The Lord, the Lord God, merciful
and gracious, longsuffering in abundance in goodness and truth,
keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression
and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty. visiting
the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and upon the children's
children to the third and fourth generation. And Moses made haste
and bowed his head toward the earth and worshiped. And he said,
if now I have found grace in your sight, O Lord, let my Lord,
I pray you go among us for it is a stiff neck people and pardon
our iniquity and our sin and take us for your inheritance."
What glorious statements indeed. There is forgiveness with God
and it is that God that is in Christ. Here's the third thing then in
regard to how we're to know that there's forgiveness with God.
The whole purpose of the law and all the ceremonies of the
Old Testament is designed to picture our need of this revelation
on the part of God. It is the message of all the
law and the ceremonies. It is the message of all the
Old Testament prophets. And let's see if we can find
one of those in our printed material here for just a moment. I'm not going to give you these
references. They're short and by the time you get there, you
won't have heard what I said. To him, give all the prophets
witness that through his name, whosoever believes in him shall
receive remission of sins. Then he said unto them, O fools
and slow of heart to believe, all that the prophets have spoken. Ought not Christ to have suffered
these things and to enter into his glory? And beginning at Moses
and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures
the things concerning himself." Now there's no better reading
this book when Christ reads it to us. explains it to us, makes
us able to comprehend and to understand. Now I'm just about
finished, so. The whole purpose of the law
and of the ceremonies is to reveal the grace of God to a sinner's
heart, enabling him to find, in the New Testament, the Pharisees,
the scribes, they found in that law exactly what they wanted,
anything they could twist and turn. But the real meaning is
far different from what they claim to see. So the purpose
of Christ coming, why did he come? Why did he come? When the angel was talking to
Joseph, when he was trying to figure out how he was going to
divorce, well they had not married at that time, how he was going
to dismiss Our Lord's mother, the angel
appeared to him and said, you shall call his name. He's not
born yet now, but here's the name. And it ain't got nothing
to do with your family or hers. It's God telling this man what
to name this boy. He said, you shall call his name
Jesus, which means Jehovah is salvation. And here, here, the
rest of that statement. Let's see. I got it right in front of me.
If I could just figure out. No, I don't. It's in, I know
where it is. Excuse me. I thought I could quote that
thing without getting mixed up. Well, I found it. And she shall bring forth a son,
referring to Mary, and you shall call his name Jesus, all capitalized,
for he shall save his people from their sins. That's why he
came. You think he's going back defeated?
Dream on. God does everything he intends
to do. He never fails. And our Lord
Jesus is God. She shall bring forth a son,
and you shall call his name Jesus. Matthew 1.21. For he shall save his people
from their sins. My oh my. Let's see, Brother Meyer this
morning had us looking at this, forget the text Bill, out of
Matthew I think it was, in regard to this matter of Christ
coming in the work of God the Holy Spirit. And in John chapter
16, we have these words, Nevertheless, I tell you the truth, it is expedient,
it's necessary that I go away. For if I go not away, the Comforter
will not come unto you, but if I depart, I'll send him unto
you. Christ speaking of God the Holy
Spirit that he would send them to the comfort of his people.
And when he has come, when the Holy Spirit has come, he will
reprove the world of righteousness. Now, why do you want to reprove
the world for righteousness? I thought that was to be desired.
Well, if it was genuine and real, it would. But when it's fake
and false, it isn't. If you know people that go around
letting it be known that they're holier than other people, you
need to just run as far as you can to get away from them. They're
lying, and you know it. When He has come, He'll reprove
the world of sin and of righteousness and of judgment, of sin because
they believe not on Me, Of righteousness, because I go to my Father, and
you see me no more. Of judgment, because the prince
of this world, namely the devil, is judged. Now how come the devil
can't interfere with what God's doing? Because he's on a chain,
and Christ has that chain in his hand. He does whatever Christ
lets him, and that's all and no more. There are so many places
in our Bibles that teach that very thing that you ought to
be able to find it without much difficulty. Judgment because the prince of
this world is judged. The Lord didn't ask his permission He didn't ask him to cooperate.
He just did it. God does things and it's not
hard. We do easy things and they're impossible. By Him, by Christ, all that believe are justified
from all things. from which you could not be justified
by the law of Moses. Revelation chapter 5, and they
sung a new song saying, you are worthy to take the book and open
the seals thereof for you were slain and have revealed us, redeemed
us to God by your blood out of every kindred and tongue and
people and nation. And has made us unto our God,
kings and priests, And we shall reign on the earth. Reign on the earth. What a day
that'll be. All right, I'm trying to be finished here.