Alright, Psalm 71. Now last week
we looked at verse 1, and if you just read that verse with
me together and recall some of the things we said there, it
says in verse 1, In thee, O Lord, do I put my trust, let me never
be put to confusion. Trust, of course, is reliance. We're depending upon God. We're
depending upon Him in every way, especially our deliverance from,
as he says in this very psalm, the deliverance from everything
that comes upon us because of our sin, and also because of
the trials that God has ordained in our lives to refine the faith
in Christ that He has given to us. So we live right now as sinners
looking to Christ to deliver us from our sin so that all that
our sin deserves from God doesn't come upon us because it came
upon our Savior who stood for us according to the gospel, that
Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, that He not
only died for our sins but was buried because his death was
real and our sins were no more remembered in that burial. And
he also rose for us, having put our sins away. Therefore, everything
related to our sins and our offenses against God has been answered
in the Lord Jesus Christ. God requires from us. He requires
obedience. He requires justice. upon us
for our disobedience. All that God requires, according
to the Gospel, is given for us in the Lord Jesus Christ, so
that everything that God requires is met fully in Christ. We can't
provide one part of it. And so, it's no wonder that the
psalmist says here, in Thee, O Lord, do I put my trust. Then
he says, let me never be put to confusion. Now, as I said
last week, sin brings confusion. Sin brings confusion because
it's the opposite of what we ought to do. It's the opposite
of what love would do, and yet we find ourselves confused when
we sin. We're confused before God. We
wonder if our hope is misplaced? Is it a false hope? Have we expected
salvation and blessings from God, and yet we find ourselves
afflicted and overcome by our sin? And so we're put into confusion. But when we see this, though,
in this scripture, because this was inspired by the Spirit of
God, for his people, he says, let me never be put to confusion.
It teaches us that it's God's grace to us to give us this plea
to reveal God's will to deliver his people so that they are not
put to confusion by any of their enemies, especially the enemy
of their sin. So that's his gift to us, this
prayer against sin. And we also need to remember
that strength against sin, this is important, Strength against
sin is in Christ alone. It's not in our resolve. It's
not in our New Year's resolution. It's not in our tears. We're
sorry for what we've done. Now we're going to fix it. We're
going to pull ourselves up out of the pit that we fell into.
The principle of scripture is that we can't get out of the
pit we fell into, the pit of our sin and guilt, because we're
impotent, we're without strength. When we were yet without strength,
Christ died for the ungodly. That's the scripture. You see,
that's from Romans 5 and verses 6 and following. So, we're without
strength, our strength is in Christ alone, therefore our strength
against sin is by faith in Christ alone. Strength against sin doesn't
come by our determination, our will, because our salvation didn't
come that way, did it? It says, it is not of him that
willeth. in Romans chapter 9. It is not
of him that runneth to run and strive and to try to finish the
race by our determination. It's not of our will. It's not
of our exerting, striving, and being strong. It's not of us.
The strength we need over sin is in Christ alone, and we have
it by faith alone, not by our work, not by our resolve, not
by our strength or determination or our will or anything that's
of us. Everything is by grace. It says in Romans chapter 6 and
verse 14, you are not under the law. Sin shall not have dominion
over you because you are not under the law. but you are under
grace, and the law means that it depends on our obedience,
and that we have to face the consequences for our disobedience. But grace means it depends upon
the obedience of our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, upon His
blood, because it was His obedience to His Father to God His Father that compelled
Him to shed His blood to take away the sins of His people.
So, this is the way we have strength against sin, to see that our
salvation is in Christ, accomplished by Him. We lay hold upon it and
we claim it by God's Word through faith in God's Word. through
the gospel, and this is the way we live. So strength against
sin here is told to us in verse 1 through trusting. In Thee,
O Lord, do I put my trust. Let me never be put to confusion,
not ashamed. because of my sin before God,
not ashamed before God, not ashamed of my Savior, that I trusted
Him for nothing because He can't fail. And so we see that. Also,
our strength here, our confusion, would be if God didn't save us
from not only our sin, but from death. which sin brings. I want to read this text of scripture
to you to remind you of this in Romans chapter 5 and verse
21. Let me just read this to you.
It says, I could just quote it, but I'm going to go ahead and
read it to make sure I get every word right. Listen to this. He
says, as sin hath reigned, like a king reigning, as sin hath
reigned unto death. So sin brings death. We can see
by that. Like a king, sin reigned over
us. We had no power against it. We
had to obey its every demand, our own sinful nature. Sin reigned
unto death. As that was the case before,
he says, even so might grace reign. Notice it's not our works,
but grace. Grace reign through righteousness,
but not ours, because he says, through righteousness unto eternal
life by Jesus Christ, our Lord. The righteousness and the life
is Christ's righteousness and His life, and that righteousness
is given to us, and on the basis of His righteousness, we're given
eternal life. It's all in the Lord Jesus Christ.
So these things show us that this first verse is teaching
us that our strength against sin, our deliverance from the
guilt of sin and the power of sin, are in the Lord. It says, in thee, O Lord, do
I put my trust, let me never be put to confusion. Alright,
so let's go on to the next verse in Psalm 71. He says, deliver
me in thy righteousness, and cause me to escape, incline thine
ear, and save me." Now, as I mentioned last time, the prayer of the
psalmist here is by the Spirit of God. And the Spirit of God
is moving the man of God here, the psalmist, to pray that in
delivering him from confusion, don't put me to confusion, but
deliver me in your righteousness. He wants God he wants to side
with God, he wants to agree with God that his deliverance has
to be according to his own requirements, the requirements of his own nature.
God's nature is that he cannot compromise the truth. He's not
going to short his law, he's not going to let his justice
go unsatisfied. God's law will be fulfilled. Every jot and every tittle, meaning
every little mark in God's law, will be fulfilled. Not the least
part of it will fall or fail. And so Jesus, mentioning that,
he says, don't think that I came to destroy the law and the prophets,
but to fulfill it. The Lord Jesus Christ came to
fulfill the law of God. He came to meet every requirement
God had for His people. And this requirement that God
has is according to God's own nature. So it was God's own character,
His nature, that created the requirement that we obey Him,
not just obey Him, but love Him. And yet the demands of the law
of God provide no strength, no motive in us for love. It requires
us to love, but it doesn't produce the love that it requires. And
we can't obey God without love. But our heart is so naturally
inclined to put ourselves first before God that we serve ourselves. So we serve ourselves. If we
want something, we make sure that we're taken care of. If
we need honor, we make sure that we get it. If we have any kind
of problem with what God has said, then we claim that God
isn't fair, and we hold God to our own personal judgment. And
of course, all of this shows that we put ourselves on the
throne instead of loving God and loving Him to rule over us. That's the nature of sin. But
the prayer here is given to the heart of the believer to say,
no, no, don't save me in any compromise to your righteousness,
to your own character as God. And so God has to fulfill that
requirement. He has to fulfill the obedience
that He required. He has to satisfy the justice
that was offended by our disobedience. And that He did in the Lord Jesus
Christ. And so when I mentioned before
that we live by faith on Christ, that's our only strength against
sin, this is the way we live. This is the way we come to God.
We can't get strength. We have no strength without coming
to God for it. And the only way we can be heard,
the only way we can be accepted in our coming to God, the only
way God will allow us to come is in the Lord Jesus Christ.
We can't come on our own. We're sinners, we're enemies,
in our mind, by wicked works, we don't understand, there's
none righteous, no not one. All these things are statements
of scripture about our condition. But in the Lord Jesus Christ,
all of this is taken care of, and so he says, deliver me in
thy righteousness, which the Lord Jesus Christ is for his
people. He himself, by his obedience,
in shedding his blood, which was an act of love, incomparable,
immeasurable love, that fulfilled all of God's law, laying his
life down for sinners, who were the enemies of God, to take away
their sins, to clothe them in his perfect righteousness, and
give that righteousness to them, and then therefore reward them
for that righteousness that was his given to them with everlasting
life, because it's an everlasting righteousness. And so this prayer,
deliver me in thy righteousness and cause me to escape, incline
thine ear to me and save me, is all consistent with the gospel. God delivers us through Christ,
who is our righteousness. He causes us to escape. Notice
the emphasis is here, let me or enable me, but cause me to
escape. This is asking God to do something
to make it happen, cause me to escape. and then inclined thine
ear to me." You get the sense in this phrase, cause me to escape,
of someone coming up to an entangled animal in a trap, releasing them
from the trap, and then setting them free again. And that's the
picture of redemption, isn't it? Christ, by His blood, purchased
us out of the condemnation of death that we deserved and out
of the bondage of our sin and God's law that we were under,
and he freed us because in Christ we were delivered from all of
our sin, from death, from the grave, from hell, from everything,
from the wrath of God itself, and also released from our sin
nature, because Christ will have dominion even over that. And
so he says, incline thine ear, cause me to escape, incline your
ear and save me. And the believer, this is the
way we start, this is the way we continue, this is the way
we finish our life. Cause me to escape, deliver me
in your righteousness, incline your ear and save me. And don't
you love to be able to take those words directly out of God's Word
in prayer to the Lord? You don't need to look to yourself
to see if you've got something that will make God listen to
you, do you? Every time we come to God, every
time we come to God, we come the same way, as a sinner, with
nothing to plead but what God has done in Christ, to show mercy
to sinners. We have no other plea. And we
should never think ourselves more capable or more acceptable
in coming to God because we've been doing something, maybe we've
been praying more, maybe we've been reading more, or doing things
in service to others more. Who knows? We make up things
that give us some confidence before God. And all that's wrong. It's wrong to consider ourselves
for recognition from God or acceptance from God in anything that we
think or do, anything from us. That's the beginning point of
the Gospel, is that we're sinners only, and we can't produce one
shred of obedience to God, and therefore God has to accept us
on the basis of the Lord Jesus Christ and His shed blood alone,
and that's our only plea. So this prayer is always appropriate. It's always appropriate, every
moment, every day of our lives. And if we find ourselves with
this attitude of greater assumption that God is going
to hear us because we don't feel the guilt of our sins and we
feel like we have some clarity now we can get to God better
or something, that's wrong. It's wrong. The only way to come
is like the publican at all times, God, be merciful to me, the sinner. That's the man that went down
to his house justified. And as you have received Christ
Jesus the Lord, that's the way we are to walk in Him, the same
way. Alright, then he goes on, he says in verse 3, Be thou my
strong habitation, Christ is our, is where we dwell, we dwell
in him, whereunto I may continually resort, thou hast given commandment
to save me, for thou art my rock and my fortress. Now the Lord
has given commandment to save his people. Jesus said in John
10, 16 that he has sheep, and all of his sheep whether they were of that group
of men that were with him then when he spoke those words, the
disciples or the believers who were not his apostles, at that
time he said, other sheep I have which are not of this fold, them
also, underscore, I must bring. Not one of the Lord's people
will be lost because God has given commandment to save them. And the Lord Jesus Christ fulfilled
that commandment when he hung on the cross and said, it is
finished. It is finished. In Hebrews 1.3,
he says, when he had by himself purged our sins, he sat down
on the right hand of the Majesty on high, because it was finished.
The work was perfect. Nothing could be added to it.
No one contributed to it. Christ did it by himself. Our
sins were washed from us. in the presence of God, and that
cleansing in God's presence was applied to us when we heard the
good news through the power of the life-giving Spirit of God
who caused us to see this with this persuasion of faith that
laid hold on and embraced and trusted Christ for everything
in all that God requires for us. We came to that point, or
we're continually being brought to this in our own experience,
that my only answer to God for all that he requires is the answer
Christ has given. In fact, I can't even give that
answer. Christ has to give himself for
me to God. He entered once into the holy
place in heaven by the eternal spirit, and he obtained our eternal
redemption when he offered his blood there in heaven. That's
from Hebrews chapter 9 and verse 12. So, Christ is our habitation. In Psalm 90 he says, Lord, thou
hast been our dwelling place in all generations. From everlasting
to everlasting thou art God. As long as God has been God,
Christ has been his anointed, and we have been in Christ by
God's eternal will, and therefore God has been our dwelling place
in all generations." And here he says it, be my strong habitation. We take the things of God that
have been revealed in the Word of God, we take them in our prayers,
in our minds, in our hearts, and we lay hold upon them. That's
what faith is doing, and we're offering these things in prayer
to God. That's what children do. I have
a granddaughter who's about two years old, and she's like a little
parrot. Everything you tell her, she just says it back. And what
better way to come to the Lord than just simply agree with Him?
And here's your word, this is what you said, and this is what
I'm taking back to you. We're borrowing His words and
we're returning to Him what He's given to us. And isn't that what
Solomon prayed? He says, what can we give to
you that you haven't first given to us? We simply are giving to
you what you have first given to us, of what you've given. That's what we're giving back.
And so we take his word the same way, from in our hearts. You've
opened our hearts to the gospel. You've given us your word. We
take it back to you in prayer. This is the communion we have
with God. We're just munging on these things
of God, like the rich, juicy, delicious food that Christ is
to our souls in His crucifixion for taking away our sins, for
making us holy before God by His own shed blood. So He's our
habitation. And we continually resort to
him, not just once, continually. And he goes on, be my strong
habitation where unto I may continually resort. Thou hast given commandment
to save me, for thou art my rock and my fortress. God made himself
our God. We didn't. We didn't make God
our God. He made Himself our God. He says,
I will be a God to them, and they shall be my people. That
was His pledge to us in the New Covenant. So God owns His people. This is such a glorious truth
of Scripture. God owns His people. He says
in Exodus 315, I am the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob. He tells us who he's the God
of, doesn't he? Not the God of Pharaoh, not the
God of Cain, not the God of Balaam. Not the God of those who perished
in the flood, but the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Do
you see that? The God and Father, Scripture
says, of our Lord Jesus Christ. How do we know God? The God and
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. We wouldn't know God if it weren't
for Christ. And God is so connected to his people that he made an
everlasting covenant where he named them and made them and
their names part of his name. When he told Moses to tell the
people of Israel who sent Moses to them, he said, tell them the
God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob. Who is this
God? The God of your fathers. The God of the covenant. with
his people, which he made with them in the Lord Jesus Christ.
And so that's what he's saying here. Thou art my rock and my
fortress. God made himself our rock. on which we stand and nothing
can shake us, and our fortress where we may seek shelter from
the eternal wrath of God, from all the consequences of our sin
and every enemy against us because of our sin, He's our shelter.
Isn't it amazing grace that God would make Himself our shelter
against His own law and justice and wrath? And he did this in
the blood of his son. When we were enemies, Romans
5.10 says, if when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God, put
at peace with God. by the death of his son, much
more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. Just as
we began being reconciled by the death of Christ, we're going
to be saved by the one who died for us, who loved us and died
for us and rose again and lives and reigns and makes intercession
for us. We'll be saved by his life. All
right, he's our rock, he's our fortress, and because of that,
he has given commandment to save us. If God is our rock, if he
is our fortress, and he is by his own word, then he has given
commandment. Save. Save that one. That one that I've named, I've
written his name in the Lamb's Book of Life. What is that Lamb's
Book of Life? You think about that for a minute, just for a
moment. Think about this for a moment
with me. What is the Lamb's Book of Life? Is there a book in heaven
with papyrus or some kind of pages and ink on it? Does God
need to write things in a physical book? No. Now, where is this
book then? Well, if you remember, when the
high priest would go into the Holy of Holies, he bore on his
breastplate the names of the children of Israel. And if they
were there, those were the people he represented. And when he went
in to make atonement and came out having made atonement, God
was reconciled to them. And no one could charge them
because they were the people of God. They were His elect,
those for whom Christ died. Therefore, the Lamb's Book of
Life is the very heart of the Lord Jesus Christ, where God
has inscribed the names of His people, where they are there
when He went to God. When He went there with His blood,
it was for them. Christ died for our sins, according
to the scripture. When He rose again from the dead,
He was raised again because of our justification. Delivered
for our offenses, because we sinned, He bore our sins, therefore
He was delivered to death, but He rose again because in His
death God justified Him and His people with Him, and therefore
He rose again from the dead. So our sins are put away. God
has declared us. He assessed. He made judgment.
He passed judgment. He said, justified, righteous
in the Lord Jesus Christ. All sins removed. Never have
they ever sinned. Because in Christ their sins
are gone. They're gone. Farther than the east is from
the west. Buried. Put out of mind. Never to be
remembered. These are the words of God. What
a blessing it is. My strong habitation and the
Lord is continuously this to his people. We always need this
salvation. Continuous means, I need it all
the time. Continuous means, I'm not going
to seek anything else except how God has saved me from my
sins, and I need to be saved now. This life we live now, whether
it's a one year life, or a ten year, or twenty, or a hundred
year life, seventy, it doesn't matter what it is. Every day
of our life, if we're the Lord's people, He's going to be teaching
us until the end of our life that our salvation is in Christ
alone. We bring nothing. In spite of
ourselves, God has saved us. In spite of all that we are,
we didn't do anything to obtain this or keep this. God has done
it all in Christ. And as soon as we see that, you
know what happens? We are suddenly at peace, aren't we? Oh, you
mean it's not dependent upon me? That's a good thing because
I've never been able to quite feel like I could do it, or do
it right, or do it enough, or do whatever was required of me.
I failed over and over again. I can't even tell you how many
times. Millions of times every day.
It's unbelievable that God would even consider me. The reason
why is because He doesn't base His grace to us on anything in
us. He looks to His Son and He says,
yeah, that's enough. There is satisfaction, there
is righteousness, and therefore blessings are given to us by
grace alone. All right. So this is our continuous
situation. And now I want to go on to the
next verse in verse 4 of Psalm 71. Look at this together with
me. He says, Deliver me, O my God, out of the hand of the wicked. and out of the hand of the unrighteous
and cruel man, for thou art my hope, O Lord God, thou art my
trust from my youth." All right. Now consider this. A lot of times
we think, well, is that talking about the guy down at the grocery
store who got in front of me in line? Is that the guy that
was unrighteous? He's talking about deliver me
out of his, or maybe it was the IRS man. Or maybe it was the
guy at work who lied about me and then my boss, you know, he
docked my pay or he fired me or something. Is that the wicked
man? Who is this that he's talking about here? Maybe I don't have someone that
corresponds to this wicked man in my life because I'm just not
godly enough. I don't have someone trying to
put me to death for the sake of Christ. I don't know, you
know, and we're confused. What does this actually mean?
And I think I have found help with this in the book of Romans.
And I've told my wife, and maybe I've said it here a number of
times already, but I find that every time that we open the scriptures,
I can't hardly avoid going to Romans chapter 8. So look with
me here at Romans chapter 8, because This scripture here explains
so much. In Romans chapter 8, I'll just
pick this up in verse 29. Notice he says here, in Romans
8, 29, he's talking about God the Father, for whom he did foreknow. God knew before, He knew before,
before we knew Him, before we were born, before Christ even
came into the world. And this knowledge of us wasn't
just like, yeah, I know, He's going to be five foot ten and
a half, He's going to have this color of eyes and hair and, you
know, He'll have this character, this personality. That's not
what He's talking about. is talking about a love from
God. When He knows us, He knows us
in love. Jesus told those who appear before
Him in Matthew 7, I never knew you. I never knew you. He knew
all about them, physically. And He knew about their minds
and thoughts. He knew it in that sense. But
He never knew them in a saving love. And that's what this is
talking about here. For whom He did foreknow, He also did,
I'm sorry, He also did predestinate, that means He, He ordained everything
necessary to achieve this goal. Predestinate, he destined before.
to be conformed to the image of his son." That's a perfect
image. And God put this in place, didn't
it? You weren't there. God knew you. You didn't know him. It was a
knowledge of love. And it was out of that knowledge
of love, he made a full, unalterable destination that you would follow
in the course of history, in all the events of history, in
order to fulfill this, that you would be conformed to the image
of Christ, His Son. And there's nothing lacking in
that, is there? So, you can see that salvation is all of God,
can't you? Then he goes on, that he, Christ,
might be the firstborn among many brethren. So, not only did
he predestinate us, but he predestinated us to be conformed to the image
of Christ, but to be his children, because Christ is the firstborn
among many brethren. We're children of God, by God's
foreknowledge and predestination. He goes on, moreover, whom he
did predestinate, them he also called. He sent his preacher
and by his spirit opened their heart when they heard the message
of Christ and him crucified. They were convinced by God. This
is the very truth of God of heaven. This is how God is glorified.
This is his nature that he would accomplish all of his will in
the salvation of his people by grace alone without their contribution
in spite of their sin and bring them to glory. And God would
do it and get all the credit for it. And so he called them
by that gospel. And then whom he called them,
he also justified. He opened their hearts not only
to hear, but to realize that they were righteous in what Christ
did, and God justified them when he considered what Christ accomplished.
He justified them for the obedience and blood of Christ. And then
he goes on, he justified them, and whom he justified them he
also glorified. Not only did Christ rise from
the dead for our justification, but when he rose and ascended
and took his seat at the right hand of God, all of his people
also ascended and receded at the right hand of God. We were
made alive with Christ, Ephesians 2 verses 5 and 6. And then in
verse 31 of Romans 8, he says, what shall we then say to these
things? A good question. What are we
going to say? What's the conclusion? Can we draw a proposition from
this? Yes. Here it is. If God be for us,
who can be against us? Okay, notice, who. You see that
little word? That's a person. Or it's at least
a personification of whoever is against us. You see? Now,
let's see who he's talking about. He that spared not His own Son,
that's God the Father, but delivered Him up for us all, delivered
Him up on the cross to bear our sins and the punishment of our
sins, how shall He not with Him, God the Father with Christ, also
freely, without anything from us, unbounded, freely give us
all things with Christ? Amazing. If he gave Christ for
us in death, then he's going to give us everything he gave
to Christ. That's what he's saying here. Which means that everyone
for whom Christ died is going to receive everlasting life and
eternal glory. That's what this means. There's
no breaking of this chain. It goes on. In verse 33, who
shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? Who can actually
bring one accusation to God against His elect? What do you think
the answer to that is? Well, the answer is, hold on,
buddy. You're going to charge one of
these that God loved before and predestinated to be conformed
to the image of His Son, that He might be one of His children,
and Christ might be the firstborn among all these brethren, and
that these that He so predestined, He called? and gave life to,
and showed them their justification in Christ, that it was by his
blood and righteousness, and not because of anything in them,
not even their faith, but this faith is given to them to see
that Christ accomplished all, and that he didn't deliver up
his son, therefore he's gonna give them all things with Christ.
Are you gonna charge one of them? Are you really gonna call up
the preacher and tell the preacher what this member of his church
has done? So that you would accuse one
of those people that he's preaching the gospel to and telling them
that they're forgiven in Christ and justified by the work of
Christ? Are you going to accuse one of those? And the Lord says,
well, if you do, recognize this, it is God that justifieth. That means you're standing against
the judgment of God for this person that you're charging.
one of his elect. And this also means that since
they were his elect before the foundation of the world, nothing
since eternity could be laid to their charge. Because God
laid all of the charges against them on his son. And Christ took
them and bore them as his own. He goes on in verse 34, Who is
he that condemneth? Can anyone condemn to death?
Or condemn for any evidence against God's people? No. It's Christ
that died. If there was something, and there
was, Christ has borne it. That's why He died. He didn't
die just as an example. He actually died because of the
sins that were laid on Him. And since He died for their sins,
and God raised Him up, God accepted full payment. And Christ paid
with His blood to have them. Now, are you going to condemn
one of those that Christ purchased with his own blood? He's going
to have them. He bought them. And you're going
to buy them back with an accusation that he answered before God in
the throne of heaven? You see what he's saying here?
And all of these things are spoken as if he's speaking to an enemy
of God's people. An enemy who opposes God's eternal
purpose and Christ's justifying death for them, and God's judgment
of what Christ did for them from eternity, you see. And so this
entity, this person or this thing that's personified here with
the word who is the enemy, the wicked, the unrighteous, the
cruel man, you see. And so he goes on to describe
this personage. He goes, who shall separate us? Verse 35, Romans 8. Who shall
separate us from the love of Christ? Who is going to do that? It's like you see a man and his
wife, and are you going to go up to that man and say, I'm going
to take your wife from you? You're not going to do that without
the opposition, without this man coming down with you with
everything he has, right? Now you're going to the husband
of God's people, and you're going to try to separate them from
his love? No. And he lists them. Notice these
personages, shall tribulation, How about distress? They have
this internal conflict. They don't know what to do in
this situation, and they're in danger, and they have no strength,
and they cry out like someone chased by a strong enemy, a bear,
a lion, or a devil. Shall tribulation? Shall distress?
How about persecution? Or famine? Or nakedness? Peril? Or sword? You see all these things?
These things are all spoken of here as the wicked, the cruel,
the unrighteous, because they come and oppose God's people. Jesus said, if you've done it
to the least of these, my brethren, you've done it to me. If an enemy
attacks one of Christ, they're attacking Christ. And so, who's
going to do that? Who shall separate us from the
love of Christ? Who? Not our sin. He already answered that one.
Because none can lay anything to their charge. Christ died
for them. You can't accuse them on either of those grounds. So
he goes on, as it is written, for thy sake we are killed all
the day long. This is verse 36. We are counted as sheep for the
slaughter. Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors
through him that loved us. For I am persuaded," again, he's
going to list these things, that neither death, nor life, nor
angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor
things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature,
nothing in all of God's creation. And that includes everything.
that's not God. God obviously is for us. Who
can be against us? Anything in the created universe?
No! Because the Creator and the Redeemer
of our souls is for us. And so now if we look back at
Psalm 71 verse 4 and read it in that light here, he says,
Deliver me, O my God, out of the hand of the wicked, out of
the hand of the unrighteous and cruel man. Personifying all of
our enemies are sin, the devil, the law of God, the justice of
God, all these things that are against us, God has already answered
his own law. He has fulfilled it and is justice.
He has satisfied it. In the court, the supreme court,
the supreme judge of all things has received the plea, the answer
of Christ, our surety. our Redeemer, our Substitute,
our Head, our Husband. And Christ has offered Himself,
and God has accepted Him for us, and accepted us with Him,
and given us all things with Him. This is God's will. It's
revealed in Scripture. Can you see it? Not with physical
eyes, can you? Can you feel it? No. But we have
God's Word on it. And see, this is the principle. that we trust in the Lord. Verse
1, in Thee, O Lord, do I put my trust. We trust God's Word.
Go outside, it feels sunny and warm, we're happy. You go outside,
it's windy and cold, not happy. Go outside, it's hot, blistering,
the north dry wind is blowing, not happy. When things are going
well, I feel better. But that's not the way that faith
works. We don't walk by sight. We walk
by faith. We live upon Christ who died
for us, the one who loved us and gave himself for us. And
see, this is how the prayer of the psalmist is being given up.
God's going to deliver us from everything that's against us.
The unrighteous, the cruel man, the wicked man. It may be a physical
man, or it may be a woman, it may be a child, it may be a tree
falling on us. We don't know what it is, a hurricane,
a tornado, but whatever it is, the Lord, even though He says
here in Romans 8 that we're delivered as sheep to the slaughter, even
though it's God's will, that He would prove His unfailing
grace to save us from all of our enemies, even death itself. He's going to prove his word
faithful. He's going to prove himself faithful
to deliver us from all of them and present us in the presence
of his glory without fault and without blame with joy unspeakable. And faith says, yes, that's the
truth. Amen to that, you see. And so
that's what he's saying here in verse four. Deliver me, oh
my God, out of the hand of the wicked, the hand of the unrighteous,
the cruel man, cruel against God's people. Wicked because
he opposes God's purpose for his elect. He opposes Christ's
work. He opposes Christ's glory. This
is the wicked. And where is this enemy found
the most strong? It's the enemy within us, isn't
it? It's that sin that remains in
us. And yet, Here's the promise of
Scripture, that Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, who saved
us from our sins on the cross, is going to deliver us from that
old man. And He is going to do it by His
Spirit, through faith in His finished work. Faith in Him who
reigns, faith in Him who gave Himself for us. He's going to
do the work, and what are we? We're sheep. He's going to hold
us, and He's going to keep us. In 1 Peter chapter 1, He says
we're kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation
ready to be revealed in the last time. through faith, not through
our works, by grace, not through our merit, but Christ's merit,
and not by our sight or sense or any of those things, but God's
word in the gospel of Christ alone. This is something, we
just have to learn this over and over again, don't we? By
experience, troubles come and we're left hanging on these prayers
that God has given us. Lord, deliver me from these things,
whether it be tribulation or distress or persecution or famine,
nakedness, peril, sword. It doesn't matter if it's things
present or things to come, life or death, principalities, angels,
powers, it doesn't matter. Deliver me from them all, especially
deliver me from my own sinful self. Isn't that what we pray?
Deliver me, save me from my sins. Let's pray.