Psalm chapter 45. I want to read
through this psalm with you. It probably is familiar to you
and it's a psalm that I have often considered and have really
been amazed at this psalm at how much it means to us as believers
in Christ. But thinking about it has actually
heightened my awareness of what it's talking about and so I'm
I'm prayerful that all of us tonight benefit from reading
this psalm and considering God's message to us in it. Let's read
from verse one, Psalm 45. My heart is indicting a good
matter. I speak of the things which I
have made touching the king. My tongue is the pen of a ready
writer. Thou art fairer than the children
of men." Now this is the pouring forth of the writer of this psalm. He first begins by talking about
how the subject matter is just whelming up inside of him and
now he gets right into it and he speaks directly to the king. He says, Thou art fairer than
the children of men. Grace is poured into thy lips. Therefore God has blessed thee
forever. So in these first two verses
we see the Trinity of God in it. First of all, the heart of
the psalmist is overflowing and compelled to speak. And he speaks
of the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the one God has blessed
forever. Grace is poured into his lips.
He's fairer than the children of men. But he speaks also of
God the Father, because he says, God has blessed thee forever.
Look at verse 3. Gird thy sword upon thy thigh,
O Most Mighty, with thy glory and thy majesty, and in thy majesty
ride prosperously, because of truth and meekness and righteousness,
and thy right hand shall teach thee terrible things. Thine arrows
are sharp in the heart of the king's enemies, whereby the people
fall under Thee. Thy throne, O God, is forever
and ever. The scepter of Thy kingdom is
a right scepter. Thou lovest righteousness and
hatest wickedness. Therefore God, Thy God, hath
anointed Thee with the oil of gladness above Thy fellows. All thy garments smell of myrrh
and aloes and cassia out of the ivory palaces whereby they have
made thee glad. Verse nine. Verse nine. King's
daughters were among thy honorable women. Upon thy right hand did
stand the queen in gold of Ophir. Hearken, O daughter, and consider
and incline thine ear. Forget also thine own people
and thy father's house. So shall the king greatly desire
thy beauty, for he is thy lord, and worship thou him. And the
daughter of Tyre shall be there with a gift. Even the rich among
thy people shall entreat thy favor. The king's daughter is
all glorious within. Her clothing is of wrought gold. She shall be brought to the king
in raiment of needlework. The virgins, her companions that
follow her, shall be brought to thee. With gladness and rejoicing
shall they be brought. They shall enter into the king's
palace. Instead of thy fathers shall
be thy children, whom thou mayest make princes in all the earth. I will make thy name to be remembered
in all generations. Therefore shall the people praise
thee forever and ever. Clearly this psalm is speaking
about the greatness of the King. The one here spoken of is no,
there's no question that this is speaking about the Lord Jesus
Christ. This verse in verse 6, Thy throne,
O God, is forever and ever, is quoted in Hebrews chapter 1.
And in Hebrews chapter 1, the first few verses is talking about
the Son of God. He says here in Hebrews chapter
1 and verse 6, He says, When He bringeth in the first begotten
into the world, He saith, Let all the angels of God worship
Him. And of the angels, he saith,
who maketh his angels spirits, and his ministers a flame of
fire. But unto the sun, he saith, thy
throne, O God, is for ever and ever. A scepter of righteousness
is the scepter of thy kingdom. Thou hast loved righteousness
and hated iniquity. Therefore God, even thy God,
hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows. That's clearly talking about
the same text of scripture here in Psalm chapter 45. And from
Hebrews chapter 1, the Spirit of God led the apostle to write
of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who is the one who
is anointed by God to be the Savior, the Prince of his people,
the King. And so this Psalm, in Psalm chapter
45, without question, is talking about the Lord Jesus Christ,
who is the Son of God. And it's talking to Him, it's
addressing Him as the King. And we know from Scripture, and
I'll go back to Hebrews 1 to read this to you, we know from
Scripture that as the King, The Lord Jesus Christ was the king.
When he came into the world, he was born and the wise men
came and worshiped him and brought the gifts that are listed in
Luke chapter one. But if you realize that he was
not only born as the son of David, but he was born according to
the promise of God to David to be the king over his people.
This was the promise of God through the Old Testament and the New
and is fulfilled, especially not only was it true of him when
he came into the world, he was king, but it wasn't evident. It wasn't clear by looking at
him that he was a king because in his life he was a servant
and he went about serving In fact, serving the poorest of
people. He served poor people. He served those who were out
of the way. And it was in that role as a
servant to all that he was fulfilling the will of God. And in fulfilling
the will of God as the servant, making himself the lowest of
all, then after having completed the will of God, he asked his
father in John 17 that he would give him the glory that he had
with his father before the world was. So there's a point when
Christ, who is the king and has always been the anointed king,
the king chosen by God and ordained to be a king over his people,
when his kingship, his rule as king, was put into force evidently. So then he ascended, he rose
from the grave, he ascended, and he was enthroned in glory,
in power, and all of his majesty. And so in Hebrews chapter one,
where we were just reading in verse three, notice he says,
Christ being the brightness of God's glory, the express image
of his person and upholding all things by the word of his power.
So here you see the divine nature of Christ as the son of God.
He says, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on
the right hand of the majesty on high. So throughout the New
Testament, we see in the preaching of the gospel and in verses like
this, throughout the New Testament, we see Christ exalted, Christ
enthroned, Christ put in the highest place of honor and power
and authority. In the end of Matthew 28, he
says, all power is given to me in heaven and in earth. In First
Peter 3, 22, he says he's been made to sit down as the ruler
over all principalities and powers in heaven, on the throne of heaven.
So these things show us that the Lord Jesus Christ was not
only ordained to be king, but he was king by God's appointment,
and he was anointed as king when he came into the world, but the
king, in this case, came as a humble servant in order to do the will
of God and to conquer the enemies of his people by his obedience
unto death, and that submission, by that submission to the will
of God, He not only fulfilled all of God's will, but God then
exalted and extolled and enthroned and proclaimed his name as being
worthy of all worship and praise and honor and gave him all authority
over all things in heaven and earth in order to execute whatever
he wanted to do his will in the armies of heaven and on earth
among the inhabitants of the earth. And so when we read Psalm
45 about the exaltation of Christ, We have to keep in mind that
this exaltation occurred as a result of not only his appointment and
his being anointed as king, but actually accomplishing the will,
the work God gave him to do, and having finished that work,
sitting down at the right hand of God in his majesty, in all
of his evident majesty as the king of kings and the Lord of
lords, the King of Heaven and the King of Earth. So here we
have the Lord Jesus Christ. And I emphasize and underline
that word Christ, that title given to him, which denotes his
place as our prophet, the one through whom God has spoken and
in whom God has spoken to his people, made himself known in
him as our prophet, our priest, the one who brings us to God,
who makes satisfaction to God for us and does for God all that
God requires and then as king to rule over us and save us from
our enemies. And this is what he did and this
is what is being celebrated in this psalm. So here we have Christ
exalted because he accomplished our redemption. Now, that is
what is welling up in the heart of the psalmist, who I'm assuming
here was King David. It doesn't say his name, but
it's probably most likely King David. He's a sweet psalmist
of Israel. He's speaking about his own son after the flesh and
of his Lord, the Lord Jesus Christ. God had promised him he would
be king. And so let's pick it up now in
verse, the very first part of the psalm, and if you read it
in my Bible, it has the text before verse one that reads this
way, to the chief musician, upon Shoshamun, and I'm probably not
pronouncing that right, Shoshanim, S-H-O-S-H-A-N-I-M, Shoshanim,
and then it says, for the sons of Korah, Maskil, a song of loves. A song of love. So this song, this psalm, is
teaching us by the inspiration of the Spirit of God, of the
love of the Lord Jesus Christ for his people. But not just
his love for her, but her love for him. It's a song of love. And the word that I'm having
trouble pronouncing, which is shoshanim, according to John
Gill, it means lilies, like lilies you would find in a field. And
it's really a term in scripture, that term lilies, that's applied
both to the Lord Jesus Christ and to his people. Now, I want
to tell you what Robert Hocker said about these kinds of terms.
not on this particular verse, but of another place in Scripture,
of the rose of Sharon, the lily of the valley. It says this,
if you have your Bibles handy and you want to turn to Song
of Solomon, In chapter 2, in verse 1, it says, and this is
the Lord Jesus Christ speaking here, I am the rose of Sharon
and the lily of the valleys. Now, that's not the only place
this term lily is used in Song of Solomon. In fact, in the same
chapter, He says this in chapter 16, my beloved is mine and I am his,
he feedeth among the lilies. So here we see Christ in the
first verse of Song of Solomon as the rose of Sharon and the
lily of the valleys. And then in verse 16, and this
isn't the only place, but here also in chapter two, Song of
Solomon, chapter two, verse 16, he says, he feeds among the lilies. He feeds among the lilies. So,
and there's other places in the Song of Solomon In verse 13 of
chapter 5, he says, his cheeks are as a bed of spices, as sweet
flowers, his lips are like the lilies. And you know what a lily
looks like. A lily is white, very white and
very beautiful, and they grow well, especially in the shade. So I was looking for the other
place in chapter six of Song of Solomon, but I'm not seeing
it right this second. But in any case, what you see
is in the Book of Solomon, the term lily is applied to the Lord
Jesus Christ and is applied to his people, the church. He feeds
among the lilies and Christ is the lily of the valley. And I
wanted to point this out to you, what Robert Hocker said, because
I found it very, very good. He said that sometimes in scripture,
like in Song of Solomon two, verse one, commentators will
say, well, this applies to the church or others, this applies
to Christ. So that it's not clear, even
by the spirit of God, whether God intended those words to apply
to the Lord Jesus or to his people, the church. And Robert Hocker
points out that he thinks that that is on purpose, that God
obviously is on purpose, that God purposefully left it somewhat
ambiguous in order that we might apply it to both to the Lord
Jesus and to his people because they're so closely related that
there's a union between them and that Christ as the lily of
the valley, the one who is beautiful and pure in his white righteousness,
the purity of his nature and in his righteousness, Is a rose
of Sharon? A rose is very fragrant and has
a color of blush, usually, or maybe red. And we apply that
to the beauty. Sometimes in poetry, oftentimes
in poetry, a woman is compared to the beauty of a rose. And
so here we have the rose of Sharon and the lily of the valley speaking
of the Lord Jesus Christ. But I also want to take you to
Matthew chapter 6, and I'm spending all this time on this one word,
shoshanim, in Psalm 45. But in Matthew chapter 6, just
take a look at these words here that Jesus used. And I never
thought of this until I was reading it. today, but in Matthew chapter
6 and verse 28, Jesus says this, he says, why take ye thought
for your raiment, your clothes? Consider the lilies of the field. And I'm sure that the Lord Jesus,
without a doubt, didn't just use that word by chance. He didn't
just use this comparison, as I've always thought of this verse,
as simply applying to the beauty of a flower in the field. And
sometimes I'll see a flower, like a poppy or some other flower,
and I think, it's so gorgeous, it's so beautiful, it's so rich
in its color and its texture. And in the depth of the flower's
beauty, you just want to look at it, take a picture of it,
hang it on the wall, send it to your friends or whatever here.
But the Lord Jesus didn't just use this word by chance. I really
think that he's taking this word from the comparison given in
the Song of Solomon by the Spirit of God of Christ and His people. Of Christ, because He is the
lily of the valley and of His people, because their beauty,
their purity, their white raiment, if you will, is given from Him. It's His righteousness. So look
at these words now in Matthew 6, 28. He says, why do you take
thought for your clothes? Consider the lilies of the field,
how they grow, they toil not, neither do they spin. And I say
to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like
one of these. All right. Now we see the comparison
here. Back to Psalm 45. The Lord Jesus
Christ, the lily of the valley and his people called the lilies
he feeds among them. They are given His own beauty. His beauty is put upon them as
their clothing. So why do you take thought? Why
do you take thought? The very beauty of Christ is
given to His people. And you see it there in those
two scriptures connected together here. But let's look back now
at Psalm 45. That was the word shoshanim in
the very beginning of the psalm. And it means, according to John
Gill, lilies. All right. But I want to also
point out that this is a song or psalm of love. So it teaches
us about Christ's love for his church. And, you know, he did,
don't you? In Ephesians 5, 25, husbands
love your wives, even as Christ loved the church. And what did
he do because of that love? And gave himself for it. The church. Paul the apostle
said in Galatians 2.20, the son of God who loved me and gave
himself for me. And then also I want to point
out this text of scripture to you, a very precious one, in
Revelation chapter one and verse five, where he says this, Revelation
one verse five, he says, unto him, Revelation 1.5, he says,
unto him from Jesus Christ who is the faithful witness and the
first begotten of the dead and the prince of the kings of the
earth, king of kings, the prince of the kings of the earth, unto
him, the king of kings that loved us And what did He do? He washed
us from our sins in His own blood. That's why He is exalted as God
and man in one person, as King over all, because He washed us
from our sins in His own blood. He said in his prayer in John
17 and verse 3, I mean verse 4 and 5 of the Gospel of John
chapter 17, he says this in his prayer to his father. Let me
read that to you. He says in verse 4, I have glorified thee
on the earth. How? I have finished the work
which thou gavest me to do. I made known My father, my God
and my father to my disciples. I've given to them his words. I've glorified thee. I have I
have made him known in all of his glory in my own self is what
he's saying here in his work, because that's the way we know
him, isn't it? His saving work. He says, I have glorified thee
on the earth. I have finished the work which thou gavest me
to do. And now, oh father, glorify thou
me with thine own self. with the glory which I had with
thee before the world was." So here, a double glory as Son of
God and Son of Man laid upon Him as our mediator. God anointed
Him as our mediator, to be our mediator, to bring us to God,
to wash us from our sins because of His love. He loved the church
and gave himself for it. He said, I am the good shepherd.
I laid down my life for the sheep. There's so many places in scripture
where God has told us of the love of the Lord Jesus Christ
for his own. And this is a psalm celebrating
that love in victory because he's exalted in heaven. All right,
I wanted to not only talk about the lilies and the fact that
Christ is the lily of the valley, but I also wanted to get into
the first verse of Psalm 45 here, where he says this, My heart
is indicting a good matter. I speak of the things which I
have made touching the King. My tongue is the pen of a ready
writer. My wife used to take shorthand.
She learned that skill in high school and it was part of her
education. They don't teach that anymore,
I don't think. But people who write shorthand
can write very swiftly. And this word, this term here,
my tongue is the pen of a ready writer. Again, according to John
Gill, it's speaking about the velocity of his pen. It means that he can write faster
than a man can speak. because that skill was necessary
to be a scribe. And so he's a ready writer. He's
capable of very swiftly capturing and conveying in concise terms,
and yet all comprehensive terms, the message that God has laid
on his heart. And that's the gift I want to
benefit from. This writer has the ability to
swiftly write out what God has placed on his heart. And notice
what it is. My heart is indicting a good
matter. The word indicting, according
to the Blue Letter Bible, online Bible, it means a bubbling up,
a bubbling over like a boiling pot, continuously moving, fluttering
like a bird in flight, a continuous motion from a fountain or spring. And so you can see that the Spirit
of God is is inspiring the writer of this psalm with the greatest
and most compelling message. And that message is the things
touching the king. And so he's he's very actively
excited and and moved to speak these things to us here. The
king is exalted because of his victory over his enemies and
because he's fulfilled the will of God and he married a wife
and he's done it all in love for her. So we see that here,
the things touching the king. Verse two. He says. I'm sorry, still in verse one.
The things I have made touching the king. Alright, so now we
know this is talking about the king, right? The king. Christ
is the king. It says so here in verse one.
And he is God, as it says in verse six. Thy throne, O God. The Father said to him, Thy throne
to the Son. Thy throne, O God. The Son of
God is God." And this verse proves that fact. I remember mentioning
this verse to a Jehovah's Witness who came to my door. Of course,
they hem and haw and they try to explain it away. It's just
an exclamation of the Son as a God or something like that.
And so they deny scripture in their attempt to explain away
that Jesus is himself God. Because they deny the fact that
there is but one God. and Jesus Christ is that God.
So he says here, he's king, verse 1, he is God, verse 6, and notice
in verse 11, he says to the church, so shall the king greatly desire
thy beauty for he is thy Lord. So he's sovereign, sovereign
over his people. And he also, according to verse
7, he loves righteousness, he hates iniquity, and in verse
7 also, God has anointed him with the oil of gladness above
his fellows. And we know that that anointing
is the Spirit of God. He had the Spirit of God without
measure. John 3, verse 34, God gave him
the Spirit of God without measure. And so, if you pile all these
things up, it's describing what the New Testament has unfolded
to us, that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, God Himself. He's the King anointed. He's
the one who loved righteousness and hates iniquity. And He's
the creator of all. So all these things are given
to describe the Lord Jesus Christ. And this is the one this psalm
is written about. I want you to think about this
now. I'm kind of jumping ahead here because in verse seven I
mentioned this. Thou lovest righteousness and
hates wickedness. Think about this. The Lord Jesus
Christ in his character, both as God and man, loved righteousness
and hated iniquity. All right. So then we know that
whatever he did was righteous and we know that whatever he
did was because he hated iniquity. So whatever he said, all of his
miracles, the will of God that he came to do that was on his
heart, all of it was according to perfect righteousness. And
what was that work? Why did he come? Well, it says
in Galatians that he was born of a woman made under the law
in order to redeem them who were under the law. He came to redeem
his people from the curse of the law. But that very act of
his was an act of righteousness. And it was an expression of God's
own righteousness. It was in fact the fulfillment
of God's righteousness because it was the work of God which
he did. So the salvation of sinners is
a righteous work. Isn't that wonderful? Isn't it
wonderful to think that in saving sinners, Christ, at the same
time as in order to save them, he loved righteousness and hated
iniquity? Remember what he told the Pharisees,
go learn what this means. I will have mercy and not sacrifice,
for I am not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance."
And that call, that work, that objective and aim of Christ was
loving an expression of his heart that loved righteousness and
hated iniquity. He loved his people, his church. He gave himself for them, all
in righteousness, And he perfected them. He made them holy by his
own blood. He sprinkled them, washed them
from their sins, and he washed them with the water of the word
so that he might have them a glorious church without spot or wrinkle
or any such thing. Now, these things are phenomenal
to think about. The Lord Jesus Christ in his
glory reigning in the admiration of his people, being recommended
to them by the Spirit of God through the pen of David here
in this psalm because of his greatness in his saving work
and in his resulting reign because of that work. All right. Look
at verse two now. He says, Thou art fairer than
the children of men. Grace. is poured into thy lips. Therefore, God has blessed thee
forever. Now, I want you to think about
these two things here. First of all, thou art fairer
than the children of men. Fairer than the children of men.
Now, we know from Colossians 1, verse 18, that in all things,
Christ must have the preeminence. He must. And even though he came
and took on a body according to the will of God to save his
people from their sins, and he was in that body, he is a man,
he has the body of a man, he has the soul of a man, and this
is both man and God and one person, yet, Because of who He is, He
is fairer than all the children of men. We think about people
sometimes, I heard Todd Nybert mention this, he said, we use
this word Christ-like sometimes, you've heard that in religion.
And even though we are conformed, this is God's will, His purpose
to conform us to the image of His Son, and when we see Him,
we shall be like Him, or we shall see Him as He is, yet, In this
life, as we look upon one another, I don't think it's correct for
us to use those kinds of terms, Christ-like, because we're really
saying that by our own view of another person, we see things
like Christ. But it borders on a dangerous
area here because, first of all, we're so biased in our views
of things. If someone is pleasant to us,
if they have a sweet personality, we are quick to assign those
kinds of qualities to them. Or if they're kind of solemn
and not cheerful and those kinds of things, maybe we're put off
by them. But our judgment is so poor and so tainted by sin
that we really aren't equipped to see those things that really
are characteristics of the Lord Jesus Christ. It says in the
scriptures in Isaiah 53, for example, there's no beauty that
we should desire Him. When we look upon the Lord Jesus
Christ, there was nothing in Him. He came into the world and
the world was made by Him and the world knew Him not. In His
own, the Jews, He came to His own and they received Him not.
So there was nothing about Him that the natural man could see
that was Christ, the Son of God. In fact, what they saw in him
turned them off. They didn't like him. Just like
it says in Romans chapter one, they did not like to retain God
in their knowledge. But here we see clearly that
the Lord Jesus Christ is fairer. He is fairer to God than all
the children of men. And there's no comparison of
him to us. He is God and he says in scripture,
to whom can you liken me? I'm not like any other God. And
that includes all people too. So the Lord Jesus Christ is unique
in his beauty. He is unique in his beauty. He
is, what does it say? He's the lily of the valley,
the rose of Sharon. He's lovely. He's altogether
lovely. And that description applies
to Him alone. And so, fairer than the children
of men is a very good description of our Savior. We should love
Christ. We should seek to see Him. We should praise Him alone. And
all believers, when they're properly taught of God, loathe themselves. They don't want any attention
brought to themselves. They want all glory given to
the Lord Jesus Christ. And John the Baptist said that.
He says, I must decrease and he must increase. He wanted all
attention given to Him. Paul the Apostle said, you know
that I determined not to know anything among you save Jesus
Christ and Him crucified. I was among you in weakness because
he wanted to make sure that those he preached to heard of Christ
and Him alone. So this really applies to him. Thou art fairer than the children
of men. But notice the next words here
in verse two. Grace is poured into thy lips. And I like that. I like that word grace, don't
you? Grace is poured into thy lips. Who poured it in? Well,
this is really you have to understand this is speaking about the son
of God. He doesn't change. Nothing is added to him. So in
that sense, grace wouldn't be poured into his lips. It's a
way of speaking of grace that comes from him. Except as the
mediator, as God and man, God speaks of him as being anointed
by the Spirit of God and given grace, given these things. And so, here when we see grace
is poured into thy lips, he's really speaking about God's purpose
to speak in His Son to His people through the Spirit of God of
His grace. You see, Christ is the message. He is the message. And the message
from God to His people by the Spirit of God is grace. Grace, not your works, Christ's
work. Look at Luke chapter 4. You can
see that that's the case in Luke chapter 4 and verse 18. I'll read from Luke 4 18. He says, This is the Lord Jesus. He stood up. He was in the tabernacle,
not the tabernacle, but the, what's it called, the synagogue.
The synagogue, he picked up the book, the scroll of scripture
to read it, and he said this, he found the place in Isaiah,
and he said this, the spirit of the Lord is upon me. Notice, the spirit, verse 18,
Luke 4, 18, the spirit of the Lord is upon me. All right, there we have the
picture. That's painted for us in Psalm 45. He was anointed. with oil of gladness above his
fellows. The Spirit of the Lord is upon
me. Grace is poured into thy lips. The Spirit of the Lord is upon
me. What's his message? Notice verse
18. Because he has anointed me, the
Spirit of the Lord has anointed me to do what? To preach the
gospel. To the poor he has sent me to
heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives,
recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty to them that
are bruised, and to preach the year of jubilee, the acceptable
year of the Lord. And then it says, he closed the
book, he gave it again to the minister and sat down and the
eyes of all them that were in the synagogue were fastened on
him. And he began to say to them,
this day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears. And all bear him
witness and wondered at the grace, the gracious words which proceeded
out of his mouth. There you have it, the Spirit
of God pouring grace out to sinners in their hearing from the mouth
of the Lord Jesus Christ. Didn't Jesus say that the words
that I speak to you are spirit and they are life, spirit and
life? The words that I speak, the words
of grace. Remember what he said to the
man who had palsy, carried by four and let down through the
roof? What did he say to him? He spoke grace. He said, Son,
thy sins be forgiven thee. Talk about grace. Remember what
he said to the woman? Taken in adultery in the very
act and set before all the onlookers there in an attempt to set Christ
against Moses and overthrow his words in the ears of the people.
And he silenced them. He so silenced them. And he spoke
to her words of grace. He said, Where are your accusers? She said, no man, Lord. And he
said, neither do I condemn thee. That's words of grace, isn't
it? Oh, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. You know the grace
of our Lord Jesus Christ. Though He was rich, yet for your
sakes He became poor, that you through His poverty might be
rich. This is grace, isn't it? Grace
is given to us by Him. I love this words of the Lord
Jesus spoken here about by the Spirit of God. It's about Him,
verse 2. There were fairer He's unique
among all men. He alone loves righteousness,
hates iniquity. He alone is altogether lovely. And God says, Grace is poured
into thy lips. God has given his own message
to his people in his son. And by the Spirit of God, he
speaks out the gospel, the words of grace. The gospel is called
the gospel of the grace. of God, the gospel of the grace
of the Lord Jesus Christ, the gospel of grace. And notice he
says, God, therefore, God has blessed thee forever. He is equipped,
he alone was equipped to speak of the grace of God because he
actually fulfilled all that was necessary in order for the abundance
of God's grace to flow upon his people like a river. all through
His shed blood. Isn't it wonderful? It's just
wonderful to think about these things spoken here of the Lord
Jesus Christ, the King on His throne, exalted by the Father,
because He did the Father's will, and that will was a righteous
will, hating wickedness, saving His people by the offering of
Himself, cleansing them from their own sins, making them white
as the lily of the field. even as the Lord Jesus Christ
himself is the lily of the valley, the rose of Sharon. And all these
things are spoken in such flowery terms because the one speaking
here is moved by the Spirit of God out of his heart, bubbling
over, fluttering about like a bird, boiling up continuously. And
the subject is always Christ and his love for his people.
What an amazing gospel we have, isn't it? In fact, we're taken
up by this. And if you just read it on the
surface, you hear it extolling and exalting a king and talking
about a queen and the daughter of the king, daughters of the
king and so on. And you kind of get lost in the
It's so far beyond me. What about me? What does this
psalm have anything to do with me? But here when we see it as
Christ exalted, having done the will of God to save his people,
we see it's all about God's message concerning him to sinners, to
his people. And that's why this song is called
A Psalm of Love. about him who is the lily of
the valley. I'm going to pause there tonight. We'll continue
this next week so that we don't get overburdened with the details
here and have time to spend on these other verses. Let's pray.
Father, thank you for such a gift of the Lord Jesus Christ and
even your own words spoken from heaven through the Spirit of
God here in this psalm and also audibly heard by disciples and
the people concerning him. This is my beloved Son in whom
I am well pleased. And here the Spirit of God recommends
him to sinners as the one who is exalted because he accomplished
their salvation and clothed them in his own pure righteousness,
washed them in his blood, made them whiter than snow, And we're
so thankful for this psalm. Help us, Lord. We are inclined
with the psalmist to enter into the joy and gladness of this
psalm. And we feel our hearts compelled
to love him for having saved us from our sins and provided
all for us out of his own riches of grace, having humbled himself
and done all for his people, to his glory and for our salvation. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.